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13.09.2009_James 3:1-12
| 12.09.2009, 22:03 | |
| Rev. Tatiana Cantarella Lectionary readings: Proverbs 1:20–33; Mark 8:27–38 September 13, 2009 James 3:1–12 and Psalm 19 One of the chief differences between human beings and others of God’s creatures is that we humans can speak. I realize that dolphins and chimpanzees also seem to have a form of sound communication, but to our knowledge it has little correspondence to what we humans can do with our tongues. I realize also that some humans cannot speak, but the signs they use are substitutes for the same mental images that words symbolize. Only a human being out of all creation is given the power of the word. This power is an important expression of God’s image in us. By the power of His word God created the universe and all that is in it. When God said, "Let there be..." there was! It is the Word become flesh that brought us salvation. The author of the letter to the Hebrews says, The Word of God is living and powerful -- it is sharper than any two edged sword." [Heb. 4:12] By His word God blesses a person and totally transforms life. Having created a human beings God gave them the power of words, the power to create and bless, reflecting His image. There is a saying in English: “Sticks and stones may break my bones but words can never harm me”. These words are often spoken by youngsters to ward off the taunts of their peers or by their parents who hope to protect their children from the harm done by human speech. There are similar sayings in the Russian language as well: “Can’t kill a man with a word.” But the existence of such sayings is their own contradiction, the proof of the opposite: “Word is not a weapon, but people perish from it”. “Be afraid not of the knife but of the word” (implying that words are often more harmful than physical wounds). We all know the power words have: the power to heal and the power to kill. This God’s gift of words and speaking has become a mixed blessing or if you will “a blessing and a curse”. Most of our figures of speech about speech, for example, are negative. “Mind your tongue!” “Keep your mouth shut!” “Button your lip!” “Motor mouth!” Even the phrase “silence is gold” puts down speech. But why, why don’t we say, “Words are gold” when they are a gift from God and the Scripture says: “like apples of gold in setting of silver is a word spoken in right circumstances” (Proverbs 25:11). Our experience teaches us very well how controversial human being is: combining in himself something of a monster and something of an angel, something of a hero and something of a coward, something of the holy and something of the sinful… James is certain that this controversy is seen more vividly in human speech. He says that with one’s tongue, a person blesses God. James lived in Jerusalem, in the center of Jewish worship where constant blessing of God was very important for Jews. When the name of God was mentioned, a Jew was to say: “Blessed is He!” A pious Jew was to repeat daily the 18 prayers; each one started with the words “Blessed be, o, God”. Jews constantly blessed God; yet, they also with their own mouths cursed, judged and ill spoke of their own people. James saw how unnatural it was. As unnatural as it is for a stream to bear simultaneously sweet and salty water or for one tree to bear two different kinds of fruit. But as unnatural and sad it was blessing God and ill speaking of people at the same time was reality also among the followers of Christ. Peter could say: “even if I am to die with You, I would never deny You” (Mt 26:35), but the same mouth he denied Jesus three times (Mt. 26:69–75). John who said: “children, let us love one another” (1 Jn. 4:7) also called out to have the fire sent from heaven to destroy a Samaritan village (Lk. 9:51-56). And from the mouths of Christ’s disciples unkind words were spoken. The problem is real also in the Church today. John Bunyan in his famous “Pilgrim’s Progress” spoke of a man whose name was Talkative as the one who is “best abroad but near he is ugly enough”. Many speak quite nicely with strangers and even preach love and kindness but at home, in their family they are irritable and impatient. We all know instances when one speaks highly during festivities and special occasions but during mundane word day yells at his workers; one day speaks piously, but the next day repeats questionable stories about people. Often, one speaks tenderheartedly among the brothers and sisters in faith, but then goes out and does much damage with his evil tongue. Or even speaks kindly to some brothers or sisters and right away harshly wounds other by his words, judgment or gossip. This is generally human problem, but James is especially concerned with those “good people” in the Church who would “never commit any other sin” but who thoughtlessly allow themselves to speak lightly of others, throwing weaknesses into relief, laughing about peculiarities and judging actions (of course with best intentions!) And without noticing the Golden Rule is broken: do unto others what you want them to do unto you. How grateful everyone is to the person who speaks well of him or her behind their back, who takes their part when they are not there to speak for themselves. We all are at the mercy of each other’s tongue. And the difficulty is both in saying the good thing at the right moment, to say what is building up, as well as to refrain from that which one shouldn’t say at all, what is destructive: gossip, exaggeration, putting others down, boasting, false teaching, complaining, lies, evil talk… But a cutting truth of James to us today is this: we all know, what is good, we all know what we want others to speak about us and with us, but again and again we speak otherwise, compromising our faith. In James 1:26 he says, “If anyone thinks himself to be religious, and yet does not bridle his tongue but deceives his own heart, this man’s religion is worthless”. God gave us the gift of speaking, of word, so that we may join Him in creating in building up, but with that speech we times and again destroy. Most of us would be very good Christians if we only had to worry about our hands and feet, our ears and our eyes… But when it comes to our tongue: with one breath we manage to praise God and to curse a person created in the image of God. We understand that there is something wrong here, but what do we do? James, for our surprise, having faced us with our serious spiritual diagnosis does not give us a recipe for the cure of our tongue problem. He doesn’t tell us how to quench the fire or damaging words or how to control our temper. So, most often we read pessimistically about our reactions and words: no one can tame the power, which simultaneously praises God and curses its creatures. And honestly speaking, I cannot draw out for you three magical points from this text of how to control one’s speaking. But it is not by chance that James does not have a specific recipe ready for us, for he realizes what we need. We need, first of all, to realize the depth and the gravity of our problem, to think about what our words, our speech say about our faith. That’s why he compares the damage that we can do with our tongue with fire that destroys everything on its way and which is born in the hell itself. Idle words can cause irreparable damage, just like a thoughtlessly thrown match can cause a fire that destroys great things. Hateful and idle words are dangerous because of how fast they spread the damage and having been spoken cannot be stopped. A couple of words spoken in anger destroy friendships that took years to build. Words are like fire in that it can’t be controlled and the damage done cannot be reversed. The story is told of a man who lived in a highland village in Scotland. He passed along a story about another man for whom he did not care. The story, he thought to be true. When the story got around the village, it utterly destroyed the man. His family, his job and his integrity were all devastated by the rumor mill. He finally had to leave town -- a ruined and defeated man. The fellow who passed the story along discovered that the rumor was false. He had helped to destroy an innocent man with his tongue. He went to his pastor (whom they called "Dominie") and said, "Dominie, I have destroyed a man with my words" and he told his pastor the whole story. "Please Dominie," he said, "I am sorry -- can I be forgiven this sin?" The pastor told the man that this was not so simple and told him to take a bag of feathers and place one in the front yard of every house in the village. Although the fellow thought this to be a strange request for a pastor to make, he really wanted forgiveness, so he followed the instructions to the letter. At last he came back to the pastor and said, "Dominie, I have done all that you asked, may I now be forgiven?" "Not yet, my son," the pastor replied, "You must first retrace your steps and bring back to me every feather you placed in the village!" "But, Dominie -- I could never do that, the wind has carried the feathers away!" "Yes," the pastor said, "And in like manner have your careless words destroyed an innocent man!" That is why an Arabian proverb says: “of the unspoken word you are master – the spoken word is master of you”. Tongue is a very dangerous point and today it is so important for us to understand how much each one of us participates with one’s mouth in destruction rather than building up. Those who confess Jesus Christ as his or her Lord and seriously taking His call to reflect Him with our WHOLE life I ask to honestly answer (God is our witness here today) some questions related to our mouth. Have I even hurt someone with words that I spoke in anger? Have I ever said anything to put another person down? Have I even discussed another person behind their back, thinking that I do it good-naturedly? Have I ever mocked someone’s peculiarity? Have I ever spread information about someone, thinking that it was totally true? Have I ever said to someone what I then regretted saying? Have I ever been a source discussing another person, saying “can you imagine what such and such did?..” If we answered even one of these questions with “yes” (but most likely it was more than one and we’ve done that more than once…), then we participate in the sin that James alarms us about. The problem of most of us is in the fact that we don’t even realize how important the purity of our speech is, while Jesus says: “How can you, being evil, speak what is good? For the mouth speaks out of that which fills the heart. The good man brings out of his good treasure what is good; and the evil man brings out of his evil treasure what is evil. But I tell you that every careless word that people speak, they shall give an accounting for it in the Day of Judgment. For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned” (Mt. 12:34–37). Often we think: most important is that we believe and the rest: however it turns out… But what we speak is extremely important because it reflects the core of our heart and it affects all areas of our lives. Isaiah 50:4 says: “The Lord God has given Me the tongue of disciples, that I may know how to sustain the weary one with a word. He awakens Me morning by morning, He awakes My ear to listen as a disciple”. James doesn’t give us an answer, but he faces us with the need to realize how often we sin with our words, how the gift of God to speak words creatively we turn into the weapon of destruction… he calls us to realize that and to grieve that and repent. And God does give us an answer today, I think, in Psalm 19 where the author having spoken about the beauty of God’s law also realizes how often he disobeys it. He prays for forgiveness and asks for protection, lest he sin again. And at the end of the Psalm he entrusts, dedicates his mouth, his words and his thoughts to God’s care. The author of the Psalm prays: “Who can discern his errors? Acquit me of hidden faults. Also keep back Your servant from presumptuous sins; let them not rule over me; then I will be blameless, and I shall be acquitted of great transgression. Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Your sight, o Lord, my rock and my Redeemer”. That’s the only key to taming the tongue - to bring our lives more completely under the Lordship of Jesus Christ. If we allow God, He is able to tame our tongue, our speech, transforming our whole self from within sanctifying the gift of words so that we can speak building up and not destroying; healing and not wounding; uniting and not dividing; strengthening and not defeating. Lord, help us, cleanse us, transform us, rule in our hearts and in our mouths! | |
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