The Book of James – The Tongue James 3:1-6

Introduction

We are switching gears in this post. James finished his thought on faith and now covers a subject that has separated friends, ruined marriages, destroyed lives and even led nations into war.

The Tongue

James begins with a discourse on the potential destruction our words can inflict upon our fellow man.  You may already have someone in mind that “really needs to hear this”.  In truth we all need to hear it.  I listened to a speech given by a Supreme Court Justice.  In that speech I heard three words that really stuck with me…words have meaning.  I really took this to heart.  He is right, words do have meaning.  Most conflicts start with careless words spoken in haste or in anger.

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The Book of James – Exercising Control James 1:19-20

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Introduction

Our next verse starts with the word “wherefore”.  As you know that means the writer is concluding a thought so we need to look back at what has been said thus far so the concluding remarks make sense.

So what has been said?  This is our 6th lesson and the repeating theme has been patience.  We were first told to have patience during times of testing when God allows our path to get harder so we will learn to trust and depend on Him.  James then reminds us that if we will ask for wisdom, to know how to live godly, God will answer that prayer.  Next James tells us to be careful what we allow our minds to think about or dwell on.  All evil starts in the mind; we must guard our thoughts.  Finally, in our last post, we talked about times when Satan will tempt us to do evil.  In all these things James says to have patience.  Now James gives us practical ways to have patience.  It is one thing to say “Be patient”, we all agree we need to do that, but it is more helpful to say “Be patient and here is how to do it.”