Introduction to the Sermon on the Tongue
A very good morning. Once again, thank you for joining us in our journey through the Book of James. We come to James 3:1-12 today. Last year I was travelling with my parents and my family to Hong Kong. And when you go to Hong Kong, one of the highlights must be the cuisine, must be the food. So we went to different places to try good food and one of the most memorable dishes I’ve had in Hong Kong was in this dai pai dong (Cantonese for open-air food stalls) stall, which is a roadside, kind of a hawker stall. It looks something like this. People queue up, people sit along that pathway and it was a delicious bowl of beef noodles I had. I mean the broth was beefy, was robust, but the highlight for me must be the beef slices. And this is a very special kind of beef slice. Anybody knows what this is? Wah! Who said it? Jing jing, wow you’re a foodie, huh? This is the beef… tongue! This is a wonderful cut of beef. It has its texture but it’s not hard at all, it’s succulent, it’s got a good bite, it’s beefy, it’s delicious. I would have had more but you know the stall owner is quite quirky. You cannot order it with just the beef, you must have the noodles as well, so bo bian (Hokkien for no choice), can’t eat so much. But it was delicious. I loved it. And if I were to go back to Hong Kong again, I’ll definitely go to this stall.

Well interestingly, recently, on my Facebook ad––you know they send you advertisements once in a while? And there’s this Facebook ad about beef tongue omakase. So the whole meal is centred around the beef tongue. Good news is you still can catch it today, April 27, this is the last day. You will probably be able to rush in if you want to. But what do they serve in this omakase beef tongue meal? Well you have beef tongue in different forms, different slices, different textures, different depth of flavour. You may have tataki, slightly charred, umami bomb they say. You may have the thick cut tongue steak, sounds fantastic. The problem again is that it closes today; it’s called “Tongue Tied with Flavour” and it has all kinds of style; beef tongue sashimi and so on. Big problem: $158++. So I’m definitely going to give this a miss.

Well, why do I talk so much about the beef tongue? Because today's sermon is on the tongue. James is going to tell us about the tongue, but not so much about how it tastes, but how you are to use it in speech.

The Destructive Power of the Tongue
So James 3 is well-known to be a passage about the tongue, about how we are to speak one with another. And it's very common when people look at James 3 to think that James is saying, “You need to control your tongue. You need to tame the tongue.” Or people look at this passage and say, “Oh, James tells us that the tongue is like a fire. So the tongue is very destructive. Whatever we say can hurt and harm a lot of people.” And we think that James is talking about either the difficulty of controlling the tongue or the destruction that the tongue brings. Now, both things are clearly mentioned in James 3, but if those are the two things you land on, ultimately, I think we missed the point.

Yes, let me say this again. James does talk about how hard it is to control the tongue. And James does talk about how destructive the tongue is, but that's not his main point. See, then what's his point? Well, the point is seen in a context. It's seen in the surrounding verses, because you must remember how we have come to this stage. In James 1:26, he says, “If anyone thinks he is religious and does not bridle or hold back or control his tongue, but deceives his heart, this person's religion is worthless.” See, James all along is talking about two kinds of people. A lot of people look at James and they think that James is someone who shoots in the dark. He hits or goes off in different directions. It's all random stuff, but I'm sure by now, you will know, as we have journeyed through James 1 and James 2, he is not someone who shoots off in different directions. He's very coherent.

He's talking about two kinds of people in the church, that when they go through trials, they have different responses. There's one who doubts God and is angry with God and wants to quit on God, and there is another one who will endure and remain steadfast. And he goes on to talk about how there are two kinds of people when it comes also to service to people. There's the kind who ignores the poor, and there's the kind who will love the poor. Then he talks now about speech, there's the kind who will spew cursings and at the same time praise God, and there is another who will not do so. So James has been trying to show very clearly to his readers: real religion is not just in what you say or profess yourself to be, but is seen in the way you serve and in the way you speak. True religion belongs to someone who is able to bridle his tongue. So James 1:26-27 gives us the three manifestations or marks of true religion. He says he will be someone who bridles his tongue, someone who visits the orphans and widows in their affliction, and someone who keeps himself unstained from the world. So Chapter 2 which is what we have covered past two weeks is really about visiting the orphans and widows in their affliction. Chapter 2, verses 1-12––don't show favoritism, don't just, if I may say, boot-lick the rich and ignore the poor, but serve all. Verse 13 onwards, we looked at how faith without works is dead. For you to say that you have faith, but you ignore the poor, you don't really have that real kind of faith. So that's what James 2 was all about.

Today, we switch gears to James 3, and James is going to talk about the tongue.  Bridling the tongue belongs to someone who has true religion. This bridling idea is repeated in 3:2, “If anyone does not stumble in what he says”––implication, bridling his tongue––“he is a perfect man, able also to bridle his whole body.” So what is James 3:1-12 about? Well, it does talk about taming the tongue. It does talk about the destruction of the tongue. But most of all, the purpose why he wrote this passage is that the tongue reveals who you really are. That's his real point. Don't miss it. So this is a tongue test. Your tongue reveals who you really are. Do you have true or false religion?

What I've said in the past five minutes is probably the most important part of the sermon. The rest, I think, supports this main idea. So what's the main idea about this passage? It is not so much about how you control your tongue. It is not so much about how destructive it is, but that his readers would know for themselves: are they of the true or false religion based on their speech pattern in life? So a true Christian is not just someone who says he's a Christian. It's going to be seen, discerned in the way he speaks as well. Okay with that, let's dive into the text. I think it's a short sermon today. I hope. First sermon so I do not know, I can tell that more accurately in the second and third services.

The Role of Teachers and the Difficulty of Controlling the Tongue
James starts this passage with a caution. He says, “Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers, for you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness.” So James says, many of you, not many of you should become teachers. The implication is that there are many who want to become teachers. I suppose people who teach in the church are esteemed in those days, certainly the Jewish rabbis were esteemed people; you can read that in the Gospels. It is also said that during those days, only about 10% of people can read or are literate. So a teacher is someone very valued, because you can't read for yourself, you can't learn by yourself. You need someone, some guru, to help you. So teachers are esteemed in those days. And certainly, whilst every spiritual gift is important and every spiritual gift is given intentionally by the Spirit of God, there is nonetheless a prominence given to word gifts. For example, in Ephesians 4, how God gave to the church apostles, prophets, evangelists, shepherds, teachers and so on. So it is not a surprise that in a gathered community, there are those who say, “I want to be a teacher.”

But James says, “Not many of you should become teachers.” Don't have this crazy zeal to be a teacher just for the sake of it, because he warns, “You know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness.” I think that's very, very reasonable that those who teach are to be held more accountable and responsible for what they teach and more culpable if they should sin or make mistakes and not practice what they preach. We all understand that, and I think that's a very reasonable thing for James to say. He takes this caution to now be a jump-off point to talk about the tongue or the speech.

So we go secondly to the control. He says, “For we all stumble in many ways.” The reason why not many of you should become teachers is because we will be judged with greater strictness, and that's a problem because…because… for we all stumble in many ways, in particular in how we use our tongue. That's his point. It's not easy to be a teacher, because it's easy to make mistakes. It's easy to say the wrong things, and therefore you are more likely to be held to judgment with greater strictness. So James says, “For we all stumble.” We all make mistakes. That's the word there, in many ways, there's nobody who is perfect, and if anyone does not stumble, if there is anyone who doesn't make mistakes in what he says, then he is a perfect man. And we know there's nobody perfect… also able to bridle his whole body. So the tongue is so hard to control that James says, “If you can really control it, you can control everything already.” You win already, lor. I guess that's how he would say it in Singaporean language.

He now gives two examples. James is a very good teacher, because he's filled with examples. He gives very-easy-to-understand examples. So one example is about the horse with the bit and the bridle. The bit is something that you put in the mouth of the horse for you to control the horse. He talks about the horse, and he says, “If we put bits into the mouths of horses so that they obey us, we guide their whole bodies as well.” I think the idea is clear: if you can control the mouth of the horse, you can control the whole horse. So he's saying, “If you can really control your tongue, you can control your whole life.” Simple. If you don't get it, he gives you another example about ships and rudders. He says, “Look at the ships, oh-so-big ships, tankers, though they are so large and are driven by strong winds, they are guided by a very small rudder wherever the will of the pilot directs.” So if you are able to control the rudder, you can control the ship. You can control this small tongue, you can control your whole life. That's what he's saying: “If anyone does not stumble in what he says, he's a perfect man, able also to bridle his whole body.”

So if you put the two illustrations in, what he says is pictured as the bit in a horse's mouth, or the rudder on the ship, and the whole body is pictured as the huge horse or the huge ship. But don't miss the point. The point is, if you can control your tongue, you can control your whole body. The problem is right at the beginning, we all stumble in many ways. The problem is none of us can really do it. So James is saying no man can control the tongue. That's his main point in verses 2-4: no man can control the tongue. Because if we can control the tongue, we are perfect. But the fact is we can't, and so we have to be cautious about being teachers, because the tongue is impossible to control.

When you go overseas and you drive along the ocean road, along the cliff, which I've done a few times, it is quite scary, you know? Because as you drive along these roads, one miscalculation and you are in deep trouble. Yesterday, I was with my neighbour for a meal, and he was talking about how he was climbing some mountain, and he actually slipped and fell off the cliff, but thankfully, he was helped by some bushes down there. I mean, one misstep and you will maybe lose your life. So when it's hard to control, you’d better be very careful. You slow down. And so I think James is saying the tongue is very difficult to control. Be cautious. Not all of you, not many of you, should become teachers, because you'll be held to a greater strictness.

The Consequences of Uncontrolled Speech
Let's roll on, because James now goes to number three: the consequences of the tongue. Now the tongue is very difficult to control, so not many of you should become teachers. But another problem is that when used wrongly, the tongue inflicts great damages. He says, “So also the tongue is a small member”––very small organ––“but yet it boasts of great things”. In a sense, right now in (verse) 5a, boasting of great things talks about the great impact of the tongue. It can be for good or for bad. It can be for good because James, later on, will talk about how the tongue can be used to bring forth blessings to God. It can be like a life-giving spring of water. So the tongue is very, very useful, but the tongue can also be very, very destructive. So right now it seems to be neutral, and maybe Proverbs, as we say, James dives deep into Proverbs, dives deep into the Sermon on the Mount. It's a wisdom literature book, and we can be reminded of how Proverbs say, “Death and life are in the power of the tongue.” Your speech can be very-life giving. You can be a wonderful encourager to people. You can give a lot of, I guess, positivity and support and warmth to the lives of people around you, or your tongue can suck life out of people. You know how it is, right? Maybe downstairs, as we eat, there are some people you like to go to and talk with because their tongue use very well, one. Give life. And there are those you want to avoid because their tongue sucks life like vampire: “Wow, talking to him or her drains me.” Well, death and life are in the power of the tongue.

But after this, James is going to talk about, predominantly, the negative effects of the tongue. He likens the tongue to be like a fire. He says, “How great a forest is set ablaze by such a small fire.” Now, when we think about this, we think about Southeast Asia forest fires. But I'm sure you know, James is not thinking about Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia. He's thinking about Middle East, and they have bush fires. Nonetheless, he understands that a little spark ignited in the deserts can cause a great fire in that space. And so we are reminded again of Proverbs: “A worthless man plots evil, and his speech is like a scorching fire.” Or in Proverbs 26: “For lack of wood the fire goes out, and where there is no whisperer, quarrelling ceases.” So the tale bearer, the slanderer, he's like someone who spreads that wildfire: death and life are in the power of the tongue. So he uses a simile––the tongue is like a small fire.

But now he goes straight to a metaphor. He goes straight to say, “The tongue is a fire.” And it burns things up––“It is a world of unrighteousness.” So we know now James is not literally talking about physical fire, but spiritual ones, destruction because of sin, because of unrighteousness. He goes on to say, “The tongue is set among our members, staining the whole body.” And we are reminded again of Matthew 15: “...what comes out of the mouth; this defiles a person.” So the tongue can result in the staining of the whole life.

“Setting on fire the entire course of life, and set on fire by hell” Well, maybe this is a little bit of a detour. The word “hell” refers to a place southwest of Jerusalem. It's a literal place, by the way. First of all, the word “hell” is gehenna. It refers to the Valley of Hinnom, southwest of Jerusalem. It was used as a garbage dump, a bit like Pulau Semakau in Singapore. You know where is Pulau Semakau? It's our refuse dump of Singapore. All the garbage is brought there to be burnt and so on. It is a landfill area. So it is like the Pulau Semakau of those days; it's used as a refuse dump, because prior to that, it was the place where the people of Israel offered their babies, their children, to the bull god, Molech, as child sacrifices. So it's a place where there's always burning. It's the incineration plant of Israel, and that's where the worms crawl, and that's why you have the description, “the worm dies.” So this place, Gehenna, the valley of Hinnom, is then seen as a representation of the place of eternal torment. That's where Satan will be judged, where the demons will be judged, and where unrepentant people will be judged. And so, James says, “This tongue is a fire”, but not a physical fire. It's a spiritual one, where sinners will be judged, where sinners are like Satan.

He swings back to the control of the tongue when he says, “For every kind of beast and bird, of reptile and sea creature…”. Now this is Genesis language––Genesis 1 talking about the various categories of creatures that will be under the dominion of man. So he refers back to that kind of language, saying, “Actually, all kinds of creatures can be tamed, and has been tamed by men.” And you think about people like Steve Irwin, right? He is able to have fun with animals. You watch videos of people, maybe controlling the snake or the crocodile or the elephant or the tiger or the lion. Every kind of animal man has tamed and can be tamed. Man has tamed a lot of things. Man has harnessed a lot of things. Harnessed the power of great floods, harnessed even the power of atoms, but the tongue no man can tame. Amazing, isn't it? We can tame everything, but not the tongue.

And James goes on to say, “...it is a restless evil full of deadly poison.” When you go to different countries, you have to go through security checks, isn't it? And they scan your body, they look for metal parts, in case you bring some bombs or guns and so on. I still remember when we were travelling, we bought some toys, a toy gun, plastic toy gun. But we didn't check it into the luggage. It was in a hand carry, and they checked it, and they did not allow us to bring the toy gun back. I mean, it was for my son, of course. But there is a weapon that is allowed into every country on a daily basis that nobody checks. Where's the weapon? [Pastor Jason points to tongue] This is the weapon. It is full of deadly poison. It is destructive. But every country, everywhere, allows for it to come in. So someone said, “The most dangerous animal known to man lives in a den made of ivory right behind your teeth and my teeth.” The tongue. The tongue has disastrous consequences when it is not used rightly. Death comes along with it.

Number four, James now talks about a certain contradiction. He says, “With it we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse people who are made in the likeness of God.” So notice what James is trying to do. With this same tongue, you bless God, but actually, with this same tongue, you are also cursing God. Why? Because you curse people who are made in the image of God. How did you come to church this morning? Or maybe I'll ask you, how will you go back from church this morning? Maybe on the way here, you scold your children, you scold your wife, you scold your husband, “Eh, you're stupid, ah! Eh ni3 qu4 si3 ba4 !(Chinese for “go and die”)” You curse, curse, curse, and then you come to church and you say, “Hallelujah, oh bless the Lord.” Or maybe after you have sung, “Oh, bless the Lord”, on your way back, you start swearing at your family again. Or you swear at the other car drivers, the other drivers on the road.

James says this is the thing about us. There's a contradiction here. With this same tongue, you bless God and you curse people: “From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers, these things ought not to be.” So there's a certain contradiction. If you say that you love God, you believe God, and you want to serve God, but you curse people who are made in the image of God. To help us understand this better, James, again, like a good teacher, gives you an illustration about a spring, about fruit trees and about a salt pond. So he says, “Does a spring pour forth from the same opening both fresh and salt water?” By the way, the word “salt” here is really not salt. It's the word “pikros”, which means bitter. So does one spring give two kinds of water? Answer? No, one spring, one kind of water. His point is one heart, one kind of speech. It doesn't make sense for someone who has one heart to give two kinds of speech.

He's getting somewhere there. Again, he says, “Can a fig tree, my brothers, bear olives or a grapevine produce figs?” Can… This isn't Middle East, ah. Can our chili plant give you orange? Cannot, lah, chili plant cannot give you orange, what. That's his point! Christian heart, Christian language, lah. Sinful heart, sinful language. It cannot be both, right? It cannot be both. And you will know the kind of tree from the kind of fruit you bear with your lips. That's his point, you see.

“Neither can a salt pond yield fresh water.” If it is fresh water, then it is not a salt pond. It's a freshwater pond. So the contradiction here is you cannot have both at the same time. The man of God cannot have this doubleness of speech. That's his idea. Blessing God and cursing God's image bearers. So James is saying your speech, or your tongue, will reveal who you really are. If your pattern of speech is always cursing, and maybe it's very important in this season––election time––we have to watch what we say, because when you're all caught up in those passions, you start to curse this person, curse that party, curse this government, curse that and you really have to ask yourself, “Uh… Does the man of God have such kind of language?” Now I'm certain James is not talking about sinless perfection, but he's talking about the consistent pattern of speech.

The Tongue as a Revealer of True Religion
As you know, I used to do medicine. And when you go to see a doctor, what does the doctor usually do? GP, all right, when you see a GP, what does he usually do? “I've cough, doctor. I got runny nose.” He will take your temperature and so but one thing he will always do. At least, I remember that when I was a kid––I've not seen the doctor for a long, long time––I'm not sure if they still do it, but when you see a doctor, what do they ask you to do? Today's sermon is about the tongue. So it's always tongue, lah. Won't get too far. Always ask you to stick out your tongue. Actually, why do they ask you to stick out the tongue? Do you know why or not? When you have a cough, flu, runny nose, they always ask you to stick out your tongue. Why? Check for infection? How to check? There's a word “infection” there? No, no, no. Actually, I think ah, you may disqualify me from being a doctor, but when you see a doctor for cough, flu, runny nose, and he asks you to stick out the tongue, he's not really looking at your tongue. He's looking at the back of the throat, whether there's any redness, all right? But let's assume he's a very good doctor. He sees everything, not just the back of the tongue, but your tongue also. If you don't already know, we can tell a lot from the tongue. Wow, li4 hai4 hor (Chinese for “very smart, right?”)? That's why I studied five years: memorise each tongue, what pattern, what normal tongue, what white coated tongue, geographic tongue, yellow color, cracked tongue, wavy tongue, strawberry tongue, every kind of tongue has some kind of implication. I wonder the beef tongue I ate got any kind of this pattern or not? Maybe more tasty when it's swollen. (laughs) I don't know. Well, in real life, it may look like this. A healthy tongue, you check, check, check, check, does yours look like this? A smooth tongue may have vitamin deficiency. A strawberry tongue may be allergy. You may have all kinds of sores, broken skin and so on or surface. Yellow tongue not brushing enough, haha, but it can also signify a real disease. White tongue may be fungal infection. So the tongue can tell you a lot. Even the color of the tongue can tell you a lot.

So James is saying, “I want you to stick out your tongue, because the tongue reveals who you really are.” His point is not how hard it is to control the tongue. His point is not how destructive the tongue is, but his point is that the tongue reveals whether you have true or false religion, because, again, in James 1:26, your religion is the empty, worthless, fake kind if your speech is always about cursing, it's always about blaming someone, slandering someone, talking bad about someone, scolding someone. Are you a cantankerous person? Are you someone who is always attacking? James says, “My brethren, it should not be like this. A spring cannot give forth fresh and bitter water.” A chili plant cannot give chili and orange. You know who you really are from your speech pattern, so don't deceive your heart. If anybody does not bridle his tongue, but you deceive yourself, your religion is worthless. You may be a church-goer, but you are not a Christ follower.

Pure speech points to the reality that you have a pure heart. Sinful speech points to the reality that you have a sinful heart. So it makes sense that it is a sinful heart that gives you sinful speech, and it is a pure heart, a good spring, that gives pure speech, or good water. And this is actually very common sense after a while. For Jesus Himself said, “You brood of vipers. How can you speak good when you're evil?” He says, “There's no way anything good is going to come out of your mouth, because I know your heart, you’re vipers, your heart is not good.” Elsewhere in Matthew 12, or Luke 6, Jesus says, “The good person out of the good treasure of his heart produces good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure produces evil, for out of the abundance of the heart, his mouth speaks.” This is what James is talking about. Your tongue reveals your heart. Now that's all James says.

So I have four points from James and 12 verses there. He kind of leaves us reeling in pain. Oh, just to see how difficult it is to control the tongue, how destructive the tongue is, and how actually it reveals who you really are. But he doesn't give a solution. I think we need to honour where he goes and just say, James, in this passage, wants us to diagnose for ourselves who we really are. But as the pastor of this church, I also feel that maybe I can add a bit more. I'm not saying I'm adding to the Bible. I'm just saying from the rest of the Bible, I want to end off with a positive note, if I can, about a cure. How can I cure myself from bad speech? My mom has a formula. My mom has a plan. When I was growing up, whenever I say something bad or say…why you all laugh? You all doubt my mother, is it? Think she's stupid is it or what? Whenever I say something bad, my mom will say? Hey, y'all don't say that anymore, ah? What do your parents say when you say something bad or say something foul? Parents say, “Go wash your mouth with soap.” Isn't that what you are told? I mean, that's what I was told. But you know that never really worked, because I would just laugh at it. That's so stupid, I would think, but I’d just do it, lah. You cannot change your mouth, you cannot change your lips, you cannot change your tongue just by washing because the real issue is not the tongue. Remember what Jesus said, “Out of the abundance of heart”. The problem with the tongue is not the tongue. The problem with the tongue is that it is so connected to the heart, and that is the source of the issue.

Now, David understood this. David said in Psalm 141, “Set a guard, O Lord, over my mouth. Keep watch over the door of my lips. Do not let my heart incline to any evil.” Without going into too many technicalities, I just want to say James understands this. No human being can tame the tongue. But I think the implication is that God can, because God is the only One who can give you a new heart. You know, the marvellous thing about the Christian message is this: it is not that you can change yourself. Every other religion is saying, “You change yourself. Do better, help the poor, control your speech and thereby earn your way to God.” But the Bible is saying you cannot do that, and you need not do that, because the God of the Bible is so good that when you are sinful and unable to save yourself, He graciously says to you, “It's all right, because I will give you a new heart. I will give you a totally new operating system, if only you will humble yourself, acknowledge your sin and helplessness and believe in My Son, Jesus Christ.” And in Ezekiel, in Jeremiah, in passages in the Old Testament, God talks about giving His people a new heart, and with that new heart, you can then have a new speech. Not only that, as you humble yourself and come to Jesus, He cleanses you from all your sin. This is the marvellous message of the Bible. We call this the gospel, the good news, not that it is for good people, but it's good news for bad people. God will make us good through the sacrifice of His Son.

What if I don't come to God? What if I don't want Jesus? What if I want to continue in my sinful ways? What if I want to continue cursing all the days of my life? Can, lah, no problem, you can do it. Except remember, “I tell you, on the Day of Judgment, people will give account for every careless word they speak, for by your words, you will be justified, and by your words, you will be condemned.” Something you have to think about. You can live any way you want today, but remember, there will be a final day of reckoning. Every single thing, every careless word, every single thing, will be brought to bright judgment because God will judge you and I. The only way we can stand before God on the day of judgment is to know that Jesus paid for all my sins. I believe one day I'm going to stand before God, and I'm going to be justified, not because I'm a good man, not because I deserve it, but because Jesus died for me and all the silly things, harmful things I've said and done. I'm so grateful Jesus paid it all, and this is the good news I hope you will receive into your life as well. What kind of heart do you really have? Let's all come to God and ask Him for that right heart.

Let's pray. Father, thank You so much for this time we can hear Your word. Thank You for this sobering warning, because so many people today may live in false presumption, just because they were raised in a Christian home, just because they said a sinners’ prayer, just because someone else told them they must be a Christian. But thank You for James and his clarity in his book that a true man of God who possesses true religion will be evidenced in service, in speech and in sanctification. I pray that this message will be mercifully used to bring someone to Jesus today. And we ask that as followers of Jesus Christ, we will also be mindful that, by the help of Your Spirit, we would let our speech always be salted with grace. Help us to acknowledge our inability. Help us to believe that Your Spirit in us can live that righteous life, that if we walk by the Spirit, we will not fulfill the lust of the flesh. Let us cry out to You and let us just speak words of life into one another. So thank You today for this time we can study Your Word and we pray that You will sanctify Your people, You will save people today and through Your church, Your glories may be made manifest. Thank You. We pray all this in Jesus’ name. Amen.