The Telephone Game — Gossip vs. Praise - Wednesday
Today’s Verse
James 3:2
Indeed, we all make many mistakes. For if we could control our tongues, we would be perfect and could also control ourselves in every other way. (NLT)
The New Testament book of James is one of the first books of the Bible I ever studied. I’m grateful that someone guided me to this book first as it was my chance to learn quickly (even at an early age) how powerful and relevant Scripture is! In the first chapter, James focuses primarily on calling early Jewish followers of Jesus to be faithful in the midst of trials. And they faced many: outwardly in the form of criticism of their faith and inwardly through the temptation to sin. James reminded this audience that it is possible to overcome both kinds of trials. Then, in chapter two, James calls early Christians to not only endure challenges, but to always live in and live out the truth.
There’s no question that James received a lot of detailed feedback about churches around the region. We know this because he chose next to deal with a very specific issue causing significant problems in the church: the tongue. Again, here is an example of how human nature has essentially remained the same since the beginning of time. Words are powerful. They were then, and they are now. But today words can be transmitted to countless numbers of people in just milliseconds.
To foreshadow this teaching, James had already cautioned his readers to be “quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to get angry” (James 1:19). And he doubled down just a few sentences later by saying that if someone thinks they are faithful but can’t control their tongue, they’re fooling themselves.
Think about it: with our words, God has given us the ability to praise Him and lead others to Him. But with the same tongue, we can quickly destroy reputations or even the hearts of people. Even worse is the influence our words might have to cause some to spend an eternity without Christ.
REFLECTION
Colossians 4:6 tells us to bring out the best of others in our conversations. How can you use the power of your words to build someone up today?
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