James 3:2-5 “ For all of us make many mistakes. Anyone who makes no mistakes in speaking is perfect, able to keep the whole body in check with a bridle. If we put bits into the mouths of horses to make them obey us, we guide their whole bodies. Or look at ships: though they are so large that it takes strong winds to drive them, yet they are guided by a very small rudder wherever the will of the pilot directs. So also the tongue is a small member, yet it boasts of great exploits. How great a forest is set ablaze by a small fire!” This episode reminds us how important our words are. Music:"Adding the Sun" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Words Can Wound
James 3:2-5 “ For all of us make many mistakes. Anyone who makes no mistakes in speaking is perfect, able to keep the whole body in check with a bridle. If we put bits into the mouths of horses to make them obey us, we guide their whole bodies. Or look at ships: though they are so large that it takes strong winds to drive them, yet they are guided by a very small rudder wherever the will of the pilot directs. So also the tongue is a small member, yet it boasts of great exploits. How great a forest is set ablaze by a small fire!”
This verse is so good because it shows us how important our words are. The verse begins by telling us a very important thing many of us overlook. It says, “for all of us make many mistakes.” That in itself could be a whole episode. How many of us jump at someone for making a mistake? How many of us get really annoyed when they mess up our order at the restaurant, or ever worse at the coffee shop? Imagine you haven’t had your coffee yet in the morning and then you go to take a sip of the newly made coffee as you are driving away from Dunkin Donuts and there person at drive through messed up your order. How would you respond in a situation like this? I know a lot of people that would not respond well. I called the pharmacy to check on my prescription today and the guy said that he was not sure what happened but it never got ordered. He just placed the order and it can get here by tomorrow. He was nice and apologized and said he could call around to other local pharmacies if I needed it today. It is face wash, so I didn’t need it right away, but you could tell by his voice that he was surprised when I wasn’t angry with them. Anger seems to be the norm these days.
However, I wonder if that would change if we were to remember what it says in this verse. I wonder how we would act towards people when they made a mistake if the fact that we all make many mistakes was always at the forefront of our mind. I can get so upset with my husband for forgetting to do something I asked him to do and yet I sometimes forget to do what he asks me to do as well. I can be frustrated when someone forgets to call me back and yet I forget to call people back as well. Do you see where I am going with this? We all make mistakes and maybe remembering this will help us be more compassionate to others when they mess up?
The next line says, “Anyone who makes no mistakes in speaking is perfect, able to keep the whole body in check with a bridle.” This is an interesting sentence. If you are able to speak perfectly, you are able to keep your whole body in check. I love the two analogies it gives. The first one talks about how if we put a bit into the mouth of a horse we can guide their whole body. The second one is comparing us to a ship. It talks about how large ships are and how it takes strong winds to drive them, but yet a small rudder guides them. The verse is saying that our tongue is like this. We must be careful about what we say because our words can guide our whole body. There is a saying that my friend had up outside of her door at work and I have loved it since the moment I read it. I feel this is similar to what this verse is trying to tell us. The quote is from Lao Tzu and it says, “Watch your thoughts, they become your words; watch your words, they become your actions; watch your actions, they become your habits; watch your habits, they become your character; watch your character, it becomes your destiny.”
Sometimes we take our words lightly. We don’t pay a lot of attention to what we say because we all learned that nursery rhyme when we were kids and we believed it. You know the one I am talking about, “sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.” I think that came straight from the enemy, because it is a lie. Words can hurt people far more than sticks and stones ever could. I am not saying sticks and stones don’t hurt, however, your bruises usually heal. Some things we say to people can leave a scar on them forever. There is a story I heard a long time ago that explains how much words can hurt better than I can. I am not sure who wrote this original story.
“There once was a little boy who had a very bad temper. His father decided to hand him a bag of nails and said that every time the boy lost his temper, he had to hammer a nail into the fence. On the first day, the boy hammered 37 nails into that fence. The boy gradually began to control his temper over the next few weeks, and the number of nails he was hammering into the fence slowly decreased. He discovered it was easier to control his temper than to hammer those nails into the fence. Finally, the day came when the boy didn’t lose his temper at all. He told his father the news and the father suggested that the boy should now pull out a nail every day he kept his temper under control. The days passed and the young boy was finally able to tell his father that all the nails were gone. The father took his son by the hand and led him to the fence. ‘You have done well, my son, but look at the holes in the fence. The fence will never be the same. When you say things in anger, they leave a scar just like this one. You can put a knife in a man and draw it out. It won’t matter how many times you say I’m sorry, the wound is still there.’”
I believe this story is a powerful reminder of how important it is to choose your words carefully. When you are angry, walk away, take a breather, try not to say anything to anyone while you are still angry. Sometimes we say horrible things to people because we are hurting and we want others to hurt to. I get it, it doesn’t feel good when we are hurting. However, what good are we doing if we pass that hurt on to others. Then we both feel like crap in the moment and you will feel even worse when you have time to calm down and think about how bad you made someone feel. If you struggle with saying unkind things when you are angry, and I think most of us are, pray about this. Ask God to help change you. He is great at that.
The last sentence says, “How great a forest is set ablaze by a small fire!” You can say some small thing that you think is no big deal and yet it sets the fire ablaze. We don’t know everyone’s story. We don’t know what they have been through. You may have a cashier who messes up your order and you think she is just incompetent. What you don’t know is she just lost her mother three days ago. You might be annoyed because someone is driving too fast, but what you don’t know is that their wife is in the ICU and they want to get there before she dies. We don’t know peoples story. What if we treated everyone like they were going through a really hard time. What if the next time you want to say something unkind to someone you imagined they had just gone through something awful and you cut them some slack? How different would this world be if we all started treating each other with the compassion we show those who have just lost a loved one? There are two other sayings that I love and they may sound cheesy, but I love them and so I am going to share them anyway. The first is, “In a world where you can be anything, be kind.” This is so true. Let’s just all try to be kinder to everyone we meet. The second is “Sprinkle love like confetti.” I love the picture I get in my mind when I picture myself sprinkling confetti. Our words matter. Our words have the power to lift someone up or to keep them down. Use your words to lift someone up today, you won’t be sorry!
Dear Heavenly Father, I ask you to bless all those listening to this episode today. Lord, help us to see how important our words are. Help us to understand their power and to only use them for good. Help us to remember we all make many mistakes and to be more compassionate when others make mistakes. Lord help us to choose our words carefully so we do not inflict wounds with our words. You are amazing Lord and we love you. We are grateful for your love. We ask all of this in accordance with your will and in Jesus’ holy name Amen.