I’ve always been intrigued about the story of Laban. Jacob’s decision to return to Canaan is motivated, at least in part by God’s will (Gen. 31:3). But another factor was his deteriorating relationship with his father-in-law, Laban (Gen. 31:2). Without warning, Jacob uproots his family, getting a three day jump before Laban finds out that his son-in-law, daughters, and grandchildren are long gone. Like a posse, Laban pursues Jacob for seven days. Like water reaching the boiling point, Laban fumes over Jacob’s double-crossing. With seven days to think, Laban rehearses his speech; he’ll repay Jacob for the pain and damage caused.
But the night before Laban overtakes Jacob and sets to confront him, his sleep is disturbed by a visit from God. “Be careful,” warns God, “not to say anything to Jacob, either good or bad” (Gen. 31:24). Wow! God puts a cork on Laban’s bottled anger and oozing thoughts of retaliation. I’ve often wished God would intervene like that whenever someone had a score to settle with me. Even more, I’ve often wished God would intervene and stop me from saying or doing something I later regretted.
The trouble with “words” is that they emerge from a problem with the heart. Jesus made it clear that it’s not what goes into a person that makes him/her unclean but what comes out of the mouth (Mk. 7:15). So whatever is going on in the heart will emerge from the mouth. We might hope the words are as sweet as honey, but we often hope in vain as what emerges is as vile as projectile vomiting.
In the New Testament list of “big” sins, the spoken sin always finds a voice. For instance, Romans 1:29 speaks of those filled with wickedness, evil, greed, depravity, envy, murder, strife, deceit, and malice. Yes these are big sins, but so are the ones associated with the mouth: gossip, slander, and boasting (Rom. 1:30). I may not be guilty of the former, but of the latter . . .? In the list found in 1 Corinthians 6:9-10, Paul includes slanderers alongside the prostitutes and drunkards who will not inherit the Kingdom of God. While the acts of the flesh (NIV’s “sinful nature”) stand in opposition to walking by the Spirit, they do not include the spoken words; they do talk of “fits of rage” (Gal. 5:20). Paul tells us to get rid of all slander (Eph. 4:31), obscenity, foolish talk, and coarse (dirty) joking (Eph. 5:5); such traits disqualify a person from any inheritance in the kingdom of God. James, recognizing that the tongue, i.e. mouth, can be as wild as an unbroken stallion, says to bridle it and keep a tight rein on it (Jam. 1:26).
James’ larger context is that the person who believes they’re religious or spiritual, yet cannot control the words he/she says is only fooling themselves; God cannot be fooled. Therefore, one of the signs that our religion is either pure or corrupted is found in the way we use words, because what we say reflects our hearts. Our heart is the throne-room. Who sits on that throne is revealed by what we say. And there is only one throne in our throne-room, and only enough room exists for one ruler. Since I doubt you’ll ever get the help to bite your tongue like Laban did, we have to ask ourselves, who’s ruling our hearts? What we’ve been saying speaks volumes about who exactly rules our hearts.
Soli Deo Gloria!
(i.e. only God is glorified!)