In the sermon 'Taming The Tongue' by Chris Hayzlip, the speaker discusses the challenges and importance of controlling one's speech, drawing from personal experience and biblical teachings from James chapter 3. Hayzlip reflects on a recent personal failure in maintaining a positive reputation at work, illustrating how easily the tongue can cause harm. The sermon emphasizes that taming the tongue is an impossible task, likening it to the 'Mission Impossible' franchise, with the tongue being a small but powerful force that can lead to destruction if not controlled. The speaker outlines various ways the tongue can be misused, including backbiting, lying, deceit, and flattery, each causing harm to relationships and reputations. Hayzlip uses biblical examples and teachings, such as the wisdom from above being pure and peaceable, and refers to Jesus Christ's response to false accusations as a model for handling conflicts. The sermon concludes with a call for self-awareness and effort in refraining from harmful speech, acknowledging that despite its difficulty, it is a mission worth pursuing.

You would turn in your Bibles to the book of James chapter 3 and as you're turning there I'll use this time to confess my faults. About a month ago I noticed that I was becoming quite negative at work. I was starting to speak ill of my colleagues in front of my boss And after the meeting was over with my boss, I kind of reviewed the meeting in my head and realized what I had done. And it really embarrassed me because I have spent the past 20 years trying to maintain a reputation for being the cheerful, happy person at work. One who doesn't get involved in office politics.

One who always has something good or helpful to say about somebody else. And I realized at that moment I had just ruined that reputation. After all, as a child of God, I have more reason than most people to be cheerful, joyful, happy, thankful. And yet, here I am, using my mouth for something worse. You would think that after working on that for 20 years, it would become a habit already.

Well, it shows that as long as we're cursed with these sin-cursed bodies, we have to work daily at overcoming our faults. Now, a couple weeks ago, My turn at church came to speak and we have a custom at Unity where the church submits subjects that they want to hear messages on and the speakers cast lots to see which one we're going to speak on. My lot fell on the subject called Taming the Tongue. I don't think that was by chance, do you? I think it's the message I needed to hear, and I hope it blesses you this morning.

If you're in James 3, let's read the entire chapter together. Starting with verse 1. My brethren, be not many masters, knowing that we shall receive the greater condemnation. For in many things we offend all. If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man, and able also to bridle the whole body.

Behold, we put bits in the horses' mouths, and they obey us. That's example one. Example two. And we turn about their whole body, behold also the ships, which though they be so great and are driven of fierce winds, yet they are turned about with a very small helm. Whithersoever the governor listeth, even so the tongue is a little member, and boasteth great things.

Behold, how great a matter a little fire can live. Boy, isn't that the truth. This little thing right here behind my teeth can get me in so much trouble so quickly. It reminds me of a saying that a lot of people say, don't let your mouth write checks, your body can't cash. Verse 6, and the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity.

So is the tongue among our members, that it defileth the whole body, and setteth on fire the course of nature." Wow! And it is set on fire of hell. You think he's serious about this? That's some strong language. Verse 7.

For every kind of beast and of birds, and sorry I've got to stop right there, like I mentioned to Unity, I did not know turkeys could be tamed. I thought they were just wild birds, but my son tamed a turkey, and it took it from becoming a potential Thanksgiving meal to being a pet. You know, we might have something to learn about that. Let that sink in a moment. Verse 7 again.

For every kind of beast and of birds and of serpents, and of things in the sea, is tamed, and hath been tamed of mankind. But the tongue can no man tame. It is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison. Therewith we bless God, even the Father. And therewith curse we men, which are made after the similitude of God.

And mind you now, it's not just the elect that are made after God's own image. Every person is made after his image and his likeness. Show some respect. Out of the same mouth proceedeth blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not so be.

Does a fountain send forth at the same place, sweet water and bitter? Can a fig tree, my brethren, bear olive berries? Either a vine, figs? So can no fountain both yield salt water and fresh. Who is a wise man and endued with knowledge among you?

Let him show forth, show out of a good conversation, his works with meekness and wisdom. But if you have bitter envying and strife in your hearts, glory not, and lie not against the truth. This wisdom descendeth not from above, but is earthly, sensual. Notice this last word, devilish. Where envy and strife is, there is confusion and every evil work.

But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, and easy to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits without partiality and without hypocrisy. And the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace of them that make peace. James tells us quite plainly that the tongue can no man tame. So the subject taming the tongue is an impossible task. It's an exercise in futility.

So quite clearly I could just stop right now and that's the end of it. James said it was impossible, therefore why bother, right? Well, there's a movie called Mission Impossible. And in that mission, the secret spy meets up with his boss and his boss gives him his assignment. His assignment and the spy's name was Ethan Hunt.

And the boss tells Hunt to what his assignment is and Ethan complains. He said, well that's going to be difficult. And his boss tells him this, well this is not mission difficult Mr. Hunt, this is mission impossible. Difficult should be a walk in the park for you.

You know, we as the saints of God, we also form an impossible mission force. Our savior has given us several impossible missions. Number one, we're to be like him. There's impossible mission number one. You can't do it, but you got to try.

Number two, he's given us a war to fight down here. One, we cannot win. It's not our job to win. He will win the war. It's just our job to fight.

There's impossible mission number two. And then taming our tongues. After those first two impossible missions, why not this one? Right? So let's define what it means to tame something.

I like definitions. I like clearly understanding the language we use because sometimes language can get ambiguous. According to Noah Webster, to tame something means to reclaim, to reduce from a wild to a domestic state, to make gentle and familiar, to civilize, to subdue, to conquer. The problem is so many times we use our tongues to do evil. Like Will Rogers once said, if you find yourself in a hole, stop digging.

So if we're going to take our tongue, the first thing we've got to do is recognize all the evil ways in which we use our tongues and stop it. Before a horse can be ridden, you've got to break the horse. No use putting a saddle and a bridle on a horse until it's been broken. Any good that we attempt to do will be tainted by the evil that comes out of our mouth. Just think of all the blessing you speak and then you taint it, you corrupt it with backbiting, lying, cursing.

How much water would you want to drink out of a cup that's been tainted? So if we're going to tame our tongue, so let's begin by examining the activities of our tongue that the Bible lists as being evil or wicked. These are backbiting, cursing, deceit, also known as guile or lying, and strife. Start with backbiting. Turn, if you will, to the book of Psalms, chapter 15.

As you're turning there, again, let's define our term. What is backbiting? Well, it's like slander. Except for, it's slandering, it's the act of slandering someone who is absent, who's not there to defend themselves. Psalm chapter 15, let's read the first three verses.

A Psalm of David, Lord, who shall abide in thy tabernacle? Who shall dwell in thy holy hill, he that walketh uprightly and worketh righteousness, and speaketh the truth in his heart, he that backbideth not with his tongue, nor doeth evil to his neighbor, nor taketh up a reproach against his neighbor, and speaketh the truth in his heart." Let me stop there for a moment because I have another section coming up on the subject of lying, but since this is here, let me go ahead and deal with it. There are two troubling things I noticed in the world today. The first, we commonly witness with politicians. Watch the news, read the news, and when a politician is caught saying something untrue, you ever notice nobody ever calls them a liar?

Even though it's plain to see that they're lying? They always use words like, oh, mistakes were made. Oh, I misspoke. Oh, it was a... They've got all kinds of fancy words for it.

No, you lied. You knew what the truth was. You told us something different. You lied. That's the first thing that troubles me.

But then there's another troubling habit I see a lot of people having today. And this is when people genuinely do say something wrong. They believed it was true. And then they come back and say, oh I'm sorry I lied. If you find yourself doing this, please stop.

Lying is something very specific. Making a mistake is not lying. You may have made a mistake but you did not lie. And that's what this verse is talking about. Speaking the truth in your heart.

If you believed it to be true when you told it, you're just wrong. You didn't lie. Lying is when you tell somebody something that you know to be not true in order to deceive them. That's what lying is. And if you call everything a lie, even though it's not, you're diluting that term to make it meaningless.

Words need to mean things, okay? So, then the scripture also goes on to say, He that backbiteeth not with his tongue. You know, we do not like to be surrounded by backbiters. Neither does God. There are those who use backbiting or slander as a tool to intentionally make others look bad.

Why? Because, you know, it's a lot of hard work to make yourself look good. It's a lot easier to tear somebody else down. But you know not all backbiting is done for the purpose of self-promotion. You know, one thing I discovered about a month ago when I caught myself doing it, is I was doing it as a form of stress relief.

Sometimes you just feel like you've got to let off some steam or else you're going to explode. And we'll see an example of that later, but regardless of its purpose, regardless of its intent, this behavior of backbiting and slandering others, It harms three people. It harms the person we're slandering. It harms the person we're telling to slander to. And it harms us.

How so? Well, the person we slander is harmed because we're damaging their reputation. Now, if that person is really as bad as we're making them out to seem, trust me, their own behavior is going to damage their reputation. They don't need our help. What's more, as the children of God, we ought to have compassion on others.

If you see somebody struggling or needs help or isn't doing a job right or whatever reason you're slandering them for, instead of complaining about them, why aren't you helping them to improve? Well that's too much work isn't it? Proverbs 30 verse 10 says, Accused not a servant unto his master lest he curse thee and thou be found guilty. The person we tell the slander to is also harmed. Because we have corrupted that person's way of thinking about the person we're talking about.

In essence, we have poisoned the well against them. We've ruined their reputation in that person's mind. So even if that person who we're telling the slander to wants to give that no good lazy bum a fair chance. He still got your slander in his head, corrupting his judgment. It's hard to dismiss.

Finally, we are harmed by the slander. How so? Like I said at the beginning, I ruined my reputation. Nobody wants to be around a backbiter. Nobody trusts a backbiter.

Tell me, if you're doing any kind of work and you know a backbiter is watching, what do you want to do? You want to leave. Because you know sooner or later they're going to be talking about you to somebody and it's not going to be nice. It's not going to be helpful and some of it's probably not even going to be true. Consider this definition.

This is an interesting Greek word, Diablos. The definition is a traducer. Sometimes my vocabulary expands just by reading the definitions of the words. I didn't know what a traducer was, So I had to look that up. To traduce means to speak badly or tell lies about someone so as to damage their reputation.

The definition of Diablos goes on to say a false accuser, a slanderer, a devil, specifically Satan. What's that tell you? When we go around backbiting and slandering, we become devils. Turn to Psalm 10. Another way in which we use our tongues for evil is by cursing.

Now, that's not a problem the saints of God have, right? We don't go around cursing, do we? See, the problem is we think of cursing as being those taboo four-letter words. Psalm 10, verse 7 says, his mouth is full of cursing and deceit and fraud. Look at the bedfellows of cursing.

Under his tongue is mischief and vanity. You see a curse needs not to have any of those taboo four-letter words in it to be a curse. Consider the definition of our English word, cursing, or I mean the Hebrew word behind it here in this verse. The Hebrew word behind the word cursing, and I found this interesting, the Hebrew word Allah. It means an imprecation.

Had to look that up too. An imprecation is when evil is invoked on anyone, or a prayer of some calamity will fall on someone. The definition goes on to say that it's an execration. I didn't know what that was either, so I had to look that up. It means to feel or express great loathing for something or someone.

So what does that mean? It means anytime we wish or pray for something bad to happen to someone else, we're bestowing a curse on them. Brothers and sisters, I'd rather you use a four-letter word than actually bestow a curse on someone. Now, Deceit, guile, lying. Psalm 120 verse 2 says, Deliver my soul, O Lord, from lying lips and from a deceitful tongue.

Of all the sins I find lying, and this is a pet peeve of mine, I admit, I find lying to be the most pernicious of them all. The problem I have with a liar is once you lie to me, I can never trust you again. Lying robs someone of the ability to make wise decisions, either by removing good options, Supplying bad options or both at the same time. In other words, a lie forces someone into making a bad decision. It robs that person of trust.

Imagine trying to do business with a corporation. You go to some business, your doctor, your dentist, let's use a dentist. That's a good one. He tells you you have a mouth full of cavities. It's going to cost you $10, 000 to get them all filled and capped.

You go get a second opinion from another dentist and he shows you the x-rays and says no your teeth are great. You ever going to go back to that first dentist again? No, it's broken your trust. And that's what lying does, it breaks trust. That first dentist would have had you make a bad decision, wouldn't he?

Proverbs 26, 28 says, a lying tongue hateth those that are afflicted by it. Understand how serious that word hate is. Christ equates hate with murder. A lying tongue hateth those that are afflicted by it. It goes on to say, and a flattering mouth worketh ruin, which brings us to the next way in which we use our tongues for evil.

And this is very subtle, very tricky, and that's flattery. And a flattering mouth worketh ruin. You know flattery is a type of curse? It's a particular form of deceit. The Proverbs tells us that it works ruin on them that receive it.

In a sense then, It's a curse. How? Two ways. Psalm chapter 5 verses 8 and 9 tells us, Lead me, O Lord, in thy righteousness, because of mine enemies. Make thy way straight before my face, for there is no faithfulness in their mouth.

Their inward part is very wickedness. Their throat is an open sepulcher. They flatter with their tongue. Flattery is used by your enemies to gain your trust without earning it. And what do your enemies do with your trust?

They betray you. Makes you vulnerable to attack. But it's a curse in another way too. Let me give you an example. It's very popular today for schools, especially in sports, to have the children go out, play a game, and then declare everyone a winner.

There's no winners, no losers. You did great. Everybody gets a pat on the head. They don't fail any students because, oh, we don't want to hurt their feelings. We don't want to ruin their creativity.

They have lots of excuses and then they get out in the real world and they have no real skills because they never had to work to improve. And then they become like snowflakes and the first little bit of heat that they take, they melt. Sorry, that's not good enough, you'll have to do it again. What? They cannot even accept constructive criticism.

And at best, they're worthless to society. At worst, they become burdensome or destructive. Look how many riots went on because the little snowflakes got told no. 1 John 3, 18 tells us, My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue, but in deed and in truth, do you love someone enough to tell them the truth? The truth hurts.

Then there is strife. Job chapter 13 verse 19 reads, Who is he that will plead with me? For now, if I hold my tongue, I shall give up the ghost. In this chapter Job has been sitting with his friends as they berate him. They keep accusing him of sins and he keeps having to defend himself against them.

And he's just gotten to that point, and I'm sure you've been there too, I know I have, where you've held your tongue as long as you possibly can, and like Job, you feel like if you hold it another moment later, you're just going to explode or die, as Job says. This is where he's at. But imagine, put yourself in his shoes, he's surrounded by his friends, he's just lost everything, and now his friends keep accusing him of sins that he's innocent of. It would be hard to hold our tongues, wouldn't it? But consider the example we're supposed to follow.

Consider Jesus Christ. Unlike Job, Jesus Christ was surrounded by his enemies, people who wanted him dead, not trying to help him. And he was accused of sins he did not commit, but he never answered a word. Imagine that, the creator of all the universe, the all-powerful God sitting silently at every accusation. He knew at every accusation.

He knew that one day God the Father would justify him. Nor did he turn around and accuse his accusers, even though he knew each and every one of their sins and could justly and rightly accuse them. He did not do that. He knew one day they would stand before his judgment seat. I like what Samuel Clemens once wrote.

He said, Never argue with a fool. Onlookers may not be able to tell the difference. Sometimes it simply does no good to argue with people. It takes wisdom to know when these times occur, but it happens more often than we realize. You see, sometimes people's hearts are so hardened against us that there's no amount of evidence or reasoning that is going to change their minds and persuade them.

Just be silent. And persuade them. So just be silent. Also, it's never a good idea when you're being charged with something, true or not, It's never a good idea to turn around and charge the other person with a crime or a sin. That's not the time and place for it.

You know why? Whether they are guilty or innocent of anything you charge them with makes no difference as to whether you are guilty or innocent. Their guilt or innocence does not exonerate you. So be quiet. Brothers and sisters, I think the biggest problem I have witnessed, and maybe just because I am guilty of it, You know, sometimes once you've been made aware of something, you see it all around you, right?

I worked for Old Dominion Freight Line and I had never heard of the company until somebody asked me to go interview for a job there. And Ever since, I see old Dominion trucks everywhere. It's like they popped up all of a sudden. But since I became convicted of backbiting, I witnessed backbiting among the saints everywhere. It's a horrible reputation for us to have.

It destroys our relationships with friends, family, saints, spouses. As James said, this ought not so to be. Thank you.