To Encourage You

James 3:10-12 “From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers, these things ought not to be so. Does a spring pour forth from the same opening both fresh and salt water? Can a fig tree, my brothers, bear olives, or a grapevine produce figs? Neither can a salt pond yield fresh water.”

Perhaps nothing so clearly indicates the spiritual condition of a person than the way they use their mouth.  Jesus told us that it is “out of the abundance of the heart (the) mouth speaks” (Luke 6:45).  It’s inevitable that what’s in us will spill out through our lips.  It’s the pressure relief valve, so to speak.  

In the passage above James likens the mouth to a spring or a tree.  The nature of both is known by what they produce – salt water or fresh water for a spring, the kind of fruit for a tree.  The same is true for the mouth, or at least it OUGHT to be.  But so often it isn’t.  There can be a great inconsistency in what comes from a person’s mouth. In this case, note that James is talking specifically to “brothers,” i.e., fellow believers.  He is contrasting what so often is true of Christians with what ought to be true.  

Christians make a habit of “blessing.”  Earlier, James specifies that they bless God. This can be by way of singing in a worship service. It can be by way of sharing what we believe about God with others.  We can do it in prayer.  But James then points out that the same people who bless God with their mouths in various ways can turn right around and curse people “that are made in the likeness of God.”  Thus, blessing and cursing can end up coming out of the same mouth.  But it just shouldn’t be this way, any more than a freshwater spring producing saltwater and a fig tree producing olives.  If we saw such things in the natural world, we would be thrown off by it. We wouldn’t know what we were dealing with. The inconsistency would cause confusion in our mind. So, what do we think happens when others around us hear us blessing God one moment then using foul language or angry and hurtful words toward people the next? Surely one of the thoughts that would come to anyone’s mind, believer or unbeliever, is that if that person is a believer, they surely don’t SOUND like one.  It’s something that just shouldn’t be, and everyone knows it – except, perhaps, the person involved in it. Otherwise, why would James, more than that, the Holy Spirit THROUGH James, need to bring it up?  But He does. 

So, we should ask ourselves, is my mouth being used in a consistent way?  If someone knew nothing more about me than what they heard come from my mouth (like a fly on the wall), what would they say about me? Would they think that my profession of faith is real, or wouldn’t they know what in the world to think?  Would they question who we really are!  

May God help us as believers to be what we ought to be.  If we claim to be Christians, may God help us to consistently, day in and day out, speak like Christians, for it’s very obvious to everyone around us that we ought to.