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  WHAT THE BIBLE SAYS ABOUT THE TONGUE？
  by Sanjay Poonen
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Summary: This sermon emphasizes the power of our words, focusing on the
impact of what we say with our tongues, lips, and mouths. It highlights
the importance of speaking words of love and encouragement, drawing from
various Bible verses to illustrate the significance of controlling our
speech and using it to build others up. The message encourages
listeners, especially children, to be mindful of the words they speak
and to cultivate habits of kindness and encouragement from a young age.

Topics: "Power of Words", "Encouragement and Kindness"
Scripture References: Proverbs 18:21, Ephesians 4:29, James 3:5, Colossians 4:6, Proverbs 15:4, Matthew 12:36, Psalm 19:14, Proverbs 21:23, Ephesians 4:15, 1 Thessalonians 5:11

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DESCRIPTION
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This sermon emphasizes the power of our words, focusing on the impact of
what we say with our tongues, lips, and mouths. It highlights the
importance of speaking words of love and encouragement, drawing from
various Bible verses to illustrate the significance of controlling our
speech and using it to build others up. The message encourages
listeners, especially children, to be mindful of the words they speak
and to cultivate habits of kindness and encouragement from a young age.

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CONTENT
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Good afternoon, brothers and sisters. Good to see you all. I have a
question for the children.

What do you think are the three most common parts of the head that are
in the Bible? So, neck and above. Children, below the age of, I don't
know, 10. Tongue, good, that's one.

Ears, two. Eyes, beautiful. Which is why, see no evil, hear no evil,
speak no evil.

All right? And off those three, which do you think is repeated, it comes
the most often in the Bible, of those three? Anybody? Off the three,
yes. Tongue, and it's not just the tongue. Tongue, sometimes it's
tongue, it's lips.

I actually did this with one of my children. I said, let's look up in
the Bible. It's easy, go to Bible Gateway and you can search and then do
that with your children.

Sometimes you have to look beyond tongue because sometimes it's tongue
and lips and mouth. So you have to add those all together and you'll
find, actually, and it's because it's hard to hurt somebody with your
ears. You can hurt yourself with your ears.

It's hard to hurt somebody with your eyes. You can hurt yourself with
your eyes. Jesus says, pluck out your eyes.

But we can all hurt somebody with our tongue, as we know. And there's
many, many scriptures. I'd encourage all of you, especially children.

I didn't print out all 131 references to the Bible. I picked a few of
them. And because this verse in 1 Peter 2 is so powerful.

When you read that chapter in 1 Peter 4, people often think it's
referring to people who speak up here, speak in the utterances of God.
But the entire chapter is about, let me just read a little bit of the
context. And you'll think like we're living in these times.

Okay, let me read 1 Peter 4, round seven. The end of all things is near.
Think about the times we're living in right now.

Wars, Israel, Hamas, Ukraine. Therefore, be of sound judgment. Above
all, keep fervent in your love for one another, because love covers the
middle.

Be hospitable to one another without complaint, okay? Everyone has a
special gift. Everyone in this room has a special gift, which is to
serve one another. And it's in that context, it says, whoever speaks is
to speak in the utterance of God.

So is that just for Brother Zach? Or, you know, as some of the other
brothers say here, every brother and sister, we have an opportunity to,
every time we open our mouth, we have a choice. It could be a fountain
of love, or it could be spewing venom and hate. I have a short story to
talk about.

Yesterday, it's been a tough week for Kathy, as you guys, folks all
know. But yesterday we were driving, and we were on El Camino, and the
car in front of her breaks suddenly, and she got rear-ended by the
person behind her. And there's just two of us, the kids were in the car.

And we pulled over, and we got out, and the lady behind her was really
livid. And I don't know how a rear-end you could think. But she was
absolutely guns blazing, okay? Guns blazing.

And my natural instinct was to defend the family, defend, you know,
paternal instinct takes over. So I'm going back at her, and we went on
for a couple of minutes. There was no, I don't have to confess, any
curse words were said.

But I raised my voice, because it was very clear it was her fault. And
at the end of a couple of minutes of that going back and forth, where we
ultimately exchanged, you know, driver's license and registration, I
thought to myself, wow, she, this is tough, because her car was in a lot
more damage than mine. And did I actually show her a bit of the spirit
of Jesus here? So it took a couple of minutes, and then at the end of
it, I asked her if we could get her an Uber, and she was in no mood to
listen to me at that point in time.

But we left home, and I, you know, prayed for her, and I wish I could
have called her and apologized, because I asked myself, if I saw her
next at the kingdom, in heaven, or at the judgment seat, would she say I
saw a little bit of Jesus at that time when she was completely in the
wrong? And so on. And for you little children, it's really important. I
think I've shared the story before.

There was a famous reporter who talked about one day she was a teenager,
and she was very upset at her dad for something, something simple, you
know, I don't know, maybe she wanted to do something, and her dad said
no. And as sometimes teenagers can do, you know, stormed away, went into
a room, and slammed the door and said, you know, I can't believe you did
this. Woke up the next morning, her father died of a heart attack.

And I always think about that in the context of older folks. You know,
what are the last words we say to them in an evening before they leave?
I'd encourage my children to give their grandparents a hug. Well, most
recently, Kathy's mom passed away, and I was thinking back, what was the
last thing we said to her? So brothers and sisters, especially the young
children, I'd encourage you, develop habits early in life that
everything you say, we can live by this verse in 1 Peter 4, where that
tongue is like that powerful rudder.

It can move a ship. I mean, if you think about these big, if you go next
to these big ships, aircraft carriers, or cruise ships, and you look at
the bottom, there's this rudder that's a small fraction of the size of
the ship, and that moves the ships. And you can see these big ships,
they can park in a small spot.

It's a huge ship, and it's a rudder that's moving them and allowing
them, rudders and engines. So it's really a tremendous reminder. We've
heard so many times about how we need to use our tongue in these last
days.

Explicit lyrics are on Spotify. The world is filled with children who
feel that they can say anything to their teachers. Employees who feel
they can say anything to their bosses.

Politicians who say they can say anything. We have to be a different
generation that guides our lips, not just lips. Sometimes it can be an
email.

Sometimes I think we have to also, there have been emails that I've
regretted sending at work. And I've learned sometimes maybe the best
thing to do, even if you feel that way, is write an email, put it in the
draft section, go to sleep, and maybe in the morning you'll delete it.
That's a good practice.

The draft section is there for a reason. You don't have to send it. You
can type it up.

It's not a sin to type it up, but then next morning I've deleted some.
So whatever the Lord gives you wisdom on how to do this, the point of
that passage is to be a servant, to be an encourager. We've heard many
times, the most important thing I tell my kids, there's a beautiful
story we used to read to them as young kids, which is at the end of
every day, you can either fill a bucket or you can drain a bucket.

Do you want to be someone who has filled someone else's bucket? Not just
in nice pat on the back kind of words, but in a spiritual encouraging
way. Are we, brothers and sisters, who fill other brothers and sisters'
buckets, are we always draining them out? And start at a young age,
brothers and sisters, you're young kids, to fill other buckets with
encouragement. Encouraging, prophesying is encouragement, something we
can all do.

And if we do that, then the utterances of God that this 1 Peter 4 verse
talks about isn't just some brother who preaches here or speaks here. It
could be every one of you. You could be a very quiet person and you may
not have a gift or a call to speak up here, but God can use you in a
powerful way in your school or in your college or in your workplace.

Or it might be an email that you send that could be a blessing to us.
Amen.

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Video: https://sermonindex2.b-cdn.net/QgVaF3A8SIA.mp4
Source: https://sermonindex.net/speakers/sanjay-poonen/what-the-bible-says-about-the-tongue/
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