Benefits and Drawbacks, Part 11

Romans chapter three. You’re
going to need your Bibles today. I made the decision not to provide
an insert. It was essentially exactly the
same as last week’s, and you have a pretty good outline of
the passage right there in your Bible, as will be again in verses
10 through 18. Romans chapter three. And as we have seen for the last
several weeks, really the last several months, Paul has roundly
indicted the Gentiles, saying that they are under sin. In chapter
two, he turns his attention to the Jews and points out that
they are all under sin. And really, all he is doing here
in Romans three is essentially pointing out that all are under
sin, both Jew and Gentile. The Gentiles were shown to be
sinners, the Jews shown to be sinners, all are sinners. That essentially is the equation.
Paul here looks around and he basically surmises that if the
Gentiles are sinners and Jews are sinners, there isn’t anybody
else to consider because Gentiles refers to anyone who is a non
Jew, anyone, all the world, the entire world, everyone in it.
All of humanity is utterly sinful. If you would go back to verse
nine, as we pick up Paul’s argument. Where Paul writes, what then
are we better than they? Not at all. For we have already
charged that both Jews and Greeks are all under sin, as it is written. There is none righteous, not
even one. There is none who understands.
There is none who seeks for God. All have turned aside. Together
they have become useless. There is none who does good.
There is not even one. Their throat is an open grave.
With their tongues they keep deceiving. The poison of asps
is under their lips. whose mouth is full of cursing
and bitterness, their feet are swift to shed blood, destruction
and misery are in their paths, and the path of peace they have
not known. There is no fear of God before
their eyes. Now we know that whatever the
law says, it speaks to those who are under the law, that every
mouth may be closed, and all the world may be accountable
to God. Because by the works of the law shall no flesh will
be justified in his sight. For through the law comes the
knowledge of sin. In essence, what Paul does there
in verse nine is a continuation of the dialogue that he’s been
conducting now for nearly two chapters. A back and forth hypothetical
dialogue where he poses yet another line of questioning, what then
are we better than they? Paul has made it very clear that
the Jews were likewise in sin, even in spite of all of their
privileges, all the privileges that they enjoyed, not the least
of which was the very word of God itself, the revelation of
God. But Paul brings the point home
even further. By pointing out, by way of this
rhetorical question, are we, that is, are the Jews better
than the Gentiles? His answer is immediate. Not
at all. In no way are we better than they. We, the Jews, better
than the Gentiles. We have greater privileges. We
certainly have enjoyed those, says Paul of the Jewish nation,
but we are not better Paul says, for we have already charged that
both Jews and Greeks are all under sin. They are literally
underneath the weight of sin. They are underneath the great
burden of sin. Paul begins. To illustrate his
point with. The greatest of all arguments,
and that is the very word of God, which every Jew would attend
to. When Paul says, as it is written, every Jew would lean
forward. Every Jew would attend to those
words because they are the very words of God. They are God’s
Word. We looked at the structure and
we looked at the fact that there were not too few arguments of
how exactly verses 10 through 18 are supposed to be structured.
Is there really this artsy thing that Paul took great pains with? Some people said that there were
three sets, some said two. The bottom line here, as I pointed
out last week, there are six Old Testament citations. And
out of those six citations, we have a total of 14 statements
of indictment. We began to look at those last
week. There is a beauty here, as many pointed out, there is
a richness to these passages that as they are gathered and
blended together, we almost have a new whole. We have a new set
of scripture. And we’ll see that particularly
this morning. The purpose of all of these scriptures,
as we discovered last week, is really to illustrate Paul’s point
that all that is all of humanity, all people ever created are all
understand all. We looked last week at the first
citation. That first citation of indictment
was taken from Psalm 14, 1 through 3, and it gave to us our first
six indictments and just by way of a very brief review. Paul
says there is none righteous, not even one. There is none who
understands. There are there is none who seeks
after God. All have turned aside together.
They have become useless. There is none who does good.
There is not even one. With regards to righteousness.
It’s not that people don’t have some goodness. It’s not that
they don’t occasionally do the right thing. It’s not that occasionally
a godless person might land on the side of justice and justly
do the right thing. It’s not saying that at all. It’s saying, do they live a life,
either collectively or individually, do they live a life that commends
them to God? Now, there is a righteous man
in God’s eyes. And Paul says there’s none, not
even a single one other than, as we pointed out last week,
the Lord Jesus Christ. There is not even one. There are none who are inherently
righteous, there are none who on their own merits could go
and to stand before God and to say, look, God, I’ve lived this
good life, I’ve been a good enough person. I have lived a righteous
life. There’s none. None. That’s what makes the sacrifice
that Christ made so special is because the only one who ever
lived such a life offered himself for us as a payment for our sin. There is none who seeks for God.
Now, we saw this last week. Wait a minute. Scripture is replete
with those commands to seek God. Many passages of dozens, in fact,
tell us to seek God and speak of those who seek God and adjure
us and implore us to seek God. The bottom line is we are commanded
to seek God, but God also knows our ability. He knows our frame.
He knows our heart and he knows that we won’t. We won’t seek
God. Not as he desires to be sought. Not as he deserves to be sought.
We won’t seek God perfectly and completely. The third indictment
there was that all have turned aside. It’s plainly evident that
this is a mirror image of what was just said. It’s another way
of saying the same thing. Of course, we’re not seeking
God because we’ve turned aside. We turned aside because we will
not seek God. As I pointed out last week, that
word was used of an AWOL soldier, absent without leave. And that’s
us. We are absent without leave with
respect to God. We’ve turned our backs on God.
And that’s why Paul, in writing to the Thessalonians, that’s
why he can say to them in praise and encouragement of them that
they turned from idols to God. We all have our backs naturally
to God. We all have naturally turned
aside. All we, like sheep, have gone
astray. Together, qualitatively, Paul
says, they have become useless. They are absolutely worthless
for the design for which they were made. to glorify God and
enjoy Him forever, if they are unrighteous, if they do not understand
God, if they do not seek God, if they have turned aside and
are out of the way, then it’s axiomatic. They’re not going
to be God-pleasing. They’re not going to be vessels
fitted for the master’s use. They’re not going to match up
with exactly what God has designed them to be. They’re just not.
There’s no way that they could be God pleasing anymore. And in that sense, Paul declares
them unscriptural authority to be useless. They have lost their
use for God. God takes no pleasure. God takes
no delight in the good deeds of a godless man. They don’t
commend him to God. They don’t earn him any favor. That’s why he ends up with that
sixth indictment. There is none who does good. There are plenty of people that
are out there doing good right now. Mowing the neighbor’s lawn. taking
care of other people, serving the community, doing good things. But there’s nobody that even
comes close to doing good on God’s standard, doing good enough
to commend them to God, to tell God, as it were, sit up and pay
attention. Look at this one. There’s nobody. There’s nobody like that, not
even one. If you would, let’s press to
the second citation. The second citation gets a little
delicate. Check that it gets a lot of delicate. What Paul does is masterfully
pull out of the Psalms these citations, these two different
citations, that are an indictment on all of humanity. And he uses
the great illustration that will make all of us squirm, that none
of us will escape. And that’s exactly why Paul did
it, because he knew that no one would escape this argument. And
the argument is simple. It pertains to our mouths. It is the sin that comes out
of our mouths and no one escapes. No one argues and we can all
immediately throw our hands up and agree with Paul that yes,
you’re right, there is none righteous. That’s the design of these verses.
If you would look, take a running start at it back in verse. Ten. Ten B. There is none righteous,
not even one. There is none who understands.
There is none who seeks for God. All have turned aside. Together,
they have become useless. There is none who does good.
There is not even one. Their throat is an open grave. With their tongues, they keep
deceiving. The poison of asps is under their
lips, whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness. Now, you might you might be a
little nervous of that. You might be saying some of those
things are partly true of me, or certainly they were true of
me prior to my salvation. But in what sense are these true
now? In what sense are these true
of all of humanity? As they pointed out in verse
13, you have your second citation. It’s from Psalm 59. And it produces
two additional statements of indictment, indictment seven
and eight. And then we have a following. And when you include verse 14,
you immediately see that, as one put it, all of the organs
of speech, the throat, the tongue, the lips and the mouth in general
are set forth as proof. Of the universal sinfulness of
man. One said. Paul describes In these
verses, the four principal vices of the tongue, filthy and infected
discourse, deceitful flatteries, subtle and piercing evil speaking,
and finally, outrageous and open malediction. In other words,
hateful cursing. Those things are true of all
of humanity. The psalmist in 5.9, what he
does is describe essentially the bitter and ruthless enemies
against whom he prayed for God’s help. They were these venomous
people with their just hateful and cutting mouths. All of these
things relate to the sins of the tongue, the sins of the mouth,
the sins of which we all too easily are indicted. Consider. Consider, first of all, verse
13. In verse 13, Paul says their
throat is an open grave. Let’s look at the illustrations
first, and then we’ll look at more a little more deeply applying
some of these and looking at what Scripture says. What Paul
intends to do here is point out the deadly effects of their speech. When he speaks of an open grave,
there’s a reason that dead bodies are buried. Number one, they
bear disease and they foment that disease as they begin to
decay. Aside from the horrific stench
that is there as part of that decay, there is the disease that
is so rampant. What he says when he says that
their throat is an open grave, it is, the mouth that is, is
just like that with the venom that it spews. with the harsh
and cutting things that it says, with the terrible thoughts that
it expresses, with the news that it bears, with the slander and
the gossip that it produces, just as the grave is this dreadful,
even ravenous place to human flesh. Just like that, the wicked
mouth that has a tendency to do evil at every turn. Matthew
records a statement of Jesus that essentially said exactly
this in much more delicate terms. Jesus said, you brood of vipers,
how can you being evil speak? What’s good? If you’re evil,
you’re going to say evil things. If evil things are coming out
of your mouth, it’s because your heart is wicked. That’s what
Jesus says, for the mouth speaks out of that which fills the heart.
It cannot do otherwise. You cannot say good and wholesome
things from a heart that is full of evil and wickedness. And it’s
axiomatic that if the mouth is saying evil things, if the mouth
is saying slanderous, bitter, cursing kinds of things, it’s
because the heart is desperately wicked. Verse goes on. With Jesus words
to say in verse thirty five, the good man brings out of his
good treasure, what is good and the evil man brings out of his
evil treasure, what is evil? You are what you say. Going on, Paul says, with their
tongues, they keep deceiving. This is a perpetual thing. It
gains steam. It picks up steam and begins
to run over all who would be in the way. It begins with a
little deception and picks up steam to where it becomes a total
sham, a life of hypocrisy. Essentially, this the meaning
of this word to see was used as bait for a hook that would
trick the fish. It would trick the fish into
swallowing the hook whole and then the angler would yank the
line. Well, we trick people all the
time. We trick people all the time,
especially in our ungodly state, we begin to try to trick people,
trick God, trick others, and we even trick ourselves into
thinking that we’re OK. With our tongues, we keep on
deceiving. Peter used this word frequently in his epistles, and
this is what makes the warning to Christians so pointed. This is obviously not the way
that Christians are supposed to live, but it is an occupational
hazard. First Peter two one says, putting
aside all malice, putting aside all deceit and hypocrisy. Receive the word implanted. First Peter three ten, the one
who desires life. To love and to see good days
must keep his tongue from evil and his lips from speaking deceit.
To see has no place in the Christian’s life. No place. I mentioned that
there was a third citation. The third citation begins there
midway through verse 13. When it says the poison of Asps
is under their lips, there were many commentators that pointed
to a poisonous snake has a sack up behind the fangs that when
those fangs are engaged, it pierces the sack and the venom is released
through the fangs or at least through the mouth of the snake,
depending on what kind. That’s what is being referred
to here. The poison of asps is under their
lips. As I said, this is the third
citation. Verse 13 comes from Psalm 140,
verse 3, and it brings to his indictment number nine. The particular
song is another complaint by the psalmist and a prayer for
help against cruel enemies. And in this particular verse,
This enemy is characterized by the harshness and the malignancy,
the cancerous nature of his slander. It is brutal. It is harmful.
It is utterly destructive. As one said, this is the highest
expression of hatred. The bite of the snake causes
the severest pain as well as produces death. To inflict suffering
is a delight to the hateful. This is a revelation of a nature
that is truly diabolical. This is an evil nature that takes
place as words flow. I pointed to a fourth citation
of indictment. We find that one in verse 14.
As I said, what Paul does is masterfully string these together
to make this unit a whole, to make these individual parts into
a whole that is an indictment on the mouth that indicts all
of humanity as sinful with their mouths. Look at verse 14, where
he adds, whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness. That verse is taken from that
citation rather is taken from Psalm 10 7. It produces that
single additional statement of indictment that’s indictment
number 10. There are four that remain. Just
briefly cursing. And it isn’t talking about just
bad words here. Cursing carries, it brings forth
the idea of hatred and hatefulness towards somebody that calls down
evil upon them. You want bad to happen to them. You think the worst of the person
and want the worst for that person. And you are willing To try to
accomplish those ends on your own by the slander that you bear
on their behalf. Bitterness is just that openly
vented hatred towards others. Ephesians 4 31 tells the Christian
mind you. Tells the Christian, let all
bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put
away from you, along with all malice. That has no place in
the Christian’s life. And we as Christians have a constant
need to watch over our lives and to eradicate those things
as they pick their head up, because we know they can. We know they
can. One pastor said of this particular
element, it is a figurative term, this bitterness, denoting that
fretted and irritable state of mind that keeps a man in perpetual
animosity. that inclines him to harsh and
uncharitable opinion of men and things, that makes him sour,
crabbed and repulsive in his general demeanor, that brings
a scowl over his face and infuses venom into the very words of
his tongue. This is not a good thing. This
is man at his worst. Man at his utter worst. Now,
lest you think that Paul is gilding the lily, grabbing these things
out of various psalm citations and building a case that really
is isolated in nature. I want to just take you to an
overview of Scripture regarding the mouth, the tongue, our speech. And I want to point out to you
that Paul couldn’t be more accurate when he says all have sinned
and fall short of the glory of God. Psalm, pardon me, Psalm
39.1, listen. Psalm 39, 1, David says, I will
guard my ways that I may not sin with my tongue. David knew
in his heart of the propensity to sin with his mouth through
lies and through slander, through falsehoods, through deceit. Paul,
rather David, knew explicitly of that potential. I will guard
my mouth, he says, as with a muzzle. I remember reading Jim and Elizabeth
Eliot’s exchanges, and Elizabeth Eliot finally came to this conclusion. Never miss an opportunity to
keep your mouth shut. What great counsel. What great
counsel. And haven’t we all, after we’ve
sinned with our mouths, haven’t we all yearned for that? That
muzzle, wherever it exists. That ability to so guard our
words that nothing comes out. that isn’t edifying or pleasing
or God honoring? Haven’t we all sought that as
Christians? The wisest man who ever lived
sought it. He desired that. He presented
it as a nugget of wisdom itself. First verse I ever preached.
This was my first sermon. And you can only surmise why
I selected it. Proverbs 1019, when there are
many words, transgression is unavoidable. But he who restrains
his lips is wise, the more you talk, the more you sin, the more
you speak, the more tendency you have, the more proclivity
you have, the more inclination you have towards sinning. Oftentimes, I’ve almost scoffed
at an older wise saint because they are so guarded. It’s almost
as if their bodies here, but their soul and their mind have
already gone on to glory. They guard themselves so carefully
and so cautiously that you never have any inclination of what
they’re thinking. They make you nervous, don’t
they? When there are many words. Transgression
is unavoidable, the more you talk, and that’s what makes this
James points out, as we’ll see in a moment. That’s what makes
the ministry an occupational hazard, because you have to talk. Proverbs 1727 says he who restrains
his words as knowledge. He who has a cool spirit is a
man of understanding, and that isn’t cool as in Jokul, one whose
whose temper is seasoned, one who doesn’t fly off the handle,
one who guards his words carefully as the saints should. Matthew
537, Jesus put a premium on wisdom with regards to speech when he
said, let your statements be yes, yes or no, no, anything
beyond this is evil. Don’t go swearing that you’ll
do such and such. Don’t go boasting of what you’re
going to accomplish. Don’t go boasting of what you
have accomplished. Somebody asks you a question,
yes or no. Mark, verse seven or chapter
seven, and Jesus, this is a thought that is repeated several times
in several different ways throughout the Gospels. It’s a fascinating
thought. We touched on it briefly, but
in Mark chapter seven, the version or the the form that it takes
there is much more complete. It records Jesus saying is, as
he was saying, that which proceeds out of the man, that which is
that is what defiles the man for from within out of the heart
of men. Proceed evil thoughts, fornications,
thefts, murders, adulteries. You see, if Paul had touched
on any one of those in Romans three, he would have missed a
great many of us. I don’t steal anything. But what
Paul does masterfully by guidance of the Holy Spirit is zero in
on the tongue, which every one of us has stumbled with. Jesus says, from out of the heart
of men proceed the evil thoughts, fornications, thefts, murders,
adulteries, deeds of coveting and wickedness, as well as of
deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. All these
evil things proceed from within and defile the man. It all comes from within, he
says. Paul sought to teach young Titus,
church planter, Establishing elders wherever he went, Paul
sought to teach him about the importance of the tongue and
the importance of purifying the tongue in a fallen world. When he told Titus in chapter
three, remind them, remind the saints among you to be subject
to rulers, to authorities, to be obedient, to be ready for
every good deed, to malign no one. What about that evil politician?
What about those people in our neighborhood? What about all
of those ungodly college kids tearing around town to malign
no one? To be peaceable, to be eager
to reach out and to be peaceable in our speech, gentle, showing
every consideration for all men. That pretty much sows it up.
I mean, is there anybody there that escapes? That little word malign means
to blaspheme, to blaspheme about another human. That’s how bad
the speech is. To speak profanely, to revile
them, to slander them, to say untrue, harsh things about them. Paul says it can’t be. If you’re
going to have any kind of testimony in a land like this, If you’re
going to have any kind of a witness, you can’t run around maligning
other people. I love the way Tony Evans said
it. Sinners sin. That’s their job description.
Take it, live with it and go with it. Take them to gospel.
That’s what they need most, right? James was focused upon the tongue. James was zeroed in on the tongue,
wasn’t he? A lot of us avoid reading the
book of James for that very reason, because it talks too much about
the way that we talk. James 119. This, you know, my
beloved brethren, but everyone must be quick to hear, slow to
speak and slow to anger. And the two things are tied together.
It doesn’t mean that we string our words along slowly, it means
that we hesitate before we even open our mouth. Slow to speak,
slow to lodge a complaint, slow to offer an opinion, slow to
criticize, slow to share any so-called news. slow. James 126, if anyone thinks himself
to be religious and does not bridle his tongue, an interesting
image, isn’t it? Does not bridle his tongue, but
deceives his own heart. This man’s religion is worthless.
You can call yourself whatever you want. You can call yourself
a Christian, but if you’re unable to bridle your tongue, which
God has given you the grace and the guidance and the exhortation, then you have good cause to wonder
if you have a grace-touched life. The greatest and most lengthy
indictment on the tongue, almost in all of Scripture, is in James
chapter 3. Turn to James if you would for
a moment. In James chapter 3, he presents
the great caution. The great caution on speaking. James, chapter three, verse one
says, let not many of you become teachers, my brethren, knowing
that as such, we will incur a stricter judgment. We’re going to be held
accountable, we’re going to be held accountable as elders for
how we shepherded our flock, what we taught you, what we did,
how we did it. But we’re also going to be held
accountable, even a more strict accountability because of what
we said with our mouths. For we all stumble in many ways. We’re sinners after all. We’re
wayward, we’re awkward, we’re clumsy. We all stumble in many
ways. If anyone does not stumble in
what he says, he is a perfect man able to bridle the whole
body as well. There isn’t anybody in the whole
world that doesn’t sin in some way, shape or form, and there
isn’t any sin that’s easier to fall into than the sins of the
tongue. No wonder James says, if you’re
going to be a teacher. If you’re going to open your
mouth for this cause of the gospel, you had better be able to bridle
the tongue. You had better be able to guard
and to guide that instrument. One Puritan said it this way,
nothing is generally esteemed to be a better evidence of the
state of a man’s heart than the habitual tone of his conversation. It isn’t even so much how he
spends his money. It isn’t so much the doctrine
that he espouses. It’s how he carries himself day
to day in his conversation. James goes on to use a number
of different illustrations, bits and bridles and rudders for ships. In verses three and following,
but the illustration that is just par excellence is his illustration
of the spark. And we know it well here in Larimer
County, don’t we? We know it well here in Tinder
Drive, Colorado, where somebody tosses a cigarette out the window
or perhaps a spark from a lawnmower, somebody said. Look at the verse again, look
at verse five. He’s given us two illustrations
of the tongue and its destructiveness. Bits in horses mouths. And ships
driven along by a tiny rudder. But the third illustration is
powerful beyond all. Verse five. So also the tongue
is a small part of the body, yet it boasts of great things.
See how great a forest is set aflame by a small fire. And he
says that our tongues are just like that fire and a tiny little
spark turns into the next thing you know, the greatest wildfire
in Colorado history started with a little spark from a burned
letter. James goes on to say, and the
tongue is a fire. The very world of iniquity, the
tongue is set among our members as that which defiles the entire
body and sets on fire the course of our life and is set on fire
by hell. It’s sinful. It has a sinful
proclivity. No wonder. No wonder. The wisest
man who ever lived said, with many words, transgression is
unavoidable, but he who restrains his lips is wise. The less you
talk, the fewer sparks that fly, right? When we talk too much. We have a great tendency to sin.
Listen to this one godly pastor years ago, put together a list
of the ways that we can send with our tongue. Listen to this. The tongue in scripture is pointed
out to be a wicked tongue, a deceitful tongue, a lying tongue, a perverse
tongue, filthy, corrupt, bitter. Angry, crafty, flattering, slanderous,
gossiping, backbiting, blaspheming, foolish, boasting, a murmuring
tongue, a complaining tongue, a cursing tongue, a contentious
tongue, sensual, vile, tail-bearing, whispering, exaggerating, and
that is even in the complete list. Set on fire by the very fires
of hell. Peter was concerned about the
tongue as well. and about speech. And he said the Christians, to
sum up all of you, the harmonious, sympathetic, brotherly, kind
hearted, humble in spirit, not returning evil for evil, verbally
speaking or insult for insult, but giving a blessing instead.
And finally, A passage which I singularly would call one of
the greatest passages on the tongue in all of Scripture, which
I could title Garbage or Grace, Ephesians 429. Let no unwholesome
word proceed from your mouth that only such a word. Is as
good for edification according to the need of the moment so
that it may give grace to those who hear that word for garbage. Unwholesome speaks of something
that is foul and rotten and utterly useless, and that’s what we spew
if we don’t guard our mouths. Now, you say, why on earth, Pastor,
are you going into all these passages written to Christians?
Because if it’s that important to say all of these things to
us who know the Lord Jesus, is there even an argument? that
all the world has sinned mightily against God and against his fellow
man with his tongue. If he doesn’t know God, what
capacity does he have to seize hold of that instrument? The more you talk, the greater
tendency there is to sin. Thomas Watson said it this way.
If the tongue be not watched, It will be sin’s solicitor general. It will be a call to all lusts. It will plead for sin, defend
sin, lessen sin and provoke to sin. It will show the pleasure
of the heart in sin. If we don’t guard our heart,
if we don’t guard our tongue, if we don’t minimize our speech,
then it will run its banks. How do we sin? We sin by our
idle chatter. Just talk, blah, blah, blah,
blah, blah. Stories and anecdotes that nobody
wants to hear in the first place, right? That sooner or later ends
up as boasting. Charles Bridges said it this
way, the fool talks forever about nothing. Not because his heart
is full, but because his heart is empty. Not for instruction,
but for the pure love of talking. And don’t you know people like
that? Not only idle chatter, but boasting.
Just boasting of what we’ve done or what we think we’ve done or
what we think we’re going to do. It’s exactly what James said. You know, don’t go boasting about
what you’re going to accomplish in the next week or in the next
year. These opinionated declarations
where we set ourselves up as judge and jury and we declare
what other people are, what they know and what they’re like. This
gossip or slander that so often, especially in prayer circles,
is called sharing. Gossip is what the Bible calls
it, hurtful remarks. Just intentionally cutting comments
that may have some truth to them, but they’re not stated in love.
They lack gentleness. They’re not bathed in prayer.
They’re designed to injure. Lying. One on top of another,
lying after lying after lying, cursing, and I am not talking
about just swearing, but really calling down evil on. Others,
These prejudicial statements where you don’t even wait for
all the facts to come in, you just run, fly off the handle,
speaking error, coarse jesting. Where we append at the end of
it, I’m only joking as if that’s supposed to wipe out everything
that we just said, while the truth behind it does the damage
that it was intended. Blasphemy, pretentiousness, rudeness,
offensive comments. Impetuousness, angry outbursts,
complaints, all of those things, all of those things can fly right
out of our mouths. So when Paul says. When Paul says, are we better
than they are, the Jews better than the Gentiles? No, in no
way. We’ve all sinned. That’s his
great point here. And he pulls out the illustration
of all illustrations that if there was ever a case to build
for the sinfulness of humanity, why not start with a mouth? Where
even after we have come to know God’s grace. We have every cause
in the world to guard every moment of every day that we live in
the grace of Christ. With great caution, lest we sin,
lest we do the easiest thing in the world to do. And that
is merely open our mouth and speak. Charles Bridges said it is wisdom. To restrain our lips, not indeed
in silence. But in caution to weigh our words
before uttering them, never speaking, except where we have something
to say. Speaking only just enough, considering
the time, the circumstances and the person of what is solid and
suitable and profitable. Let’s go before God to ask for
his grace. A merciful king. You get no argument from us.
We acknowledge. that especially prior to Christ,
we were absolutely fitted within this group of people characterized
by sinfulness in our speech. And Lord God, we thank you and
praise you that in your mercy, you saved us in spite of that.
And yet, even still, father, we have great cause to watch
and to guard our speech, to question it, To examine our hearts at
the end of each day, to plead with you for mercy, to cry out
to you for grace, that we would be changed by your grace. Lord God, examine our hearts. And examine our speech, because
one betrays the other. Our gracious God, if there are
any in the room, whose heart knows that they have sinned with
their mouths. If they know Christ, they know
where to go. If there are any in the room
whose heart affirms that they have sinned absolutely, then they must know that the
only remedy for sin of any kind, not the least of which is the
sin of our mouths, The only remedy is the Lord Jesus Christ, who’s
paid our penalty on the cross. Draw them, Father, we pray. Draw them in your grace to yourself
for forgiveness. That you would take them and
make them new. That as Isaiah, that you would
touch, as it were, their tongues with a burning coal and change
their mouths as you change their hearts. We know that you can
do that, Lord. You’ve begun a good work in us.
Begin it in those who do not know you this morning. We ask this in Jesus name, Amen. You. You. You.