Bible Commentaries
James 3

Verses 1-18

IV

TEACHERS AND TONGUES

James 3:1-18

All of James 3 is concerning teachers. It starts out this way: "Be not many of you teachers, my brethren, knowing that we shall receive heavier judgment." That is, don’t be in a rush to crowd into the teacher’s office, since the teacher is held to a more stringent account than the pupil. Dr. Broadus used to say that the ministry had a great attraction for weak minds. And it is certain that a great many weak minds do turn to the ministry. James merely wishes that the entering into the ministry should be a very careful, prayerful, thoughtful step. This chapter is one of the most important parts of the book of James, and ’indeed the Bible, and its value is simply incalculable to young preachers. By their profession they become teachers of the word of God; hence, no other chapter ought to be more important to them in their official character than this chapter. He then says, "If any stumbleth not in word, the same is a perfect man, able to bridle the whole body also." He is saying that the most difficult perfection to attain is perfection in talking; that it is harder to do right in talking than in anything else in the world. He uses three illustrations:

1. A bridle is put into a horse’s mouth – a very little thing – yet with that bridle one can guide that horse wherever he wants him to go.

2. He uses the helm of a big ship. The helmsman with that little instrument makes that ship go in the direction that he wants it to go.

3. "Behold, how much wood is kindled by how small a fire!" As it is expressed in the margin, "Behold, how great a forest of trees is consumed by a little fire!" Some one scampered along and carelessly left a fire. A spark blew out and caught the leaves and burned up a hundred million feet of wood timber. In the northern states and Canada, every year we have the most appalling accounts of forest fires, and very richly the saying of James expresses the thought, "Behold, how great a forest a little fire will burn down!" J. R. Graves, in one of his flights of eloquence, describes a man walking down the street lighting a cigar and throwing the match down; the match set fire to a shaving which curled over on some other shavings, and they caught fire and burned, and set fire to a great pile of lumber; and that lumber to a house and that house to a block and that block to a city, and a conflagration came that painted hell on the sky and left a hundred thousand people without homes.

James says of teachers that when they rush into the teacher’s office, they must remember the power of the tongue for good or evil, and that it must be controlled, as the horse must have the bridle, and the great ship the helm; and as the thoughtlessly kindled spark may destroy a world, so must they set a watch for the fire of their lips. In one of my opening addresses before the Seminary, I took as my theme, "Tongues of Fire and Rivers of Water."

But we come now to a part of James that is set over against Pentecost. Pentecost shows how the Holy Spirit sets on fire the tongues of preachers to preach the salvation of men. Here James brings out the devil’s tongues of fire – set on fire with tongues of demons. What a theme for a sermon – Pentecost tongues and the devil’s tongues! The tongue is a little member, it is a restless member, it is an unruly member, it is full of poison. It is set on fire of hell, and it sets on fire the whole course of nature, when it is kindled, just as the Holy Spirit fills the hearts of good men and gives them tongues of fire to proclaim the word of life in love and meekness, so the devil may kindle the tongues with a fire of hell, and use them as a means of universal ruin. Somebody, someday, will win immortal fame in contrasting the devil’s tongues of fire and the Spirit’s tongues of fire, in a sermon.

I recapitulate: The first admonition to the preachers: "Be not in haste to enter into the teacher’s office." How well our Lord speaks to this point: "Be ye not called Rabbi; for one is your teacher and ye are all brethren. And call no man father on the earth; for one is your Father, even he who is in heaven. Neither be ye called masters (magister, from which we get the word "master") for one is your master, even the Christ."

It was the characteristic fault of a Jew both at home and abroad to covet the honor of the teacher’s office more than the efficiency in the service of a teacher. Vanity and conceit would lead men to thrust themselves forward where angels dared not tread. Whoever is inspired to enter the teacher’s office from a spirit of vanity rather than the spirit of hard work is utterly unworthy of the position.

Paul, in Romans 2:17, says, "But if thou bearest the name of a Jew, and restest upon the law, and gloriest in God, and knowest his will, and approvest the things that are excellent, being instructed out of the law, and art confident that thou thyself art a guide of the blind, a light of them that are in darkness, a corrector of the foolish, a teacher of babes, having in the law the form of knowledge and of the truth; thou therefore that teachest another, teachest thou not thyself? thou that preachest a man should not steal, dost thou steal? thou that sayest a man should not commit adultery, dost thou commit adultery? thou that abhorrest idols, dost thou rob temples? thou who gloriest in the law, through thy transgression of the law, dishonorest thou God?" The thought of Paul is that the life of the teacher must harmonize with what he teaches. Read Cowper on this.

Again, we are told by Paul (1 Corinthians 14:29) that the teaching gift must be exercised, even when possessed, with due discretion, looking always to order and never to confusion. His picture of the Corinthian church shows that there were many teachers in that congregation. He says, "What is it then, brethren? When ye come together, each one hath a psalm, hath a teaching, hath a revelation, hath a tongue, hath an interpretation. Let all things be done unto edifying." He rebukes this church because of the disorderly method of teaching. Instead of convicting sinners, they produced an impression upon the mind of the ignorant man and of the skeptical man that they were crazy.

Again, Paul says that one who seeks the office of a bishop must be apt to teach. He must have the capacity to attract and hold the attention, to instruct the mind, to awaken the conscience, to lead the convicted sinner to Christ, to expound the word of God, rightly dividing that word. Unfortunately, the candidates for the teacher’s office are not all apt to teach. The caution to these would-be teachers is on the line that vanity should not be the cause of one entering the work of a teacher, seeing that he should not covet the honor more than the work itself, and that his life and his gifts must be exercised to the upbuilding of the church, and not confusion, and that unless he be apt to teach, he should not seek the position of a teacher. There are men with natural aptitude for teaching that are very ignorant. There are men full of information and a wide range of knowledge that cannot teach at all. They cannot impart what they know. They never wake up a soul, they never stir an audience, as Demosthenes did his audiences. When he got through, the crowd would be wild, and would say, "Let us fight Philip!"

His second admonition enjoins that the teacher must bridle his tongue. He gives two reasons for this governing of the tongue. He who can govern his tongue is a perfect man. I repeat that the word "perfect" is never used in the New Testament in the sense of sinlessness, but ’in the sense of maturity; and James certainly does not mean sinlessness, because he preceded his statement with the saying that we all stumble; that we all sin some. What he means by a "perfect" man is one who is mature; he who has bridled his tongue we call a mature man, just as a grown person is called an adult. His two reasons for bridling the tongue arise from its relative power for either good or evil. He uses the illustration to which attention has already been called. We put a bridle on a horse so as to turn his body wherever we may desire; so a bridle should be put on our own mouths. And as a helmsman steers a mighty ship in the storm through the use of the helm, so the one who would be a teacher must be able in every storm of life to have power of rightly directing his course, whatever be the direction of the wind or the force of the waves. He is led to say in illustration of the power of the tongue, "How great a forest a little fire destroyeth!"

His illustration is familiar in the classics. A writer has well said, "A little torch can burn the summit of Ida." Homer says, "A spark scarce seen fires a boundless forest." Vergil tells us of a careless shepherd who "wraps the forest in a robe of flame" by his carelessness at his campfire. Edgar Allan Poe tells of one who in a dream was caught up and carried away by an angel until he saw a volcanic island without soil or fountains or vegetation, hideous with ashes, its lava and its scars. "What is this?" he said to the angel. The angel replied, "This is an evil word that you spoke in yonder world that went on acting and reacting until it struck the shores of eternity, and God crystallized it into this horrible volcanic island." The angel then carried the dreamer away to behold another island covered with verdure; the grass carpeted it, the flowers beautified it and filled it with perfume. Luscious fruits bung from the boughs of many trees. Birds were singing in the groves. Fountains were playing and sending forth living waters. It looked like a paradise of God. Said the dreamer to the angel, "What is this?" "This," said he, "is a good word you spoke in yonder world. It went on acting and reacting until, striking the shores of eternity, it was crystallized into this island of the blessed."

Another reason assigned for the teacher’s keeping his tongue consists in the fact that through the devil’s gift men receive tongues of fire. As James expresses it, "Set on fire of Gehenna." We have seen the Spirit’s display of power on the day of Pentecost, and these tongues are employed in speaking of the wonderful works of God in leading men to salvation. He declares that this tongue, set on fire of hell, is restless, duplex, body-defiling, and that it sets on fire the whole wheel of nature. Man’s control is vividly set forth by James. Everything that swims, that walks, that crawls, that flies, bath been tamed. The elephant has been trapped and trained and employed in man’s service. The huge python has been brought from his home in the forest to become a show, and women take these hideous monsters and coil them around their bodies with impunity. The tiger’s cub has been bound with a chain, and the lion has been caged and forced to be harmless and dumb in the presence of the trainer. It is a fearful commentary on the untamable nature of the tongue that it is more untamable than any wild animal of the jungle, or bird of the air, or serpent of the rock, or fish of the sea. When set on fire of hell, this tongue is said to be full of deadly poison. Indeed, it is declared to be a world of iniquity; that is, there is no evil ever known to man that has not in some instance been brought about through evil speaking.

Solomon declares that in the lips of the worthless man is a scorching fire. David, in denouncing the evil counselor who sought his overthrow, says, "His mouth was smooth as butter, but his heart was war. His words were softer than oil, yet they were drawn swords." Again he prays, "Deliver me, great Jehovah, from lying lips and from a deceitful tongue. What shall be given unto thee, and what shall be done more unto thee, thou deceitful tongue, sharp arrows of the mighty coals of juniper?"

The tongues of the devil in malice curse men, made in the image of God. It becomes duplex, that is, it uses words to conceal ideas. This tongue, set on fire by the fires of hell, whispers away the good name of the innocent. It is given to backbiting, while friendly to the face; it slanders when the man’s back is turned. As the prophet says that the wicked in their talking eat up the sins of God’s people, the tongue set on fire of the devil is always murmuring, always scolding and is always foul.

In an early day in the history of the Waco Association, Dr. Riddle and myself were visiting all the churches, and one night we were bound to camp, and while looking at the stars the conversation turned upon the conversation of preachers, and I proposed that we enter into a solemn covenant, never while we lived would we tell a questionable anecdote. In the course of time we got about one hundred preachers into that covenant. And when Dr. Riddle was dying he called his wife to him and said, "Wife, we have been together a long time and now I am leaving you. Now, when I am dead, don’t you be one of those complaining women." Tears have come into her eyes, at least a dozen times since the dying admonition of her husband, as she has explained to me why she is not a murmurer or a complainer.

The third admonition is that the teacher must seek true wisdom. And as the Spirit’s tongues of fire had their opposite, the devil’s tongues of fire, so the true wisdom has its opposite, the devil’s wisdom. The contrast between the two kinds of wisdom is very sharp. One is from above and the other is earthly. One is full of mercy and good works without variance, without hypocrisy; the other sensual, carnal, devilish. The fruits are also contrasted. Peace is the fruit of one and strife of the other. This contrast between the two ought to be read whenever there is friction, evil speaking, and strife.

When I was a young man I became impressed by the vast amount of trouble that comes from talking the wrong kind of talk, and I caught myself in talking the wrong thing, so when I read that chapter I determined to see if I could find a way by which I could keep from evil speech, and, particularly, from anger. Naturally, I am impulsive, quick to take offense, quick to strike, and quick to say, and seeing that fault ’in myself I determined to learn a way by which when I was angry I could be silent; that I wouldn’t say anything. Well, it was the hardest thing to do that I ever tried. To be angry and not say anything! But I certainly accomplished it. I heard my daughter when she was twenty-one years old, say, "Papa, I have never heard you speak an angry word." That is the best way that I know to cure anger, that is, don’t say anything. If a man just won’t say anything he is safe, but he cannot when his mind is on fire with anger keep from doing wrong if he just lets his tongue be tied in the middle and wag at both ends.

Now, dear reader, try it. It will be a big job. When you have worked hard and are tired it is so easy to be petulant; it is easy to growl and whine, and it is so easy to become a man with a grievance. The world gets tired very soon of the man who has a grievance. Just carry your sorrow in your own heart.

There are great things in this for preachers. A man might steal from a man, might burn his house, but, if he burns a house, that burns out after a while, but if he says something, that goes on in every direction. I have known some lives blasted by gossip and slander just as a mighty forest fire blasts the vast trees.

QUESTIONS

1. What is the theme of James 3?

2. What is the first admonition concerning the teacher’s office?

3. What Dr. Broadus’ saying on this point?

4. What the special value of this chapter to preachers?

5. What is the most difficult perfection to attain?

6. What three illustrations used by James on this point?

7. What theme for a sermon suggested?

8. What the teaching of our Lord on the point of rushing into the teacher’s office?

9. What the characteristic fault of the Jew?

10. What does Paul say about the teacher and his teaching?

11. What Paul’s rebuke to the Corinthians on this line?

12. What qualification does Paul show that one must have who seeks the office of a bishop?

13. What his second admonition, and the application to teachers?

14. What the first reason why a teacher should guard his tongue?

15. Give classic illustrations of James’s use of fire.

16. What is Poe’s illustration of the power of a spoken word?

17. What is the second reason of James why the teacher should keep his tongue?

18. What is Solomon’s testimony on this point?

19. What is David’s?

20. What are some of the things the devil’s tongue can do?

21. What was the Carroll-Riddle covenant?

22. What is the teacher’s need of true wisdom?

23. Contrast the two kinds of wisdom, as to origin, elements, and fruits.

24. What is the beat way to cure anger?