Imagine for a moment growing up in the same house with Jesus. How many times did James sin in words spoken to his brother? How many times did he complain to his mother Mary and his father Joseph about Jesus? The scene from The Brady Bunch comes to mind, "Marsha, Marsha, Marsha!"
As someone who has been told I am larger than life and due to my size and passionate nature, I can be intimidating to some. I have come to learn it oftentimes isn't what I say but how I say it that matters most. And because I am a son of Adam and inherently fallen, I can cut people with my words, both spoken and written. Try as I might, I can never seem to get control of my speech. It is only through the power of the Holy Spirit and sanctification of my spirit that I can ever hope to be better than I am now. It is a CONSTANT battle. And if you listen to someone or yourself long enough the true condition of the heart will always reveal itself.
Imagine a man with an apple tree in his backyard. He planted the tree and tends it faithfully but it won't produce an edible apple. As bad as he wants it to give him the delicious and crispy apples he loves, it just keeps giving off bad fruit. He tries everything to correct this situation and as the last resort goes to the store and purchases a big bag of shiny red apples. He then ties these store-bought apples to his tree. That will fix the problem, right? Wrong.
The fruit on the tree will look great from a distance but the closer you get the more you realize that something is dreadfully wrong. It is the same with us. Our hearts, not so much our behavior and our speech, are ruined apart from Christ. So much of what we see and hear about people changing is nothing more than tieing apples on a tree. When my kids talk badly, I tell them to stop and speak better. That is necessary but that doesn't truly fix the problem. I have to dig deeper to find the roots of this issue. Jesus tells us that our tongue problem is a problem of the heart. We don't need a spiritual tongue doctor we need a spiritual heart doctor.
Each of us is guilty of saying something to hurt someone, whether intentional or not. And reading the 3rd chapter of James can leave you feeling like you're an utter failure. I know because that is how I used to feel when I would read it. But there is hope. If we are in a constant walk with Christ, if we are working towards having a sanctified heart and spirit, then there is hope. God speaks in redemption and we all know God has the last word. We just need to be faithful and speak the words that God gives us to speak as we grow with the Holy Spirit.
As someone who has been told I am larger than life and due to my size and passionate nature, I can be intimidating to some. I have come to learn it oftentimes isn't what I say but how I say it that matters most. And because I am a son of Adam and inherently fallen, I can cut people with my words, both spoken and written. Try as I might, I can never seem to get control of my speech. It is only through the power of the Holy Spirit and sanctification of my spirit that I can ever hope to be better than I am now. It is a CONSTANT battle. And if you listen to someone or yourself long enough the true condition of the heart will always reveal itself.
Imagine a man with an apple tree in his backyard. He planted the tree and tends it faithfully but it won't produce an edible apple. As bad as he wants it to give him the delicious and crispy apples he loves, it just keeps giving off bad fruit. He tries everything to correct this situation and as the last resort goes to the store and purchases a big bag of shiny red apples. He then ties these store-bought apples to his tree. That will fix the problem, right? Wrong.
The fruit on the tree will look great from a distance but the closer you get the more you realize that something is dreadfully wrong. It is the same with us. Our hearts, not so much our behavior and our speech, are ruined apart from Christ. So much of what we see and hear about people changing is nothing more than tieing apples on a tree. When my kids talk badly, I tell them to stop and speak better. That is necessary but that doesn't truly fix the problem. I have to dig deeper to find the roots of this issue. Jesus tells us that our tongue problem is a problem of the heart. We don't need a spiritual tongue doctor we need a spiritual heart doctor.
Each of us is guilty of saying something to hurt someone, whether intentional or not. And reading the 3rd chapter of James can leave you feeling like you're an utter failure. I know because that is how I used to feel when I would read it. But there is hope. If we are in a constant walk with Christ, if we are working towards having a sanctified heart and spirit, then there is hope. God speaks in redemption and we all know God has the last word. We just need to be faithful and speak the words that God gives us to speak as we grow with the Holy Spirit.
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