James 3:9-12 With the tongue, we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings, who have been made in God's likeness. Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this should not be. Can both fresh water and saltwater flow from the same spring? My brothers and sisters, can a fig tree bear olive, or a grapevine bear figs? Neither can a salt spring produce fresh water.
Human beings can utilize the tongue
for the highest calling (to praise God) and use it for the lowest evil (to
curse human beings). In those that are born again, it should not be that with
the tongue comes praise and cursing. We honor God with our words, but then we
turn right around and dishonor other people with what we say. This behavior is
inconsistent because humans are created in the image of God (Genesis 1:27). The
image spoken of here is perfection, which is what God is. Of course, none of us
as humans are perfect in ourselves; however, the saved have God's Holy Spirit
indwelling in them, which is perfect. With Peter's
tongue, he confessed Jesus as the Messiah, the Son of the living God, and denied
Jesus with curses. (Matthew 16:13-20; Matthew 26:73-74). John said, "love
one another" (John 13:34), and he wanted to speak the words to bring down
fire from heaven to destroy a Samaritan village (Luke 9:54).
Our dialogue should be consistently glorifying God. We should
not use one vocabulary or one tone of speaking at church and a different one at
home or on the job. Like a spring of water, our mouths should not send forth
both salt and fresh water. James points to the crucial unfeasibility of such a
contradiction. If corrupt fruit and bitter water continue to emerge, it means
that there is no surrender to God. James asks can a spring bring forth both
good water and bad? Can a spring yield both freshwater and saltwater? Of
course, the answer is no. Then He asks, can a fruit tree of one kind produce
the fruit of another kind? And again, we are forced to answer no. This now
brings up the obvious question. Then how could Christians that are following
the guidance of the Holy Spirit curse others? The obvious answer is they
cannot. And when a Christian does so, they are double-minded, as James pointed
out in a previous chapter (James 1:8).
In other words, Christians who do this are no longer following the Holy
Spirit, but rather they are trying to live as one with the world.
They are trying to live with one foot in the world and another
foot in God's kingdom, and that is not possible. And it naturally calls into
question the genuineness of their faith. The only cure for double-mindedness is
to turn our hearts and our lives entirely over to the Lord. And He will give us
a new heart sensitive to the will of God. And when we do this, God will replace
the source of our speech. We will no longer draw from a world at enmity against
God. Instead, we will draw from the divine source itself, the indwelling Holy
Spirit, along with the word of God.
It would be unnatural for a fig tree to bear olives, and it is
just as unnatural for Christians to live in sin. Unless one is regenerated,
born from above by a new and heavenly birth, one is not a child of God. and
cannot produce fruit which is agreeable to God, any more than a fig tree can
produce olives. You can call a fig tree an Olive Tree but that will not
make it an Olive Tree. You can trim a Fig Tree to look like an Olive Tree, but
that will not make it an Olive Tree. You can surround a Fig Tree with many
Olive Trees, and that will not make it an Olive Tree. You can transplant that
Fig Tree to the Mount of Olives, and that still would not make it an Olive
Tree.
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