Bold Steps with Dr. Mark Jobe - Controlling Your Mouth -- Part 2

0:00Today on Bold Steps with Mark Job, we're considering the profound impact that our words can have for better or worse. You need to put a security checkpoint in your mouth and you need to start speaking the things that are edifying good, godly, blessing into the life of your children, into the life of your marriage, into the life of your future and destiny because you are shaping with your words where you're going. Welcome to Bold Steps with Pastor Mark Job, President of Moody Bible Institute and Senior Pastor of New Life Community Church in Chicago. Now here's a question for you, just how important are the words we speak? Do the words we choose to say to one another and to ourselves matter? And do you believe that the words we use have a direct impact on the course of our lives?

1:00Well in today's message Mark challenges us to re-evaluate the way we talk as he reveals the spiritual significance of words. Mark is continuing our study in the book of James and returning to chapter 3 as we begin the second part of our message titled, controlling your mouth. Do you remember Jacob in Genesis chapter 32 or 33 I believe he wrestles with God and Jacob means deceiver and he wrestles with the angel of God and after he wrestles God says to Jacob, Jacob your name will no longer be Jacob. I'm changing your name to Israel which means someone who wrestles with God and wins. From now on when people say, hey Jacob, Jacob how you doing? No, no, no, sorry my name's not Jacob anymore, it's Israel.

2:00Oh, when that happened recently. Jago Buddy, no, no, Israel. Why? Because he was transitioning his destiny and his future from being a deceiver to being someone that wrestled with God and wins. So every time he spoke his name, every time he talked about who he was, he was, I wrestle with God, I win. I wrestle with God, I win. I wrestle with God, I win. That was 2000. That was over 2000 years ago, 2500 years ago that that happened. And even today now when a fifth grader spends the global round and puts his finger on the Middle East, there's a little trek of lamb there and on the globe and on the map it says Israel. Going all the way back to him who wrestled with God because his wrestling with God determined his destiny and his destiny was to be a father of a great and mighty nation and to populate it and because he spoke it, because he believed it, because God touched him, he became the father of a great nation, the nation of Israel.

3:08What I want you to understand is that God changed his name specifically so he would have to speak his new destiny so he would have to speak his new name so he would be declaring who he was before he was even it. Do you remember the story of Gideon in judges? Gideon was the Midianites had oppressed them and they were Gideon was in a cleft of a rock hiding from the enemy trying to make some food and the angel of the Lord appeared to him and he said, How are you mighty warrior? He wasn't a mighty warrior. He was a scared oppressed person but God was speaking into his destiny mighty warrior. Oh, he was not that yet but he was becoming a mighty warrior. It was the first time that Gideon had seen himself as a mighty warrior. Why? Because God through his spirit was speaking into his future, speaking into his destiny, he was speaking into who he would become. There are power in words, a power that shape your future, power that begin to channel your destiny. In the same positive power that's there, there's a negative power that's there as well and that's what James talks about.

4:26Listen what it says in in Proverbs chapter 18 verse 20 through 21 it says, for the fruit of his mouth, a man's stomach is filled from the fruit of his mouth. It's talking about words. With a harvest from his lips, he is satisfied. The words that you speak out end up satisfying. They create either a bad vacuum or a good atmosphere in which you live. The tongue has the power of life and death and those who love it will eat its fruit. Those who love what? Those who understand that the tongue has power, those who understand that we are to love the good fruit that the tongue can produce and understand that there's also bad fruit that's there.

5:27In the tongue, the tongue has the power of life and the power of death as well. James continues his discourse and he says, hey, the tongue is a small part of your body but it can make great boast. Consider what a great forest fire is set on fire by a small spark which leads me to my third point. Our words have extraordinary power to influence for good or for evil. Look at what it says, verse six, the tongue is also a fire, a world of evil among the body parts. It corrupts the whole person. It sets the whole course of his life on fire and it itself is set on the fire of hell. Wow. Have you ever seen a mighty forest fire? My nephew is a firefighter in Pasadena, California and they have a lot of forest fires there.

6:32It's like every year it gets dry and a huge acreage of land starts burning and they always try to trace what the arson came from and sometimes something as small as someone flicking a cigarette but that was still lit starts a forest fire. A little spark can burn a huge fire and once it started, it's virtually impossible to put out. Once a fire starts, I mean it's raging, it can do tremendous damage once it started but a little flick can get it started. Listen, the tongue is the same way. He's talking about your own life. Listen, he says the tongue is also that kind of fire. It's a world of evil among the body parts because once it gets going in the wrong direction, it can contaminate your soul and spirit. It can begin to influence your family and your neighbors and your destiny. It can begin to burn in a way that you cannot put out. It corrupts the whole person. It sets the whole course of his life on fire.

7:39Your tongue can set all of your life in the wrong direction on fire, fire destroys. Because of what you speak, you can be damaging your household and your marriage and your finances and your future and your children. Your words can be starting a fire that's a fire of destruction and the fire begins to spread and once it's spread, it's hard to stop. It's hard to put out and you say, well pastor, what if I just take back those words? Listen, once those words are out, it's really hard to take back. I heard of a young man that went to his wise old grandfather and he said, grandpa, I think I've blown it. I've been talking about someone and I've gossiped and said things that weren't true and I really want to make it right. What should I do? And he said, well son, I want you to go and get a pillow full of feathers. I want you to split it open. I want you to throw the feathers to the wind and then come back and so he did that and he came back.

8:48And then the grandfather said, now I want you to go and find all of the feathers and put them back in the pillow. And he said, I could never do that. I mean the wind's taking them in the same way. Once those destructive words have gone out there, it's very hard to be able to take back the words that you've already spread out there. Now here's the point. The point is once the tongue gets going and keeps going, it begins to create a fire. A fire that starts burning. You can have one man within the household that cannot control his tongue. And so when he speaks to the children, he speaks to them harshly and critically and you're nothing and you're dumb and why don't you ever obey and you're this and you're that and speaks to his wife harshly and that relationship that could be good and could blossom. He speaks words and then he says, I'm sorry I said that babe and she'll take babe. I'm sorry so far before she gets hard and like right before you do it again.

9:53And suddenly his marriage gets hard and suddenly his kids start turning rebellious and against them. He's spoken into their destiny and suddenly the words that he's spoken his son starts to live out and his wife starts to live out and his boss starts to live out. And this fire starts to spread and spread and spread. It's affected the destiny of his children is affecting his job. It's affected his marriage and he looks up and he says, I don't know how I've gotten to this point. Listen, I know how you got to that point. You started a fire and you kindled that fire and you spoke into that fire and now your life is burning and the very things that you treasure and love are burning up on a fire that's evil and hard to stop but it all started with the tongue. The power of words. Listening to bold steps and today's message from Mark Joe is titled controlling your mouth. If you haven't been to our website yet, we encourage you to visit and see all the faith building resources and opportunities and sermons series we have available. Just go to boldsteps.org.

11:00And even catch up on these daily lessons right from your phone or mobile device by downloading the bold steps app. With the app, you can listen to Mark's messages on demand. You can dive into full length sermons and browse exclusive video content. It's already your fingertips whenever you're ready. So open up the app store on your phone or mobile device and download it for free. Bold steps app. And if you'd like to get even more connected with us and maybe share how God is using bold steps in your life, we always love to hear from you Mark. We read and see these comments that come in. We do and we just received a message from Virginia who lives in Aurora and she says as always, moody is on my radio playing in my car. Absolutely love to hear that. I love all the programs, especially bold steps. Thank you and God bless you. Our joke is wonderful and very knowledgeable and I really appreciate him so much. Thank you Virginia. That means a lot. You know, we put energy, time, prayer into the preparation of these messages. And we really believe that God is speaking at particular moments to particular people that really need it. So thanks for that word of encouragement.

12:06Your message is not only encourage us, they encourage the whole team here at bold steps. So keep that in mind when you contact us. You can reach us online at boldsteps.org or send email to boldstepsappmoody.edu. Now we also have set up a special phone line or listener line where you can leave a message with your own voice. It's 312-329-2011-312-329-2011. Now let's go back into the second half of Mark's message today. It's titled controlling your mouth. And James says this very fire is set on fire by the fires of hell. The word hell here and the Greek comes from the word gehenna. Gehenna was a Jerusalem city dump on the outside of the wall where people would bring their trash and they would burn.

13:13And this fire was always going and they would bring dead carcasses of animals and burn them there. They would bring even bodies of enemies and burn them there. It was trash dump. It was smelly. It was infected with bacteria. The fire was always burning. It was a place that people avoided. It was a fire that continued to go. The word hell comes from the word gehenna. The same idea is this fire is a destructive fire that is constantly burning. What it tells us in Proverbs 26 verse 18-19, like a man who throws firebrand arrows and death is the man who deceives his neighbor and then says that was only joking. The great thing about this is if you've had a loose tongue and your tongue has been speaking in the wrong direction, the great thing is that the same power that it has for evil, it has the same power for good. There's something powerful about words spoken at the right time into someone's life.

14:19There are people that I know that had a teacher spoken to their lives, believed that they could do it or a coach that spoke and believed and encouraged and was honest and did something into their lives. James continues on verse 7-12 as last section here. He basically tells us it's our choice whether our tongue flows in life or death. Notice what it says in verse 7. All kinds of animals, birds and reptiles and creatures of the sea are being tamed and have been tamed by man. But no one can tame the tongue. It's a restless evil full of deadly poison. I was at the Shed Aquarian with my 11-year-old son recently and saw whales jumping through hoops and dolphins doing flips and seals flapping because they had been tamed. But yet the tongue is hard to tame, impossible to tame by man only through the power of God can our tongue be tamed.

15:24Through the power of the Holy Spirit. With our tongue we praise the Lord and Father and with it we curse men who have been made in God's likeness out of the same mouth come praises and curses. My brothers this should not be can both freshwater and salt water flow from the same spring. My brothers can a fig tree produce olives or a grapevine bear figs, neither can salt spring produce freshwater. What James is saying is hey you need to decide what your tongue is going to be. Is it going to be a force of good or a force of evil? Because some of you are blessing Jesus on Sunday and cursing your driver on Monday. You have to decide what it's going to be you can't produce to both and the other and there has to be a steady stream of what God is bringing in you. Let me tell you the secret of doing this. With man it's impossible. Look what it tells us in Ephesians.

16:24Ephesians chapter 4. Ephesians chapter 4 verses 18 and 19 says this. Do not get drunk on wine which leads to debauchery. Debachi is another word of another way of saying just leads you to be out of control. Don't get drunk with wine because if you're drunk you just kind of get out of control. You stumble, you slur, you talk. You do things that normally you wouldn't do. You say things normally you wouldn't do. You dance in ways normally you wouldn't dance. And then you say did I do all that? Yeah. Don't get drunk with wine because it leads to out of control living. But instead be filled with the spirit. And when you're filled with the spirit here's what's going to happen. You will speak to one another in songs and hymns and spiritual songs. You'll sing and make melody in your heart to God.

17:25Always giving thanks to God the Father for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. When you're filled with the spirit the first thing that starts changing is your speech and your tongue. And when your speech and your tongue changes the course of your life changes. You start singing and making melody and those you become grateful. You start giving thanks to God. You start saying thank you Lord and instead of the Lord do I have this piece of junk car. And look at my neighbor he's got a nice car. I got this piece of junk over here. I can't stand this car. My job doesn't pay enough. Man this house has leaks in it. Man this wife, you know I kind of regret I married her. These kids are you know you're talking negativity criticism. When you're filled with the spirit you begin to thank God for what you have. You begin to bless God. You begin to praise God. You begin to say thank you God that you are on the throne. Thank you God that at least I have a car that has wheels and drives most of the time. Thank you Lord that I have a job and I'm not in skid row.

18:25Bless you Lord that I have a wife and I love her and I'm still married to her. Thank you that I have my children and they're not perfect but I'm praying into their destiny and their lives. And you begin to speak the positive power of God into their lives. You begin to speak out of faith and not out of flesh. You begin to praise instead of criticize. You begin to speak favor instead of curses out of your life. And that's the way that your tongue becomes a power of blessing to many people. It nothing like being around a negative person. Have you ever been on a team of some sort and there's one negative person? It's like EOR in Winnie the Pooh. It's never going to happen. We're never going to make it. One negative person can begin to influence the whole team spirit.

19:29It's that way with the tongue. One critical complaining person can affect your destiny. You remember the people of Israel? God took them out of the land of slavery and said I have a promise land for you. They were on their way to the promised land and then they got to the very shores of the promised land and they were complaining and we can't do the... There's giants in the land. We'll never be able to take them. I mean, why have you taken us here? Hey, we want better food than this. We can never make it. And after murmuring and complaining, God said you want a future of murmuring and complaining. Then how about 40 years in the desert where you have something to complain about? And it was because of their lips, because of their tongue, because of their mouth. It's the blessing and thinking they complained and cursed and God sent them to the desert for 40 years. So they could get that complaining and cursing out of their system. I believe that when people are filled with the spirit, they will begin to speak the words of God.

20:34Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, my Redeemer. Let me close with this thought. Listen. I believe that some of us need to begin to put a checkpoint between our brain and our words. Once I'll run into someone and they say, I'm just the kind of person I just speak whatever's on my mind. Well, honey, I wouldn't be proud of that. That's not something to brag about. Because really, you shouldn't speak everything on your mind. There are certain things that pop in your mind. You just keep it in your mind. It's a sign of immaturity. If everything that comes in your mind, you speak out. If I look at what the psalmist says, the psalmist says, I will guard my ways, less thy sin with my tongue. I will restrain my mouth with a muzzle. Well, the wicked are before me. What David is saying, hey, I'm going to guard what comes out of my mouth

21:37because I know my words affect people's lies and affect my destiny. So I'm going to guard what comes out of my mouth. You know, you go to an airport security and you go through a checkpoint. And if you have something that shouldn't cross to the other line, they frisk you and they say, sir, you can't take this in. Some of you need to frisk your thoughts before they turn into words and make sure that stuff that shouldn't be spoken stays on the other side. You need to put a muzzle. You need to put a security checkpoint in your mouth and you need to start speaking the things that are edifying good, godly, have a future, dignity, success, blessing into the life of your children, into the life of your marriage, into the life of your future and destiny because you are sowing seeds into you are shaping with your words where you're going. Powerful message today from Mark Job.

22:37Mark, we have a few moments. Can you follow up on what you mean by guarding our words? Do you want to say more about that? Yeah, you know, James says that our tongue is set on fire and it refers to the fires of hell. I've spoken to so many grown men who still have deep wounds from words spoken in anger by their father when they were young. And little did that father know, maybe they just said, well, it was just words, but the piercing of those words, the damage, the hurt, the scars that are left are deep and powerful. And so I want to challenge you whether you're a father or a spouse or a friend that the words that you speak, they're not just words. They have power in them for good,

23:38and they have power in them that is set ablaze on the fires of hell. Very destructive. Yes. Well, thank you for that challenge, Mark. Next time we'll be learning how to pursue godly wisdom and we'll discover a few key steps to take in order to get closer to God's will. But if you missed any part of today's message or want to share it with a friend, just go to our website and find all the ways you can listen at boldsteps.org. We want to draw you closer to the presence and power of Jesus Christ. In this month, we're excited to be offering a powerful book by New York Times best-selling author, Dr. David Jeremiah, called Keep the Faith, How to Stand Strong in a World Turned Upside Down. When life knocks you down with fear, discouragement, and worry or doubt, Dr. Jeremiah shows you how to lean on the strength of your faith even in the toughest times. If you're biblical wisdom and compelling real life stories, you'll discover how to face life's daily battles and experience the blessings of grace, perseverance, responsibility, and fortitude. Regardless of your circumstances, God will hold you up to help you face whatever comes your way.

24:42We'll be happy to send you a copy of Keep the Faith when you make a donation of any amount to support bold steps. Just call us at 800-DL Moody. That's 800-356-6639 or give online at boldsteps.org-giv. And if you'd rather send your donation through the mail, our address is boldsteps 820 North La Salle Boulevard, Chicago, Illinois, 60610. Well, I'm so glad you joined us. Be sure to listen next time when Mark starts a new message about finding true wisdom in a world filled with foolishness. And don't forget, all weekend long, our Sister Program Bold Steps Weekend is available to help you stay grounded in God's Word beyond the work week. It's a great way to continue learning, growing, and taking bold steps of faith one day at a time. You can listen to your local Moody radio station on your podcast app or anytime at boldsteps.org. Join us here on Bold Steps, we'll be learning about making wise decisions next time on the Monday edition of Bold Steps with Mark Jewel.

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