TEXT: James 1:26

SUBJECT: The Bridled Tongue #10: Spiritual Conversation

Today, with God’s blessing, we’ll continue the study we began two or three months ago. It’s called The Bridled Tongue. To "bridle your tongue" means to control what you say, how you say it, and when. You need to do that because, if you don’t, your devotion to God is worthless. A religion that does not affect the way you talk—in church and out—is no religion at all.

In the first part of our study, we looked at the qualities of good speech. Now, we’re on its content. As believers in Christ, we’re free to talk about almost anything. But some things are better to talk about than others. We’ve looked at two of them so far: Praising God and Thanking the Lord.

Now we move on to a third. I call it Spiritual Conversation.

Most people would define it as talking about the Bible, doctrine, the church, the Christian life, and so on. As far as they go, they’re right. But they don’t go far enough. I’ve heard a lot of this talk which was far from Spiritual. It was full of pride, contempt, and other things that cannot please the Lord. And, not only have I heard a lot of it, but I’ve done more of it than I care to admit. And maybe you have too. Perhaps you also have discussed the things of God without His love and grace in your heart.

By Spiritual Conversation, therefore, I mean talking about godly things in a godly way. It is discussing our Lord or the Bible or the Christian life with patience, humility, and wisdom. The Apostle calls it,

That’s what I’m getting at today.

Of course He does. Many verses teach this and let me cite three of them. The first is in the Old Testament, in Malachi 3:16, 17. There, the Lord praises His people for their godly conversations,

The New Testament teaches the same thing. Two verses, in particular, stand out. The first is Ephesians 4:29,

Many Christians read only half the verse. They get the negative part right: Don’t say bad words! And they’re right; we shouldn’t tell dirty jokes or use four-letter words. But that’s not all the verse says. In goes on to say: Speak in such a way as to impart grace to the people who hear you. Or, try to bless the ones you’re talking to. It’s a positive command. Don’t corrupt people by what you say, but do them good!

The other verse is very often quoted, but, again, only part of it. It’s Hebrews 10:25,

What is the verse getting at? Pastors are quick to tell you: It means go to church. That’s right, of course, but go to church for what? To sit quietly and listen? There’s a place for that, but that’s not what the verse says. It says to go to church in order to exhort each other. In other words, to talk about the things of God.

The Lord wants you to engage in Spiritual Conversation, and to get into the habit of talking about things that please Him and do His People good.

If you’ve been in church very long, you know that some people are a lot better at discussing spiritual things than others are. They’re smarter, maybe, better read, and can explain themselves more clearly than others. In other words, they have a real knack for talking about the things of God. They do it naturally and with warmth and wisdom. By all means, these people ought to talk up spiritual matters as much as possible.

But what about everyone else? What about the new believer whose enthusiasm is much greater than his knowledge? Or what about the man who never got past Third Grade? Or the woman who’s swamped with housework and taking care of the kids? Or shy people?

Should these people get in on the Conversation, or would they be better off leaving it to others?

The verses I referred to a few minutes ago seem unqualified. They say nothing about how smart you are, or how many books you’ve read, or how gifted you are in speaking, or how many years you’ve known the Lord. They’re addressed to every believer! To the 60 year old professor of theology, to the ten year old boy, and to everyone else.

It’s not that everyone is equally gifted, but that everyone is gifted. Every believer has an insight that others need to hear. Not on every topic, of course, but on some things he knows what others don’t know. He has something to say the rest of us need to hear.

Let me give you two illustrations.

A friend of mine is a pastor who knows a lot and has had something like thirty-five years in the ministry. He’s a good man and a good preacher. But he’s lacking in one area. He has a way of saying the right thing in the wrong way. Nobody disputes the truth of what he says, but he often hurts people by the way he says it. In other words, he lacks sensitivity. Now, thankfully, my friend has a very good wife, who is unusually gifted in this area. He runs all his sermons by her—not to check his Greek or Theology (which she doesn’t know), but to check his sensitivity (which she knows far better than he). Her insight is not the result of deep study, but it’s immensely helpful to her husband and her church.

On a personal note: The best advice I’ve had in the last several years came from an 11 year-old boy. He had something to say, something the pastor needed to hear.

The Lord wants all His people to talk about godly things. And not only does He want them to, but He has equipped them to do it. No believer knows everything and every believer knows something, therefore, everyone has something to add.

Including you.

This means: Don’t be intimidated by people who seem to (or really) know more than you do. Just say what you need to say and let God use it as He sees fit. Under the New Covenant, knowledge belongs to all the Lord’s People,

And the Lord gives you that knowledge, not to hide, but to use for the good of His people,

In short,

Have you been saved one week? If you have, you know something the oldest believer doesn’t know. Are you a bumbler with words—you know, you know, you know, uh, ah, well you see…--? If you are, you can still help the most eloquent man alive. But only if you stop worrying about what you don’t know or what you can’t put into words, and say what you do know and can put into words!

If "the earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof", then you can talk about spiritual things anywhere. But, there are two places in particular where you ought to do it: at home and in the church.

The Lord wants you to talk about spiritual things at home, Deuteronomy 6:6-7,

In these few words, there are three separate commands: meditation, formal teaching, and spiritual conversation. Keep My Words in your heart—God says—Teach them to your children, and just talk about them when you’re sitting around, taking a walk, lying in bed, and so on.

Family worship is a good thing, praying at the dinner table, telling stories at bed time, and so on. But I wonder how much good they do when the Lord never comes up at any other time? When He is compartmentalized or sealed-off from the rest of family life? These things are good, but they can never take the place of spiritual conversation.

The Lord also wants you to talk about godly things in Church. The verses I cited before are all in a church setting. Mutual exhortation is one way the Church grows in Christ. Paul says it occurs, as

Not just the pastors, the Sunday School teachers and the men who provide pulpit supply. But everyone—believing men, women, and kids—have something to say. And what they say promotes the health and happiness of God’s Church.

We ought to talk about the Lord everywhere, of course, but especially in the home and in the church.

There are some things you can do personally to promote spiritual conversation. They’re all pretty obvious, so I won’t spend much time of them:

In the first place, you can read the Bible more and think more about what you’ve read. Maybe you’ve got nothing spiritual on your tongue because you’ve got nothing spiritual on your mind.

Get God, His Word, and His Church into your heart and before long, you’ll be talking about them.

In the second place, you can reduce or eliminate the unnecessary thing you spend so much time thinking and talking about.

Underline the word "unnecessary". Some things have to be thought about a lot and talked about very often. But is sports one of them? Or movies? Note carefully: These things are not wrong to think about or to talk about. But, for many people, they become wrong because they take over their minds and fill up their conversations. It’s not that you don’t want to think or talk about spiritual things, but you’re so wrapped up in the pennant race, you’ve got no time to think or talk about them.

Only God’s mind is infinite. He can think of everything without excluding anything. But you and I can’t. To keep spiritual things in mind, you’ve got to exclude other things.

In the third place, you can repent of the worldliness and sin that so fill up your mind and conversations. By "worldliness" I mean things like "The cares of the world, the deceitfulness of riches and the pleasures of this life".

A really important thing you can do is Not Badger the person you’re trying to talk to. I know a man who’s been happily married for more twenty years. But he told me that the first year of his marriage was a living hell! One reason for it was…Family Worship! He assigned his wife a chapter to read and then quizzed her on it and corrected her work. This led to nothing good, but only to hurt feelings, self-righteousness, and other things that ruin family life! Don’t do that! Pharisaism in the home never makes things good.

In the Church, we can also do some things that promote conversation. Here they are, in brief:

In the first place, we can reject what people say without rejecting them. Arminianism is wrong, but the Arminian Christian is my brother in Christ. And, though I cannot agree with his doctrine, I am obliged to "receive him" in love.

In the second place, we can give people we disagree with a fair hearing. "Our Law condemns no man without hearing him" said the just Pharisee. Yet we often do. If something sounds "Arminian" or "Antinomian" or something else we don’t like, we stop listening and start labeling.

In the third place, we must be more interested in learning the truth than winning the argument.

And, finally, we can wait on God. Full agreement in this life is not possible. But it will occur one day. But we have to wait for it. And until then, "forbear with one another and forgive one another".