The Power of Words: Reflecting Christ's Love

Music.

So glad you've joined us today as we continue our Christmas series,

Ugly Sweater Christmases.

While we often laugh at the outrageous patterns and colors of our holiday sweaters,

the truth is some of the things we allow into our lives can be far less amusing and much uglier.

In today's message, Pastor Jeff dives into the power of our words.

Words have the ability to build up or tear down, to heal or to hurt.

How can we reflect Christ's love in what we say, especially during this season.

Let's lean in and discover how to overcome ugly words.

Music.

Well, good morning. Welcome to Generations Church. I am so glad that you are

here with us this morning and I hope you feel at home and feel welcomed as you come in this morning.

We are so glad that you've chosen to worship with us this morning.

I wish that I were here with you, But I got the run. I just signed up tonight.

And so instead of making someone read my sermon, I thought I would come in and

at least attempt to record it for you guys.

Because I know that God has something that he wants to say and that he wants to do.

And we're not going to let a little bit of sickness get in the way.

I do want you to know I showered before I came over here to record this. I got dressed.

I put on my new ugly sweater slash sweatshirt. check it out, right?

If I would have come, maybe I'll be the one, I don't know, but yeah.

But I'm so glad that it's okay to have fun in the house of the Lord.

But would you go with me to the Lord in prayer and let's pray and ask God's

blessing on the message this morning.

Lord, we come to you and we're so grateful and thankful for the Word of God.

We're thankful that as we dive in, as we open the Word, your Holy Spirit will

reveal things, we'll reveal truth, we'll convent of sin, and we'll open blind eyes and deaf ears.

And so we ask this morning that you would speak, help us to get rid of the ugliness

in our hearts this Christmas.

It's not really about Christmas sweaters, it's about the ugliness of our hearts.

The ugliness of our minds, and today the ugliness of our vocabulary and our words that we say.

Would you change us and make us more like you? We ask it in Jesus' name. Amen.

Well, last week we talked about the battle, the battlefield,

and the battle plan where it comes to getting rid of the ugliness of our thoughts.

We talked about the fact that the enemy, the devil, he knows where we're vulnerable.

And so he'll come and he'll knock, right? He'll knock on the door of our minds.

And it's not sin for us to have a thought, but it is a sin for us to begin to

dwell on those thoughts, to allow those lies to come in and for us to host them, if you will.

Today, we're going to be talking about something that we all struggle with.

And that is the sin and problem of our ugly words.

Our ugly words.

I came across this quote by Henry Ferguson, and it says this,

If someone picked you ten cents for every kind word you said about people and to people,

but they collected five cents for every unkind word you said to people,

Would you be rich or would you be poor?

How would you fare if for every unkind word, someone took away five cents?

Words are powerful. I'll just share an example with you, and I'm going to give you a list of words.

And I just want you, even though it's technology and you're watching the video,

I want you to act like I'm here, okay?

So if you're going to make fun of me, make fun of me. If you're going to laugh, laugh.

Dean, if you want to say amen, say amen. But just be yourself this morning, okay?

So I'm going to put up some noise. Here's the first word. Go ahead and put it up.

Snow. When I say the word snow, what do you think?

Some of you are not very happy about that word.

That is not inciting a very good feeling, is it?

What about this? Hot chocolate.

Now we're talking, right? That's a little bit better.

When I say the words hot chocolate, you're thinking, oh, man,

I've worn maybe some melted marshmallows.

I'm getting in the mood for hot chocolate just talking about it.

What about this? Christmas lights.

Maybe you think, oh, Danny and Lisa. By the way, their display is up.

Go into their house. Go ask them. They'd love to have you come by.

Here's another word for you.

Eggnog. What does that have to be for you? We have a tradition at our house,

growing up with my family.

My mom makes the

most amazing eggnog i

don't think my kids like it somewhat but i grew up on

it it's like homemade it's not anderson erickson

stuff it's the real stuff there's clumps of i don't know what it is but there's

it's amazing and then you rub some cinnamon and nothing on it it's awesome what

about the word mistletoe well yeah i know right somebody said man i hope this maybe you this?

This will be the year. Then I

get to kiss that beautiful girl under the mistletoe. What about this one?

Fireplace. As soon as I say that, I can already feel the warmth.

I can feel the heat coming off. I can hear the crackling.

And so every time you say a word, there's an automatic response in our hearts and in our lives.

Some words make us excited. Some words make us think of great memories or family activities.

Some make us happy. Some make us feel frustrated.

Maybe some words make us feel anger at the thought of failing.

Words, they're so policy. You shook the hand in a handout when you walked in

this morning and it's got some fill in the place this morning.

Once you take advantage of that and just take some notes if you would.

Words carry so much meaning, and it matters how we use them.

And the first thing that we need to do this morning is we need to understand the power of our words.

You and I need to understand the power of our words.

Read with me from Proverbs 18, verse 21.

Proverbs 18:21

It says this, Death and life are in the pile of the tongue, and those who love it will eat its fruit.

Do you understand that you have the ability to speak death and life because

of the power that's in the tongue?

Your words have incredible power to impact others in incredible and profound ways.

Do you realize that the words you say and how you say it can influence someone's

thoughts, someone's emotions, even their actions?

The words you choose to speak can uplift someone.

They can inspire someone. They can bring comfort to someone.

And they can put in joy and renewal to those who hear them.

Conversely, they can also wound. They can discourage us. They can hurt us.

They can bring about destruction.

I know in my own life, this has been one of the biggest struggles and sin areas for me.

Most of my life, when I get angry, I have the potential to rain down words upon the hearer.

It's just a special gift that I've had my entire life that I still have to wrestle

with and still have to try to gain control.

Words can bring life into dreams.

You ever have a coach that just said, Hey, I believe in you.

You're going to do great things.

Or a mentor that just believed in you.

Maybe a counselor or a friend who just sat and listened and gave you words of

affliction and just said, Hey, even though I don't understand,

even though I don't know what to say, I love you and I'm here for you.

And just those words alone, that's so much comfort to where you were at.

Words can offer encouragement and help to someone who is absolutely hopeless.

Your words can empower someone. They can be a source of strength and motivation.

But on the other hand, words spoken in anger and hatred or deceit can sow seeds

of discord and pain and despair, leading to turmoil in relationships and destruction.

The way you communicate with others, even the tone you use, the facial expressions,

all convey a message that has the potential to either bring about life or death.

Choose your words wisely, for they have the power to shape the world and the people around you.

Next in your notes, our hearts either build up or they tear down.

Our hearts either build up and bring healing to somebody or they tear down and

they bring destruction.

Proverbs 16, 24 says, high words are like honey, sweet in the soul and healthy for the body.

It does you so much good just to hear an affirmation just to hear one kind word

from somebody it brings healing and there's a sweetness have you ever been around somebody,

that when you leave them you just feel you know like they just simply fed you some honey.

They built you up. They were gracious. They were loving. They were kind.

May our words, friends, be honey to those who hear.

Proverbs 15, 4 says, The soothing tongue is a tree of life, but a perverse tongue crushes the spirit.

We need to daily assess the state of our words and the condition of our tongues

because they're either building others up or they're tearing people down.

In the book of James, we're given extensive warnings about the kind of damage

that our speech can cause.

I won't go into great depth and detail because we did walk through the book

of James a few months ago.

But I want to revisit just a few verses. James 3, 5, and 6.

James was addressing the early church as they were learning how to build the local church.

We're a church player. We're almost two years old.

I can't identify with these people in James. They're really working hard and

learning how to interact with one another and how to build a church and how

to get things done and how to please God rather than people and how to balance everything.

And he knew that they were working so hard, but that it could easily all be

undone by some sinful, careless words.

This is what he said. Likewise, the tongue, it's a smaller part of the body,

but it makes great boast.

Considering but a great force is set on fire by a small spark.

The tongue is also a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body.

It corrupts the whole body, sets the whole course in one's life on fire,

and is itself set on fire by God.

That's incredibly powerful. Your tongue has the ability to set the whole course of your life on fire.

The first thing we have to do is recognize that there is incredible power in

our words, both for good and for harm.

Then after we recognize the power of our words, we have to do this.

Number two, identify the ugniness of our words.

And this is where the work begins to take place in our lives, right?

We have to go through the proverbial closet of our speech.

We have to identify those things in it that we need to get rid of.

And as we pray, the Holy Spirit will begin to help us to identify the different

types of negative habits that we have with our speech.

And the more time that we spend in Scripture and in prayer and with the Lord,

He will begin to identify things that we need to get rid of.

So let's look at our closet over here, and we're going to take a look and see

what we need to get rid of.

There's a few things that stick

out right away when it comes to the things that we do with our mouths.

Probably the biggest one is lying we're going to go over here and we're going

to go through our mind and we're going to look for lying.

Going to get rid of it we don't want it in our lives

anymore we have to identify it

we we can't just put it back and use

it once in a while no we've got to get rid of it we got to throw it away we've

got to be done with it we know that that lie is a big deal to god all throughout

scripture we see that lying is a big deal i mean it even made the top 10 right

it made the 10 commandments.

Exodus 20, 16 says, you shall not give false testimony against your neighbors.

What does that mean? He's talking about lying.

Colossians 3, do not lie to one another since you have put off the old self with its practices.

See, it's a practice of those who

don't know christ to easily fall into

life to not be trusted but as

someone who is a new christian and now

as a mature christian as the holy spirit begins to

clean you up and fix you it makes

it it makes you new and then you you

put off that old stuff you get

rid of the light so we've

got rid of the lying we've got sat in here

well oh oh generation's church

oh we got gossip we got gossip i don't know why it's intentional vikings i didn't

do that should be like a packers or if we were talking about cheating we can

have kansas city chiefs or something like that but gossip we we gotta get rid of gossip it's gone.

Many relationships have been ruined by gossip?

How many people have left the faith or have left a church because of gossip?

Proverbs 11 says, a gossip goes around revealing a secret, but a trustworthy

person keeps a confidence.

Gossip. Do you ever read a movie in youth group where or a party when you're a young girl,

play the telephone game, or we played this within the last year or two on Wednesday nights,

but you line a bunch of kids up and you tell them a secret at the beginning

and you whisper them their ear and then they each tell the person,

they each tell the person to

write the end, they're supposed to tell you what the first person heard.

It never is the same thing. It's never the same thing.

Usually there is one word, or one grain of salt to it, but be honest with you, I've dealt with this.

Here, there are people that are no longer here because they heard a grain of sand.

And they didn't come talk to us, they didn't come talk to me, get yourself.

Gossip does incredible damage to relationships.

Gossip does incredible damage to friendships.

Clive 16 says, A perverse person stirs up conflict, and a gossip separates close friends.

The truth is that. So the next time someone comes to you and wants to speak

to you about someone else, You need to say, sorry, I don't want anything to do with gossip.

I don't want anything to do with disunity.

I don't want anything to do with stirring up conflict. I love this next verse.

Proverbs 26, 20 says this, Without wood, fire goes out.

Without wood, fire goes out. without a

gossip conflict dies down

okay what a great contrast

we're given in farmers how much

conflict and disunity in the body of christ would disappear if we refused to

gossip we've got to get rid of gossip let's see what else is in our closet over

here got a nice suit jacket maybe my mom is Jerry would like me to put on.

We've got a very nice jacket.

Very nice jacket, but it's slain.

What about slander?

We all know it's wrong to gossip, but what exactly is slander?

Slander is the act of making a false, damaging statement about someone verbally

with the intent to harm their reputation.

Awesome is the spreading of information that's not worth to spread,

while slander is set with a direct intent to harm someone's reputation.

Proverbs 20, 19 says this, Whoever goes about slander and reveals secrets,

therefore do not associate with a simple battle.

So we've got to get the slander out of our lives. Not just out of our lives,

but here Proverbs says, don't even associate with people that tend to do that.

Are you kidding me? God doesn't want us to not associate with people.

He wants us to love people. Yes, he does want us to love people.

But let's look at Psalm 101, verse 5.

Psalms 101:5

This is what God said about slavery.

He said, I will destroy, that's a pretty powerful word, I will destroy anyone

who secretly slanders his neighbor.

I cannot tolerate anyone with haughty eyes or an arrogant heart.

So now we've got this connection that's happening between someone who's slandering

and someone with an arrogant heart. There's a strong connection between the two.

Says this in James 4.11, Brothers and sisters, do not slander one another.

Anyone who speaks against a brother or a sister or judges them speaks against the law and judges in.

When you judge the law, you are not keeping it, but sitting in judgment on it.

This is why slander is so mad. those who

slander begin to worship at the

altar of themselves and their

hearts become so full of pride that

they'll do anything to exalt themselves and put others

down when someone slanders someone

else they are not out for the unity of

the body of jesus christ they're not not for the good of anyone

they're absolutely consumed with

themselves and making themselves look

better that's why it's so

bad god says when we slander someone

we place ourselves in the

seat of god and we try to cast judgment

where we have no jurisdiction and god

hates it and so should we so we

gotta get rid of that all right we need to keep

moving what else we have in here criticism yeah

that's a that's a big one isn't it a lot of us have struggled with criticism

and we've got to get rid of it and here's what criticism is criticism is the

act of judging unfavorably or fault finding when you criticize someone,

you're not building them up or speaking life into them.

When you criticize someone, you're tearing them down at your fault-finding in them.

Yes, let me say there is constructive criticism, right? There's constructive criticism.

And sometimes criticism can be healthy.

But here's what constructive criticism or healthy criticism looks like.

Healthy criticism is always, say always.

Always. All right, just making sure you're still with me.

Healthy criticism is always based on truth, grounded in love,

and results in edification.

You want to know if what you're doing to your spouse or to your kids or to your

conagers or to whoever any of your friends.

Know if it's healthy criticism or negative sinful criticism ask yourself the question,

did the person i criticize leave feeling

loved and feeling edified man i've

been so bad at this sometimes well

i'll come to somebody and i'll talk to them and my

heart i think my heart's in the right place and i want them

to to feel loved and i want them to feel edified but then i just turn it and

i find faults and even though sometimes we feel like we're doing them a favor

well if they just know no god's got to reveal that to them sometimes people need to leave,

a conversation with you and i feel it that you care that we care about them

that we love them and that they're edified.

Even if they have different thoughts than you, even if they dress differently

than you, even if they have a different lifestyle than you,

people need to leave your presence feeling loved and edified.

Parents, we're so guilty with our kids with this one.

We criticize a lot of times out of our emotions or out of anger or disappointment.

And there's so much damage that has been done between fathers and kids and mothers and kids.

Even between spouses. It happens all the time in sinful ways.

And I'm with you on this. This is something that I struggle with.

I feel like Paul, when he said, I'm the chief sinner.

I have failed my kids time and time and time again and left conversations where

they didn't feel loved, where they didn't feel edified, but they felt disappointing.

Like they disappointed us or they weren't loved. And it tore them down.

1 Corinthians 13, we all know it as the love chapter. It says this,

love is patient. Love is kind.

Love does not envy. It is not boastful. It is not arrogant. It is not rude. It is not self-seeking.

It is not irritable, and it does not keep a record of wrongs.

Verse 6, love finds no joy in unrighteousness, but rejoices in the truth.

It bears all things, believes all things, it hopes all things,

and it endures all things.

Listen, if you are criticizing someone and it's done in love,

then what you said, what you said will reflect those characteristics found on 1 Corinthians 17.

Will feel loved when you walk away. A couple more things in this clause,

and I know we gotta shut this down.

Malice. Malice. Anyone know what malice is?

Malice. We gotta get rid of it. 1 Peter 2 says, Therefore, rid yourselves of

all malice, all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and all slander.

So we know we're supposed to get rid of it, but what is it? What does it really look like?

Colossians 3 says this. It's going to show us a little bit more characteristics

of what malice is associated with.

Colossians 3.8, but now put away all the following, anger, wrath,

malice, slander, and filthy language from your mouth.

So this is when you add filthy language, you add slander, you add anger,

and you put some wrath in it, and that gives you the definition of malice.

Malice is the desire to cause pain, injury, harm, and distress with our words.

How many have you done that? If you've ever been married, you've probably done

that. If you've ever been a parent, you've probably done that.

And Jen and I, when we first got married, we came from just similar backgrounds,

but different family atmospheres.

We had so much to learn about communication.

I thought the winner of, you know, you get in fights, you got to have a winner.

And so I was out to be the winner.

And that did not bode well for an unmarried couple.

Many times have we spoken to our spouses or children with the intent to hurt them with our words.

We speak out of anger. We use words to belittle or to degrade. We call names.

We pound people into the ground because in our hearts, we really want them to suffer pain.

And some of us in here today and we're

guilty of intentionally causing pain on others with our words and you've never

owned it you've never confessed it to what it is and that's sin and some of

you need to confess to the person you've sinned against with your words and

you need to do it as soon as you can't.

Get rid of it. Cast it out. The last one here in our closet.

Filthy language. Filthy language.

Ephesians 4 says this. No foul language should come from your mouth,

but only what is good for building up someone in need so that it gives grace to those who hear.

We just read this next text

a few minutes ago but we're going to read it again put

away paul says put away all

of the following anger wrath malice slander and filthy language from your mouth

we see all throughout scripture that cussing and our language should reflect a change in our hearts,

James 3 says this in verse 10 through 12, blessing and cursing come out of the same mouth.

He's identifying a problem that he's seeing in the church.

He says, blessing and cursing are coming out of the same mouth.

Like brothers and sisters, these things should not be this way.

It shouldn't be this way.

Does the spring pour out sweet and bitter water from the same opening?

Can a fig tree produce olive, let brothers and sisters, or a grapevine produce figs?

No, neither can a saltwater spring yield fresh water.

What is James saying here? He's telling us that our words reflect our hearts.

Words reflect our hearts. And so if you use filthy language and you cuss and

you take the man's name in vain, it's revealing the nature of your heart.

And James says, guys, it shouldn't be this way.

There should be no one who claims the name of Jesus and yet speaks the filth

of cussing. You can't say you love Jesus and yet speak profanity, James says.

Matthew 15, Jesus said this. It's not what goes into the mouth that defiles

a person, but what comes out of the mouth.

This defiles a person.

Your words matter. Again in Matthew 12, Jesus says, I tell you that on the day of judgment,

people will have to account for every careless word they speak.

Our words matter. Our words are a big deal.

And if you feel like maybe I'm stepping on your toes a little bit,

I've got one last thing to say.

I think it's a contemple talking. Okay. did you know that you shouldn't be taking

the Lord's name in vain I hear it every Sunday in this room,

something will happen and they'll laugh at it oh my G-O-T did you know that is the misuse,

of our father's name,

or texting O-N-G.

Hilarious,

any time You use God's name other than worship,

in holiness, and with reverence.

It is considered to be in vain or without purpose.

God's name is holy, and we should never use his name without reverence.

Listen to what two great preachers said. First one, Jonathan Edwards said this.

Using God's name in a frivolous manner demonstrates irreverence not only for

God, but for the general sacredness of speech.

John Wesley, another preacher, said this.

The third commandment forbids the taking of his name in vain in idle or untrue

speech or in rash vows and profanity.

Oh, come on. I swear to God.

It's not okay. God's name is holy.

And it shouldn't be part of our vocabulary or our text messages or our social media.

God's name is sacred. God's name is holy.

Don't think that you're spiritually mature when you speak in this way.

James Corthon says in verse 26, If anyone thinks he is religious without controlling

his tongue, his religion is useless.

It's useless, and he deceives himself.

I'm not going to lie. These are difficult passages.

Not because they're vague, but because they're straight to the point,

and they give to us, don't they?

These are hard things to preach, because I know how it's going to be received.

I know how it lands with some of us.

I've heard the excuses. I'm a farmer. I'm a trucker. I'm a seller.

I'm this. I do this. I do this.

You're going to give an account before Almighty God for the speech and the words

that come out of your love.

And I tell you this not because I want to be better than anyone.

I just want you to not have to give an account before God.

Thing you can change and stop now i know

we got to keep moving number three we

have to rely on the power of the holy spirit rely

on the power of the holy spirit look what james says in verse seven all kinds

of animals birds reptiles and sea creatures are being tamed and have been tamed

by mankind but no human being can tame the tongue it is a restless evil full of deadly poison,

and what he's saying is that you cannot tame the tongue apart from the work of the holy spirit.

That's why so many of us we try and fail we try and fail we try and fail we

try and fail because we do it apart from the power of the Holy Spirit.

Guys, when our words are uncontrolled, they're evil in front of deadly poison.

Controlling our words is not easy. It's something that we cannot do on our own power.

We need the Spirit of God to empower us.

Galatians 5 says, But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace,

patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

You and I have to understand that the more we're controlled by the Holy Spirit,

the more your heart reflects Christ, the more your mouth begins to reflect Christ,

the more your words reflect Christ.

And in order to have a tongue that is controlled by the Holy Spirit,

you and I must have hearts that are controlled and that reflect the very heart of God.

You just three practical ways we can

control our tones three questions

that we need to ask before

we speak first one is this well what i'm about to say utter god the true test

of of of our words is the way that reflect on the one who created us for his glory,

to reflect his image and glory.

We were made by God to be agents of love in the world.

And we have a choice in participating in that purpose.

Will what I'm about to say honor God? Secondly, will what I am about to say

honor the person I am saying it to? When I speak to them, is it going to honor them?

Is it going to give them respect, admiration, love?

How we treat people around us says something about how we feel about the Lord

Jesus Christ and how we feel about honoring Him and loving Him.

And then lastly, will what I'm about to say be something that I will regret?

I wish I could stand up here this morning and say, I've got it all figured out.

My mouth's always under control, but that's just not the case.

I fail time and time and time again in so many areas in the Christian walk and in the Christian life.

But i can confess it and i keep trying

and i'm encouraging you if this

is an area that you're struggling with in just

a moment our prep team's going to be down here

in front they're not here to judge you

they're here to pray with you they're here to encourage you

the team's got to come up they're going to sing a closing

song and we're going to go about our our weekend

but i'm looking footer to seeing you

next week as we continue the

series but gosh we gotta do

better our words are either

gonna burn healing we gotta go courage

or that we couldn't defeat somebody they're

gonna help somebody they're gonna crush somebody may we learn to submit every

part of our lives to the Lord Jesus Christ and get rid of the ugliness in our

lives during this Christmas season.

Father, we come to you and we thank you that you still speak to us,

you still convict us, you still long for us to be obedient to your word.

Thank you that you are a speaking God, a revealing God, a convicting God.

You're also an empowering God. And we ask that, number one, you would forgive

us for the way we speak when we don't honor people, when we tear people down, when we criticize.

Forgive us for failing you and forgive us for failing those we speak to.

And Lord, I also pray that you would empower us with the power of your Holy

Spirit, that you would help us to speak life and that our mouths would reflect,

the character of our hearts,

hearts that are people who just love you and want to be more like you.

Thank you for being here with us today. We love you.

And that's what all God's people said.

Music.