Bridled Tongue: Specific Sins of the Tongue

Driving home: God has set two natural fences to keep in the tongue, the teeth and the lips. And this commandment is a third fence set about the tongue that it should not break forth into evil.

Martin quotes Watson, who says God has set two natural fences (teeth and lips) and a third fence (the Ninth Commandment) to keep the tongue from breaking forth into evil, illustrating the divine and natural restraints on speech.

The Hebrew word for false witness is not the same as you have in Exodus 20. In Exodus 20, the word primarily focuses upon bearing false testimony in a legal sense. However, the word used in Deuteronomy means any kind of vain or unfounded witness that we bear concerning another. And I say it's vital at the outset to understand the meaning of this commandment because in the quaint words of Watson, and I quote, God has set two natural fences to keep in the tongue, the teeth and the lips.

11:51 - 12:33 Read in full sermon

The point: Recognize and confess the sin of lying, especially when motivated by gaining advantage or escaping punishment.

Martin directly addresses children, explaining that they typically lie to gain an advantage (like cheating in school) or to escape deserved punishment, making the abstract concept of lying concrete and relatable for a young audience.

Revelation 21.8 Whoremongers, adulterers, fornicators, sorcerers and all liars. Shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and with brimstone. Further on in Revelation 22.15 we read that without that glorious city the new Jerusalem are the dogs, the unclean and whatsoever loveth and maketh a lie. And I speak particularly to you dear children this morning for one of the primary sins of children is the sin of lying. And you know when you lie? You generally lie for one of two reasons.

17:28 - 18:07 Read in full sermon

The point: Desist from overt, explicit lying, particularly with the tongue.

He extends the example of lying motives to adults, specifically mentioning lying on income tax forms for personal advantage, showing that the same sinful motivations affect all ages.

You see? Truth the very fundamental aspect of the character of God is more precious than personal advantage and gain or personal comfort. It's sad to say those motives not only affect little children who cheat in their studies and when they lie to mom and dad they affect grown-ups who will lie in their income tax forms for what? Personal advantage.

20:18 - 20:49 Read in full sermon

Driving home: It's one thing for you to conceive a lie and to give birth to it by your own tongue. It's another thing for someone else to have the baby and for you to nurse it and nourish it and pass it on to someone else.

Martin uses the metaphor of conceiving and giving birth to a lie versus someone else having the 'baby' and you nursing and nourishing it, to distinguish between originating a lie and passing on a false report.

Do not take up a report that is false. It's one thing for you to conceive a lie and to give birth to it by your own tongue. It's another thing for someone else to have the baby and for you to nurse it and nourish it and pass it on to someone else. And this is the sin that is particularly forbidden in Exodus 23 and verse one.

22:21 - 22:50 Read in full sermon

Driving home: It's one thing for you to conceive a lie and to give birth to it by your own tongue. It's another thing for someone else to have the baby and for you to nurse it and nourish it and pass it on to someone else.

He tells a story about John walking past Harry, Harry misinterpreting John's action as a bad attitude, and then Harry passing this 'report' to Pete, illustrating how false reports are generated and spread through misconstrued intentions.

The God of truth is saying you and I must speak only that which we have real fundamental reason and evidence to believe is truth. What happens so often is this. Here's John, Harry, and Pete. John does something that Harry reads in a certain motive to what he did.

24:06 - 24:33 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: Martin then explores the less obvious sin of taking up and passing on false reports, drawing from Exodus 23:1. He explains that this includes not only originating lies but also…

Martin uses the example of a parent spanking a child, showing how a person with a biblical view of discipline sees a noble act, while someone with a permissive philosophy sees brutality, illustrating how actions are interpreted based on the observer's predisposition and then passed on as 'fact.'

You see, the actions of people are often determined by the predisposition of the eye that sees the action. A person who understands the biblical doctrine of discipline, who happens to see a father or a mother, not in anger, not in a feverish spirit, but in gentle, tender love, spanking a child, his eye sees a deed that is noble and biblical, and the response of his heart is, Thank God for a parent discharging his duty. The person brought up with the permissive philosophy who looks upon all corporal punishment, all spanking and chastisement as a carryover from medieval days that ought to go out...

26:15 - 27:19 Read in full sermon

The point: Examine your conscience and confess if you are guilty of breaking the Ninth Commandment by passing on unfounded reports or slander.

He quotes an unnamed man who said, 'He that raises a slander carries the devil in his tongue and he that receives it carries the devil in his ear,' vividly illustrating the destructive nature of slander for both speaker and listener.

That's what it is to slander. And as one man has so perceptibly said, He that raises a slander carries the devil in his tongue and he that receives it carries the devil in his ear. Turn to the 15th Psalm for a beautiful description of the ideal righteous man, perfectly fulfilled, of course, in no one but our Lord, but in some measure fulfilled in all his followers. Lord, who shall dwell or sojourn in thy tabernacle?

28:24 - 29:04 Read in full sermon

The point: Examine your conscience and confess if you are guilty of breaking the Ninth Commandment by passing on unfounded reports or slander.

Martin argues that if ignorance excused sin, the best thing to do would be to sear one's conscience, highlighting the absurdity of using ignorance as an excuse for sin and emphasizing accountability.

Then you've been sinning with your tongue. The fact that you've been insensitive to God's standard doesn't excuse you. If ignorance of God's standard and insensitivity was excused and got us off the hook as far as God's concerned, then the best thing for a man to do is go out as quickly as possible and sear his conscience completely. Then he can plead innocence to any sin.

30:22 - 30:46 Read in full sermon

The point: Recognize your bondage to a slandering, lying tongue and seek deliverance through the power of Jesus Christ.

He compares the bondage to a slandering, lying tongue to an alcoholic's bondage to drink, illustrating that both require a power greater than oneself for deliverance, pointing to Christ.

May I say a word to the unsaved amongst us? Now do you see why Jesus said, except a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of God? Your heart perhaps has been so given to this through the years that you're a slave to it. And just as many an alcoholic is brought to the realization if I ever get delivered from the bondage of my drink it'll have to be a power bigger than myself, so the person who's been in bondage to a slandering, lying, tongue knows that it's going to take a power beyond himself to loose him.

31:25 - 32:04 Read in full sermon

Driving home: Your words are the diet of other men's minds, hearts and affections.

Martin uses the metaphor of putrid, rotten fish, grapes, or fruit from a backyard tree to explain the meaning of 'corrupt' speech, emphasizing that it is unfit for consumption and causes sickness, not edification.

Let no corrupt speech proceed out of your mouth but such as is good for edifying as the need may be that it may give grace to them that hear. Now this word is a fascinating word. Originally the word for corrupt here meant that which was putrid, fish that had gone bad, grapes that were lying on the ground, unfit for human consumption. Some of you may perhaps have a fruit tree in your backyard and some of the fruit that falls and after a few weeks begins to rot and it sort of smells like a little still in the back there.

33:04 - 33:47 Read in full sermon

Driving home: Your words are the diet of other men's minds, hearts and affections.

He describes words as the 'diet of other men's minds, hearts and affections' and compares eardrums to 'thirsty sponges' that take in every word like a drop of moisture, illustrating the profound impact of speech on others.

Your words and my words are the diet of other men's minds and hearts and affections. Why, the writer of the Proverbs says that the words of the whisperer are like dainty morsels. They go down into the innermost part. To God that we have some of the oil that's in a duck's feathers there on our eardrums.

34:31 - 35:00 Read in full sermon

Driving home: Your words are the diet of other men's minds, hearts and affections.

Martin shares a personal anecdote from his college days where he mistakenly interpreted Ephesians 4:29 to mean he should only speak about spiritual things, leading him to sit silently during general conversations, illustrating a wrong interpretation of the command.

And sobriety tongue will studiously avoid all speech that corrupts and is non-edifying. Now that does not mean as I mistakenly thought one time and I'll tell on myself here that unless the conversation is explicitly about God the Bible, Christ, sin, heaven, hell we shouldn't talk. I remember reading this as an earnest young Christian of age 19 I was a freshman in the college and I took the word of God seriously. When I read this verse I said now that's exactly what I'm going to do and I'm not going to open my mouth unless the conversation is going to be directly on spiritual things.

35:53 - 36:30 Read in full sermon

The point: Appoint yourself a committee of one to track down all the poisoning you may have brought about by allowing corrupt, putrid speech to proceed from your mouths.

He draws an analogy between federal agents tracking down polluted food to protect physical health and the need for believers to track down and repent of the 'poisoning' caused by corrupt speech, emphasizing the greater importance of spiritual health.

and make it my own rather for Christ's sake and by his grace I would be willing to let you share the fruits of my legitimate labor oh that it would become as unthinkable that I would ever enter into the realm of the sacred reputation and standing of a brother or sister and knowingly tear it down by my corrupt let no corrupt speech proceed out of your mouth of that which is good to the use of edifying that it may minister grace. Now what happens in a community when it's known that some food poisoning has been let loose upon that community federal agents civil local governments move in to track ...

39:55 - 41:22 Read in full sermon