Proverbs 12:25-18:21
The Righteous Use of the Tongue #2
Pastor Albert N. Martin continues his series on 'The Righteous Use of the Tongue,' expounding Proverbs 12-18. He emphasizes that parents must diligently admonish their children concerning their speech, grounding this instruction in the fear of God and the understanding that words have immense power for good or ill. Martin uses vivid imagery from the Proverbs to illustrate how the tongue can encourage, preserve life, or, conversely, destroy relationships, break spirits, and inflict lasting scars, urging parents to faithfully apply both verbal admonition and the rod of correction to train their children in godly speech.
Primary Texts
Topics
Outline 9 sections · 62 min
- The Ordinary Means of God's Grace in Child Nurture 0:03
- Foundational Categories of Parental Admonition from Proverbs 5:43
- Encouraging Words and Guarding the Mouth (Proverbs 12-13) 8:32
- Truthfulness, Pride, and the Ease of Lying (Proverbs 14) 16:32
- The Power of Soft Answers and the Breaking of Spirits (Proverbs 15:1-4) 21:51
- Speaking Knowledge, Timely Words, and Avoiding Strife (Proverbs 15:7-28) 29:03
- Righteous Lips, Self-Control, and Scorching Fire (Proverbs 16) 33:48
- Harsh Words, Wise Silence, and Deep Waters (Proverbs 17-18:4) 41:35
- Foolish Contention, Whispering, and the Power of the Tongue (Proverbs 18:6-21) 47:07
Key Quotes
“However, the measure of our duty is never determined by what God may do in his exceptional workings.”
“If you are not continuously admonishing your children regarding the righteous, the righteous use of their tongues, you are failing in a major dimension of their nurture.”
“Lying is an absolute denial of the image of God in that God is truth. They are to be reflectors of God image. When they lie, they are like the devil, for he is a liar.”
“I've said because a soft answer turns away wrath. Now, you've got to call me a liar. And if so, then please get up and walk out of this place and go somewhere else where you've got a true man in the pulpit or believe me when I say I've had ones of you sitting there to me.”
“Perverseness therein, that is, in the use of the tongue is a breaking of the spirit in which is more destructive of a person's humanity. The breaking of the bones. The breaking of the spirit. According to my Bible, the answer is clear. It says a wounded spirit who can bear.”
“Your children could have a blowtorch between their cheeks if you don't admonish them. A blowtorch will burn the skin of their future spouse, burn the skin of the soul of their future children. Because you never did anything to tell them that their mouth can be turned into a blowtorch.”
“Death and life are in the power of the tongue, and they that love it that is love life and the use of the tongue that leads to life shall eat the fruit thereof.”
“All he'll have to do is produce the whisperings that sowed seeds of doubt the words of contention as opposed to the soft word that turned away wrath just bring forward the unrighteous uses of the tongue and that will be enough to say as I consign you to hell your words prove you were never made righteous in your heart.”
Applications
All listeners
- Continuously admonish your children regarding the righteous use of their tongues.
- Teach your children the holy art of encouraging discouraged people.
- Do not pass on a cruel legacy of only pointing out fault to your children; teach them by example how to pick up a stooping heart with words.
- Teach your children to encourage their siblings and even their parents when they are discouraged.
- Teach your children that guarding their mouth is a matter of the well-being of life itself.
- Train your children not merely not to lie, but to hate lying, bringing to bear upon their consciences why they must hate it (e.g., it's unlike God, like the devil, leads to hell).
- Teach your children that if they do not learn to think before they speak, and if they speak proudly, those words will form a rod to beat and bruise themselves.
- Teach your children to be a faithful witness, telling the truth even if it means facing negative consequences.
- Teach your children that a true witness delivers souls and that honesty is always the best policy, even if it doesn't immediately appear so.
- Teach your children the principle of a soft answer turning away wrath in the context of the home, especially when they speak grievous words that stir up anger.
- Sit your children down, take these texts, and admonish them about the destructive power of their tongue to break spirits; if admonition fails, use the rod of correction.
- Teach your children that they must earn the right to open their mouths by paying the price of learning something first.
- Teach your children that there is legitimate joy and well-being when their tongues are used properly, speaking the right thing at the right time.
- Rebuke and immunize your children against the sin of being whisperers who sow seeds of doubt and bring alienation between people.
- Tell your children that righteous lips can be a delight to people in authority, leading to honor and influence, even among unbelievers.
- Teach your children that their heart must instruct their lips before they speak, emphasizing self-control and being swift to hear, slow to speak.
- Begin training children from the very threshold of speech that they do not have an unqualified right to say anything they want, at any time, in any circumstance.
- Teach your children that their tongue is a blowtorch that can burn and scar others, and if words don't work, use the rod of correction to connect pain with harmful speech.
- When children harp on a little issue, ask them if they would like others to constantly remind them of their own faults, and teach them to cover matters with love.
- Teach your children that it is prudent to keep their mouth shut when they don't know something, as silence can be esteemed as wisdom.
- Teach your children that if they are to speak wisdom, they must pay the price of having a deep supply of knowledge and a refreshing spirit.
- Diligently, prayerfully, and consistently apply these principles, even to the point of growing weary in the task, to avoid passing on unbiblical standards to the next generation.
- If your children show a tendency to welcome verbal battles, use the rod of correction until that foolishness is driven out and they learn not to be contentious.
- Teach your children the horrible, devastating influence of whispering, emphasizing that it is never morally innocent and goes down into the depths of the soul.
- Recognize the awesome task of teaching children the righteous use of their tongues.
- Teach your children that their words demonstrate their heart, and unrighteous words can be enough to condemn them on the Day of Judgment.
- Teach your children that if their words cut, scorch, pierce, or wound, true righteousness is demonstrated by humbling themselves to seek forgiveness and heal the wounds.
- Parents, do not project your own unbiblical standards regarding the tongue to your children; humble yourselves and seek forgiveness for your own unrighteous speech.
A full transcript is available on the tab. 183 paragraphs, roughly 62 minutes.
The Ordinary Means of God's Grace in Child Nurture
How not to foul up the training of your children. This is cassette number 23 in a series given by Pastor Albert N. Martin in the adult Sunday school class of the Trinity Baptist Church on July 14, 1991. Now as those who believe and who joyfully confess faith in the supernatural power of God's grace, we must never set limits on what God may do above and beyond his ordinary means of working.
Now did that statement wake you up? If it did, now that you're awake, listen to it again. As those who believe and joyfully confess our faith in the supernatural power of grace, we must never set limits on what God may do, above and beyond the ordinary means of his working. However, the measure of our duty is never determined by what God may do in his exceptional workings.
Rather, our duty is determined by his revealed will and ways as recorded in the scriptures. God did one day stretch out, a 24-hour period long beyond its ordinary ticks of the clock in order to help Joshua win a mighty battle. But as we planned the services of this day, we assumed it would be comprised of 24 hours with 60 ticks to each second, 60 seconds to the minute, 60 minutes to the hour, and it's right that we should do so. And nowhere are these principles more crucial than the fact that we must set limits on what God may do above and beyond his ordinary means of working.
In the matter of the training of our children in obedience to the command of Ephesians 6.4. For that text which says fathers provoke not your children, but nurture them in the chastening and the admonition of the Lord indicates that God's ordinary framework of nurturing children, that is bringing them from infancy to maturity in a state in which they are, prepared to assume under Christ all of their mature adult responsibilities with biblical character formed in them, biblical perspectives coloring their entire outlook on life, God's ordinary means of producing such an adult is the painstaking line upon line, precept upon precept, day by day, week by week, month by month, year by year, nurture which is of the Lord. That is the ordinary way of God's working, and that nurture, as we have seen, is to be accomplished by two major means, namely, godly application of the rod of correction
called chastening, in Ephesians 6, 4, and by admonition. Which, we discovered in our word study of every usage of the noun and verb form of that word in the New Testament, takes in the full range of authoritative, Bible-based, verbal instruction of our children.
Now, as a general rule, noble character, a properly enlightened conscience, submission to authority, social grace, diligence. And self-control, along with a host of other virtues, will either be acquired by patient, biblical, spirit-blessed nurture, or they will never be adequately acquired. That's why the scripture says in Proverbs 22, 15, foolishness is bound up in the heart of the child, but the rod of correction driveth it far from him. And Proverbs 29, 15.
We are told that the rod and reproof, chastening and admonition, give wisdom. But a child left to himself causes shame to his mother. That's the ordinary rule. If the child does not get it by that means, he'll not get it, and he'll bring shame.
Now, what God may do in the exceptional cases, we rejoice.
But what God may do is not the rule of your duty nor of mine. The rule of our duty is Ephesians 6. And therefore, for a number of weeks, we have been studying together how not to foul up the training of our children. And in this subject, as we've treated it in a biblical framework, we have addressed the crucial issue of the spiritual and emotional climate of the home as the example and framework within which the nurture is to be carried forth.
And then the two great means. We've already addressed. And now we are focusing upon the whole issue of admonition. What constitutes the admonition of the Lord, which is the ordinary means ordained of God for bringing our children to maturity of character and all of these other things that we have mentioned?
Foundational Categories of Parental Admonition from Proverbs
Well, the major issue in admonition is the foundational one, which is the fear of God. And we've established that from our study in Proverbs. And now we are concerned. Considering what are the major categories of parental admonition as found in the book of Proverbs, all of them based upon the fear of God, that is, upon the fact of God's existence, the rights of God's claims, the position of God as Lord and judge over our children, so that the pressure of God's being and rights and presence and knowledge, all percolate through the entire admonitory process. What are the major areas in which we are to admonish our children? And using the book of Proverbs as the uniquely given divine deposit of parental admonition, we have thus far considered four major categories and are presently opening up the fifth. Parents must repeatedly admonish their children to be admonished by the Lord.
Parents must repeatedly admonish their children to be admonished by the Lord. Parents must consistently and repeatedly admonish their children to be attentive listeners to godly parental instruction. And we opened up 12 texts. Parents must consistently and repeatedly admonish their children to be active and earnest in the pursuit of true knowledge and wisdom.
15 texts. Thirdly, parents must consistently admonish their children to learn to desire, welcome, heed, and obey, rebuke, correction, and counsel. 20 texts. And then parents must consistently.
And then parents must consistently and repeatedly admonish their children to recognize and avoid moral defilement and to recognize and avoid those people and influences that would lead them to moral defilement. Approximately 12 pivotal texts. Now we're focusing on category number five. And after getting some input from you, one of you hit the nail right on the head when you said the matter of the use of the tongue is a major point of emphasis in the book of Proverbs.
And I've expressed it this way. Parents must consistently and repeatedly admonish their children concerning the righteous use of their tongues. And there are at least 75, no fewer than 75. I found some more.
I could have easily stretched it to say 80 or 85 explicit references to this issue. Last week we covered approximately two dozen of those texts. Taking us to the end of Proverbs 12. And that's exactly where we're going to begin today.
Encouraging Words and Guarding the Mouth (Proverbs 12-13)
And for those of you visiting with us, what I'm doing, in some instances, simply reading the text. In others, making a brief comment. In others, I'm cutting loose and I'm preaching for four or five minutes. And I'm not doing it arbitrarily.
I've gone over each of these texts for a second time in preparation for today. These are not last week's notes dragged out and just read off. Every single text has been consulted afresh with notes before me. Which ones to simply read.
What explanations and expansions and emphases to give. And I say that so that I trust you will, as you sit with your Bibles open in your laps, be convinced that these things cannot and must not be taken lightly. If you are not continuously admonishing your children regarding the righteous, the righteous use of their tongues, you are failing in a major dimension of their nurture. And others will have to live with your failure for the rest of your children's lives.
Now we come then to the last text of Proverbs 12. We've just about completed the list of texts up through Proverbs 12. Now we take up Proverbs 12, 25. Heaviness in the heart of a man maketh its stoop.
There's the picture. You see the graphic imagery. A man's heart, the internal disposition of the seat of his being, is full of heaviness and it makes his heart like the shoulders of a disheartened, dispirited person. Stooping. Bowed down.
Heaviness in the heart of a man makes it stoop. But what will cause it to stand upright again? A good word maketh it glad. In other words, we must teach our children the holy art of encouraging discouraged people.
We must teach them that holy art. Now the major way you teach them is by doing it with your children. When you see them determined to accomplish a righteous task and they seem to be failing and they are getting dispirited, you as a parent, by your example, must show what it is to cause the stooping heart to again stand erect and noble in its holy intentions and purposes to accomplish a noble goal. But that's an art to be learned.
And the children will learn it, first of all, as they see it in you. I've been amazed in pastoral counseling situations when I've asked many of you sitting here, did your parents ever give you verbal encouragement? They said no. The only time the parent's mouth was open was to point out fault.
The only time the parent's mouth was open was to holler. The only time the parent's mouth was open was to correct. Never to apply the holy art of encouragement. Please don't pass on such a cruel legacy to your children.
Teach them by your example how to pick up a stooping heart by the power of words and then teach them how to apply that to their siblings, how to apply it to their own parents. You mothers, when you know the dad's discouraged, things are not going well at work. You teach your little daughter and son, look, daddy's down. Daddy's discouraged.
You go tell daddy how much you love him and how much you appreciate the fact that he works so hard that you might have food on the table and clothes on your back. The child learns the art of encouraging the parent. I never thought of that. I know you didn't because you didn't have that example in your home, but you do have the word of God.
And this is one of your responsibilities as a parent to teach your child that heaviness in the heart of a man makes it stoop. But a good word. Makes it glad. Chapter 13, verse three.
He that guards his mouth keeps his life, but he that opens wide his lips shall have destruction. Now, here again, you see the father, Solomon, the wise man speaking by the spirit of the greater than Solomon. Even the Lord Jesus, the ultimate author of all scripture, likens our mouth to something that is to be jealously guarded. He that guards his mouth, that is, exercises holy caution and care as to what comes out of it, is actually guarding or keeping his life.
This is a matter of the well-being of life itself, to have a well-guarded, judiciously monitored mouth. But he that opens wide his lips, in other words, he says, whatever he says, whenever he feels like saying it, however he feels like saying it, is in the path of destruction. He'll destroy meaningful social relationships. He'll destroy anyone's desire to get close to him because they never know when that wide mouth will pour out that which is hurtful.
He that opens wide his lips shall have destruction. We must teach our children this great principle. Verse five. A righteous man doesn't say simply will not lie, but he hates lying.
But a wicked man is loathsome and comes to shame. Now, it's one thing for your kids when you say, now, mommy doesn't know what to fix tonight with vegetables. Shall we have corn or peas? The kid likes corn and peas.
But if she said, all we've got left is spinach and the kid goes, yuck. Why? I hate spinach. What's he saying?
He's saying, I don't have a neutral attitude to spinach like I do to corn and peas. I have a very positive, negative aversion to spinach, a strong negative aversion. He hates it. He loathes it.
Now, this text says that we must train our children not merely not to lie, but to hate lying, to have a conscious, emotional aversion to lying. Now, how do you do that? Well, you've got to tell them why they must hate lying. Lying is an absolute denial of the image of God in that God is truth.
They are to be reflectors of God image. When they lie, they are like the devil, for he is a liar. You say to your children, do you want to reflect the image of the devil? That vicious, foul fiend who's out to destroy you and all of God's creatures and drag them into hell.
You want to love the devil? You want the devil to love you? No, daddy. Then don't you lie?
Because lying is being like the devil. It's being unlike God. We must bring to bear upon their consciences that liars go to hell. Should you hate that which would chop your fingers off one a week?
Should you hate that which would stick needles in you once a day in order to just hurt you? Then remember, that could chop off your fingers and stick needles and you could only destroy your body. But lies will destroy your soul. They'll take you to hell.
All liars have their part in the lake of fire. What are you doing? You take the time to sit down with a concordance and look up lying and come up with a theology of lying that by degrees you bring to bear upon the conscience of your children until by the blessing of the Holy Spirit. If they don't hate lying, it won't be because you didn't give them the fuel with which to learn to hate it.
Truthfulness, Pride, and the Ease of Lying (Proverbs 14)
If they love lying, your conscience will be clear. I sought under God to teach them to hate lying. Verse seven of chapter 13. I'm sorry. Verses 13.
Chapter 13 is verses three and five. Now we come to chapter 14, verse three. Keep my eye closely on my notes. 14, verse three in the mouth of the foolish is a rod.
For his pride. But the lips of the wise shall preserve them. What's he say? He's saying that the foolish person and remember, folly in the Book of Proverbs is never someone's a bit limited.
Intellectually, folly is moral perversity. Folly is always ethical and moral perversity. It's ungodliness in the mouth of the ungodly. The morally perverse is a rod for his pride.
See what the picture is saying again. The Bible loves to deal in graphic imagery. When the proud person who has a perverse heart opens his mouth, what does he do? He constructs a rod by which he will beat himself in the mouth of the foolish is a rod for his pride, but the lips of the wise shall preserve them.
A rod laid enough upon a man will destroy him. The opposite of being preserved. We must teach our children that if they do not learn to think before they speak and if they speak words that indicate a proud heart, those very words will form a rod with which they will beat and bruise themselves. People will not want to be around them.
They don't like to be around proud, strutting, arrogant people boasting about what they have and what they can do better and what they have that's better. Teach your children this because Solomon lays out this principle so clearly. Verse five of the same chapter, faithful witness. Will not lie, but a false witness.
Others lies here. We are instructed that we must teach people to be a faithful witness. What's a faithful witness? One who tells it as he saw it and doesn't alter what he saw in terms of how it gets from the eyeballs to the brain, to the impulses that move the tongue that say what he saw.
Don't allow fear of self. Fear of consequences to alter the truth of faithful witness will not lie. Even if telling the truth means I must be spanked, I must be grounded. I must be exposed and put to shame before my siblings, before my class at school, or as in my case, more than once put to shame before the local grocery store man.
When I, with others, dared to take a candy bar and had to march down on my own. And confess that I had taken a candy bar. And when he had asked us, you kids take anything and said, no, I'd lie. I had to go out and confess my lies.
That's how mean my parents were. And that's why I stand and bless God for them today. That they taught me this truth. A faithful witness will not lie, but a false witness.
Notice the marginal reading not only utters lies, but breathes out lies. You see, once a child gets accustomed to lying, he learns to do it as easily as breathing. Easiest thing to do. You've all been sitting here doing breathing.
Whether you've been paying any attention, you've been breathing. Haven't seen anybody. You've all been breathing. You want your child to lie as easy as breathe?
Then you just leave his conscience unconditioned by these passages. Just fail repeatedly, earnestly, prayerfully to bring these passages to bear upon his conscience and your child as a built in teacher that will make him lie as easy as it is to breathe. And all you need to do to encourage it is do nothing. Verse 25, chapter 14, verse 25.
A true witness delivers souls. But he that utters same Hebrew word, he that breathes out lies, causes deceit. What are they to learn here? They're to learn that the faithful witness who speaks the truth is always in the way of the well-being.
Of his fellow man, speaking the truth in the aphorism. I don't know whether it was Ben Franklin. Honesty is always the best policy. It is.
It may not immediately appear to be the best policy. Honesty may cause you to lose your job. Honesty may cause people to hate you. That's all right.
But honesty is the best policy. For the word of God tells us in this passage, a true witness delivers souls. Truth leads to the deliverance of men's souls from the power of lies and misconception, slander, et cetera. And we must teach our children this.
The Power of Soft Answers and the Breaking of Spirits (Proverbs 15:1-4)
Chapter 15, verses one and two. Here was one of the passages with which I was brought up as a child. And I thank God for it. A soft answer turns away wrath, but a grievous word stirs up anger.
The tongue of the wise utters knowledge. You're right. But the mouth of fools pours out folly. Two ways to answer brother sister has done something that was wrong.
They deserve to be rebuked. There's two ways to do it. One is the harsh answer. And what does that do?
That stirs up anger. And before long, you got to fight. The other is the soft answer. And as my parents would do it, two of us were fighting, they came into the midst of it.
Well, she started it. She said this. No, no, he did this. You're having a fight.
Yes. Well, you both get it. And we'll sort out who started it later. But there can't be a fight without two people.
So you both get it was academic who started because if one of us had given the soft answer, it would have turned away wrath. And then this text got preached into us. And how many times it has saved a church split in Trinity Church coming up in our twenty fifth year. And we've never had a church split in this place, we've never had a congregational meeting where angry words have been spoken.
And much of that, not all of it, but much of it is the fruit of my parents faithfully pounding this verse into my conscience. There are times when different ones of you have come to me and said, Pastor, how in the world could you have fielded that insulting question from one of the members? That question assumed that you and your fellow elders and the deacons are a bunch of dummies. How in the world could you stand there and take that and answer as though it were an intelligent and gracious question?
It was so self insulting. I practically burned a hole through the pew sitting there. I've said because a soft answer turns away wrath. Now, you've got to call me a liar.
And if so, then please get up and walk out of this place and go somewhere else where you've got a true man in the pulpit or believe me when I say I've had ones of you sitting there to me. I haven't come to you and said, oh, boy, wasn't that something that I had to put up with? No, but you've picked up on it. And you knew that the answer to the question was arrogant.
It was spoken by someone full of himself or herself, full of pride. It was absolutely demeaning. You think I didn't feel it being demeaned before several hundred people by a stupid question and be like me saying to Dr. Ruhle today, who's been up here to take his board certification for family.
And a doctor rule. Do you know what an elbow is? Do you know what blood pressure is? Do you know how to take the blood?
It's a customer. And that's insulting to a certified physician. Yes, it is. But he could respond two ways and say, well, I just happened to.
This is an elbow. I say, oh, thank you. Then he gets out his what? Signometer. Is that the right word for Gary?
And he says, this is how you take the blood pressure. Stretch your arm out and puts the cuff on. Oh, thank you. What's happened?
The soft answer. It's turned away. He could answer and say, what do you mean? Do I know what an elbow is?
Do you know what Genesis is? Hey, buddy, don't get smart with me. Remember your age. I'm old enough to be your father.
Yeah, well, remember, I spent a lot more years in school than you did. And before long, we could have a verbal fight. Why? Because he did not respond with the soft answer that turns away.
You got to teach your children this way in the context of the home where they're speaking grievous words that stir up anger and you step in, you say, Pastor Martin, you're laying a horrible burden on us. No, I didn't lay it on you. God did nurture your children in the admonition of the Lord. That's your task.
That's your responsibility under God. Down to verse seven. I'm sorry. Verse four, a gentle tongue is a tree of life.
But perverseness therein is a breaking of the spirit. Look at the last part of the verse. The first part is very. Well, to the soft answer turns away wrath.
But look at the negative perverseness therein. That is, perverseness in the use of the tongue is a breaking of the spirit. You see, the tongue can do what the widest strap and the thickest rod cannot do. A strap and a rod can break a man's skin or a man's bones, but they can't break his spirit.
There are times when men have been beaten within an inch of their death and their spirits have stood tall in the saddle and faced their accusers and said, kill me if you will. I stand with a good conscience before God. There's something noble about an upright spirit speaking through a broken, bruised, abused and almost dead body, Allah's even when the stones are pummeling down upon them. Lord Jesus, lay not their sin, this sin to their charge.
Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. What a noble spirit. But the tongue can get in and pummel and break the human spirit. Isn't that what the text says?
Perverseness therein, that is, in the use of the tongue is a breaking of the spirit in which is more destructive of a person's humanity. The breaking of the bones. The breaking of the spirit. According to my Bible, the answer is clear.
It says a wounded spirit who can bear. Some of you have used your tongue as a devilish, demonic rod to break the spirit of others. Some of you do it with your wives. Some of you do it with your husband.
Some of you do it with your children. And some of you allow your children to do it with one another. God help you to sit your children down and take these texts and admonish them. And having admonished them, if you see them make a rod out of their tongue and they bruise anyone else, you deal with it faithfully by admonition.
And when admonition doesn't work, you bring the rod of correction to enforce it. You say, I will not turn loose someone who wields a rod that breaks spirits. So help me, God. Verse twenty five.
Speaking Knowledge, Timely Words, and Avoiding Strife (Proverbs 15:7-28)
Chapter fourteen. A true witness delivers souls that he that others lives. I'm sorry, we're into chapter fifteen, aren't we? Verse four. I'm sorry.
I've just got to keep something here so my eye doesn't drift back and forth. I have them listed by chapters and the verse is going along this way. All right. I got a guide for me here now.
OK, verse seven. The lips of the wise. This. Verse knowledge, but the heart of the foolish do it not.
So simple comment. Our children must learn that they must earn the right to open their mouths. That means they've got to pay the price of learning something before they earn the right to say something. The lips of the wise disperse knowledge and where they get the knowledge because they were willing to pay the price to cry out for it and seek for it and hunt for it as for hid treasure for seven.
Verse twenty three. Verse twenty three. A man hath joy in the answer of his mouth and a word in due season. How good it is.
I don't think of an old television program when you hear the words. How good it is. Just because I did. Don't you do it.
All right. A man hath joy in the answer of his mouth and a word in due season. How good it is. You see what he's saying?
It's in your own best interest to learn how to speak. The healing word, the soft word that turns away wrath. You have a tremendous sense of fulfillment when you see your words, vibrations coming up over your larynx, articulated by tongue and lips and mouth and the rest being a means to lift up a broken spirit, being a means of encouragement. And we must teach our children that there's a legitimate joy and sense of well-being when their tongues have been used used properly and the answer of the mouth brings joy.
A word in due season, you see, teaching them to speak the right thing at the right time. Teaching them the art of timely speech. And then verse twenty six evil devices are an abomination to Jehovah. But pleasant words are pure.
So in the context and in the structure of the Hebrew parallelism, it would appear that the evil devices that are abominable to the Lord are devices that find expression in words, but the opposite of the evil devices, which are abominable to the Lord, are pleasant words. And here I only pause to emphasize. You see how the fear of God again slips in. You think he's gone verse after verse just talking about speech as though he were moralizing.
And then all of a sudden God is stuck right in the middle of the instruction. A reminder to us that we must constantly come back to the foundation in every one of these aspects of admonition. Then verse twenty eight, a perverse man scatters a broad strife and a whisperer separates chief friends. Oh, how quickly do our children learn not only the unholy, devilish art of lying, but they learn the unholy, devilish art of being whisperers.
Do you know what I heard about? And what are they trying to do? So and so is closer to this third party than they are. And they're jealous of that relationship.
So they want to separate party two and three so they can get closer to party three. And what do they do? They whisper so little seeds of doubt to bring alienation between those parties. Yes, your children do that.
If you were only this close enough to know what they're doing, you'd know they do that. And when you pick up on it, you must rebuke it. Better yet, you should seek to prepare them and immunize them by bringing such attacks to bear upon their consciences that they are not to indulge in this horrible sin of being instruments in the hands of the devil to separate chief of friends. All right, we come now to chapter 16 and verse 13.
Righteous Lips, Self-Control, and Scorching Fire (Proverbs 16)
Righteous lips are the delight of kings and they love him that speaketh right. Now, this is a general principle. It's not infallibly true in every instance that people in places of authority will love those who have righteous lips. There are times when people will hate righteous lips.
There was a king. Named Herod. And he hated the righteous lips of a man named John. And one day had his head cut off and we could bring forth many other examples.
But generally speaking, even worldlings, when they can find someone that tells the truth, they're delighted. Daniel, Joseph in heathen settings were given tremendous places of prominence and influence. Why? Because their righteous lips were the delight of kings and they loved him who spoke right.
And we need to tell our children that that one of the ways that God may honor their commitment to truth is that he will so work in the hearts of men in common grace that they will know, though I don't want this man's religion. I like the fruit of it because I know whatever he tells me is the truth. He's never going to call me. He's never going to give me half of the story when he tells me he's giving me the whole story.
I can trust him. And though I hate his religion, the fruit of it's good for the business. And he has a secure job. Why? Because righteous lips are the delight of kings, corporation presidents, personnel managers, foreman. We need to teach our children one of the blessed fruits of the righteous use of their lips. Verse 21, the wise in heart shall be called prudent and the sweetness of the lips. Increases learning.
So what's that mean? Well, go get bridges and find out and then teach your kids. All right. I can tell you 23 and 24.
The heart of the wise instructs his mouth and adds learning to his lips. Here's a vital principle to our children. We tell them until your heart has taught your lips, don't let your lips speak. It's another way of saying be swift to hear.
Slow to speak. It is the heart of the wise that instructs his mouth and adds learning to his lips. We must teach our children if they run off at the mouth, they're going to be sinning all the time and that they must learn self control in the use of their lips. Now, I know I'm a parent.
I'm now a grandparent. I've never known a period in my life when I wasn't surrounded with kids. Second oldest of ten. And I can remember waiting for the first words of all my younger siblings and rejoicing.
They said thus and thus. And only we could interpret it. Anyone else would say that what they said. We say, yeah, only a parent, only a loved one.
You long for the day when they speak their first words. But oh, once they start, what a what a field for the devil to do his work. And then we must begin to teach them, even at that young age, that they don't have a right because mommy's on the phone to say, Mommy, Mommy, Mommy. Just because they want money.
They've got to discipline their lips. When daddy's talking to someone, they don't have a right to come up and say, Dad, Dad, Dad, Dad, Dad, Dad, Daddy's talking. You be quiet till daddy speaks. You don't start that when they're two, when they're three, four.
You start the minute they start using words. They must learn that as their feet do not have an unqualified right simply because they can now carry them somewhere that they have a right to carry them anywhere. So when this tongue begins to work, they must learn immediately. They don't have a right to let it frame anything they want it to frame at any time, in any circumstance, in any place, in any way.
And that training must begin with the very threshold of speech. Verse twenty seven, a worthless man devises mischief. Now, listen to this. And in his lips, there is as a scorching fire.
Remember what we saw? Last week, rash speaking was like the piercings of a sword. And when you're pierced with a sword, deep life threatening internal injuries occur with very little blood on the outside. Now look at the imagery scorching fire.
What a scorching fire to burn skin. I can stand the sight of blood and chewed up flesh. But when I go into a burn ward that test my grace. What a horrible thing.
When someone's skin has been scorched by fire, the stench of burning flesh is unbelievable, unbelievably nauseating. And what a difficult thing it is, even with all the modern skills of newly developed artificial skin and skin grafts. One's skin has been scorched severely. Usually the person bears the scars for life.
Look at the text in his lips. There is a scorching fire. Oh, yes, someone may put the fire out. But when the scorching has gone down deep and its third degree burns, they'll carry the scars for life.
Your children could have a blowtorch between their cheeks if you don't admonish them. A blowtorch will burn the skin of their future spouse, burn the skin of the soul of their future children. Because you never did anything to tell them that their mouth can be turned into a blowtorch. That's the imagery.
You see, God doesn't deal in abstractions. The graphic imagery is there so that none of us can say, oh, I just can't grasp that. That's too deep for me. Pastor Martin, deep, too deep.
You know what a blowtorch is? Want me to pump up the gas? Have the flame come out? Move it to your cheek?
All your instincts. Throwback! Teach your children that's what their tongue is. It's a blowtorch.
Teach them! And if words don't work, scorch their behinds with the rod of correction until the connection between the nerve endings on their behind and their tongue begin to synchronize. And they know if they once again say to brother or sister, dummy, that they're not going to let loose a blast of the blowtorch without feeling the pain of the rod on their behind. I'm not talking about a little tap through six layers of diaper.
I'm talking about sting enough to make it worthwhile not to shoot the blowtorch again. Serious stuff, isn't it? I feel the weight of it as I sit week after week and keep speed reading through Proverbs. How much God has to say about this matter of the tongue.
Harsh Words, Wise Silence, and Deep Waters (Proverbs 17-18:4)
Verse 28 of the same chapter. A perverse man scatters a broad strife and a whisperer separates chief friends. Chapter 17, verse 9. He that covers a transgression seeks love, but he that harps on a matter separates chief friends.
You didn't know how many of our English phrases came out of the Bible, did you? Oh, stop harping on that issue. Where did that come from? Right out of the Bible.
You want to separate chief friends? Be one of these that constantly harps on a matter. Oh, there is a matter. You see, you're not creating it.
You're not lying. You're not creating it. But it's a little thing that love ought to cover. And instead you make a string to put in your heart and you sit there and plunk it all day long.
Plunk, plunk, plunk, plunk, plunk, plunk, plunk, plunk, plunk, plunk, until you separate chief friends.
What a horrible thing. And our children are liable to that. And when we see them harping on a little issue, we say to them, would you like somebody to take that little thing in your life and constantly remind you of it? And you want daddy and mommy to meet you every morning and remind you of that issue?
Remind you of it? No, no, no. Then you stop that. You're harping on a matter that ought to be covered by love.
Chapter 17 and verse nine. I'm sorry, we just took 17 9 verse 28 key text. Even a fool, when he holds his peace, is counted wise. When he shuts his lip, he is esteemed as prudent.
Here's a little bit of humor. Now, here is one of the few places where fool is not used in a moral sense. Here's a guy that was a bit shortchanged when God was passing out the gray matter. He just limited.
But somehow he's learned how to keep his mouth shut. So here a group of people are sitting around all shooting off at the mouth like they know something, and the more they talk, the more they're spewing out their ignorance. He just sits there listening very quietly. Stranger comes in and says, you know, I bet that guy knows more than all of them put together.
And he sees through their stupidity. So much that he won't even demean himself by talking in such a nonsensical context. And so he goes away in the eyes of people esteemed a wise man. For one reason, he kept his mouth shut.
Now, if that isn't humor, I don't know what humor is. Even a fool, when he holds his peace, is counted wise. He's still a fool. He's still a bit shortchanged in the providence of God.
But he had enough moral sense to keep his mouth shut. If he'd opened his mouth, everyone would have known his problem. But by keeping his mouth. Shut, he was counted wise when he shuts his lips.
He is esteemed as prudent. That is, he has applied wisdom as prudence. Teach our children that. Tell them that's not being dishonest.
Say, if you're in a situation, don't know anything. Don't let everybody know it by opening your mouth. Keep your mouth shut. They may think your silence is wisdom, may stand you in good stead.
As a grown man, one esteemed in many circles as a leader. I'm asked to do. And to speak on subjects where I don't have sufficient knowledge to speak on it. And I tell people, I say, look, you've got the wrong person.
I'd make a fool of myself to try to speak on that subject. They think because you have some knowledge in a given area of biblical truth and theology and have been used of God in this area, then certainly it can be used in this area. I say, no, no, no, you've got the wrong person. So at least they say, well, the guy's wise enough to know he doesn't know.
Whereas if I came and spoke on it, they'd say he's a fool to think he knew enough to speak. That's the application. It's living with me at age 57 as a leader who lives by public speaking. I've got to have the sense enough to know when I don't know and keep my mouth shut.
Where'd I learn that? In great measure, I learned it from my parents. I learned it from my parents. One or two good teachers along the way whose influence in common grace.
I was not saved. They were not saved. But they understood this principle and under God, they drove it into my thick hide and I thank God for them. Bridges, page 279 and 280.
Time has gone too quickly. I was going to read his comment on that verse 28. Very, very interesting comment. I commend it to you quickly now.
Chapter 18, verse four. The words of a man's mouth are as deep waters. The wellspring of wisdom is as a flowing book. Very briefly, what's the imagery there?
Where? A wise man. He's got more than a shallow stream that just sparkles. You can take your ladle and dip beyond six inches and come up with something pure and clean and wholesome.
The words of a man's mouth are as deep waters. The wellspring of wisdom is as a flowing brook. It's wholesome, clean, healing, refreshing. We must teach our children again that if they are to have a mouth that when it speaks, speaks wisdom, they've got to pay the price of having a supply that could be called a deep river and a fresh and a refreshing spring.
Foolish Contention, Whispering, and the Power of the Tongue (Proverbs 18:6-21)
If God's given them anything of a good mind, they will be stroked and pride will be nurtured in areas where you have no control over it. And you need under God to seek continually to emphasize the issue is not what God gave them in the gray matter, but what they're doing to make acquisitions by pains and prayer and carefulness. Some of you heard me say this before, but others you haven't. So I'm repeating it, not because I'm getting old and senile, because you need to hear it in our report cards, in our school, all through grammar school, that two marks at your A, B or C.
And then you have next to it a one, two, three or four. This represented effort and character revealed in the way you dealt with your subject. You want to know something? If I came home with an A2 or an A3, I was in big bad trouble.
Why? Because my parents were not feeding their pride by my letter grade. And they said to me, son, this represents what God gave you. This represents what you're becoming in your character.
If I came home with a C1, I was praised. I was encouraged. But if I came home with an A2, I was in trouble. I thank God for that.
Why? Because I was being taught some of these principles that we're looking at in these very passages. That if I was to have any substance over the long haul, over a full lifetime, then I would have to pay the price of diligent, constant application. I couldn't coast.
Sure, there were subjects that I could get an A without studying. And that disturbed my parents. And until it was A1 or A plus one, I was in bad trouble. Now, many of you, you sit there and say, Pastor, that's as far into my upbringing as night from day.
I know it is. But do you want to pass on your mess to the next generation? If not, then you start doing something in this area and do it diligently and do it prayerfully and do it consistently, do it to the point of growing weary in the task. Verses six to eight, a fool's lips enter contention and his mouth calls for stripes.
A fool's mouth is his destruction and his lips are the snare of his soul. The words of a whisperer are as dainty morsels, they go down into the innermost parts. What's Solomon saying here? What is he trying to pass on to his son here?
He's saying, if you like to squabble and you like to get into verbal jousts, you're a fool. It's a fool's lips that enter into contention and you know how you deal with a fool. You have to give him stripes or rebuke enters more into the heart of one that have understanding than a hundred stripes into a fool, but the fool must have the stripes. And if you see in your children, for whatever reason, a tendency to welcome verbal battles, it's a call for the rod, a call for the rod until it drives out that foolishness and they learn not to be contentious.
Otherwise, what happens? They become grown up. They become church members and they're always fault fighting, always causing contention, and they're like the drunk with the old stinky Limburger cheese on his mustache everywhere he goes. This place stinks, can't stand around here.
This place stinks, can't stand around here. We've got grown adults who spend their whole life going from church to church. This place stinks, can't stand around here. Why? They're the fool whose lips constantly enter into contention.
Never learned this lesson. Never were nurtured to learn that stripes should have driven out that folly and his lips become the snare of his soul. Verse eight. The words of a whisperers dainty morsels.
They go down into the innermost parts. There's a picture of someone bringing a lovely spread of orders. My wife and I can't get over this. It was the most amusing thing recently happened in our trip out to the Midwest.
The people at Anderson were very kind to provide for us a lovely night and evening afternoon and evening and a night in a downtown motel in Indianapolis between the southern and the mid America conferences recently, and they knew it was our 35th anniversary that weekend. And they told me to take her out to eat at a lovely restaurant in the area. And I found this elegant I think it's a four star restaurant because the concierge at the hotel said, I shouldn't tell you this. And I said, look, this is our 35th anniversary.
I kind of whispered, you know, I want to do something special, said, well, I shouldn't tell you this, but nothing special enough in our hotel. Here's where you go. So she gave me the name of this elegant restaurant and it was elegant. They were all prepared for us.
Fresh cut flowers on the table. When we came, it was sort of a U shaped booth. They pulled the table out for us, brought it back in, opened up the napkins for us, spread it on our lap. I mean, it was just and the first thing they did is I saw the waiter coming out with plates, biggest symbols.
Two plates, two plates. Now, I kid you not, if my wife were here, she'd bear witness. I know my tendency to rhetorical exaggeration and I'm restraining. I mean, huge dinner.
And they're sitting right smack in the middle with this one little order and the waiter serious, solemn as the day of judgment explained what it was. It was such and such a cracker with a little looked like an impoverished cow shrimp who'd been starved a while and some kind of special, elegant sauce on it. But here was this one little order sitting in the middle. It looks so lonely in the midst of that huge plate.
And we tried very elegantly to take it with our fingers and nibble on it and then have the plate taken away. Well, what's the purpose of all of that? Well, look at the text, verse eight, dainty morsels. That was a dainty morsel served up elegantly.
And I tell you, it went I was hungry by then. So, I mean, it went down into the innermost parts. It wasn't floating on the top at the end of a large meal like after dinner. Mint. I mean, I was hungry.
How comes this big plate? And I thought, good, here comes an appetizer. And there was a little order, dainty morsel. But it went down into the innermost part.
Now look at the text. The words of a whisperers, dainty morsels. They go down to the innermost part.
Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me. Oh, it's not true. The words whispered you're on the end. You see, I'm your friend.
So I'm telling you, you're somebody special. Where are kids going to learn the horrible, devastating influence of whispering, passing on information that others have no right to know, passing it on with no good intent, with no noble intent, where are they going to learn it? They're going to learn it from. They won't do or they won't learn it at all.
We must teach them that whispering in that sense is never morally innocent. It goes down into the depths of the soul. And how many a time a man or a woman has spent 20 years building up moral and ethical credibility? And someone came along and whispered a little word that went down into someone's innermost part and it was utterly forgotten until in a moral crisis, when that person had reason to want to resist or reject that person's friendship or influence.
What happened? That dainty morsel was brought up by the devilish gastrointestinal operations by which those morsels can then be brought up. Oh, yes. I remember what somebody told me.
Aha. Not a thing they saw. Not a thing observed. Ten, fifteen, twenty years of blameless walk.
And it's swept away by the cursed influence of the words of a whisperer.
And though the whisperer will be held accountable, so will you be held accountable because you never taught your child how wicked it was. You let them whisper about their siblings, whisper concerning their friends. Parents, what an awesome task to teach our children the righteous use of their tongues. So let's take a look at the Bible.
This is the first chapter. Verse twenty and twenty one. A man's belly shall be filled with the fruit of his mouth. With the increase of his lips shall he be satisfied.
Death and life are in the power of the tongue, and they that love it that is love life and the use of the tongue that leads to life shall eat the fruit thereof. A man's belly. That is. with the fruit of his mouth I believe the assumption in this text is that he is speaking good things and in return his own inner being will reap the fruit of his good things because look at the last part of the verse where the same thought is repeated in different words you see in the Hebrew poetry you have contrast or you have amplification and reiteration in different words which is what I believe we have in this text the man's belly shall be filled with the fruit of his mouth that is good fruit from good things that he has spoken with the increase of his lips shall he be satisfied in other words he sees what he says bringing holy fruits and holy increase in the lives of those to whom he has spoken then this frightening text death and life are in the power of the tongue think of it death death death and life in the tongue death and life in the power of the tongue all the way to spiritual life and spiritual death because by thy words
in the day of judgment thou shalt be justified and by thy words thou shalt be condemned we need to teach our children that if their words do not demonstrate that they have a righteous heart all God will need to prove in the day of judgment that they are wicked is not that they visited brothels not that they watched pornography not that they cussed and swore no all he'll have to do is produce the whisperings that sowed seeds of doubt the words of contention as opposed to the soft word that turned away wrath just bring forward the unrighteous uses of the tongue and that will be enough to say as I consign you to hell your words prove you were never made righteous in your heart our children need to know that it's not enough for them to say oh everybody I mean you know God doesn't expect no it isn't it isn't enough we've got to tell them until grace so works in their hearts that grace frames what comes out of their lips and when that which cuts and scorches and pierces and wounds and hurts and causes contention comes out the proof that they're righteous is they're willing to humble themselves as necessary 50 times a day to seek forgiveness to heal the wounds to bridge the separations
to cease the contentions that their lips caused and if that's not so they're not bringing forth fruits meet for repentance they're lost they're unconverted and if you regard them as Christians you're as deceived as they are and some of you parents God have mercy on you you have projected to your kids your own unbiblical standard with reference to this very issue your tongue can cut and scorch and wound you won't humble yourself you just think well the dust is settled time has passed that's enough try to convince God of that in the day of judgment when he says your words are the basis on which I'll damn you folks this is serious business you're beginning to feel the cumulative weight passage after passage after passage I'm sorry I didn't look at the clock I'm sorry it's 20 to 11 let's stop let's pray
oh father how sobered we are before your word the sheer power of your word Lord its cumulative effect overwhelms us buries us but we thank you that it resurrects us with the cry who is sufficient for these things oh by the Holy Spirit deal with every parent in this place that we may be determined by your grace to admonish our children in the righteous way by the gracious use of the tongue and by the power of the spirit to be godly examples of everything concerning which we admonish them Lord forgive your servant for being careless about the time pray that you'd help everyone to make up these matters that there be no confusion and ruffling of spirits as we go into preparation for the coming hour we thank you for the forgiveness that is ours in the blood of Christ Amen
you have been listening to how not to foul up the training of your children by Pastor Albert N. Martin these cassettes are distributed by the Trinity Book Service if you would like a free listing of other audio cassettes and books please call us at
This transcript was generated by automated speech recognition and may contain errors. It is provided for study and reference only; the audio recording is the authoritative source.
Passages Expounded
The sermon systematically expounds numerous verses from these chapters, focusing on the righteous and unrighteous uses of the tongue as a primary means of parental admonition.
Texts Expounded
Also Referenced
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