Robert E. Dunham
The Power of Words
July 28, 2021
James 3:1-12
James 3:1-12
Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers and sisters, for you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness. For all of us make many mistakes. Anyone who makes no mistakes in speaking is perfect, able to keep the whole body in check with a bridle. If we put bits into the mouths of horses to make them obey us, we guide their whole bodies. Or look at ships: though they are so large that it takes strong winds to drive them, yet they are guided by a very small rudder wherever the will of the pilot directs. So also, the tongue is a small member, yet it boasts of great exploits.
How great a forest is set ablaze by a small fire! And the tongue is a fire. The tongue is placed among our members as a world of iniquity; it stains the whole body, sets on fire the cycle of nature, and is itself set on fire by hell. For every species of beast and bird, of reptile and sea creature, can be tamed and has been tamed by the human species, but no one can tame the tongue—a restless evil, full of deadly poison. With it we bless the Lord …, and with it we curse those who are made in the likeness of God. From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this ought not to be so….
Sermon
At one point in Leif Enger’s latest novel, in a conversation with a mostly illiterate, but savvy young friend, the protagonist-narrator says, “Words are one way we leave tracks in the world.”[1] I’ve pondered that comment more than a few times since reading it, wondering what kind of tracks I’ve been leaving…and worrying about the loss of civil speech in our land. As one who has spent a lot of time over the years trying to find just the right words, I believe how we choose to speak to one another in both the personal and public spheres is so crucial.
Some of my passion about language comes from a personal failure in that regard. Some years back, I wounded a good friend with some careless words. I was irritated by something my friend had done, and in my irritation, I wrote and sent a note, when it would have been far wiser and certainly kinder to sit with my words for a while and express them in person in a less confrontational fashion. I have lived with my regret ever since.
It was perhaps providential that right on the heels of that experience I first came across a short poem by the American poet Carl Sandburg:
Look out how you use proud words.
When you let proud words go, it is not easy to call them back.
They wear long boots, hard boots; they walk off proud; they can’t hear you calling –
Look out how you use proud words.[2]
Sandburg called that poem, “Primer Lesson.” It is a lesson that everyone in or out of the public sphere should take to heart. It is a lesson I am still trying to take to heart: “When you let proud words go, it is not easy to call them back.”
Sandburg’s “primer lesson” is not unlike the admonition James offers us in our reading for today. James is not especially hopeful when he considers human language and speech. While he sees power for good in it, he also senses its great peril.
How great a forest is set ablaze by a small fire! And the tongue is a fire…. For every kind of beast and bird, of reptile and sea creature, can be tamed and has been tamed by humankind, but no one can tame the tongue—a restless evil, full of deadly poison.
New Testament scholar Luke Timothy Johnson says James’s discourse on speech is so direct and so forceful that it takes little effort to understand it or apply it. So, maybe our best response to his instruction is simply to confess and acknowledge the many ways this linguistic disease has infected our lives.[3] James here invites us to reflect on the power of language for both good and evil, tracing all the way back to Eden in the Book of Genesis. Says Johnson:
In the…creation account, the human person is given the power of speech to name all of the living creatures. The first and most important gift distinctive to humans is this power to name, to create language, and by creating language also to continue God’s own creative activity in the world.
When we realize that language is a world-creating capacity, we can begin to appreciate James’s cosmic imagery in describing [both] its power and its peril… The power of language is awesome, for it gives humans the freedom to structure human life according to “the word of truth” … or to create a universe of meaning in which God is omitted or ignored. The real peril of the tongue is not found in the passing angry word or the incidental oath or the petty bit of slander. It is found in the creation of distorted worlds of meaning within which the … truth is suppressed.
One of the most distinctive and disturbing [signs of our times, said Luke Johnson] is the way in which language serves [to distort the truth]. We dwell in a virtual Babel of linguistic confusion and misdirection.[4]
I should note that Johnson wrote those words more than a quarter-century ago to describe the culture of the late 1990s. But they describe the culture of our own time, too, and perhaps even more pointedly. There has been so much discussion of late about the subordination of truth to utter falsehood, and we have all witnessed complete fabrications of truth in so many arenas. Given the power to use language to bless and enrich, we have settled too often for using that power to damage and diminish human life, to obscure the truth, to promote darkness instead of light, ignorance instead of awareness, wrath instead of compassion.
Language has the power to name and to bless. It has the power to create an environment of generosity and love and grace, the power to soothe and comfort. But it also has the power to wound, to curse, to lead others astray. James seems to say that it more often does the latter than the former, and at times I fear that he is right, though I have seen evidence of both sides of such power.
I have a pastor-friend who told once of an incident that occurred one Sunday morning at the door of the church he was then serving. I’m not naming names, but it was a fairly prominent church in a large southern city. My friend had just offered the benediction and had walked to the back of the sanctuary and out onto the front porch to greet the congregation.
But before anyone else could reach him, a woman came bursting out the door and stormed up to him. He said he could tell she had a purpose and momentarily wondered if he should duck. She laid into him verbally, crowding him as she spoke. She told him she had not liked his sermon, and she told him why. My friend doesn’t remember the particulars of her critique, but he said one was that she thought the sermon was too short. Now, that’s a complaint most preachers don’t hear!
As her tirade continued, my friend began to glance around, looking for anyone who might come to his rescue. And with no one behind her in line, she went on and on. “Of all days for there to be no line!” my friend thought. The woman complained bitterly and at length about a number of things, and then, before my friend could say a word, she turned and walked away with a spring in her step. He said she seemed invigorated by having gotten all of her complaints out in one fell swoop.
He stood there stunned for a moment, then went back through the front doors to see where everyone else had gone, only to be greeted by howls of laughter. It turns out everyone had been waiting in the sanctuary. They weren’t about to leave! Without the pastor or his antagonist having realized it, she had been speaking directly into his still active lavaliere microphone. Her complaints had stopped everyone in their tracks, had even halted the organ postlude, broadcast quite loudly to the horror and amusement of everyone in the sanctuary.
My friend just shook his head, embarrassed, but an elder said to him, “Oh, if we could only hear ourselves the way we heard her!”
Look out how you use proud words, the poet said. When you let proud words go, it is not easy to call them back. Human language possesses the power to curse and damage, to alienate and destroy. How many of us, given the chance to hear ourselves amplified, might wish we had never said some of the things we have said?
We know the inherent danger in human language. But there is a flip side, too; for we also know how gracious and kind and thoughtful language can help to bring healing, to create good, to offer hospitality…or encouragement…or solace. We know the way words of grace or forgiveness or compassion spoken in just the right moment can make all the difference in diffusing anger, in restoring harmony, in helping make things right again. The power of language cuts both ways, for ill and for good. James says that with our tongue “we bless the Lord … and with it we curse those who are made in the likeness of God. From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My [friends], this ought not to be so.” We are made to be people of loving kindness and compassion and are fashioned to be a blessing to others.
I was in Florida recently for the funeral of a dear high school friend, and was in the Tampa airport for my Sunday night flight home, when I encountered a reminder that gracious speech is not lost completely. It happened at a Cuban restaurant in the Delta terminal. The tables were pretty close together, so I could overhear a nearby conversation as a member of the wait staff was patiently trying to explain the menu items to a couple who clearly did not speak English or Spanish. They seemed to be of Middle Eastern origin. Anyway, the server was trying her best, matching up menu items with pictures, and I was moved by the warm interaction between the server and her customers.
Apparently, not everyone was moved as I was, however, for I also could hear a rather loud guest at the next table just beyond that one. That patron spoke up to protest the slow service he was receiving. “Oh, come on!” he said after a while. “They’re never going to understand what you are saying! And I have a flight to catch. I need to order or I’m going to miss my flight.” The young server looked up at him with a smile: “Don’t you worry, sir! I’ll get your order in just a moment, and we’ll get you to your flight on time.” She then went back to trying to understand, smiling and encouraging the Middle Eastern couple who didn’t quite grasp Ropa Vieja, or Croquetas de Pollo. They finally settled on red beans and rice, which somewhat resembled familiar fare for them.
When the young woman came to take my order, I told her how much I admired her graciousness to the two travelers who had found the menu so difficult to comprehend. She smiled and said, “It’s so hard sometimes when you don’t know the language. I just try to be kind.” And I said, “What a remarkably good idea!” It was then I noticed the necklace she was wearing, and the crucifix that hung from it. And I thought, “I do hope she learned such kindness and patience and compassion in the church.” I suspect that was the case.
By the way, after I finished my meal and made my way to the gate, I noted it would still be an hour before our flight would board. I also noticed that the loud customer who complained that he was going to miss his flight was already there, queued up in the priority boarding line.
There is such power in the words we speak – blessings and curses in what we say. “Words are one way we leave tracks in the world.”[5] Of course, we all know the power of words… know that the tracks can help lead others home or guide them into peril. Words can go either way. James knew it. Carl Sandburg knew it. So do you. So do I.
But I’m still thinking about that young server at the Tampa airport restaurant, about how she exuded genuine grace and hospitality with her kind and patient words. I hope someday someone might say the same about us. That with our words we have been welcoming, encouraging folk, who blessed others with grace and kindness.
I’ve also been imagining a church – a faith community – that might have taken seriously its responsibility to teach that young woman with the crucifix necklace how to offer blessing. I’ve been thinking about what we might do to encourage one another to embody and encourage Christ’s kindness and hospitality and grace. And it hit me, as one who’s been watching you at work these last 33 years, that you have provided such a model for others. You have taught children and youth and one another how to show kindness and grace and forbearance, even how to disagree in love. That, friends, is no small thing! Especially in these difficult days filled with a cacophony of hard, proud words that wear long boots. Goodness, how we need to learn and to teach words that bless and heal and extend love and welcome! I’m thinking maybe that will be part of your lasting legacy. Wouldn’t that be a joy! Wouldn’t that something to celebrate!
[1] Leif Enger, I Cheerfully Refuse, New York, Grove Press, 2024, 233.
[2] https://allpoetry.com/Primer-Lesson, accessed July 18, 2024. The linkage of the James text and the Sanburg poem was first suggested by my friend and colleague Patrick Willson in a paper he delivered to a meeting of the Moveable Feast study group some years ago. This sermon draws from that paper at several points..
[3] Luke Timothy Johnson, “The Letter of James,” The New Interpreter’s Bible XII, Nashville, Abingdon Press, 1998, 205.
[4] Johnson, 205-206.
[5] Enger, 233.