2 Timothy 2: 14-19
Words… they’re one of the trickiest things about our faith, aren’t they?
How are we supposed to treat each other with kindness, with perfect honesty, without gossiping, without quarreling, without anger, without grumbling, without complaining, and most of all like we would treat ourselves? All of these are specific commandments we receive in Scripture.
We are told very specifically of the dangers of our tongue. James 3: 6 says “and the tongue is a fire, a world of unrighteousness.” Proverbs 18: 21 says “the tongue has the power of life and death, and those who love it will eat its fruit.”
2 Timothy 2 puts it just as strongly, saying that quarreling about words “does no good, but only ruins the hearers.”
These are great challenges for us. Of all of the sins with which we struggle, I think for almost every one of us the tongue is the greatest hurdle. How can we tame our tongue, and by extension our mind? It is, of course, a discipline, not a gift. A gift is something that some have and others do not. Some have the gift of healing. God has designated that for a few. But no one has the “gift” of a tamed tongue. It is something they must practice, and which very few if anyone has ever mastered completely.
I come from a family where sarcasm is a second language. That’s not even the truth. I come from a family where straightforwardness, realness can often be a second language, hidden behind walls of sarcasm. And in some ways, that’s not wholly awful. We relate through our shared language effectively, and often without hurt or pain. But it is impossible to tell where those lines are, and we step over them all the time.
I don’t believe, as I’m certain others do, that sarcasm should be eliminated entirely. I think it is a perfectly acceptable way to relate to one another if each person feels comfortable with it. But sarcasm is just one way our tongue can be untamed.
Verse 16 is particularly challenging: “avoid irreverent babble, for it will lead people into more and more ungodliness.” This can definitely touch at sarcasm, but it can also touch at much of our speech. How often do we give things their proper respect, especially God? We do so rarely, and Paul reminds us how it can end.
Paul specifically calls out two men who have strayed from. This is something we must emulate with extreme caution. Always we must remember Jesus’s exhortation to take the plank out of our own eye before looking at the speck in another’s. But we must also always, always guard against the spread of false gospel. This is perhaps our greatest challenge as Christians. I do not believe there is much difference between believing a wrong gospel in the name of Jesus Christ and believing no gospel at all. Paul calls out specific men for their unbridled tongue, we may not choose to emulate this, but we must always remember that words are power, and that right words, perhaps the only right words, are those which profess Jesus as Lord.
The Chesedh Project 