Tongue Tied

This is the sermon I preached at First Church Simsbury on September 16, 2018.

James 3:1-12

An old friend of mine from Hawaii just shared a wonderful story. Peggy is a brilliant trial lawyer and passionate advocate for liberal causes. She is fearless and dogged in any debate about contemporary issues. Some years ago, Peggy moved from Hawaii to Moscow, Idaho. Though the University of Idaho attracts some liberals to Moscow, Idaho is a red state so Peggy often finds herself outnumbered in political discussions. Since moving to Idaho Peggy’s labor of love has been leading an organization called Palouse Pathways that works with children and youth to inspire and prepare them to attend college.

Peggy picks up the story from here:

I had a great afternoon at the Latah County Fair at my table for Palouse Pathways. I have to share a couple of experiences that will stay with me in this crazy world. I had a wonderful time talking with kids, but these experiences were both with older men.

One was a volunteer for the Palouse CareNet Pregnancy Center booth right next to mine. I loathe crisis pregnancy centers, hate them with a passion. But I did not discuss this with my booth neighbor. We talked about kids and college, and I felt we had a similar passion for helping young adults figure out what to do.

The other encounter was with a heavy set guy named Lynn, a little rough around the edges, wearing overalls. He took all the material I had, telling me that he wanted to give it to his neighbor who had three little kids and no job. He kept saying he wanted her to have dreams and that it’s terrible when people don’t dream.

He then pulled out his beat up wallet and took out a tattered piece of paper (I’m thinking, uh oh), and he quietly sang to me a song he wrote, reading the lyrics off of the folded and refolded sheet. The verses each started with the phrase “oh dreamer, oh dreamer, oh dreamer.” He had a lovely voice and pale blue teary eyes.

It felt like time stood still — really because I wrestled my monkey mind to hold time still — because I was telling myself — this is a moment.

And it was.

Peggy faced a choice, we all do, especially in these times, when to hold our tongue and when to speak up for what we believe in. In his letter, James writes, about the power of the tongue, of words, of speech, of language to damage and destroy. He also writes about bridling or controlling our tongue. I know Peggy well enough to know that she was capable of using her tongue to start a political firestorm in her encounters with these two men, yet she felt led in a different direction.

James’ letter is wisdom literature, the only example in the New Testament. This means it is composed or proverbial sayings and practical word of wisdom to live by.

The author speaks in imperatives, short commands that tell us what to do and what not to do, for example, “If any think they are religious, and do not bridle their tongues but deceive their hearts, their religion is worthless.”

To some, James’ tone is off puttingly judgy. Many contemporary readers would rather be led to a feel-good experience of God’s grace and love, than be left feeling reprimanded for falling short of God’s expectations. As a result, James is sometimes neglected in Bible studies and sermons.

But James suggests that we cannot fully rest in God’s love, nor can we fully experience our own humanity, unless we first recognize God in each other. And we too often deploy our tongue to deny God’s likeness in others.

James puts it right out there, we all make mistakes, specifically in what we say, in our use of language. He then uses a series of metaphors to describe the tongue, like a bridle or a rudder, the tongue is small but powerful. Ignited by hell, he says, the tongue is a small fire that can set a whole forest ablaze. The tongue is a world of iniquity that stains the whole body. Then come these blistering verses:

“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.”

Bible scholar Mark Douglas writes, “James’ warnings about language are all the more pressing at the beginning of the twentieth-first century. As we move ever further into the information age, we also move ever further into the disinformation age. Error, miscommunication, deception, slander, and libel have become so common that we expect them from reputable sources, and all but insist on them from sources we think of as disreputable.” Douglas wrote those words in 2009. Some ten years later, James’ words have never been truer.

I return again to Peggy’s encounter with the two men at the county fair. Like all of us, she is quite capable of cursing those made in the likeness of God. Given her experience as a trial lawyer, Peggy’s tongue could have functioned as a flamethrower. Where did she find the bridle to lead her in another direction?

As sometimes happens when I have scripture percolating in my head all week, stories come in bunches. In this one, Ann Bauer writes:

I come from Minneapolis, and before that I lived in Seattle and Boston — three of the bluest, most left-leaning cities in the United States. I was an urban woman and couldn’t imagine living anywhere other than a city. My husband concurred. Then our 28 year-old son died in late 2016.

Suddenly the traffic and noise and confusion became too much. John and I took off on a year’s driving tour of gentler parts — both of us working from the road, a computer security consultant and a writer. We grew nearly silent in grief. We considered Asheville, N.C., and Santa Fe, N.M. But on a chilly, silver January day, we drove into the Ozarks of Northwest Arkansas. Though neither of us could put our finger on exactly why, this felt like our place.

People back home were flummoxed: I heard them say a lot about white, rural Christians who reject outsiders and “cling to their guns.” But what city folk don’t know is how beautiful it is here, and by that I mean way more than you imagine.

One Sunday in August, after yoga, our pit bull Ellie accompanied us to Home Depot.

There was an old truck in the parking lot with a large American flag stuck upright in the bed and a handmade sign about the virtues of patriotism and God. Since our daughter joined the Navy, everything about the military makes me miss her. And the constant evangelizing feels like a threat to every spiritual inkling I have.

We walked through the store slowly, because it was cool and somehow nicer — quieter, maybe? — than the Home Depots up north. Somewhere around plumbing, a couple stopped to admire Ellie. They were adorned in pastel tie-dye and Jesus paraphernalia. He had a silver beard, a lurching limp and an enormous silver cross on a leather cord around his neck. She wore her hair in a messy gray bun, and had a rubber bracelet around her wrist. On it was printed “Matthew 11:28.” “She is gorgeous!” hollered the man, leaning down to pet Ellie, teetering because his game leg was at least two inches shorter than his good one. He scratched her where she likes, on her hips, for a minute. After he was done, the woman squatted gracefully and let Ellie lick her entire face. “They are such a misunderstood breed,” she said, wiping away either tears or dog slobber as she rose. “Thank you for letting us visit with your little one.” We wished them a good afternoon, and they walked away holding hands.

When we got home, the dog lay in the air conditioning and slept with her tongue hanging out. I started making dinner, and while the meat was cooking I googled Matthew 11:28 on my phone. I suspected it would be about the wicked and our need for salvation, or miracles where only believers were raised from the dead. Instead, I found this: “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” I had wandered onto our deck, and the trees around me shimmered in a sudden cooling breeze. And so — in a sense — we have, I wanted to tell the woman. We are weary. We’ve found rest. We are here.

Peggy concludes her story with these words:

I know the value of meaningful political conversations. But encounters like the ones I had at the fair remind me of the essential human dignity of others. That’s what I need now.

I need to be reminded of others’ humanity.

And my own.

Upon meeting those they were inclined to judge, both Peggy and Ann were led to hold their tongues, and so encountered God in these strangers.

Oh dreamers, Oh dreamers, Oh dreamers, you too are being led.

Come, all you who are weary and burdened, open yourselves to recognize the likeness of God in others, their humanity and your own, and find rest in God’s grace and love.

Amen.