September 17, 2006
Text: James 3:1-12
Leverage Point
“Not many should become teachers,” James
asserts. And don’t we know it. Just this week, NBC aired an extended
interview by Matt Lauer with Debra LaFave, the 23-year old Florida teacher convicted
of seducing a 14-year old student. She
could be the poster child for the point James is trying to make. And unfortunately, her story is not
unique. The news has been littered, in
recent years, with stories of teachers whose stewardship of their position has
been both tragic and obscene.
But it
wasn’t lewd and lascivious conduct that prompted James’ counsel. Primarily on his mind was the power of the
word and the recognition that not everyone wields that power effectively or
even honorably. And because teachers
occupy uniquely influential positions to wield the power of their words, James
urges special caution around the profession.
Those who enter this line of work ought to be constantly mindful of the
trust and responsibility that is theirs.
And the rest of us ought to be vigilant about to whom we give access to
a classroom.
What we know – sometimes from painful
experience, is that “the words of a teacher touch the soul and, because they
reach the vulnerable places of the heart, have potential both to heal and to
destroy. While teachers are called to sustain the weary with the word (Isaiah
50:4), their words become spiritually lethal when they are divorced from God’s
goodness, gentleness and wisdom.” [1]
But as James’ subsequent
observations make clear, it isn’t only teachers that need to be mindful. All of us have conversations. All of us shape thoughts and emotions and
ideas into words and launch them into some common hearing, and if “looking
before leaping” is sensible counsel for our actions, “thinking before speaking”
is no less critical for our voices.
Words, after all, are more than sounds; they
are color and texture and substance and heart.
Words cast darkness or shower with light. Words paralyze with fear or melt with
love. Words are velvet and brick, slander
or song, insight or insult, blessing and curse.
Like nitro-glycerin, they have the power to steady a heartbeat so that
life might go on, or to explode an entire building, bringing life to a sudden
close. More than grunts and vocal
exclamation, words are power and meaning and nuance and guide; and we had
better form them, use them, shepherd them with care.
For words,
and the tongues that roll them into action, have leverage. Leverage, that “positional advantage” that
attributes to something small the power to move or sway or influence that which
is conspicuously larger. As a bridle is
to a horse or a rudder is to a ship, so is the tongue to a person. And as a spark is to a forest fire, so is a
word to the conduct and comprehension of human interaction. Despite the ludicrous chant of childhood that
“sticks and stones can break my bones, but words will never hurt me,” words –
so small and ephemeral – matter. I don’t
know anyone who hasn’t been hurt by words – carelessly spilled or angrily
thrown; insensitively dropped or maliciously jabbed. As James points out with understated
artistry, “…the tongue is a small member,
yet it boasts of great exploits.”
Great
exploits, indeed! It was with words that
God created the heavens and the earth and everything that fills them. The Word of God is a lamp unto our feet,
proclaims the Psalmist, and a light unto our path. The Word, according to John, was in the
beginning with God, and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us as a light
that lives on so powerfully that the darkness can not put it out. It was the Spirit, manifested through tongues
as of fire, that animated the first disciples at Pentecost and transformed them
into bold witnesses of the faith.
But as James goes on to caution, the tongue can
also be set on fire by hell, itself, as when crowds gathered outside the court
of Pilate and shouted, “Crucify Him!” As
when crowds stand outside a funeral or a school play and shout “God hates you!” “How
great a forest is set ablaze by a small fire! And the tongue,” James
observes, “is a fire.”
Of course, not everyone takes words this
seriously. In fact, careful speech is
often ridiculed by critics as mere nonsensical slatherings in the name of
political correctness. And to be sure, “political
correctness” can be taken to extremes.
One of my seminary professors was a guy named “Countryman,” and in one
of the student satirical newspapers that circulated at the time, his name was
modified to make it “gender neutral.”
Country-man became Country-person.
But even that didn’t finally satisfy, because the name still ended in a
masculine form – “son.” So finally the
evolution was completed with “Country-per-offspring.” It was, I’ll admit, linguistic precision run
amuck.
But if the
“political” part of the phrase sometimes steers our discourse a bit off-track,
the importance of the “correctness” part ought to be self-evident. How we say something is inseparably
interwoven with what we are trying to say.
Why should we continue to call
them “mailmen” when women just as often carry the post? And why would we want to call it a “manhole cover” when it no longer represents the
truth? We don’t treat our clothing with
such cavalier abandon – as if one garment is as good as another as long as it
covers the skin.
James
understands the risks – and the irony.
The same mouth that sings God’s praise also curses those made in God’s
image. The same tongue, he laments,
speaks both healing and hurt. In fact, there
is a dark and pessimistic tone to James’ description. One struggles to read in his words any kind
of optimism at all about our ability to control the little leverage point that
is our tongue. Indeed, he says quite
bluntly, “no one can tame the tongue – a restless evil, full of deadly
poison.” He makes it sound like the bird
flu – only a matter of time before it kills you.
I’m of the
mind to believe that James exaggerates the case. That’s not to deny the tongue’s potency, or its
ability to cut and poison and bludgeon and belittle. It is just to air the conviction that its
malignant potentials can be blunted, and its considerable leverage be applied in
life affirming ways. Besides, unless one
is a fatalistic drone, why else bring it up?
The real
issue, of course, is not the stray or incidental oath, nor even the passing
angry word. Of more significant concern
to James is the “creation of distorted worlds of meaning within which the word
of truth is suppressed;” [2] in which “perception” is more important than
fact; in which simply saying something over and over again makes it “true,”
regardless of the evidence or experience at hand; in which a single flat
surface or corner or loose thread is represented to be the whole of what is, in
reality, immense and intricately shaped, and wonderfully complex.
We have long since understood that history has
largely been told through the voice of the winners, meaning that concern for
those who have no voice could well be
the greatest justice issue of all time. How
many years, for example, did the people living in Des Moines’ “southeast
bottoms” complain about water in their basements every time it rained without
ever being heard by the leaders with the power to correct the problem?
The gospel
calls us to use the power of our words to call into being fresh images of
healing and hope; powerful portraits of welcome and reconciliation; vivid colors
of forgiveness, understanding and humility, as well as strong affirmation,
relational innovation, and grace. How
long will the choking voices of immigrants locked in railroad cars be muffled,
less by the steel of the walls than the indifference of our attention, before
they are heard and saved? How long will
the voices of the lepers of our time be relegated to the outskirts of town, the
outskirts of the church, the outskirts of family life, before we listen,
respond, and welcome?
What is
the word of the church – and does it finally matter if that word is not on our
lips and in our lives?
As some of
you have heard me say, I think the current billboards around town suggesting
that “If you can wish, you can believe” are not only silly, but
misleading. But risking the same kind of
censure, I would be so bold as to assert that if you can say it, you can
imagine it; and if you can imagine it – if you can picture it in your mind and
feel it in your heart – you can begin to practice it in your life even if only
in the smallest, most insignificant appearing ways. And if that seems trivial, remember the
wildfires that are set in motion by a single spark – and the spreading flame
that once was a simple act, that once was a vivid dream, that once in the
beginning was as a hopeful, prophetic word.
Ah! The
tongue: such “…a small member and yet it boasts of great exploits.” For through its leverage can be shifted
the gargantuan weight of change.
.