Hold Your Tongue | AdventAI

Pacific Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Oakland, California · Mar 6, 1879

Hold Your Tongue.

MEN can guide ships, bridle horses, tame lions, run telegraph cables under the ocean, navigate the air, signal the storms and tunnel the mountains, but the tongue remains unconquered.

The tongue was made to speak words of hope, to sing anthems of praise, to console the broken-hearted, to encourage the doubting, and to proclaim the beauties and glories of an immortal world. Its words were to distil like the dew, and to be as sweet as honey, but how perverted. It is sharper than a sword, stings like the viper and wounds the hearts of men. Words of blasphemy, of distrust, of despair are uttered, when there should be only words of hope, of truth and of love, falling like the rain drops on the new mown grass.

It was the tongue of an eloquent Greek which calmed the stormy passions of the multitude. It was the tongue of an angel that proclaimed the tidings of love and hope to the fallen of earth. It was the tongue of our blessed Lord that pronounced the world's forgiveness in his name. And we behold cloven tongues of fire ready to proclaim the pentecostal gospel, when the tidings of life were to go forth to the nations. Unknown tongues were heard in the infant church, and uttered the wonderful words of the Father's love.

But there are times when the tongue should be silent. Men are to be judged by their words. When two men are in a quarrel, hold your tongue; when you have nothing to say of others, hold your tongue; when your words are to be carried by feet that are swift in running to mischief, hold your tongue.

Remember that the seven sins of the body include the sinful tongue. Says Solomon: "These six things doth the Lord hate; yea, seven are an abomination unto him: A proud look, a lying tongue, and hands that have shed innocent blood, a heart that deviseth wicked imaginations, feet that be swift in running to mischief, a false witness, and he that soweth discord among brethren." Prov. 6:16-19. He who would see long days, enjoy the comforts of truth, be ready for angel-greetings, must refrain his tongue from evil, and his lips, that they speak no guile.

The tongue is indeed a little member but it boasteth great things. Let the heart be imbued with love and purity, then from its abundance of goodness the tongue will utter words of hope for the fallen, and messages of peace to those who sit in the valley of death.