https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/03\/CarefulWhatYouSay.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n\tby Jeffrey W. Hamilton<\/p>\n\t
Text: Ephesians 5:1-8<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I. There is a passage that should cause each of us to pause – Matthew 12:32-37<\/p>\n
A. We will give an account to God for every idle word we speak!<\/p>\n
B. What we say will either justify us or condemn us<\/p>\n
C. We will not be able to avoid facing our past. God is all knowing.<\/p>\n
II. In all that we say, we must show respect and reverence for God<\/p>\n
A. After all, God is the creator of the universe and He is our Lord<\/p>\n
1. We ought to speak of him respectfully.<\/p>\n
2. We ought to hold our God in awe.<\/p>\n 3. Consider how you behave in front of an important person, such as the\npresident of your company or the president of the country\n
a. We are on our best behavior.<\/p>\n b. We choose our words carefully. Now is not the time to put our foot\nin our mouth.\n
4. Yet, when are we ever not in the presence of God?<\/p>\n B. In the model prayer, Jesus instructed his disciples to call God’s name “hallowed” –\nMatthew 6:9\n
1. Hallowed means to hold something as holy, sacred, or revered<\/p>\n
C. The Israelites were warned not to take God’s name in vain – Deuteronomy 5:11<\/p>\n 1. Vain means to make something useless, such as an idle remark, to bring to\nruin.\n 2. It derives from a word that means to rush over something, to be careless\nwith something\n 3. How often have you heard someone use God or Jesus’ name as an\nexclamation?\n
a. They are not thinking about God.<\/p>\n b. It is just filler. You could say “Oh, Wow!” and have the same\nimpact.\n
c. Are you careless with the name of God?<\/p>\n
D. Leviticus 19:12 – Do not profane the name of the Lord<\/p>\n
1. Profane means to wound, defile, or pollute<\/p>\n 2. Have you heard people invoke the name of God in a string of corrupt and\ndisgusting words?\n
3. Have you heard God called upon in events that violate the will of God?<\/p>\n E. God’s name is also polluted by people who call themselves his children but disobey\nhis will\n
1. Israel disobeyed God, causing God’s name to be profaned by the non-believers – Ezekiel 36:20-23<\/p>\n 2. When we call ourselves Christians, but then lie, cheat, and steal, we are\npolluting the name of Christ.\n
III. Another category of words we must be careful about is cursing<\/p>\n A. Cursing is to make light of something serious, to bring a serious matter into\ncontempt, to show no respect, evil or wicked talk.\n B. In discussing how everyone sins, a verse is quoted to show that people’s mouths\nare fulling of cursing – Romans 3:14\n C. Under the Old Testament law, cursing your mother or father was punishable by\ndeath. – Mark 7:10\n
D. Solomon warned not to curse the king or the rich – Ecclesiastes 10:20<\/p>\n
1. They can do something about the matter<\/p>\n E. In a moment of weakness, Peter cursed to “prove” he wasn’t a follower of Christ –\nMatthew 26:73-74\n F. Consider when a person stubs their toe on a chair and mutters words to the effect\nof condemning the chair to eternal punishment.\n 1. Does a chair have a soul? Is hell real? Can a non-living object spend\neternity in hell?\n
2. Do you desire to see anyone go to hell? Doesn’t hell scare you?<\/p>\n
3. Then why treat the topic in a flippant manner?<\/p>\n
4. “Oh, I didn’t really mean it.” That’s the point!<\/p>\n
IV. We must also be careful about inappropriate talk<\/p>\n
A. In describing the wicked, Paul talks about those who are profane – I Timothy 1:9<\/p>\n
1. Profane means to wound, to defile, or to pollute.<\/p>\n B. Paul talks about things that should not be associated with Christians – Ephesians\n5:1-8\n 1. To not to be named means that when topics such as who is sleeping\naround, who lives an impure life, or who uses other people for their own\ngoals, the last person you would think of is a Christian.\n 2. How do we accomplish this feat? We never leave the impression that we do\nthese things or approve of them.\n
3. Filthiness <\/p>\n
a. Talk that is obscene or shameful.<\/p>\n b. We should not be sprinkling our language with words dealing with\nbodily functions or sexual actions.\n
c. Not just words, but gestures as well<\/p>\n
4. Foolish talk<\/p>\n
a. Talk that is absurd, stupid, or dull of wit<\/p>\n b. Every generation has jokes about the disgusting. When I was in\nHigh School “dead baby” jokes were all the rage.\n
c. Teasing people of sleeping around.<\/p>\n
5. Coarse jesting<\/p>\n
a. Vulgar jokes, such as commonly told in locker rooms.<\/p>\n
b. Jokes were sexual matters are the punch line.<\/p>\n
V. Perhaps you are congratulating yourself<\/p>\n A. “I always knew those things were bad, though I might not have realized why they\nwere wrong.”\n B. Yet, many people, including many Christians, engage in this type of language daily\nand never think about it.\n C. You see, we commonly dress things up in “polite words” to make things seem\nbetter than they really are.\n 1. They are called “euphemisms,” where we called the garbage man a\n“sanitation engineer” because that sounds better.\n 2. Euphemisms don’t change the mean, just the words. A sanitation engineer\nstill picks up the garbage.\n 3. Euphemisms are non-offending words that are used in substitution for bad\nwords.\n
D. People do this constantly, especially with exclamations. <\/p>\n
1. What is the meaning of the following?<\/p>\n
2. Using God’s name in vain<\/p>\n
a. Gosh, golly, gee, goodness, gee-whiz<\/p>\n b. If you look these works up, you will find that as exclamations they\nrefer to God or Jesus\n c. Not only is God being referred to casually, we corrupt His holy\nname in the process!\n
3. Cursing<\/p>\n
a. Heck, darn<\/p>\n
4. Inappropriate talk<\/p>\n
a. Bull, Shoot (depends on the dictionary)<\/p>\n
b. Sometimes we just use initials, such as B.S.<\/p>\n 5. If you are uncertain, look up your exclamations in a dictionary. Usually a\ncollege dictionary is more blunt and to the point.\n
VI. We must bridle our tongue – James 1:26<\/p>\n
A. And it is so hard to control – James 3:3-6<\/p>\n B. As Christians, we must also speak well because we represent God to the world –\nColossians 4:6\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
by Jeffrey W. Hamilton Text: Ephesians 5:1-8 I. There is a passage that should cause each of us to pause – Matthew 12:32-37 A. We will give an account to God for every idle word we speak! B. What we say will either justify us or condemn us C. We will not be able to avoid facing our…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[119,32],"tags":[492],"class_list":["post-47639","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-audio","category-sermon","tag-profanity"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":27644,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/are-you-ready-for-what-god-may-be-sending\/","url_meta":{"origin":47639,"position":0},"title":"Are You Ready for What God May Be Sending?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"November 15, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"by Raymond Warfel There was mention of the President possibly having received treatment that involved fetal cells. This was checked after the sermon was presented and found to be not true, for which we are thankful. See Update: Here's what is known about Trump's COVID-19 treatment.","rel":"","context":"In "Audio"","block_context":{"text":"Audio","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/audio\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":36689,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/we-just-listened-to-your-sermon-beware-for-our-morning-bible-time\/","url_meta":{"origin":47639,"position":1},"title":"We just listened to your sermon “Beware” for our morning Bible time","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"January 23, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: A great lesson on hypocrisy: \"Beware.\" We just listened to it with our sons for morning Bible time. We really appreciate your articles, sermons, and audio sermons. Thank you for making them available. Answer: I'm glad you are finding the material useful in your own studies.","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":40328,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/thank-you-so-much-for-the-sermon-can-we-trust-the-text-of-the-bible-on-your-website\/","url_meta":{"origin":47639,"position":2},"title":"Thank you so much for the sermon “Can We Trust the Text of the Bible?” on your website","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"September 18, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Thank you so much for the sermon \"Can We Trust the Text of the Bible?\" on your website. I am so blessed spiritually when I read this teaching. When I shared this teaching with our church many people were blessed and touched by this teaching. I really feel the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":62837,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/the-inheritance\/","url_meta":{"origin":47639,"position":3},"title":"The Inheritance","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"March 22, 2026","format":false,"excerpt":"by Jeffrey W. Hamilton Download Audio Text: Revelation 21:6-8 \u00a0 I.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The Christian\u2019s relationship with God is described by several metaphors \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0A.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0We are servants - I Corinthians 4:1 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a01.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The emphasis is on our obeying the will of our Master \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0B.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0We are priests - I Peter 2:4-5, 9 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a01.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0We are able to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Audio"","block_context":{"text":"Audio","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/audio\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":14682,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/i-appreciate-that-you-post-your-sermon-texts-and-not-just-audio-files\/","url_meta":{"origin":47639,"position":4},"title":"I appreciate that you post your sermon texts and not just audio files","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"November 2, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Hello, Hope this email finds you well I just wanted to send a quick message to express my appreciation for your website.\u00a0The fact that you take the time to post sermons in text form rather than audio-only is a tremendous help in studying the word.\u00a0I have learned a great\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":18388,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/what-do-you-say-as-an-invitation-at-the-end-of-a-sermon\/","url_meta":{"origin":47639,"position":5},"title":"What do you say as an “invitation” at the end of a sermon?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"January 15, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Good morning Mr. Hamilton, Could you give me some examples of what to say as an \"invitation\" when I'm done with a sermon? 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