Brood of vipers! How can you, being evil, speak good things? For out of the abundance of a man’s heart the mouth speaks. A good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good things, and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart brings forth evil things. But I say to you that for every idle word men may speak, they will give account of it in the day of judgment. For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned.    Matthew 12:34-37

We are all works in progress. As human beings we won’t reach perfection until we are called home to spend eternity in heaven with our heavenly Father. And I don’t know about you, but my words are something I still struggle with on a daily basis. This is why I must daily ask God to forgive me.

In Matthew 12:33, Jesus said, “Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or else make the tree bad and its fruit bad; for a tree is known by its fruit.” When we see an apple tree, we know it is an apple tree. When it produces beautiful apples, we know the tree is good and its fruit is good. Our words are like our fruit.

We are told in Galatians 5 that the flesh and the Spirit are against each other. They are contrary to one another. Paul said that as Christians we should walk in the flesh to help us from fulfilling the lust of the flesh. It is often easy for us to discern whether someone is walking in the Spirit by their words.

Paul said in Galatians 4:19-21 says, “Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, and revelries.” He goes on to warn that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

But in verse 22, Paul lists the fruits of the Spirit as love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

Whether our heart is in the Spirit or in the flesh, will usually be obvious to others in the words we say.

Jesus warns against idle words for these are the words by which we will be judged. So, what are idle words? Warren Wiersbe describes idle words as words that mean nothing or small talk. He warns that if God is going to judge our small talk, how much more will he judge our deliberate words?

Jesus said that from an abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. We may be able to fool some by talking like sister super Christian in certain situations, but it’s those unguarded moments when our words reveal our true character. It’s in those moments when we are not using as much control that those words flow from the abundance of the heart.

I’d like to share with you a quote from John MacArthur’s commentary on this verse. He said that the most seemingly insignificant sin like a slip of the tongue carries the full potential of all hell’s evil. No infraction against God’s holiness is a trifling thing, and each person will give account of such indiscretion. Nothing indicates a bad tree more truly than the bad fruit of speech. The poisonous snakes were known by their poisonous mouths revealing evil hearts. God judges a person by his words, because they reveal the state of his heart.

We must learn to control our mouths. We do this by controlling our hearts. We need to rid our hearts of evil. We must turn to God and repent for our sins and trust in Him to help us and to fill our hearts with His Holy Spirit. We must take our thoughts captive and not allow them to infect our hearts and our speech.

I want to leave you with this one thought. Every careless word you use will have to be accounted for before God. This should be good incentive for us to be more careful about what we say.

Have a great day!