So very clearly - I want to share one more Verse, then we're going to look at these diseases of the tongue. You're going to love these ones and just see, you may find there's one that reflects you. In Proverbs 22:11, look at this. It says he who loves purity of heart, and has grace on his lips, the king will be his friend. That's a good one isn't it? He who loves purity of heart, and has grace on his lips; now what does that mean? Well, whatever comes out of your mouth is going to be a reflection of what's in your heart, so when we begin to cultivate purity in motive and heart and intent, when we begin to let the Holy Spirit show us where we need to make shifts and changes, and we do it, and we begin to make a practice of speaking life-giving words; grace means words that empower and build and bless people. The Bible says let your speech always be seasoned with grace, that it may build up the people who listen.
So it's something we can begin to cultivate in our life, is the words we speak, we speak to build people, to strengthen and to change what's around us. We can do that. It's a decision to do that, and notice what it says, that the person who does this, the king will be his friend. The king will be his friend. In other words intimacy with God is deeply impacted by the way you speak to people, the way we treat others with our words, the way we speak to people around us, deeply impacts our relationship with God. In Psalm 15 it tells us very clearly there, who shall abide in the hill of the Lord, he that has clean hands, a pure heart - now look at this - and then hasn't lifted up his soul to deceit and lying, doesn't take up a reproach against his neighbour, doesn't backbite with his tongue. Notice there's about three things, where the tongue deeply impacts the ability to abide in intimacy with the Lord, and experience His power in our life.
So if you were serious, if we're serious about enjoying the presence of God, carrying the presence of God, we have to put a guard about our lips. We have to actually deal with the things in our heart. Now the Bible says, no man can tame the tongue, so therefore God has got to help us in it. Amen, He's willing to help us in it, and I want to show you some things. First thing is, you've got to know where He needs to help you, so we've seen then, if you want to know what a person's like, you've got to look at their heart, not at their outside. If you want to find out what's in the heart, listen to the words, and feel the content of the words, then you can begin to start to see what's really there.
If you want to change a person's life, change the heart, what the person's holding in the heart. Now I want to look at three diseases of the tongue, very quickly look at three diseases of the tongue, and we'll look at each disease, and I want to give you what a scripture says about it, then an example of person who did it, then what is in the heart. There's always something in the heart drives it, so if you're going to change the tongue, you've got to change the heart. You've got to come to grips with what we've got going on in the heart. Are we okay on that? Alright, here's the first one.
See, now when you go to the doctor, one of the first things he gets you to do [laughs] open your mouth. He looks at the tongue, he looks down your throat, looks at your tongue because your tongue, you know, if it's a furry tongue - if you're not well in your body, your tongue doesn't look good either. Ever looked when your body's unhealthy, how bad your tongue looks? See, so even physically in your body, when your body's not well, your tongue looks grotty and smells bad, tastes bad, gets furry, gets horrendous. But the same thing in the spirit; when our heart isn't good, when our heart isn't sound, then the words we speak won't be either. So let me get the first one, the first disease of the tongue - see how far I get, may only get one or two done today, but we'll keep going with these because I just felt it's really a time, if you just look at it now, and then begin to just decide Lord, if this applies to me, I'm going to make a shift. Here's the first one, Proverbs 6 and Verse 16.