Sadly, ours is an age in which restraint is becoming increasingly rare and anger is increasingly common. Each day brings news stories of uncontrolled and unleashed anger in the home, in the workplace, and in incidents of “road rage” and other forms of violent anger. The verbal and physical expression of anger has become so common that it is almost an accepted fact of life. Perhaps this is to be expected in societies where far greater stress is placed on not bottling up emotions and freely expressing them rather than on learning to control them – and this is especially true when it comes to restraint in what we say.
The result is unbridled speech that regularly leads to broken families and relationships – and even to assaults and homicides. When the Bible tells us that “the tongue has the power of life and death” (Proverbs 18:21), it is not exaggeration – which is why Jesus firmly instructed his followers “I tell you that anyone who is angry with a brother or sister will be subject to judgment … anyone who says to a brother or sister, ‘Raca,’ is answerable to the court. And anyone who says, ‘You fool!’ will be in danger of the fire of hell” (Matthew 5:22). Here, Jesus was not speaking of simply experiencing the emotion of anger – which is not wrong in itself as the apostle Paul showed when he wrote “Be angry and do not sin” (Ephesians 4:26 CSB; etc.) or, as the NLT renders this verse, “don’t sin by letting anger control you.” Rather, Jesus was speaking of unrestrained anger that leads to exactly the kind of verbal abuse – or worse – that we see so often today.
Even if, as Christians, we do not exhibit unrestrained anger to the degree Jesus spoke of, we all need to restrain our speech and the Bible emphasizes this continually. For example, the book of Proverbs tells us “When words are many, transgression is not lacking, but whoever restrains his lips is prudent” (Proverbs 10:19 ESV). And in the New Testament, James tells us “Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry … Those who consider themselves religious and yet do not keep a tight rein on their tongues deceive themselves, and their religion is worthless” (James 1:19–20, 26).
So how do we restrain our speech? Because most of us speak with others daily, we can and should pray for help with this on a regular basis. As David wrote “Set a guard over my mouth, LORD; keep watch over the door of my lips” (Psalm 141:3), and that is a prayer we can all pray. But we also have the responsibility to do what we can in this regard, and there are a number of strategies – habits of restraint– that we can develop. For instance, sometimes we need to simply ignore things that would almost certainly arouse anger. Thinking of insults or other verbal provocations as pits or traps to be avoided can often help us to defuse anger before it has a chance to flare. This may not be easy for some of us, but it is always possible.
If we do get involved in a verbal disagreement and feel anger rising, the old advice of counting to ten before answering can often give us time to remember the need for restraint. And we need to continually remind ourselves that when we do answer, we should do everything we can not to escalate the situation because “A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger” (Proverbs 15:1). This takes work. A “gentle answer” involves multiple words, whereas an answer that makes matters worse need only be a single word!
Sometimes the best strategy is simply hat of silence. As David tells us in the Psalms: “I will watch my ways and keep my tongue from sin; I will put a muzzle on my mouth while in the presence of the wicked.” (Psalm 39:1). David realized that there were times when he needed to be particularly careful (“while in the presence of the wicked”), and his caution at these times sometimes went as far as “I remained utterly silent, not even saying anything good” (vs. 2). In most of the circumstances we may not need to remain totally silent, but David’s example is a powerful one of a person going to whatever lengths are necessary in order not to be drawn into unrestrained speech.
These examples of things we can do are all basic strategies, but in reality that is all it takes to utilize restraint. The problem is not that the solutions are basic, but that we do not utilize them often enough. Yet when we do, they are almost always effective – the smallest strategy can change the course of our conversations and steer us away from angry speech. As James wrote: “When we put bits into the mouths of horses to make them obey us, we can turn the whole animal. Or take ships as an example. Although they are so large and are driven by strong winds, they are steered by a very small rudder wherever the pilot wants to go” (James 3:3–4). James uses these analogies to describe the tongue, of course, because left alone our tongues will steer us; but if we consciously begin to utilize strategies of restraint, we will find that we can and do steer our tongues and words in the right direction and can begin to use their power for good.
Restraint in our speech then becomes like the line in the center of the highway – holding us back from potentially hurting ourselves and others. Sometimes it is the blanket we throw on the flames of anger, saving us or others from certain hurt. But we all need to utilize restraint by developing, remembering, and using strategies that suppress and control the anger that can so quickly get out of control in the human mind.
- Excerpted from our free e-book The Power of Speech: The Potent Force that Every Christian Is Called to Use Wisely! Download a free copy here.
