The Power of Love in Regulating Speech

[The person] who has faith in God, has confidence in the power of love, as well as in the power of the truth. And indeed they are closely related. True love is love without selfishness, which is always a love according to the truth. Such love will win its way against every sort of argument, which is not founded in the truth. Nothing has such efficacy in weakening prejudice, in soothing passion, and in bringing the mind of an opponent, in every respect, into a right position. If we had nothing but nature for a teacher, we could not fail to learn the lesson, that there is nothing so efficacious as the spirit of love in correcting the perversions of prejudice, and in prostrating the falsehoods of passion. But when we know from the Scriptures, that “God is love,” those who are like him can never distrust themselves in being what he is. And accordingly in a multitude of cases, holy love, having faith in God as its source, and having faith in itself as that which God will approve, will be silent, while the weakness and irritation of an unsanctified nature will fill the air with its clamors.

This subject may appear of small importance in the eyes of some persons. They do not clearly perceive the connection between the use of the tongue and the sanctification of the heart. Their want of perception does not alter the fact. They never will know, they never can know the blessedness of purity of heart in connection with a speech unsanctified. It is impossible that the two should go together. It is as true now as it was in the times of the Savior, that “out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.” [Matthew 12:34]. If the tongue is unregulated, the heart is unregulated also. Nor is it less true now than it was then, that “every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment.” If we really have faith in this declaration of the Savior, it will necessarily have an effect upon us. And the converse of this statement is true. We may lay it down as truth, that the man, who is not careful in his words, is a man wanting in faith; or at least, is a man of weak faith. It was the natural result of the faith of the Psalmist, that he was enabled to say, not merely that it was his delight to do God’s will, but still more specifically, “I said I will take heed to my ways, that I sin not with my tongue. I will keep my mouth with a bridle, while the wicked is before me.” Psalm 39:1.

The Rev. William Law, author of the Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life, and other religious works, makes the following remarks in a letter to one of his correspondents. —

“The SPIRITUAL LIFE is nothing else but the working of the Spirit of God within us; and therefore our own silence must be a great part of our preparation for it; and much speaking, or a delight in it, will be often no small hindrance of that good, which we can only have from hearing what the Spirit of God speaketh within us. This is not enough known by religious persons. They rejoice in kindling a fire of their own, and delight too much in hearing their own voice, and so lose that inward unction from above, which alone can new-create their hearts. To speak with the tongues of men or angels on religious matters, is a much less thing, than to know how to stay the mind upon God, and abide with him in the closet of our hearts, observing, loving, adoring, and obeying his holy will.”

— edited from The Life of Faith, Part 2, Chapter 14.