James 3:1,2 - Not many of you should become teachers

3:1

It was noted earlier that speech is considered very important (James 1:26), as it is in Proverbs, and we now get a longer exposition on this topic. The first warning is that “not many of you should become teachers”. Now teaching is part of the five-fold ministry in Ephesians and is clearly very important. Indeed, elders should be able to teach. However, if we teach, then we do so as servants. There can be a desire to teach to show how clever we are. Such an attitude is not Christlike! Moreover, if we teach then we teach in order to influence the lives of others. Done rightly this is very important and very rewarding, but it is dangerous! If we teach rubbish then we will be judged most strictly. Those who feel free to go beyond and even against Scripture should take these words on board.

3:2

“We all stumble in many ways”. With a book like James we might at times think we might as well give up, for we all know our weaknesses. James was also fully aware of this, and we need to be careful how we read his words. We need to give them full weight, but ensure that we apply the correct weight. If we were never at fault in speech then we would have full control over all aspects of our lives. None of us are never at fault in speech and this has two consequences. The first is that we need to be humble and to have a realistic view of ourselves, not thinking too highly. The second is that we need to seek to gain better control of what we say.