Say "Aah": Take This Spiritual Tongue Test

By Sinclair Ferguson

My first doctor was a man of great personal warmth and reassuring presence. As a child, I thought of him with deepest admiration and affection.

However, there was one part of his examinations I always disliked—when he spoke the words “Stick out your tongue, and say ‘aah.’” Yet while always feeling terribly discomfited by this procedure, I was also always amazed that he could apparently tell so much about my health by this “tongue test”! He always did it, so it must have been important.
Well now, later in life, I have come to a much greater appreciation of how important the tongue test is–only now in the sphere of spiritual health. I see the results of the spiritual tongue test as an incredibly important measure of the condition of our lives.

There is no right living without a healthy tongue. Its significance is out of all proportion to its size. James saw that clearly when he wrote that the tongue resembles the rudder that steers the mighty ship through the seas (Jas. 3:4). Some other truths about the tongue:

1. Your tongue is evidence of the condition of your heart. The mouth speaks out of the fullness of the heart (Matt. 12:34). It is the heart’s exit door. From it emerge the breaking stories on what is taking place in the hidden recesses of the mind, will, and affections. Our words resemble so many media people rushing to file their reports. Unfortunately, often the reports seem to be contradictory: “With the tongue we praise Lord and Father, and with it we curse men who have been made in God’s likeness”(Jas.3:9). Our tongues can bring us into danger from the fire of hell, says Jesus: we call our brother a fool; we stab him verbally in the back and murder his reputation before men. Within the hour the same tongue is singing the praises of God with great satisfaction. What kind of heart expresses itself so inconsistently?

But the issue is more complex that just the words we use. Our heart “speaks” through our lip, even when the grammar we employ is at variance with what our heart really thinks. We cannot avoid giving ourselves away when we open our mouths. The discerning spirit, at least, will always “hear” what we really think.

Fortunately, that principle is two-edged. As someone wrote to a preacher after hearing one of his sermons: “It was not so much what you said as your manner of speaking that struck me.” And such was supremely true of our Lords Jesus Christ. People were struck by his “gracious words” (Lk. 4:22). They heard his heartbeat. The tongue is the index of the condition of the heart.

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