One of the best indicators of where a person hails from is how they talk.
I’m not only referring to their accent, but to the way they pronounce certain words. And even certain phrases they use.
In the same way, the way a person speaks reveals which kingdom he or she belongs to. Either the kingdom of God or the kingdom of darkness (the world system).
This insight leads into the thorny matter of using profanity, vulgarity, cussing, swearing, and cursing.
Having been a follower of Jesus for decades, I’ve observed three different attitudes on the subject among Christians. They are:
1) It’s wrong to cuss for both children and adults, so don’t do it (without any explanation of why or even what constitutes a “cuss” word).
2) There’s no problem with it. Cussing is like eating liver. God doesn’t care if you do it or not. It’s up to one’s personal preference.
3) Then there are those who have never thought about it and assume it’s normal and fine.
But does Scripture address the subject? And if so, what does it have to say about it?
Suppose that God condemns the use of profanity. If that’s the case, what do we make of Christians who freely drop f-bombs and s-bombs, but then angrily condemn others for sins they hate (whether it be consuming pornography or drug addiction or greed, etc.)?
This would make profanity another example of the sin metrics game where some Christians get very angry with other Christians who sin differently than they do.
Or is swearing/cussing/cursing the moral equivalent of wearing a baseball cap in public?
In our most recent episode (Episode 10) of the new Insurgence podcast, John and I tackle this issue head on and add some thoughts on it that are not commonly discussed.
It’s short, but you’ll want to listen to the whole thing.
It naturally follows Episode 9 where Jeff and I talk about the culture of heaven and its relationship to the gospel of the kingdom.
(Reminder: each episode builds on the previous ones, so if you’re new to the show, you’ll want to binge on all the episodes at some point. We release a new one every Tuesday.)
For more, see The Swearing Christian and Sin Metrics.
The Swearing Christian