Ecclesiastes Chapter Five, is our tongue a pure foutnain?

Ecclesiastes 5:1 “Keep thy foot when thou goest to the house of God, and be more ready to hear, than to give the sacrifice of fools: for they consider not that they do evil”.

In the beginning of this chapter Solomon is dealing with words. V:1 deals with the sacrifice of fools, their foolish words; V:2 deals with rash and ill chosen words delivered from a foolish heart; V:3 deals with one who does not know when to refrain from speaking, he will miss the words of the wise and learned because he or she will not stop talking; V:4-5 deals with the vows one makes and how it is better not to vow than to vow and break it (remember Matt 21:28-31); V:6 deals with the breaking of promises before God and angering Him.

These first six verses deal with our conduct with God and our words; how they must be right. Entering into the place of worship in the fear of the Lord; coming into His house realizing that we are approaching the great God! This specific advice is advice on how to enter the house of God; be more ready to come in, sit down and hear from Him than to come in and offer the sacrifice of fools (insincere worship and meaningless words). We are coming into the presence of The Great King (Habakkuk 2:20).

The scriptures set forth examples of men and women who should have refrained from speaking and yet they spoke on. Men such as Nebuchadnezzer who boasted of the great kingdom he made when he was warned by Daniel to prophet to be careful and give glory to God. (They were not in the temple per se but they were in the presence of the king and they should have let the Lord speak first).   But even among the godly this was a problem at times:

• Mark 9:4-6 in this instance Peter did not know what say...so he said something anyway. We do not want to be unkind to Peter but we are illustrating that there are times when we need to be silent in Gods presence.

• Luke 9:52-56 Jesus had to rebuke them for the folly of their ways; You do know not what spirit you are of when you say such things...again wait to see what the Master says.

2 “Be not rash with thy mouth, and let not thine heart be hasty to utter any thing before God: for God is in heaven, and thou upon earth: therefore let thy words be few”.

This is a critical point; one who has restraint in this area is a mature person. This speaks to one having overall control over the lips, which is ultimately having control over one's spirit. Proverbs 16:32 say as much; James 3:2 also speaks of control over the tongue and adds he that rules over his tongue can rule over his own body! Not to pick on Peter but in his younger years he was a bit impetuous with his words (and he is not unique) many speak before they think and even fewer exercise restraint with their lips. They think by speaking their mind and getting in the last word that they are exercising their rights to an opinion; however, it is far more important to use your words "aright" than it is to simply spout out opinions.