Human beings are communicators. It is part of our essential nature, central to who we are and how we were created to function in this world. There is no escaping the reality that we are a people of words. All people inherently understand this reality, but secularism has led the masses to struggle in accounting for its origin.

Evolutionary science can identify that we communicate, but it fails to provide the foundation for why we do so. Naturalistic materialists, atheists, and skeptics all know that their words have power, but cannot explain the reason they have power or supply an ethical framework to distinguish between acceptable and unacceptable speech.

In contrast, “the lips of the righteous know what is acceptable” (Proverbs 10:32). The Christian worldview delivers to us the source of our communicative capacity and explains its purpose in light of our creational design. Divine revelation imparts to us the proper usage of speech and outlines its moral dimensions in relation to the character of God. In short, the Bible has much to say about words, how we are to use them, and how capable they are to effect change in the world. Indeed, “life and death are in the power of the tongue” (Proverbs 18:21).

Word of faith proponents have had a field day with such truths, prostituting the clear teaching of Scripture to “name and claim” their ideal lives and possessions. Secular psychology and modern spiritualism have done the same, turning words into mechanisms that can manifest desired realities and outcomes for the one who speaks.

But the Bible knows nothing of such self-serving practices. Rather, it tells us that we are speaking creatures of a speaking God who intended for us to faithfully imitate him.

God’s word at creation

In the beginning, God wove together all of creation with his word (Genesis 1). Human beings live in a spoken cosmos, not a sea of impersonal chaos. All things visible and invisible exist only through the spoken decree of the Creator, whether they be atoms, galaxies, hormones, or the device used to read this article. Nothing has come into being unless it was first spoken.

As if this were not glorious enough, God made a creation that speaks back to him: “The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge” (Psalm 19:1-2).

All things visible and invisible exist only through the spoken decree of the Creator, whether they be atoms, galaxies, hormones, or the device used to read this article. Nothing has come into being unless it was first spoken.

The apex of this reality is seen in the formation of males and females, whom God makes in his very image (Genesis 1:27). In this sense, men and women are an icon of the speaking God. We are meant to be a small picture of what God is like, a mirror that reflects his speech to the world he created.

This separates human beings from all else God made. However, the Creator retains his uniqueness in that he alone possesses the ability to create “ex nihilo” by speaking things into existence out of nothing (Revelation 4:11). But he designed his image-bearers to receptively reconstruct his revelation and live in accordance with the norms and structures he established at the laying of the earth’s foundations.

Covenantal speech

This tells us something central about the proper use of language. By nature, speech is unequivocally covenantal. Wisdom from above would have us see that words are never neutral. They either work to bless or curse us in accordance with our obedience or disobedience to the revealed will of God. Our words and how we employ them are either acting to construct or deconstruct the spoken world. Our use of words reflects the orientation of our hearts. This is what determines the type of speech we produce. Christ tells us that out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks (Matthew 12:34) and that we will be held accountable for every careless word uttered (Matthew 12:36).

Human beings understand that words have power. Words make or break marriages. They start wars or avert disaster. They alleviate burdens or crush souls. Words lift up or tear down. They affect emotions, change attitudes, and shape one’s deepest convictions. They create irrevocable harm and leave behind a wake of destruction. We can all recall words fitly spoken with treasured fondness or recoil in horror at the words we cannot seem to forget. James reminds us well about the power of the tongue: “So also the tongue is a small member, yet it boasts of great things. How great a forest is set ablaze by such a small fire!” (James 3:5).

The perversion of language

The Bible would have us understand that people who cannot govern their mouths have a deeper problem. They speak like they do because they are of a different seed. The root of life is absent within them, resulting in the rotten fruit of crooked speech. Corrupt hearts lead to corrupt mouths. As we are witnessing today, fallen creatures at war with God will attempt to use words in such a way as to alienate his creation from the Creator instead of bringing it into subjection to him.

Their speech does not accord with the wisdom God built into the world. It is perverted and instead works to undermine all creational normativity. Enemies of God do this by emptying words of their God-given definitions and substituting into them a foreign meaning that defies reality itself. This is how Christianity has been slowly undermined in the West.

Those who have discipled an entire generation into apostasy and unbelief have waged an effective campaign on language. The great battle of our time has been over the dictionary. Adversaries of Christ have been hard at work, repetitively muttering incantations in an occultic attempt to subvert and overturn the created order.

One need not wonder how public perception and opinion has been so drastically altered over the course of a generation. Words have become tools to change meaning. The priority has been on using them in an attempt to bend reality and conform it to the autonomous will that wants to be free from all constraints. This is a prerequisite if creatures are to be self-defining.

Corrupt hearts lead to corrupt mouths. As we are witnessing today, fallen creatures at war with God will attempt to use words in such a way as to alienate his creation from the Creator instead of bringing it into subjection to him.

Examples of this today can be seen throughout public discourse. Men and women choose their preferred pronouns and demand to be addressed in accordance with their identification. Titles like husbands and wives have been replaced by “spouses” or “partners.” The term “pregnant persons” has been substituted for child-bearing women. Human beings in the womb are labeled as “products of conception” or “fertilized eggs.” Instead of using terms like pedophile to identify deviants, we soften it to “minor-attracted persons.” We label the chemical castration of our sons and daughters as “healthcare for kids” or “gender-affirming care.”

All of these intentionally hinge on the rebellious desire to imagine a new beginning without God. Many have been enchanted by such idolatrous redefinitions. It should come as no surprise that just as man in the garden was given the power to name creation, subordinate men today seek to provide new names to take dominion.

The incarnate Word

But speaking the same sequence of words does not equate to speaking the truth. Truth is objective, which means the language we use ought to conform to objective reality. Nowhere is the embodiment of truth more clearly seen than in the Lord Jesus Christ himself. He is Truth Incarnate. “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son of the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14).

John is alluding to the active Word that was present before creation (John 1:1), the Word that upholds and sustains the entire universe (Hebrews 1:3). The Word that governs creational norms is the same Word that speaks to us in the pages of Holy Scripture. Whether it be the prophets, apostles, or Christ himself, the Word of God from beginning to end is equally binding and authoritative (Matthew 22:31, Luke 24:25). Christians confess to be people of the Word precisely because it is the Word that brought their faith into being (James 1:15). It is this Word that gave life to the formless void and is the active agent of renewal in the world.

Truth is objective, which means the language we use ought to conform to objective reality. Nowhere is the embodiment of truth more clearly seen than in the Lord Jesus Christ himself.

God’s Word cannot be broken (John 10:35). Fallen creatures can only break themselves trying. This is why the subversion of language is a futile endeavor. Truth does not change. Fallen creatures can only violate this Word to their own destruction.

The need for truth today

Christians believe there is such a thing as truth and that it can be known. The Word of truth is powerful. It brings light out of darkness and causes the dead to come to life. But if believers hope for the resurrection of their culture, reclaiming language and winning the war for the dictionary is imperative to realizing this victory.

They cannot allow words to be emptied of their meaning and replaced with definitions that are foreign to God’s creational intent. Nor can they allow Christian terminology to be co-opted by lying lips and blasphemously inverted by the culture.

How do we win the war of words? By speaking the truth. The Church must embrace the centrality of the Word and use language faithfully. “Live not by lies” begins with refusing to repeat the culturally-endorsed mantras the unregenerate are parroting. Not only do words have power, but the way we use them matters. Language is meant to describe how God actually made the world. Christians are to reinforce that meaning with their speech and take no part in the apostate use of language.