IT TAKES TWO

Tim Challies, author and teacher wrote, “Gossip is not only a sin of the mouth, but also a sin of the ears. It takes two: the one who speaks and the one who listens. Reading or listening to gossip is not a different sin from speaking or spreading it, but simply the opposite side of the same sin. It’s a quarter whether it’s head or tails, a dime whether it’s six or one, and gossip whether it’s spoken or heard. It’s as sinful to hear it without protest as to speak it without apology. As the children’s song warns, it’s “O be careful little mouth what you say” and ”O be careful little ears what you hear.”

The trouble, of course, is that we don’t always know its gossip until we’re in it up to our necks. And then, as we begin to acknowledge that growing sense of disquiet, it’s often unbearably awkward to interject and ask, “Is this gossip?” or “Do I really need to know this?” or “Did he give you permission to tell me this?” And so we allow ourselves to be party to this sin, to learn what we should not know, to quietly allow what we should steadfastly refuse.

We must not gossip, of course. We must not strike the fire that will soon burn out of control (James 3:6,8). We must refuse to be the kind of arsonists whose crime is not burning down buildings or forests but tearing down people and churches. “How great a forest is set ablaze by such a small fire!”

“You brood of vipers! How can you speak good, when you are evil? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.” Jesus