Get off the Gossip
Cycle
5 BREAKTHROUGHS THAT WILL TRANSFORM YOUR LOVE WALK IT STARTED OFF HARMLESSLY ENOUGH. FIVE FRIENDS GATHERED FOR COFFEE AND FELLOWSHIP. The kids played in the yard. Sounds of their carefree youthful laughter filled the warm summer morning air. We settled around the patio table, needing the female companionship we had come together to experience. Then it happened. I’m sure she didn’t intend to change the emotional atmosphere of the room, but with five little words she did just that. “Did you hear about Shelly?” Yes, I had heard about Shelly. I knew what others were saying. I had heard the rumors. The internal battle began between my love for the low-hanging fruit of juicy personal details and my desire to reach into the heavens and love like Christ. The words poked into my consciousness and forced me to confront my relationship with gossip. I’ve never considered myself to be one with a gossip problem. I never maliciously seek to harm others with my words. Sometimes I’ve even prefaced my sharing of private information with a call to
prayer. Information that was never mine to share without the express consent of the one it directly affects would lead to a prayer light on grace and in need of mercy. How do you define gossip? What does it look like? Where is the line drawn between acceptable and inacceptable sharing? From prayer groups to office breakrooms, whenever people gather there is potential for gossip to arise. We all love a good drama, a quality the movies and television have capitalized on. But unlike the sitcoms on our screens, these are real people with real feelings and real emotions. Negative stories, even true ones, told about a person who is not there to defend herself begins to slide down the slippery slope of gossiping. Gossip grieves God’s spirit and can leave you feeling uncomfortable. It is the opposite of love. Gossip divides; love unifies. Gossip inherently holds a judgment on the one being discussed. It calls us to judge the actions, decisions and events in another’s life. It leads to unhealthy comparisons which elevate ourselves while putting another down. This is not love. Love shows us how we are similar in our pain, our misunderstanding and our failings.
{36.} - -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --
