Pieter’s Rap

Or why do we dish the dirt? Why do we gossip…mm?

We all have been in a situation were somebody comes to you and says, “Don’t tell anyone this, but…” That is a red flag moment.

What happened over the weekend made me think again. We all have at one point of of our lives played the game, telephone. One player whispers a word or phrase to the person next to him and so the message gets passed on until the last person repeats aloud what he heard. And in most cases the message is very different or distorted by the time it reach the end!

This is precisely what gossip is. A distortion of the truth! The book of James in the Bible warns us quite clearly about the dangers of the tongue. He actually uses a few pictures to describe the tongue. First he liken it to a bit in a horses mouth. That bit controls the whole body. Secondly he liken it to a ships rudder that determines the direction and thirdly to a wild fire that can wreak havoc in a forest, in the same way the tongue can defile a person.

We had a little “forest fire” the weekend. A very serious and character damaging rumour was spread about a fellow South African here in Wellington. I was the last person that heard about it. As in the case of the “Telephone game”. Knowing the person I thought I would call him. The Bible is quite clear that if you have anything against a person take the case to him. So I did. Well, that caused a bit of a fire. I am of the opinion that love believes all things as Proverbs say and I like to believe the best about every person. That of course until you prove me otherwise. It is not a blind, turning the head kind of love.

Here is what Proverbs say about gossip:

Prov 11:12 – Gossip lacks judgement

Prov 11:13 – Gossip is untrustworthy

Prov 16:28 – Gossip is perverse

Prov 20:19 – Gossip betrays confidence

What caused the fire is that the guy (A) I told about rumour called the person (B) that started it and he shook the persons foundation a bit to found out who told him that. As in most cases the whole thing was blown out of proportion and a few feathers was roughed up in the process. Person’s A intention was just to found out who started the whole thing. Person B who’s house was a bit shaken after the phone call from person A in turn confronted the people he told. You can all picture the scenario. It was again a passing the buck type story. Moa, myself and I was also called and confronted since I decided to bring the whole thing into the light.

My revelation caused a couple of sore toes and bruised images in he way. Of course you feel bad and in a way guilty at first, but you quickly take comfort that the truth will set you free. Even though you knew you did the right thing you still wonder if you did not break the confidence of a friend. Luckily this was not the case. I visited the friend who told me initially and our friendship garden did not suffer any damages due this ” wild fire”. A true testimony to friendship!

Lets us remember a true friend covers a multitude of sins!