If you can’t say something nice…
July 30, 2007 (Monday) – A beloved pastor was killed by lightning last week as he hiked with his sons, who were burned by the strike. The notice of his death was published in the newspaper, which provided a space for people to send in expressions of sympathy and gratitude for the life of the pastor.
Would you believe that several people used that space for ugly remarks about religion, churches, pastors, etc.? I don’t know why I was surprised by such, but I was not expecting comments like that.
Many of us have become desensitized to the pain of others. If the people are public figures of some kind, we consider their suffering fair game for ugly jokes, satire, or gossip. Many seem to think that such people can turn off their feelings, so that the public is free to say whatever they like about them. But they are still just people, whose feelings can be hurt; not stone statues. The late night comedians on T.V. lead their audiences to laugh heartily at the pain of public people and others.
Which sinners are worthy of our prayers, and which deserve our harsh words? What kind of line do people cross in their lives that gives us permission from the Lord to stop praying for them and start gossiping about them?
We thank God for our freedom of dissent and the right to speak up about the issues. We should speak up and be heard as citizens. That’s the freedom guaranteed us by the U.S. Constitution. I don’t think the intent of granting that freedom was meant to encourage us to behave irresponsibly. When freedom becomes license to hurt people, then that freedom is being abused.
I think some people avoid public service because of the total scrutiny of their private lives, the rumors spread about candidates, the half-truths that are turned into so-called facts, the calumny and malignity from their opponents and detractors, and their opponents’ paid campaigns to destroy their reputations. In a popular movie, a candidate for president, road-weary and cliche-overloaded, babbles non-sensically to himself in the back seat of a limousine en route to the next campaign speech. His assistant warns him not to behave like that; someone might see him and the word will be spread that he’s crazy. The candidate (Robert Redford) replies, “Well, so what? A person has to be crazy to run for president!”
Part of surrending to the Lordship of Christ in one’s life is surrendering our speech. Not only should we avoid profanity and obscenity, but we should avoid the temptation to speak harshly of another, no matter who it is. Most of the time, we don’t know the other person, and we don’t know as much about them as we think we do. The same standard applies to those we know personally. Remember the old proverb, “Water and words: easy to pour but impossible to recover.”