People can tame all kinds of animals, birds, reptiles, and fish, but no one can tame the tongue. It is restless and evil, full of deadly poison. Sometimes it praises our Lord and Father, and sometimes it curses those who have been made in the image of God. [James 3:7-9 (NLT)]

“Something is eating my flowers!” I said. Immediately, I got out the pesticide and started spraying with a vengeance, until I met the culprit! There he was, in his glorious bug beauty: a praying mantis! Coming face to face with my target, I just couldn’t continue to spread the poison. He was as surprised to see me as I was to see him. After his initial shock, he left my garden quickly; if he was lucky, he lived to see another day in someone else’s garden.

Gossip is like that bug spray; while it is easy to spread and looks harmless, it is poison. Just as a few teaspoons of pesticide made the water toxic, a few poorly chosen words can turn an innocent conversation into gossip. Unlike the bug spray, gossip doesn’t come with a label that easily identifies it as such. How do we know when we’re harmlessly chatting and catching up or when we’re gossiping? An easy test is asking ourselves if we’d say those same words if we were face to face with the person about whom we’re speaking. There’s nothing like being eye to eye with our prey to stop us from spreading poison! Just as the praying mantis quickly fled from my pesticide, we also need to make a quick exit when someone is spreading poison (or gossip)!

The gossip of bad people gets them in trouble; the conversation of good people keeps them out of it. [Proverbs 12:13 (MSG)]

Listening to gossip is like eating cheap candy; do you really want junk like that in your belly? [Proverbs 18:8 (MSG)]