The phone rang this morning.
A familiar name on the screen — someone who used to be part of our church family, someone we had walked beside through grief and sickness and loss. I didn’t know the call was an accident until later.
We caught up a little, and then she said something that made my heart stop for a beat:
“I heard your dad had passed away.”
My father is very much alive.
I told her so. She sounded surprised, even embarrassed, and said, “Well, that’s what I heard.”
I hung up and sat in silence for a while. Because the truth is, if that rumor has been making its rounds, no one called. No card. No text. No word of comfort.
Nothing.
And that silence hurts almost more than the lie itself.
The Poison in the Air
Somewhere, someone spoke death into the air.
And someone else repeated it.
And another passed it along, like sharing a prayer request without ever actually praying.
That’s what gossip does — it sounds like concern, but it’s really infection.
“The words of a gossip are like choice morsels;
they go down to the inmost parts.” — Proverbs 18:8
It spreads quietly, carried on soft voices and good intentions. It slips in during casual talk and coffee breaks, and before long, it poisons trust.
Gossip doesn’t just distort truth — it dulls compassion. It makes the Church forget how to love.
A Quiet Kind of Pain
I’m not angry. I’m disappointed — and, if I’m honest, a little sad.
I thought we were closer than that.
Maybe that’s the worst part about gossip: it always seems to come from people who once called you “brother.”
It’s a small thing, maybe, but it makes you wonder — if they’ll bury the living with their words, what chance does the truth really have?
Still, I can’t hold on to bitterness. The wound is real, but the witness matters more.
Because how we respond to gossip determines whether the poison spreads or the healing begins.
“Do not repay evil for evil…
but overcome evil with good.” — Romans 12:17, 21
Let’s Speak Life Instead
The Church doesn’t need more rumor mills. We need resurrection people.
We need believers who refuse to echo the lies, who pick up the phone instead of the pitchfork.
People who speak life — even when the world speaks death.
I don’t know who started the rumor about my dad, and maybe I never will. But I know this: words matter. They can bury the living… or breathe life into dry bones.
Prayer
Father, forgive us when our words wound instead of heal.
Forgive me for the times I’ve joined the chorus of whispers instead of stopping them.
Make me quick to listen, slow to speak, and eager to build up.
Teach Your Church to speak life again.
Let truth be our testimony and love be our language.
And thank You, Lord — that even when others bury us in rumor, You still call us by name and raise us up to life.
Amen.
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