Careful!

Have you ever said anything to someone and then immediately regretted it? I have, and if we are honest all of us have fallen victim to this problem at one time or other. Recently a conversation between the Reverend Billy Graham and then President Richard Nixon was made public.
In the conversation Nixon was railing about liberal Jews controlling the media. Billy Graham can be heard chiming right in. Unfortunately this private conversation is no longer private and Jewish leaders worldwide are howling for Billy’s head. This in spite of a lifetime of good work.
In fact Billy Graham received an award for doing more than any other Protestant leader to develop good relations between Jews and Protestants. The same people who gave the award to him now are demanding it back. They ignore a lifetime of good work because of an isolated brief conversation conducted thirty years ago. A conversation by the way that he states he does not even remember and the attitude conveyed is certainly not his viewpoint as evidenced by his life’s work.

The Bible warns about this phenomenon in no uncertain way. A handful of words can quickly turn a lifetime friend into a foe. Wars have been started, people have been killed, friends lost, marriages broken. Be careful what you say, especially if you are in a leadership position.

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James 3:1
My brethren, let not many of
you become teachers, knowing
that we shall have a stricter
judgment.
For we stumble in many
things. If anyone does not stumble
in word, he is a perfect man, able
also to bridle the whole body.
Indeed we put bits in horses’
mouths that they may obey us and
we turn their whole body.
Look also at ships: although they
are so large and are driven by fierce
winds, they are turned by a very
small rudder wherever the pilot
desires.
Even so the tongue is a little
member and boasts great things.
See how great a forest a little fire
kindles!
And the tongue is the fire, a world
of iniquity. The tongue is so set
among our members that it defiles
the whole body, and sets on fire the
course of nature, and it is set on fire
by hell.
For every kind of beast and bird,
of reptile and creature of the sea, is
tamed and has been tamed by
mankind.
But no man can tame the tongue.
It is an unruly evil, full of deadly
poison.




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