A.J. Ogden

Imagine in front of your house there is a beautiful white dog trotting along. He stops and smells in all directions every now and then. I guess he is in hopes a rabbit will jump up out of the ditch and he can have a merry chase. This little dog is not looking for trouble; in fact he is not bothering anything or anyone. He isn’t big enough to fight anyway. All is well at first, but all of a sudden a great big dog three times his size pounces on this little fellow, biting, barking and chewing on this helpless little one. Then from out of nowhere comes another big dog who attacks and then several others, all from seemingly nowhere!

But strangely enough they all whip up on the little dog, or shall we say the underdog, for some strange reason. It looks like they would want to help the innocent little underdog, but they beat upon him too. They have no idea why they chew up the helpless one. In fact they don’t even know what started the fight! But they chew up the little one until the farmer runs out with a heavy stick and scatters them all. He rescues the helpless one who is wounded, bleeding, and half dead!

But I have noticed that wicked gossiping people are about the same way. They can completely destroy a good person with what I call their “wrecking bar” or destructive tongues. James tells us about the gossiping tongue in James 3:6, “And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity: so is the tongue among our members, that it defileth the whole body, and setteth on fire the course of nature; and it is set on fire of hell.” A poisonous, lying tongue can destroy a man, woman, or a whole church. It is as dangerous as those blood thirsty hounds that attacked the little dog. It has no mercy for anyone.