Keeps Quiet

It is foolish to belittle one’s neighbor;

a sensible person keeps quiet.

A gossip goes around telling secrets,

but those who are trustworthy can keep a confidence. Proverbs 11:12-13

FOR MOST PARENTS, the day comes when we discover that our children are more likely to do what we do rather than do what we say. They’re watching our actions, and it shapes what they do for good and for bad. Likewise, when we think our children aren’t listening, they are —even when we’re not talking to them. In fact, our children absorb a great deal from what we say to each other —to people in the halls after church, to our best friends over the phone, to and about the policeman who stops our vehicle, to the referee who goes against us, to the neighbor who annoys us.

What are your children overhearing in your conversations with other adults? Do they hear you constantly belittling others —coworkers about the quality of their work, other parents about the way they parent, your own parents about the choices they’re making? A sensible parent keeps quiet.

Do your children overhear you gossiping —about the secret habits, the secret faults, the secret failures, the secret heartbreaks of those you pretend to care about? Those who are trustworthy can keep a confidence.

How much better would it be if our children were to overhear us praising the Christlike qualities of others, celebrating their accomplishments and affirming their gifts? How much would our children learn from us if they observed us squelching gossip rather than joining in? How would their willingness to trust us with their secrets grow if they observed us keeping the confidences of others?

Lord, I have foolishly belittled others, gossiped, and shared things that were not mine to tell in private and in the presence of my children. Today I am naming these things as sin and asking you for divine help to forsake this sin. Won’t you empower me, instead, to choose to bless rather than belittle, to keep quiet rather than to share secrets?