1 Peter 4: 8-11 We are coming to the end of all things, so be serious and keep your wits about you in order to pray more forcefully. Most of all, love each other steadily and unselfishly, because love makes up for many faults. Show hospitality to each other without complaint. Use whatever gift you’ve received for the good of one another so that you can show yourselves to be good stewards of God’s grace in all its varieties. If you’re called upon to talk, speak as though God put the words in your mouth; if you’re called upon to serve others, serve as though you had the strength of God behind you. In these ways, God may be glorified in all you do through Jesus the Anointed, to whom belongs glory and power, now and forever. Amen.
God’s Truth Is The Only Truth
What we think we know, we don’t. Only God is all knowing. We can’t really know everything, we don’t possess a wholly-holy truth. As human beings, we are flawed in our deductions. We only see in part. The purest, most fully true-truth God gifted us with is the Bible, His Holy, Living Word. It is here in God’s pure truth, that there is no doubt about it, that we will always find truth, real truth, powerful truth, life changing truth. God’s Word is the first place we should go when we seek truth.
Jeremiah 23:24 Am I a God anyone can hide from? Do I not see what happens in secret? Am I not everywhere, filling heaven and earth? The Voice
Know The Heart Of God
Are we pointing our self-righteous finger of disgust at someone? How can we really know a person? How can we really know their heart? How can we truly know who they are? How can we know their design? How can we know their potential? We can’t. Only God can. So when we speak against someone, we basically are lying, because we really can’t know them like God knows them. We have no right to position ourselves in the place of God, because we have no real truth to be pointing out. Only God does. God is the ONE who shaped them, designed them and gifted them. There are some things that can’t be done well by human flesh and we should leave it to God. We should not step into a God position and think we can be flawless. Only God is impeccably correct at all He does because He has the Kingdom Perception that we human beings in our finite state, will never fully have.
Jeremiah 17:10 I, the Lord, search and examine the mind, I test the heart, to give to each man according to his ways, according to the results of his deeds. The Voice
Only God Can Know A Person’s Heart
You hear things about someone and your nature takes it one more step and then you speak out of something you have heard about them. It is not true. If you are not in their circle of friends, then you have absolutely no right to defame someone. You truly do not know them. This is called gossip and gossip is a sin. If you are pointing a finger at someone you don’t know because someone told you so, you are wrong. You are absolutely wrong. You do not know them, you have no idea of the intention of their hearts and you can’t know their heart, only God can. You are not even a part of their life. Not only do you hurt their reputation, but you heart everyone that knows and loves them.
1 Corinthians 2:16 For who has known the mind and purposes of the Lord, so as to instruct Him? But we have the mind of Christ to be guided by His thoughts and purposes. Amplified Bible
Be Led By God, He Is The Only Truth
Is the media the worst at spreading gossip and lies in this current culture. It used to be that we could trust the media, but we live in a world where our media may have been corrupted. There has never been a more biased, self-righteous, hateful media then there is now. It is hard to watch. We can’t believe the media, we can’t repeat what they say, because they are deceptively influencing us for their gain. There is no more truth in the media. Turn off the media and turn to God and listen up to Him. He will guide you.
Isaiah 30:20-21 Even though the Lord has fed you the bitter food of adversity and offered you the water of oppression, your great Teacher will reveal Himself to you; your eyes will see Him. Your ears will hear sweet words behind you: “Go this way. There is your path; this is how you should go” whenever you must decide whether to turn to the right or the left. The Voice
Mud Slinging Makes For Difficulty Clarifying Truth
It is so hard to see through all the mud that is being slung. Here is a different perspective: Maybe this could be kind of a refreshing place to be, because now, we have to go to God for the discernment we need, for the truth we need. It is exhausting trying to live life out of our own personal knowledge and strength. Our personal strivings start out really strong, but then we fade out until we collapse in burn out. We need to turn away from finite strength and turn towards the Power of God that has been so unused in this generation of personal strength. God is truth. His Holy Spirit will speak powerful truth to your heart as you ask Him, He will guide you into all truth. He promised you that, He will do that. It is kind of a “God Incidence” that we can no longer get truth anywhere but God, His Word and His Holy Spirit.
James 4:12 Know this—there is One who stands supreme as Judge and Lawgiver. He alone is able to save and to destroy, so who are you to step in and try to judge another? The Voice
We Can’t Judge Right
We can’t judge period. We don’t have that kind of insight. Ours is a finite, worldly viewpoint, where God’s is an Infinite Kingdom perspective. What right have we to damage a person’s reputation if we truly don’t know them, if we are listening to gossip, reading things that we can only assume to be true? What right do we have to judge another human being by something the media has said? Why do we trust that which is corrupt instead of looking to God, Who knows everything. Why do we choose to be a carrier of lies and despicable attitudes against another human being we have not even met? We are being used as a fool with a foolish errand for someone else who has a greater evil in mind.
Exodus 23:1 “You shall not bear a false report; do not join your hand with a wicked man to be a malicious witness. The Voice
Gossip Is Cowardly
Gossip is for cowards who don’t truly want the face to face conflict, but want to stir up strife. Gossip creates an atmosphere of quitters who don’t really deal with the issues of life, don’t really want to know the truth, want to stay in their own comfort zone, don’t want to be changed in viewpoint or heart. Gossip, speaking something you don’t truly know to be true, you have not heard it first hand from the person themselves, you do not really know or have never met the person or are not even in their life circle, it makes you the fool. Deception picked up out of offense and spoken creates dupes, bitter angry fools. This is why in this culture we can’t have a conversation without some kind of angry, bitter name calling. Gossip turns your soul rancid and most gossipers are embittered people.
Matthew 7:1-5 Do Not Judge Others “Do not judge others, and you will not be judged. For you will be treated as you treat others. The standard you use in judging is the standard by which you will be judged. “And why worry about a speck in your friend’s eye when you have a log in your own? How can you think of saying to your friend, ‘Let me help you get rid of that speck in your eye,’ when you can’t see past the log in your own eye? Hypocrite! First get rid of the log in your own eye; then you will see well enough to deal with the speck in your friend’s eye. New Living Translation
Opinion – Personal Bias – Gossip
The truth will set us free and keep us off the path of gossip. We should listen up to God’s Voice first before we take words from other people and react to them. Respond to God first. What we hear from human beings, never take it as absolute truth, we live in an age of deception, don’t be deceived by others bias. An opinion is just that, a personal bias based on an assumption that pays forward gossip. If we don’t know it to be true, don’t speak it. End the gossip. End the destruction of people’s reputation by not being the fool that transports the presumption that is truthfully, an unwarranted judgement.
Proverbs 18:6-7 When a fool’s lips move, a fight breaks out; it’s as if his mouth is begging for a beating. The mouths of fools are their destruction, and their lips entrap their very souls. The Voice
What Are You Paying Forward?
All these things that we are speaking out of in these days: assumptions, presumptions, rationalizations, pre-suppositions, guesses, deductions, opinions and conjectures are NOT truth. Consider the voice of your conjecturing? Is it a corrupted media say-so or is it from the Voice of the ONE and only truth, God’s truth. Choose to be the ONE, God can use as a Voice of truth. Words are damaging, or words are life giving? Which one will you be? Will you add value or will you destroy? Will your lips move in the gossip of fools or will your voice be one of truth and love? Will you be a fool paying forward destruction or will you be God’s wisdom paying forward life giving truth?
1 Samuel 16:7 Eternal One (to Samuel): Take no notice of his looks or his height. He is not the one, for the Eternal One does not pay attention to what humans value. Humans only care about the external appearance, but the Eternal considers the inner character. The Voice
You Can’t Possibly Know
We can’t possibly know what you are saying is true if you have just heard it from another person. Recently someone said, three evangelistic women leaders said something. I did not take it to be true. I went back, researched it and found the article where someone else had written the article, and used something these women said and spun it to sound like they said it, but they actually did not say what this person had wrote. Don’t just spit out the hate of other people, instead choose to be the little echo of the voice of the I AM. Echo God’s truth instead of rolling around in the mud with cultural say-so. Only God can truly know the heart of another, the intentions of their actions, the motives of their speech and the exact condition of their heart. Trust God, because He always is in control and His purposes are in play for very specific Kingdom things.
1 Corinthians 13:12 For now, in this time of imperfection, we see in a mirror dimly, a blurred reflection, a riddle, an enigma, but then, when the time of perfection comes we will see reality, face to face. Now I know in part, just in fragments, but then I will know fully, just as I have been fully known by God. Amplified Bible
Be Influenced By God First
We need to be influenced by God first, because He knows everything about what we are dealing with. We are prejudiced by other people, what they say, what they write, we are predisposed in our emotions, in our spirit and our soul can become darkened by the lack of truth in their say-so. Most of the offenses we pick up from the media today are lie based on assumptions, opinions and corrupted say-so, they are not wholly-holy true, they are words craftily spun to influence you in the direction of their intent. Lean into God’s way and know and experience the fullness of His truth in you and through you. God is still speaking. Listen up to Him first.
Matthew 6:33-34 Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and then all these things will be given to you too. So do not worry about tomorrow. Let tomorrow worry about itself. Living faithfully is a large enough task for today. The Voice
God Is Speaking Truth To Our Hearts. Listen Up!
Which direction do we want to be influenced in? Towards our flesh or towards God? God has the right things, the good things, the true things to say. He is pure truth that has never been tainted by the media of this world. We need to look to God first before we react with an embittered soul and gossip, tearing down the reputation of someone we don’t even know and can’t even begin to know the intention of their heart. Seek God first and everything we need to know, when we need to know it, will be purposefully revealed to us. A good plan for us is to let go of our personal bias and open our heart wide to God. God is speaking. Are we listening up?
Romans 1:28-29 And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God or consider Him worth knowing as their Creator, God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do things which are improper and repulsive, until they were filled, permeated, saturated with every kind of unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice and mean-spiritedness. They are gossips spreading rumors,
When We Gossip We Are NOT Trusting God
Gossip is a symptom of the lack of knowing and trusting God. You run with something without even entrusting it to God first. Would God have you say that about another person you don’t even know? We need to grow up and stop being used as someone else’s foolish errand person. The gossiper has an evil intent to damage the reputation of someone else and they use you to do it. A gossiper lacks the courage, strength and godly maturity to wait on God, to go to God for wisdom, discernment and truth, they just impulsively say horrible things about other people that they have not even met in person and do not even know personally. Really? How can you know something you heard is true if you don’t even know the person, you have not even met the person, you know nothing of their day to day life, you do not do life with them? You can’t know. You are a gossiper used by the enemy to tear down another person. No doubt about it. Gossip is a sin. So the very vehicle that you are using to point to someone you “think” has sinned, is sin.
Romans 3:23-24 You see, all have sinned, and all their futile attempts to reach God in His glory fail. Yet they are now saved and set right by His free gift of grace through the redemption available only in Jesus the Anointed. The Voice
Pointed Finger Out ~ Three Fingers Are Pointing Back At You
Pointer finger out? Notice the way God made our bodies as a very specific truth. Pointer finger out, pointing at someone else, three of your other fingers are pointing back at you. When we flesh out and point out someone else, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit redirect it back at us. There is never a time we can grow when we are pointing out someone else’s failure, we grow when we look at ourselves and realize we are the same humanity, with some of the same secreted sins. We are all sinners and we have no right to stone someone else because of their “perceived” sin that we don’t even know what truly happened because we were not there, we don’t know the intent of their heart, because we could never know that. Only God knows. This is the truth. Only God calls us into accountability, because only God knows the whole of it. This is the truth. We cannot know the true heart of someone else, we can never know the intention behind their words and actions. So if someone tries to tell us that they do know, they are wrong, they don’t know. Only God Knows.
John 8:4-7 Then they said to Jesus, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of doing a sex sin. Moses told us in the Law to throw stones and kill a woman like this. What do You say about it?” They were trying to set a trap to find something against Him. Jesus got down and began to write in the dust with His finger. They kept on asking Him. Then He stood up and said, “Anyone of you who is without sin can throw the first stone at her.” New Living Bible
Gossip Is Stone Throwing
Gossip could be likened too picking up a stone and stoning another person. Let’s keep our gossip judgment at the foot of the cross where it belongs and let’s let God be a part of our lives in Spirit and Truth, because His discernment is the only truth and knowing. Jesus did not even judge the thieves that died on the cross with Him, He reached out to them in unconditional love. We need to be more like Him, we need to shake off the mediatic feeding frenzy that is purposefully going on in our time and not be the vehicle of their cowardly, deceptive gossip, but be strong in the power of God and speak truth, speak God’s way, and be His life. We need to do everything possible to add value to the lives of others, always, because this is what Jesus did. Jesus asked us to become part of a humble group of people, His children who do not throw stones at sinners. Listen Up:
1 Peter 4:7 Be sound-minded and self-controlled for the purpose of prayer [staying balanced and focused on the things of God so that your communication will be clear, reasonable, specific and pleasing to Him. Amplified Bible
Flesh Out And Truth In
If we truly do not know and we are exaggerating, embellishing, stretching the truth out of a motive of swaying another person to your point of view, wanting our opinion to be followed, we are out of soul synchronization with God and truth and we are a damaging gossiper being used by the enemy of our soul. Turn and fully face God. We need to shut up our flesh and listen up to God. We need to now, in a time such as this one, choose to be a life giver, using our words, attitudes and deeds for truth, for adding value to our sphere of influencing. Flesh out and Truth in.
Matthew 24:12 The love that they had for one another will grow cold because few will obey the law. False prophets will appear, many will be taken in by them, and the only thing that will grow is wickedness. There will be no end to the increase of wickedness. The Voice
Gossip Elevates Personal Pride
When we set out to purposefully destroy a person, ask yourself why? Our hearts are desperately wicked and when we look to defame another person’s reputation that we don’t even know, it is a fleshing out of our own human depravity. We have no right to throw stones at other people when our lives have not been perfect and still are not flawless. What right have we to speak ill of another when we are and have done the same thing? Gossip does that, it elevates personal pride and creates a self-righteous atmosphere in our soul where arrogance can grow and take over us, causing our love for God and others to grow cold.
2 Chronicles 7:14 If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land. NIV
Matthew 7:1-5
A Simple Guide for Behavior
“Don’t pick on people, jump on their failures, criticize their faults— unless, of course, you want the same treatment. That critical spirit has a way of boomeranging. It’s easy to see a smudge on your neighbor’s face and be oblivious to the ugly sneer on your own. Do you have the nerve to say, ‘Let me wash your face for you,’ when your own face is distorted by contempt? It’s this whole traveling road-show mentality all over again, playing a holier-than-thou part instead of just living your part. Wipe that ugly sneer off your own face, and you might be fit to offer a washcloth to your neighbor. The Message
Psalm 33:14-15
God Is Omniscient – He Knows Everything
He observes every soul from His divine residence. He has formed every human heart, breathing life into every human spirit; He knows the deeds of each person, inside and out. The Voice
Let’s take these scriptures and apply them to our lives in that way only God can do, let’s pray them up and live them.
1 Peter 4:8 Have a fervent and unfailing love for one another, because love covers a multitude of sins, it overlooks unkindness and unselfishly seeks the best for others. Amplified Bible
I hope you enjoyed your meal at The Smorgasbord Table. You never know what meal topic you might find on this Smorgasbord Table in The Bridegroom’s Café. Jesus likes to talk and teach about so many things and it is great to sit and listen to Him. In fact your life can be an adventure that leads you to many different journeys in your constant conversation with God. Enjoy this meal on “Finger Pointing”. Please also share this post with all of your social media by using the buttons below and leave a comment, it is always good to add your experiences and wisdom to bless and encourage others. I also highly encourage you to get a copy of my book: The Bridegroom’s Voice. It is a God encouragement that will strengthen your faith, getting you into the Word of God and hearing His Voice daily. I promise you will increase in relationship with God and “flesh out” your soul, giving you a better spiritual ear to hear God clearly. God bless you MUCH! KimberlyMac