Assuming Destroys Friendship

In a previous post I wrote about relationship suicide resulting from gossip. If a person is a gossip others know it and keep their distance; always on guard. Or worse, if the gossip has persuasive power, he or she might convert others to become gossips themselves. Gossip is sin. It is incredibly destructive to relationships and destroys any chance love might have to grow. In a couple places it's included in a list with greed, envy, deception, and murder (Romans 1:29; 2 Corinthians 12:20)! It's very, very serious. But I think there is another equally serious sin: assumption.

I've been so guilty of this myself.
We tend to joke about what assuming will make out of you and me. But all joking aside for a moment, assuming is most often the asphalt in the roadways of gossip. Gossip and assumption go hand in hand. Assumption occurs anytime we are too lazy to do the work of finding out what is true about another person. We might even have a bit of information, or maybe "a strong feeling." But it's not the whole truth, nothing but the truth, so help us God. We haven't heard it from the horse's mouth. And therefore we're making things up that may or may not be true. That's assumption. And it destroys relationships.

In college we were required to do "research" term papers in nearly every class. And in nearly every class I learned the hard way about assumption. The professor would spell out clearly in the syllabus that we were to have "15 sources" and that those sources were to be credible and that they were to be primary sources. From Wikipedia:

Primary sources are original materials. Information for which the writer has no personal knowledge is not primary, ...In the study of history as an academic discipline, a primary source (also called original source or evidence) is an artifact, a document, a recording, or other source of information that was created at the time under study. It serves as an original source of information about the topic.

We had to read those sources, quote those sources, footnote those sources, and give the writers of those sources due credit. At first I tried the lazy approach -- not enough sources, not credible, not complete, not primary. The result? The teacher's red ink bled all over my beautiful pages. Those mean scholars wrote things like, "David, you have made assumptions here about your topic that are not based on solid research. You have not done the work to discover the complete facts."

• Grade? C- 
• Blah!! 
• Ok, back to work.

The lesson of writing terms papers sticks with me to this day. The point of the whole exercise was to completely eliminate assumption. My conclusions had to grow out of the garden of my own hard work. No matter what I chose to write about the process was always the same -- research, research, research. Then write. Today I wonder what a difference it would make if we applied the same principles of writing terms papers to discovering the truth about another person. Before we spill a single word about someone we could track them down to find out what they really said, did, felt, or thought. But the lazy way is so much easier. "I just don't have time," we might say. Ok. Then we shouldn't speak. To speak without the research is gossip.

I've seen brothers get caught in a deep rut of assumption and gossip. Like a diagnosed sickness they just couldn't seem to stop. Assumption, I think, is addicting. We do it a few times. We speak to friends with some authority on the matter. We don't get shut down. We get immediate positive reinforcement from the listener instead. We walk away satisfied. And then we're hooked.

• Gossip guns fired. 
• Assumptions left all around the crime scene. 
• The relationship is dead or dying and we may not even know it. 

So what should we do? I think there are two steps to healing:

1. Step one: Stop. We should stop assuming anything about other people. We should not even speak on a topic unless we are able to give a quote from a primary source, that source being the person. We should never open our mouth unless we're able to open with, "Well, I just talked to them and they said....." Can you imagine what would happen if we never made assumptions but only made statements based on first-hand conversations with one another???? Wow. That alone would be amazing and LIFE-changing. 
2. Step Two: Repent. Ask the Spirit of God to bring to mind anyone we have done this to.... and then we repent. The fastest way to a joyful restoration is to walk the humble road to their heart...and repent. But what if we're not sure we really did sin against them? Repent anyway. What's the harm if we repent for something we were not completely sure about? Nothing. But to not repent would be to continue in the sin of gossip and assumption. But what if we're not sure God has really prompted us to repent? Repent anyway. I can pretty much guarentee that God is not going to punish anyone for apologizing when we didn't need to. He might, however, punish us for NOT. So what's the harm in taking that chance?? 

To continue with a lifestyle of gossip and assumption doesn't just harm you and me. It is a work against the very thing Christ came to establish, and the very thing God asks us to help Him build -- His Kingdom. There is no more successful attack on God's Kingdom than that of an attack from within. May God teach us to love as He loves, forgive as He forgives, and hold our tongues!

So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. 

Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer.

2 Corinthians 5:16

“Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen.” 

Ephesians 4:29