March 21, 2024
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Some years ago for my wife's birthday, she was given a gift of dinner at a restaurant that is themed to look like an Air Force base during World War II. So we went out to dinner because it was a gift and we had a great time, and everybody there kind of gets into the atmosphere.
You know, the dress is appropriate. They're wearing Red Cross aprons there like army nurses. And the music is 1940s music, and all the decorations are '40s and sort of World War II things. It was a lot of fun!
The posters on the wall though reminded us of G.I.s of that generation who were told not to talk about troop movements, assignments, schedules, and their destination. In fact during World War II the motto was, "Loose lips sink ships." And that's true. If word got out to the enemy, even indirectly where the troop movements were going to be, it could very well be that that carrier would be torpedoed or hit by a Kamikaze and it could cost many lives.
I'll tell you, I saw this one poster in the restaurant that has haunted me for a long time. It was a drawing of a G.I. drowning in the ocean. He's just barely got his head above water. He's desperately pointing one finger toward us and saying two words, "Someone talked." Boy, that was heavy. Someone had and he was the victim of someone's loose lips. Well, that war is long over, but loose lips? Oh, they're still causing fatalities.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Someone Talked."
Our word for today from the Word of God is found in Proverbs 18:21. It's a short statement, it's a powerful statement, it's a convicting statement: "The tongue has the power of life and death." That's an awesome power described in the Word of God that you can, with a few words, deeply wound another person. In a sense, you can emotionally sink them or kill them. You can with a few words ruin a reputation, destroy a close relationship, maybe ruin your own reputation, or leave a scar on somebody that may never heal.
I can still see the desperate image of that drowning G.I. shouting, "Someone talked!" Could it be that you've sunk another person because you talked? You talked too much, you talked too critically. Think of the damage we do when we disobey Jesus' command to take our problems only to the person we have the problem with. Maybe we've spread the poison to other people and we've victimized our brother with our loose lips - the gossip about another person that marks their most precious possession, their reputation - those critical words spoken behind someone's back - those angry words that were spoken to someone's face.
We can sink people's lives with our words. World War II G.I.s were warned not to say the things they could say, because they were wanting to save lives. See, that's still an important warning and maybe it's a time for us to pray as the Holy Spirit points this out inside us, "Lord, help me to stop this tongue of mine before more hurting words come out." "The tongue has the power of life and death."
Loose lips do sink ships and people. May we never be the guilty party to the sinking of another person. To be that someone who talked. That someone who knew better.