TRISTAN SHERWIN

“All lies and jests, Still a man hears what he wants to hear, And disregards the rest” — Paul Simon, The Boxer

“Enter RUMOUR, painted full of tongues.” — William Shakespeare, stage direction, Henry IV, Part 2, Introduction

SEEING RED

It was a study in scarlet . . . along with a splatter of crimson and a dash of fuchsia.

He was around 5 years of age, and his bloody index finger was pointing directly at me, whilst his other hand was cupped beneath his broken nose, acting as a repository for the crimson molten that rolled over his mouth and dripped from his chin onto the concrete pavement below.

His father’s face, hungry for truth and justice, was fiery scarlet with rage—except for his dark-brown moustache that was frantically moving up and down as he bellowed words of accusation.

I, on the other hand, clutching tightly to the handlebars of my stationary Raleigh Chopper Bicycle, was a deep shade of fuchsia that was slowly, but steadily, transforming into the same hue of purple as my bike.

I wanted to cry.

Inside, I was a gelatinous bag of tears and terror. I was trying to hold it together, in the hope that my defence would be better received if I kept some level of composure. It wouldn’t be long, though, under the continual fire of accusation, that my tears would retaliate against my will and patter against the pavement in concerto with the other boy’s blood.

Only five minutes previously, I’d been daydreaming and peddling my chopper on a continual loop from our front door, up the street to the lamppost that stood less than twenty yards away from home, and back again. I was on my own, but I didn’t mind. As long as I had my thoughts, my bike, and the sunshine dappled on my face, I was content.

The only intrusion to this solitude had been a five-year old kid who had walked past as I reached the lamppost for the fourteenth time. He stood out, not just because he’d been the only person I’d seen that day, but because he had stared at me. It had been one of those odd stares; one that caused me to pull my breaks and stare back. Being a nice seven-year old, I smiled at him and said hello. But instead of a friendly response, the kid took off at sprint.

Five minutes later, interrupting my twentieth lap, the boy then reappeared from the direction he’d exited in, with blood smeared over his face and his dad in tow.

‘Who was it?’, his dad was demanding, as he approached at a speed that almost matched the pace with which his son had left.

I pulled my breaks again, wondering what had happened and where this was going—not suspecting that I was headed for a starring role in this drama. But my part soon became apparent when, in the same instant that I had come to a halt, and in response to his father’s question, the little boy’s hand was raised, and his accusatory digit pointed in my direction!

‘It was him!’

It’s hard to describe the shock I felt in that moment. It was as if I had been winded. Like someone had switched off the oxygen. Like suffering concussion. I had no words. I had no breath. At the same time, questions swarmed my mind: ‘What was this kid accusing me of?’, ‘Why is he lying?’, ‘What is his Dad going to do?’, ‘What actually happened?’, ‘How am I getting out of this?’, ‘Should I run?’, ‘Is his Dad going to hit me?’, ‘Should I get help?’, ‘Why is this kid blaming me… why does he think I did this?’

Still struggling to breathe, still suffocating with shock, still generating questions . . . and then the father started bellowing, and pointing, and accusing, and condemning.

Fear gripped me. And maybe in some subconscious attempt to prevent this accelerating any faster, I squeezed all the more tightly onto my stationary-bike’s brakes.

I muttered what defence I could. ‘I didn’t do it … I never hit him …’

I even found myself lying: ‘I’ve never even seen him before’. Why? Because in desperate circumstances, some of us fallible humans, as crazy as it sounds, will lie to prove our innocence; especially when the people we’re trying to persuade are irrational and hysterical.

My mumbles repeatedly fell on deaf ears, though. Ears that were preoccupied with anger; ears that only wanted to hear what they wanted to hear. Every defence I gave was met with the same screeched retort: ‘Why would my son lie?’

I must admit, thirty-three years later, I’m still asking myself that question. Why did this kid accuse me? He knew, just as well as I did, that I was innocent.

Recollecting this, from the perspective of now being a parent myself, I can empathise with this father’s emotional state. I understand his reaction, to the point that I have also felt it whenever any of my children have been exposed to harm and injustice. But he was wrong, and in a terrifying, explosive way.

He was searching for answers, sure. He had every right to find out the truth. But he was driven by revenge, not justice. He was unconcerned with the fact that he could be wrong; that his accusations would create collateral damage. His anger and thinking, though understandable, were out of control and irrational. He kept getting closer, and as the time passed, his temperament became more threatening. I was seven. Scared. Small. I didn’t stand a chance.

Despite my best protestations, despite my story, despite my innocence, I stood convicted of having broken this kid’s nose. It was a case of ‘guilty until proven innocent’. The only witness called to take the stand was this bloody kid, and his dad was both judge and jury.

Against such odds, I could only play the one card I had; I dropped my bike on the pavement, ran to my front door, and got my mum.

It’s worth noting a few important factors here. Firstly, I grew up on a council estate and in a benefit’s family. There’s a close-knit tribalism between such families which causes us to defend one another to the hilt from any outside accusations and threats (even when you are the one in the wrong). Secondly, my mum was a Scouser. Her own upbringing in Liverpool had instilled within her a courage and bluntness that only Liverpudlians possess. And finally, and most importantly, to state the obvious, she was a mother, and mothers are, without doubt, creation’s most fearless defenders.

My move payed off. Within thirty-seconds, my Mum, like a mother bear defending her cub, had this guy on the back foot and ready to retreat. He went from condemning certainty to questioning his son’s testimony, ‘Are you lying to me?’

His kid was as scared as I was, at this point. I could see it in his face the moment his dad’s anger started to deflect upon him. And as his dad dragged him away up the street, leaving droplets of blood in his wake, I genuinely felt sorry for him. But my pity didn’t dispel the terror that was rumbling within me, it didn’t lower the adrenaline that was pumping through my body, and it certainly did nothing to prevent me from wetting the bed that night.

SATANIC

This was probably one of the most short-lived experiences of my life. It was over in the space of five minutes. And yet, the impact of this moment has ricocheted throughout my life. It’s never left me, and it has certainly left stains.

I’m still not one-hundred percent certain, but this five-minute episode could be one of the root causes for my anxiety and insecurity—especially around angry, irrational, waring people.

That’s not the only stain, however. To this day, I cannot stand false accusations, whether they are directed at me or regarding someone else. I also loath Accusations’ offspring, too: Slander and Gossip.

To say I can’t stand these things, is an understatement. I find them insidious. To be blunt, they’re satanic.

Now before you start accusing me of calling people evil, I’m not, because we’re not. But our desire, at times, to slander, gossip, squabble, and demonise are. These things tear us apart and purposely erode the bonds that tie communities together.

I’ve had the pleasure of being part of several communities throughout the years: work, family, church. And in each scenario I’ve witnessed the harm and devastation that has been caused through gossip and slander, backbiting and in-house fights.

It happens in the ‘virtual’, too. So much so, that we’ve coined new terms such as trolling and gas-lighting. It may be online, it may only be digital interaction, but that doesn’t mean that our words don’t leave footprints.

As we ebb and flow in and out of one another’s lives—especially in this digital age—how we talk with each other, and how we talk about one another, matters greatly. We run the risk of causing great damage. Just one wrong word, whether intended or not, could end up burning down someone’s life, or drive someone into a deeper cycle of anxiety and depression, or lead another to take their own life.

I’ve experienced this. I’ve seen this. The amount of speculation and rumour that has been presented to me as hard facts, has been astonishing. I’m not talking about fake news, or the real news, but the way in which good people—deluded by gossip and convinced by their own subjective view of the evidence—have presented a distorted caricature of another; a caricature that has then spread and infected others.

Some of these character assassinations have arisen from past grievances—purposely spread with the intent to hurt and destroy. What makes them more insidious is the mechanism through which they spread: they’re whispered into the ears of innocent people who, trusting their source, naively pass the deceit along. These recipients meant no harm, I think, but they unwittingly fan into flames the spark that someone else has ignited, thus becoming accomplices in turning someone else’s life and reputation into ashes.

Of course, some of us, like the father in my recollection, speak out or finger-point because we’re seeking justice, we’re seeking to bring the truth to light. Which is noble and required. If operated correctly, one may even call it prophetic. However, if the heart is not right, we may be adding to the problem and not remedying it. If we hate the haters, we are part of the darkness rather than the light. We can be driven by good causes, and we can be good people, but our desire to finger-point at those we dislike, in fact, our zeal in doing this at times, is deeply troubling and revealing.

It reveals that we, too, can be acting under the subtle evil of accusation.

Within the Bible, there’s a name for this pattern: Satan. In the Old Testament, the term is ha satan, and it means adversary. In the New Testament, the term is diablos, often translated as devil, but again, it means adversary or accuser.

Now I don’t want to go a detour here, by starting a discussion on the nature or origins of evil, or by beginning a debate over whether there is such a thing as the Devil, be that an actual persona or just some malignant force.[i]

What I want to talk about in this blog is not some outside agent, but our desire and collusion with this zeitgeist to finger-point. Far too often, we’re prone to be accusers, to be satans, and our motives are never altruistic when we play this role. Whenever we do this, although we may not recognise it and we may feel that we’re doing the right thing, we’re actually acting on a subtle-but-effective, Satan-rooted impulse that is only seeking to destroy and not repair.

To put it another way, I’ve never heard anyone gossip with the intent of doing good. I’ve never heard a slanderous remark that was intended to heal the person it was about. I’ve often heard people claim that their intentions were good and that their desired outcome was restorative, but let’s face it, when has gossip ever produced a better relationship (except among co-conspirators)? And I have yet to see a phoenix arise from the ashes of gas-lighting.

As Suzy Kassem points out, ‘One who gossips usually carries boredom in one hand and bitterness in the other.’[ii]

If we’re honest—we know what we’re doing. At least, some of the time we do. We can act with malicious intent and our motives, as Kassem points out above, can be darker than some pursuit of truth and justice. Justice means to put things right. Sometimes we’re just seeking to ruin.

Sure, there are occasions when we are just acting on what information we have. But even here, we are not entirely innocent. Ignoring the possibility that someone may have sown some misinformation and distorted facts into us, we can be an accomplice by not doing the hard work of stopping to consider that we may not hold all the facts, even when the evidence fits the story we’ve been told.

Let’s go back to my own story, to see this at work.

Consider the father; he had all the evidence he needed. But therein lies the problem; all the evidence he needed. Although that bloody nose was clearly evidence of something—that his son had been the victim of something, whether that be a victim of someone else, or just his own clumsiness (maybe he tripped up and fell as he ran away from me?) —it certainly wasn’t evidence of my guilt. But it didn’t matter to this guy; he had a narrative already formed in his mind, and the evidence fitted it. He felt no compulsion to ask whether the narrative he held was wrong, or whether the evidence could lend itself to other stories.

In sum, this father acted on what he knew. But he failed to act on what he didn’t know. We’re all prone to this. Even I’ve done it, and I’m someone who detests accusations, slander and gossip.

When we choose not to stop and think, when we refuse to accept that there could be more to the story, or refuse to entertain the notion that the evidence lends itself to other, equally valid stories, we have to ask ourselves the hard question of, ‘Why?’

Why are we so willing to only hear the lies and jests, and disregard everything else? Are we just responding to our emotions in that moment, or could it be that what we’re hearing is resonating with some bitterness that we’re nurturing? Could it be that we are only willing to consider the evidence that fits the story we have crafted, that we don’t learn to filter, because we love our “truth” more than the truth, because our “truth” better serves our purposes?

SPARK LOVE

This scolding problem is nothing new, and it’s one that has the potential to char many arenas in life.

For me, though—and I’m going to be blunt and personal here—one of the arenas that seems most prone to this virus is the church. It hurts me every time I see this malignant cancer creep through the body of Christ.

The crazy thing is, we should be more discerning about this stuff. Especially we Pentecostals, who claim to be Spirit-filled. We don’t discern the Spirit enough, though. And often, instead of being moved by love, instead of exercising the prophetic and speaking in tongues, we too can be apt at trolling, gas-lighting and talking past each other (which involves misrepresenting one another’s views and mishearing what we’re each saying).

We need to remember the wisdom of the writer of Proverbs:

‘There are six things Adonai hates, seven which he detests: a haughty look, a lying tongue, hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that plots wicked schemes, feet swift in running to do evil, a false witness who lies with every breath, and him who sows strife among brothers.’ (Proverbs 6:16-19, CJB)

We’re not alone, though. The first-century church had its tensions due to the way people spoke of each other and towards each other. In one of the most practical of the New Testament letters, the early-church leader, James, writes a passionate exposé of the human tongue:

‘[T]his tongue is a small part of the body, yet it carries great power! Just think of how a small flame can set a huge forest ablaze. And the tongue is a fire! It can be compared to the sum total of wickedness and is the most dangerous part of our human body. It corrupts the entire body and is a hellish flame! It releases a fire that can burn throughout the course of human existence.’ (James 3:5-6, TPT)

It’s worth pointing out the obvious here; James is not talking about the lump of muscle that sits behind our teeth as if it had a mind of its own. He’s talking about the operator: us; you and me. It’s about what we say and also about the intention with which we speak.

James is writing this because he is aware that nothing can destroy fellowship and unity more quickly than verbal abuse and gossip. The tongue, to put it another way, is the most dangerous weapon that we have.

Words harm and scar. I’m certain I am not the only person who carries such wounds, either. With little effort, it is easy for most of us to recall the words that others have used to cut us to pieces.

Words are powerful.

But this is where my mind begins to tick over. If words can harm, then they also have the power to heal and strengthen. Imagine if we could stop pretending that our motives were good, and imagine if we could actually speak life, love and liberty into the lives of others?

There’s no room for gossip, rumour and speculation in our vernacular. As I’ve said above, there’s nothing wrong with speaking up for truth and justice—but if you’re seeking to dismember someone with your words, then it’s best to shut your mouth. And, if you’re only seeking to build yourself up, or build yourself a platform by pulling another to pieces, then you’re part of the problem that plagues our world.[iii]

Be wary of those who disparage others. Beware of those who don’t talk with others, but past them. Be cautious of those who spend more time talking about the failures of others than they do their own weaknesses and vulnerabilites. And most of all, watch out for those who prey on others.

Maybe, when it comes to our words, the best advice I can finish with is that of the 4^th Century Archbishop of Constantinople, John Chrysostom:

‘The tongue is a piercing sword. But let us not wound others with it; rather let us cut off our own gangrene.’[iv]

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[i] But if you do want a great book on that, then I’d highly recommend Reviving Old Scratch: Demons and the Devil for Doubters and the Disenchanted, by psychologist and theologian, Richard Beck).

[ii] Suzy Kassem, Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem

[iii] I’ve recently come back to Twitter, after drawing away from it for a while because of the toxcity between certain Christians. It’s become popular on social media by influential Christian speakers, from both the religious left and right, to finger-point and slander other influential Christians. Sure, they may add, we’re only highlighting their errors; their lack of justice or morality or sound theology. But their tone says it all, and their method speaks louder than their apparent heart. Their posture is nothing like Jesus, who helped blind people to see. No, these people have no desire to heal their “enemies” of their ‘blindness’ when they point it out. They sound more like Ham, Noah’s son, gloating as he points out his father’s nakedness to others. And they do so because this fashionable way of finger-pointing generates much more ‘likes’ and social media engagement which, in turn, generates them a larger platform. Sadly, most of these likes come from Christians, who, unlike Ham’s brothers (who go and cover their naked father), just join in on the finger-pointing in order to protect their own reputations from being pointed at. It’s school play-ground tactics. And again, it looks more like Satan than Christ. I’ve written more about this problem in another blog a few years back: see Magpies & Vomit.

[iv] John Chrsostom, CATENA CEC 23