I Know They Talk about Me

By Warren A. Hodge, Jr.

Is it really that shocking when we find out that people have been talking about us? I wouldn’t think so. To some degree I believe we all have an idea that people talk about us regardless of what is being said or who is saying it. The real question is, “How do we handle what people think and say about us?”

A semi-smile followed by a short chuckle with feelings of joy and satisfaction tend to bombard us when we hear through the grapevine that someone has been saying good things about us or we are caught by the feeling of a pleasing embarrassment. After all, who doesn’t like to be thought of and talked about in a good way? To know that friends esteem you highly and co‑workers think the world of you would bring a smile to anyone’s face, but what about when the thoughts and conversations, with you as the main topic, aren’t too nice – what about reality?

There are people who care a little about what people think and say about them. There are people who care too much what people think and say about them. Then there are people who “say” they don’t care what people think and say about them.

I don’t think it’s possible to absolutely not care at all what people think and say about them; it goes against the grain of how God made us. We are relational beings. We were made to interact with others. A part of interaction with others is acceptance by those we interact with. Plus there are too many people in our lives that we care about to not care what they think or say.

It seems so much easier for some people to brush off other’s feelings, thoughts and words about them. It’s as if they have the skin of an elephant and the feathers of a duck – certain things just don’t penetrate their feelings and things just roll off their minds without soaking in. These types of people are in the minority, in my opinion.

Possibly somewhere along the road of their lives something might have happened to them where their skin became tough and feathery –all at the same time. Nothing necessarily negative, it could have been a responsibility they were thrown into where they had to step up and get the job done in spite of what people thought and said. They may be the ones that others think are callous and cold hearted with no feelings, but actually they have mastered an “art” that helps them to go forward and achieve even in the midst of the naysayer.

It is this kind of mentality or spirit God encouraged Jeremiah to have when He said, “Be not afraid of their faces: for I am with thee to deliver thee, saith the LORD.” (Jeremiah 1:8) Jeremiah had to warn Judah of judgment and couldn’t afford to be consumed by the looks, thoughts, feelings, and words of others. If he did he would have failed his task. Jeremiah didn’t lack compassion or a heart for Judah, evidence of that is seemingly in the Book of Jeremiah and especially Lamentations. What he had to lack was caring what people thought and said lest it derail his mission.

What is so key, and lends reassurance, is the latter part of the scripture, “…for I am with thee to deliver thee, saith the LORD.” To know God is with you when your doing what your doing helps to toughen that skin and grow those feathers, because “If God be for us, who can be against us?” Jeremiah’s initial response to God’s ordaining him a prophet to the nations was, “…I cannot speak: for I am a child.” Who would listen to a child? What would they say and think about judgments coming from the mouth of someone so young? Surely ridicule would and did come; enough to turn the average person away, but God was with him.

Way on the other end of the spectrum are the people overly consumed with the thoughts and words others have of them. It becomes paralyzing for these people to function properly through life. There is no direction in their lives because they are constantly changing directions with the changing thoughts and words of others. Times of being alone are not really alone because the words of others play in their minds like a skipped record. Momentary glimpses of peace are quickly shattered by the remembrance of what their family member, co-worker or next door neighbor said or of what they are thinking.

It’s not impossible for God to use anyone, but I would think there is more work to be done in a person like this. People like this will not stay faithful to the command that God has given them because the concern of what others think and say would supersede God’s commands. In 1 Samuel 15:24 we find a good example of what would happen. Leading up to this verse King Saul was given the strict commandment from God to kill the Amalekite nation; this included men, women, children, babies, cattle, sheep, goats, camels and donkeys – everything. Everything and everyone wasn’t killed. Saul and his men kept the best of the livestock and did not kill King Agag (King of the Amalekites). Saul’s reason for not completing the mission as instructed was because he “feared the people, and obeyed their voice.” The repercussion was God’s rejection of Saul as King.

The overwhelming concern for what people will do and what they say not only will cause God to reject us from our given assignments but will also cause us to reject self confidence, self identity, and joy from our lives.

There are those who care just enough about the right things at the right times and go through life a lot easier and care free than the latter. Certain things said about them aren’t as easily forsaken as those in the first group discussed. There is a care of what people talk about concerning them, but it’s not to the point where they lose sight of who they are or what they are to do. They care to the extent that they will strive to make themselves better people based on the validity of the negative things said about them. Yet they are capable of brushing off some things said about them that aren’t true and have been derived from the lips of those with a malicious spirit. The good things said about them don’t go to their head and spawn a prideful attitude. These types of people are more readily usable as opposed to those types in the first group discussed.

It must always be kept at the forefront of our minds that we are Christians, therefore Christ-like. If Jesus was hated without a cause surely he was thought about and talked about in a hateful manner. On the other hand, he was and is also loved, therefore talked about in a loving manner. Jesus can’t (and didn’t) please everyone because people are going to think, say, and do what it is they are going to think, say, and do. It’s called free will. God doesn’t control our free will so we surely can’t control other people’s free will to think how they want to and say what they want to. So if Jesus is talked about, who are we not to be talked about? Let them talk, but love them. Let them hate, but pray for them. “...If God be for us, who can be against us?”