One of the first Proverbs of my year, 11:9:
With his mouth the godless destroys his neighbor,
but through knowledge the righteous escape.
A lot of Proverbs seems to glut together verses saying basically the same thing. The series I'm in now esteems the virtues and benefits of righteousness - and this verse is no different. However, that's not what caught my eye. When I read it, I suddenly remembered a conversation I had with a neighbor. We were talking about another friend and I said something critical about a choice she had made. As soon as I said it, I wished I could have taken it back. Only a few days before I had silently prided myself on not being a gossip, but here I was talking poorly about someone who treats me with kindness.
When someone is always slandering others, it doesn't take a great deal of discernment to dismiss most of what they say, but if someone usually avoids gossip, their critical words carry more weight...more power, maybe enough to destroy the reputation of someone else. I think this is a very convicting sort of verse.
The encouraging part is the second half - "through knowledge the righteous escape" - how Proverbs defines knowledge is still unclear to me, but the best I can understand so far is that it is synonymous with wisdom. So for a righteous person, there is a defense against slander - and that at least is a comfort for me when I think of my friend.
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