WILDFIRE
OF WORDS

Topics: Apology; Conflict; Negligence; Reconciliation; Relationships; Self-control; Tongue; Unity; Words

References: Proverbs 16:27; James 3:1–12

More than a thousand firefighters battled a wildfire for two weeks in the Black Hills of South Dakota. The fire started August 24, 2000, and was not contained until September 8. Meanwhile, more than eighty thousand acres of valuable timber burned.

Janice Stevenson, forty-six, was arrested on suspicion of starting the fire. She pled guilty to second-degree arson, was sentenced to twenty-five years in the South Dakota State Penitentiary, and ordered to pay restitution in the amount of $42,204,155.48.

Federal investigators who filed charges against Stevenson say she admits stopping by a road on August 24, lighting a cigarette, and tossing the still-burning match on the ground. “Rather than putting out the fire,” an affidavit said, “she looked at it and decided to leave the area.”

Like starting a forest fire, producing a “wildfire” with our tongues requires little effort. Rumors, half-truths, grumblings, sarcastic remarks, hurtful things said in the heat of anger—all of these smoldering matches have the potential for burning down acres of office morale, family peace, and church unity.

—“Wyoming Woman Accused of Starting South Dakota Wildfire,” CNN.com (September 30, 2000); 2001 Annual Report of the Attorney General to the Governor of South Dakota, www.state.sd.us