Jumping To A Conclusion

The story goes: A group of frogs were traveling through the woods when
two of them fell into a deep pit. All the other frogs gathered around the
pit. When they saw how deep the pit was they told the two frogs that
they were as good as dead. The two frogs ignored the comments and tried
to jump up out of the pit with all of their might. The other frogs kept telling
them to stop, saying that they were as good as dead. Finally, one of the frogs
took heed of what the other frogs were saying and gave up.
He fell down dead.

The other frog continued to jump as hard as he could. Once again, the crowd
of frogs yelled at him to stop the pain and just give up and die.
He ignored them and jumped even harder and finally he made it out.
When he got out, the other frogs said, "Didn't you hear us?"
The exhausted frog explained that he was almost deaf. He thought
they were encouraging him and didn't want to disappoint them if
he could possibly avoid it.

The story teaches two lessons. There is the power of life and death in the
tongue. James, the brother of Jesus, said that it was capable of igniting the
fires of Hell. An encouraging word to someone who is down, whatever the
reason, can help them gather the courage to keep on going. A destructive
word, by the same token, can be the last straw and like the first frog, they
simply give up. We need to be very careful what we say, especially when
we are down and having a difficult time ourselves.