Has a friend or member of your family ever come to you with weighty burdens and torments of their life? Have they said to you, “I’m sharing because I know I can trust you?” Perhaps they even asked you to pray with them during a heavy-hearted chapter of their life. Were you a vault or a sieve?

For over 44 years I frequently sought persons whom I believed would realize I honored them enough to share some of my deepest despair(s) with them. Yet, too often they were not vaults; holding my confidences in their hearts only. They were sieves as they shared with not only others, but most often the perpetrator of the sorrow.

When a “sieve” shares another’s heartache, they have betrayed not only the person whom trusted them, but those whom they shared with. When someone comes to you with a tale about another person, does it cause you to pause?  Do you realize if they so rapidly shared another’s heartache, which they were asked to hold in confidence, what other things do they do? Do they lie, steal and cheat, or are they merely persons whom honor nothing?

Because I am a 44-year survivor of domestic violence there were no agencies, I could go to seeking help. I had no family or close friend to confide in. After time with the Lord in prayer and bible study, I often desired a “human ear.” Because I believed my most logical “vault” would be those in my church whom I knew and had socialized with, I shared my burdens with them. The confidence breaking sieves are too numerous to count.

Far too often the person whom you have confided in lacks self-respect, honor and/or integrity. By allowing your heartaches to be shared with others, it boosts their self-esteem. They believe being a sieve places them on a higher plane than the person that trusted them. They feel they possess something of value; another’s trust.   The gift of trust as a “vault” is far greater than being a sieve that possesses the knowledge granted them.  Proverbs 13:3 NIV, “He would guards his lips guards his life, but he who speaks rashly will come to ruin.”