"All they took was the tongue."

WARNING: Those of a sensitive nature may find the descriptions in this post upsetting!

A disturbing image came into my mind as I drove to work yesterday: it was the image of a baby whale, floating on it's back, dead, its tongue and lower jaw missing. If you saw the BBC/Discovery production "Deep Blue" or the earlier "Blue Planet" from which it was based you will know the scene I mean immediately. Most of the film contains the serene beauty of the undersea world, accompanied by soothing classical music, then suddenly the mood changes, and there are these scenes, which as one critic reported, "Are almost too disturbing to watch."

Orcas! Killer Whales as they are commonly known, but portrayed in a way that is totally contrary to the "Free Willy" Disney makeover they have enjoyed in public opinion. They are savage, compassionless killers, praying on the young. They will snatch a baby seal off the beach, and then toy with it for hours tossing it high into the air like a plaything, before finishing it off. A whole pod, were displayed attacking a lone mother and baby whale. They relentlessly harassed the pair, trying to separate the baby from its mother. Then constantly bullying the lone child, they kept pushing it under the water, until it drowned, exhausted.

The most shocking thing of all though was the senseless waste. Most animals kill out of need, but these Orcas just took the tongue and left the rest to rot... All they took was the tongue.

As this image and this phrase came to my mind, I felt God speak to me. The enemy is after our tongue! That is what he wants to take away from us, once he has got that, it's mission accomplished, he doesn't care about the rest. It doesn't matter how good the rest of our Christian life is: our prayers, our bible reading, our giving; if we have lost our tongues we are dead in the water, just like that poor baby whale.

I'm not writing this to scare or to condemn: our enemy is a defeated foe, and there is no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus. In fact, I myself found these images so disturbing, I nearly didn't share this at all. But everywhere I turn at the moment, God is speaking about our confession: what comes out of our mouths. We must guard this at all costs; we must keep speaking, and confessing our faith and never let the enemy get our tongues.