Proverbs 19:11 “It is good sense to be slow to anger, and an honor to overlook an offense.” The episode talks about 4 things that contribute to the spirit of Offense and four things we can do to overcome the spirit of offense. This is something I struggle with a lot, so I was happy to find the articles. I hope you enjoy this episode as much as I did! I put a link for the two articles about the spirit of offense down below. Music:"Adding the Sun" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
The Spirit of Offense, Be Gone!
Proverbs 19:11 “It is good sense to be slow to anger, and an honor to overlook an offense.”
I have really been struggling with the spirit of offense lately. Actually, I am not sure if it is new or if I am just noticing it more lately. Ever since we learned about it last year in Encounter Ministries, I have noticed that I definitely take offense often, especially with Tony. This is not something I am proud of, and it is something I am trying to figure out so that I don’t keep doing it. When we had a disagreement today, and I took offense again, I decided to look up and see if there was a prayer I could recite daily that would help me out with this. There was an article with a prayer the woman wrote, and it had the verse above attached to it. I decided this was the verse for the episode. I actually found a couple of verses that pertained to taking offense. This was the one I liked the best, though.
I think I am pretty good at being slow to anger. My mother has the patience of a Saint, and she passed them down to some of us kids. I am lucky enough to have gotten a lot of patience. I have also had to develop a lot of patience over the years as my kids could be pretty trying at times, and if I lost my cool, it just made it all that much more difficult to get anything done. If I was angry while they were angry, it just made the whole situation that much worse. I have actually gotten pretty good at not taking offense from my boys either, as they went through some tough phases where they liked to say anything to get me angry. I had to learn not to let their words affect me as they didn’t mean the. I knew it what they were saying wasn’t about me. It was about them and what they were going through.
However, for some reason, I still tend to take offense to several things my husband says or does. It is usually the same things, over and over again. You would think after 23 years of marriage, we would have these things figured out by now. You would think I would have learned not to take offense to them, as I am sure he is not trying to offend me. However, sometimes I think it is automatic. I did find an article that talks about four things that can cause us to become hurt or offended, and it also talks about four ways to overcome offense. I hope that this information will help you overcome offense. I think it is something many of us struggle with, and yet we would be so much happier if we didn’t.
Let’s start with the four things the author listed that contribute to people feeling hurt or offended. First is unrealistic expectations. It is important to know and understand what the other person’s expectations are for you and for the situation. This is not something you want to guess about. If you don’t know what their expectations are, then ask them and listen when they tell you. It is also important that they know what your expectations are, so don’t keep them to yourself. Share them and check to see if they understand them. Second is our own wounded spirit. I have heard it said that we don’t see others as they are. We see others as we are. We all have our own history, our own wounds, and our own thoughts that we take into every interaction that we have. We use all of this as a filter through which we view every interaction. Once we know our identity in Jesus and we understand what His love means to us, then we can start to work through our wounds with Jesus. Once we do, we can stop using them as a filter through which we see others.
The third is our holding onto things for too long. Sometimes we are offended, and we hold on to that for too long instead of just shaking it off. Friendships are important, and it is good to keep that in mind and get better at letting this go. The fourth thing is assuming negative intent. I was just at a retreat, and they asked a few people what the best piece of advice they were ever given was, and someone said, “Always assume positive intent.”This is so important. This is the biggest culprit, I think to me taking offense. I hear what is said, and I assume negative intent, so I get defensive and I slip into fight mode. It would be much better if I assumed positive intent. I am very good at this in other areas of my life. I am good with telling people if you don’t know the answer, tell yourself something that will serve you better. For instance, if you don’t know why someone hasn’t called back, assume they are busy instead of assuming they don’t want to talk to you. Do you see how that is assuming a positive intent? However, I struggle to do that in these instances.
This article, I will put a link in the show notes, goes on to list four steps we can take to help us learn to avoid a spirit of offense. It says that overcoming a spirit of offense takes intentionality and a humble spirit willing to surrender the right to stay hurt. Wow, that hits home for me. I sometimes want to cling to my right to stay hurt. I don’t know why because being hurt doesn’t feel good. I am seeing now why humility is another way to strengthen my resolve against taking offense.
The first step the article lists is to acknowledge that you were hurt by something someone said or did, even if it is an irrational hurt. God is ready and willing to hear our cries and help us walk through our pain. The article is not saying we need to acknowledge our pain to the person who hurt us. We need to acknowledge it to ourselves and to the Lord and then let the Lord help us heal. The second one is one that I didn’t really think of before, and yet I can definitely see the wisdom in it. It says, don’t quickly turn to others for counsel without serious consideration. If you need to process or discuss the offense, one person can prove the wisdom you seek. If you involve a lot of other people, you may easily create a bigger problem. Also, what came to my mind when I read that is that now you may even fall into gossiping instead of just seeking counsel.
The third thing was to pray for your own grieving spirit and for the other person. Prayer is always a great thing to do to help us avoid something and also to help us get over something after it happens as well. Fourth is to walk through forgiveness even if you don’t feel it. This means if you see the person who hurt you, act graciously. This can be difficult, but it is such an important step in the healing process. Forgiveness is an act of the will, not a feeling. You can forgive someone, even if you don’t feel like it. You can forgive someone and then not feel any different afterward. If you are willing to say, “Yes, I forgive this person.” Then God will come in and do the healing on your heart. You are not forgiving them on your own. God does all the heavy lifting. He just needs your yes!
I hope these two different lists of four things were helpful to you. If you have the time, I would suggest clicking on the link and reading the whole article. CLICK HERE for the first article. She also has three books that deal with overcoming a spirit of offense. I got the first on Audible, and since I am headed out of town on a plane tomorrow, I am guessing I will have plenty of time to listen to it. I will probably do more episodes on this topic once I am done with the book, as I really do think it is something many of us struggle with. I am going to end with a prayer from another article. CLICK HERE for the article with the prayer. Here is the prayer:
“Jesus, please call out the spirit of offense that is wreaking havoc on my soul. Remove it from my life and take away all its power. Deal with me on this issue and help me place this moment into a Kingdom frame so that in my heart and behavior, I’m not jerked around by the enemy of my soul who is whispering in my ear what he’d rather me believe. Amen.”
Thank you so much for joining me on this journey to walk boldly with Jesus. I look forward to seeing you again on Monday! Remember, Jesus loves you, and so do I! Have a blessed day!