When someone offends you, how do you respond?
What you decide will impact your life for many years, and will also impact the lives of those you spend most of your time with.
Our response to an offense is a really big deal. Most people may not truly stop to contemplate the full impact of one’s response to someone else who has offended them.
It is necessary to truly determine why we are offended by something someone else said or did toward us. This is vital, because it is always possible the person wasn’t offensive, it was really our perception that is skewed. It could also be an indication of the lack of true intimacy with the Lord. After all, Jesus wasn’t offended or bitter about taking all of our sin on Himself when He went to the cross.
Too often we want to be offended. Now before you stop reading because you think I’m losing it, really consider this.
There are various ways an offense can come our way. Most likely, it could be that we are in a pattern of sinful behavior. When we are generally not open to hearing anyone speak truth to us, no matter how kind, loving, or caring the person who is speaking truth is, we take offense. It is too easy for us to want to be offended, aka not wanting to take responsibility for our own behavior, that we cast off the responsibility for our own sin as an offense, and blame the other person.
Too often we quickly forget how much the person who supposedly offended us really cares for us. We so easily forget the numerous acts of kindness we received from this person, who we now believe is offending us.
We can easily fail to remember acts of kindness, but be quick to become bitter when we believe we are offended.
But God clearly instructs us in 1 Corinthians 13 how we need to respond to an offense, perceived, or actual….because there are also times when people determine to be unkind and uncaring toward us.
In 1 Corinthians 13:1-4 we learn that we really are not loving people if we behave in certain ways. Therefore, before we respond to an offense, we need to do some self-analyzation. We need to make sure that we are people who are others-focused, and have others-centered love flowing from God, through us, to all people we encounter.
If this is not the case, then be more concerned about getting your life in order with the Lord, before you harbor bitterness toward anyone.
1 Corinthians 13:4-7 continues to define the manner in which we should be handling our own lives (I’m using the 1984 NIV below):
Verse 4 – we should be patient, kind, not envious, not boastful, not proud
Verse 5 – we should not be rude, self-seeking, easily angered, nor keep a record of wrongs done to us
Verse 6 – we should not delight in evil, but rejoice with truth
Verse 7 – we should ALWAYS protect, ALWAYS trust, ALWAYS hope, ALWAYS persevere (emphasis mine)
I fall far short of doing all of these all of the time, but I want God to change me so that I am increasingly living by His standard.
I look at this list, and in my early years as a new follower of Jesus, I thought loving people like God does, as described in Scripture, was impossible. I felt condemnation. I soon learned that the condemnation was coming from the enemy of our souls. I learned that God understood I didn’t, and still don’t, love and bear with others perfectly.
But God has given me new birth, the old nature has been replaced with a new nature (2 Corinthians 5:17). The effects of that old nature linger, but slowly, God, by the power of His Holy Spirit, is changing me so that His unconditional love is increasing in me, and I am more apt to respond by my new nature.
Therefore, I am able to respond more quickly without bitterness toward those who can be outright nasty and mean toward me. God helps me to continue to do acts of kindness toward those who reject me because of my faith in Christ.
The outcome when I do this? I experience an increase in closeness with my Lord and Savior, Jesus. NOTHING could possibly compare to that. The more I determine to deny bitterness, and rise above by the power of God, the more I can love and care for others.
With all of this said, this does not mean that we are to enable people to continue in their sin. Scripture clearly provides clear guidance on how we need to handle offenses. I’m certainly not saying that we turn a blind eye to true offenses, but we handle them with the love of God, according to the Word of God. We handle them in a way that is not with retribution, but with forgiveness, because we have been fully forgiven. Vengeance is God’s (Leviticus 19:18; Ezekiel 25:17; Romans 12:19). Leave revenge in His hands. He will do a far better job of doing what is appropriate. Please, don’t sit back waiting for Him to dole out what you and I might believe the other person deserves. Instead, pray for that person to find the love of God.
Isn’t that the bottom line to acts of unkindness? People who are uncaring and mean to others just don’t have a true understanding of how much they are loved and valued by God. It is the responsibility of those of us who profess Christ as our Lord and Savior to extend that love.
Sometimes, we need to hug the person, and sometimes we need to let the prodigal go until such time as he or she relinquishes himself/herself to the Lord. God will guide us in this decision.
In the meantime, become better, through Christ’s love and power, not bitter.
If you are dealing with an offense, I’d be glad to help you work through it. Please contact me at the email below, or through this site.
Living for Jesus, Donna
Note: If the verses for Bible references do not appear when you hover over them, go directly to the website, and they should appear for you.
Copyright 2020 Donna Shappy
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