Offense
Good Morning,
The Bible tells us that if we love God’s Law, we will not be offended. I am aware of how little the Bible is read and loved, and by how easily offended people are. I am not talking about trials or broken hearts — we all have those or face them. To be offended means to stumble or have something happen that causes us to stumble, to fall, or to run away from the right things we once did. Turning from a relationship, or quitting on a friend or a job because we have been offended is the subject here.
Psalm 119:165 “Great peace have they which love thy law: and nothing shall offend them.”
Those who love the Bible will tolerate injustice and keep going.
Those who love the Bible will find peace in troubled times.
Proverbs 18 brings us to the other extreme. It talks about a brother being offended. Through whatever offense, the wise man warns us that winning an offended one back to a close relationship will be very difficult. A “brother offended” is somebody who needs a deeper walk with God and a greater love for the Bible. Too much needs to be done for God for us to wander around being offended over every mistake or wrong that another does.
Proverbs 18:19 “A brother offended is harder to be won than a strong city: and their contentions are like the bars of a castle."
In the past five decades of being a Christian, I have known many Christians who love the Bible and walk with God but were hurt. They briefly grieved over their pain, and then moved on with life. As a general rule, those who feel the world has offended them have failed to develop a close relationship with the Word of God. The simple reality is, a deep love for God‘s Word will help us bear the awkward, difficult, and even offensive situations without being offended.
In Genesis 37, we read about the brothers of Joseph conspiring against him. Joseph had been his dad’s favorite son, and he had turned in his brothers for doing something wrong. Adding this incident to Joseph’s other actions greatly irritated the big brothers to the point that they considered killing him. Eventually, they sold him into slavery. What weak and frail men allowed such small irritations to cause them to go to such lengths of dramatic response.
I think we would all agree that the wrong done to Joseph far exceeded any wrong the brothers had to face. Yet, we find that the brothers were offended and acted wickedly while Joseph forgave and acted godly.
I have found it impossible to control the offensive things people do. Correcting wrong behavior of others is impossible; therefore, I devoted myself to a walk with God and a love for His Book in hopes that I might never stray from the right path because someone “offended me.” My goal would be to so walk with God that I would always forgive, always love, and always believe in people, even though they may behave poorly.
In a world where technology occupies our minds hundreds of times a day, may we be the kind of people who step away from the world regularly to read the Bible, meditate on certain passages, and prayerfully seek to know God personally and intimately. God said that if we loved His Law, we would never be offended. What a change in our world that would bring!
Pastor