EP 9 The Spirit of Offense: How Do I Choose to be Unoffended? How to Fight Spiritual Battles with your Words and Choices for the Busy Mom Wife Accountability Series Part 3

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EP 9 The Spirit of Offense: How Do I Choose to be Unoffended? How to Fight Spiritual Battles with your Words and Choices for the Busy Mom Wife Accountability Series Part 3

Instead of dealing with the feelings that whatever that action was that offended us caused or hit it's like striking a chord when we're offended. It's because some feelings in us have arisen from whatever was said or done to us or about us or around us. Now, some people just walk around being offended about anything and everything, and others of us become offended at certain things that people do and say, I want to challenge you to think about this as being a choice.

Hey friend, what's up. Welcome to episode nine. This is part three of the accountability series, and I know we're talking about hard stuff, but we're going to be better for it. After we do it, we are strong enough to do hard stuff. I know you are. So today we're talking about to be offended or not to be offended. That is the question we're going to deal with. All right, let's do it sisters.

Hey friends, we are back for part three of the accountability series. And today we are going to talk about the spirit of offense, not often, but offense taking offense. So in the last segment, we talked about assuming positive intent and making choices to believe what is the truth or believe what is helpful for us to have better outcomes in our relationships. If you haven't listened to that, go back to episode eight and look, and listen to accountability. Series part two, where we talked about how to assume positive intent. We talked a lot about making a choice. And what I was alluding to in that episode is this whole idea of making a choice to be offended or not to be offended. I think it's important to realize that when you talk about being offended, that is a choice. Whether we like that or not friends to be offended is a choice that we make when we choose to be offended about something.

Instead of dealing with the feelings that whatever that action was that offended us caused or hit it's like striking a chord when we're offended. It's because some feelings in us have arisen from whatever was said or done to us or about us or around us. Now, some people just walk around being offended about anything and everything, and others of us become offended at certain things that people do and say, I want to challenge you to think about this as being a choice. When you have those feelings or thoughts of being offended, I want you to step back and I want you to think about, okay, why am I choosing to be offended about this? And what's the underlying feeling that's causing this to rise up. What about this interaction? What was said, how I feel is making me feel this way. Ultimate thing offense is that it serves only to conquer and divide.

It serves to break up unity because when we feel offended, we do act say things that we may not otherwise say, because we feel almost entirely titled because of the offense that we're feeling from that person, from what they did or said, when we respond that way, there's no other result that can come from that, except for yeah. Or division. We've had a lot of that this past season in 2020, there were a lot of words and actions that were taken that a lot of them people were offended by whatever it is. We want to talk about. Those things are events, information that we can use to become offended. And I think the challenge is to really assess when you have these feelings, what cord is being hit, what is pulling on your heartstrings? That's making you have this visceral reaction, this emotional reaction that then makes you want to guard yourself against what it is you're feeling.

And Proverbs 10, 12. It says hatred stirs up strife, but love covers all offenses. So my whole stance throughout all of this, regardless of my position. And like I said, in the intro, I will not talk about politics, but I think it's important to, to understand that if we're choosing to walk in love and that's one of my main things, lead with love, walk in love, just love people enough, love them, hard, love them enough. So they know their worth and they know they're important and they know their significance and they know the impact they're supposed to have in this world. If we're choosing to walk in love, it's really difficult to choose to also be offended in Romans 16, 17, 18. It says, I appeal to you brothers to watch out for those who cause divisions and create obstacles contrary to the doctrine that you've been taught, avoid them for such persons do not serve our Lord Christ, but their own appetites.

That's their flesh. And by smooth talk and flattery, they deceive the hearts of the naive. So when someone's not walking completely with an understanding that it's our responsibility to walk in love and love others, no matter what side of the fence they're on. When our task is to love. If we don't understand that or we haven't taken that stance, then it becomes easier for us to become and then choose to stay offended. So one of the first things I do when I, when that creeps up in me is I assess what is it about what was just said? That hit me so hard that I feel like I'm offended, or I need to be offended. And then I deal with the emotion of that. Something within me, an experience I have had something that's happened. I deal with me and what's inside of me. And I turned to prayer and I focus my efforts on that.

Versus the other person it's like bait in a trap, choosing to become offended, puts us in a trap because it ruins the ability to see that person in love. And then when you're responding in a way that's not in love, your relationship is damaged. So there's nothing really good that can come out of being offended. It puts gaps up between me and the other person. It puts bars up between us. It almost keeps us in our own little prisons and isn't it like the enemy to want to keep us separated and keep us isolated. I mean, this whole season of 2020 has been about division and separation and isolation. When there's an opportunity for us to stop the line and make a different choice that would not lead to our own isolation from others. Then my challenges for myself and everyone else to choose the thing.

That's not going to keep us isolated the thing that's going to create community instead of destroy it. And guys, this is about a mindset shift. This isn't about this easy, and it's not about it being something that we're not going to struggle with. It's just about shifting our mindset to view offense as a choice instead of a passive thing. The other thing I want to talk about is when you feel offended by something that was said or something that was done, I would challenge you to really go to God about that instead of another person. And the reason I say that is because if offense is a trap to keep me divided from others or, or destroy the unity that I have in relationship with others, then adding another person to that mix can also damage that other person. Here's an example. This is the whole reason why I would never have a conversation about something I am really upset about with my husband, something my husband said or did with someone else.

Because once I do that, I can't take that back. And so when I have forgiven him and I have, you know, moved on that person that heard that information doesn't have the same stake or benefit in forgiving him as easily as I would, doesn't have the same stake in that relationship. So now not only have, if I choose to be offended and I strife in our relationship. Now I have caused that Stripe, that the vision with someone else against him, when you're, when you're talking about something, that's happened with someone else, be really careful about choosing to share that with somebody else. If that person is loyal to you, then you are now causing division in a relationship that really has nothing to do with you. But now it's about you. So now, if I go tell, tell Susie what happened with Emily and Susie is my friend and is loyal to me.

She then has to make a choice to be offended with me, which causes division between her and Emily. And that may not have been hurt her strife to carry in the first place. So your offense spreads beyond just you and your heart and that relationship that you're dealing with, the person that so-called offended you that can spread beyond like tentacles and it can grab a hold of somebody else and put somebody else in a space where now they're feeling offended and they're in division. And they're no longer walking in the primary focus of love for that person. And I don't feel like I ever want to be in a place where I have caused someone else to be divided in relationship with someone else, just because I had some emotions that I needed to deal with on my own. So that leads into with the next episode will be about, which is about gossip or slander.

So I know these are things that are hard to hear and hard to talk about because again, my challenge to you and myself is always going to be to turn it inward, to look at yourself, what can you do differently to grow through this versus act out in a way that will damage relationships with other people or cause people to choose to walk out of whatever their calling is. If, if, if I involve Sally and now she's fallen out of relationship with Emily, well, what if that was a relationship that had some worse and some value in the kingdom? Now my action has caused Sally and Emily to no longer be friends when it really had nothing to do with either one of them, it's almost like poison sisters. Are we still friends?

I know it's hard stuff, but I think in order for us to grow and be the women that we are being called to be, we have to be able to talk about this hard stuff. And we have to be able to set the boundaries with ourselves, with our own flesh so that we don't fall into these traps. That cause damage to our relationships with other people in our lives, because that's the last thing that any of us want to do. Finally, James one 19 says, understand this, my beloved brethren, let every man be quick to hear a ready listener, slow to speak and slow to take offense and to get angry. So I'll leave you with that. Let's be slow to take offense. Let's take that pause. When we feel offended and figure out what is that emotion that's creeping up for us and what is it for?

Why is it there? What do I need to do with that? What do I need to reflect upon? What do I need to pray about and ask God to reveal to me what it is that's causing these feelings, because then I'm working on myself and I'm not focusing that outward expecting someone else to change. When I have no control over that person in the first place, that's an illusion to think that we have control to change anybody else in this world. The only control we have is over our own self, our own selves. So I want to end in prayer. God, I thank you today for my sisters, for my friends. I thank you for this truth and this revelation that we have the power and the control to reflect upon our own feelings and emotions that come up in interactions, in relationships and things that happen in our lives. God revealed to us when we are taking on the spirit of offense, instead of walking in love, reveal those things to us, help give us rest and pause when we experienced those things so that we can refrain from damaging the relationships that you have placed us in, in Jesus name. Amen. I'll see him the next episode.

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