TRAPPED: Offence - Pastor Kyle Self

Welcome to the World Changers Church Gold Coast podcast. Join us as we listen to today's message. Amen. Can you give the Lord a hand clap of praise this morning? Oh, come on, come on. It's rainy outside. It's all right. Come on. Come on, can you give the Lord a hand clap of praise? He's worthy to be praised this morning. Father, we just thank you this morning that we do not come here acting like Christians. We do not come here portraying a face. No, Lord, we come in here exactly who we are, knowing that you will lead us and guide us and direct us in all things. We ask you this morning, Lord, that we strip back the layers of our thoughts this morning and the layers of life and just come to a place of honesty with you. That will help us consistently walk out love in you. It's in Jesus name, I pray, amen. Can you give the Lord a hand clap of praise? Amen. God is good. Is God good this morning? Well, the weather outside is frightful. Anyway, well, I'm starting to get in the mood for Christmas carols and Christmas. I'm excited. Me and Caitlin are excited, good job. You know, I know Christmas is tough on most people because it's like, oh, I've got to buy gifts. But I came to the realisation, I buy my kids and wife and myself a lot all year long. I just think I want to enjoy being together this season. And that doesn't mean I'm not giving you boys anything, it's all right. But just Caitlin, but it means that Tina and Caitlin will have a good Christmas. But I think that, you know, a lot of times we put a lot of undue stress during this season and we forget the joy of this season. You know, we get offended because people buy the gift that we didn't want. My wife told me, don't you ever buy another gift with a cord attached to it. Men, that's a good lesson right there. Yeah. You understand what I'm saying? But I found in this season that we are easily offended, easily offended in this season. And as we're in this series called Trapped, and we've been talking about the traps, both spiritual and natural, that the enemy uses, we started off the first week with the armor of God and we talked about how those are defensive weapons and an a-offensive weapon to stand in a position of identity, a foundation of belief so that we can walk in peace. If you haven't listened to that, go back to the podcast. It's the first one. And then last week, we talked about overcoming shame and the reality of guilt. And the reality of guilt is guilt can lead you in two directions. Guilt is not the problem. It's the response, the faith response you have to being guilty of something. Guilt says, I made a mistake. Shame says, I am a mistake. And because we have Jesus, we have an advocate with the Father that when we make a mistake, we can make things right again because we are the righteousness of God. Amen. But today, we're going to talk about the bait of Satan that he uses to trap us in, you know, he traps us and gets us to derail ourselves off the path. And the problem is the Bible does tell us that we do not war against flesh and blood. But where does most offence come? From flesh and blood. You know, I think in Psalms, you don't have this one, Timmy, but in Psalms 55, 12, and 14, it says, for it is not an enemy who reproaches me. I could bear it. Then I could bear it. Nor is it one who hates me, who has exalt himself against me. Then I could hide from it. But it is you, my equal. Oh, man. Anybody ever had that? I can't believe you did this to me. My companion, my acquaintance, we took sweet counsel together and walked in the house of the Lord. Father, we thank you for this opportunity to minister this morning to these people that have braved the weather and the parking. I know that sounds funny, but seriously, hallelujah. Father, we thank you for the next building with abundant parking. Hallelujah. And Lord, we thank you this morning that we will receive a revelation of hope and help and insight into what you've called us to do. Amen. So, let's look at Luke 17, one through five. That's the key text we're pulling from today. And I really, I'm not going to spend a lot of time breaking this down. If you need to know certain things, YouVersion Bible app has lots of things for these scriptures. You can download it and break that down for you. But I'm going to speed through some things today. And if I need to slow down, Tina will tell me to slow down. So it says in here in Luke 17, one, then he said to the disciples, the other pupils being taught by Jesus. It is impossible that no offences should come, but woe to him through whom they do come. Now let's look at this and not focus on the last part of the sentence, which most people look at. Let's look at the middle. It is impossible that no offence should come. Now I want you to think about that as a backdrop for the rest of the message today. Verse two, it would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck and he were thrown into the sea, then he should offend one of these little ones. Verse three, take heed to yourselves. If your brother sins against you, rebuke him. And if he repents, forgive him. Verse four, and if he sins against you seven times in the day and seven times in a day returns to you saying, I repent, you shall forgive him. Verse five, and the apostle said to the Lord, increase, and the apostle said to the Lord, increase our faith. Now why is that? Because offence is not easy to forgive and we want vengeance. We want, when somebody does us wrong, we want them to understand how we feel. I mean, I've been a married man for coming up on 25 years and we do a, we're going to do a wedding renewal and a wedding vow renewal next May, praise God, and my wife's looking forward to that and so am I. But for 25 years, there's one thing I'd never understood until about 10 years ago. My wife doesn't want me to fix it. My wife wants me to do more than listen. She wants me to understand how I made her feel, amen. And I've come to a realisation, I can't do that. I will never be her, so my best bet is to listen, repent, and do better. But I have to give that opportunity, but that's not the point. The apostle said, increase my faith, because Jesus had just said, if your brother sins against you seven times 70, you're going to forgive them. That is not easy to do. But it goes on back to the beginning and says that if you think that offence is not going to come, you are mistaken. Offence is a part of living in this world. Does that make sense? You might have been offensive this morning with your attitude and your inconsistencies, the way you drove here, or the way the person cut you off and you told them happy birthday. We all can be offensive and we just don't realise it, but as Christians, we are called to walk in love, unity, and forgiveness. So what does the enemy attack the most? Our love, our unity, and our ability to forgive. Offence, if it takes root in your heart, impacts your ability to forgive. Offence, if it grows fruit in your life, will cause you to distance yourself from people and not be in unity. And if offence is taken and is given to others because you've let it bear fruit in your life, it will cause hate and not love. Amen? Make sense? So however, you know, one of the enemy's most, I think, subtle and effective traps is what we've been talking about already, which is offence. It's the tool that Satan uses to divide us, to discourage us, and to isolate believers, especially within the body of Christ. The pastor didn't shake my hand today. Well, praise God, I'm sorry. You know, that was offensive, right? Well, he didn't even act like he cared. Well, I'm sorry. You know, pastor didn't text me back. Pastor didn't answer my phone call. So-and-so walked right past me. Did we ever consider that maybe something is going on in their life, and it's less about us, I mean, about us as the individual, and more about us as the community, and let's find out what's going on before we get offended? Does that make sense? Come on, somebody. But here's the good news. We do not have to fall in this trap. We choose to. I'm going to say that again. Offence is a trap of submission. Offence is not something that takes hold of you. Offence is something that you take hold of, amen? Offence is something you take hold of and say, yep, I'm going to run with that. And if you do not deal with the offences in your heart, you will offend others. And you wonder why people don't like you, because you've become offensive because you're so offended. I had a man tell me one time, I don't know if you've ever heard this, I had a man tell me one time. He says, you can't offend me. My mind said, Joker, you're probably the most offended person in life. Anybody that ever tells you you can't make them angry, you can't hurt them, or you can't offend them, that is their sentry turrets and their walls to try and tell you, do not do this to me. But they are probably the most offended, the most angry, and the most hurt person you've ever met in your life. So Satan, or this life, uses offence to cause division, to see things differently. Let's break down that word, vision, to see clearly, division, to see blurred. When someone has two different visions, it's like having a bad night and drinking things you shouldn't, and you're seeing two instead of one. You cannot be in unity until vision becomes one. Whether it's disagree to agree, or finding your part and purpose in the vision, division is seeing things differently and less clearly than what's being presented. And that's what the enemy wants to do with the word of God. He wants to cause offence so that you see things less clearly. Does that make sense? So even though Satan uses offence, the Bible teaches us how to break free from this trap. The gospel teaches us that through the wisdom of his word and encouragement through dealing with offences, that we can overcome this trap and step right past it. So today I want to help you embrace God's heart about forgiveness and how to live in freedom and peace that he offers. Does that make sense? So let's look at the first point I'm going to make, recognising that offence is inevitable. It's going to happen, but overcoming it is possible. Offence is inevitable, but overcoming it is possible. Yeah? Anybody ever been offended? Yeah? Got some. Now I do have some super saints in here like, no, not me, dun, dun, dun, dun. No, everyone in here has been offended. I get offended by people's inconsistency. I really do. When people love me and I'm like, oh, I feel safe around you and then they don't love me as much the next day because I didn't do something the way they wanted it done, I don't feel safe in their love. I hate inconsistent love. It is offensive to me and it takes a lot for me not to dismiss that person because they're so immature in love. Amen? But it's my maturity with the word that helps me step over that and say, I'm going to keep loving them anyway consistently. Does that make sense? Yeah? Another thing that offends me, I'm just going to tell you, this is like my confession session, okay, is bad drivers. I can't stand bad drivers, even though I'm one of them. Amen? Another thing that offends me is people that don't know how to submit to each other and always want to be the alpha. You don't have to be the big dog in the room. We're all Jesus's friends. We all got a part to play. We don't have to lead this and be the emcee. Trust me, if God would let me, I'd hand the keys over to you and let you lead and you'd hand it back in five minutes after dealing with the phone calls, the texts, the emails, the bills, and all the other stuff I got to deal with. Amen? The way we overcome offence is first realising that it's inevitable. Jesus was very clear in Luke 17, let's look back there. Then he said to the disciples, it is impossible that no offence should come. I've heard people say if somebody's against me or this is happening, this is Satan. That statement does not say it is impossible that Satan won't offend you. It is saying that offence is a part of living in this world. You have to accept the fact that there's going to be offensive things that you face today and that the way you overcome it is through the love of God. He didn't say offences might come. He said it's impossible that they won't come. So this is part of living in this world. We don't have to be controlled by offence, instead we can overcome it with his help. So let's look at this, when we face offence, whether it's a harsh word or a misunderstanding or a feeling of being overlooked, anybody ever felt overlooked, dismissed? Like you say something and it just like, everybody just moves on like you're not even there? Does it make sense? You ever walk in a room and just don't feel a part of the party, right, you're just not there? You ever doing the work and never feel like you get an accolade? You ever work so hard and I think everybody can say amen to that one, amen. I mean, every boss in the world that lets you do all the work and then gets all the pats on the backs for how good their company does. And that can be offensive, right? So it's important to remember, now listen to this, it's important to remember that it's not, that being overlooked is not a reflection, listen to this, of our worth or our identity. Offence comes when you're overlooked and it attacks your identity, it attacks your worth, am I good enough, why are they not seeing me, they don't know who I am and what I do. Does that make sense? So when you feel overlooked, it's actually an attack or an insecure position in you about your worth and your identity. Overlook me, I don't care, I know who I am. Overlook me, pay me no attention, dismiss me, disrespect me, I don't care, I know who I am and I know my worth. Your way of treating me is never going to devalue who I am in Christ, amen? You cannot change my value because you did not die for me, amen? You cannot change my identity because you didn't give me the Holy Spirit, you didn't give me the fruits of the Spirit, you cannot change my worth because you did not die for me. Does that make sense? So because of that, if I know that I'm in Christ, my value, my identity is constant in Him and therefore I cannot be offended when you overlook me, amen? We need to get better at that. We snag onto offence like popcorn, like a chewy, chewy snack, we're just like, nom, nom, nom, nom, nom, nom, just offense, let's take it in. I know, right? But it's so quick how we get offended. Do not let offence be your snack of the day, let it be something you move away from and say I know who I am, amen? Learn to see offence for what it is, a trap and an attack on who you are. And you do not have to take part of it, does that make sense? Okay, so when we face offence, we have to see that our efforts, we have to see who Christ is and we have to realise Christ is on trial, not us. I must say that again. If you are a Christian, you understand this. If you're not a Christian, you need to understand Christ so that you can overcome offense because the world without Christ will just make you hard-hearted, but the world with Christ will help you overcome in faith, amen? You need Christ to not become hard-hearted by offence. You need to realise that Christ is on trial, not you. They persecute you for my name's sake, Jesus said, amen? And so when we realise that they're not attacking you, they're attacking the good or the Christ in you, then we can easily forgive. But we need to understand forgiveness when it comes to offence to really be able to forgive. See, most people think that forgiveness, point two by the way, most people think that forgiveness is a dismissal of actions. Forgiveness is not a dismissal of actions. Dismissal is freeing you from the anger of the actions against you. Do you understand? Forgiveness is not a dismissal of actions. Forgiveness is dismissal of the anger in you about the actions taken against you, the hurt in you, the depression, whatever it is. Forgiveness frees you from the result of the attack, amen? Does that make sense? So our most powerful tool that God has given us to combat offence is the gift of forgiveness. Let's look at Colossians 3.13, bearing with one another and forgiving one another, if anyone has a complaint against another, even as Christ forgave you, so also must you what do. Okay. Forgiveness of the Lord forgave. Man, I'm gonna tell you something, the church body, we are not good at forgiving one another. We're good at judging one another, we're good at criticising one another, we're good at using the Bible against one another, but we're not really good at forgiving. Because we think forgiveness is forgetting, no, forgiveness is freedom for you while setting a standard on how people treat you. Does that make sense? See, when you don't know how to forgive, you actually training people how to treat you. I don't wanna deal with that person because they're angry all the time. I don't wanna be there because they're offensive to me. They don't realise that the reason that, most people don't realise that the reason that that person is treating you that way is because somewhere along the line you offended them. That's tough. Forgiveness is your most powerful tool. Forgiveness is not just an act of kindness, listen, listen, listen, listen, oh my goodness. Forgiveness is not just an act of kindness, it is a choice to lead in freedom. Think about that. Forgiveness is not just an act of kindness, it's when you choose to forgive, you're leading freedom. You're leading patience, you're leading peace. When you choose to do these things, you're leading in the manner in which freedom can be found, bearing with one another, brother, come with me, let's walk in forgiveness. Sister, come with me, let's walk in forgiveness. Forgiveness is not just an act of kindness, oh, it's okay, it's leading yourself and others to freedom and peace. So if we're going to forgive as Christ forgave us, what did his forgiveness give? Peace, love, reconciliation, all the fruits of the spirit, gentleness, I mean, come on somebody. So our forgiveness should have a fruit of freedom, not a reminder of wrong. I forgive you, but. See that's offensive. See, do you realise that your forgiveness can be offensive? I forgive you, but I want to remind you. I forgive you, but you should have. I forgive you, but I want to let you know one more thing. That's offensive, that's not forgiveness, that's an intro to you telling somebody off once again, amen? So forgiveness is not just an act of kindness. When you choose to forgive, we release ourself from the bond of anger and bitterness and we open a door for God's peace to flood in our and their hearts. So good. Forgiving others can be challenging. Anybody ever challenged to forgive people? Especially when you feel deeply hurt. My mom deeply hurt me when she lied about my dad for 16 years of my life. I still have some times in my life where I walk in that home and I'm like, man, it would have been nice to have shared this memory with my dad. But I can't let that offence take root and make me angry at my mom. So each time I forgive her, I am quick to forgive so that I walk in peace and not in anger. Do you see how that works? Offence is a trap against you and a trial for Jesus in you. Will you listen and surrender to him or will you listen to yourself? Does that make sense? Oh, this is a deep one. But here's the beauty. Forgiveness isn't about excusing wrong. I said this, but I want you to hear it for those that didn't hear it. It's about freeing our hearts to move forward. See a trap causes you to sit down where you are. If you're ensnared in something or you're sabotaged by something, it makes you sit in one place and keeps you from moving forward. There's a study out there that says when trauma happens, a person's emotional development stops at that age and they don't develop in that emotional area until they've overcome the trauma. So when I was offended by my mama and she told me my daddy didn't love me, I was from three to like 12. So my development of love was very skewed so much to the point I had a very childish love when I met Tina. I was like, well, what you going to give me if I give you this? Well, what you going to do if I do that? That's not love. That's childish. I didn't realise that until I forgave my mama, my love couldn't move forward. That makes sense. So somebody's hurt you. Somebody has wronged you and it is a trap to try and get you to sit there and build walls around that part of your life and keep you from moving forward and growing and being better because that attack on you was trying to stop you from being a better person because of the bad person that did it to you. Amen. Man, that's good. Quit building walls around the place you were hurt and learn how to forgive, move forward, mature and be better. Amen. Jesus demonstrated the ultimate forgiveness on the cross. Well, I can't forgive people. You don't know what they did. They showed up. They did this. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Jesus was hanging on the cross. Father, forgive them for they know not what they do. And then they didn't do nothing but divide his garments and go gambling about his stuff. Father, when it says forgive like Jesus forgave, no matter what they've done to you, tried to kill you, backstab you, no matter what they've taken from you, you are releasing yourself from the anger. Jesus could have called down angrily 10,000 angels and all of mankind, including me and you would have never met the father. But he chose to love us even though we were yet in sin, he died for us. So sometimes your greatest choice is to not take the offence. Come on somebody. Not to take the offence of what you see on the ground and you hanging up there on the cross. Because you got to look and say, I'm going to move forward. This is not my final destination and this is not who I am. Jesus's transfiguration happened after his burial. He was a broken, beaten man on the cross. He went down and rose up an offering and the lamb of God and the lion of Judah. Does that make sense? Come on somebody. Sometimes your forgiveness will transform you into something greater than the hurt that happened. Amen? Come on somebody. I'm dropping bombs today. I mean, if I had a mic, I'd just drop it. Hallelujah. Father forgive them for they know not what they're doing. When we forgive, we mirror Christ's heart and experience the freedom that comes from releasing our hurt into his hands. The father said, vengeance is mine, saith the Lord. Someone offended you. Someone attacked you. Someone came against you. Your weapons of warfare are carnal, but God's weapons are stronger and they're built in holy places and can do much more good than what you can do. Does that make sense? If you will trust the Lord and rely on him and realise that God's going to create a turnaround, the greatest vengeance that the Lord told me one time, the greatest vengeance that can happen is the person that offended you, the person that was your greatest enemy, somewhere down the line, God changes and becomes your best friend. That is vengeance. I mean, that's a trophy for God. Amen? The snake that tried to bite you. I know the phrase that's out there in the world today, don't befriend someone that has hurt you because a snake only changes his skin. Well, that's worldly wisdom. Amen? Okay, so that just means you're going to have less people in your life because, can I tell you something? Look around. Ain't none of y'all perfect, including me. You're going to do stuff that's going to hurt people and the only skin you're changing is to die daily and turn back to Christ in repentance. What if you were judged for your worst day just as much as you're judging somebody else? Amen? That's a hurtful one. Shaba-rama. I mean, that's a bad one. What if you were judged for your worst day just as much as you were holding a fence against someone else right now? Come on, you got forgiven. You moved on. You begged for... I mean, I remember. I mean, even when my mama did some harsh things to me, I did some harsh things to her. I remember begging mom, I'm sorry, mama. I've got drug dealers coming to the house wanting to kill you and dad and take everything from you. Like it was just a simple little apology. I mean, really look at the gravity of that context there. My dad looks at me and he goes, well, I love you, but you got to leave, my stepfather. And that hurt. And I thought, you're not there for me. He said, son, we... And I literally said it. He said, son, I got guns and everything else, but I'm not going to let anybody come in here and hurt your mama. As I'm walking out the door, my mom says, please don't leave. I love you. Stay. I don't care what happens. That was forgiveness. That was love. Love doesn't have a demand or a command. It has a position that'll change your life. And I still remember those words because those words were the beginning of my turnaround. Then I was an addict, and I got people coming here to collect money on me, and my mama still loves me. And that showed and sowed a seed in my heart greater than the offence. That makes sense? Learn to forgive and walk in freedom that Christ has given you by not taking the bait of Satan that is called offence. Amen? Amen. All right. Oh, man. Oh, man. So if you've made it this far, recognising offence is inevitable and overcoming it is possible and that the power of forgiveness presents freedom for you. The real big issue with offence is trust. Do you trust that God is going to turn it around? Do you trust God's plan in every situation? Listen, offence is just a delay for the opportunity that God has given. Did you hear that? Offence is just a delay. You may be sitting in a good job and promotion being right around the corner. I'm only talking for a couple of you, not one of you. But promotion may be right around the corner. Amen? And you're about to change jobs because you can't handle how offensive your boss is. Listen, stay, learn everything you can and go start your own business. Amen? But serve the Lord with all your heart while you're there and don't become a disgruntled employee. Amen? Don't let your circumstance change your heart and who you are. Remember, your worth and your value cannot be changed because they didn't die for you. Amen? And your identity is in Christ. So no matter what they do to you, you are valuable because of Christ. Amen? And if you can trust God's plan, one of the enemy's strategies is to convince you that we have been treated unfairly, that we're invisible, and that our efforts don't matter. I mean, look at Satan when it comes to Eden, coming up in there, did God really say that? You just eat that fruit because God's afraid you're going to be like him. The enemy will try and tell you and get you to a place and people and your own heart and your own thinking will try and get you to a place through offence that you are not getting what you deserve. Well, if we got what we deserved, we'd be on the cross. Quit thinking you've been treated unfairly because God promised us you'll never be shortchanged. Amen? So nothing could be further from the truth that your efforts don't matter. Well, let's look at it in the Word. 1 Corinthians 15:58. Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain in the Lord. Couple of key words, beloved brethren, family, be steadfast, be firm, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, that your labor is not in vain in the Lord. When you can realise that no matter, that your life is a ministry, that your life is a witness to Christ, so your workplace is a mission field, your car drive is an evangelistic tool either for good or bad, your bank account can be used for God, your marriage can be used for God, your divorce can be used for God. Wait a minute, but I'll talk about that in the next one, in the next series, in the next verse next Sunday, because I knew that one would shock a couple of you. So it don't matter what bad has happened, God can turn it around because it won't be in vain because of the Lord. Amen? Don't let what's happened to you make you so offended that you no longer resemble Christ. Amen? Trust the Lord. God sees everything you do, every act of service, every word of encouragement, every prayer you pray, and he honours it. If you're looking for me to pat you on the back and give you an attaboy, listen, I wasn't loved that well as a kid, and I didn't pet dogs freely every day. I don't know how to give people attaboys every day, I just know how to work and get it done. Don't look to me for your attaboy, look to Christ. Don't be waiting on me to acknowledge you and do what God told you to do. Do it in decency and in order with the way the church runs, sure, but man, don't look for me to pat you on the back because I didn't get a lot of that growing up. And if you're looking to me, I'm going to offend you. Most people do. They're like, man, I really love the church, Pastor Tina's really awesome, she's like sweet like apple pie, but that Pastor Kyle, he looked like a bulldog walking around, you know, just never talks to me, always busy, gets up there and talks and makes jokes and then walks out the door. Listen, you need love, talk to Tina. You need a good kick in the backside, talk to me. You need a pep talk, talk to both of us. It's going to be like salt and savoury, you're going to get the good from her, good cop, bad cop. Wait a minute, bad cop, good cop. But that's why God put us together, because we're not the Saviour, we're the representation of him and we complement each other. Quit looking to other people to make you feel good about yourself. That is just the fear of man and that is the most offensive way of living, amen? Trust that the Lord sees you and approves of you. Look at your neighbour and say, the Lord approves of you. Yep, I don't know what that is outside, but it's loud and that's offensive, whatever that noise is, is offensive. It's a car. Well, they need to get a muffler for their car, hallelujah, I'm kidding, that's offensive. When we feel overlooked, when we feel undervalued, when we forget the opportunity of our worth, it doesn't come from man's approval, it comes from God's love. God is a righteous judge and he knows every injustice and every hurt you've experienced, amen? I don't know what time it is here. I don't know what pain you've experienced, but we must trust with our, ooh, we must trust God with our pain and release the need of validation from others to see our pain and accept the identity that is firmly grounded in the love of God. I'm going to use Claire as an example because she's safe and she's right there and she knows I'm not picking on her. If Claire offended me, it is my responsibility to approach her and say, this hurt me. And even if she laughs in my face about it, I have spoken my peace because my responsibility is to let her know that this offence is not mine and I'll release you from how you've offended me, whether you say you're sorry or not, amen? So one of the things about offences is that sometimes we attach offence to a person, but offence happened in you. John says the quarrel is in you. What offended you is because it's something you didn't like being touched. We hold some things too precious. We hold our opinion way too precious. We hold our wisdom way too precious. My worth is not attached to my opinion. You don't want to listen to me about what I got to say? You not listening to me doesn't change my worth. Nothing that you do to me changes me. It's how I respond to Christ when you hurt me. It's how I respond to Christ when the world hurts me. But sometimes instead of telling people what they did wrong in a situation, we need to learn how to encourage one another. You know, I used to be really bad with just trying to fix every problem that my wife would bring to me. And I started creating this one rule when we'd start talking, are you inventing or do I need to fix something? Because sometimes she just wanted me to hear it and she just needed to get it off her chest. And a lot of times she's wanted me to fix it, but those are very few. She's a grown girl. She can handle most things herself. And she's pretty scary when she's mad. I mean, she's sweet as apple pie, but man, she'll cut you if she's mad at you. I'm kidding, honey. I love you. I'm just testing her offence right now. She's like, no, it's the truth. Oh, Lord. Hebrews 10:24-25, offence. When offence happens, we have something to consider. What are you giving back? And let us consider one another in the order to stir up love and good works, Paul. You hurt me. You didn't love me. You didn't do good to me. My job is no matter how you treat me, my job is to be responsible for how I treat you. Offence wants to cause me to react out of character in Christ. Amen. Remember, when Job was tested, the trial was on God, not on Job. Even though Job was walking it out, God gave his word. He loves me. He will turn to me. So who was on trial with that? God. Look at verse 25. Not forsaking the assembly of one ourselves together as the manner of some do, but exhorting one another in so much that the more as you see the day approaching. But first thing we do when we don't like something is we run. We cancel. We don't show up. We get mad. It's the first thing we do. But that's what offence wants you to do. Offence wants you to stop showing up. And I'm not just talking about church. I'm talking about for your family. Walking through the door, sitting down, just turning on the TV. For your friendships. Not making a phone call, not responding to the text. Offence says, I just can't deal with you right now. We need to change and we need to change our words so that our heart, no matter how we're treated, is encouraging and is always moving forward. Does this make sense? Is this hitting home today? Is this actually going, ooh, never really thought about it like this. That's what church is for. To celebrate and to get convicted of what Christ is doing in you. Amen? Hallelujah. So when we choose joy over bitterness, we can overlook offence with the glory of God. Amen? When we release offence, we embrace peace. Proverbs 19:11 says this, good sense makes a man restrained from anger. Good sense. Having your wits about yourself. Offence even though you think you're thinking clearly, you're not. Good sense makes a man restrain his anger and it is his glory to overlook a transgression or an offense. Man, I've had plenty of opportunity to let the spirit of slap come on me, but I let the Holy Spirit comes over me and I operate from that place. Amen. John 14:27 says that Christ said, peace I leave with you, my peace I give to you. You have the peace to overcome, not as the world gives, do I give you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. Look at that. The God type of peace passes your understanding. So the world's peace is everything's got to be good for me to be happy. But God's peace says I will give you everlasting joy when your happiness fails. Amen. Offence just wants you to rob you of the joy of life because you're so stuck on the fickle thing called happiness. Happiness is fleeting. I mean, happiness can be in a TV show and your favourite character gets what they need. Hot makes you smile, a joke, a movie, but it's there and gone. But joy is a position that you have in Christ to know that God is with you. Amen. So when we let go of the bait of offence, we position ourselves and experience God's peace. How many want more of God's peace? Amen. Come on. Come on. How many want more peace in your life? Come on. Oh, man. We can break free. We can choose to forgive. We can trust God's plan. We can walk in the peace of Christ. We can not only heal of our hurts in our heart, but we can contribute unity, strength and freedom in the body of Christ. I want to contribute, not take. I'm not a spiritual parasite. I want to give back. Amen. I want to give back to what good is. So remember, you're not alone in your journey and you're not the first person that's been hurt or offended this way, but you may be the first person in your family that responds differently and that will change generations to come. Amen. You may be the first person that doesn't go to a crutch to make you happy when you get offended. You may be the first person that works consistently because you're not looking for approval. You may be the first person to finish in your family because you decided to walk differently than the history of your past and the history of your family. And you chose Christ to not let offence trap you or the remaining generations. Romans 8:37, and in all these things, we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. The curtain rod of life is hinged on love. The curtain rod of life, everything that we can overcome the world with is with love. I've learned this as a father. I've learned this as a husband, and I'm learning it as a friend because, man, I don't trust. Let me change that. I didn't trust anybody, but I'm learning that with friends, sometimes the most scariest thing I can do is walk in something new with others that I've never done before. And we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. So let go of offence. Embrace freedom, joy, and peace that comes from walking in God's grace. Amen. You may be wondering why the long pause, but there's two reasons. I'll tell you the one. This body of believers is being equipped for what's coming. And I don't mean like revelations, I don't mean like end of times, don't let your mind just go that way. Man, that's coming no matter what we do. I'm talking about there's good coming, and there is good coming, and it may not be present in the world, but there is good coming. For you to be able to see it and grab a hold of it, you got to be free from offence. Because the ocular view of offence is always looking down instead of looking ahead. God has good for you, no matter what's happening, no matter how it didn't work out, God has good for you. You can get in self-pity, and you can get in doubting your worth, and you can get into all these conversations. I don't care how old you are, how young you are. It attacks gender, it attacks age, it attacks all parts of the human existence. So you being offended is a part of living. But you overcoming it is a part of Christ, amen? And I mean, I know somebody trying to be your God by overshadowing you and helicoptering your life. But God wants you to experience freedom and still love them, amen? God has good coming your way, whether you can see it or not. Offence is just trying to keep you from looking backwards and down instead of ahead. Offence is trying to get you to build walls around what hurts you instead of freeing yourself to grow in love. Does it mean you're not going to get angry? No, you're going to get angry. You're going to get spitfire blind mad. But how you deal with it matters, amen? And you're not going to trust men again, maybe for a while, until you get over the one man that offended you. You're not going to trust women again until you get over the one woman that offended you. And you've created a method of living based off of what one person has done to you. And that is a stronghold in your mind that you need a breakthrough for, amen? Well, you don't understand what they did. Well, you're so focused on them that you're becoming them and not Him, amen? Do not let offence rule you, let love guide you. Father, we thank you for each and every person in here this morning that was not offended by this message. Dad joke number one. But it was a real prayer, man. That's how the enemy robs a word out of your heart is through offence. They don't understand how bad I'm hurting. Honey, I don't, but God does. And He wants to help you move forward. Father, I thank you for every person in here that is not offended by the message. I thank you for every person in here that is growing in love through this series, because it's not about the traps. It's not about giving glory to Satan. It's about overcoming through the love of God. For you gave us the power to overcome the world through the name of Jesus. So, Father, we thank you. We honour you. We love you. And it's in Jesus' name we pray, amen. Now, I'm going to say a couple of things for the people listening to the podcast, but I also want to say a few things for the people here. How many people? It was like 2,000 or something. How much was it? Like, it was how many through Spotify? How many plays did we have? 300 in the last 90 days. I would really like to change that, because this word needs to go out. Amen? So, do me a favor. This is not a promo. Listen back to this message. Share this message. If you feel like you don't have words to share with people, just share it with people. Say, man, just put it on play while you're driving. You're going to get mad at some of the things he says, but just make it through. Invite people to get in this word. But for you that are listening and for you that are sitting here, if you do not know Christ Jesus, every head bowed, every eye closed, if you do not know Jesus as your personal Saviour and would like to experience freedom from the world's persecution of you and your goodness, and you would like to be able to overcome the hardening of your heart and the pain of how people have hurt you, I would invite you to begin this journey with Jesus right now. And simply say, Lord Jesus, I invite you into my heart as my Lord and Saviour. I confess with my mouth. I ask forgiveness of my sins, and I know that you are good in me. And I receive you now in Jesus' name. Amen. For all of us sitting here, you've heard this message today. Every head bowed, every eye closed. Is there anyone here today to say this message was good for me? Amen. Amen. Thank you for the hands. This is not for me. This is just for you to say. How many want to experience more peace in your life? Question I asked earlier. Can you lay hands on someone close to you? You don't have to stand up. You don't have to go far. Patty, would you mind if somebody comes pray with you, ma'am? Would that be okay? Yeah? All right. Alex, you know that I'm praying for you. Amen. Father, I ask that more peace abundantly shine in these people's lives. May your peace shine upon them. Because they're walking in the freedom that you give. They're walking in the truth and light of your word. And that they are walking in health, hope, and happiness, joy that comes from you. Father, I pray that they discover peace that passes understanding. I pray that they discover the beauty of walking with the Prince of Peace, you Jesus. And that they trust you. Be guided by you. It's in Jesus' name I pray. Amen. And amen. Come on, give the Lord a hand clap, I pray. Amen. Well. I'll give you one last nugget. Stop focusing on everybody else. That's where offence begins. God bless you. Thank you for tuning in to today's message. To connect or find out more, you can reach us online at worldchangers.life. Remember to subscribe for more uplifting messages from our pastoral team. And may you continue to walk in faith and transformation until we meet again.