Take Offence Back to the Store: It Is Costing You Your Destiny

Sermon outline

Offence is the enemy's tool to cripple you and keep you from your destiny, so refuse it, forgive, stay patient and faithful under pressure, and keep on walking in the love of God.

1. Offence is the enemy's tool to cripple you

   Offence means wounded feelings, hurt, annoyance, anger and resentment, and together with discouragement it is the enemy's number one ploy to keep you away from fellowship and the corporate anointing. When hearts turn bitter the glory departs, and it returns when God's people humble themselves and pray. People in the church, the family and the workplace will all give you the opportunity, and whether they were right or wrong is not the issue: the one who is robbed is you. An offended spirit puts you in the wrong posture, with closed hands, to receive from God, so let go and let God, because lost time is too expensive.

   Illustration: A supermarket sale where one aisle is completely empty. The Christians ask the manager what had been on the shelf at $1.99, and he tells them it was cans of discouragement, sold out across the whole country because so many Christians came in and bought it.

   “It is not the situation that will visit you that matters. It is your response to the situation that matters.”

   • James 1:21
   • Hebrews 10:25
   • 1 Samuel 4:21
   • 2 Chronicles 7:14

2. 1. Love does not take offence; it takes no account of wrongdoing

   Reading 1 Corinthians 13 from the Amplified Bible, he shows that love is not proud, rude, touchy, fretful or resentful, and pays no attention to a suffered wrong. Guard your heart, because miracles, ideas and your connection with people all flow out of it, and God cannot work in, with or through a person in a state of offence. God works even what was designed to destroy you into good, so when you suffer wrong, rejoice, and stop cursing your own situation with your mouth. When something good happens to someone else, say that something good is going to happen to you too.

   Illustration: They put Joseph in jail and said that was the end of him, but it was in jail that God gave him the interpretation that brought him before Pharaoh and made him ruler of the land.

   “By harboring offense in your heart, you sabotage your destiny.”

   • Proverbs 4:23
   • 1 Corinthians 13:4-6
   • Romans 8:28
   • Genesis 40-41
   • Proverbs 18:21

3. Pressure reveals what is really in your heart

   Every day brings an opportunity to be offended. Some people are sent by the devil to discourage you, and some situations are allowed by God as a test, to reveal you to yourself, because what is inside only comes out when someone treads on your toes. God may embarrass you to teach you, but never to break you, and so your character is built. Even Jesus was not offended at Judas, and God took the betrayal and placed it in His plan of salvation.

   Illustration: In a bank queue a woman in front of him called an elderly lady with a walking stick "a sweet old lady". His thought was that you only find out how sweet someone is when you tramp on their toe. He also recalls a pastor he served under who would deliberately "burn the fire under their feet" to see what came out of people.

   “God never embarrasses you to break you. He always does that to make you.”

   • Song of Solomon 2:15
   • Matthew 26:20-25
   • Matthew 27:3-5

4. Keep on walking: your Goliath is designed to make you great

   Love your enemies and leave vengeance to God instead of erupting like a volcano. Whether people pat you on the shoulder or backbite you, keep walking, because the crowd that cheered on Palm Sunday also cried "Crucify Him". When you get offended you camp, and when God moves you are left behind. It is hard, but you can do it, and the attack meant to destroy you is what brings out the potential God packed inside you. He tells his own story from the workplace to show that God could not promote him until his heart was right, and adds that living the life is harder than preaching, and that we need to be quiet long enough to hear God.

   Illustration: Before the church, in secular employment, a man one rank above him despised him and made things difficult, and he wanted to hit him. While making coffee in the kitchen he sensed the Lord say, "Why don't you make him a cup of coffee and take it to him too?" He did. Within two months there was a restructuring, he applied for that man's post, jumped two ranks and became his boss.

   “When you get offended, you camp. When you camp, God moves.”

   • Romans 12:19-20
   • Matthew 21:9
   • Matthew 27:20-23
   • Exodus 13:21-22
   • Philippians 4:13
   • 1 John 4:4
   • 1 Corinthians 10:13
   • 1 Samuel 18:7
   • 1 Samuel 17:40
   • John 13:35

5. 2. The answer to all offence, whether directed toward God or man, is patience

   Some people sit in church, tithe and call themselves Christians while holding resentment towards God over a miracle that has not come. The answer is patience: learn to wait and never give up. Have your cry behind a closed door, then come out and tell the devil the fight is not over. Be loyal and faithful, the same under pressure as under blessing, in church and tithing whether you have money or not. When people gossip about you, forgive them before you have even heard the story, release them to the Lord and let God fight your battles.

   Illustration: He admits he loves mafia movies, and the one thing the mafia demands is loyalty. If the world's system can understand loyalty, the church must be loyal to the Lord in winter as well as in good times. He contrasts this with the member who begs for prayer for a business breakthrough and then becomes too busy to come to church.

   “For every setback that you'll experience, God's prepared a comeback for you.”

   • Proverbs 28:20

6. 3. Offence is a sabotaging force

   If you are easily offended, nothing in life will work out in your favour, because Satan's job is to steal the word you have received by tempting you to question God and walk in doubt. John the Baptist had called Jesus the Lamb of God, baptised Him and heard the Father's voice, yet from prison he sent to ask whether He was the one. Jesus answered with the miracles and added, "Blessed is he who takes no offense at me." He submits that John walked out of his destiny through offence, and warns that many believers will do the same.

   Illustration: He imagines Elizabeth and Mary sitting together, telling each other how great their sons would be: one the Messiah and one the forerunner.

   “John the Baptist missed his destiny because he got offended.”

   • Matthew 11:2-6
   • John 1:29
   • John 1:19-27
   • Matthew 3:11
   • Matthew 3:16-17
   • Luke 1:36-44
   • Matthew 3:3-4
   • John 3:30
   • Revelation 19:16