Taking offence
Proverbs 19:11
“Good sense makes one slow to anger, and it is his glory to overlook an offence.”
How do you deal with life when it fully surprises you and smacks you in the mouth?
I think we find out so much about ourselves when we face difficulty and drama. We discover whether we are calm and at peace under pressure, (having ‘good sense’) or whether we are actually inhabited by fear, offence and feelings of failure. Maybe its the emotions nearest the surface that, all-too-easily, escape?
I don’t believe that anyone wakes up in the morning wanting to be a high maintenance first-class over-reacter! But, occasionally, this is what happens. We find out that we are unable to respond in a way that makes us feel proud, and may be uncertain that we have acted maturely. We become the Drama Queens we despise, regretting our words or our actions and wish we could, to coin a phrase and slightly misquote a Cher song, ” Turn back time.”
The whimsical comedy show ‘Miranda” often uses the character Stevie to sing a refrain from another song, made famous by M People’s Heather Small, to process a situation. The line “What have you done today to make you feel proud?” features in many an episode. ttp:// https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tms-ayMYzb8
Perhaps we might wince at such a question. But its a helpful one.
Many of us can point to an alarming number of situations each day that we DON’T feel proud of. Why might this be?
I have one suggestion.
Years ago, I had the honour of working with a wonderful woman called Rachael Orrell. One of her quietly-spoken definitions of maturity was this:
“How quickly do you feel you take offence?”
In our world of angry, reactionary Tweets and minute- by- minute journalism it can be hard not to “take offence.” We see people spouting ‘offence’ everywhere, do we not?
Part of the Collins Dictionary definition of ‘offence’ is rather interesting. It says:
“If someone takes offence at something you say or do, they feel upset, often unnecessarily, because they think you are being rude to them.”
The two words that jump out to me here are, “often” and ‘unnecessarily.”
Our world is often jumping to the wrong conclusion because we confuse fact and narrative.
We are all often unnecessarily caught up in things that don’t concern us, shouldn’t concern us, or need not be a part of our thinking. We piggyback onto them and feel offended FOR or on behalf of, someone else.
Proverbs 17:9 teaches us this challenge:
“Whoever covers an offence seeks love, but he who repeats a matter separates close friends.”
Ironically, I am aware that what I am about to say may cause offence! But I really think some of us Christians are TOO easily offended. I think we take offence too fast and too deeply. I also think we can (and I am firmly talking to myself with a pointy finger here) hold on to grudges about how people treat us.
I began today with this verse from Proverbs 19:11
“Good sense makes one slow to anger, and it is his glory to overlook an offence.”
It is glorious to God when we overlook an offence. That is NUTS! But oh, so godly.
James 1:19 says, “Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger.”
I find this immensely hard – except when I consider how I want to be treated!
Then I suddenly find I am very keen indeed for this to be adhered to. Anyone else??!