If you shrug off an insult and refuse to take offense, you demonstrate discretion indeed. But the fool has a short fuse and will immediately let you know when he’s offended. Proverbs 12:16
Prayer Is The Best Choice
From person with a human condition to person with a human condition, it is so easy to get offended, to take up an offense and create a rift in your family life, exchanging unity for strife. To keep from having an “offended” family life we must be the people who refuse to take up the offense the enemy is offering, humble ourselves like Jesus did and shrug off the insult, the ill timed words, the false accusations, and give them to God, pray and ask God to work it out. Spending more time in prayer and less time in careless thought, talk, and in the retaliation of emotional punishment. Prayer is the better choice.
Reckless words are like the thrusts of a sword, cutting remarks meant to stab and to hurt. But the words of the wise soothe and heal. Proverbs 12:18
No “Flesh Outs” Allowed
In our family life, we need to not react or flesh out, but take our emotions to God first. When there is confusion in the strife, as hurled accusations that don’t make rational sense, slow down, don’t speed to an offense. Get God’s revelation first before you say anything. God is always at work in our hearts. Is He using this hurt, this offense to grow godly character in you? Have you been falsely accused and you can’t make rational sense out of a family situation founded upon condemnation that has no truth in the reality of who you are and who you have been? Who said that? God or the enemy of your soul? God uses all things, especially offenses that hurt us emotionally, He uses them to grow godly character in us so He can use us in the lives of other families who are growing through similar things. Wait before your react. Talk to God and respond godly. God has the real revelation behind the offense.
2 Peter 1: 5-8 So devote yourselves to lavishly supplementing your faith with goodness, and to goodness add understanding, and to understanding add the strength of self-control, and to self-control add patient endurance, and to patient endurance add godliness, and to godliness add mercy toward your brothers and sisters, and to mercy toward others add unending love. Since these virtues are already planted deep within, and you possess them in abundant supply, they will keep you from being inactive or fruitless in your pursuit of knowing Jesus Christ more intimately.
“Whom God Will Use Greatly God Will Wound Deeply.” A.W.Tozer
For [the Servant of God] grew up before Him like a tender plant, and like a root out of dry ground; He has no form or comeliness [royal, kingly pomp], that we should look at Him, and no beauty that we should desire Him. 3 He was despised and rejected and forsaken by men, a Man of sorrows and pains, and acquainted with grief and sickness; and like One from Whom men hide their faces He was despised, and we did not appreciate His worth or have any esteem for Him. 4 Surely He has borne our griefs (sicknesses, weaknesses, and distresses) and carried our sorrows and pains [of punishment], yet we [ignorantly] considered Him stricken, smitten, and afflicted by God [as if with leprosy]. [Matt. 8:17.] 5 But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our guilt and iniquities; the chastisement [needful to obtain] peace and well-being for us was upon Him, and with the stripes [that wounded] Him we are healed and made whole. Isaiah 53
Guard Your Heart
Our human condition is stirred up easily by casual family conversations that should never be had where things are said when family members are tired. Out of exhausted people, impulsive backbiting happens, where words are said that engage negative emotions. We need to guard our hearts, for out of them flow the issues of our life. (Proverbs 4:20-23) It is better not to react to someone else’s assumption, speculation, or incorrect perspectives that they have drawn out of irrational reasoning. Go to God, and get His perspective, His response, and pray for Him to speak the reality of truth, to change all minds concerned, change them up to truth. Assumption, Speculation, Perspective is not truth. Don’t react to these, respond to God. Walk It Out With God First Before You Talk It Out With Others. Listen Up To This 1 Minute Encouragement Video For This Specific Wisdom:
Reckless words are like the thrusts of a sword, cutting remarks meant to stab and to hurt. But the words of the wise soothe and heal. Truthful words will stand the test of time, but one day every lie will be seen for what it is. Proverbs 12:18-19
Our Soul Enemy Sets Up Our Upsets
Emotions get stirred up so much by the enemy of our soul, who is so good at disrupting our peace. I have had emotional weeks, with multiple things going on in my life at once that were stirring up sad and negative emotions. Have you been there and had that kind of a day or a week? It is not fun! Emotions can be so exhausting. I am so grateful that even though our emotions make us tired, they don’t tire God out, or make God tired of us. We can share with God what we are feeling. He understands, as He has grown through and experienced every human emotion. Jesus was hurt and through that wounding God used it to bring us eternal life. “Whom God Will Use Greatly, He Will Hurt Deeply.” A.W.Tozer
Emotions Rise Out Of Hurt
Offenses arise out of hurt, God allows hurt in our lives, and will use the pain of it for His good purpose. Don’t hold that painful emotion in, it will turn into a bitter root of contention. Share your emotions with God. God is not afraid of our emotions, and always has a heart wide open to us. God is a safe place to dump out our emotions. Tara Leigh Cobble said this: “God is not afraid of our emotions. God can be trusted to do what is right, even when our feelings are wrong. God can handle receiving the honest outpouring of our emotions, even the ones that don’t honor him or align with His plan.”
Abundant life is discovered by walking in righteousness, but holding on to your anger leads to death. Proverbs 12:28
Don’t Be Bitter Be BETTER
God listens to us and doesn’t judge our emotions, but embraces them as if they were His own and helps us sift them out until truth rises above emotion. This is a safe atmosphere, in God’s Presence, sharing our hearts. This makes us a much better, not bitter, but better family member. God chooses us and He stays consistent in our lives even if that means coming into a soul wild with chaotic emotions. God proves to us that He is faithful and trustworthy and that we are a keeper, by loving us unconditionally. God works with us through all the fleshing out of our human condition and He helps us, growing us through from emotion to the steadfastness of truth. Refuse to be bitter family member and choose to be a better family member. Listen Up to this 1 Minute Encouragement Video and pray it up for your family.
In every relationship be swift to choose peace over competition, and run swiftly toward holiness, for those who are not holy will not see the Lord. 15Watch over each other to make sure that no one misses the revelation of God’s grace. And make sure no one lives with a root of bitterness sprouting within them which will only cause trouble and poison the hearts of many. Romans 12:14-15
Our Safe Place
In our relationships with people, God is our safe place of unconditional love. When I dumped my emotions out on God, walking it out and talking it up, God treated me kind of like he did Elijah (1 Kings 17:2-16), very practically. Get some food, get some soul rest, and take some time with Me. So I did. I went to my favorite place, the beach, and brought some food with me and I walked out my emotions on the beach. It was such a beautiful evening with God. I dumped out everything that I was feeling, and He took it and changed up the atmosphere in my soul to Shalom: disrupted chaos with His peace.
From Hurt To Healing
Change happens within families and it shakes life up, but God is faithful to listen and direct our emotions to truth, flip-flopping them from negative to positive, from lie to truth, from incivility to civility, and from hurt to healing. We have so much to be grateful for as we continue to be God’s Because He finishes what He starts in us. Having God at the center of our family is the best choice we could ever make, and another good choice is taking things to God first before we react to offense, and speak out of emotional hurt. We human beings have this really bad habit of devaluing one another. Do what it takes, change it up to be a family who adds value to each other, pray it up that this would be so in your family. Listen Up To This 1 Minute Encouragement Video
Walk It Out With God
When I can’t wrap my mind around something it stirs up my emotions like no other. I know that if I walk it out and talk it up with Jesus, I will end up being okay and won’t dump out my emotions on some poor human being! This is really good wisdom for the dynamics of family relationships. God can defeat the enemy by thwarting the scheme of the enemy that is in play. As I walk it out in prayer, I put on the armor of God and position myself underneath the rulership of God, and this always ends well for me, but not so well for the enemy of my soul. Walk It Out – Talk It Up! Finish Well In Your Family Life!
Dig Deeper
The weapons of the war we’re fighting are not of this world but are powered by God and effective at tearing down the strongholds erected against His truth. We are demolishing arguments and ideas, every high-and-mighty philosophy that pits itself against the knowledge of the one true God. We are taking prisoners of every thought, every emotion, and subduing them into obedience to the Anointed One. 2 Corinthians 10:4-5 The Voice
Welcome to the Bridegroom’s Cafe and God bless you and your family. We hope the Spiritual Meal on the Family Life Table has nourished your soul. Please let us know how we can pray for your family in the comment section and also let us know how these Family Prayer Posts are helping your family. Thanks for the feedback. Make sure you subscribe to our Rumble Channel https://rumble.com/c/c-278341 where all of our 1 Minute Encouragement Videos are posted. We gratefully appreciate that. God bless you, MUCH, KimberlyMac, Author