The Artisan Post

We can hardly make it through a day without coming across another person or group crying out they’ve been offended.

“I’m offended!”

“We’re offended!”

Everyone’s offended.

Laws are changing. Bylaws get imposed. Safety circles are implemented. All to allow people to waffle, unoffended, in their own self imposed ideologies, to project their own little moralities — with no one to challenge them. To find fellow egg-shell walkers who will simply stroke their backs with shallow affirmations…. “It’s ok. It’s ok. You be you.” As if love and care just blindly affirm every whimsical drifting feeling of our ever-so-wandering hearts.

And we start taking on the looks of zombies shifting about in our own little worlds, cowering in carelessness under the banner of ‘love, inclusion, and acceptance’, all so as not to offend.

And the latest drivel… we need to cut prayer and God out of Remembrance Day services. You see, it might offend those who don’t believe in God or have any affection for this country (despite its less than perfect history). A new command is in: “Thou shalt not speak of a heavenly Father.” Acceptance and inclusion are for all except for God Almighty and any who believe in Him.

This is ridiculous! Absolutely nonsensical. And disconnected from our past, our deep and long past. It’s a cultural shift that will kill us.

Now I probably sound offensive.

Good. Because real love and concern for people shakes things up in our lives. And I am concerned for our country and its people — of all backgrounds and history.

Besides, if you have any sense of self-worth or self-confidence in your life and your decisions, you should be able to withstand differing points of view and engage with and live alongside others who think differently.

But this whole excessive, almost incessant, push that everything needs to bow to the lowest common denominator of ‘non-offending’ or all inclusive… this will kill us, and squelch freedom.

To be offended can be a good thing and is often needed in our lives.

A constant hiding behind, “I’m offended, I’m offended” is a cover for, “Don’t speak into my life. I know what I am doing. Leave me alone.” And frankly, that’s foolishness and arrogance. A path towards isolation and self destruction. As if I can go through life with no one correcting me, no one guiding me, and no one speaking words of wisdom into my life. And ultimate wisdom, would that not come from God, our heavenly Father, the very One we want to eliminate from life? The One who has spoken into our lives a word of warning and correction, but also the One who speaks a word of forgiveness, hope, and reconciliation through Jesus Christ His Son?

Oh how we hate correction, rebuke, and a pointing out of our waywardness and sins.

We understand some things are offensive. Rudeness, abuse, perversion, mutilation, murder, reckless violence, all generally fall under accepted offensive activity.

Why? Because we have an innate sense of justice and a moral compass within us. Placed there not by chance but by our heavenly Father. We all have a sense of the spiritual. Deny it all you want, but it will haunt you, because it is in you. You can’t get rid of it.

Now other things in life, like lifestyle, work ethic, values, worship, who and what we worship, (And we all worship something — just think, what you give most of your attention to, therein you will find your worship and character formation.) respect, dignity, worldview, they are harder things to align on. They need guidance from above, from outside of ourselves. From, you guessed it…. God. The heavenly Father who cares enough to speak into our lives. He spoke through His Word, His Son, His Spirit, and still engages with us through all those.

But no, no, no. We can’t have God in the picture. Because that would change everything. We wouldn’t be able to do as we please. God and His instruction, His Word for us, the gospel might offend! And guess what, it does. It tells us we are miserable reckless sinners in need of saving. Don’t agree with me? Take a look at the world we live in. Strife, brokenness, division, a striving after ideologies in pursuit of utopia. A world where so many are offended so easily and will go to great lengths to prove their point… to eliminate any differing view, even to the point of killing and warfare. Jesus said that murder has its root in anger. Do we not observe so many angry people out there?

So if you are offended, calm down. Maybe the other has your best interest in mind. Does God our heavenly Father offend you too? Maybe He has your best interest in mind.

Might I suggest that when you’re feeling offended, ask yourself two things:

1) Does this person, group, or even God, care enough or even love me enough to speak into my life? Am I open to listen, especially to correction?

Love speaks. Love acts. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices in the truth.

2) Where might I be wrong in my thinking or feelings?

Maybe someone else’s perspective will reveal I have some blind spots.

Right and wrong need a moral compass, a moral measuring stick. This has been set up by God in His Word. Not only is He our heavenly Father, but He is also Creator God, who created all things very good and is redeeming a world gone astray in rebellion. In His Son Jesus Christ true forgiveness and reconciliation with God, and each other, and creation can be achieved beginning here and now already.

This would defuse so much “offendedness”. Rather than multiple shifting views on what is right and wrong, and what subsequently offends, and the litany of new laws and regulations, there could be a sought after well-being and purpose for each other under God’s direction. Unity rather than division.

Remember our ultimate offense… we offend God by our sin. Remember too, the ultimate sacrifice made for us, that Jesus died for our sins, in our place, giving us a new freedom in Christ to live for Him. And understanding the depth of that would bring a man or woman to the point that they would in turn want to die for God and their free country. Because a nation that acknowledges God, will be blessed, and experience true freedom, even through the struggles of this life. Free nations are places where we can worship freely, but that seems to be under a global attack.

And what we see all around us, in Canada and abroad, is a long disastrous trail of attempts at eliminating God from every public sphere. And this Remembrance Day attempt is another nail in the coffin of the “I’m offended” cultural catch-all that’s killing us.

We best speak out now and attend to our country’s heartbeat. It seems to be fading.

Saying nothing acquiesces our slow death. Saying something just may revive.

You do care. And so do I. Will you join me in speaking out?

“O Lord, no one but you can help the powerless against the mighty! Help us, O Lord our God, for we trust in you alone. It is in your name that we have come against this vast horde. O Lord, you are our God; do not let mere men prevail against you!”

2 Chronicles 14:11