Altar My Right To Be Offended

Hello, and welcome to the Salt Church Podcast. Thank you for tuning in to this week's message. Join us as we explore God's Word providing practical teaching for day-to-day living. The message you are about to hear was recorded live at our Sunday morning worship experience. If you would like to learn more about Salt Church, please visit us at saltchurch.

org. We hope that you are encouraged by today's message. Well, we are sacrificing our rights on the altar, altar ego. This is based on a book by Craig Rochelle I read many years ago, and it was something that I wanted to do a series on because I thought it was very significant to look at who we are. So, most of you know, as we talked about each week, the altar is anything.

It's symbolically physical altars or a symbolic altar where we lay down or sacrifice something before the altar to become all that God wants us to be. Moving something out of the way so that we can become or grow closer to Christ. And our ego is how we think about ourselves, who we are, our view of things. And that could be a high ego. Some of us have high egos, right?

We think a lot about ourselves, but others of us maybe think a little bit low about ourselves. And what we're doing is because our egos are kind of all over the place and insecure and they have all these things going on, we've got to take some things and lay them down before the altar. So, I've dug up a few things and got a few ideas together of some of those things that we probably deal with as people in our lives. And in first week, we talked about the feeling of inadequacy, an inadequacy that we often feel inadequate or we're not able. We have a low self-esteem about ourselves and we don't think we're capable of doing certain things.

And we put that on the altar because God has created us as unique, special people and he's given us everything that we need. And the next week, we talked about approval, the approval of others. That was last week. We talked about how we often try to please other people and we conduct our lives in such a way so that everybody will like us, right? Instead of looking at what how God sees us and we and we so we're sacrificing some of those things on the author and putting that down.

OK, I sacrifice how people or what people see how people see me, what people think of me so that I can be all that God wants me to be. Now, I posted a little a little something on Facebook a couple of beginning of the week, probably. And I got a response on there and it was really cool because it kind of segued into the message today. And and somebody quoted, man, I love this this this message in so many ways from last week because I tend to be a people pleaser. But I think people take it to the other level, too.

And they they think, well, I can be a jerk to other people or I can be offensive to other people or I'm or I'm offended myself. So I write people off because I don't care what people think. So they take it the wrong direction. Well, today we're going to talk about that. We're going to talk about our right to be offended, our right to be offended.

We're going to lay that down on the author. How many of you have been offended? OK. We all have been offended at some point in our life in one way or another. And all these little offended.

Let me ask you, why are you offended? You know, why do we get offended? What causes us to be offended? Why are we walking around all the time offended? I feel like in this culture we deal with more offense than ever before.

Every time you hear something, every time we we notice something, every time something comes across our table, we we take it in certain ways and we are offended. And I deal with offense as well. And and in fact, one of the things that I have worked on is my one of the biggest things probably for me is restaurant service. Restaurant service. I feel like when I walk into a restaurant, I should be served well.

Right. Because I worked hard for my money and me and my wife take a date night to a place and we sit down, we want to be served. And I get terribly offended when the server doesn't show up, doesn't deliver my food in time. Right. And they put too much of this on it or too little of this on it or it's overcooked.

That bothers me. And they don't fill up my drink in time. In fact, when I'm through with my drink and I put it down, I want it to be refilled right away because I am offended if you do not do that. Right. Fast food restaurants, I look, you know, going into a McDonald's or something like that.

When you walk up, this just really offends me that I walk up to the counter and they look at me and don't even say hello. How are you doing? You know, can I help you today? They just kind of look over and just watch you and stare at you. And I'm staring back.

I'm like, so you're going to take my order? Are you busy? You know, I get offended. It's my right, you know, to be offended about that, because how dare they? I walk in there just the other day I was at cookout.

I love cookout, man. If you haven't been to cookout, you know, five dollars and 50 something cents, I guess, 30 something cents for a whole meal. You know, you get the burger, you get two sides, you even get a drink and then a dollar more, you get a milkshake. Shake. Wow.

I mean, where can you get that anywhere else? Man, there ain't no, there's no place. Thank goodness for North Carolina, you know, where it was born and bred. You know, we know how, you know, I'm a North Carolinian, so I'm going to throw that out there. We're just a step down from Texans, you know, Eli.

You know, we're proud of our state, too. We just not not quite as proud. And we're working on our egos as well, you know, when it comes to that. But I was at I was at cookout the other day and you know how they have those two drive throughs. They have one over here and one over there.

And I swing on the outside one and I sit there and I'm waiting for him to ask me for my order. And and I'm and I'm not getting an answer and I'm not getting an answer. And I wait there and I'm like, you know what? I'm going to give them the benefit of that. I'm going to wait here for a few minutes.

I waited for five minutes, five minutes. Finally, I was I was perturbed. I was upset. So I come pulling around the corner and I drive up to the window and I look in the window. Nobody's even there.

They're like all doing their thing. I'm knocking on the window. Hey, come over here. You know, I've been there for five minutes waiting at the drive through. And nobody has as even knows.

Hey, if that thing's broke, you need to put a sign up there or something, because I was there all that time and you have wasted my time. I've got stuff to do. Yada, yada, blah, blah. And the girl just looks at me like, oh, um, I just got in work. I'm like, what?

She's an actually this computer doesn't work. And she started giving excuses. And I'm like, what? OK, fine. I'm coming back and talking to your manager later.

Whoa. That took off. I was mad. I was offended. I probably exaggerated the story just a little bit.

But at any rate, I was offended because it was my right to be offended. How dare she say, you work there, right? You should be serving me. I'm going to. I'm a customer.

Our right to be offended. And all of you can stand out there and polish your halos and all you want and talk about how bad I am and how wrong I am. But but you are there, too. You are there. Offense.

We are all offended in some way. And we live in a world of offense. And and today we want to deal with that. I mean, here's here's just some examples. Maybe maybe someone is short toned.

My wife says that about me sometimes, like sometimes I'm very direct and I say things and I don't mean, I don't intend to say them a certain way, but I can say things and maybe it can offend you or offend her. In fact, she herself has a tone of disagreement. A friend of ours told her that. She says, Brenda has a tone of disagreement. You can hold all kinds of tones, you know?

And maybe somebody has done that to you and you felt offended or maybe you weren't invited to an event or a gathering that you thought you should have been invited to. Some friends had gotten together or whatever and you weren't invited. Or someone was slow to respond to your phone call or your text. Can I hear anybody out there? Polishing your halos, right?

You've been there. You've been there. You know, you got that phone call. You call them. They didn't respond to me today.

What is their problem? Do they even care? Or maybe somebody cut you off in traffic, God forbid, right? That's a big one. And then you got your Salt Church stick.

On the car. And you're riding by, you know? We are offended. Or if somebody doesn't respond with a thank you when you give them a gift or do something for them or you don't hear anything from them, we are terribly offended. How about politics?

Oh my goodness. Like, because of our different views, I mean, I don't even like to look at social media a lot of times because these, like, people will post things and then people will post something and we're not friends anymore. And they're unfriending each other. And it's just terrible the offense that takes place, even on politics and ideology. Or maybe you're one of those people who's like, I don't like the way she dresses.

I don't like it. And church people are the worst. You know, they say, she's supposed to, how dare she dress like that? I'm not coming back to church. I'm not coming to church here.

Pastor, you need to say something about that. You need to go and talk to them about that. Sister Sue. Sister Sue comes up to you and tells you these things, you know? There's always a Sister Sue.

Do we have Sister Sue here? Who's our Sister Sue? Not here at Salt Church. But church people, you know, they can be the worst. I can't believe that pastor, he uses the message paraphrase.

Oh my goodness, how unbiblical is he, you know? Oh, you go to that church, you know? I had a friend, I had a fast-growing church in North Carolina. And as you're growing and as you're doing things, people are getting saved, you know, people talk, right? Because they wonder what's going on.

And around the community, they're talking around the community. You're like, man, that church over there, I don't know about that church. They have recliners in that place, you know? They have recliners and drinks, and they're sitting back. And somebody in the community heard that and says, that church has recliners?

I'm going to that church, you know? So they show up that day, and not only do they not find recliners, they do find something else, and they found Jesus that day. So, man, if some people talk about us as a recliner church and people want to come, bring them in, right? Amen? Amen.

Let them talk. We often are offended. We are often offended even as Christians, as believers. Why do we allow small offenses to affect us in such big ways? Why do we do that?

Because our egos are desperately wanting to win. Because we're so insecure. We think so much about, if I'm going to be right, somebody else has to be wrong. If somebody is going to, if I'm going to win, somebody else has to lose. And we head in that direction of a right, and our wrongs, and we know what's best, and we know how it's supposed to be, and our egos are swollen, and we need to sacrifice.

In fact, this happens all the time with people. I mean, they get offended, and then they get around other people who are offended about the same things, you know? And they get together as groups, and sometimes they might even call themselves small groups, you know? Like, they get together, and we talk about what we are offended about, and we live on it. It's like a crack, you know?

Like, oh, I've got to have it. I've got to have it. I've got to be offended. I've got to get more of that. Let's talk it out.

Let's just elevate this offense that I have in my heart. And we eat it up because we are all about us. Our egos are all about us, and it's a miserable way to live. Proverbs 19, 11 says this. This is a great scripture if you want to use this.

A man's wisdom gives him patience, right? It is to his glory to overlook an offense. It is to his glory to overlook an offense. Because we live in a world today that's quick to judge, that's quick to call wrong, quick to offend, but slow to overlook an offense. We're slow to overlook an offense.

And I've got to ask myself, why am I going to allow something so small, something so petty, some small offense in my life to keep me from the bigger picture, from the bigger things that God has for me? I'm not going to allow some offense to come into my life and keep me from the things that God intends for me to do, the purpose that God has on my life, the plan that God has for me, the bigger things. If I allow offense to pull me back, I cannot accomplish. And that's a strategy from Satan. And you need to know that today when you deal with offense in your life.

Paul says it like this. He dealt with it, I'm sure, on many occasions. Romans 12.3 says, For by the grace given me, I say to every one of you, do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you. According to the measure of faith that God has given you.

Was Paul extended grace? Yes. Paul was a murderer of Christians. Paul was not a good person before he met Christ on the road to Damascus. Did Christians extend grace to Paul when he found Christ?

Yes. They brought him in. They discipled him. They coached him. They were with him.

They walked with him through a number of years and brought him into the ministry. They extended grace. Let me ask you this. Did you receive grace? Did you receive grace?

Should we extend grace to others? Do we extend grace to others? Do we extend grace to others? Put your ego... See, here's what we need to understand.

Being sober. It says being sober. Using sober judgment. What do we know about being sober in our culture? It means we're not under the influence, right?

We're not under the influence of, say, alcohol or what have you, so that we can have clear minds. Well, let me say, do not be under the influence of offense. Because when we are under the influence of offense, we are not able to think clearly about hope. We are not thinking clearly about grace. We are not thinking clearly about others.

We should be extending the same grace that God has extended to us. We need to live out what God has done in our lives and in our hearts with others by sacrificing offense. Let me just share three things. Let me just share three things with you really quick here. Because of Christ's grace to me, number one, I'll give others the benefit of the doubt.

I'll give others the benefit of the doubt. You need to write this down. We judge others by their actions. I'll give others the benefit of the doubt. I'll give others the benefit of the doubt.

I'll give others the benefit of the doubt. But we judge ourselves by our intentions, right? We judge others by their actions. We look at them, I can't believe she's wearing a dress, right? I can't believe she's acting like that.

I can't believe he's acting like that. I can't believe he's foolish and arrogant. I can't believe he's... We look at their actions and we judge them based on that, but when we're under the microscope, what do we do? We give ourselves the benefit of the doubt because my intention wasn't that, right?

We don't give other people that leverage, but we give ourselves that leverage. I intended to do it this way, so give me the benefit of the doubt, right? But we don't give others that same benefit. Ephesians 4 says it like this, Always be humble and gentle and be patient with each other. Can we be patient with each other just for a second?

Can we just be patient with each other? I mean, just that one phrase alone is what I really want to tell you to the church today, right? Be patient with each other. We are a bunch of messed up people, right? We got issues all over the place.

We need grace. We have to have grace. And when we're offended, don't be offended. Pull back and practice being humble and gentle. Being patient.

Humble, gentle, being patient. Making allowance for each other's faults because of your love. Because you never know what somebody's going through. You never know. And the longer I minister and the longer I pastor, the more I realize that.

Because I've made some mistakes in the past where I've called people out, where I looked at their actions, and I identified them and I labeled them based on what they were doing without ever considering what they might be going through. And when we consider what they're going through and we really look at their situation, it might change our hearts and how we respond to them. They might be having a really bad day. Maybe they received a bad report, you know, on their health. We don't know.

There was one day we had a good friend of mine here, even in the church. We were having some issues with him showing up on time or not telling us when he's not going to be here. And he was a very significant role in the church. And he was out for probably three or four weeks doing some stuff. And then there was just a lot of, you know, some leadership things that we were trying to work out, you know, how to do this better.

And one day I just got, I just approached him and maybe I had that tone that I was talking about earlier. I said, I said, man, you can't do that. You're a leader. You've got things going. You know, people are depending on you.

You've got second tier, you've got third tier people. Everybody's expecting you here. And when you're not here, you cannot. But and he was trying to explain to me and I wouldn't listen to him because I was already fed up because I was offended that he wouldn't do what he was supposed to be doing in the in our ministry. And what I what I learned later on is that he was going through a tremendous time himself and he couldn't think he couldn't process things well.

He was not clearly communicating to me for this reason. And that was my main frustration. He wasn't communicating to me. It wasn't that he needed to be out or whatever. He just wasn't communicating to me.

But there was reasons behind that. He had just gone through a terrible battle with his family out of state. A lot of things were going on. They fell out out of way of each other. And there was just a lot of tension going on.

He was really dealing with some depression and some things like that. And I had no clue what he was going to through because I never considered what was going on. You got to give people the benefit of the doubt because it really isn't about us. It's not always about us. If somebody is in a bad mood and treats you wrong, it's really it's not always about us.

If somebody cuts you off in traffic, maybe they're just late for work and they're hurrying and they're going to get fired if they don't get there in time. It's really not always about us. Right. It's not about our offense or whatever. Maybe someone just had a bad day.

It isn't really about you. It's just they're having a bad day. We need to take we need to we need to have thick skin and soft hearts, thick skin and soft hearts, thick skin in that we are able to take offense. We are able to take it right thick skin and soft hearts, but but soft enough to understand that people are going through things and to be humble and gentle and be compassionate. Because the truth is that there are a lot.

If you think of them as wounded people, you have compassion for them when people because people are wounded. When we think of people as wounded, we have compassion. So when you start thinking at that level instead of I can't believe they've done this. I can't believe they they didn't show up on time. I can't believe that they're they're making those decisions.

Sometimes you have to just step back and realize maybe this person is hurting. Maybe this person needs some some spiritual help. Maybe this person needs to be prayed for. Maybe this person needs to be ministered to. We need to have thick skin.

And soft hearts. And secondly, I will not judge others. In fact, I like to say it like this. I will not label others. I will not judge others.

I will not put labels on people based on their actions and what they're doing. And could you imagine if God put labels on us? How that would look? That jerk. He's such a jerk.

She's such a gossip. You know, he's he's such a loser. She's so arrogant. And we but we do that all the time, right? We take and we put labels on people based on how we perceive them, how we see them, what they're going through, their actions.

Their actions may not even we put we put labels on people. We tag them. We characterize people over even just one incident. And we're quick to be offended, right? They did that one thing forever.

I don't ever want to talk to that person again because they did that. They didn't serve me correctly. So I'm never coming back to this restaurant again. I'm never coming back here again. I've written them off all together.

He's such a jerk. I don't want to have anything to do with him anymore. I don't want to ever see him again. I don't want to be a part of I'm going to avoid him when I see him. I'm not going to talk to him at all because I have labeled them as the jerk.

They are the jerk. That's who they are. Luke 6 36 and 37 says it like this. Be merciful just as your father is merciful. Be merciful just as your father is merciful.

Do not judge and you will not be judged. Do not condemn and you will not be condemned. Forgive and you will be forgiven. So you need to be merciful. You need not to judge.

You need not to condemn and you need to forgive forgive those. I like how Jesus even told told as he was teaching about judge not unless you're ready to be judged. Meaning hey, if you're going to judge somebody, that's okay. Go and judge them. Put a label on them.

Do whatever you want to, but you better make sure you have a clean heart. You better make sure those hands are washed well. Because in the same manner that you're judged, you will be judged. Are you ready to make that judgment? Are you ready to put that label on that person?

Good example of that in my own life. When I was in middle school, I had a jerk in my life. I rode the bus. They'd sit behind me. Thump your neck, you know, and just bug you to death.

You know, just jerk guy that was on my bus. All the time. All the time. I avoided them at any cost. Just did not like them.

He did it to a lot of people. He did it to me, especially, because I was his neighbor, and he was just a jerk, and I didn't want to have anything to do with him, and I had already written him. I labeled him as the bully. You know, he's the bully. I don't want to have anything to do with him.

But, you know, middle school and high school went on, and we weren't very close friends, because I always had that label on him. This bully guy that I don't want to have anything to do with. But a few years into college, we reconnected. And what I learned about this guy is that we had known each other for a long time, obviously, but I never really knew him. In fact, we had a lot in common.

And he was a believer, in fact. He had given his life to Jesus, and he had really made some changes in his life. And I had to confess to him, I said, man, I thought you were the biggest jerk, biggest bully, and this and that. You know, that I'd ever seen. But I was wrong about that.

We ended up being best buds. We are. And still this day, we keep up with each other. He sends me texts or sends me things every once in a while. I mean, I'm praying for you today.

I know doing your work is hard work. You're a pastor. And it's just been a great relationship. Man, we got along so well. We were such good friends.

We could do anything together. Always have a good time. Never had any issues. And I would have written that off in a heartbeat. Something that was precious that I really needed in the future if I had labeled him for what I saw him back in middle school.

That jerk on the bus that was sitting behind me. Thumping my ears and thumping my neck. Maybe you've got a neck thumper in your life. Maybe you've got an ear thumper in your life. And you've already labeled them.

It could be the best thing that God has for you. We need to be merciful to people. We need to consider people. We need to look. We need to give them the benefit of the doubt.

And not label people. Because this could be a very limiting factor in your life. Limiting you from the freedom you can experience in God. Because you're concerned about, you know, that person in my life. It's a very freeing thing to know that it's not necessarily that person.

But it might just be me that needs to be freed. It might not be that person that needs to be freed. It might just be me that needs to be freed. So that I can be and become what God wants me to be. And three, I'll forgive as I've been forgiven.

I'll forgive as I've been forgiven. Colossians 3.13 says this, Make allowance for each other's faults and forgive anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you and you must forgive others. Father's, hmm, make allowance for each other's faults.

How many of you are flawed? Okay. If you're perfect, that's fine. I'm not. And I hope that you would offer forgiveness to me.

And forgive anyone who offends you. Forgive anyone. Remember, the Lord forgave you and you must be forgiven. I can forgive the small, you know, here's how we think. Here's how we think.

Pastor, I can forgive the small stuff. I can forgive when somebody cuts me off in traffic. I can forgive when someone who doesn't thank me when I give them a gift or do something special for them and you never hear a response. I can probably forgive that. Or I can forgive somebody for doing something really small.

But how about the person that really hurt me? How about the person that really did something to hurt my loved one? How about the person who lied to me? How about the spouse who betrayed me? How about the best friend that did things and said things to me and really did some awful things in my life that betrayed me and broke my trust and hurt me?

And what about the 1% pastor where it's a serious hurt? It's a serious offense. It's a major offense. Because I'm justified, right? I'm justified because this was a bad thing they did.

I'm deeply wounded. I'm hurt. Well, here's the answer to that. Jesus says this in Matthew 6, 14 and 15. For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.

But if you do not, and this is a hard one to take. And I, you know, every time I read this, it's deep. And I start looking at the offenses in my life. But if you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive you of your sins. So how?

They hurt me. They abused me. Someone did something awful to me. How do we do that? Ephesians 4, 32 says, Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other.

This is the key. Just as in Christ God forgave you. How we forgive just as we have been forgiving. The closer I understand, the closer I walk with Christ, the closer I know his forgiveness, the closer I, the more I tap in to who he is, his nature, his forgiving, holy, righteous, God-fearing nature. But yet, this forgiving Savior, I begin to understand more of what it means to forgive.

But the more you know about God and his forgiveness, the more you are able to forgive. Forgiveness, it kind of transitions from a process. Because sometimes these hurts are deep. These hurts are ingrained in us. And sometimes those things are a process of months and even years.

And I don't want to diminish that. And we don't overlook the process. We don't overlook it. We know it's there. But the closer we walk with Christ, the more we understand who he is, the more we know him, our process becomes real-time forgiveness.

And the easier it is for us to forgive others who offend us. It's easier for us to receive the forgiveness of God when we understand what it is for us to receive the forgiveness of God, to pour that forgiveness back on those who need forgiveness. This example in the Old Testament, how would one lay their sin before the altar? It was usually through an innocent animal, an innocent lamb, a bull, a ram, a sheep. They would lay it before the altar and there would be a blood covenant sacrifice made for the forgiveness of sin, an innocent thing.

And there's this one particular account in Scripture, and many of you know this account. When the Israelites were under the bondage of Egypt, and God was to send a death angel over Egypt to take the firstborn of each family. And God said and made a commandment to put blood on the sides of the post and above the door. And when the blood would fall from the top of the door to the ground, it was symbolic. It was foreshadowing the cross of Jesus.

It was foreshadowing the cross of Jesus. It was foreshadowing the forgiveness that Jesus would give us, who is the pass-over Lamb. To overlook an offense, Proverbs 19.11, to overlook an offense, if you look at the original Hebrew word of that, it is to pass over, to walk over. How beautiful is that, that Jesus Christ walked over us, walked over the offense we had towards us, and tapped into the grace that He wanted to offer us on the cross.

It was a beautiful thing. Jesus is our Passover Lamb, and He set the prisoner free. But the prisoner has to realize they need to be set free. We set free. Because the truth is, hurt people hurt people.

Hurting people hurt people. But forgiving people forgive people. If we are forgiving people, we are capable of forgiving. It sounds impossible, I know, at times. But if we understand the forgiveness of Jesus, you know, I may not know all the pain and all the hurt that you've gone through.

I may not know the wound that's still there that you're dealing with. I may not be able to relate to that, but there is someone who does. His name is Jesus. And He faced it all. He was betrayed.

He was rejected by His best friends. Everyone left Him in ministry. They hid. They went back to their jobs and their occupations. Well, I guess He wasn't the one.

They spat on Him. The very people that He created spat on Him, put Him up on a piece of wood. The lowest of the low was crucified in that way. No Roman citizen would have ever been crucified. Horrific death on a cross.

The emotional pain that Jesus must have felt at that moment. But He says, forgive them. You're doing. Give them, Father, the benefit of the doubt. I'm not going to label them.

I'm going to offer them the same forgiveness that You offer, Father. Because that's who we are. We're forgiveness. That's our very nature. We forgive those who hurt us.

Because the hurting hurt others. The abusers, those who are abused. We become soft-hearted to understand that those who are hurting are going to hurt you. But we are capable of offering forgiveness because we are forgiving people. Because of what Christ did for me, I will do for others.

And the more I know and the more I see, it's easier for me to forgive. The more I know about Jesus, the more I understand about what He went through, the closer I walk with Him, the more liberty I have to become who He has called me to be, that I am not going to be held down any longer by any offense, by any kind of sin. We are liberated from that in the name of Jesus. And we need to be delivered from that. We need deliverance from those things so that we can be a church that God wants us to be, the church that He has called us to be.

I am tired of offense. I am tired of people being offended. There is no reason to be offended when we are in Jesus. There is only reason to be forgiving because of all that He's done. In Jesus' name.

Bow our heads and close our eyes. Maybe there's some of you in here that are dealing with that very thing. You've been offended. You've got some offense in your life and you're struggling. Today, let's lay it on the altar.

Let's lay that ego. We have a right. I have a right to be offended. They did wrong. And I'm right.

Entitlement is not the answer. Give it to Jesus. Let Him heal you. Let Him take it away. If that's you today, if you would just raise your hand.

I just want to pray for you. That's me. Amen. Amen. Hallelujah.

I'm dealing with offense. I'm sensitive. I walk around hurt quite a bit. Amen. I'm just going to pray over you with all heads bowed and all eyes closed.

I just want to lay it. We're going to lay it at the altar. Let's lay it today. Let's put it down. Let's leave it there.

Let's walk away from it. Let's walk over the offenses of the future and leave it there. Lord, we're giving it to you. We're laying it on the altar. This is our sacrifice.

Our right to be offended is no longer there. I lay that down. I may have every right to be offended about this particular thing, but I'm laying it at the altar. I'm not going to allow it to do it. I'm going to have a soft heart, a thick skin, and I'm going to move forward because I know you've got greater things.

I've got bigger fish to fry. I've got bigger things. You've placed so much more in my life, and I'm going to walk in that identity. Lord, no longer the offensive identity, no longer the insecurity that I have. I'm laying it down in the name of Jesus.

Lay them down right now. Lay it down over these people right now. Lay it down, God. Lay it down in the name of Jesus. Hallelujah.

Hallelujah. In that same spirit, if there's anybody here, maybe you've never even given Jesus the opportunity to walk with you. Maybe you don't have a relationship with Jesus. You know of Jesus, but you've never actually made a decision for Jesus to walk with Him. I'm going to tell you, can I say this today?

This could be the greatest decision that you ever make. This could change everything. This could give you the ability to forgive. And if that's you today, and I'm not going to embarrass you, but I want you to be bold and open and just lift your hand up and say, I've got to give my life to Jesus today. I've walked on my own today.

Is that you today? If you want to raise your hand, slip your hand up, because I want to pray specifically for you, and I want to pray with you today. Father, in the name of Jesus, I pray that those who are ready to make that decision today, that they would be all in. And church, let's just pray this together. God, I believe that you sent your son.

Father, I know that you love me. You sent your only son. And Jesus, I know you died on the cross for my sin, that I was so far from you. But today, I give my life to you. Come into my heart.

Cover me. You, the Passover lamb. Cover me. Make me new. Regenerate me.

Change me from the inside out. So that I can be yours. And we ask that in your name. Amen. Can you give God a hand clap of praise?

Hallelujah.