Offenses Will Come. Take Heed to Yourself.

I had a different message prepared that Sunday. God gave me this one instead, and I want to start where He started with me: offense is coming to you. Not maybe. Coming.

Why does Jesus say offenses will come?

Because they will, and He would rather you were ready than surprised.

Look at Luke 17:1. Jesus tells His disciples it is impossible that offenses will not come. Impossible. He is not softening it and He is not excusing the person who causes it. He is telling you the weather before you walk outside.

So stop being shocked when it happens. Being offended is not evidence that something has gone wrong with your walk. What you do next is the whole test.

How seriously does God take causing offense?

Read the next verse and see what He compares it to.

Luke 17:2 says it would be better for a man to have a millstone hung around his neck and be thrown into the sea than to offend one of these little ones.

Understand the picture. A millstone was the great stone they used to grind grain — you have seen the ones a donkey walks in circles to turn. That is what Jesus reached for. And He did not say a river. He said the sea.

He picked the heaviest object in ordinary life and the deepest water He could name, and He said that is preferable to what you are doing when you offend your brother. It is very, very dangerous to offend one another.

Who am I supposed to watch?

Yourself. That is the part we skip.

After the millstone, Jesus says take heed to yourself. Not take heed to Brother Stacy. Not take heed to Brother Antonio. Yourself. He put the millstone in front of you and then turned the mirror around.

That is uncomfortable, and it is the only instruction in this passage you have full power to obey.

What do I do when someone trespasses against me?

Go to them, and forgive them the moment they turn.

Jesus says if your brother trespasses against you, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him.

Now hear me on that word rebuke, because people get it wrong. It does not mean standing there announcing "I rebuke you in the name of Jesus." Look at the word. It means you talk to him with feeling, so that he comes away actually knowing that what he did was wrong. You are not performing. You are reaching him.

And then the second half, which is where most of us stall: if he repents, forgive him. Quickly and instantly. Not after he has proved himself for a season. Not after you have thought about it. Quickly, and instantly.

Offense is coming this week. You already know who it is likely to come through. The instruction is not to avoid it — you cannot — but to take heed to yourself and to forgive fast when they turn.