To Encourage You

Matthew 5:23-24 “So if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift.”

Are you mad at anyone?  Is there anyone that you have negative thoughts about every time you hear their name?  Is there someone that you just can’t resist talking about in a negative way anytime the opportunity presents itself?  If that’s the case, then according to the words above of Jesus from the Sermon on the Mount, going to church and attempting to worship God is a waste of time. 

In a sermon I heard recently the thought was presented that we are no more like the devil then when we have anger and unforgiveness in our heart towards someone else.  Conversely, we are never more like God than when we love and forgive.  1 Corinthians 13 tells us that love “keeps no record of wrongs.”  To actually think like this and live like this is virtually impossible without Christ, however.  In fact, in many churches where such love should be the rule, there is much discord and strife specifically because this kind of love, God’s love, is not being demonstrated. 

Have you ever considered that when someone offends you that it is nothing more than a test to reveal what is in your own heart?  It’s fairly easy to get along with people that love us, are kind to us, and who are like us.  And if those are the type of people that we spend most of our time with, which is likely, it can become easy to impress ourselves with how wonderfully good-natured, kind and loving we are.  However, when someone trips our trigger, rubs us the wrong way, offends us, whatever you want to call it, then what is deepest within us is revealed.  We find out at those times if we are like those Jesus rebuked who hated those who hated them, or if we are like those who “love (their) enemies, do good to those who hate (them), bless those who curse (them), and pray for those who abuse (them)” (Luke 6:27-28).  I know I’ve missed the mark often on these points and it is necessary for me to search my heart often because I know my own history. 

It’s so interesting that God’s Word tells us to “Count it all joy, . . . when you meet trials of various kinds” (James 1:2) for it is trials, including and perhaps especially, those involving our relationships with others, that reveal the truth to us about ourselves.  True spiritual growth seldom happens without them.