Free From Offense: Finding Peace Through God’s Love

Psalms 119:165

¹⁶⁵ Great peace have those who love your law,

and nothing can make them stumble.

(NIV)

We get offended when we have thoughts linger in our minds of how someone thinks or feels about us or something important to us. These intense emotions can push us to do and say things we only regret later. To journey through life without being offended will save us from the self-sabotaging behavior that can ruin relationships, put us in bad financial situations, destroy business deals, and split churches. In our passage this week, we see how loving God’s law gives us peace to keep us from stumbling, but the word ‘stumble’ comes from a root word meaning ‘offended.’ Great peace protects us from ourselves by keeping us from being offended.

When we follow the laws of God, He teaches us how to respond in love to all people at all times. We don’t simply love when others are treating us well, but we continue in the loving behavior of patience and kindness, not being easily angered, even when they are mistreating us. This is not easy, but when we are able to move further in that direction, we see His love with greater clarity. 

It’s difficult to grasp the depth of love that would move someone to give up their life for another. But when we refuse to reciprocate insult for insult with people but instead, we offer grace, we get a glimpse of our Lord who died for us even in our rebellion to Him. Loving others truly is loving them when they don’t deserve it, but none of us have lived so righteously that we deserve or have earned the love God has lavished on us. When we love those whose behavior does not merit grace, we put ourselves into the shoes of Christ who loved us the most when we deserved it the least. 

The greater knowledge of God’s love we have, the less weight we will give to those who treat us as if we have no value. We will no longer be offended by what they say because what they are saying is so clearly untrue. If God, who knows every thought and every sin of every person, loves us as He does, then anyone who treats us as if we have no value is just wrong. They do not know us nearly as well as our Lord. So, what He says is the truth, and what they say is not. 

The more we frame their insults as untrue, eclipsed by God’s estimation of us, our reasons to be offended fade away. Instead of offense, we have compassion because they are offended and remain a slave to what others think about them. When we are not offended, we keep loving as Christ loved us, even when we refused to return HIs love. As we love them as Christ loved us, we might help them to break free from being easily offended, just as we have been set free from offense.

Prayer: Teach me to follow Your laws, see Your love, love as You love me, and be set free from offense. Amen.