Take Offense

Intro

[Title "Take Offense" is on the screen. You don't read it aloud yet.]

You can be seated, I’ll read my scripture shortly.

You know, we live in a world

where people are offended

by just about everything.

They even get offended on behalf of other people.

Even when if has nothing to do with themselves

and the other people who should be offended

are not even offended.

Somebody looks at you wrong at the grocery store

— offended.

Somebody doesn't text you back fast enough —

offended.

Somebody leaves you off the group chat —

offended.

The pastor preaches a little too long — well,

now we've gone too far.

[pause}

We've become a society of

THE easily wounded.

And church, if we're honest,

we're not always immune to it either.

Somebody sits in our pew.

Somebody doesn't shake our hand.

And before you know it,

we're carrying offense around like it's our job.

So this evening,

I want to talk to you about taking offense.

In fact, that's the title of the message.

as you can see

It's right there on the screen. Take Offense.

Now I know what you're thinking.

"Pastor, that doesn't sound very biblical.

Doesn't the Bible say not to be easily offended?

Doesn't Proverbs say it's our glory to overlook an offense?

Pastor, are you really telling us this morning

to go ahead and take offense?"

Are you really saying that Taking Offense is acceptable behaviour?

[pause]

Yes. Yes, I am.

But not the way you think.

[longer pause — let it land]

See, when you read that title,

your mind went one direction.

You read it as oh-FENSE.

You know, The thing you take

when somebody hurts your feelings.

The thing you nurse.

The grudge you hold onto.

But that's not the word I'm preaching this morning.

It is a word that’s spelled the same

but pronounced slightly differently

The word I'm preaching is OFF-ense.

Take OFF-ense

Like in football or basketball.

Like in chess.

The posture of the team that has the ball.

The mindset of the player who isn't reacting — they're advancing.

Going on the Offense

Taking charge

Planning your own attack

Church, I want to suggest to you this morning

that the reason so many of people are stuck taking oh-FENSE

is because they’ve forgotten

That as a church—

we were called to be on OFF-ense.

And until the people of God recover an offensive mindset,

we're going to keep wandering in circles

around promises that already have our name on them.

Amen…

Let’s open our Bibles to Numbers chapter 13...

A familiar story for most

Moses has just sent 12 spies into the promised land

A land that God already said was theirs

They spent 40 days spying out the land

And they found all kinds of fruit there

And it was a good land

But they saw something else over there

And when they return to give their report

They decided to focus on everything except the good stuff

Let’s pick up in verse 25 as they begin to give their report to moses…

Numbers 13:25–33 ESV

25 At the end of forty days they returned from spying out the land. 26 And they came to Moses and Aaron and to all the congregation of the people of Israel in the wilderness of Paran, at Kadesh. They brought back word to them and to all the congregation, and showed them the fruit of the land. 27 And they told him, “We came to the land to which you sent us. It flows with milk and honey, and this is its fruit. 28 However, the people who dwell in the land are strong, and the cities are fortified and very large. And besides, we saw the descendants of Anak there. 29 The Amalekites dwell in the land of the Negeb. The Hittites, the Jebusites, and the Amorites dwell in the hill country. And the Canaanites dwell by the sea, and along the Jordan.” 30 But Caleb quieted the people before Moses and said, “Let us go up at once and occupy it, for we are well able to overcome it.” 31 Then the men who had gone up with him said, “We are not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we are.” 32 So they brought to the people of Israel a bad report of the land that they had spied out, saying, “The land, through which we have gone to spy it out, is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people that we saw in it are of great height. 33 And there we saw the Nephilim (the sons of Anak, who come from the Nephilim), and we seemed to ourselves like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them.”

Their perspective became their reality

That last verse we read there is so instructive

You see, these men were not just anyone

The bible says that they were the chiefest men from each tribe.

They were not weak by any means

They were the best and the brightest

The bravest and the strongest

And yet, when they saw the enemy

They said…

We seemed to ourselves like grasshoppers

and so we seemed to them.

Notice the order of operations here.

First, they viewed themselves as grasshoppers

and THEN the enemy viewed them the same way.

When you think you are weak

The enemy does too

When you think you can’t make it

The enemy agrees

You perspective shapes reality

You see, the people didn’t have a giant problem

They had a grasshopper problem.

The issue was not the external factors

It was the internal ones.

It was how they viewed themselves

That shaped how the enemy viewed them.

Yes, the giants were real

But grasshopper identity

made the giants bigger

What you believe about yourself

becomes a self-fullfiling prophecy

If you think you are not going to make it

you won’t

If you think the enemy can’t lose

he won’t

If you think the battle is over

it is

If you think you are a grasshopper

Start hopping away now

Because your perception shapes your reality.

You see, the enemy doesn’t need to defeat you

If you do the work for him

If all the devil has to do

is hand you a mirror with a lie on it

and you believe that lie,

Then you’ve already lost

He will tell you any number of lies

You are too broken

You are not enough

You can’t make it

Your brain is broken

Your no able

You are just a grasshopper

And if you agree with him

Get ready to wander around for 40 years without a promise

Because you are already defeated

and you didn’t even need to face the giant

to fall.

You will never rise higher than the identity you accept.

The enemy's greatest victory isn't defeating you —

it's convincing you that you're already defeated.

You see, it wasn’t that the giants were too tall for God

It wasn’t that the walls of those cites were too high

It was that their own identity was too low

You’ve got to remember who you are.

You are a child of God

Greater is he that in you…

No weapon formed…

With God ALL things are possible…

But 10 of the 12 spies let their perception

keep them out of their promise.

Instead of going on the Offense

They let fear keep them on the defense

But, let me point out something here

That too often we forget.

God hasn’t called the church to play defense.

God hasn’t called us to play defense

Years ago, I used to be really into college football

I don’t pay much attention to it nowadays

I rarely have the time.

But when I was really into it

I was always fascinated by teams

That just didn’t seem to have any defense at all

But they still won every game because they could score lightning fast.

Oregon and Boise State were like this for awhile

And even Auburn had a touch of it years ago

We’d here people say

The best defense is a good offense

It doesn’t matter how many yards your defense gives up

If your offense is ahead by 40 points.

I’m a chess player

and recently my kids have been really getting into it

And it has gotten me more excited about it too

And one thing that lower rated players do

it is a common mistake

Is that they play too passively

They are always reacting to the opponent’s attack

And never planning their own attack.

This is basically what these 10 spies were doing

They saw the enemy giants

They saw the enemy walls

And their reaction was the be passive

They said… we cannot go up and possess this land.

IN fact, in the next chapter

They suggest retreating all the way back to Egypt

They would rather go die a slave

Than take a chance at their promise.

In chess, this passive approach loses so many games

A novice player will react to every single attach from the opponnent

If their knight is attacked,

the immediately retreat it

If their bishop is attacked

They immediately defend it.

The novice player never stops to think

what would happen if I attack the opponent

Instead of defending.

If you ever want to advance in the game of chess

You have to learn this principle

and I think that this principle doesn’t just apply in chess

Which is a war strategy game if you didn’t know

It is the oldest board game

over 1500 years old

and it is about a battlefield

And in a real battlefield

The same is true

If you retreat

You’ve already lost

If you are just defending

You can never win

You’ve got to take offense

You’ve got to attack back

An expert chess player knows this

When you attack their knight

They don’t look to retreat it

They don’t think about defending it first

They look for a counter attack of equal or greater value

If you attack my knight

I bet you won’t take it

if I attack your queen

And then all of a sudden

The attacking opponent

has to abandon their attack

and go defend their more valuable piece that is under attack.

Attack my pawn…

I’ll attack your knight

Attack my knight

i’ll attack your rook

Attack my rook

I’ll attack your queen

Attack my queen

I’ll attack your king.

This strategy is the only winning strategy in chess

If you’re only move is to defend or retreat

You’ve lost the game

and you just don’t know it yet.

And while chess is just a game about a battlefield

There’s a real battfield that we all face

And I’m not talking about the ones with bombs and guns either

I’m talking about spiritual warface

And the enemy is on the offense from some of you right now

And maybe you’ve decided to take a defensive approach

And I came to tell someone tonight

That God doesn’t go on the defence

He is always on the offense

Matthew 16:18 ESV

18 And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.

So often we read this verse and think that the gates are attack us

And the gates of hell won’t win in their attack

But gates don’t offend

Gates DEfend

You see, the church is supposed to be on the OFFence

and hell has no defense against a church

that realizes that she isn’t a grasshopper

because when God is on our side

we are more than conquerers!

If God be for me, who can be against me!!

So, just like in chess

When you attack my piece

I’ll attack a more valuable piece of yours.

So, when the devil attacks your finances

Don’t just go into defensive mode

Go on the offence

Give more to the kingdom

When the devil attacks your family

Go try and win another family into a bible study

When the devil attacks your health

Don't just fight to survive —

fight to testify.

Lay hands on somebody else who's sick

and watch God move on both ends.

Start praying for healing for somebody else.

You'll be amazed how often God heals the intercessor

on the way to answering the prayer for someone else.

In chess, when you play a good counter attack

The opponent has to abandon their weaker attack

and go on the defense

If you learn to counter attack your spiritual enemy

He will have to flee his attack

And go play defence

And now, instead of retreating

You’ll be storming the gates of hell

and those gates can’t hold up

to a church that takes offense.

One of my favorite books is by Danny Aber

It’s called “Just Do It”.

Closing

You see, Danny figured out something

that 10 of those 12 spies never figured out.

He figured out that the devil

is counting on you to flinch.

The devil is counting on you to retreat.

The devil is counting on you to look in the mirror

and agree with the lie

that you’re just a grasshopper.

But the moment you decide

that every attack from hell

is going to be answered

with a bigger move for the kingdom—

the devil starts thinking twice

about messing with you.

Church, hear me tonight.

The enemy didn’t come to take your stuff.

just for the sake of taking it…

He came to stop your advance.

He doesn’t care about your bank account

nearly as much as he cares about

keeping you from giving to the kingdom.

He doesn’t care about your family

nearly as much as he cares about

keeping you from winning other families.

He doesn’t care about your health

nearly as much as he cares about

keeping you from laying hands on the sick.

Every attack he launches is just an admission

that you were about to do something

that scared him.

So why are we wandering?

Why are we circling?

Why are we sitting in the wilderness

of oh-FENSE

when God called us to live

on OFF-ense?

Forty years is a long time to walk in circles

around a promise that already has your name on it.

I came to tell somebody tonight—

you’re not a grasshopper.

and You never were.

That was a lie you agreed with

in a moment of fear.

But greater is He that is in you

than he that is in the world.

Altar Call

Let’s all stand

I want every head bowed

and every eye closed tonight.

Some of you came in here

carrying oh-FENSE.

Somebody hurt you.

Somebody overlooked you.

Somebody wounded you.

And you’ve been nursing it

and protecting it

and REhearsing it

until it has cost you forty years of forward motion.

Tonight is the night

you lay it down.

Some of you came in here

seeing yourself as a grasshopper.

You’ve agreed with a lie about yourself

for far too long.

The enemy handed you a mirror

and you believed what he wrote on it.

Tonight is the night you break that mirror

and pick up the Word of God

and find out who you really are.

No ye not that your body is a temple of the Holy Ghost?

And, yet,

some of you came in here under attack.

The devil has been hammering away

at your finances

at your family

at your health

at your peace

or at your faith—

and you’ve been on your heels for far too long.

Tonight is the night

you stop retreating

and start advancing.

Tonight is the night

you stop defending

and start attacking.

Tonight is the night

you take OFFense.

If that’s you tonight—

if you’re ready to lay down the oh-FENSE

and pick up the OFFense—

if you’re ready to stop being a grasshopper

and start being a giant-killer—

if you’re ready to stop circling the promise

and start possessing it—

I want you to slip out of your seat

and make your way to this altar.

Don’t worry about who’s watching.

Don’t worry about what they’ll think.

Caleb and Joshua had to stand up

when everybody else was sitting down too.

And forty years later

they were the only two still standing.

Come on.

The gates of hell are waiting.

And they can’t hold up

against a church that finally decides

to take offense.