Unoffendable: How Just One Change Can Make All of Life Better

by Brant Hansen

Problem: I now think he’s right. Not only can we choose to be unoffendable; we should choose that. We should forfeit our right to be offended. That means forfeiting our right to hold on to anger. When we do this, we’ll be making a sacrifice that’s very pleasing to God. It strikes at our very pride. It forces us not only to think about humility, but to actually be humble.

Forfeiting our right to anger makes us deny ourselves, and makes us others-centered. When we start living this way, it changes everything.

God is “allowed” anger, yes. And other things, too, that we’re not, like, say—for starters—vengeance. That’s His, and it makes sense, too, that we’re not allowed vengeance. Here’s one reason why: We stand as guilty as whoever is the target of our anger. But God? He doesn’t. For that matter, God is allowed to judge too. You’re not. We can trust Him with judgment, because He is very different from us.

He is perfect. We can trust Him with anger. His character allows this. Ours doesn’t. God loves you and thinks you’re special, but no . . . you’re not God.

We won’t often admit this, but we like being angry. We don’t like what caused the anger, to be sure; we just like thinking we’ve “got” something on someone. So-and-so did something wrong, sometimes horribly wrong, and anger offers us a sense of moral superiority.

I tend to side with me. My arguments are amazingly convincing to me. But inconveniently, there’s this proverb that says, “You may believe you are doing right, but the LORD will judge your reasons” (Prov. 16:2 NCV).

Anger is a feeling, after all, and it sweeps over us and tells us we’re being denied something we should have.

It provides its own justification. But an emotion is just an emotion. It’s not critical thinking. Anger doesn’t pause. We have to stop, and we have to question it.

We humans are experts at casting ourselves as victims and rewriting narratives that put us i...

Grace isn’t for the deserving. Forgiving means surrendering your claim to resentment and letting go of anger.

Anger is extraordinarily easy. It’s our default setting. Love is very difficult.

Love is a m...

“The anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God” (James 1:20 ESV).

Seek justice; love mercy. You don’t have to be angry to do that.

Anger does not enhance judgment.

Choosing not to take offense is not about simply ignoring wrongs. If someone, say, cuts in front of you in line, you can address the situation. You don’t have to simply accept it. But you can act without contempt, anger, and bitterness.

We want to think people are worse than us. It’s one of our favorite pastimes.

An experiment: Go to a mall food court, grab a chicken kabob or something, sit down, and listen to the conversations around you. Compare how often people are telling stories about hurtful, wrong things other people did, versus confessing hurtful, wrong things they, themselves, have done.

“That” guy is always wrong, because he’s always that guy. I’m always this guy.

What’s more, for those who still want to make anger a nutritious part of their spiritual breakfasts: in the Bible’s “wisdom literature,” anger is always—not sometimes, always—associated with foolishness, not wisdom.

anger may visit us, but when it finds a residence, it’s “in the lap of fools” (Eccl. 7:9). Let that sink in. When anger lives, that’s where it lives: in the lap of a fool. Thinking we’re entitled to keep anger in our laps—whether toward the sin of a political figure, a news network, your dumb neighbor, your lying spouse, your deceased father, whomever—is perfectly natural, and perfectly foolish. Make no mistake. Foolishness destroys.

Being offended is a tiring business. Letting things go...

I go into situations thinking, I’m not going to be offended. No matter what. I can let stuff go, because it’s not all about me. Simply reminding myself to refuse to take offense is a big part of the battle.

Truth is—and you already know this—most of the time, whatever it was that we were taking personally, it really didn’t have to do with us. Some people are rude, or selfish, or whatever, and we were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. It happens. We can take it personally if we want . . . but why?

Instead of changing our beliefs to match reality, we often just rearrange reality, in our heads, to match what we want.

So let’s have the guts—and the humility—to believe what the Bible says about us, and what the research shows us. We simply can’t trust ourselves in our judgments of others. We don’t know what they’re really thinking, or their background, or what really motivated whatever they did. And since we don’t know, let’s choose ahead of time: we’re just not going to get offended by people. If I don’t need to be right, I don’t have to reshape reality to fit “The Story of My Rightness.”

That makes life much easier, and makes us much more peaceful, and even fun to be around. Oh yes, the heart is deceptive. And that calls for humility above all else, because my heart isn’t deceptive because it fools other people. It’s deceptive because it fools me.

Your life will become less stressful when you give up your right to anger and offense. And by the way, if you don’t, you’re doomed. So there’s that too.

Forgive in the big things and the small things. Don’t take offense.

It’s not that I think that potentially offensive behavior is “right” or “good.” Not even close. It’s just that it’s not about me. I’m not going to be threatened or scandalized by someone else’s immoral behavior. So

I’m not entitled to anger, because I’m me. I can’t handle anger. I don’t have the strength of character to do it. Only God does. We can trust Him with it. Jesus gets angry, but His character is beyond question, so He is entitled.

We all think that we deserve to carry anger, but it will destroy us unless we let it go. We have to deny ourselves, die to ourselves, and surrender ourselves. Whatever it takes.

John simply refused to be offended. He was free to love Bill just the way he was.

Yes, God sees things we don’t. We can risk loving people—incredibly difficult, insulting people—because He loves us. That person you find so offensive? Somehow, God sees something there. Something you don’t. Ask Him what it is. Maybe He’ll show you. I bet He wants to.

Perhaps a big part of being less offendable is seeing the human heart for what it is: Untrustworthy. Unfaithful. Prone to selfishness. Got it. Now we don’t have to be shocked.

War is not exceptional; peace is. Worry is not exceptional; trust is. Decay is not exceptional; restoration is. Anger is not exceptional; gratitude is. Selfishness is not exceptional; sacrifice is. Defensiveness is not exceptional; love is. And judgmentalism is not exceptional . . . But grace is. Recognize

Someone cuts you off on your commute? Just expect it. No big deal. Let it drop, and then be thankful for the person, that exceptional person, who lets you merge.

See the human heart for what it is, adjust expectations, and be ...

Grace has no borders. Love breaks through, and—just as Jesus said of the church—the gates of hell will not prevail against it.

When we recognize our unsurprising fallenness and keep our eyes joyfully open for the glorious exceptions, we’re much less offendable. Why? Because that’s the thing about gratitude and anger: they can’t coexist. It’s one or the other.

One drains the very life from you. The other fills your life with wonder. Choose wisely.

When He says to get rid of anger, to serve others, and to die to ourselves, it’s in our best interests to obey. He knows how we can thrive.

We have nothing to prove, and when we really believe that, we’ll hardly be quick to anger.

When we do get angry, we’ll rid ourselves of the anger more easily. Remember: Anger and rest are always at odds. You can’t have both at once.

God wants us to drop our arms. No more defensiveness. No more taking things personally. He’ll handle it. Really. Trust Him. Rest. Quit thinking it’s up to you to police people, and that God needs you to “take a stand.” God “needs” nothing.

Quit trying to parent the whole world. Quit offering advice when exactly zero people asked for it. Quit being shocked when people don’t share your morality. Quit serving as judge and jury, in your own mind, of that person who just cut you off in traffic. Quit thinking you need to “discern” what others’ motives are. And quit rehearsing in your mind what that other person did to you. It’s all so exhausting.

I’ve tried appraising people, determining their value based on how they treat me. I’ve tried holding on to anger, harboring resentment, and doing the necessary mental gymnastics to justify myself, even if only in the court of my own opinion.

I’ve tried evaluating everything everyone else says, sifting through it to find if there’s some way I’ve been slighted.

I’ve tried resisting God’s clear command to forgive as He has forgiven me, and I’ve gone to the great effort to explain—again, if only to myself—how whatever I’ve done really isn’t...

It’s really hard. It’s really time-consuming. It’s really a drain mentally, spiritua...