Unoffendable: How Just One Change Can Make All of Life Better (updated with two new chapters)

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.

Honest question: Why do we decide to read the Bible that way when it comes to this issue?

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.

Of course my anger is righteous. It’s righteous because, clearly, I’m right and they’re wrong. My ways seem pure to me. Always.

That’s the whole point: The thing that you think makes your anger “righteous” is the very thing you are called to forgive. Grace isn’t for the deserving. Forgiving means surrendering your claim to resentment and letting go of anger.

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

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.

get angry toward murderers, and then here comes Jesus, telling me if I’ve ever hated someone—and I have—I am the murderer’s moral equal.

“That” guy is always wrong, because he’s always that guy. I’m always this guy. In other words: Everybody’s an idiot but me. I’m awesome. Go, me.

Sounds reasonable. Sure. Absolutely. But merely “reasonable” isn’t what we’re going for here. We want to follow the gospel, wherever it takes us.

God knows others’ private motives. We don’t. God knows our private motives. We don’t.

We think we can judge others’ motives. We’re wrong.

Dan Kahan, a Yale law professor, led a study that found that our passions and biases undermine even basic reasoning. The study showed that people who are normally very adept at math are suddenly unable to solve a problem when the obvious answer conflicts with their political beliefs.

(This applied to both liberals and conservatives, by the way.) Instead of changing our beliefs to match reality, we often just rearrange reality, in our heads, to match what we want.

but he’ll push you to change, because he sees a different you ahead.

Look, you have free will, and you can be perpetually shocked and offended. But be honest: Isn’t it kind of exhausting?

This is not cynicism; this is living with realistic expectations—the very same understanding of our nature that Jesus has.

Yes, the world is broken. But don’t be offended by it. Instead, thank God that He’s intervened in it, and He’s going to restore it.

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.

Turns out, when you have time to do what, culturally speaking, is “nothing” (like walking the baby around, chatting with neighbors, letting the kids play together), neighbors get to know one another.

We have to actively choose a way to live, because otherwise, we’ll simply get swept along: hurried, stressed, status-driven, easily angered, and opting for madcap busyness without even knowing why.

God wants us to drop our arms. No more defensiveness. No more taking things personally. He’ll handle it. Really.

We struggle with trusting God to mete out justice. We’re afraid He won’t mete out justice, that people won’t get what they deserve. So perhaps our entitlement to anger is our little way of making sure some measure of “justice” is served.

We are too good at deceiving ourselves to know if we have “righteous anger” or not. Maybe this is why there is no such allowance in Scripture. Even so, we can fool ourselves into thinking we’re innocent, or justified, or victimized.

I also thought it was my job to single-handedly “win souls for Christ,” and when these souls saw my impressive purity and how I abstained from worldly things, like cigarettes, they’d say something like, “Wow! I want to be like you. Tell me about this ‘Jesus’ who claimed to be the Jewish Messiah, the fulfillment of all prophecy, the hinge in the history of the universe, and who has inspired you to wear this Smoking Stinks T-shirt.” Just for the record: to date, exactly zero people have said that.

Perhaps I’m wrong on this, but I doubt people will love God more because of my list of moral accomplishments. They’re more likely to be annoyed.

And the good news, too, isn’t that God is disinterested in what we do, that He doesn’t care how we behave, or what we do to ourselves or others. It’s good news that He does care about those things.

I don’t pretend the differences aren’t there; I just appreciate that God has a different timetable with everyone.

Let’s dispense with one idea at the very start of this chapter: that anger and action are synonymous. Often, we confuse the two, thinking that if we’re not angry about an unjust situation, we’re simply accepting it. That’s completely false.

Let’s face it: we’re positively in love with “taking stands” that cost us absolutely nothing. We even get to be fashionable in the process.

“But if we don’t get angry, we won’t do anything.” Really? Why? So you can’t just do the right thing, because it’s the right thing?

simply saying that “good might come of it” does not make the “it” a righteous thing.

Think about it: in order for us to justify our right to anger, we have to confuse ourselves with God.

But Timothy Keller tells us that worrying is, ultimately, simple arrogance: Naturally, if you love people, you’re going to worry about them. But do you know where constant worry comes from? It’s rooted in an arrogance that assumes, I know the way my life has to go, and God’s not getting it right. Real humility means to relax. Real humility means to laugh at yourself. Real humility means to be self-critical.3

I’m not “winning” or “losing,” because I’m not even playing that game anymore. I’m off the board.

Rules are wonderful. As I said in chapter 2, I’m a rules guy. Rules bring wisdom into our lives. They help us live better. They spare us from pain. But rules don’t change anyone’s heart, ever. Grace does.

I went to an aquarium once at a major metropolitan zoo that had all sorts of helpful

signs. They all had a similar theme: all animal species, everywhere, are in jeopardy, and it’s mankind’s fault. I just wanted to see stripey fish that glowed and stuff.

Anyway, I stopped in front of one display and reread the sign. Did it really just say that? Yep, it said: “The fish in this display are all native to the South Pacific Ocean. We have removed the predators, so you can observe the fish relating in peace as they do in nature.” Okay. Think about that. Yeah, I guess if you take out all predators, all the fish live in peace, just like in the ocean . . . where there are predators. Nope. Makes no sense whatsoever. It’s boring too. And certainly not “natural.” The world isn’t safe like that. We can play pretend and try to set up an aquarium-type existence, devoid of interaction with anything or anyone who might challenge or upset us, but that’s not the world Jesus came to save. He entered the violent one, the brutal one.

We humans can’t save ourselves, but we want to be our own saviors. And many of us would rather go down on our own terms than be humble. It’s that simple, and it’s that tragic.

Real humility isn’t about putting yourself down or pretending your performance is substandard at everything you try. Real humility lies in self-forgetfulness.

I can’t help but think, as much as we humans value our visionaries, that God loves the way the humble ant operates.

It doesn’t mean we don’t need leaders; of course we do. But we need humble ones, leaders who don’t need a spotlight, don’t need approval, and don’t need attention. “Ant” leaders who prod us on and serve us in order to help free us to do what God puts in front of us.

Jesus really is a genius. The way of life he’s giving us isn’t just refreshing and freeing, it’s just plain healthy. Research shows us consistently that chronic anger can lead to high blood pressure, headaches, serious digestion problems, heart issues, and even skin disorders.