Hi, this is Victoria. Thank you so much for downloading this podcast. I believe God has amazing

things in your future. I hope you enjoy this message.

Good to have you in the House of the Lord today. I want to encourage us all this morning

to keep our heart free from offense. Offense is everywhere. Jesus said, as long as you're here,

offense will come. As long as we live in this world, someone's going to say something that we don't

understand, something that hurts our feelings. Maybe your husband doesn't listen to your opinion.

There's always going to be reasons to take up an offense, an opportunity to take it in. You know,

it's interesting because the people that you're around are one thing. But how about the people

that you've never even met? And you don't know what I mean by that. Everybody's opinion can go public

these days on social media. You begin to read somebody's opinion. You hear what they're railing

against. Kind of blusters you. You think I don't agree with that. Why would they say that?

Then you begin getting all upset. You call your brother. You call your sister. You call your

neighbor. Can you believe that they think that? Isn't that crazy? You say you begin to get frustrated

and upset and spend energy on that offense, on those things that don't really even matter.

You see, it's as if we're taking the bait. See, we cannot take the bait of offense and live in victory,

joy and peace. We got to let it go. We can't let it get on us. We can't swallow the bait. In fact,

in the scripture, the word offense comes from the Greek word that means bait. It was used to

lure animals into a trap. See, the bait or the offense was what got the animals to come on in

and take the bait. And sometimes that's what happens to us with offense. It lures us right into a trap.

We get caught up in this circle of offense, in this trap of offense. We get upset. We get frustrated.

We get bitter because we've swallowed it, hooked, lined and sinker. So we spend our time trying to

figure out what somebody meant, dissecting every word. That's a waste of our time. What in the

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