UNOFFENDABLE
Everyone’s an Idiot but me
Pages 9-16
Psalm 103:8-12 (NIV) The LORD is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love. He will not always accuse, nor will he harbor his anger forever; he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.
Proverbs 18:17 (NIV) In a lawsuit the first to speak seems right, until someone comes forward and cross-examines.
Ecclesiastes 7:9 (NIV) Do not be quickly provoked in your spirit, for anger resides in the lap of fools.
How would you summarize the message the current culture is teaching about anger? How would you summarize the message the current culture is teaching about forgiveness? What are the most consistent messages our culture communicates when it comes to the value and practice of forgiveness?
If you decided to forgive someone, to let go of the “right” to be angry at that person, and instead offer the same forgiveness to them that you received from God. What would that process look like?
“In the Bible’s ‘wisdom literature,’ anger is always - not sometimes, always - associated with foolishness, not wisdom. The writer recognized that, yes, anger may visit us, but when it finds a residence, it’s ‘in the lap of fools’ (Ecclesiastes 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.” (page 12).
When have you seen or experienced this connection between anger and foolishness?
Foolishness is often portrayed as silly or harmless in today’s world - where have you seen evidence to support the claim that foolishness is ultimately destructive?