I see you all looking like a bunch of tax collectors. “Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you. For if ye love them that love you, what reward have ye? Do not even the tax collectors do the same?”
So there I have it, proof!! Bunch of tax collectors; because while you live your lives strapped to your seats, belts on waists looking all cute and manly, freckled faces with oink wears dressed up pretty, you forget pretty soon(that is if you even notice) how cunning the devil really is. Let me enlighten you on what you should already be well aware of; see a trap has two characteristics
1. It must be hidden(so you stumble without a notice)
2. It is usually baited (just to lure you with its promise).
But no, you will still bite on it with all pleasure because it is enticing and you don’t know it is a huge trap-doors shut,and you are struggling to break free.

But this trap is not even nice looking and like every baited trap it remains harmless when the bait is left in the trap unless you try to bite it.
“and the servant of the Lord must not strive but be gentle unto all men, apt to teach, patient, that they may recover themselves out of the (SNARE) of the devil who are taken captive by him at his will”
But no, you just put off your candles just because the people you care about hurt you, because actually, more often than not, only them can do.
There are two groups of people that can be offended; those treated unjustly, and well; some others who believe they have been treated unjustly. For the first, it looks like they have the right to get offended, and the second, well the second, give me a second……… NO!!! None of these have the right to be offended, and I say again none of these have the right to be offended. I’m talking to believers, spirit filled, tongues speaking, manifesting spiritual gifts; forgetting that they were gifts given by the Spirit Himself not to make us feel better but for useful service, working round the clock for the Father because time is ticking, faster than a teacher nodding and leaving straight marks of acknowledgment on the script of an intelligent student who has done so well in his examination and I am left to wonder, if after this examination of a chance to anger will we get the same markings from the Father?….. because all I see is how we ask for and unwrap these gifts, putting them together looking for a way to fit in every bits and desiring the next one we see not manifesting in our lives like new materials just so we can get all the designs for the perfect cloak of pride, forgetting that He gave nutrients (gifts) to see fruits, so am sorry Mr. fruitless big tree, your gifts no longer impress me.

I will tell you a little about gold, pure gold is soft and pliable, but impurities makes gold hard and depending on the particular impurity combining with gold, alloys are formed. So all these things that annoy you make you impure, remember that “the heart is hardened through the deceitfulness of sin”. Deceitfulness? You still think this is not a trap?.. no wonder God told the Laodicean church to buy of Him Gold refined in fire; because when gold is heated, impurities float and gold settles, making it pure, so when that fire of anger and wrath or unpleasant situations heat you, you suddenly find out that some things are unpleasantly surfacing and you wonder where they are coming from, well they have been inside all these while, so do not blame the person that made you angry, thank God and submit to the purification, because no matter how much impurity floats in heated Gold, it settles right back in if not scooped off, so please clean your eyes with eye salve so you can see what is really going on.

You know Christ told us in Matthew 24 that many will get offended, feel betrayed, hate, and you wonder why it was followed by false prophets arising to deceive many. You will be misled, you will believe the devil and you will have no discernment when you are covered with a cloud of offense, forget those voices you have been hearing, how many of the solutions you have gotten or thought of has been tried in the light of God’s word or even seemed to set you free? Because that is what anything that comes from my Father would do.
Then their love will wax cold because they cannot love like Christ did, without being loved in return. See He knew what He would gain in the long run, no matter what happens or would happen God will forever have people loving Him, but we want things immediately, we profess His free love but get discouraged to love when we are not loved in return forgetting the promise of the father in Galatians “be not deceived, God is not mocked” so He pays back what is planted, meaning when you sow the love of Christ freely without becoming weary,…. Well you can fill in the blank space.
The Word said that a brother offended is harder to win than a strong city, why not? When you build walls around your heart from a hurtful relationship, then you try to move on with walls, killing relationships at will, not minding how or who would be affected or at least what Christ thought about it, we just walk out finding scriptures to back up our fleshy desires! Now check how many relationships Jesus terminated, and you will suddenly realize who you have been following. I mean He was offended, abandoned at the time of need, died, resurrected, but He ended up sending His Spirit to the same people to help them, can’t you see that these people offending you are just calling out for help, Your room mate, your neighbor, your family members, your friends and even strangers; so when would we stop collecting taxes for the works we are supposed to normally do? Holding onto your rights will not help us, I mean unconditional love gives people the right to hurt you.
I heard of two seas in the holy land, the Sea of Galilee and the Dead Sea. The Sea of Galilee has all sorts of life in it, and then it flows through Jordan to the Dead Sea, now the name says it all. The Dead Sea collects the living waters without giving out so there is no life there and so is a Christian who keeps taking in life without giving it! You bottle up love, forgiveness, mercy and all the life that God freely supplies you and then come back to ask me why things are not working and you are steadily dying. This now creates a new pattern of reasoning through which all information coming to you are filtered; filters of past hurts, rejections, deaths and experiences making it hard for you to believe God. With an atmosphere of deception well set you begin to chase shadows because knowledge without love leads to deception; you get new rhema and new revelations; but Paul referred to them as those who are “ever learning and unable to come to the knowledge of the truth”. I know you have had enough and now you are watching with wisdom, check 1Cor 6:7, we need to start reading and doing the scriptures. Learn from Christ, 1Pet 2;21-23, you will say He was a God right? So what of Joseph, straight to the point, he hugged, kissed and wept on his brothers, does that look like someone who held a grudge? Funny how he was never clouded in sight seeing the redemption of Israel and journey to the promise land even before they started affliction, and a dead man’s bone got to a land even Moses only saw, GOD!!! We need to start letting go!

Then we start sharing blames, funny flimsy excuses, one woman even said ‘if not for my parent’s divorce, my own marriage would have worked out, like seriously?

Now everything is generational, really, the devil has got us where he wants us, can’t you see that just letting go can break all you have once believed all these curses if you allow God’s love in, IT NEVER FAILS!
When will we start responding to situations to show the world that our father already has it figured out, Unless you want to tell me that the sudden situation confusing you is also confusing God. “When He is lifted up, He will draw all men to Himself”. But you lift yourself up in anger and then pray ‘forgive me as I forgive those who sin against me’ taking your eyes off the source and hoping all men gathers unto you, sorry to say No angry man fulfills destiny no matter his level of annointing.

If you have managed the whippings thus far, am almost done, but this one is quite important am bringing it home. We are in the church right? The leadership is bad, they do not know how it is done, the pastor either laughs too much or does not laugh at all, both ways he is not your type. Oh, maybe he does not appreciate the gift of God in you, or they are all just downright annoying, so the next thing YOU LEAVE, I always hear us say we are chasing after God, (more like chasing ourselves from God),
1Cor 12:28 said “He puts members in His body as He wills” so you do not relocate yourself unless He relocates you and Isaiah 55:12 revealed how we should leave and what should follow. Samuel worked under a man who was fast to point out that a praying woman was drunk but could not see the log of fornication in his children but did he run out off to another cafeteria just because the food didn’t taste fine, he stayed there, he fulfilled destiny.
Moreover, the only perfect pastor is Christ, now this is not an excuse for leaders to just step on toes, you are also accountable, but I am going to try and be more encouraging here, all ye runners, keep running, you would eventually outrun Elijah, someday. The ways we always respond to situations and wrongs spontaneously got me thinking, if the Bible was written in our times, the 5th book of the new testament would have been the REACTS of the apostles and then the man at the beautiful gate might have even spoilt our well planned time schedule; always quick to ask God to take the cup away, why not search the Word to get relief, what if God gave the situation to mature, refine and strengthen you, Reasons why only a few are growing spiritually, if you still pick offense, you are still a baby and that is fact.
I know I have said much, and I want you to go with this 1Pet 1:6, like pure Gold, situations shake and remove impurities from us, it is grace. So when you see those habits surface, do not get defensive, allow God, because sincerely; they were just going to destroy you. Now to the Glory of God, we will all drop offenses with hearts free of impurities, because from now on, no one can offend us, we will hold on when going through the furnace of affliction.
If you have not given your life to Christ, please get born again and then read from beginning, because no matter how much you try to follow due process in achieving this on your own, you will still fall short, and you believers, help save this world, drop all offenses stop flipping over everything, God help keep offenses from pushing us off-fences, so we do not realize it too late that we have steadily, by our own hands, with our own decisions caused our own crashing from a height of Grace. “forgive their trespasses as you will want God to forgive yours” God bless you.

-Njoku Uchechi