An offended friend is harder to win back than a fortified city.
Arguments separate friends like a gate locked with bars.—Proverbs 18:19 (NLT)
Heavenly Father,
May my heart always seek after Your heart—my spirit yield only to Your Holy Spirit—so that the words that I speak and the things that I do, won’t give cause for others to be offended with me.
Help me to be especially
careful not to offend my friends and loved ones—for I know that those offenses
bring the most difficult of separations and that those broken relationships can be
harder to win back than a fortified city.
Still, in those
situations, help me to realize that even a fortified city can be won back, if I
listen to You and submit my will to Your plan.
Help me to be wise enough not
to needlessly argue with others over matters that don’t matter at all—in the
light of eternity—and stand up against only that which I cannot compromise
without offending You.
Knowing that offense will
come—despite my best intentions—make me humble enough be the first to offer my
heart-felt apology when someone is offended with me—in hopes that the wall of
division might be torn down before it has a chance to become a permanent barrier
to our intended relationship.
May my heart always seek after Your heart—my spirit yield only to Your Holy Spirit—so that the words that I speak and the things that I do, won’t give cause for others to be offended with me.
In the name of Jesus,
Amen.
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