Inside Out: A 40 Day Journey to Transforming Your Heartنموونە

Overly-Sensitive Heart --> Grace-Filled Heart

Some of us may be more sensitive to what people say and do around us. We may get easily offended and take things personally that we shouldn't. Someone makes a joke about our mother, and we're swinging at them to defend her name. People offend us knowingly and unknowingly. Even if people are intentionally trying to push our buttons, we choose how to respond. An overly sensitive heart tends to react impulsively rather than respond in a Godly manner. If our hearts remain overly sensitive, we will isolate ourselves from further pain or fight back with equally offensive words. Both responses will destroy relationships. We will be a ticking time bomb ready to fight about anything or a fragile individual who could break from a reckless comment.  Both reactions lead to people not wanting to engage with us in deep conversations due to fear of how we might respond. We become unsafe people. People's words should not have this much power over us and how we respond. 

It helps to remember that everyone is a sinner around us, including ourselves. We have offended others. We have been rude. We have been disrespectful. We have been judgmental. When we remember that we are not righteous either, we can take less offense to what others say to us in the heat of the moment. Ecclesiastes 7:20-22 says, "Surely there is not a righteous man on earth who does good and never sins. Do not take to heart all the things that people say, lest you hear your servant cursing you. Your heart knows that many times you have cursed others."

Maybe our hearts aren't overly sensitive to others but, instead, are overly critical.  People can quickly irritate us, and we act in frustration toward them. This is called vexation.  Ecclesiastes 11:10 tells us that we create inner turmoil when we don't remove vexation from our hearts. "Remove vexation from your heart, and put away pain from your body, or youth and the dawn of life are vanity." Sometimes, what we negatively think about others comes out in our speech toward them. Ephesians 4:29 command us to, "Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear." We must intentionally give grace with our words even if someone is not providing grace with theirs. Grace is giving someone something they may not deserve.  We are to give grace to the person who offends us and the person who annoys us. 

How can we find the ability to be grace-filled people? We begin by going to the grace-filled throne in prayer. It is there we will grasp our need for God's grace in such a way we will be able to give grace freely to others. Hebrews 4:16 says, "Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need." God gives us His grace so that we can give our grace to others.  

This is one of the most explicit ways we can live out the gospel to others. The gospel is about God offering us His grace so that we can be reconciled to Him and have a relationship. When we offer our grace to others, they experience God's grace in action. The Apostle Paul urges us to do this in 2 Corinthians 8:7. "But as you excel in everything—in faith, in speech, in knowledge, in all earnestness, and in our love for you—see that you excel in this act of grace also." Paul knew that when we excel in offering grace to others, we are acting counter-culturally than how the world behaves.  This is one of our greatest testimonies that God changes our hearts. 

We can give grace to those who hurt and offend us because we don't expect that they can heal the hurt they have caused. Only God can heal us from the offenses of others. 1 Peter 5:10 says, "And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you." It is God who restores us when we are offended. God will strengthen us to brush it off and move forward with others by extending grace. This grace-filled heart will not only change us from the inside out but significantly impact the lives around us! 

Take a Moment:

• How has being overly sensitive affected you and those around you? 

• What is the benefit of choosing to excel at giving grace instead of staying critical of others? 

Prayer:

Heavenly Father, I enter Your throne room of grace, asking You to give me the strength to give grace to those who have offended me or annoyed me. Remind me of the grace You have given me that I do not deserve. Remind me that giving grace to others will enable me to live out the gospel and see lives change. Please restore relationships where I have been overly sensitive or critical. Help me admit where I have wronged others and ask for their forgiveness. Amen.