We're starting a new series answering listener questions. Special thanks to those who submitted questions. In today's episode, we talk about how we became Assemblies of God credential holders and what keeps us in the AG. We'll discuss some of the strengths of our movement and the challenges we face moving forward. 

In today's episode, we're wrapping up our conversations through the book A Sharp Compassion. If Jesus was willing to risk offending people, should we seek to offend people like Jesus did? How should we think about hard words and hard conversations? And does Jesus offer us wisdom for knowing when to risk offense? We'll explore how Christians and ministers should think about their own words of offense. 

As we continue our look at the book A Sharp Compassion, we unpack what it really means to follow Jesus. We've talked about how insecurity and imitation of this world draw us into offense, but in our conversation today, we'll discover how by imitating Jesus, we are freed from offense. We hope this conversation helps you focus your own life on following Jesus and being healed from insecurity and offense. 

In our conversation on A Sharp Compassion, we have been looking at what we've called the mechanism of offense, the complex series of emotions and desires that lead from insecurity to offense. In today's episode, we're looking at the final step of that process: accusation. We'll explore how insecurity moves us to accusation and how this spirit of accusation has consumed our modern culture. 

Over the past few episodes, we've been talking about the mechanism of offense. How insecurity creates idols and leads us into imitation. That imitation leaves us more insecure and desperate for affirmation. In today's episode, we're taking a look at why our culture is so desperate for affirmation and the temptation the church faces to offer grace as a cheap form of affirmation. We're continuing our conversation on the book A Sharp Compassion. 

As we continue our look at A Sharp Compassion, we come to the topic of imitation. With our attention fixed on an idol, we are drawn to imitating them. We become like what we worship. But imitation is more pressing than most realize. Wherever there is insecurity, there is a temptation to imitate the things of the world. We take a closer look at how Jesus freed his disciples from the things of the world and offered them a better form of imitation.

As we continue our discussion of the book A Sharp Compassion, we take a closer look at the consequences of our insecurity. Wherever there is an insecurity, there will inevitably be an idol, a hope for some salvation and security. We discuss how we become blind to idols in our hearts and how it often takes a hard word for us to recognize them. 

As we continue our discussion of the book A Sharp Compassion, we turn to the topic of insecurity. There is a deep connection between the feeling of offense and insecurity to which we are often blind. You might not have recognized it, but insecurity is one of the oldest themes in the Bible. In our conversation, we'll describe how insecurity works, how it is connected to offense, and why it's so hard for us to recognize. 

We're continuing our discussion around the topic of offense, based off of Chase's new book, A Sharp Compassion. In today's episode we track the theme of offense through the Old and New Testaments and discuss why the theme is often negelcted in our reading and theology. Through our conversation you'll come to not only better understand the biblical theme but also learn to recognize it in your own reactions. 

In this episode, we have a special conversation about the hard words of Jesus and how we should think about them in a world that is increasingly sensitive to offense. We discuss the idea of offense and how it appears in the Biblical gospels. We hope the conversation helps you better navigate hard conversations in your own life and leadership.