True story. The other day I was presented with a situation involving a person who I had a real issue with.  This person, instead of praising the work I had put in, decided to criticize me. And I don’t mean constructive criticism, which I embrace, but rather destructive criticism that was very obvious. I had put in time and effort and even arrived early to get this work done but my work was met with remarks that most people would have snapped at. Now granted, in my flesh, I was angry. I wanted to say all types of things to this person that, in my mind, would have been justified and right. It would have made me feel better too.

But instead, I referred to the Kingdom Constitution. I began to think of Ephesians 6:12 that states, “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.” Armed with this truth, and after my initial anger, I silently began to pray for this person. I petitioned God to do battle with whatever spirit or emotion this person was dealing with in their personal life. This negative spirit was coming out of this person in the form of words directed at me. I allowed God’s Word to help me understand what this person’s real issue was. At that point, my issue was no longer with the physical person, but it was with the unseen spiritual form of negativity being manifested in the form of speech from this person.

We have to stop allowing people to be our issue. People will always come up short. They will always, sometimes inadvertently, let you down. People are not perfect. But God is. And His Word teaches us how to deal with people who come against us or cause us to be angry. Anger is indeed a real emotion and sometimes it is valid and warranted. But we cannot use anger to dictate our responses. God’s Word is not based on our emotions. But rather, it helps us understand our emotions and how to handle them in such a fashion that we still remain Kingdom witnesses. People are watching how we handle things. They are looking to see if we respond to things the way the world says or do we embrace the Kingdom way. Let us be diligent in handling our responses to people so that our witness is never compromised and we draw more people into the Kingdom

KINGDOM LIVING