There is a reason so many people have left church or church hop. Fifty percent of them will reason they left because of Church hurt. The Church transgressed them. And I'm not going to dismiss Church hurt. As I often say, the Church is not a safe place. Everyone who attends will get Church hurt. It is, by nature, part of the fall and recovery. Everyone in the Church should know they are there because they need a Lord and Savior to heal them of sin and its long-term consequences.

What I don't hear often is people reasoning they left the Church because they got offended at God. It is easier to blame the messengers than the message. Church hurt is real, but so is taking offense at God for delivering truth. And more people leave the Church through offense at God than Church hurt, but who wants to acknowledge that we have fallen short of the glory of God and don't want to hear it anymore?

Some may say God has never offended me, and I'm still in Church. I'm glad you are in Church, but I don't think you have lived a life for Christ without taking offense a time or two. It is part of the nature of God to confront sin and the heart and wake us out of our slumber.

God chastises those he loves. If you have never been chastised, you may not be a legitimate son or daughter of God. The greatest sin is pride in that we don't want to submit to a higher authority. We want to decide what is evil and what is good.

But before we continue into what offended by God is. Let's take a quick look at real Church hurt.

Who hasn't been hurt by a religious person? A pharisee? Or an overzealous Christian who thinks they are Holy Spirit junior and are called to overthrow change tables, dividing sheep from the goats and the tares from the wheat.

Is Church worth attending in 2024? In the 2020 separation, natural and spiritual, one-third or more decided the Church was no longer worth attending. I agree with a few that they weren't attending a worthwhile one. We are getting more and more churches that aren't worth getting up early Sunday morning to participate in a worship service that is more entertainment and not true worship that is in spirit and truth. Then we move on to a Ted Talk, an influencer, or a life coach that teaches us how to succeed in this life but not how to hear, well done, good and faithful servant at the end of our journey.

I have wondered over the past year if my Church is worth attending. I often do self-analysis, so don't get concerned if you attend the same Church as me. There is always room for improvement, and we live in a world where it is easy to go off course, so we always need a compass to repoint our true north in Christ. A GPS that recalculates when we take a wrong turn.

We are protestants. We have been since we attended our first church service, young or old. Some I know have come from Catholic or Orthodoxy. But we are protestants, and it shows. I studied with a group of Antioch Orthodox brethren for a year. It was interesting to see where we agree and disagree. One of the questions that was asked of me was when were protestants going to stop protesting. If you have never thought of it, that is how we got our name. The Great Reformation protested the workings of the Catholic Church.

This is my Son in whom I am well pleased. It was with the affirmation and approval from God the Father to His Son Jesus before he started His earthly ministry. We often hear this scripture as an encouragement that God approves of us and is pleased with us before and without doing anything to merit that approval. But is that true? Does God approve of us and love us just as we are because he is?

It sounds good, but not exactly. God is love and loves us unconditionally without a response from us, either good or evil. God does not love us based on performance. We do that. But does God approve of us before we rightly respond to Him? Should we view God's approval of Jesus before his earthly ministry as approving of us without a proper response?

God does not approve of us for the good works we can deliver. We can't deliver good work without him anyway. Without God's love, we can only mimic good, but we will come out sounding like a clanging symbol in eternity. Without Christ, we can-do no-good thing. There is no one good but God. But because God gave his Son Jesus, we are saved for good works. So then, does God approve of us before we do anything?

We need inspired scripture to tell us what pleased God about Jesus before Jesus ever entered ministry. Jesus pleased the Father before entering a life of good works. But how? Was it because God was just that good?

Hebrews 11:6 reads that without faith, it is impossible to please God. Our works don't necessarily please God, as we find out with Israel in the wilderness, who did work but did not add faith. Jesus pleased God before the work of the ministry through faith that God is good and that God is a rewarder to those who believe that he is.