Download the transcript as a Word file to receive access to the full outline and complete sermon.

• Illustration: May tells a story of a man who attempted to bomb an IRS office in revenge for not paying him 14 dollars.
• When you become consumed with revenge, the particulars of the offense lose significance.
• The desire for revenge can destroy you if you let it.

• Refusing revenge is pleasing to God.
-1 Peter 2:19
It helps you identify with Christ.
-1 Peter 2:21
It helps you become good.
-1 Peter 3:14
-1 Peter 4:1

• Refusing to get revenge doesn’t mean that you refuse to hold others accountable for their actions—it means simply that refuse to retaliate.
• Illustration: To illustrate how easily retaliation exceeds the original offense, May tells a story of working in a fast food restaurant where a man when to extraordinary measures to hassle a restaurant over 25 cents worth of French fries.
• If you’re in a situation where you’re being mistreated, you have the right to do what you can to put an end to the mistreatment, and (if possible) you have a right to hold the other person accountable for their actions, but you don’t have the right to strike back.
• Do not retaliate.
-1 Peter 2:23
-Matthew 5:38
Do not talk trash.
-1 Peter 2:23
Put yourself in God’s hands
-1 Peter 2:23
-Isaiah 42:4
-Romans 12:19
Do something kind for the one who has hurt you.
-Romans 12:20

• I’ll tell you how I do it. I say three words to myself: I AM FORGIVEN.
• 1 Peter 2:24-25
• The more you dwell on your forgiveness, the easier it will be to express forgiveness to others—whether they ask for it or not.

• Illustration: May tells a story from Chuck Colson about a powerful moment when the mother of a murdered daughter forgave and embraced the man who murdered her child.
• Jesus can understand your pain, because he experienced the pain of mistreatment also.
• Big Idea: If you refuse to allow yourself to become consumed with the idea of revenge, if instead you become consumed with forgiveness, you will experience the grace of God in your life in a powerful way.