Don’t Let the Offense Write the Ending

Scripture: Romans 12:21 (CEB) — “Don’t be defeated by evil, but defeat evil with good.”

Reflection
One of the quiet lies of unforgiveness is this: What they did gets the final word. The offense becomes the headline, the identity, the center. It shapes the way we see people, trust relationships, and interpret the world. Even when the offender is absent, the injury stays in charge.

Romans 12:21 offers another path. It doesn’t pretend evil isn’t real. It says: don’t let evil win twice—once in what it did to you, and again in what it turns you into. Forgiveness is the refusal to let the harm reproduce itself through your bitterness.

Sometimes “defeat evil with good” looks like prayer. Sometimes it looks like boundaries. Sometimes it looks like choosing not to speak poison even when you have every reason to. Forgiveness is not being passive; it’s choosing a different power.

When you forgive, you’re not rewriting the past. You’re reclaiming the future. You’re declaring, “This wound will not be my master.”

And slowly, grace begins to re-author the story: not because what happened was small, but because God is bigger—and because you’re tired of living under the shadow of what someone did.

Application
Finish this sentence: “I will not let this offense have the last word—God’s last word over me is ______.”

Prayer
Jesus, keep me from being shaped by what hurt me, and shape me by your love instead.

Song“Rise Up” — Andra Day