Tag Archives: bitterness

SETTLE YOUR DIFFERENCES JESUS’ WAY

Bible Study, , ,

SETTLE YOUR DIFFERENCES JESUS’ WAY

Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ, God forgave you (Eph. 4: 31-32).

No more bar-room brawling!

The words Paul uses are reminiscent of the way that ungodly men typically settle their differences. One can just imagine the scene in a tavern. An argument breaks out between two drunk men. Tempers flare, words fly, peppered with swearing, cursing and oaths. A fist strike out and the fight is on. Chaos! Blood flows and furniture, crockery, and even some of the bystanders take a beating. Nothing has been achieved but more reason to be angry and bitter.

This is not the way to handle conflict, says Paul. Boys fight with fists, girls with words but fighting resolves nothing. However, you are no longer immature children, driven by heat and not guided by light. There will always be differences and conflicts between people as long as we are in this world. Fighting with fists or words achieves nothing but increased hostility, tension and bitterness. The ripples of anger and antagonism spread outwards, encompassing families and even communities.

Jesus has a way of dealing with conflict and all the emotional baggage it brings that is far more effective and final than fists. It’s called ‘forgiveness’. He had a lot to say about forgiveness since forgiveness is the basis of His relationship with us and should always be the way we relate to one another.

Before we talk about forgiveness, let’s take a look at the consequences of harbouring offences and holding on to bitterness.

Bitterness has a root which produces fruit. Moses reminded God’s people, on the eve of his departure, that idolatry was the fruit of a poisonous root.

Make sure that there is no man or woman, clan or tribe among you today whose heart turns away from the Lord our God to go and worship the gods of those nations; make sure that there is no root among you that produces such bitter poison (Deut. 29:18).

The writer of the letter to the Hebrews picked up on this thought.

See to it that no one falls short of the grace of God and that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many (Heb. 12: 15).

What is this ‘bitter root’ of which both these verses speak? Both idolatry and unforgiveness are the expression of self above God. God forbade His people to worship idols because of the terrible effect it would have on them. They chose to ignore His warnings. They put themselves above God and became like the gods they worshipped.

But when they came to Baal Peor, they consecrated themselves to that shameful idol and became as vile as the thing they loved (Hos. 9:10b)

Refusal to forgive is based on the same principle – self above God. God commands us to forgive those who sin against us because we no longer have a reason to hold grudges. Jesus died to deal with the sin of the whole world. His death provides forgiveness for all sin, for all people, for all time. When we refuse to forgive another, we are in effect saying that God is a liar and that He has not forgiven the sin of the one we hold guilty. We think we have the right to punish our offender even though Jesus has already paid his debt. Idolatry! We set ourselves above God just as effectively as those who worshipped idols.

Idolatry, worshipping self above God, is the bitter root that produces the fruit that ‘defiles many’. Selfishness and all the ramifications of self above all, is the root of conflict.

What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you? You desire but do not have, so you kill. You covet but cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask God. When you ask, you do not receive because you ask with the wrong motives that you may spend what you get on your pleasures (James. 4: 1-3).

God gives the grace to forgive when we turn from our selfish passions with the earnest desire to please and obey Him. He enables us to look our offender in the face, literally or figuratively, and say, “You owe me nothing,” because God has forgiven him, and I can, therefore, let the offence go. Once my heart is at peace, I have no need to engage in the attitudes and activities of which Paul speaks.

A forgiving heart no longer harbours anger, rage, bitterness, slander and malice. These are the devil’s ‘weapons of mass destruction’ which forgiveness through the power of the Holy Spirit defuses. God’s love, shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, neutralises the poison of idolatry and shuts down the need for conflict or revenge.

Scripture is taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Have you read my first book, Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing)? You’ll love it!

ISBN: Softcover – 978-1-4828-0512-3, eBook 978-4828-0511-6

Available on www.amazon.com in paperback, e-book or Kindle version, on www.takealot.com  or order directly from the publisher at www.partridgepublishing.com.

My second book, Learning to be a Disciple – The Way of the Master (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing), a companion volume to Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart, has been released in paperback and digital format on www.amazon.com.

Twisted and Bent Over

Christian Life, , , , ,

TWISTED AND BENT OVER

“He was teaching in one of the meeting places on the Sabbath. There was a woman present, so twisted and bent over with arthritis that she couldn’t even look up. She had been afflicted with this for eighteen years. When Jesus saw her He called her over. ‘Woman, you’re free!’ He laid hands on her and suddenly she was standing straight and tall, giving glory to God.” Luke 13:10-13 (The Message).

Luke had a special interest in Jesus’ ministry to women in keeping with his purpose of presenting Jesus as the ‘Son of Man’. Women were disrespected in Hebrew culture, treated as inferior to men, and even as a husband’s ‘possession’ to be retained or disposed of at will. By His compassion and care for women which Luke recorded so tenderly, Jesus gave women the dignity and respect accorded them by their Creator.

Knowing full well that healing on the Sabbath would create a furore among the religious leaders, He persistently ignored their scruples and healed whoever was afflicted whenever He had opportunity. This woman was so twisted in body by her disease that she could not even lift her head to look into His face. Perhaps she was not aware of Jesus but He was aware of her, and with His awareness came His spontaneous response to her plight.

His words to her are also surprising. ‘Woman, you are free!’ not ‘Woman, you are healed!’ Was Jesus aware of a deeper reason for her affliction? Of course, all human imperfections are the result of Adam’s original sin, behind which lay the deceiver’s subtle enticement to disobedience, but in this woman’s case, was there something in her life that directly resulted in her enslavement to the physical condition that held her bound for eighteen years?

It is medically attested that 95% of physical conditions are the outcome of stress which is the body’s response to sustained high levels of adrenaline, the ‘fright, flight, fight’ hormone which prepares our bodies in time of crisis. There is one condition that plays havoc and does untold damage to our physical systems, unforgiveness. Every prolonged emotion that flows from our refusal to let go of a real or perceived offense does damage to us and not to the person against whom we hold our grievances.

Jesus often warned of the consequences of unforgiveness, the most drastic and unthinkable being cut off from the Father’s forgiveness. Is this not one of the main reasons why doctors wrestle with physical problems that defy diagnosis, why hospitals and psychiatric facilities are filled with sick people and why our world is overrun with cruelty and violence? The world is full of angry people who do not realise that forgiving those who have hurt them would set them free.

There is powerful symbolic significance in Luke’s descriptive words of her condition – she was twisted and bent over and could not look up. This is what happens to us inside when we refuse to forgive. We cannot look up and see the face of God when we are twisted and bent over by bitterness and hate. Only the presence and words of Jesus can set us free so that we can stand up and look up.
Jesus changed this woman’s life with a few words. ‘Woman, you are free!’ In them she found forgiveness for her own sin and release from the anger and bitterness with which unforgiveness had poisoned her body and her life. She stood upright and gave glory to God. What a moment!

Is it possible that you can also experience spiritual and physical healing when you become aware of His presence, hear the words of Jesus in your heart, feel His touch and receive the forgiveness which will free you to forgive others? This is the key to your healing.