Episode #43 Fast from Bitterness; Feast on Forgiveness

Speaker A: 00:00:03

Welcome to the Hobo Soul Podcast of Road advised from the Bible and from me, Yvon Prehn, someone who's a little further down the road of life.

I'll talk to you every Tuesday and Thursday for about 10 minutes, and if you'd like more in depth information on walking with Jesus, you can find that@my bible805.com website. For now, let's get started on our topic for today, which is

Episode number 43, Fast from Bitterness feast on Forgiveness.

ur verse for today is Hebrews: 12:15

Now this is an interesting exchange, exchanging bitterness for forgiveness.

And I wondered why when I read this that the writer of the poem that we're looking at that recommends various exchan in the Christian life, from something negative to something good, would pair bitterness as the opposite of forgiveness. Bitterness isn't always the first thing that comes to mind when I think about forgiveness.

Maybe forgiving anger or resentment, maybe some action done to us, maybe, I don't know, just various things. But bitterness? I guess I just hadn't really thought about that and so I decided to look at this in more detail.

First of all, I realized I needed to simply define what bitterness is, and here are some definitions from the web that I thought were kind of interesting.

First of all, anger and disappointment at being treated unfairly or resentment or from the free dictionary, difficult or distasteful to accept, admit or bear, proceeding from or exhibiting strong animosity marked by cynicism or resentment.

And then for good measure, I just thought, well, I'll look it up on the online Thesaurus, and here are some of the words that we use in place of bitterness. Trauma, Tragedy, Grief, Misery, Sadness, Sorrow, Anguish, Unhappiness, Resentment, Anger, hostility, indignation, vexation. Oh my goodness.

After reading these definitions and synonyms for bitterness, I think perhaps I've operated out of bitterness more than I thought. And also, I don't want any of these terms to define my life. They are obviously not things that should define a follower of Jesus, a hobo soul may be stumbling through life, but someone who wants to grow to be more like Jesus.

The question follows, then how should I live so that bitterness doesn't creep into my life, and not only into my life, but this verse has an important aspect that we must not ignore, where it reminds us that bitterness defiles many when we're resentful, angry, vexed, no matter what the reason it may be over even a real sadness or injustice or unfair tragedy. But when bitterness is our response to whatever happened, it doesn't only hurt us, but as the verse says, it defiles everyone around us.

It makes everybody around us sort of dirty because of our bad attitude.

Serious results so how should we deal with this? The poem we're looking at talks about forgiveness as being the exchange. But how does this work?

As I thought about it, I realized that of course Jesus in this instance is our teacher, as he is in every area of life. He gives us an example to follow. And in thinking about that, I remember how I've often wondered when, why he went through all he went through on earth. I mean simply living for a time that he did on earth.

In the poverty and trials he endured, he came as an ordinary person, actually a hard working person who didn't have a whole lot of money in a preaching ministry with honestly ornery and unbelieving friends who rarely trusted him, always questioned him, and who would ultimately betray him when he needed him the most. And. And then the horror, not only of the crucifixion, but the unimaginable pain of the scourging and the mocking before it.

I've wondered why, you know, because, it seems like if you read the Old Testament and from all the prophecies of the Old Testament, to satisfy the just demands of God, all He would have had to do is somehow just show up and die. When we talk about the prefiguring of it, of an innocent lamb being slaughtered, it was a very painless death. It was quick, it was easy.

That's all it required. They didn't have to beat up on the lamb or whatever, but he did more than that.

Again, to satisfy the just requirements of God, it seems like all he would have needed to do is simply show up and die.

But the difficulties of that scenario aside, as I thought about it, it seems like he went through all he went through not simply to satisfy the minimal requirements for our redemption, but to show us how to live.

In the book of Hebrews, where our verse about not allowing bitterness to come into our lives, it talks about this as it says in Hebrews 2:18, "Since he himself has gone through suffering and testing, he is able to help us when we're being tested."

And then in Hebrews 4 it goes on to say, "This high priest of ours, Jesus understands our weakness, for he faced all of the same testings we do.

Yet he did not sin. So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God. There we will receive mercy and we will find grace to help us when we need it the most."

Jesus went through the trials and troubles and horrific pain he did to show us how to live.

We can look closely at his life to see how he did this, how again and again he was patient with the weak and unbelieving, how he forgave people again and again for things they said or did against Him.

But the ultimate example of how to live and die without bitterness comes from some of his final words on the cross when he said, " Father, forgive them because they don't know what they're doing."

And here we see the ultimate example of forgiveness as the anecdote to bitterness.

I think Jesus words that they don't know what they're doing are so appropriate here as a help to the temptation of bitterness, because I think much of what causes bitterness between us and another person is often ascribing incorrect motives to them, thinking they intentionally meant to hurt us, that they were doing something because they were intentionally mean or vicious or awful or whatever. And sadly, much of the evil in reality caused by others, either in big or little ways, is often unthinking. They weren't thinking about us.

They didn't know what they were doing. We sin because we're sinners.

When we act without God and when we temporarily don't listen or obey or become tired of living his way, we wreck destruction in our lives and the lives of everyone we touch.

When we realize this, when we name our sins, when we talk about, when we talk honestly to God, that we've strayed from him, from his will and his ways, his forgiveness and cleansing is complete. And we need to continually do that for those around us.

But wait, wait, wait. We might protest, but they didn't repent.

They didn't admit they were wrong. They didn't apologize to me. Yeah, that might be an issue. But look closely back at the cross at the example of Jesus.

Now, this is a bit tricky here, as of course, admitting sin and clearing things up with someone we've wronged is important for the restoration of a relationship. But for forgiveness, I'm not sure that any request or response from those doing evil to to us is a requirement.

The people responsible for the crucifixion of Jesus were those mocking him as he died. He forgave them and he prayed that His Father would forgive them also. They didn't ask for it.

They did nothing to deserve it, and he forgave them anyway. Perhaps if we live with that attitude of undeserved and extravagant forgiveness that we've received.

That way, bitterness won't ever be able to take root in our lives, poisoning us and the people around us. What a wonderful exchange that is. What a free and good way to live.

That's all for this podcast, for transcripts, links to related material, and much more to help you learn to know, trust, apply and teach the Bible. Go to www.bible805.com. For now, let me end with this benediction and prayer.

May you walk each day surrounded by the gracious love of the Father, guided by the gentle wisdom of the Holy Spirit, and conscious of the astoundingly real presence of Jesus, who will walk with you until you're no more a hobo soul, no more a transient wandering heart, but at home in the kingdom prepared for you with your God forever. Amen.