Bitter or Better

Rarely get it on the back end of uh after I'm speaking, so thank you for that.

Some of you got that joke.

I appreciate it.

If you don't have a sense of humor, you're gonna have to leave right now.

I'm just gonna set that out there.

No.

How's life?

Is it good?

Good, good.

I want to read a verse of scripture.

Uh I'm gonna give a little context to it uh a little later, but let's just look at God's word a second and just kind of set our heart.

It's coming from the book of Hebrews in the New Testament, and I'm gonna jump in.

Uh I'm gonna start at verse 12 and end at verse 15, and today we're gonna look at verse 15.

Uh, but Hebrews chapter 12, starting at verse 12, I'll give you a moment to find that in your Bibles.

Hebrews 12 · chapter mention

I'd give you uh a page number, but I have no idea what page number that's on in your Bible.

Therefore, strengthen the hands that are weak and the knees that are feeble, make straight paths for your feet, so that the limb which is lame may not be put out a joint, but rather be healed.

Pursue peace with all men and the sanctification without which no one will see the Lord.

See to it that no one comes short of the grace of God, that no root of bitterness springing up causes trouble, and by it many be defiled.

Heavenly Father, we just ask now, give us uh uh clarity in our thought, in our mind.

Would would your spirit, would your word work in us and through us?

Would it teach us?

Would it convict us?

Would it empower?

Would it heal us?

Uh would I not get in the way of that today, Lord?

In Jesus' name I pray.

Amen.

So I asked you how your day was, and many of you said, good, that's fantastic.

That's great to hear.

Uh how many of you have a busy life?

Active life, full life?

How many of you have extra time?

Because I have some work in my basement I could use some help in.

No, that's shameless, isn't it?

So let's think of life.

These bags here are going to kind of represent the things that we experience in life.

So I've got a bag here, got some stuff in it.

Say this is my bag of my relationship with my my spouse, my wife.

It's going well.

Maybe sometimes it's not going to go so well.

I guess you could ask her that question as well and maybe get a completely different answer.

Uh but so I carry that relationship, right?

But and then I have a I have a I have a teenage son.

Teenage son.

He's a wonderful boy, with one exception.

He's a lot like me.

So I have him, right?

So now I I've got that relationship.

I've got my my wife relationship.

Maybe you have multiple kids, so maybe you want to throw on a couple backpacks.

Now, oh, one of my favorites, I've got work.

I've got work.

Let's make this my work.

Here's my work.

So I've got lots of projects, I've got supervisors, I've got peers, I've got new employees, I've got supervision.

So I've got my look, this is my wife, this is my son, this is work.

And then let's oh, I've got friends, maybe I've got things in the house, I got some finances I got to carry, I got balls to pay, I've got to think of college ahead.

So I've got that, so I'm carrying that.

You know, it's manageable.

I can do this, right?

Do this, so that's good.

But then I've got one thing, and this this is the biggest bag.

For me, anyway, it may not be for you.

This is me.

This is all of my history, all of the skeletons in my closet, which uh probably have more than all the the graveyards around.

This is my hurts, this is my dreams, my aspirations.

This is uh everything that makes me up.

And here I am.

This is me.

So now I want to ask you again how's your life?

Is this hitting home with anybody?

It's easy, isn't it?

And and you know, there's many different bags we could add to this.

This is just a few.

This is the reason I only have this many, is this the only number of bags I could find in the house?

Now, if I were to continue to preach holding this, which actually would probably be a pretty good illustration, uh, but it would not be good for me.

So I'm gonna be a little selfish, and I'm gonna put these down right now, but we're gonna revisit this.

And I want you to understand and kind of right set because I believe this is normal for us to do as humans, all right?

This is just who we are.

We have a tendency to take on everything.

And we have a tendency to maybe compartmentalize, maybe not.

Maybe try to struff everything into one bag.

The point is, we go through life carrying a lot of this.

And the question is, should we?

And the question is, if we shouldn't, then what would that look like?

So that's where we're headed today.

And specifically in the context of what happens, I believe, scripturally, when we look at the Bible and we look at many, the mosaic of scriptures that address this, we see it really summarized perfectly in this verse of Hebrews 12, 15.

And it will cause bitterness, it will cause anxiety.

And we're gonna look about look at that as we move forward.

So, first, let's jump back into the text, and I want to right set and just give you the backdrop of, you know, so often in preaching, you just you kind of just drop in the middle of a book, right?

And you you and you pull one phrase out or one word out, and sometimes it's like, well, what's the context?

At least I wonder that.

So let's let's just look very quickly.

If you go to the next slide, we're gonna see what's the context of this verse.

One, Hebrews, the book of Hebrews.

Um throughout Christian history, we don't really know who wrote it.

Now, there's a great scholarly work.

We can kind of deduce and think, we believe it's maybe Paul, or maybe it was Barnabas, maybe it was Luke, Clement, but ultimately no one knows but God and the author themselves.

It was written to Jewish believers, which is important to understand that if you were to go back and read, they were really trying to compare and define and lift up the supremacy of Christ and how the Christian faith and belief is the culmination of the Jewish faith and is higher and more supreme than just the limited perspective of the Jewish faith as it was viewed as at that time.

And it was written approximately 64 A.D.

So we're looking at what, 30 years, 30 some plus years after the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

So by that time the church had been formed.

We're starting to see the church grow and expand throughout the region, throughout the uh geographically.

Uh the context of the book, let's look at the first four chapters, deal with that majesty of Christ, then the ministry of Christ, the next six chapters.

Outcome of faith.

What should the outcome of faith be?

Chapters 11 through 13, which our chapter and what the verse we're looking at is right in the middle of that, of actual realized faith.

What does that look like in a person's life?

Chapter 11 of Hebrews is awesome.

That's the heroes of the faith.

That's where it goes through and lists from the heroes of old, kind of right through the Bible.

And it shows us that that example, that great cloud of witnesses.

And then if we move into chapter 12, next slide, we see the first four verses really focus on Christ's example and how we can learn and emulate and reflect what he has done.

Chapters are verses 5 to 11 and chapter 12 talks about discipline and the importance of discipline, and that sometimes discipline can be painful, but ultimately it's not discipline to beat, to build, to beat down.

It's discipline to correct, to encourage, to empower, to rise up.

And then chapter or verses 12 and following, it really talks about active faith and what does active faith look like.

So that leads us to this verse, chapter 12, verse 15, and let's just let's read it together out loud, please, okay?

Would you do that with me?

Uh out loud, would you do that with me?

Okay, sure.

Thank you.

Thank you for that.

So let's write, we'll just we'll go with this version so we're all on the same page.

So see to it that no one.

All right.

What I want to do now is we're gonna we're gonna first focus in on some of the key words and hopefully bring context to this verse.

And then as we move through it, we're gonna start to apply it, and then at the very end of the message, we're gonna try to just give us some clear things that we can take away from it and hopefully cause you to ponder or even look at applying in your life.

But first of all, the word see.

Now, when we hear the word see in English language, we think of visual, right?

Well, the way that was written by the author, see to it really meant to inspect, to really see intently, to to observe uh intentionally so that we can uh understand what is going on, but it's even more than that, it also means to see as in to look after.

It's actively.

You know, I think one of the areas within life, just in life in general, but specifically within the Christian life, that has um become less effective than it could be, is the the importance of coaching and giving uh spiritual feedback to an individual that can cause spiritual growth.

And I think part of it is because the feedback we've given that we receive, uh, you know, think of the feedback you got.

What was the first feedback you received as a human?

It was probably your parents disciplining you.

It was probably them telling you not to do something.

And we we we and it's important, it's good, you know, don't touch that burner, it's hot, right?

But as we grow up, most of the feedback or coaching we get is usually critical.

It's it's criticism at times, even.

And some of it's for a good reason to to prevent us from harm, but what happens is I think it naturally gives us that tendency that as soon as someone's going to engage with us about our behavior or our attitude, we flinch.

We get defensive.

And we need to move into that.

And this verse is specifically talking about one as spiritual leaders of the flock, they are to see to it that their flock doesn't engage in this or go this way.

But also as the body of believers, we're called to look out for one another.

Christianity is a team sport.

Okay?

As much as frustrating that may be at times, as much as difficult that may be, we are called to work together, to hold each other, to encourage one another, to forgive one another.

And what happens is we get into criticism rather than critique.

And I I English doesn't really differentiate, but uh Daniel, we'll just scratch up Webster's and we'll just put Daniel Klug's dictionary.

I like to differentiate that in my mind.

And it helps me so that as I'm getting emotionally charged in working with my son or with a colleague, am I being critical and criticizing or am I critiquing?

Criticism is about me.

So, Scott, I'm gonna be, I'm gonna criticize Scott, it's really about me.

And I'm going to tear him down so that I feel better.

Now, if I were to critique Scott, it's about him.

And it's about how do I help him become better?

Do you see the difference?

And we're charged in Scripture to see to it what?

That no one, now, is anyone excluded?

No one means what?

What's the what would be the other way you could say no one?

Everyone, thank you.

See to it that everyone, so look around.

You're everyone, right?

We're in this together, friends.

See to it that no one does what?

Misses.

Now, when we hear the word miss, you might think of a target, we miss the target, which that can infer.

But if we dig into this word a little more, we find it's it's even more meaningful than that.

It literally means as if you're in a race and you fall behind and you don't even complete the race.

You you fall so far back.

And again, Christianity is a team sport.

And we're on the same team.

So if a teammate starts to fall behind, what should we do?

If we need to carry that person so that they can complete it.

So see that no one misses.

And then and then the grace of God.

I love this part, and then this is really the key to the entire verse.

This is the key to the entire scripture, this is the key to the entire Bible, this is the key to our entire life and existence.

And there's no greater time than to focus on it than this week.

It is the grace of God.

Whose grace is it?

God's.

And see to it that no one in here misses the grace of God.

The grace, the word there is caris.

It's the word that is used throughout scripture to describe and define and express the unmerited favor and love of God that was demonstrated, that was visually applied and implemented and shown for the world through his son, God's only Son, Jesus Christ.

So that through his rebirth, through his life, through his death on the cross, and through his resurrection, we have received forgiveness.

You are loved.

Even if you're unlovable, you are loved.

You're forgiven.

And I don't care how long you've been in church, I don't care how many messages you've heard, you should never grow tired nor grow complacent in hearing the fact that you are forgiven.

And if that starts to become dull to you, then I would I would caution you because you you're maybe starting to feel a little too uh too self-secure in your own righteousness.

In your own.

So see to it that no one misses the grace of God.

It must focus on the cross.

So we talk about bitterness.

That's that's the whole point of this verse.

See to it that no one misses the grace of God, and we continue on.

What does bitterness look like?

Here's some of the English words that can summarize what bitterness looks like: malice, strife, contention, covetedness, envy, rage, unforgiveness, anger, lust, pride, resentment, oppression, slander.

And that was just this morning.

Now, if you can't find yourself in there, I would encourage you to be more self-reflective.

Because upon further study, I think we'd find that we all live there occasionally.

If not, some of us maybe have resided in some of that for a long time.

Bitterness manifests itself in many ways.

At least 36,000 people in the United States have heart attacks triggered by anger.

Hostility is shown to raise a person's bad cholesterol, LDL.

Studies show that letting go of anger and resentments can reduce the severity of heart disease and even have an impact in cancer patients.

You know that the majority of murders in this country are usually done through an acquaintance?

Forty percent of all women who are murdered are murdered by their spouse or significant other.

Homicide is the second leading cause of death in the United States from the ages of 15 to 24-year-olds.

We have conflicts in marriage, conflicts with our children, broken relationships, conflict in church, conflict with our family, conflict with you know, conflict in work, and it all gets down to the heart.

So let's go to the next verse.

What does it cause us to do?

It says, let we are to see to it that no one misses the grace of God so that no bitter root.

Now we already looked at what bitterness is and it and we had more time, we'd get into it.

But but what is the root?

And this is important because when you think of a plant, what is what importance does the root play in a life of a plant?

Can't have one, can you?

It gets grounded, right?

It seeks for nourishment.

Matter of fact, that is the source of where nourishment and moisture comes up and through and feeds.

So if you have bitterness in your heart and that's infested and grounded, what's going to happen?

Everything that comes up in and through you is going to be what?

Bitter.

Anger.

How many of you have ever don't raise your hands, I don't want to embarrass you, but sarcastic.

I can be horribly sarcastic.

Sarcastic is just trying to mask my anger with some humor.

But it's still coming out of anger.

It's coming out of a wrong place, a wrong motive.

Luke tells us the good man out of good treasure of his heart brings forth what is good, the evil man out of evil treasure brings forth what is evil, for his mouth speaks from what fills his heart.

That's what this is talking about.

So it's asking us see to it that no one misses the grace of God and that there are no bitter hearts.

Because what happens?

It grows up.

That word talks about producing, it brings forth, it multiplies.

Just like a plant brings forth fruit, if we have a bitter root, a bitter heart, we're going to bring forth bitter fruit.

And we influence others around us, we can't help it.

You influence the people around you, either for the good or for the not so good.

It causes trouble.

I have caused trouble in my life.

And unfortunately, I probably still will at times because I'm I'm still sinful.

I'm still on this journey.

But when I was a child, matter of fact, it was funny.

Well, not funny, it was kind of disturbing, but uh my mother died 20, what, 23 years ago, and at her funeral returned back to uh my hometown or where I kind of was a young lad grew up.

And uh I spoke at my mother's funeral, and after the funeral, uh an elderly person came up, a lady, and and she just was shocked, and she said, I'm amazed that you spoke that message.

And I said, Well, thank you.

I mean, it's God and she said, No, no, because you were such a little demon when you were a kid.

We cause trouble and defile.

That word there, defile is important.

It literally means to stain.

It literally means to stain.

Think of a beautiful, clear glass of water, and then you throw a clump of dirt in it to defile it.

And we can defile many, pollute to contaminate.

What are the steps to bitterness?

How do we become bitter?

Well, this uh Dwight Carlson wrote a book, Overcoming Hurts and Anger, and I would encourage you, it's a great book to read.

And a lot of these kind of steps I've I've hijacked and taken, and then I've added my own, and I've I've bent the ear of my wife and tried to, how do we articulate this process?

Because I think it's important that I believe it's all of us have this tendency because we are human.

We have longings, desires, we have needs, we have expectations, both externally what we want to accomplish or internal expectations.

But the reality is life is hard.

It's a fallen world.

We live amongst fallen people, and we can be hurt, we cannot meet our own standards, we cannot meet the standards of church.

We can take what was meant to be a gracious, uh, positive love of God and experiencing it in the harmony of brothers and sisters in Christ, and we can get to be judgmental, legalistic.

We can look at each other and be critical and criticize.

And what happens then is we start to tell ourselves a story.

We start to add motive.

So I have an experience with someone, uh, I have an interaction with Stefan, I'm gonna pick on Stefan, uh, and I walk away hurt.

He didn't meet my expectations.

And I start to wonder why.

Well, maybe he doesn't like me.

Well, maybe he's this.

So now as I start to have continued uh interactions with Stefan, I keep telling me that myself that story.

Or I tell myself, I don't deserve that.

Why did that person treat me like that?

I don't deserve that.

I can't believe what a w awful wife you are.

I I deserve better.

But the problem is no matter how many wives I have, no matter where I go, there I am, right?

It's me.

And I'm carrying all this stuff around.

And so I have all this baggage that I'm carrying.

And then what happens is when I have an interaction with someone, guess what I do?

I unload it.

And I just, and it might not even be anything related to this.

Scott may have just triggered something in me in that energy, in that anxiety, and that anger, and that bitterness, so I defile Scott by dumping this all on him.

I do it to my son.

And it breaks my heart.

He doesn't deserve it.

But I retain it.

And I strive.

I'm going to do better.

I'm going to do better.

I'm going to manage it.

If I just create enough lists, if I just prioritize, if I just pray enough.

What happens too is when I share it to Scott, when I walk away, he's stuck with all my baggage, but all mine mysteriously appears again.

I didn't have enough bags for that illustration.

Otherwise, I would have had more bags here.

Does that make sense?

Is it resonating?

Is it just me?

Is it just me?

Let's everyone circle around and pray for me right now because.

So what is what do we do?

What do we do?

We're running out of time here, but let's look at this chart.

I've I've kind of thought through how do I visualize this?

So we've got life.

Life, that's everything.

That's your life.

That's external, that's internal.

That's what how people treat you, how you treat yourself.

It's the pains, the joys, everything.

And we have expectations in life, right?

We want to meet those expectations, right?

If we meet them, what happens?

Go to the next slide, please.

Good.

Man, we feel successful, right?

I get evaluated at my job, a performance evaluation.

Am I a top performer?

And if I meet those expectations, if I meet those metrics, I feel joy, I feel happy, I feel secure.

I'm not going to get fired today, right?

What happens if those expectations are met, are not met?

How do I feel?

A failure.

Frustration.

Anger, insecurity.

It's there that we start to work on that striving, that we take that baggage and we hold on to it.

And we either tell ourselves, I don't deserve it.

That's the source of bitterness.

The word bitter, that I is it's I'm I'm focused on myself.

And I'm going to strive, I'm going to own it, I'm going to work on it, and I blame others.

So you may point out a stain I have in my own heart, and somehow I'll turn around and make it your issue.

It's your fault.

It's because of the way I was treated, or you did this to me, or you said that, or you didn't do this, or that occurred to me.

And we strive and we work and we struggle.

So the key to life, obviously, is we just need to lower our expectations.

No, that's not the point.

That's not the point.

Because the point is God has expectations.

But here's the beautiful thing.

Just reset that.

Those expectations are rooted in the grace of God, not in the performance and striving of Dan.

And so as we're walking through this, it's time to lay these at the cross.

And some, if you're like me, some of you've been carrying some of that for quite a while.

So how do we, how do we, how do we not do better, but how do we become better?

And I and there's a difference between doing, because doing is striving, being is who we are.

And we need to be reminded of who we are.

You are loved, you are forgiven.

Jesus Christ died on the cross for you.

And your sin, yesterday's sin, today's sin, and tomorrow's sin has already been atoned for.

I think that's so important to realize.

You are God's child.

So what are the steps to being better?

Well, it starts out, you know, we have longings and desires, we have experiences, we will experience loss.

When I pastored in town here, I was also the chaplain of the Grand Fork Sheriff's Department, and one of the things that they relied on me to do was give death notifications and go with deputies.

Um, that's not a good way or a fun way to spend a day having to go to someone.

One of the worst examples uh was it was a week before Christmas, and I got a call, and I had to go in, and I went with a deputy to an apartment complex, to a 20-year-old mother who had a week-old baby, and her 21-year-old husband had died in a construction accident.

There's the Christmas tree, there's the gifts, there's the cradle, and I've got to sit down with a deputy and tell this 20-year-old, this child that has a seven-day-old baby that her young husband love, all those aspirations.

Now tell me that's not loss.

I've had to be in a hospital with a young couple in their mid-twenties, with an 18-month-old baby that died just suddenly.

It it my friends, it doesn't get any worse than that.

And yet I can complain because uh I have to wait in line 10 minutes for Starbucks.

I'm an awful person.

If you really knew me, you'd say, get down.

You have no right being up here.

And I don't.

Because it's not about me, it's not about you, it's about him.

So instead of telling ourselves a story about what we expect or what we want or what we believe we deserve, we need to tell ourselves his story and be reminded of the grace of God.

It is about Jesus.

I have been crucified with Christ.

I no longer live, but now Jesus Christ is within me.

And he has not only, not only, he doesn't even carry those anymore because he paid for them, he cleaned them out, and they're buried.

They're dead.

These things are gone.

Why do I want to continue to dig them up out of the ground and carry them around again?

It doesn't make sense, friends.

God has so much more for us.

So how do we do that?

We just need to submit rather than strive, acknowledge.

You know what?

My feelings, feelings are good.

So often in Christianity, we we emphasize faith at the expense of feelings.

Feelings are important.

They tell us how we're feeling.

And if we're angry, if we're bitter, that's good to understand that and know, but then we submit it, we acknowledge it, we grieve it, we give it to God.

We don't try to strive and fix it, we don't try to hide it.

We just have to surrender and say, God, I'm really angry right now because I don't believe that I was feeded fairly.

I don't like what happened over there.

I don't like what they said about my family or me.

Or I don't, man, I can't believe I did that.

I can't believe I said that.

What is wrong with me?

And if you're just honest with God, he knows it already.

He's looking for us to just realize it, acknowledge it, and submit it to him.

And being better, then notice the E there.

Instead of the I focus, the E is on the eternal perspective, what He has done for me and what the position he's put me through.

I want to end on this verse.

Let all bitterness and wrath, anger, clamor, and slander be put away from you, along with all malice.

Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving each other just as God in Christ also has forgiven you.

I'm gonna be very intentional.

And I and I realize this could be very personal, but obviously faith is going through some ch some challenges and transitions and working through that.

And uh conflict and bitterness can rear its ugly head in the church sometimes even more than in the world.

My friends, uh be kind to one another.

Be tender-hearted to one another.

Forgive each other.

Forgive yourself.

Go to the cross so that we all meet and realize it's through the grace of God.

And it's through that wonderful work we can all let that baggage go.

And then we're free to really live this life joyfully, graciously, lovingly, like he intended.

Heavenly Father, I thank you for your love and your grace.

I thank you for what you have done for us.

And as we enter Holy Week and we think of your passion, we think of the pain you went through, we think of the victory you won over death, the power of sin.

You have paid our penalty.

We are forgiven.

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only beloved Son.

Praise you, Jesus.

Praise you.

Hosanna.

Hosanna in the highest.

In Jesus' name.

Amen.