I’ve worn bitterness like a security blanket. I’ve wrapped it tight around me and held it close under my chin. The fabric is worn and ragged with stuffing spilling out, but still I cling to it. Nothing can penetrate, and no one can see what’s underneath. I’ve found comfort in my grief. It’s familiar. There’s constancy in replaying that conversation that slashed my heart. Instead of applying the salve of grace, I replay bitterness and hate and watch as the wound festers and weeps.
Bitterness doesn’t need much to take root. It can be a disappointment in a health diagnosis, a lack of response to your latest effort to connect with people, or harsh words exchanged between two people. But before we get to bitterness, we have to recognize something else.
Grief.
If we reserve the expression of grief for those “big bad” experiences like death or devastation, then we’re ill-equipped to deal with the daily griefs. The daily griefs are more commonly known as disappointments and offenses.
But when I trace the disappointments back to the core feeling, I find grief. I’m sad because something didn’t turn out the way I wanted it to. Or God didn’t answer my prayer the way I thought he should. Or someone I love chose to reject the very thing that I’m passionate about. Sorrow is at the root of these disappointments.
At the root of my response to offense, underneath the anger, is sadness. I’m sad that someone I called “friend” chose to walk away. Or insult me. Or turn others against me. I’m angry, but I’m sad too. And sadness is grief. And it must be processed in order for us to know the freedom that forgiveness brings.
But It’s in the processing where we trip and fall. And some of us don’t even like to process our emotions. Let’s just forget it and move on. Let’s pretend it didn’t happen. If we ignore it, it will go away. And in running away from conflict we find ourselves struggling to experience authenticity in our life. And when we fail to experience authenticity, we rob ourselves of the fullness of God’s grace.
The antidote to bitterness is grace. It’s grace that gives us the power to forgive when forgiveness seems impossible. Grace gives us the courage to place our wounds in God’s gentle hands. It’s grace that reminds us that without God, we are wretched sinners bound for hell. It’s grace that washes us and makes us new. It’s grace that God longs to give us and it’s grace that makes a way for us to boldly walk into the throne room of God and ask for daily grace.
“See to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God; that no “root of bitterness” springs up and causes trouble, and by it many become defiled;” Hebrews 12:15
The problem with wearing bitterness in our hearts is that eventually it shows up on the outside. We might feel secure and justified in it, but to other people all they see is that ragged security blanket that’s starting to smell.
Bitterness manifests itself in your approach to people. It’s a hard edge in your voice. It’s cynicism in your relationships. Bitterness manifests itself in your speech when your words tear others down instead of building them up.
Bitterness leads to selfish ambition which leads to forgetting what your purpose here on earth is for: to make God known and enjoy him forever.
But God. The most two powerful words in our language. But God. But God can turn our bitter into sweet through the power of his grace. Don’t fail to obtain grace. Receive it. Surrender your hurts, wounds, anger, and sadness. Practice grace. When that hurtful scene replays in your mind, see yourself running to the throne room, getting grace, and then pouring God’s grace on the situation.
It’s God who works in you. I know what it’s like to be unable to forgive. The hurt is too deep. Too personal. It feels like I’m bleeding to death while I put a smile on my face and go about my day and no one sees me bleeding out. Partly because I don’t let them. Partly because I don’t want to give voice to the beast inside me.
But what I can do is this: run to God, tell him of my incapabilities and that hurt has incapacitated me and that I need him to help me forgive. So I hold out my hurt and he pours his grace on it. He reminds me of his stripes and the beating he took for me when I was still a wretched awful sinner. And then he enables me to extend that same grace to the one who wounded me. And exchange bitterness for grace.
The Takeaway
Consider a situation that has caused you grief.
Listen to this song and picture yourself running to God’s throne room.
Imagine God filling up your bucket with grace and then imagine you pouring it out on your situation.
The memories play on repeat. The shame weighs heavy. How can it be? There is this grace that pours down like sweet rain. Will I dance in it or will I run from it? Will I see that it’s running into grace that wipes shame away or will I let shame whisper it’s lies to me?
If anyone had reason to feel shame it was Paul. Here was a man who persecuted Christ’s church. His hands were covered with blood and righteously he justified his actions. But then Christ intervened. In order for Paul to see, he had to be made blind. And in his physical blindness, God set him free from his heart blindness.
I thank him who has given me strength, Christ Jesus our Lord, because he judged me faithful, appointing me to his service,though formerly I was a blasphemer, persecutor, and insolent opponent. But I received mercy because I had acted ignorantly in unbelief,and the grace of our Lord overflowed for me with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. 1 Timothy 1:12-14
But instead of letting shame stop his witness, he used his past to bring glory to God. Paul didn’t try to pretend it away by never making references to it. He knew exactly what he was before grace rained down on him.
He called himself vile names: persecutor, insolent opponent, and blasphemer.
Do you call yourself names? Do you call yourself cheater, abuser, failure, or not enough?
Stop trying to convince yourself you’re not those things. You are. But you’re also redeemed. Shame keeps you locked into your past, but Christ in his grace and mercy came to set you free from shame. Don’t pretend you didn’t need Christ. Use what you were to point others to Jesus.
You once loved nothing more than to share the latest juiciest bit of news? Christ set you free. Talk about him. Talk about how he changed your words and showed you how to build others up. Share your struggles.
There’s no shame in having struggles. It’s the hiding of them that causes shame.
You took a knife to your own skin because you couldn’t bear the internal pain anymore? Christ set you free. He gave you hope. Share that hope with others. Your soul’s enemy plays on your shame to keep you from sharing your hope.
It’s because you recognized that you sin that you realized you need Jesus. Jesus came to save the lost. It’s okay to own your lostness, and it’s okay to talk about what you once were. Let God redeem your past. You can say you were a slanderer and gossip, but that Christ set you free. It’s okay to say that you despaired so deeply that you cut yourself, but that Christ became your hope.
Your sin and Christ’s grace collide to create this most beautiful expression of life. But it doesn’t stop there. It becomes this dance of remembering your past while embracing your present identity in Jesus.
That’s what makes your testimony powerful.
The Takeaway
Jesus road into Jerusalem ready to conquer your sin and shame. Take a few moments to ponder what you would be without Christ.
Listen to this song and let the words become your own heart’s cry.
Then stretch your arms wide (for real, stretch them, it’s okay) and say, “Holy God, here I am. Vile. Wretched. Selfish. Take my sin and shame. Pour your grace on me.”
Dance in grace’s rain. Let it wash your shame away.
I’ve battled with anger issues off and on throughout my life, and underneath the anger lies shame. I’m ashamed when my temper gets the better of me. I’m ashamed at the words that fly out of my mouth that do more damage than a club. Words wound in ways that destroy the essence of a person. I battle anger and I battle shame.
We screw up or we make life-altering wrong choices. We doubt Jesus’ blood can truly clean our past. Anger rules us. Our enemy uses shame to keep us locked in a pit of hopelessness.
How do we get out of that pit? How do we exchange shame induced hopelessness for redeeming hope? By not letting the enemy win. By not letting shame rule your decisions or dictate your actions. Let the shame you feel guide you to the redemption Christ offers.
The First Reason
Shame indicates two things: an attack of the enemy or an issue that hasn’t been dealt with. The enemy deals with generalities and the Holy Spirit deals with specifics. When you experience overall shame and condemnation, the enemy is preventing you from knowing hope. Stand firm in God and resist the devil by speaking truth over yourself. Say, “Jesus’ blood redeems me, in his name I’ve confessed my sin and I stand forgiven. God chooses me. God makes me victorious and nothing can prevail against the God’s love for me and in me.”
The Second Reason
The second problem is a little bit more nuanced. Often when shame lingers over a particular incidence, we have a forgiveness problem. Many of us are quick to ask God for forgiveness and he grants it to us. (1 John 1:9). Often we will go to the person we’ve wronged and seek their forgiveness and whether they grant it to us is between them and God, but we’ve done our part. Whatkeeps us trapped in shame is when we don’t forgive ourselves.
If God has forgiven you, why can’t you forgive yourself? God doesn’t treat us with “three strikes and you’re out” so why do we treat ourselves that way? If you’ve said something you’ve regretted and you’ve made it right with God, make it right with yourself. When you refuse to forgive yourself, you reject God’s redeeming forgiveness.
When you reject God’s redeeming forgiveness, you rob yourself of hope. And when you struggle through, you find your way to hope.
The Solution
“Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance,and endurance produces character, and character produces hope,and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.” Romans 5:2-5
When we wrestle through the suffering we build endurance. Endurance builds our character because we don’t give in to the easy way out of living in shame, but we battle through to victory over shame. Character produces hope because we’re changed from the inside out. Hope is an outward projection of belief and trust. And hope doesn’t shame us. Why?
Because of God’s love poured out into your heart through the Holy Spirit.
Hope Fulfilled
It’s God’s love that starts and ends it all, draws us to himself, and makes a way for redeeming forgiveness. That love resides in us. And when his love is flowing through us and out of us, shame has no place. Hope does.
Hope in God and rest in the confidence that he brings. You are forgiven. Your past is redeemed. Your love is God’s love.
Application
Memorize Romans 5:2-5
Consider anything you haven’t forgiven yourself for and receive God’s forgiveness by forgiving yourself.
