From John Collins Ministries:
“Pursue peace with all people, and holiness, without which
no one will see the Lord:
looking carefully lest anyone fall short of the grace of
God; lest any root of bitterness springing up cause trouble, and by this many
become defiled.” Hebrews 12:14-15 (NKJV).
Bitterness is something that we must be on guard against and
we must have complete honesty with ourselves if we are to monitor our hearts so
that we can repent if we find ourselves gone astray. Bitterness will creep up
on you and it is easy to allow to happen. We like to think of ourselves as
deserving the best and we become very offended when others hurt us, reject us
and when we perceive that we have not received our ‘due’.
We must be careful to find the balance of self-worth and
humility. Sometimes people just don’t think things through with faith. Do you
deserve health, happiness, wealth, love, respect, honor, recognition or to walk
through this life without hurt? Does the Bible promise that? What about
Lazarus? What about our dear Lord Jesus Christ who not only died on the Cross
for us but was rejected, told he had a demon, was cursed and taunted, beaten
and tormented and forced to carry his own instrument of death?
God does not want us to hurt but there must be a desire for
God inside of us and we must come to recognize His lessons and His love. There
will be seeds planted in our hearts; seeds of love, anger, hate, joy,
bitterness, forgiveness and the list just goes on and is replenished regularly.
We must make the choice about which seeds we choose to water and which seeds we
choose to pluck out.
We are the children of God and we have Jesus. This world is
evil and has no hold upon us. Our home is in heaven and if this is what we know
then we should act like it. Remember that we are not promised a blissful life
on earth but we are promised that blissful life in heaven, but you have to get
there first.
“Let your conduct be without covetousness; be content with
such things as you have. For He Himself has said, ‘I will never leave you nor
forsake you.’ So we may boldly say: ‘The Lord is my helper;I will not fear. What can man do to me?’” Hebrews 13:5-6 (NKJV).
