"Pursue peace with all people and holiness, without which no one will see the Lord. (15) 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
How do we fall short of the grace of God? We hold on to things such as:
UNFORGIVENESS. Someone hurts us and causes us much pain and heartache. In return we harbour unforgiveness towards them. At times such as this, we need to remember that, if we don't forgive, neither will God forgive us. (Mark 11:25-26). It's a dangerous place to be in.
RESENTMENT. We can tend to resent certain people, especially those who have hurt us, and we begin to hold a grudge. Every time we see them from thereon, the grudge gets bigger.
DESIRE TO GET EVEN. To be able to survive in this world, life has taught us to stand up for ourselves. If someone does us a wrong, then we need to get even with them. Many battles are fought over trying to get one back on someone who has hurt us.
BITTERNESS. If we're not careful, when all of the above are not addressed and dealt with, bitterness springs up. It begins small but eventually becomes unmanageable, the root is so deep.
We are all prone to these areas. As soon as something like this begins to take hold, we need to deal with it immediately. If we don't, it will take hold of us and taint our walk with Jesus. Thankfully, Jesus knows how difficult things can be, the difference being, He didn't fall into it. Every part of Jesus showed grace to all He met. Hebrews 12:3 says, 'Consider Him who endured such hostility lest you become weary and discouraged in your souls.'
Jesus took it all and still produced grace to all who hurt Him. We may be tempted to think, 'Yes, but He was different, He was God.' Yes that's true but He was still human at the time; He bled and He showed emotion. The difference was He demonstrated hesed -God's mercies, goodness and peace, wherever He went. He showered people with hesed, therefore, His Father honoured Him and gave Him the ability - the strength, to carry out His mission.
And He will do the same for us, but we need to deal with these four areas: (1) Unforgiveness, (2) Resentment, (3) Desire to get even, (4) Bitterness. It's not easy to shrug these areas off, but it is achievable with Jesus' help. Let's all give it a go!
Copyright 2020 Grahame Howard
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