Series 1 of 7: Overcoming the Spirit of Bitterness, Ep 19
Welcome Back! I am your host, Dawn Simmons, and in this episode of Conquering Our Unseen Enemies we are going to be doing something different and it will be our focus for the next 7 weeks, which is the remainder of 2022. We are starting a series which discusses 7 demons, one each week, that show up so frequently in our lives that I wanted to address them head on and really focus on understanding them and evicting them as we end out our year. The plan was to enable us to start the 2023 with a new heart for the Lord, but the plan got so much better which I will share in a moment. First, let me tell you the 7 demons we will be addressing in the series are: Bitterness, Insecurity, Impatience, Worry, Strife, Accusation and Cursing, not necessarily in that order but that is the 7. Then on week 8, we will have a new beginning for 2023. The inspiration for this was initially based on what I am hearing from people regarding disconnects in our marriages. If the enemy can get a foothold into our households through our marriages, then he can easily distract us to begin to teardown other areas in our lives. As I sat down to hear from the Lord on specifically what content He wanted included, it became clear He wanted me to address the marriage between Him and His church. This is what He asked me to share with you, these are His words for you, not mine.
"There are mainstay areas that need to be cleared out so people can move on and develop their time and relationship with Me in a new way and rid themselves of their heavy burdens and areas that have controlled them or limited them. Break chains and release them for more. My love is waiting to heal deep wounds. Some will think it cannot be done, but they are closing their heart and mind and believing the same lies the devil told Eve and created the first divide. I came to create a bridge over all divides until the divide can be resolved once and for all. You are to show people there is a bridge, they are to take a step onto it and I will meet them there. That's all I ask. Some will walk farther than others, it doesn't matter, I'm on the bridge waiting for everyone."
When the Lord said at the beginning, there are "mainstay areas" I wanted to make sure I understood what He meant. The definition of Mainstay is: a person or thing on which something else is based or depends. (idols, incorrect understanding of Him, demonic influences) He said there are mainstay areas that need to be cleared so we can develop our time and relationship with Him. In doing that we will rid ourselves of burdens and things that have controlled or limited us. He specifically said we need to break chains. Folks, He wants us to get rid of demonic influences in our lives that are holding us back from our John 10:10 relationship with Him. The fullness He can provide. Whatever wounds we have, He can heal them, He is willing, He is able if we come to Him. The enemy created a divide with sin, but Jesus came to redeem us and as a result provide us a bridge over that divide so it no longer exists for us. The only thing he asks is that we take a step onto that bridge. That's it. He knows some of us will take one step, some will take ten, some will run up on it to meet him. He just asks us to take a step, so friends, listen to this series. Take it to heart and whatever resonates with you over these next 7 weeks, work on it, trust Him, get on that bridge while we go through this. Know that we are all doing this together. We all have something. You are not alone, email me if you are struggling or have something to share with others. I will keep your privacy. There are people all over this world listening to this podcast. We are in 6 countries so far. We are particularly growing in Canada and Africa has recently started to grow. We are in 38 US states so far, all of which we are so happy to see for a young podcast. My point is, you are not alone, in whatever you are dealing with, you are not alone as you commit to this next 7 weeks. Let's clear our "mainstay areas" and break some chains so we can get on that bridge and get over any divides that are holding us back from the Lord. This is not a salvation discussion, don't misunderstand what I am saying here, this about the divides we have keeping us from having a full relationship with Jesus. Now, let’s get started.
Demons in my mind fall into one of 2 categories, silent or loud. What I mean by this is how a person reacts to being demonizing can be heard as the demonic spirit begins to work through the person. People who have what I consider to be silent spirits will generally keep to themselves about it, example loneliness, guilt and doubt tend to keep the person hurting more inward. By being silent about it, they don't often seek help or reach out to others but rather suffer silently. Other spirits I consider loud, and Bitterness is a loud spirit. When someone is bitter you hear it through their words. You will see it in their actions and how they treat others, but as bitterness grows, anger and hatred tend to be vocal. It creates fear in others and can push people away because they don't want to hear it or deal with it, which then feeds the bitterness.
What is the Spirit of Bitterness, how does it function and what influences generally are associated with it? The Spirit of Bitterness is frequently a strongman. It typically develops early in us as a result of an experience where we feel we have been wronged, cheated or betrayed. There is a deep emotional tie to our heart and whatever it is that has occurred. Our emotional tie is so damaged, we are unable to overcome the hurt and resentment gets a foothold in our lives. Now in reality, that is a lie the enemy is telling us, so there is a Spirit of Deception involved. If we don't identify that lie and turn to the Lord, it can then allow a root to develop in our heart and our mind that is very difficult to cut out. Unforgiveness and hatred move in and they can function slowly and creep their way through our heart without us realizing how deep the roots are forming. Over time it shapes our behaviors, reactions to others, our activities, our outlook and through these areas other influences are allowed to enter our heart as well. Typically, with the Spirit of Bitterness you will find the companions of resentment, hatred, temper, anger, retaliation, unforgiveness and all of these can then escalate to violence and unfortunately in extreme cases murder.
Let's see what the Bible tells us about the spirit of bitterness. We have several scriptures here and I want to look at them and identify what it is saying about us, our hearts, our minds, and where it tells us it is going to take us.
Hebrews 12:15 warns us in this way, "See to it that no one falls short of the grace of God and that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many." The result of falling short of the grace of God, not allowing God to redeem you, not entering into that relationship, allows a bitter root to grow and what is the result. Who does it affect? Everyone around you!
Deuteronomy 29:18, "Make sure there is no man or woman, clan or tribe among you today whose heart turns away from the Lord our God to go and worship the gods of those nations; make sure there is no root among you that produces such bitter poison." Speaks to relationship and bitterness associated with poison.
Deuteronomy 32:32, "Their vine comes from the vine of Sodom and from the fields of Gomorrah. Their grapes are filled with poison, and their clusters with bitterness." This is an analogy. What happened to Sodom and Gomorrah, God's judgment left nothing to spare.
1 Samuel 30:6, "David was greatly distressed because the men were talking of stoning him; each one was bitter in spirit because of his sons and daughters. But David found strength in the Lord his God." Bitterness leading to hatred, violence, murder
Proverbs 14:10, "Each heart knows its own bitterness, and no one else can share its joy." Again, discussing bitterness in the heart and who does it hurt? Everyone!
Jeremiah 2:19, "Your wickedness will punish you; your backsliding will rebuke you. Consider then and realize how evil and bitter it is for you when you forsake the Lord your God and have no awe of me,” declares the Lord, the Lord Almighty." These are the Lords words through the prophet Jeremiah and see how the Lord associates evil and bitterness together. This shows there is no future in bitterness.
Amos 5:7, "There are those who turn justice into bitterness and cast righteousness to the ground." This is an amazing scripture that reveal the two sides justice vs bitterness and in casting righteousness to the ground, bitterness brings that to fruition, it is the opposite of righteousness.
Amos 6:12, "Do horses run on the rocky crags? Does one plow the sea with oxen? But you have turned justice into poison and the fruit of righteousness into bitterness—" Again showing the two things that do not belong together. Depicting bitterness as the opposite of righteousness.
Acts 8:23, "For I see that you are full of bitterness and captive to sin.” Here bitterness is now associated with sin. We need to be real with ourselves if we have bitterness, it’s sinful and if you are unclear about that, we’ll get into why in the next few minutes.
Romans 3:14, “Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness.” Cursing is one of our other demons to address during this series and again see the association Paul is making with bitterness. We don’t want this in our mouths, our hearts, our minds, our lives anywhere.
James 3:14, "But if you harbor bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast about it or deny the truth."This is another way of saying what we call nowadays, being transparent.
We have identified what the spirit of bitterness is and we have looked at several verses that give an equally damning depiction of what bitterness will do in our lives, so how do we get rid of it?
Well first, we need to acknowledge it.
If we have a spirit of bitterness, don’t hide it, it will find it’s way out. It will be apparent in our words, attitudes, behaviors, it will not be silent. Address it head on and understand the reasons behind why the spirit of bitterness was able to creep into your heart. We want to close any doors we have open or past hurts that will cause a closed door to reopen. The spirit of bitterness knows our weaknesses so we need to call on the strength of the Lord and make our way to the bridge.
Now maybe you don’t have a full-blown case of bitterness and so you are feeling pretty good right now. Well, what about a baby case of bitterness that doesn’t rear its head very often so you don’t even remember you have an issue with someone or something. We are heading into the holidays and this year will likely be another year that we see people we haven’t seen in a few years. Maybe last year you weren’t able to travel or certain family still wasn’t able to be a part of Holiday events. When you don’t see people regularly, it’s easy to forget an old hurt. It’s easy to be reminded of a childhood resentment. I am really trying to jog your mind a little bit so that you can find any old bitterness and get yourself ready to root it out. This is not an easy task for some, so if you can, pray for those of us here who may be dealing with bitterness as a result of a traumatic event or a betrayal. Carrying it around is heavy and the Lord told us He is available and wants to heal deep wounds, but he cannot do that if we are not willing to let Him do it and release it to Him. I am asking you to truthfully do the work to look into your heart, identify any bitterness, resentment, unforgiveness, violence, temper, anger, retaliation, and even murder and that includes thoughts of murder.
What if you were someone who was molested as a child and let’s say your molester has passed away. The fact that they have passed away does not negate your need to address it and clear out any spirit of bitterness. You were trespassed in an incredibly evil way, and I certainly wish I could take it away and you never had to experience it, but I can’t. Jesus, however, can help you overcome it. I know some of us will have some very real deep hurts, but we need to allow Jesus to take that on for us and begin that healing process so we can be free of old pain.
So secondly, after we acknowledge it, we need to be willing to release it to the Lord. We have to let go of any bitterness, resentment, all of those demonic influences. Releasing is not an easy step. We are making ourselves extremely vulnerable and that is a scary, uncomfortable place to be, but we have to be willing to have the courage to do that because remember, we are making our way to the bridge. When you are going through the process to release it, it will take your heart and mind working together. You can say in your mind you are releasing it, but if you are still carrying it in your heart, then you haven’t released it. It may take some time to get your heart and mind working together, but it is possible. For some people, it also helps to get their body involved. So you have done all the work and are ready to release it to the Lord, then create some physical activity that demonstrates a release. For some it’s writing a letter to the Lord, for some it’s letting out a good cry, for some it’s letting out a good scream. Whatever fits for you, do that.
The third step we want to make in this process is incredibly important. You can do all the work but if you fail to do step three, then you will likely find yourself right back where you started at some point. Anytime we evict demonic influences, we need to go back and fill that void with what we receive from the Lord. Paul tells it to us this way: Ephesians 4:31-32, "Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. 32 Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you."
Forgiveness. If you are willing to release it to the Lord, the way you support that release is to forgive whoever was involved in bitterness coming to fruition. Now let’s say you have listened this far and you have found no deep bitterness, but what about pre-bitterness. You have some feelings, but you have not allowed it to take root but it is certainly working to try to do just that. Forgiveness.
In order to overcome and evict the enemy, we use the light to drive out the darkness. Now let’s take this a step further. What if we have done something that creates bitterness in someone else.
I want to share with you a story from my own life. I’ve shared before I believe that I have a blended family. So I have been divorced and as I was in the beginning stages of the divorce I was dealing with a lot at one time. It had been a really, really ugly situation for four years until we had agreement that a divorce was happening. Once I had biblical grounds, everything began to move forward. I had 4 children and I had a lot to figure out on a new place to live and schedules, all of that. When a friend of mine heard, she reached out to me. We weren’t terribly close, but she reached out to me because she was recently divorced as well. Same reasons for the divorce so she wanted to commiserate. The conversation was clearly going down the path of men bashing and while I understood her position, I felt it wasn’t healthy for me or necessary at this point. I knew I was out of an awful situation, I would be safe, my kids would no longer be in that environment and I needed to remain focused on what needed to happen. Developing a relationship with this person would be toxic for me and I just couldn’t do it and I had to explain I couldn’t do it, it wasn’t helpful to me in my situation. My doing that created a divide between me and this woman that lasted for years. She wouldn’t talk to me for years, even when she saw me, she wouldn’t talk to me. I could tell she had become bitter toward me, she was bitter towards several people but I knew I was one of them. I didn’t see her for years and then a mutual friend called and shared with me that this woman was sick. It was pretty serious, and I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do about it. She had refused to talk to me the last time I saw her, but after a few months I decided to call and we talked. We neverspoke of the break in the relationship and instead we just shared our lives. I felt good about it. You never want to be the cause or contribute to the cause of anyone else feeling bitterness. I want to encourage you to think too of how your actions may have impacted someone and hurt them. Whether you were right or wrong, knowing someone is hurting from an experience with you is not what we want. Even though I know I made the right choice, I should have followed up sooner or tried to explain myself better. My friend passed away 4 months after I decided to make that call. We spoke a few more times in those last months but knowing she passed free of the bitterness helped me to forgive myself of what I could have done better. Never forget, forgiveness also applies to ourselves also.
I hope you were able to take away some good information and action items for our first week of this 7-week series. We want to address all these areas and rid ourselves of these demonic influences as we end this year and meet the Lord on the bridge so He can take us into 2023 with a deeper relationship with Him.
Ok so as always let's recap the Top Show Points:
We are starting a series which discusses 7 demons, one each week, that show up so frequently in our lives. It will be our focus for the next 7 weeks, which is the remainder of 2022 and focus on understanding and evicting these demons as we end out our year.
The 7 demons we will be addressing in the series are: Bitterness, Insecurity, Impatience, Worry, Strife, Accusation and Cursing, not necessarily in that order but that is the 7. Then on week 8, we will have a new beginning for 2023.
We discussed a word the Lord gave me to share with you about what He wants from us in the next 7 weeks
The Spirit of Bitterness is frequently a strongman. It typically develops early in us as a result of an experience where we feel we have been wronged, cheated or betrayed.
Typically, with the Spirit of Bitterness you will find the companions of resentment, hatred, temper, anger, retaliation, unforgiveness and all of these can then escalate to violence and unfortunately in extreme cases murder.
Discussed what the Bible tells us about the spirit of bitterness. We used several scriptures to identify what it is saying about us, our hearts, our minds, and where it tells us it is going to take us.
Well first, we need to acknowledge it. If we have a spirit of bitterness, don’t hide it, it will find it’s way out. It will be apparent in our words, attitudes, behaviors, it will not be silent. Address it head on and understand the reasons behind why the spirit of bitterness was able to creep into your heart.
So secondly, we need to be willing to release it to the Lord. We have to let go of any bitterness, resentment, all of those demonic influences.
The third step we want to make in this process is incredibly important. Anytime we evict demonic influences, we need to go back and fill that void with what we receive from the Lord. Paul tells it to us this way: Ephesians 4:31-32, Forgiveness.
We encourage you:
· To have an active Bible reading plan, it will be helpful in gaining wisdom and understanding and it is required for the gift of spiritual discernment
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Have a great week!
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