Clean and Clear #2

[video, music] Don’t let bitterness and resentment get you down this holiday season.
Say goodbye to negativity forever with new Clean and Clear.

Well, welcome to week number two of the series called “Clean and Clear.” I am glad to
have all of you guys at Oklahoma City, you all at High Octane, the truly wild group of
them all, the Edmond campus, welcome. Tulsa, Stillwater, and all around the world on
the internet, thank you for joining us today to share in God’s word. The title for today’s
message is “Bitter or Better”. If you’ve got your Bibles with you, let’s grab Bibles, open
them up to Hebrews, chapter 12. As you are turning there, let’s just start off as we are
talking about bitterness, and acknowledge that it’s easy to see why, often times, the big
and major hurts will trip people up into bitterness. What’s interesting to me is to notice
how often small and insignificant things can lead us into bitterness. For example, in my
marriage, Amy and I have been incredible blessed with what, we are thankful, is really a
great marriage. Believe it or not, though, the one thing that has led us to more
bitterness and more fights, believe it or not, this is not a lie, but we have fought more in
fourteen years of marriage, over pancakes than anything else. You may kind of lightly
chuckle, but I will tell you, it is a serious issue, because pancakes, to me, they are a gift
from God. Amy, though, she grew up in a pancake deprived home. I mean, they ate
them, but they didn’t know how to make them. And so, when we got married, there was
a lot of tension. Some of you may be newly weds and may not know how God wants
you to make pancakes. If that is the case, let me just shed some light on. It will save
you a lot of the trouble that we have been through. When you are making pancakes,
take your griddle, turn it all the way up, as hot as you can get it, put some butter on and
make sure it goes “psssst” when you put the butter on there. Take your batter, mix it up,
make sure that there are no little clumps of your batter, in your dough, in there that’s
ungodly and of the devil. Little clumps are very, very bad. Then, you take some well-
mixed, thin batter … not thick and clumpy, but thin, and you pour them on the hot
griddle. Make them so they are about this big, not bigger, not tiny little silver dollar
things. About this big, let them cook through quickly. When you see the bubbles
coming up, turn them over, and then you take four, not three, not five, but four about this
size. Put them on a plate. Put butter on them, and then put expensive syrup. Now,
some of you may be saying. “Oh, but you’re a hypocrite. For all these years, you have
been saying, ‘Save money.’ ” That’s exactly right. You save money on other things, so
that you can spend them on good syrup. Okay? Unlike Amy, who buys this cheap
sugar water that they call syrup, which is horrible. So, you see the right way to do
these. When I got married to Amy, she, on the other hand, who had been raised in a

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pancake deprived home, instead took this lumpy, clumpy, big bowl of stuff, and poured
these pancakes all different sizes. It was the most horrible thing you’ve ever seen.
Some big. Some small. Not even round, God help her. And then, she piled them up
and wouldn’t let us eat them when they came off the griddle. Instead, she would wait
until all the family has them, and let them be cold and crunchy, and all this kind of stuff.
Now, you know I’m all for family, but when it comes to pancakes, every man for
themselves. Eat them hot, and so, we’d fight over this, and one day, she almost pushed
me over in the kitchen as I stepped in to set her straight according to God’s table.
We’re probably the only couple in history who ever needed Biblical counseling because
of pancakes. Okay?

It’s easy to see why the big things would cause people to become bitter, but often times,
it’s small, insignificant things that can lead us to having a bitter heart. You guys at all of
our video teaching experiences, if you guys would participate, that would be great. How
many of you would say that if this Christmas season reflects the past, if this Christmas
season reflects the past, how many of you would say that with family members, you
have at least the possibility of some tension, some hurt feelings, and maybe some
bitterness that causes problems? How many of you would say that would be the case
for you? Many, many hands go up all over the place. Christmas is interesting, because
it seems to magnify things. It magnifies the good, and the love, and we enjoy that. But,
at the same time, it magnifies pain and hurt and struggling relationships. From our
perspective, we are going to let God’s word speak into our hearts, and we are going to
ask God to clean and clear our hearts from bitterness. We will start in Hebrews 12:14-
15. If you guys at all of our experiences, you could help me out, the Bible tells us to
make what kind of effort? Would you say it out loud? The Bible says to make what?
“Make every effort,” scriptures says, “to live at peace with,” how many people? “With all
men,” the Bible says, “and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord.” Verse
15, “See to it that no one misses the grace of God and that,” what? Would you say that
phrase out loud? “And that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many.”
See to it that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many. You can live in
bitterness, or you can let God make you better.

Today, as we establish a foundational understanding of bitterness, let’s start with these

first two Biblical thoughts. If you are taking notes, write this down. The first thing is
this. We need to embrace that bitterness has a dangerous root. Scripture teaches us
clearly that bitterness has a dangerous root. Scripture says in verse 15, Hebrews 12,
“See to it that no bitter root grows up.” Now, when will a bitter root start to grow? I’m
going to argue that a root of bitterness always grows in the soil of a hurt that was not
dealt with Biblically. The root of bitterness grows within the soil of a hurt that was not
dealt with Biblically. Now, where do roots grow? We know they grow underground, and
a root of bitterness starts out as an underground job. Other people may look at you,

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and they may not see it. You may look normal, and they may think the relationship is
okay, but under ground, there can be a very dangerous root of bitterness that starts to
grow.

Now, what do we know about roots? If you are taking notes, we know these three
things. We know that roots absorb, they store, and they grow. They absorb painful
information. They store the words that someone may have said against us. And if left
unchecked, roots of bitterness start to grow. They absorb, they store, and they grow.
Now, contrast a root of bitterness with love. I Corinthians 13 tells us that love keeps no
records of wrongs. What does a root of bitterness do? A root of bitterness, on the other
hand, keeps detailed records of wrongs, doesn’t it? How do you know, perhaps, if
you’ve got a root of bitterness growing in your heart? One of the ways is, if someone
hurts you and you can remember every word they said, or every detail of the incident,
that could be an indication that you’ve got a root of bitterness. For example, I’ll just tell
you kind of a personal story. There was a guy several years ago, who for whatever
reason, just hated my guts, and I’d never met him. He’d never met me, to my
knowledge, and he was just talking all the rumors about me. I mean, making things up
like I had a helicopter and I’d fly from church to church, and you know, and I had all this
weird stuff with money and my morals, and my marriage, and questioned my heart, and
all this kind of stuff, and it was so pronounced, I heard about it from so many people,
finally, I just called the guy and said, “It seems like, you know, you’ve got some issues
with me. Why don’t we talk and we can just sort this thing out face-to-face.” Well, he
said, “You did this, and so you shouldn’t be a minister. And, you did that,” and I was
like, “Buddy, I never did anything close to that. I’d appreciate it if you’d stop,” “Oh,
you’re lying,” and he went on and kept telling people. Well, I realized that a root of
bitterness was growing in my heart, because to this day, several years later, I can tell
you word for word what this guy said, because I’ve replayed it in my mind over and over
and over again. In fact, if I ever bump into the guy, I’ve rehearsed what I would say to
him this time, both Godly, and may even ungodly, if I needed those words. And, you
know why? Because bitterness has so consumed my heart that it is, I live in a very
dangerous place.

We will start to realize that we’ve got a root of bitterness when we’ve absorbed, stored
bad information and it starts to grow within us. Second thought about bitterness is this.
Bitterness has a dangerous root. Secondly, we need to understand that bitterness also
has a poisonous fruit. What starts out as an underground job, if left unchecked, will
eventually grow into fruit that everyone will see, and it will hurt many people. Verse 15,
Hebrews 12, “See to it that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many.
Now, the Greek word that is translated as defile is the word miaino, and it means to
stain, to pollute, or to contaminate. Many of you, if you were honest, you’d say you’ve
got some relationships that are stained with bitterness or polluted, or contaminated with

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the poisonous fruit from the root of bitterness. The New Living translation tells the verse
this way, verse 15, New Living says, “Whenever the bitter root springs up, many are
corrupted by its,” what? Say it out loud, “Many are corrupted by its poison.” Bitterness
starts with a dangerous root that grows into a poisonous fruit.

Now, how do you know if your heart is growing bitter? Let me show you four
indications, or four fruits of bitterness. If you are taking notes, the first thing is this. If
your heart is growing bitter, number one, we easily see the bad in others. If someone
hurt us, man, we can pick them apart and see the bad in them so easily, “Who do they
think they are, walking around so self-righteous, saying that they do this, when they
really do that,” and we can pick faults out of them so quick. Why? Because the root of
bitterness is growing and we easily see the bad in those who hurt us. Second fruit of
bitterness is this. We feel justified in criticizing and gossiping about these people. Now,
normally, if we were gossiping, we might realize this is wrong, but because they
wronged us, by golly, we feel like it’s our right to tell everybody else what a low down, no
good person this is, and you shouldn’t trust them, and it’s the right thing to do for me to
expose you to truth. “Why, I feel justified because they hurt me, so they’re going to get
theirs.” The root of bitterness.

Thirdly note, if you are taking notes, is this. And this is the dark side, but it is true …
fruit of bitterness. We secretly celebrate their misfortunes. When something goes
wrong in their life, secretly, we go, “Yeah, saw that coming. Yeah, they’re getting what
they deserve. Yeah, they lost their job because they didn’t have integrity. I could see
that. Yeah, they lost their marriage because there was sin in their marriage, and no
marriage is going to last. Oh, yeah, they’re struggling financially. That’s ‘cause God’s
dishing it out on them, because they’ve got it coming. Oh, yeah,” we secretly celebrate
their misfortunes. And number four, and this is, perhaps, where we see it in most
families, especially around the holidays. Number four is, we bring many people down.
Not only do we hurt ourselves, but we hurt people all around us, and the way we see
this played out in families is, we create what I call very dangerous and strategic
alliances. In other words, “This person hurt me, so I want you to know the whole truth,
and I want you to side with me. Well, you heard their side of the story, but I want you to
hear my side of the story.” We see this in divorces all the time. You know, “Children,
you need to favor me and not my spouse, because my spouse did whatever, and that’s
why we don’t like her,” or, “Here’s some presents. I hope this will make you feel better,
and that you will love me more than someone else.” We form very dangerous strategic
alliances.

Now, here is what I am going to do. I am going to ask you to be very, very honest and
transparent in your own life, and I am going to ask you a question for reflection, and
when I do so, let me just warn you ahead of time. That most often, those who are

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struggling with bitterness, they don’t see it and don’t acknowledge it. Most of the time,
those who have a bitter root growing don’t even acknowledge it in their own lives. How
do you know that’s you? Well, perhaps, if you find yourself rationalizing your thought life
or your behavior, and saying things like, “You know what, Craig? Yeah, whatever, if you
only knew what I’ve been through, then you would understand. You see, my deal is way
different. It’s not like you are talking about. Mine is different, and there’s a reason that
it’s like this.” If that is you, perhaps your eyes could be blinded to the fact that there is a
root of bitterness growing in your heart. You may need to peel away some layers of
pride in order to see there is a dangerous root that could be producing a very poisonous
fruit.

Ask yourself this question. With whom, or at what are you bitter? With whom, or at
what are you bitter? Could be it’s someone you work with. It just gets under your skin.
It’s always cutting you out of a deal that’s taking your ideas and getting credit for them.
It’s the brown noser that always says the right thing, and that’s, in front of you, and acts
some way different in front of somebody else. It could be your friend, a close friend that
you grew up. You were there for your friend, but one day when you needed your friend,
your friend wasn’t there for you. Or, maybe your friend told a lie about you, or said
something about you and it hurt you. Could be that you and your friend were close, and
then things in your friend’s life changed, and then all of a sudden, you were kind of
unnecessary. Your friend’s kind of gone on and seems too good for you, and that hurts
deeply. Some people are incredibly bitter toward mom and dad, toward their parents.
Many of you, you’re grown and you’ve got kids of your own, and you’re still carrying
bitterness toward your parents. One of the most common places we will find that is
around divorce. “Well, if dad had done this and not that, then they would have stayed
together and wouldn’t have messed up my life. Well, if mom hadn’t been so whatever,
then things … you know, if they hadn’t been alcohol in the home, and if my parents
hadn’t been this way or that way…” Many are bitter, even to this day. The root of
bitterness. “Well, if they just weren’t so immature, then maybe we could have a holiday
like grownups.” Maybe someone didn’t repay you. You let them borrow something or
some money, and they just kind of took advantage of you. Maybe, and this is where it’s
really sad, you’re bitter toward your husband or your wife. The better half has become
the bitter half, and rather than being really married, it’s kind of more like a convenient
arrangement. “Then we’ll stay together for the kids and we’ll kind of share the bills, but
we are more like roommates than we are husband and wife. But, you see, what you
don’t understand is old so-and-so did something to me years ago that really, really hurt,
and I’m still holding that against them. You see, I’ve got a bitter root, but I don’t want to
acknowledge it.” Or, you know, “She doesn’t appreciate anything that I do.” Or, “He
doesn’t appreciate all that I do. He just thinks that he is so great and I’m doing all the
hard work.” Root of bitterness. Perhaps, there are those of you that you are bitter at
God. “God, if You were really good, then You wouldn’t allow this to happen in my life.

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God, if You had only answered my prayer, then I wouldn’t be in this place. God, I’m not
even sure that You exist, and if You do, I don’t like the way that You are doing things.” Is
that too real for you? Some people are bitter at themselves, made some bad decisions,
and you are living with it today, and you hate yourself for the decisions that you made.
Wrestle with it. Peel away the pride and ask yourself, “With whom or at what am I
bitter?”

Now, as you do that, let’s shift gears for a minute. I need to get something off of my
chest. You guys at Edmond, High Octane, Tulsa, Stillwater, you guys participate. How
many of you know that there is a Biblical way to handle yourselves at four-way stop
signs? How many of you know that? Raise your hands. Raise your hands. Raise
yours up. See, many of you don’t know that, and that’s a shame, because if you don’t
know, chances are you are ignorantly living in sin, okay? Let me just unpack this. You
pull up to a four-way stop sign, there’s some Biblical rules of etiquette. For instance,
when you pull up, if you are the first on to pull up, when you stop, and I’m not talking
about a little rolling stop like some of you try to do, we’re talking stop and your car even
rocks back a little bit. At that point, whoever stops backwards indicates you stop first.
Whoever stops first, then owns the right of way and you are allowed to go first. Now,
watch out for the evil ones out there, who don’t know Christ. What they’ll do is, they’ll
try to pull up, and they’ll try to pretend like they don’t see you, and you’ve already
stopped and pulled backwards, and then they’ll try to roll the stop. That is wrong, and
they will answer to God for that. If you were there, you’ve got some options. You are in
control. God has anointed and blessed your life. Option number one is, you take the
street and you go. It is your divine right, and you can do that anytime you want, or if you
are feeling generous and Christ-like instead, you can choose. It’s your choice. You can
choose to wave them on, but it’s your choice. Now, when you wave them on, you can
either wave them like this, or you can, if you’re cool, you can give them a little head nod
like that. If you’re on the receiving end of a polite wave on, you must give the courtesy
“thank you.” Thank you. If you do not give a courtesy thank you, again, you are in sin
and you will answer to God. You never take it when someone else has the right. They
take it and go by without a courtesy thank you. That is wrong. Thank you for letting me
get that off my chest.

So, here I was, bitter and angry at this guy saying thing about me. I’m running over in
my mind, “Who does he think he is doing all this kind of stuff. If I ever see him, this is
what I’m going to say to him. Scripture says to lay hands on people.” Anyway, so I’m
bitter and I’m driving home, and I pull up to this stop sign, and I stop. Stop, roll back, I
got it. This other guy pulls up a good second after I do. I’m not feeling Christ-like. I’m
not giving him a wave on. Instead, he ignores me, and he starts to pull out in front of
me, and all of a sudden, I realize I am God’s instrument of justice in His life, and I
decide inside, there’s not way he’s beating me across the street. How many of you

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have ever been there? Yeah, you’re sick, too. Okay, he starts to go and I pull out. He,
then, looks up at me. I’m in my Suburban with, of all things, a LifeChurch license plate
on the front of it, but I don’t even let that ruin my day. I’m taking a nap. He looks at me
as if to say, “Are we going to play chicken?” I’m like, “Don’t you play chicken with this
pastor on this day,” and so, I go. He goes. We get really close. Finally, he chickens
out, swerves off the side of the road. I go by with a big smile on my face. Why?
Because I beat him, and he gave me the signal, proving that I’m number one. [laughter]
And for a minute, I felt great, and for the rest of the week, I felt like I really was
incredibly small and sinful.

Now, you laugh about this, but the more serious issue is, I was letting a guy that I didn’t
even know, and didn’t even know me, affect my attitude, my witness, and even my
marriage, because there was a root of bitterness that had grown in my heart. I was
replaying it, rehearsing it, and it was showing itself in a poisonous fruit. That’s where
some of you are right now. You can’t see it, and I want to tell you. There is poisonous
fruit coming out, and you don’t even know it. It’s time to deal with the root of bitterness,
and the longer you allow that root to grow, the more difficult it will be to kill. Today, in the
presence of God, by the power of His Spirit and His living word, God will kill the root of
bitterness. How does God do it? Ephesians 4:31-32, help me out. The Bible says to,
“Get rid of all,” what? “To get rid of all bitterness, rage …” That word can actually be
translated road rage. Just joking. Okay, “Get rid of all bitterness, rage, anger, brawling
and slander, along with every form of malice.” Verse 32, “Be kind and,” what? Say it
out loud, “Be kind and compassionate to one another,” doing what? Say it out loud,
“Forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.” How do we kill the root of
bitterness? How does God kill it? Verse 32, with kindness, compassion to one another,
forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.” Here is our prayer, clean and
simple. Kill bitterness with compassion.

“God, in my heart, kill bitterness with compassion.” Verse 32, “Be kind and
compassionate to one another.” Now, this Greek word that’s translated as
compassionate is also regularly translated as tenderhearted, and I like that. Be
tenderhearted toward one another. Now, the truth is, whenever there is a root of
bitterness growing in our lives, the fruit starts with a cold and a hardening heart. If you
are bitter towards someone right now, I can guarantee you, your heart is growing cold
toward them. “God, give me compassion. Help me to feel for them.” And, what I
started to do for this guy is, when I realized it was a problem, I started to pray for him.
Very sincerely, I prayed, “God, I pray that You would bless this guy,” and I’ll tell you,
when you are praying for someone, God may not change them, but God always seems
to change you. That’s what God started to do for me, and I prayed for him that God
would answer his prayers and that he would see God’s favor, and that God would bless
him in every single way. And, let me tell you what happened. My heart that was

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growing increasingly hard toward him started to soften, and God gave me a tender
heart, and all of a sudden, I had insight into what made this guy tick, and when I had
insight, it made me hurt for him rather than being mad at him. You see, this guy
believed that he was called to ministry, and he wanted to do what I was doing. And
because of his own sinful actions, he disqualified himself, at least temporarily, from
doing what I’m doing now, so in all reality, chances are he wasn’t really, really mad at
me as much as he was mad at himself. And, he was hurt. I just happened to be the
closest and best target for him to shoot at. He was a very hurt person, and what we
know about hurt people is this. Hurt people hurt people. That’s what they do, and when
I saw him as a person who was hurting, it softened the edge of anger and it gave me
compassion toward him. It makes me to genuinely care about him and to be able to
pray for his well-being and his standing with God. “God, kill bitterness with
compassion.”

The second thing that we pray is, “God, kill bitterness with forgiveness. Kill bitterness
with forgiveness.” Scripture tells us this, that forgiving each other, just as in Christ, God
forgave you. Forgiveness is not an elective course in Christianity. It is required, and we
are to forgive others as God has forgiven us. Now, this is where some of you are going
to wig out on me, and you are going to say, “But Craig, if you knew what I’ve been
through, you wouldn’t want to forgive. If you knew the deep, intense pain that I’ve
experienced …” Maybe, you are not bitter with what someone did with you. A deeper
bitterness is often what someone did to someone that you love, and you are incredibly
bitter that someone hurt someone that you love. “Craig, if someone did that around
you, you wouldn’t want to forgive, either.” Well, you know what? You may be right, but
my opinion doesn’t matter as much as God’s word, and God’s word tells me. How am I
to forgive? The same way that I’ve been forgiven. And no matter how deeply that I
have been hurt by other people, every time I measure the weight of their sin against me
vs. the weight of my sin against God. Every single time, the weight of my sin infinitely
outweighs the weight of anyone’s sin against me. I am to forgive others as God has
freely forgiven me, and so are you.

I heard a story that I thought was interesting. It was told of a couple of monks, who
lived several hundred years ago, and they were part of a monastery, where they were
not allowed to touch women … which is a decent argument for not being a monk, but
that is a whole another story. And so, anyway, these guys were not allowed to touch
women, and they went to a long journey across from one town to another, and they
came up to this big, flowing river. And at the river, there was this older lady, who was
rather frail and kind of weak, and she was afraid to cross the river, and she said, “Would
you help me get across?” And, you know, one monk said, “No, we can’t do that,” and
the other monk thought for one minute, and prayed, and said, “God, what would You
have me do?” And he felt like God would have him to help this older lady to get across

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the river, so sure enough, he said, “Ma’am, why don’t you hop up on my back?” and she
did, and he helped take her across the river carefully, and when she got to the other
side, she was just overjoyed and overflowing with gratefulness, and she gave him a
great big hug and said, “Thank you so much.” And he felt like he had honored what
God had wanted him to do. Well, the second monk was furious! Couldn’t believe that
he had actually defiled himself by touching the opposite sex, and so for several miles as
they walked on, the second monk just refused to talk with the first, wouldn’t even speak.
And so finally, the first monk said, “What’s your deal? Why won’t you talk to me?” And
the second monk said, “I cannot believe you touched a woman and allowed her to touch
you.” And the first monk said, with all sincerity and compassion, he said, “With all due
respect, I sat her down miles ago, and yet, you still carry her in your heart.”

What if there’s a hurt or a wound that God would say to you, you should have set down
miles ago? Years ago, but you still carry it in your heart. It’s time to set it down. It’s
time to lay it down. The root of bitterness absorbs, stores, and grows. Then, one day, it
produces a poisonous fruit. I love my family so much, my extended family, and we’re
not perfect. We are just regular old folks, and we’ve had our share of struggles, but
what I have noticed is the common ingredient in the struggles has often been me. And
I’ve been more a part of the problem than I have been a part of the solution, and so
have many of you. So, God’s word speaks directly to me, and His word tells me this,
that I am to make every effort to do at all possible, to live at peace with all people. I
need to make sure that no root of bitterness grows up within my heart to defile many
and to cause trouble. So, my prayer is very simple. “Clean and clear my heart of all
bitterness, God. I don’t want to be bitter by Your power, I want to be better.”

“God, clean and clear my heart from all bitterness.” How does a root of bitterness start
in our lives? Before we are hurt, we are completely clean and clear, and then, one day,
someone may say something to hurt us, maybe reject us, and all we do is experience
one drop of pain, and all of a sudden, our whole life is colored by the pain, which grows
into bitterness. One drop of bitterness can stain, contaminate, or pollute your whole life.
What is the answer? Scripture tells us this, to get rid of all bitterness. How do we do it?
We pray to God to clean and clear our hearts, to give us a compassionate heart for
others to teach us, by the power of the Holy Spirit, to forgive others as Christ has
forgiven us, and by the washing of the watering of the word of God and by the power of
the Holy Spirit, all hurts can be overcome and once again, your life can be clean and
clear.