Category: Inspiration

The Root of Bitterness and the Grace of Forgiveness

On By Bp. Justin ElwellIn Applied Theology, InspirationLeave a comment

“The heart knows its own bitterness” (Prov. 14:10).

There are pains carried deep within the human heart that no other person can fully comprehend. Even those closest to us may only see the outward expression of inward sorrow. Hidden wounds, disappointments, betrayals, fears, and griefs often remain buried beneath the surface. Solomon reminds us that each heart carries its own bitterness, known fully only to the Lord.

We live in a time where bitterness easily takes root. Political strife divides families and congregations. Financial pressures create anxiety and resentment. Emotional wounds from rejection, abandonment, betrayal, or misunderstanding linger long after the moment has passed. Many carry silent pain that has never truly been brought into the healing light of the Lord’s presence.

Scripture warns us carefully about the danger of allowing bitterness to remain unchecked: “See to it that no root of bitterness springs up and causes trouble, and by it many become defiled” (Heb. 12:15). Bitterness is rarely stagnant. Like a hidden root beneath the soil, it grows quietly and spreads deeply. What begins as a wound can become resentment. Resentment can become anger. Anger can eventually poison relationships, distort judgment, and harden the heart.

The tragedy is that bitterness rarely harms only the one who carries it. It spreads outward into families, friendships, congregations, and communities. A bitter spirit often creates more pain than the original wound itself.

This is why the apostle Paul exhorts believers so strongly: “Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you” (Eph. 4:31–32; cf. Col. 3:13).

Forgiveness is the antidote to bitterness.

Not superficial forgiveness that simply ignores pain, but forgiveness deeply rooted in faith in Messiah. The forgiveness extended to us through Christ becomes the foundation from which we learn to release others. We forgive because we ourselves have been forgiven. We release because the Lord has released us from a far greater debt (Matt. 6:14-15, Lk. 7:47).

This does not mean wounds are unreal. Scripture never minimizes pain. Hannah is a powerful example of this truth. In 1 Samuel 1:10, she “wept bitterly” under the crushing shame and anguish of barrenness. Her pain was real. Her sorrow was deep. Yet Hannah did not surrender herself to bitterness. She brought her grief, petition, and tears before the Lord. Rather than allowing pain to harden her heart, she poured out her soul in prayer.

There is a profound difference between carrying pain to the Lord and feeding bitterness within ourselves.

This fallen world constantly presents opportunities for bitterness to take hold internally and externally, and the enemy of our soul would like nothing more than to feed a bitter root buried deep within us. Broken relationships, disappointments in ministry, injustice, false accusations, unmet expectations, and personal suffering can all become excuses for allowing bitterness to grow. But this is not what we have been redeemed for. The Lord did not call us out of darkness so that we might become prisoners of resentment.

Instead, we are called to become tenderhearted people shaped by mercy, humility, and forgiveness.

Even suffering itself can become a sanctifying instrument in the hands of the Lord. J.C. Ryle wisely wrote:

“Be patient under the bitterness of the gates of hell. It is all working together for your good. It tends to sanctify. It keeps you awake. It makes you humble. It drives you nearer to the Lord Jesus Christ. It weans you from the world. It helps to make you pray more. Above all, it makes you long for heaven, and say with heart as well as lips, ‘Come, Lord Jesus.’”

What a needed reminder. The Lord does not waste our suffering. Even bitter experiences can become means by which He draws us closer to Himself.

If bitterness has begun to take root in your heart, do not nourish it. Bring it honestly before the Lord, confess it where needed, and bring it into His marvelous light. Lay the wound before Him in prayer as Hannah did. Ask the Holy Spirit to uproot resentment before it grows deeper. Choose forgiveness, even when emotions lag behind obedience. Trust that the grace of God is sufficient not only to forgive sin, but also to heal wounded hearts.

The Lord alone fully knows the bitterness of every heart, and the same Lord alone is able to heal it, “He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds” (Ps. 147:3). 

Maranatha. Shalom. 

A Chisel in the Hands of a Loving God 

On By Bp. Justin ElwellIn Applied Theology, InspirationLeave a comment

It is usually only in hindsight of challenges overcome or when sorrow turns to joy that we recognize how the working of faith has changed us. The often painful process of transformation, the growing pains of maturity, unfolds as the hand of the Lord works in areas of our lives that few people ever see. Having gone a mile or two in this race, I can assure you: He is faithful.

Still, there is something both humbling and instructive in the fact that Abraham was seventy-five years old when the Lord called him out from his father’s house (Gen. 12:4), and yet he was still only at the beginning of his faith formation. The initial call of the Lord did not signal completion; it marked commencement. Too often we assume that calling implies readiness, but in the economy of God, calling initiates a journey of becoming. Abraham stepped out in obedience, but he did not yet fully walk as the man the promise required him to be. His life would be shaped in the tension between trial and triumph, moments of faith alongside moments of faltering, each one serving as a chisel in the hand of God.

The journey to the place the Lord promises is never just about arriving at a destination; it is about being transformed into the kind of person who can dwell there faithfully. The land was real, but so was the inner work. Abraham was not only traveling to a land; he was becoming the man who could inhabit it in covenant with the Lord. Every delay, every test, every apparent contradiction between promise and reality became part of his formation. The famine that drove him to Egypt, the waiting for a son, the testing of his trust, these were not detours but instruments. In the mystery of God’s faithfulness, both trial and triumph serve the same end: maturity.

This is the pattern for all who walk in the path of faith. The call of Messiah Yeshua does not only lead us somewhere new; it leads us into someone new. We are called out, as Abraham was, from what has shaped us, but we are also called into a process that reshapes us. The unknown spaces of obedience are not empty; they are filled with the Lord’s intention. What feels like delay is often preparation. What feels like struggle is often refinement. The promise requires a corresponding formation, because He is not only interested in giving us an inheritance; He is committed to forming in us the character that can carry it.

So the question is not simply whether we have heard the call, but whether we are allowing the journey to do its work within us. Faith matures not in comfort, but in movement, through surrender, through testing, through perseverance, as the apostle Paul writes, “Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope” (Ro. 5:3-4). Like Abraham, we may begin with obedience, but we are invited into something deeper: trust that endures, identity that is reshaped, and a life that reflects the faithfulness of the One who called us. In this way, the journey itself becomes a gift of grace, for through it we are formed into people who can dwell in the promises of the covenant Lord, not merely visit them.

Maranatha. Shalom. 

 

The Dust of Your Rabbi

On By Bp. Justin ElwellIn Applied Theology, InspirationLeave a comment

Many years ago, when I purchased a new iPhone, I seem to recall it being the iPhone X in 2017, I was surprised to discover that it would not sync with my Mac. The new operating system was not backwards compatible. It struck me that, in the faith life, we can face a similar tension. We must be “backwards compatible.” We honor what the Lord has done, remembering His faithfulness, and recognizing the growth rings of our formation (Ps. 77:11), but we must never become “backwards controllable” (Isa. 43:18-19). 

This tension is vividly on display in Numbers 11. Israel, though physically free from Egypt, was not yet spiritually or psychologically free. They were no longer following Pharaoh, but neither were they truly following Moses. Instead, they were following their memories. “We remember the fish we ate in Egypt that cost nothing, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic” (Num. 11:5) they said, longing not for the Lord’s promise, but for their past comforts. Their desires had rooted them in memory, anchoring them to what the Lord had already called them out of. But they were not being shaped by His presence or the leadership of Moses; they were being hardened by what they refused to release. They had left Egypt, but Egypt had not yet left them.

This reveals something essential about the life of faith, or life in general: we are always being formed by something. The question is not whether we are being shaped, but by what, and by whom.

When Messiah says, “Come, follow Me,” He is not offering a casual invitation to observe Him, but a call to imitate Him. Discipleship is not just the transfer of information; it is the transformation of life. This is why Paul can say, “Imitate me,” (Phil. 3:17) and again, “Imitate me as I imitate Christ,” (1 Cor. 11:1). The disciple does not simply learn the teachings of the rabbi; he adopts his way of life. He walks as his teacher walks. He becomes, in time, a living expression of what he has received: a “living epistle,” read by all (2 Cor. 3:2-3). 

In the ancient Jewish world, this idea was captured in a powerful image: to be a disciple was to be “covered in the dust of your rabbi.” This was no small concept. The sages taught, “cover yourself in the dust of their feet,” a call to walk so closely with your teacher that his life settles upon you (Pirkei Avot 1:4; cf. Lk. 10:39; Acts 4:35; 22:3). In a land of dry, unpaved roads, this was not metaphor alone; it was lived reality. As the rabbi walked, his disciples followed close behind, the dust rising from his steps settled upon them. To be covered in that dust was a sign of proximity, devotion, and formation. You were not simply near your teacher; you were being shaped by him.

This image brings clarity to the warning found in Matthew 10:14, where Yeshua instructs His disciples to shake the dust off their feet when leaving a place that rejects them and their message. In Jewish practice, devout Israelites would sometimes shake the dust from their feet when leaving Gentile lands, a symbolic act of separation from what was considered unclean. Yeshua draws on this imagery, not to cultivate pride, but to teach discernment – not everyone we walk with, nor everything we walk through, should be permitted to have formational influence on us. Influence is never neutral. One must not carry the “dust” of every place into the life of discipleship. The issue is not withdrawal from the world, but awareness of what is shaping us as we move through it.

So the questions must be asked: What dust is covering you? And whose voice is still directing your steps?

For Israel, it was the dust of Egypt: the residue of a life they had physically left but inwardly preserved. For us, it may be the dust of our past, the weight of former identities, the pull of cultural expectations, social convention, or even the subtle influence of misdirected orthodoxy. It is possible to walk with the Lord outwardly while still being inwardly shaped by something or someone else entirely.

This is why discipleship must be intentional. In Hebraic thought, learning is never an end in itself. The root ל-מ-ד (lamad) connects learning and teaching. One learns in order to live, and lives in order to teach. Likewise, the concept of avodah (ע-ב-ד), encompassing both work and worship, reminds us that what we do is inseparable from how we serve the Lord. This is not passive discipleship, but intentional, lived obedience before Him. It is a life lived in response to the One we follow.

This balance is beautifully illustrated in the account of Mary and Martha (Lk. 10:38-42). Too often, they are set against one another: Mary as the spiritual ideal, Martha as a cautionary example of distraction. But this is an unnecessary dichotomy. Martha’s service was an expression of devotion, offered within the cultural framework she understood. Mary, however, stepped beyond those expectations, sitting at the feet of Yeshua, taking the posture of a disciple. Remarkably, Yeshua affirmed her.

The lesson is not that one must choose between being Mary or Martha, but that discipleship requires both. But first we are called to sit at His feet, to be formed, instructed, and covered in His dust, Mary’s “good portion,” and then to rise and serve with lives shaped by that formation. Service without formation becomes hollow; formation without service becomes stagnant: “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things.” But when the two are joined, the result is a life that truly reflects our Rabbi, “You will drink my cup…” (Matt. 20:23). 

Israel’s failure in the wilderness was not simply disobedience; it was misdirected formation. They did not walk closely enough with their shepherd to be shaped by him. Instead, they clung to the dust they already carried—they remained “backward controllable.” And so they longed for what the Lord had delivered them from. The voice – and dust – of Pharaoh still directed their steps. We must not make the same mistake.

To follow Messiah is to walk so closely with Him that His life shapes ours as we are covered in His dust (Ro. 8:28-29). It is to allow His words, His ways, and His character to permeate our thinking, our desires, and our actions. It is to be transformed, not by the residue of where we have been, but by the presence of the One we now follow.

The winds of life will always carry dust. Influence is unavoidable. Formation is inevitable. The only question is whether we will be shaped by the dust of our past, or by the dust of our Rabbi.

So walk with Him. Stay near. And let His dust, not the dust of your past, be what forms you.

Maranatha. Shalom.