No Going Back

Poisoned by bitterness…Acts 8:23

Unfortunately, there are still too many poisoned by bitterness and bound by iniquity, Acts 8:23. For this reason, we like them, preach the gospel. For Jesus came to set the prisoners free. Free from sin and free from bitterness. 

In both English and Hebrew, the word bitterness carries the idea of anger. Too often, anger that arises from resentment; the unrelenting disappointment of unfair treatment. Too often, people when left to stew in their past become bitter. A bitterness that traps them; imprisons them. These are those Jesus came to set free.

Think about that. We have been invited by Jesus to be His disciples. To follow Him, to learn from Him how to lead people to God. God, who will lovingly free them from the chains of their past. God, who will powerfully set them free. And whom the Son sets free is free indeed, John 8:36.

This is true freedom. Freedom not only from bitterness but freedom from sin. This is who you are: free. For you know the truth, and the truth has set you free, John 8:32. Your debt has been paid. You are free from your sin debt; that is death. 

And let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, and evil speaking be put away from you, with all malice, Ephesians 4:31. Which you have done. Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage, Galatians 5:1. 

Why go back? There is nothing but bondage in our sinful past.