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"The Difference Between Bitter and Sweet" [ Selected ] May 10, 2003 I've eaten a few plums in my life, but I never found it particularly inspiring or educational. But, one of our Team members ate a plum recently and got an insight that I found enlightening! When she bit into that plum, it tasted very sweet. It didn't stay that way. The closer my friend got to the center, the more bitter the plum tasted. She explained to me her simple, but probably accurate, theory about this bittersweet taste experience. She said what the sun has touched is sweet ... what the sun hasn't touched is bitter. I guess, in a way, I'm that plum. You're that plum. We've got parts of our personality, our ways of treating people, our ways of responding to stress that are actually pretty sweet---and then, there are those parts that are bitter for us and certainly bitter for the people close to us. Once we open our life to Jesus Christ, we have divine power available to help change those harsh, distasteful parts of us into something beautiful. It's part of that miracle 2 Corinthians 5:17 calls becoming "a new creation in Christ." I can tell you from my own life - the parts of me that are becoming sweeter are the parts of me that I have opened up to the "sunlight" of Jesus Christ. And those things about me that I don't like, the people around me don't like and God doesn't like, are the areas where I need to more fully open up to Jesus' control. The people we love, the people around us, the people who are affected by us most, would probably be able to provide a pretty good list of the "bitter" parts of our personality and our responses. That's the list that needs to become top priority for surrender to Jesus Christ. It's a matter of calling the ugly parts of us what they are---no more defending, no more excusing---and saying, "Jesus, here it is. Come into this stubborn, sinful part of who I am and shine Your light on it. I can't change it, but I don't want to be this way anymore. Make me new!!" In our word for today from the Word of God, He helps us see some specific attitudes and actions and approaches that are bitter stuff---and then, what we can be like, if we'll remove the walls around those areas of our life. Colossians 3, beginning with verse 8, says, "Rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator ... Therefore, as God's chosen people ... clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience." The powerful reality about belonging to Jesus is, that we don't have to keep on being what we've always been ... maybe even what generations before us have been. Jesus changes people in ways they could never change themselves. But there may be a reason that our bitter, has stayed bitter. Instead of repenting and surrendering it to Jesus, we just keep looking for someone to blame for the way we are. We keep replaying the past, complaining, recruiting sympathy, retaliating for what others have done. But we're not letting the Son---the Son of God---shine on it. It's time to open up our ugly side to Jesus. Release it completely to Him for Him to make us like Him! There's a Gospel song that says, "The longer I serve Him, the sweeter He grows." Let's add a verse: "The longer we serve Him, the sweeter we grow."
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"A Word With You" by Ron Hutchcraft is a daily radio challenge, with slice-of-life illustrations and insights - providing practical help on the issues that matter most. If your local Christian radio station does not air "A Word With You," please let them know how much you value this program. Over six years of transcripts are available online, at http://www.gospelcom.net/rhm/awwy/ Ron Hutchcraft Ministries is a member of the Gospel Communications Network - "A Word With You" is a production of:
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