Jim Van Gelderen: So tonight we're going to look at the book of Hebrews, chapter number 12, and I've entitled the message, The Backsliding of Bitterness.

The Bible tells us in the book of James that the Bible is a mirror.

Now, obviously, we all know a little bit about mirrors because they're something that we use on a daily basis.

I remember several years ago, Brother Micah Schultz was the youth pastor at the time, and I remember he came to me, this was a long time ago, and he said, Brother Van Gelder, I'm going to take the kids up on a camping trip up to the Boundary Waters in the state of Minnesota.

Anybody familiar with the Boundary Waters other than, okay, just okay, a few of you are.

There's a series of lakes in northern Minnesota that go into Canada.

That's all they're called, the boundary waters.

Okay, and if you know what you're doing, you can get in a canoe on the United States side, and you can canoe into Canada without going through customs.

Okay, so if you don't want to sneak into Canada, that's where you go.

If you want to get in without the jab, that's where you go.

Okay, but anyway, so, but anyway, he said, Brother Van Gelden, I'm going to go up there.

It's remote camping, and I want you to come along and be the preacher.

Now, I love to preach, I really do, but I don't like to camp.

You say, why?

Well, my dad's idea of camping was the Holiday Inn.

That's really true.

We didn't camp.

I don't remember one time camping.

I really don't.

I think, well, I say one time maybe I went out with some of the boys from the church on some of the boy programs they had there at Marquette Manor.

But I really didn't do a whole lot of camping.

So I didn't really know how to prepare.

And so I went up to that boundary waters.

And man, it didn't take me long to realize I forgot something I really regretted.

You know what that was?

A mirror.

A mirror.

You ever try to comb your hair in the reflection of a lake?

Doesn't work real well, plus the fact you had to wash your hair in that water, and that water had an orange tint to it, so some of us that don't have body at all, by the end of the week I had body, you know what I'm talking about, hair was like, you know, and I needed that mirror, boy did I regret not having that mirror, now all of us know, a mirror, all it does is tells you you've got problems, have you noticed that, a

mirror doesn't fix your problem just says you've got some big ones, some of you girls this morning, 530, didn't you remember?

Yep, that alarm went off.

Yep, you stumbled down to the bathroom, took one look in the mirror, and said, we got problems.

We've got big problems.

You got out the plaster of Paris, you got out the paint, you began out the tool kit, you began reconstructing.

Hey, don't smile, it's gonna crack, it's gonna crack wide open.

Okay, don't smile.

Okay, yeah.

Okay, you get the idea.

And so, that's what happened.

Most of you girls, you came up, everybody thought, okay, all the girls look pretty this morning.

And some of you guys, what happened?

Alarm went off, 7 to 15, took one look in the mirror, and you came.

We could tell.

We could tell.

Yeah.

Mirror didn't do you a lot of good, did it?

Yeah.

So the problem with a mirror is it doesn't necessarily fix you, but it sure shows you that you need to be fixed.

I mean, some of you walked in the bathroom during the day.

I'm not trying to be gross, but it is teenagers.

Something's hanging out of your nose.

You know what I'm talking about?

I'm telling you.

That mirror revealed you got a problem.

Some of you, life was over at that moment.

You know, I'm talking about I cannot go back and face the general population.

But the point is, a mirror does reveal we've got issues.

Now, the one difference between the Bible and the mirror in the restroom down the hallway here is that the Bible, that mirror can fix you.

So, tonight we're going to look in the mirror of the Word of God.

And I will tell you this, honestly, young people, if you are bitter, if you are bitter, you will see yourself in Hebrews chapter 12.

because God wrote it.

And He knows what happens with bitterness.

Now, I've had the privilege of 40 years now, it's hard to believe, 40 years preaching to teenagers.

Now, I will be honest with you, sometimes I'm kind of slow on picking stuff up, but over the years I've come to realize something.

The number one problem our team counsels on a regular basis is the issue of bitterness.

It's number one.

Number two of the moral issues, like I preached on them just a few hours ago, I think that probably is close to bitterness, it's just less likely to be brought up than bitterness.

But it's definitely an issue with the dysfunction of our day, some of the selfishness that has been in our homes.

There's a lot of potential and possibility of hurt, and as a result of infection, which I believe spiritually speaking is bitterness.

Now if you're bitter this evening, I promise you this, you will see yourself in the Word of God, but you'll also see the solution.

So let's begin in verse number 14 if you would please.

The Bible says, follow peace with all men, and holiness without which no man shall see the Lord.

Now that word follow is the main verb there, of course it's the command, and to follow there is not a casual pursuit.

All of us out here, you don't understand sometimes we have a casual pursuit, that's kind of what the brewers do when they try to pursue the World Series, it's a casual pursuit, but anyway, that was supposed to be funny, but anyway, but this word actually is a relentless pursuit.

I mean it is all in.

In the animal kingdom I would see it as a big cat.

I don't know if you've ever gone to a National Geographic video or something like that and watched a big cat bring down its prey.

Why do we like that kind of stuff?

I don't know.

But anyway, yeah, and that's the idea.

Boy, that cat is relentless until it brings down lunch.

Now that's the idea of the word pursue.

Here's what God says, I want you to follow peace, could you tell me with how many?

All men.

I want to ask every young person here a simple question.

Are you at peace with your mother?

Are you at peace with your father?

Are you at peace with the dad you've never met?

Are you at peace with the dad who walked?

Are you at peace with the dad who divorced your mother?

Are with that next door neighbor.

The Bible says you've got to be at peace.

You need to pursue it.

Peace with all men.

And notice he says and holiness without which no man shall see the Lord.

So not are we pursuing peace with all men, we're pursuing a holy attitude.

And that's another thing.

Do you have any resentment towards someone that maybe has wronged you or hurt you?

Do you have any blame?

Yeah, that person really ruined my life.

Do you have any unholy attitude, ill will?

Yeah, that person man, I wish I could get back at him.

Okay, God says these need to be pursued.

We need to pursue peace with all men and a holy attitude toward all men.

Okay, so you see where God's going there.

And then we have in verse number 15, we have a participle.

Did I tell you English was important?

If I told you that yet, I can't remember.

Okay, yes.

Yeah, I have a participle off the main verb.

Isn't that good stuff?

Infinitives and participles and that all good stuff.

That's a lot of fun, isn't it?

Okay, it actually is.

It's great stuff.

I'm trying to motivate you young people.

Okay, get to school, learn that stuff.

It'll help you when you study the Bible.

Okay, looking diligently comes off the main verb, follow peace with all men, looking diligently.

Lest any man fail the grace of God.

Lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby many be defiled.

Lest there be any fornicator or profane person as Esau.

Did you notice something?

I think you noticed that little connector word, lest.

I see it as a downward progression.

God You need to pursue holiness, a holy attitude toward the people who've wronged you, and without which no man will see the Lord.

You'll not have a walk with God without it.

And so he says, okay, pursue peace with all men, holiness without which no man shall see the Lord.

And you need to follow peace, looking diligently lest any man fail of the grace of God.

Now if you fail the grace of God, lest there be any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby many be defiled.

Then, lest there be any fornicator or profane person.

You see it, it's a downward progression.

That's why I called it the backsliding of bitterness.

Now God says the first thing we've got to do is we've got to pursue peace with all men, looking diligently, and let's look at these three steps downward.

And then we'll come back and we will look at what the mirror's solution is.

Okay, it says, lest any man fail of the grace of God.

Now you say, preacher, what does it mean to fail the grace of God?

Well, there's a couple of words we've got to deal with.

The first one is the grace of God.

You know, you can go to church all your life and hear the word grace.

There are many people that go to a grace Baptist church and have no idea what grace is.

Just the word is used so often, I think sometimes we don't even really know what it means.

But the very essence of grace means it's a gift.

You cannot buy grace.

You cannot work for grace.

You cannot earn grace.

If you ever get grace, it's because it was given to you.

So grace is given to us from Almighty God.

Now you say, well preacher, how do you know what grace is?

Now grace can be tangible.

There's no doubt God gives us tangible things.

Have you ever heard of that?

Give us this day our daily bread.

Okay, yeah, there are tangible things God graces us with.

Have you ever sat down in a meal and somebody says grace?

Okay, so we understand a little bit about tangible things God gives us.

I think all of us in this room say for any length of time, No, there's tangible things.

God clearly has given us.

But that clearly is not the emphasis of grace.

The emphasis of grace is the things you can't see.

So you say, well, preacher, how can I benefit by something I can't see?

Well, let me just give you a few ideas what grace is.

You know, there's many different nuances.

Grace is when God intersects with man.

Grace is when God gives you what you do not deserve.

Grace is supernatural.

Ah, grace would be the fruit of the Spirit.

Grace is a supernatural love for somebody that's hard to love.

Grace would be a joy when you're going through a tough time.

Grace would be peace in the midst of the storm.

Are you tracking to me what grace is?

Grace happens when I see a teenager walk into a principal's office and confess he's been cheating.

And all of a sudden God walks through the door.

Yeah, that's called grace.

Grace is supernatural strength to enable you in time of temptation or in time of ministry when you need a divine intervention.

Grace is God working in your life in an undeserved way, which always is undeserved.

Are you catching what grace is?

Now, every day of your Christian life, God is gracing you.

Several years ago, we were conducting one of our ministry weeks in North Charleston, South Carolina.

And I remember as we were there, it was our testimony service on a Friday night.

There was a young man who had walked over from a rough section of town, and he walked over every night.

Remember when our testimony service, he stood to his feet, I will never forget his testimony.

This was given in 1994, that's 30 years ago.

As he stood to his feet, he smiled real big, and he said, on Wednesday night, he said, I got saved.

He said, man, and if you're not saved, you need to get saved, because getting saved is like having Christmas every day.

And do you know what I thought when he said that?

That kid understands the Christian life more than, better than most Christians I know.

You say, you know, hey, preacher, I'm glad I'm saved going to heaven, but hey, I have to admit, My Christian life's not like Christmas every day.

Well, can I tell you, from God's perspective it is, you know what your problem is?

You're not opening the presents.

Every day, God gives you grace.

Sometimes it's joy.

Sometimes it's peace in a storm.

Sometimes it's strength to have victory in your life or strength to win somebody to Jesus, supernatural wisdom in a time when you don't know what to do.

God has given you more grace than you can use.

You say, how do you know that?

He says, my grace is sufficient for thee.

I like what one Christian author has said, that's more than enough, more than enough.

God gives you so much grace, you can't open it all, okay?

And He does it every day of your Christian life.

So God is constantly giving us the supernatural intervention that we need to live the Christian life.

But you know what many Christians do?

They fail it.

You say, preacher, how do you fail grace?

Here's the point, you don't open it.

You know what happens when you don't open a present?

It doesn't do you any good.

Let's imagine I came over to your house for whatever reason.

Maybe to see your pet iguana or maybe to see your baseball card collection or whatever.

But I come over to your house, walk through the door.

Here it is in October.

And I look around the living room and there I see it.

There's a stack of Christmas presents.

Now I can tell they're Christmas presents.

You know why?

They got bells on them.

They got holly on them.

They got wreaths on them.

They got the big fat guy in the red suit.

You know what I'm talking about.

They have Rudolph with his big red snog.

They are clearly Christmas presents, angels, whatever, no doubt.

I'm kind of stunned.

I'm thinking, as the lady of this house named Martha Stewart, what's going on?

I mean, all these Christmas presents here, it's October.

So I look at you a little puzzled, and I said, what's that?

I point to all the Christmas presents, and you kind of laugh a little bit and say, well, those are Christmas presents from last Christmas.

We'll get around to opening them sooner or later.

Now, would you find that to be odd?

teenagers in the house, oh, it's not going to happen.

Do you know if that were to be the case, all those presents would not be doing you any good.

You could have a brand new smartphone, and it wouldn't be doing you any good.

And now, 10 months later, the thing's a dinosaur.

You know what I'm talking about?

Totally worthless.

Okay, but there it is.

Yeah, you could have a nice gift card to Dunkin' Donuts or to Tim Hortons, certainly not to Starbucks.

But anyway, you could have a nice gift card, and it wouldn't be doing you any good.

So, what do you have to do to make those gifts beneficial, to benefit your life?

And the answer is pretty simple, isn't it?

You have to open them.

Do you know every day of your Christian life, I want you young people to understand this, you feel like God's a million miles away.

The truth is, today He gave you all kinds of gifts, you just didn't open them.

You just did not open them.

Some of you in this room, God seems a million miles away, and I feel sorry for you, because you've got presents everywhere, and you don't realize God's given you everything you need to live the Christian life.

And it's a wonderful thing.

Okay, so you say, Preacher, I'm getting it, but how do you open something you can't see?

I get opening something you can see.

I'm good at that.

But I don't know about this opening something I can't see.

Great question, isn't it?

How do you open something you can't see?

How many of you saved on your way to Heaven and you have the gift of eternal life?

Could you just put your hand right up and right back down, not trying to embarrass anybody, right up, right back down?

Okay, how did you get that gift of eternal life?

I'm going to tell you how you got it.

Okay, you can't see eternal life.

You had to unwrap it in a way that was not material.

How did you do that?

You can't see eternal life.

Well, I'm telling you, friend, here's how you did it.

For by grace, oh, there's our word, are you saved, anybody know, through all.

Yeah, there was the day when you realized you were a hell-bound sinner, you needed Jesus, and the best you knew how, you cried out and trusted Jesus to do what you couldn't do.

And the moment you did that, guess what?

You opened eternal life.

And you know what happens when you have eternal life?

you will have it for eternity, otherwise it wouldn't be eternal life.

You got it forever.

You can't lose it.

And you got it, why?

How?

By trusting Him.

Now don't miss this.

If you opened your first grace by believing God, you open all the rest of the grace by believing God.

So you say, well, preacher, how do you fail grace?

It's real simple.

By not believing God.

You say, preacher, what are you talking about?

You know, bad things happen in life.

Some of you young people have grown up in wonderful homes.

You have a good relationship with your parents.

You ought to be grateful for it.

But I want to tell you something, life's rough.

Sooner or later, you're going to get hurt.

Somebody's going to say or do something that's going to be difficult.

Some of you don't come from decent homes, and you've got a lot of things you've had to work through.

And I'm going to tell you, here's what happens when somebody wrongs you.

Here's what happens when pain comes into your life and difficulty.

Here, you've got two choices.

You can either think, wow, man, that stinks.

That rots.

Why did my dad say that?

Why'd that have to happen?

Man, why did mom, why did, man, why'd that person, whatever, you can do that.

And do you know what that's called?

Unbelief.

And do you know what's going to happen?

Well, when it comes to supernaturally, nothing.

Now, you've got another response.

You say, God, that hurts.

God, that was really hard.

God, that was really difficult.

But Lord, I'm trusting you to take all these things and work them together for good.

You know what that's called?

Faith.

And when you express faith in God to take your difficult circumstances and that He's big enough and wise enough to take other people's sinful choices, which He had nothing to do for, weave them into your life to accomplish the will of God, it is that moment you are starting to unwrap grace.

And God will begin to supernaturally work in your life, lift you, and give you what you never could imagine.

you see you'll open grace by believing God but I'm getting ahead of myself let's go back to the negative you fail grace by doubting God that rots that seems to me so man I'm gonna get back that person man why'd they do that to me okay now what happens when you do that look at the next one last any root of bitterness bringing up trouble you and thereby many be defiled so the next step down is what?

Bitterness troubles you.

I've noticed this in working with teenagers and some adults.

Bitter teenagers are always troubled.

They're always troubled.

But the wicked are like the troubled sea when it cannot rest.

Whose water is cast up mire and dirt.

Have you guys ever heard of hurricanes?

I don't know if you ever have.

But anyway, yeah.

Recently we've had a couple of hurricanes in this country.

And I understand particularly when they come over shallow waters, guess what they do?

They stir up the bottom of the ocean.

and it stirs things up.

The Bible says that's just like the heart of a troubled teenager in this room.

Troubles you.

And you know you're troubled.

And you're not at peace.

I remember several years ago I was in South Carolina in a large Christian school.

We were doing our trash ball game and we were on a gym floor and I was surprised they didn't want us to put a tarp down because it was a beautiful wood floor with the surface that it had there.

And I remember we were playing the game and there was one young man who was clearly the school clown.

And he was falling out of his chair and goof around, scratched up the floor.

It was a big deal.

I kind of wondered why, because he was clearly, it was all about him.

It kind of hindered what we were trying to do.

I didn't really address it that day, but I never forget that Friday night when that young man stood at the testimony service, tears streaming down his face as he confessed to the student body how bitter he was at God.

And there was a connection.

I'm not saying all class clowns are bitter, but some of them are.

They're troubled.

It's the way they kind of hide the hurting heart.

And most of you know this, that some of the funniest people in American history, comedians, have been some of the most miserable people you and I could ever know about.

It was their way to cope with all the trouble, all the storm in their soul.

And some of you tonight are troubled because that's what bitterness does.

It troubles you.

But not only does it trouble you, the Bible says it defiles many.

Now one thing about bitterness, it never stays with you.

I find this, I tell this to young people all the time.

I think many young people out here, how many have younger siblings?

Can I see your hands please?

Younger siblings, a lot of you do.

Now I'm not trying to be in kind, but I'm trying to help you.

If you're bitter, you know what often bitter teenagers do?

They're all upset because somebody's wronged them, and sometimes they have been wronged, sincerely so.

But then they turn around and treat younger brothers and sisters like trash.

Completely blind to their double standard.

I'm talking to some of you who treat younger brothers and siblings like total dirt.

Completely blind to the fact of what you're doing.

Bitterness causes you to defile many.

Doesn't just defile the person with it, it defiles other people.

By things you say, things you do, inconsistencies.

Bitterness is a bad deal.

It's like this.

Several years ago, had a young lady come forward or come to me after the service at a Christian school in the state of South Carolina.

And she said, Brother Van Gelden, can I talk to you?

Very cavalier.

No emotion.

I said, yeah, sure.

She said, I'm adopted.

She said, my mother who adopted me has said to me on several occasions, I wish I'd never adopted you.

Now let's just stop and say, that's rough.

That's rough.

I remember looking in and I said, young lady, you're in a crisis.

I said, either you'll get bitter and one day do the very same thing to your children, or you can access the grace of God and stop the mess.

I want to tell you something friends, that's often what happens is bitterness comes in your own life and if you're not careful you'll transfer it to the next generation.

Do you know what bitter teenagers become?

Angry parents.

Do you know what angry parents produce?

Bitter teenagers.

Do you know what bitter teenagers become?

Angry parents.

Do you know what angry parents produce?

Bitter teenagers.

Do you know what on.

Many times when I'm dealing with a teenager, I'll ask him, is your dad angry?

Yeah.

Is your grandfather angry?

Yeah.

And pretty soon the light bulbs are starting to come on.

That's exactly what you'll be if you don't get a hold of the grace of God.

God's grace is bigger than that.

You don't have to reproduce it.

God's bigger than that, friends.

But I'll tell you what bitterness is.

That's why the mirror is so good, isn't it?

It says it defiles many.

You get bitter, you will defile others.

Now, the Bible moves on to a next step.

And it then says something stunning, lest there be any fornicator or profane person.

Now how did we get to seem like two unrelated sins?

Fornication and profane person.

How did we get there?

Well God took us there.

The third step God says is this, when a young man or young lady becomes bitter, they open themselves up to two really bad things.

Now I've done this for a long time, so I've got a large sample size, and I will simply say the word or is stunning.

It doesn't say and.

Less there between any fornicator and profane person.

It says or.

I found practically speaking it is one or the other.

Either a young person moves toward moral impurity like we talked about a few hours ago or they move toward becoming a profane person.

I'm talking to young men in this room do not even realize it.

But the reason you're hooked on looking on filth is because there's bitterness in your heart.

Perhaps toward a dad.

I've said this statistic so much I hate to repeat it, but it's so stunning to me.

Remember years ago when I read Pure Desire by Dr.

Ted Roberts, I was stunned by the statistic in the book.

He has counseled thousands of men who have been in sexual addictions and all kinds of failure in that regard.

And he said 98% of the men he has counseled have deep father wounds in their souls.

You know what he's saying?

They're bitter.

Unresolved bitterness in the heart.

And it has opened the door to fornication.

The word fornication interesting Greek word.

It's the word pornos.

You probably recognize the very word.

Combine it with the word graphe, which means to write.

You've got a modern day word we use.

But the word pornos itself has two major definitions.

One is premarital sexual activity.

The other one is the whole arena of moral filth.

Anything immoral, it includes it in the word.

Clearly to me, the second definition is in view.

In they open themselves up to the whole arena of moral filth.

Sometimes it can be gender issues.

Sometimes it can be fornication in the first sense of the word.

Sometimes it can be internet issues.

But it can manifest itself in all kinds of different ways.

Now the reason I'm bringing this up, because there are probably young men and young ladies in this room who have found themselves in moral bondage if you wondered, how did I get here?

Oh, you can remember perhaps being unwise when you were tempted or somebody showed you something or it came across you inadvertently.

I get all that.

But you know what I will say for many of you in this room?

That what happened was bitterness fueled it.

You didn't even know it, did you?

Bitterness fuels moral impurity.

And for some of you in this room, this connection, this light bulb moment may be the very thing you need to deal with.

Some of you need to deal with bitterness tonight.

That's the way out.

You start with that issue.

And that bitterness towards your dad that walked, I'm telling you, I have seen kids with hatred in their eyes.

Tell me about their hatred toward a man.

Don't miss this.

They have never met.

How can you hate a man you never met?

Well, I know kids who do.

Yeah, where'd my dad go?

Why is he not my life?

Why'd he walk out?

I've never met him.

I'm telling you, friends, that bitterness can fuel some pretty bad stuff.

And what God is trying to help you understand is that the bitterness opens the door to moral failure, But it also, in fact, let me just give you that same young lady who said, her mother said to her, I wish I'd never adopted you.

Later in the week, my wife was counseling her.

I found out she had an unsaved boyfriend, and you can understand things were going on.

And I remember when my wife told me I was grieved and I was burdened.

But can I say this carefully?

I was not shocked at all.

You know why?

That's what bitterness does.

Remember, I had a young lady on our team several years ago and gave a stunning testimony about the fact when she was 12 years old, she got bitter about duplicity in her parents' lives, their hypocrisy.

She said she didn't see the connection at the time, but she began to have a thirst for looking at the wrong kind of things.

And she began to have a thirst for filth.

And at 16, age 16, she went to a camp, got thoroughly right with God and dealt with her bitterness.

She said, amazing, when I got right with God about my bitterness, my thirst for filth was gone.

See, isn't that interesting?

Bitterness opens the door to moral failure.

I want you to understand that, friend.

It's a big deal.

But God doesn't just say fornication.

He says fornicator.

He says profane person.

You say, preacher, what does the word profane mean?

Can I tell you its definition?

Common.

You say, what do you mean common?

You ever heard of profanity?

You know what profanity is?

Taking the exalted name of God and using it as the cuss word.

That's a profane person.

You know what a profane person is?

They have an attitude toward God.

They treat Almighty God like He is common.

In fact, the Bible gives us an example of a profane person because I'm sure some people wouldn't know what a profane person is.

So God gives us in Hebrews 12 an example.

Anybody want to take a guess who the example from the Old Testament is?

Okay, profane person as Esau.

Now what in the world did Esau do to be profane?

Esau, friend, had the birthright.

Esau had the birthright through which the Messiah was going to come.

He gave something eternal, valuable, and spiritual.

And he gave it away.

Anybody know what he traded it for?

He traded it for a bowl of soup.

A bowl of soup.

Yeah, some of you heard me say this.

Yeah, it still happens today.

You say, preacher, I don't know of anybody giving something spiritual, eternal, valuable for a bowl of soup.

Oh yeah, it happens every February.

People stay home from church and watch the Super Bowl.

Did you get that?

Yeah, there it is.

Yeah.

They trade something eternal, spiritual and valuable for a Super Bowl of soup.

Okay, but anyway, you get the idea.

Yeah.

Stretching the exegesis there a little bit.

But anyway, you get the idea.

Just ask Dr.

Paul.

He can figure it out for me.

Okay.

But you know, friends, that's a profane person.

Profane person.

You know what I found about profane?

listen, some of you go to Christian school, when kids complain about Bible class, you can mark this down, they're profane.

When a kid says, why do we have to memorize Scripture?

That's a profane person.

A person that hassles the parents, yeah, why do we have to go to church?

You can mark it down, that's a profane person.