Pulling Up Roots

I confess I was surprised to find it there, one of those evangelical catch phrases that unbelievers don’t understand. I’d heard people confess to the problem, warn about its destructive nature, accuse others of being in its grip- the root of bitterness. And there it was, right in Hebrews 12. I’d read Hebrews many times before, even preached from it multiple times. Somehow I missed this. Had you asked me I would have guessed either the expression came from some Christian counselor or Puritan, or that if it was in the Bible, it would be found in Proverbs.

Hebrews, of course, is written to encourage believing Jews not to turn their back on Jesus to go back to the Egypt of Judaism. Hebrews 12 begins with a “therefore,” followed by instructions for godliness before ending on the glory of our worship. It seems strange to me right in the middle of this we find the warning about roots of bitterness. Until we realize their true nature.

It is perfectly fitting that we would recognize a distinction between horizontal relationships and vertical. Joseph grasped this when he told his fearful brothers regarding their sin against him, “you meant evil against me; but God meant it for good” (Genesis 50:20). In our horizontal relationships we have sinners interacting with sinners. We have wrongdoers doing wrong to wrongdoers who do wrong back. Bitterness in that context half-way makes sense. We are genuinely wronged. But we all genuinely do wrong. In our vertical relationship, however, we are sinners interacting with a holy God. He never does wrong. We never do right. Bitterness in this context half-way makes sense. That is, were God to be bitter toward us.

This distinction between the horizontal and the vertical must never lose sight of the connection between the two. Because God is sovereign, everything we experience from other sinners on the horizontal plane is something He has ordained on the vertical plane. When we forget we find ourselves planting bitter seeds against our Father who loves us. Joseph was able to forgive the genuine wrong of his brothers because of his genuine trust in his Father in heaven.

The recipients of the letter of Hebrews were wrongly rejected by their families and their communities. They were excluded from the temple, banished from their synagogues, shunned by their kin, all for simply recognizing that Jesus was the long awaited Messiah. Who wouldn’t be tempted toward bitterness against those who were doing the rejecting? The danger, however, was that such bitterness would, in the mind of the wronged, implicate the Almighty. How could God allow all this hardship to befall those who are seeking to follow Jesus?

Because that’s what it means to follow Jesus. When we see the faith as a ticket to the good life, when we see our embracing of Christ as a sacrifice we make for His sake, bitterness lurks at the door. When, however, we remember what is our just due, when we remember our calling to pick up our cross daily and die to self, we not only escape the dangerous folly of being bitter toward God but escape the corrosive folly of being bitter toward others. The Hebrews, and we, Gentile children of Abraham, would be wise to remember what we are in ourselves, who we are in Christ, and how much our heavenly Father loves us.