THREE DARK ATTITUDES OF THE HEART
Bitterness-anger-resentment flowed through my veins with every beat of my heart. When you have bitterness in your heart, it tends to consume every part of your mind, body and soul. That is how I felt many years ago when my husband was in a deep depression for two years-every day-every night-all the time.
My last blog I talked about that period of time and how depression can deep-press-on; so I will not go into the details of his depression, but I want to focus on the feelings of bitterness, anger & resentment I felt during that time and how, with God’s help, I got myself out of those feelings. Those feelings were trying to swallow me up, trying to get me to fall into a dark abyss and were hurting me physically.
Webster’s dictionary defines bitter as: “being or inducing the one of the basic taste sensations that is acrid-suggestive of hops (a vine related to the mulberry whose ripe catkins are used in medicine and in flavoring malt liquor)-marked by intensity or severity as of distress or hatred-extremely harsh or cruel-a resentful attitude.” I visualize a baby the first time they try a lemon or a pickle. The way their little faces pucker up showing that they do not like their taste.
Let me give you a little background on why these feelings were trying to trap my spirit and my body. I was working two jobs, gone from home 12 hours every day. Our daughter was a teenager and so involved with so many activities. I was trying to pay the bills and all the things a household requires. My husband rarely helped at home, nor went to activities of our very active, involved daughter and he slept most all day and night. He did not shave or bath very often, which made our home, as our daughter said, smell like a really bad nursing home. I had tried everything: having someone else talk to him about how he was feeling, I tried tears, I tried showing anger, I tried ignoring how he was being, I tried to get him help professionally-thru counseling & medication, I tried sympathy. I tried encouraging him. There was one time he told me he just could not do anything while sitting in his computer chair. He had been so active in Boy Scouts and he had been an active elder and preacher for church. I went and sat at our kitchen table. I wrote down 100 things he could do while sitting at his computer to encourage and help others. But none of these things worked. His health and attitude became the definition of who he had become. His identity!
I started feeling resentful-angry-bitter! Other than going home to my daughter (who I feel God sent me as a surprise, after my husband and I decided to not have any more kids; God knew I would need her to help me through this period of time-bringing me joy and distraction); I started dreading going home even though I was bone tired every day from working so many hours. I would come home and he would be in bed, not seeming to care about how I was feeling. (Of course, he cared. He cared a lot. He blamed himself for everything. If I ever tried to tell him how I was feeling, he would turn around and go back to bed feeling defeated and that he was the reason for all our problems.) I started feeling like a weight was on my shoulders and pressing hard on my chest! I was having trouble breathing. These three dark attitudes of my heart, were starting to consume me mentally and physically! Turning my heart away from God!
One day, I REALIZED what was happening to me. That was my first step. I had to be humble enough to come to the realization of what was happening to me. Instead of giving myself permission to feel this way because of how I felt my life had become, I needed to rather strive towards becoming who God wanted my life to be! I was being so negative, when I had always been such a positive person. At work, at church, I tried to put on a “good” face. I tried to cover up how I was really feeling on the inside. I kept pushing that pain deeper and deeper causing me more pain. I was starting to physically hurt and felt like I was a totally different negative person than I wanted my daughter to grow up with and have as an example. I turned to scripture and God through prayer.
Let’s look at a few scriptures I looked at that showed me how bitterness, anger and resentment were trying to cause me to stray away from God.
- James 3:11-12, talking about the tongue: “Does a spring send forth fresh water and bitter from the same opening? Can a fig tree, my brethren, bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs? Thus, no spring yields both salt water and fresh.”
- Hebrews 12:15, the writer here is trying to uplift the Christians at the time of this writing: “looking carefully lest anyone fall short of the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness, springing up cause trouble, and by this many become defiled…”
- Acts 8:20-23, this is when Simon the sorcerer saw the laying on of hands to receive the Holy Spirit, he wanted to buy this amazing power, Peter replies to him: “Your money perish with you, because you thought the gift of God could be purchased by money! You have neither part nor portion in this matter, for your heart is not right in the sight of God. Repent therefore of this your wickedness, and pray God, if perhaps the thought of your heart may be forgiven you. For I see that you are poisoned by bitterness and bound by iniquity.”
- Ephesians 4:31-32 reads, “Let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor and evil speaking be put away from you, with all malice. And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Christ forgave you.”
- Psalm 40:1-3 David says “I waited patiently for the Lord, and He inclined to me, and heard my cry, He also brought me up out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my steps. He has put a new song in my mouth-Praise to our God; many will see it and fear, and will trust in the Lord.”
Wow! I had to do something! I started praying. Not just a “normal” prayer, but some gut-wrenching prayers. Prayers from pain deep within and pleading for help. This is what I realized I needed to do after turning to God for answers.
- I JOURNALED. I cannot emphasize how much that helped me through this time. I have, lightheartedly told my kids that when they are cleaning and going through my belongings when I am gone; when they find a journal with a lighthouse on it, throw it away. I poured my heart out trying to release the bitterness, anger and resentment within me.
- I TALKED to a TRUSTED friend, who I knew would keep whatever I said and not gossip. I know that when I talk about a situation with someone else, things in my life have become clearer somehow. I lift some of that heaviness off my shoulders and release some of that pain within my heart. That friend heard from me quite often and encouraged me to keep on-keeping on.
- I turned my attitude of negativity to POSITIVITY. My heart told me to start thinking one good thing about my husband every day and I prayed for him with that in mind all day long. I remember one particular day when I was really angry with him; I could not think of one positive thing about him! So, I prayed thanking God that he was still alive! How sad is that! But it was a positive. Do you know what happened when I started and kept thinking positive things, day after day, about my husband? I started looking at him in a different light. I started getting my positive attitude back.
Nothing in my life had really changed. I was still working two jobs, 12-hour days. I was still bone tired. I was still trying to do everything that a normal household requires. Our unpaid bills were still piling up. My husband was still laying in his bed in a depression.
What had changed? MY ATTITUDE! The good Lord had changed my heart! I realized I was going down a dark path, instead of following the light of the Lord. There were many times after I got my attitude right with God, that I felt that weight of bitterness, anger and resentment trying to push me back down once again. But I took the steps I have told you in this blog, to pull myself up and get myself out of that negativity back into positivity!
This life is hard. Each and every day we just feel that we can’t take another step because the activities of this life seem to weight us down. But there is hope! That hope is our good Lord above! He helped me see where I was going and helped me to see what steps I needed to take to go where He wanted me to go!
So, if you are being burdened by this life’s three dark attitudes of the heart, try these steps I used. I feel so much stronger and closer to God after going through the struggles I have endured. If these steps do not work for you; do something. God has put us on this earth to fulfill a purpose. Being negative-bitter-angry-resentful are not the attitudes that will lead us to heaven. They are what is leading us away from God and peace within our hearts. Dig deep and push those negative attitudes out of your heart. You and the people you come in contact with every day, will be so glad you did.
Till next time! Keela