We are going to look at 2 case studies in the bible, about 2 individuals who became bitter.
We are going to look at the impact of their bitterness and then I’m going to talk to you about how to deal with bitterness in your life and how to deal with bitterness when it is in somebody’s life.
The first case study is from 2 Samuel 13, it talks about how bitterness grows and how it functions. This is bitterness within a family because most of the times, a lot of bitterness that we have in life, they are within close quarters; in close proximity either with family members, friends, colleagues but they are always against people who are close to us or used to be close to us.
There is a lot of bitterness in families. Sometimes, family gatherings are not moments of happiness, it’s moments of bitterness. Little things springs up quarrels and you see people who were brought up by the same parent fighting, killing one another and destroying one another, and then it moves from one generation to the nephews, from nephews it goes to grand children and on and on. The root of bitterness!
2 Samuel 13:1-2 It says, “After this Absalom son of David had a lovely sister called Tamar and Ammon the son of David loved her. Ammon was so distressed about his sister Tamar that he became sick and it was improper for Amnon to do anything to her.” Now what happened as you know, David created a lot of problems, he had too many wives and that’s what happens when you have a polygamous situation. You create unnecessary problems for your children.
For all of you who are having children in different places, you may be having fun for yourself but the story after you, may be very bitter because you are planting seeds that can become roots of bitterness.
Now David had these women, had children with them and he had one child Tamar. Tamar and Absalom i.e another of David sons came from the same woman and then they had a half brother called Amnon. And Amnon saw his half sister Tamar and had a lot of lust in him for his sister. He wanted to sleep with the girl. And he pained in his heart for Tamar for so long and the Bible says he became sick.
So Amnon talked to one of his best friend’s to discuss his problem and his best friend gave him a very bad advice as to how to get Tamar (you can read the rest of the story).
Eventually, Amnon rapes Tamar and throws her away from the house. Literally, kicks her out of the house.
The bible says after he had raped her, hatred entered his heart for the girl he thought he loved. And that’s one thing about lust because lust is not love, it is not enduring. After it is satisfied, it is replaced by hatred.
So, Tamar leaves the house and she changed her clothes she was wearing (sack clothes now). Verse 19 explained that, Tamar put ashes in her head, tore her robe of many colours that was on her and lay her hands on her head and went away crying bitterly.