Bitterness is the inability to forgive someone who has hurt you so that you can go forward.  It is walking backward into the future with your eyes fixed on those who have hurt you in the past, thus setting you up to fall backward into the future.

It has been said that we would do well to chart our lives after the law of the windshield and mirror.  Every car is required by law to be equipped with a windshield and a rearview mirror.  The windshield is for looking forward and the mirror is for looking back.  The rearview mirror is one-hundredth the size of the windshield, implying that 99 percent of the time, you need to be looking forward.  Imagine how many accidents would occur if this were reversed.  You would be forced to have 99 percent of your visual field filled with views of the past and only one percent available for looking forward.  It would have a paralyzing effect on your driving.

This is exactly the situation for the person who is shackled to the past.  Such people feel they have no future because of the tragedies of their past.

When you experience the forgiveness of God, you can extend it to others.  It is not natural, but by the grace of God, it is supernatural.  It will reframe your past and free you from its paralyzing power.  Every once in a while, memory will call you to look back, but by the grace of God, as you glance back, you will see a different history.  

By Des Cummings, PhD

Author of Original Love

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