When you actually stop and take a minute to look at them, dandelions are really a beautiful little flower. They are soft and a bright, cheery yellow. Dandelions grow anywhere and everywhere. After dull and dreary winter, they splash much needed color to the landscape. What a beautiful contrast they are against the dark green background of green.

Why then do we hate them so much, and go to all lengths to eradicate them from our lawns. The problem is they are not flowers but weeds that left untouched will take over your yard. Each and every spring homeowners fight the unending battle against these persistent yellow lion-like weeds. We throw an inordinate amount of our weed-killing arsenal at this perennial nuisance—all in an effort to forestall their infestation. When Stephanie and Steven were young, I even paid them for each dandelion they picked.

In spite of all our efforts, spring after spring finds these nasty little sinister buggers rearing their ugly heads in my yard. The problem lies with some of my neighbors who have surrendered and given up the good fight. Year after year raise bumper crops of dandelions. For the uninitiated those pretty little, innocuous ‘flowers’ transform into little white balls of fuzz. When the wind blows those ‘fuzzies’ are blown across the surveyors boundary lines only to find a good home in the soil of my lawn.

Hebrews 12:15 reveals a remarkable similarity between bitterness and dandelions. Like dandelions bitterness grows anywhere, even in the most righteous and godly lives. Bitterness is insidious, ever present and looking for a heart in which to take root. Once bitterness arrives, if left unchecked, it will become a kind of spiritual dandelion and envelope the heart and soul of any person. Like the dandelion that in due time crowds out the Kentucky bluegrass and fine fescues, bitterness will eventually overtake and overwhelm all that is loving, kind, gentle, gracious and good in the human heart. And bitterness so easily finding a home in our hearts and spirits, if left unchecked and uncontrolled, will eventually destroy us.

Dandelions are not content either to stay in one yard because they have the gift of evangelism. They work night and day spreading their insidious seeds into other yards. So too the bitter spirit will spread from one person to another like a prairie wildfire. One bitter, negative, faultfinding person causes other to become bitter and negative and they too begin to find fault.

The result of all this is that we miss God’s grace in our lives. The fruit of the Spirit, which is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control, become smothered in the presence of the carnal sin of bitterness. God’s blessing then leaves. Bitterness is one of the weeds planted by Satan in the garden of our lives.

The only effective method of removing dandelions is weed killer. The only effective method of killing bitterness is the blood of Jesus. If your bottle of weed killer sits in the garage of shed unopened, how effective will it be? If you mix some of that weed killer with water and it sits in your sprayer, how many dandelions will it kill? None! For weed killer to work it needs to be applied to the weeds. It needs to make contact with the dandelion and as that dandelion absorbs the ingredients in the weed killer it begins to die, inside out.

Bitterness is a spiritual weed, a sin in our hearts and lives. In order to kill it, we need to ask the Master Gardener to apply the blood of Jesus directly to the root of our bitterness. That happens when we put into the process specified to rid our lives of spiritual weeds. The first is confession, i.e. acknowledging that indeed we are infested with the weeds of bitterness. The second step is to repent—admitting your blame and fault and wanting the bitterness to be removed. The 3rd step is belief—understanding that only the blood of Jesus can kill it. The next step is faith and this is the application of God’s spiritual weed killer to our hearts and lives. And finally, the last step is assurance—accepting the fact that God’s grace will begin working to destroy that bitterness once and for all from the deep tap root all the way up to that pretty little, and very deceptive, flower.

The neat thing is that the blood of Jesus is a broad-based weed killer, killing all kinds of spiritual weeds. What a great place and a great time to allow Spirit of God to remove that root of bitterness that is clogging your life and stealing the joy of your life and your walk with Jesus.

Thank You for Taking The Time to Read This Message.
May God Use These Words to Help You and Strengthen You.