Praying In the Holy Ghost + “The Best Marmalade Is Made With Bitter Oranges”
Life is such an incredible mixture of good & bad, happy & sad, joy & sorrow, victory & defeat, but the rearview mirror always seems to display the “pretty” bits.
Unintentionally, that ties into a thought that’s been swirling & twirling through mind for a long time. Several years ago, while doing some research, I ran across this little line in an article…
“MARMALADE…THE BEST IS ALWAYS MADE
WITH BITTER RATHER THAN SWEET ORANGES.”
Just like marmalade, I believe the best LIVES are made with BITTER experiences rather than sweet experiences. Oh, yes, there must be a mixture of both, just as bitter oranges with no sugar would never be put in the “best marmalade” category, the best lives will always be a mixture of bitter and sweet. When bitter experiences come into our lives, and we refuse to allow them to turn to bitterness, there are incredible things that take place in the deep, recessed places of our hearts. Bitter experiences mellow, settle, and soften us. They add a “flavor” to our lives that combined with joy and beauty and laughter produce a mixture that others will observe, but never know the source of. Casual observers, acquaintances, and even friends will never look at the “sum of your parts” and know the bitter experiences involved in the mixing and making of “you.”
So many of us avoid bitter experiences. When they happen, we lock them away, determined to forget the pain, and move on. It is, however, in embracing and pressing into bitter moments that releases their full impact in our lives. Pain aversion will never produce a “delicious’ quality in our souls.
Years and years ago, I taught a lesson called, “EVEN BITTER CHOCOLATE MAKES A PRETTY GOOD CAKE.” No one would ever eat a spoonful of cocoa on its own, but mixed with eggs, butter, flour, and sugar, you have a concoction whose flavor far surpasses that of a plain white cake. You don’t eat the cake and think of the BITTER COCOA, you taste the melding of the sweet and bitter combined, and that combination makes for a pretty good cake.
When we are in the middle of a bitter season, it is easy to think it will define your life, or that it will “always be this way”. The reality is, however, that a bitter season of loss or grief or sorrow or heartache will make you so much better than you’d ever be without it! Bitter seasons are the thing that will MAKE YOU who God wants you to be.
The key in bitter places will always be to keep a right spirit.
BITTER to BITTERNESS?
or
BITTER to BETTERNESS?
The choice will always be ours. Embrace bitter. Run to Jesus with bitter. Release bitter. Let Him use bitter as He sees fit.
This reminds me of Exodus 30:22-25 where God instructs Moses on the recipe for the anointing oil: “Take thou unto thee principal spices, of pure myrrh five hundred shekels, and of sweet cinnamon half so much, even two hundred and fifty shekels, and of sweet calamus two hundred and fifty shekels, And of cassia five hundred shekels, after the shekel of the sanctuary, and of oil olive an hin: And thou shalt make it an oil of holy ointment, an ointment compound after the art of the apothecary: it shall be an holy anointing oil.”
It is interesting to note that the first ingredient God instructs Moses to include in the sacred anointing oil was myrrh, which literally means “BITTER.” Myrrh was the sap of a tree that would harden into a resin or “into a bitter gum, of sweet smell and valuable.” (Genesius Lexicon) Myrrh was bitter to the taste and sweet to smell. I have heard it said, “There was more bitter ingredients in the anointing oil than sweet,” and that “Everything in the anointing oil had to be crushed, ground, or broken.” (Stan Gleason). Yesterday, Pastor said, “the only way to have anointing is to suffer.” OUCH. BITTER? CRUSHED? GROUND? BROKEN? SUFFER? Those are not the things that I would ever volunteer for, yet those are the VERY THINGS that God uses to produce the sweet fragrance of anointing in a life. Anointing is somewhat elusive and somewhat hard to describe, but it is readily recognizable when it is resident on a life, and it is in the crushing and breaking down of both BITTER and sweet components that it is produced.
I see more and more that God loves brokenness because it produces dependence. He had always wanted a people who would rely and depend totally and completely upon Him. David wrote: “The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise,” (Ps 51:17) and “ The LORD is nigh (or CLOSE) to them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit.” (Ps 34:18) (Contrite here means “crushed to a fine powder.”) Again, not something the volunteer arm goes up for. BUT it’s in CRUSHING BITTER THINGS that dependence, and subsequently, anointing is produced. The sweet fragrance of God is released in a life as self-sufficiency is replaced with dependence THROUGH THE PROCESS OF CRUSHING.
The BITTER places. The BROKEN places. The seasons of life where we have no strength for even the next moment. The days where we have no idea “how” we’ll “make it,” and we have reached the end of personal resources. The places we want to run from but have nowhere to go. THESE BITTER PLACES…. BITTER TEARS…..BITTER QUESTIONS…are things God uses to release anointing in our lives. Sweet seasons alone would never have this affect or produce the dependence God desires from those that are His. Like marmalade and cake, the best lives are produced with BITTER INGREDIENTS. The lives He is most able to use are those that are stripped of self-reliance, self-will, and self-dependence. It is those who endure BITTER and the crushing of BITTER that will exude the fragrance of Christ.
God told Moses “You shall make it an oil of holy ointment, an oil COMPOUND after the art of the apothecary: it shall be a holy anointing oil.” (Ex 32:25) It was not bitter alone. There was sweet, too. It was in the crushing, melding, and mixing of both sweet and bitter that anointing oil was compounded.
If you’re in a bitter season, hold on, because a sweet season is on the way. God is not going to leave you in “bitter” forever. He’ll add some SUGAR to the marmalade…He’ll add some SUGAR to the cake. All bitter oranges or all bitter cocoa would be just that. It is in the MIXING, the COMPOUNDING, the MELDING of other flavors and ingredients that produces something desirable. Allow Him to add as much BITTER as He sees fit. He is the One with the recipe for anointing and One who knows the PROCESS through which it is produced in a life.
“Marmalade…the best is always made with BITTER rather than sweet oranges.” I think it’s true, the same can be said of lives.
(A little redundant, but…). 😊
Thank you for joining me for this journey!
Go grab your Bible and your journal!
I look forward to the power of this habit in your life.