I’ve read a number of stories about people who have tried to disarm bombs and maybe they have blown up in their face. Handling a ticking bomb could be a very dangerous thing.
Have you ever know a person that’s like a ticking bomb? They seem like a normal people, but you get on a certain subject and they explode. There’s a certain thing that is like a trigger, and if you talk about that thing with that person, it just sets them off. They’re time bombs. The smallest static electricity set them off. A comment, a word.
One thing that makes for unstable people and people that are time bombs is when they carry a grudge. They’ve been offended about something or certain subject, and you bring that subject up and they’re explosive.
As a pastor, I would visit people like that. Maybe they weren’t going to church any more, and they had a reason that they weren’t going to church. And if you wanted to find it out, you would go and sit down and talk with them and mention them coming back to church, and poof, explosion. Because there was something they felt injured about, that they were carrying, and that had built up a lot of gunpowder in their lives. They were carrying a grudge.
The dictionary defines a grudge as a “cherished dislike”. Isn’t that an interesting word? Cherished dislike. Now, it’s one thing to cherish something that you like. That makes sense. You wife, your children, your God; but when we cherish something that we don’t like, what’s going on?...
ILL. This is an oxymoron - words in combination that simply don’t make sense. Soft rock. There’s no such thing as soft rock, is there? Working vacation. Or, Almost saved. These words just don’t go together. That’s an oxymoron. To cherish a dislike is an oxymoron. That’s what carrying a grudge is. It’s a wound that we grab to ourselves and that we hang on to.
Imagine someone who loves their wound, you know. They broke their arm and they cherish it: “Wow, I love that. Isn’t it great? I mean, look at that!”…. People who are carrying a grudge are displaying wounds, are cherishing wounds, and they’re time bombs. Because if you touch that wound, they explode. You never know when they’ll explode.
Ahithophel was a time bomb. He was a person like that. Normal under all circumstances, seemed to be a friendly person, a very bright person, good friend of King David, but he was wound up tighter than a clock. And he was ready to explode. Now, it wasn’t that he was unintelligent. He was a very intelligent man, but there was a part of his life that he was really stupid in. Even smart people can do some really stupid things.
2 Samuel 16:23 – “Now in those days the advice Ahithophel gave was like that of one who inquires of God. That was how both David and Absalom regarded all of Ahithophel’s advice”.
Isn’t that amazing? When it came to judgment in most things, talking with Ahithophel it was like you were talking to God. How would you like that said about you? "When you get counsel from Pastor Ovidiu, it’s like you’re asking God."
We read in 1 Chronicles 27:33 that Ahithophel was the king’s counselor. Now, not only was Ahithophel a wise man, but as the king’s counselor he had a lot of status in the kingdom because any time the king had a problem, he would call for Ahithophel. He would have access to the palace and to David directly. Any time the king wanted good information, he asked Ahithophel. It would be like today, President Obama always calling you for advice. "I need to know what to do in the Middle East. What do you need me to tell you what to do?"
He would have a lot of say in the kingdom. But Ahithophel, as wise as he was, was loaded up with gunpowder. He was a time bomb. He was carrying a grudge. He was full of bitterness, anger and hostility because of an experience that he had, that he was not able to get over. What was the grudge that he was carrying?
What is the grudge that you’re carrying? Are you carrying something? Is there something in your life that is building up the gunpowder, of being a time bomb that if someone touches you on that subject it really sets you off? Maybe it was something you were injured about. Maybe some individual that did something totally wrong to you. Is there someone, is there something in your life that sets you off?
Let’s see what set Ahithophel off. You remember the story in the Bible that Absalom rebelled against David. The Bible said he stole the hearts of the men of Israel. And we can read about it in 2 Samuel 15:2-4. (read)
"Well, I would help you. I would do this. I would do that. Just vote for me as your next king" And he stole the hearts of the people.
Absalom was doing this right under the king’s nose. After 4 years of electoral campaign, kissing up to the people, undermining David as king and showing off himself to everyone, Absalom said to the king in 2 Samuel 15:7:"Let me go to Hebron and fulfill a vow I made to the Lord.
Hebron is about 20 miles south of Jerusalem. When he arrived at Hebron, he sent secret messengers to the tribes of Israel and this message is in 2 Samuel 15:10. "As soon as you hear the sound of the trumpets, then say, ’Absalom is king in Hebron." He went down to Hebron, not to complete his vow but for a overthrow. Kill the legitimate king, David, and Absolom be the king.
There was Absalom in Hebron, starting a rebellion. He was gathering an army, he was organizing his cabinet, he was reaching out to everyone who would support him, and he was getting ready to march on Jerusalem.
2 Samuel 15:12: “While Absalom was offering sacrifices, he also sent for Ahithophel the Gilonite, David’s counselor, to come from Giloh, his hometown. And so the conspiracy gained strength, and Absalom’s following kept on increasing”.
Absalom asked Ahithophel to join the rebellion. Now, how in the world could he do that? Ahithophel was a wise man. he had been David’s counselor for a long time. He was serving in David’s cabinet. He reached right into David’s private group of counselors, the ones having the full power, and got one of them to join the rebellion. And what does the Bible say? Because he did that his conspiracy gained strength. Because Absalom was able to attract some of David’s counselors everybody else began to think, "Well, I guess we’d better get on the right side of this. Because Ahitophel is on this side too”…
How could Absalom get Ahithophel to do that? Certainly he was smart enough to know that this was not a sure thing: rebellion. Absalom knew something about Ahithophel. He knew that he was a time bomb. Over the years Absalom had opportunity to found out that Ahithophel was carrying a grudge, a very heavy grudge, a cherished dislike about David.
I imagine that this grudge caused Ahithophel to abandon David. Now, what was this grudge? What would cause Ahithophel to abandon his long-time friend, David? Well, I’ve put together a couple verses. You don’;t need to look them all up.
2 Samuel 23:34 gives a list of David’s mighty men and it mentions Eliam, the son of Ahithophel. So we find that Ahithophel had a son named Eliam.
In 2 Samuel 11:2 we read, “David got up from his bed and walked around on the roof of the palace. From the roof he saw a woman bathing. The woman was very beautiful, and David sent someone to find out about her. The man said, "Isn’t this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam and the wife of Uriah the Hittite?”
Bathsheba the grand-daughter of Ahithophel was taken from her husband and her husband was killed by David. Ahithophel’s son, Elaim had a daughter, named Bathsheba. So this grudge: Bathsheba had been stolen by David and Uriah, the Hittite, her husband had been killed by David.
Now, Bathsheba probably undoubtedly forgave David. And maybe Elaim, Bathsheba’s father forgave David. And, certainly we know that God forgave David. But Ahithophel, the grandfather never let it go. He never forgave David for that sin. He carried a grudge, and for year and years and years it festered in him until it finally exploded when he had opportunity in Absalom’s rebellion to abandon David. Absalom was alienated from his father and Ahithophel used that opportunity to participate in the rebellion.
Well, we of course know the story of what happened after that. Absalom chased David out of Jerusalem. After David was out of Jerusalem Absalom asked Ahithophel what he should do next. Ahithophel’s advice was among other things, to use twelve thousand men and pursue David immediately.
But instead of following his advice, Absalom decided to ask somebody else. It was Hushai. And you remember the rest of the story. Hushai was actually David’s friend who had stayed behind to frustrate the counsel of Ahithophel and his advice was the he should wait and then make a large-scale attack on David in his stronghold. All the men of Absalom said that the advice of Hushai was better than the advice of Ahithophel.
I think his advice appealed to Absalom’s ego that he’d make a big large-scale attack on David. Anyway, that end of Ahithophel’s advice. What was the end of Ahithophel?
2 Samuel 17:23 “When Ahithophel saw that his advice had not been followed he saddled his donkey and set out for his house in his hometown. He put his house in order and then hanged himself.” Why did he hang himself? He knew the cause was doomed. He knew that David would be able to rally the troops and in the end win the battle.
In reality the end any grudge, the end of carrying bitterness in our hearts is total collapse. It doesn’t destroy the other person that we’re seeking to injure. It destroys ourselves. If we are not able to experience forgiveness, and extend forgiveness to others, it isn’t that it destroys others, it destroys ourselves. Jesus was hanging on the cross and He said, "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.
Forgiveness is not something we give to people when they come crawling to us on their knees. Forgiveness is not something we extend to people when they finally realize that they were wrong and we were right and they beg forgiveness. Forgiveness is an attitude toward people that we don’t hold grudges. We don’t carry bitterness. Bitterness is a poison like a boomerang. You throw it and it might feel good when you throw it, but it comes back to cut our heart out. Carrying a grudge destroys us. It doesn’t destroy others.
Can you imagine doing with the physical wound what we sometimes do with a spiritual wound?
ILL. I get a cut on my hand and I put a band-aid on it and show it to my wife. And she says, "It’s OK, don’t wory. It’s just a little cut." The next day I take the band-aide off and show it to her and she says, "Yes, it’s really healing. It looks good." But I say, "No, it’s not." And so I pop it open again. I squeeze it open until it bleeds. "Look how bad that is!" And she says, "Yeah, that is pretty bad, let me take care of you." I wanted some sympathy, some attention there, finally I got it. But what’s even worse is that you opened it up. I would never do that with a physical cut.
Why do we do that with emotional injuries? Why, when I am emotionally injured by someone, do I then go to somebody else and keep opening the cut? Keep showing it so that infection continues to grow? And again, eventually destroys myself like it destroyed Ahithophel in his suicide. Don’t nurse a grudge. Don’t allow the poison of the past to pollute the present.
Whether the past sins are your own or whether they’re others, accept an experience of God’s grace. When we understand God’s forgiveness of us, we are able to extend that forgiveness to others even when they don’t ask for it. Maybe they don’t want it because we’re forgiving them not for them, we’re forgiving them not for them but for us. We are expressing to them the grace of God the same way God expressed His grace to us, dying for us while we were yet sinners. And so we, in turn, are able to die for others, to forgive others, to live gracefully for others, even while they are sinners. Don’t collect the powder of a time bomb, its explosion will destroy you.
• Didn’t Ahithophel have a right to be offended? Absolutely!
• Didn’t David do an horrible thing? Absolutely!
• Didn’t Ahitophel have a right to be injured? Absolutely!
• Did he have a right to be unforgiving and to carry that bitterness through his whole life? No. Not if he was going to experience what God wants us to experience. God forgave David. Ahithophel apparently never did.
The best way to defuse a grudge is forgiveness before it’s asked. Even if it’s never asked. Christians forgive. Our Scripture today Rom. 12:17-21: (READ)…
Jesus did it before us… (MORE…)
Think of someone you may be holding a grudge against. It may not be big, just a broken relationship. Maybe an estranged relationship. Now, think of some way you can defuse that: send that person a note, maybe a dinner invitation, maybe a phone call. Remember to take your wound and continue to open it up and you will eventually die from the infection. Allow the cleansing grace of God to clean out those infections.
(Thanks to Pastor D.Gettys)
