 Satan will try to use Christians hypocrisy, Christians being mean and awful and nasty to distance you, to separate you from God. That's the truth. And if you've been countered mean people, they call themselves Christians, you know that there is a temptation to be like, okay, if you are with him, if you're with Jesus and you're acting this way, then maybe I want no part in this. Maybe this whole deal is just like this. I know for a lot of people, all they've encountered is mean Christians, Christians that put themselves on a high horse and say, I'm holier than now. And all you are a bunch of scumbags and sinners. And it gives you a really bad taste in your mouth when you think about Christians, maybe that's where you are. Here's the truth is that Satan will do what it takes to separate you from God. He will use anything at his disposal to get you to question the goodness of God, the care of God, the love of God, and whether you even want to be associated with God, what at all. You know, I just think about this like, okay, in high school, I didn't go to high school, but I watch a lot of high school movies of movies. Okay. And a lot of these high school movies, there's these different clicks, there's these different groups, right? And usually there's like a group of mean people, maybe they're even popular people. But then you maybe the main character is like, I don't want to be a part of that group, because they're just mean. They're just bad. Maybe that is the popular group. Maybe that is the group that's getting everything. But they're just all mean. I don't want to be a part in that. And honestly, that's kind of how I would feel about Christians. If I just encountered a lot of mean, awful Christians, and the truth is that that happens. And you're like, okay, that might even be the right group. But they're so mean, they're so awful, I'm going to do my own thing. So what do we do when we encounter mean, awful people that call themselves Christians? Well, number one, we got to speak truth to them. We got to speak truth to them. You look at Jesus with the Pharisees. These Pharisees were purporting themselves to be, I am the representative of God and His law, and I'm going to stand firm on His law. And yeah, when you look at them, they were really mean. They were really awful. Some dude got healed, and they were concerned about what day he got healed on. They're like, we can't have this. They were jealous of Jesus and his popularity and his notoriety. They were not good guys. They were not good guys. They were lovers of money. They were lovers of self, and Jesus spoke truth to them, hard truth to them. There's a time for that. There's also a time for forgiveness to say, okay, God has forgiven me so mightily, so graciously, that it's my job to forgive this person. That's way easier said than done. That is way easier said than done. Especially if they've hurt you deeply. Forgiveness can be a lifetime, but that's where our heart needs to be. It says, okay, I know this person has hurt me so bad, and yet God has forgiven me. And I don't want to be like that parable where somebody, oh, this massive amount to this master, massive amount. Something you never pay off. And the master says, you know what, okay, I'll let you go. I won't send you to jail for not paying me back. But then this other guy, he is owed something by somebody else. And yet he doesn't have mercy on him. He sends him to jail. He tries to take everything that he has. I don't want to be like that. God has forgiven me beyond what I could pay back. Why would I hold this over this person? Because I'm angry, because I'm bitter, because I'm just so frustrated at this, this situation and why they did this. Man, those are deep feelings. Those are tough feelings, but that's the next piece of it. Another aspect is setting boundaries. You mentioned boundaries in Christian circles, and people get nervous. People get nervous because in a lot of cultures and a lot of social circles, the idea of saying no is just forbidden. You can't say no. If somebody needs something, you say yes. If somebody needs help with something, you say yes. If somebody wants something from you, you say yes, because that's the loving thing to do. That's the good thing to do. If somebody has a request of you or wants you to change something about yourself, all the people pleases in the room are like, of course I'll do it. Of course I'll do it. The idea of setting a boundary there is just foreign. It's just foreign. But the truth is, if it is a dangerous person, if it is somebody that is not safe, and what would you define as a safe person? A safe person to me is somebody that not only has your best interest at heart, because a lot of people that are unsafe have your best interest at heart, but they understand how to show love and compassion in a Christ-like way. That's the truth. That's as simple as it gets. Somebody can have great love for you and great care for you, but they show it in just a destructive way because of their own trauma, because of their own upbringing, and that's how they were shown love. That's how they believe that they need to show it to you, and that just becomes a whole whack of a mess. But setting boundaries is important. If it's somebody that, hey, you have hurt me in the past, I'm not going to give you the same access to my life. I'm going to forgive you. I'm going to not necessarily hold that over you in such a way where I hold bitterness or anger resentment towards you. I'm going to try to let go of those things as I give them to God, but I'm not going to give you the same access into my life. I don't want you guys to just feel like you are captive to every desire and whim of somebody that calls himself a Christian. If somebody in your church saying, hey, I need you to do this, you need to be this, you need to be this, I'm calling you out on this, and you're just like, oh, I guess this is all true about me, or this is something I need to totally be receptive to. Not necessarily. Not necessarily. It's good to be open to correction. It's good to be open to reproof, but understand who they are. Understand what is their relationship to you. Are they somebody that you respect? Are they somebody that you would want to take advice from? Are they a safe person? Are they just somebody that wants control? A lot of folks that are Christians and that don't represent Jesus very well. It can be easy to get a bad taste in your mouth about the church, about Christianity in general, about God even. Satan will use that. He will try to use that to separate you from God, to remove you from being in a place of community, being in a place of peace. Bitterness rots the soul. That's the truth. Bitterness and anger rot the soul. And I don't want you to be there. I don't want you to be there. So what are we going to do? What are we going to do? This is what I tell myself. You can get so angry and frustrated at Christians, people that call themselves Christians and yet represent Jesus in such a poor way. You can lose sight of your own sin. God, how have I represented you in just a way that isn't good, leads you to repentance? But then also just saying, okay, God, I don't know how to deal with this on my own. I want to forgive this person. I want you to help give me discernment and what access I should give them to my life because I want to be safe in a certain context. I don't want to be open to abuse, but I also want to love them and I also want to extend myself in a particular way that shows them love beyond what they deserve. How can I do that in a God-glorifying way? Help me with that God. Just a few things I need you to go away with. Somebody else's actions and reactions, behavior, that does not indicate how God's actions, reactions, or behavior is. They're not representatives for him. They should be, but oftentimes they're not. So you need to look at his word to understand, hey, this is how God loves. God loves in a very different way than this. Or God cares for me in a very different way than this. This person says, they're coming to me and they're wanting to love me or they're wanting to care for me, but are they truly doing it in a way that God has done it? Okay, that's a good piece of discernment. Understanding, are they a safe person? Do you need to put up some boundaries in certain places? Say, hey, I don't want you to talk to me in that way. You don't have access to this aspect of my life or I'm not going to share this with you. I'm not going to be as vulnerable with you because of how you've treated me in the past. And it's just because I don't trust you. And my trust for you is not owed. I'm called to forgive you. I'm called to dwell in community with you perhaps if we're in the same church, but I'm not going to share with you vulnerable things in my heart because you're not a safe person. That's just the truth of it. Okay, and I'm not going to hold on to bitterness in my heart. I'm going to live a free life. I'm going to be released from this bondage of being angry or bitter towards this person. And sometimes it's harder when they're Christian too. You know, that's what I find is that if you, if they were a non-Christian, you'd kind of chalk it up to their sin, the sinner, their sinner, and they haven't met Jesus. And you pray that they meet Jesus, repent of their sin, and they turn to him. And that their behavior makes sense. They do this and they call themselves a Christian. You're like, what's going on? What is this? God, what? This is one of yours. Why aren't you fixing them? Why did you allow them to do this? Or you, you know, maybe you're like, okay, this isn't a Christian at all. You know, but yet maybe they're still at church. Maybe they're still playing the Christian part and that's even more frustrating. I don't want this bitterness to overcome you, to take over your heart, to take you out of the fight, to steal your peace. I don't want any of that for you. So even right now, I want this to be a freeing moment for you, to let go of that. How do you let go of it? Isaac, I've been holding on to it for so long. God, I give this to you every day. I do this every day. I do this, not just about people that have hurt me in the past, but about the anxiety is in my heart about the things that are weighing heavy on me. I do this every single day, multiple times. I say, God, I give this to you. This is more than I can carry on my own. And I know you have, you've given yourself to me. You're seeking to carry my burdens. And so I give them to you. And I release them now. And if you need me to do something, tell me to do something, but otherwise I'll just release them. They're not on my shoulders anymore. They're on yours. Just give yourself that freedom. Give yourself that freedom because that's the freedom God's inviting you into. He's not saying you got to sort through all this on your own and you got to find your own healing. It's about every day saying, God, I invite you into this. God, please heal me from this bitterness, this anger, this resentment, help me to let go of it. Find true forgiveness and love for them. That's the place we'd like to end up. Yes, Christians can be awful sometimes. We can be awful sometimes. God gives us more forgiveness and more grace than we could ever deserve. We need to keep that in mind. And thank God for the gracious and merciful Father that He is. Thanks so much for watching this video. If you enjoyed it, subscribe because I'm putting out new videos all the time. And be sure to sign up on Patreon if you're interested in getting access to exclusive videos and our discord and all sorts of other stuff. And it really helps out what I'm doing here with the ministry. It really, really does. So it'd be a huge blessing on your part. Thanks so much for watching and I'll see you later. God bless.