I read these words by Thomas Watson in Ruth Chou Simons book, "Beholding and Becoming - The Art of Everyday Worship". They are so true!
However, Christ, Jesus Christ, for so many people is just a swear word with no understanding of the actual person of Christ or of sin. Sin is either seen as a dirty word (as no one wants to be known as a sinner) or it is seen as something tantalizing and enjoyable. Christ or religion is seen as a judgmental overlord depriving people of fun, and is definitely not seen as sweet.
Most of us also like to consider ourselves pretty good people who don't sin, or at least not very often. Sin is what those other people, those bad people do. We have our own set of rules and standards and as long as we keep our standards we're OK. We like to judge ourselves as better than some one with lower standards than us. We don't murder or rape others. We're good people and don't need religion or Jesus. So sin to such people is not even considered let alone bitter.
For those of us who own up to following Jesus Christ, do we actually see Christ as sweet like the Psalmist in the following verses:
Oh taste and see that the Lord is good Psalm 34:8
How sweet are thy words unto my taste! yea, sweeter than honey to my mouth!
Psalm 119:103
We cannot see Him as sweet If we don't understand the seriousness of sin if we are not prepared to face and own up to sin in our own lives. T Austin Sparks in his book, "The School of Christ" talks about the "other-ness of Christ", which in us is basically self or sin.
Quoting from his book, he states, "We have to come to a very severe School of the Spirit which eventuates in our coming to discover that our best intentions are defiled, our purest motives are unclean before those [God's] eyes. Things that we intended to be for God, somewhere at their spring is self. . . . And the one basic lesson you and I have to learn in this life, under the Holy Spirit's tuition and revelation and discipline, is that He is other than we are. And that "other-ness" is indeed an utter thing. . . . Settle it that "all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags.
We shall never find rest unto our souls until we have first of all learned the utter difference between Christ and ourselves, and then the utter impossibility of our ever being like Him by anything that we can find in ourselves."
We have to own the bitterness of sin, if we are to experience the sweetness of forgiveness, love and rest to our souls which is only to be found in Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ then truly will be sweet to us.
