Gentle and Lowly Pt. 1

Opening

Good morning Church family. I am so glad you all are here, and I’m so glad I get the privilege to speak again to you all. And today, we’re continuing in our Attributes of God series… We have touched on the eternalness of God, the holiness and goodness of God, the wisdom of God and just last week, we touched on God incarnate, His incarnation… and today, we’re looking at the only two words Jesus ever used to describe Himself in the four gospels…

But before we do that, I want to play a little game. I want you all to share with me one word you would use to describe the heart of Jesus, just go ahead, shout it out.

(Moment for answers)

Well, during my writing of this teaching, I typed into my Google search bar “Use one word to describe Jesus” and the first thing that popped up was a video from a sermon by Pastor and Writer Chuck Swindoll and he compiled a list of words he would use to describe Jesus… including amazing, compassionate, forgiving, faithful, loving, fascinating. Then, I went a little deeper and found a Reddit thread asking the same things. There, others said love, faithful, perfect, awe inspiring, mercy, patient and love.

And while these are all great and true words to describe our Lord and Savior, Jesus never calls Himself these things, in fact, the only time Jesus describes himself in the whole scriptures in in Matthew 11, so lets turn there together, and, if you’re able, stand with me in honor of the reading of the scriptures and read it together, Matthew 11 starting in verse 25

25 At that time Jesus declared, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children; 26 yes, Father, for such was your gracious will.[g] 27 All things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him. 28 Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

Let’s Pray

Did you catch how Jesus describes himself? He is gentle and He is lowly in heart. This is not only how he describes himself, but it is His heart. It is what He beats for, to be gentle and lowly. We’re going to dissect this statement over the next two weeks, but right now, lets define the words. First… Gentle.

Gentle, here in the original greek, because that is what the New Testament was written in… is the word praus (prah-ooce) which means “mildness of disposition, gentleness of spirit, meekness.” The greek word is used three other times in the New Testament, including in the sermon on the mount where Jesus says “blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.”

The Webster dictionary says meek is “enduring injury with patience and without resentment.” And if we can see anything from the life of Jesus is that he was indeed praus.

He bore our cross, with patience and without resentment. He took the lashes of the whips and the spit and the beatings and did not once even try and fight back… he was gentle. He was meek. When those who were to arrest Him came, his followers wanted to fight back, Peter even cut off a soldiers ear, but not Jesus. No, he took the betrayal of his close friend, Judas, without resentment. Praus.

Jesus looks at us and holds no ill-will to us. Us. Who deny him like Peter. Who, every time we tell a lie or boast, every time we go somewhere we know we ought not go or look at something we know we should look at, we deny that we even know Christ. Jesus doesn’t care, he doesn’t hold it against us. He is gentle with us. He is right there, ready to wrap his arms around us an say “I forgive you, Child.” Just as he did on the cross in his last breath, when he said “Father, forgive them. They know not what they do.” Even as he was hanging on the cross, he held no resentment towards them. Towards us.

And then, we have lowly. None of us like to be thought of as lowly, do we? We think of a servant, or a trash collector, right? Someone who stinks and kinda is… beneath us. But that, of all other words, was one of the two ways Jesus described His heart.

Lowly, or the greek word tapeinos (tap-i-nos'), means, in this usage, humble. We all know what humble means, but for the sake of reference… Webster says humble is “not proud or haughty : not arrogant or assertive”

Jesus is not arrogant and patient. He is not resentful or proud… and that looks a lot like us today, doesn’t it?

Jesus never looked down on anyone because he was the son of God, no… he did the opposite, he thought of himself as less than. He saw himself as a servant, as Philippians 2 says “6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped,[a] 7 but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant,[b] being born in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.”

Jesus did not see himself greater than, but less than, he saw himself as a servant. Jesus’ heart is gentle and lowly and I am most certainly not. But this begs the question… why does all this matter? Why does it matter if Jesus is gentle and lowly? Well… let’s talk about that… but to do so, I want to split up these two, gentle and lowly. One so I have something to talk about next week, and two, so we can get to the nitty gritty of the truth behind this.

Heart Defined

First off… Verse 29 says “for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls” In heart, catch that… Not I am gentle and lowly. (period.) But In heart. Let’s define why the important distinction here. This isn’t defining God like… a characteristic… like I would define myself as funny, as kind, as flawed… right. But this isn’t just a characteristic… this is God’s heart towards us. That phrase, “IN HEART” in the greek means, in this passage, the centre of all physical and spiritual life. Meaning this is the main point of Jesus’ heart, the reason he does what he does… is because he is gentle and lowly…

think about your heart what does it do? It helps you LIVE. It is literally how we are all here today because your heart is beating, it is pumping blood to your brain, it supports your lungs, it literally keeps you alive. No one ever loses their heart and continues to live… so what Jesus is saying here is that the heart behind EVERYTHING that he is doing and does do and will do is these two adjectives… gentle and lowly.

Man, many of us… if we boil down why we do what we do to two words, do adjectives… it probably isn’t gentle and lowly… right? I tried to think why I do what I do this week and I’m not sure I could come up with the words… but Jesus did…

Why is This Important?

So why is this so important? Why is it important that Jesus’s heart is gentle?

The reason I believe is because if he wasn’t… he would be terrifying. If God was one of quick temper, he most certainly would not have dealt with us humans so kindly. He would have easily wiped our humanity again and again, just to recreate them again, trying to keep us inline over and over and over. But that is not the type of god we serve, we serve a God who is patient, who is gentle. If God’s heart towards us was anger, why would he care about us. Why would he give us the law, why would he just let us run around, do whatever the heck we want and if some of us choose to live a life worthy of Him, then he’d love those people and murder the rest and sentence them to a life separated from Him… That is an angry God… but our God’s heart is gentle…

And if he wasn’t gentle… the gospel would not be possible… (Pause)

Think about it, the gospel is, in the simplest sense, Jesus giving us a second chance. We’ve all sinned and Jesus is giving us a second chance to come back to Him, to repent of our sins and ask for his forgiveness. How is this forgiveness possible?? By the sacrifice that Jesus gave by willingly dying on the cross… Willingly…And when He was raised from the dead, defeating death once and for all, He opened up the gift of salvation to everyone.Without holding any resentment towards us, us who killed him… And that is the gospel. And it wouldn’t be possible without our Jesus being gentle of heart.

If Jesus wasn’t gentle He would not have gone to the cross so willingly. He would not have given himself for those who injured and abused and ridiculed him, no. He would have come with vengeance. He would have come to payback those who murdered Him… but he is a God who loves, who is kind, who is gentle with us.

The gospel would not have been possible if Jesus’ heart was anything else but gentle… But good thing for us is, it is. His heart is gentle.

As I said last time I taught, I believe that the goal of a Christian life is to grow more and more in line with the heart and life of our Rabbi, Jesus. This is why when Curtis asked what characteristics of Christ I wanted to talk on, I asked to do this verse, the heart of Christ. Because when we realize that this is the heart of Christ towards not only His followers, but everyone, is gentle and lowly, then we realize how our heart for others should be, and that’s Praus. Gentle.

It’s also important because he is able to deal with us and our sins gently…

He Deals Gentle With Us

Many people read the ascension of Jesus, Him returning to the Father and think, well now we have to try and follow Jesus perfectly and never mess up and if we do God will let us into heaven, and this is plain false.

In Hebrews 5, it says this “1 For every high priest chosen from among men is appointed to act on behalf of men in relation to God, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins. 2 He can deal gently with the ignorant and wayward, since he himself is beset with weakness.

Jesus; is our high priest, he is our mediator, as Curtis talked about a couple weeks ago. Jesus is up in heaven, mediating on our behalf… now think about if Jesus held resentment towards us. It would be like when you got in trouble as a kid. Let me tell you a story. I was probably around the age of 12, and my mom had decided that she would leave me, and my two sisters home alone for the first time. And we were so excited. But… as kids do, we would tend to get into some arguments… and my mom had left my 15 year old sister in charge and me and my at the time 10 year old sister, would get into arguments with my older sister, Anna. Now whenever mom would leave us alone, inevitably Anna would do something that made me mad at her and I would do something not too nice back. And Anna would always say “Just wait til mom would get home.”

Now when mom would get home, she would sit Anna and me down and hear our sides of the stories, and then she would bring Abby in, an ‘impartial’ third party. Now, what I learned to do was to get Abby on my side in the argument so when mom would come home and sit us down, she would side with me and not Anna. But if I had made Abby and Anna mad in a particular evening, which happened on occasion… then I was in big trouble. There was no way I would get a light sentence because I was out numbered. All that to say… aren’t you glad that Jesus is a fair and patient mediator? Who handles our sins gently? Aren’t you so glad about that? Jesus know’s what we’ve experienced so he handles our sins gently.

Hebrews 5 says that he can deal gently with us because he himself is beset with weakness… what does that mean? Is Jesus weak? Not in the least. But what that does mean is that Jesus is well acquainted with our weaknesses. When Jesus came to earth he became FULLY human while continuing to be fully God. Meaning he had every chance to rebel, to sin, to say ‘no way God, I’m not doing that.’ but he didn’t.

Jesus experienced every range of human emotion from hate to love, from anger to peace, jealousy and lust to contentment. He had the urge to complaining and gossip, to be bitter and petty. He has experienced it all… He is well aquatinted with those temptations. But yet, in the face of those temptations, not once did Jesus give into them. In fact, Jesus probably knows weakness and sin moreso than we will ever know! (PAUSE)

I caught a few of you off guard with that statement. Let me explain. Jesus actually knows temptation and wickedness to the fullest, because he is the only one to be tempted and never ever give in. You and I give into temptation on the daily, but Jesus… he never did. He got the fulll barrage of the devils flaming arrows while you and I, we crumble after 2 or 3 or maybe 5. C.S Lewis, on of my favorite authors and spiritual thinkers said this about Jesus and temptation and I just love this… He says,

“No man knows how bad he is till he has tried very hard to be good. A silly idea is current that good people do not know what temptation means. This is an obvious lie. Only those who try to resist temptation know how strong it is. After all, you find out the strength of the German army by fighting against it, not by giving in. You find out the strength of a wind by trying to walk against it, not by lying down. A man who gives in to temptation after five minutes simply does not know what it would have been like an hour later. That is why bad people, in one sense, know very little about badness — they have lived a sheltered life by always giving in. We never find out the strength of the evil impulse inside us until we try to fight it: and Christ, because He was the only man who never yielded to temptation, is also the only man who knows to the full what temptation means — the only complete realist.” - C.S. Lewis.

Because he has experienced our temptations to the fullest extent, He knows more about wickedness and temptation than we ever will… And that is the great thing about having him as a mediator between God and us… He knows what we’re going through and we don’t have to try and explain ourselves to God because Jesus is there on our behalf. And you may be sitting here thinking, “yeaaah he can deal with some people but man… I knew what God said and purposefully rejected it and did the opposite. I knew the Bible said don’t lie and I still did it anyway. So you can’t possibly deal gently with me.” Well friend, I have some good news for you… He can. Look at Hebrews 5:2 again “2 He can deal gently with the ignorant and wayward,”

Right there… proves He can. “Well, ignorant and wayward. Those seem pretty mild words for sinners.” You may be thinking. And yes… they are. But… The author is relaying what the book of Numbers says. Numbers 15:27-30 “27 “If one person sins unintentionally, he shall offer a female goat a year old for a sin offering. 28 And the priest shall make atonement before the Lord for the person who makes a mistake, when he sins unintentionally, to make atonement for him, and he shall be forgiven. 29 You shall have one law for him who does anything unintentionally, for him who is native among the people of Israel and for the stranger who sojourns among them. 30 But the person who does anything with a high hand, whether he is native or a sojourner, reviles the Lord, and that person shall be cut off from among his people. 31 Because he has despised the word of the Lord and has broken his commandment, that person shall be utterly cut off; his iniquity shall be on him.”

So we see here, even in the Old Testament, it seems there are two kinds of sins we can commit… The unintentional and “with a high hand,” or unwillful and willful or accidental and purposeful or, as Hebrews says, ignorant, accidental and wayward, purposeful. Hebrews here shows that Jesus is will deal gently with ALL sinners who come before Him because He knows exactly what we’re going through… he knows better than anyone knows.

If that isn’t enough to convince you that Jesus will be gentle with ALL how about Hebrews 7… it says in verse 25 “25 Consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost[b] those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them.” Jesus can and will save to the uttermost you if you draw near to him. He doesn’t care your issues… he will save to the uttermost. What does that mean? Well, in the greek, “to the uttermost” is one word, panteles which is used to denote completeness… and as Dane Ortlund says, “We who know our hearts understand. We are to-the-uttermost sinners. We need a to-the-uttermost savior.” Meaning what…

We don’t need to rely on our own strength to fix ourselves because JESUS is working on our behalf, interceding panteles to God to save us, consistently… We don’t need to worry that we’re too damaged or dark for Jesus to save, or we’re too scary for Jesus, no. None of that. We’re never too far gone for God. Dane Ortlund has another great quote that says, “God's forgiving, redeeming, restoring touch reaches down into the darkest crevices of our souls, those places where we are most ashamed, most defeated. More than this: those crevices of sin are themselves the places where Christ loves us the most. His heart willingly goes there. His heart is most strongly drawn there. He knows us to the uttermost, and he saves us to the uttermost, because his heart is drawn out to us to the uttermost. We cannot sin our way out of his tender care.”

That can do one of two things for you… either make you TERRIFIED to let Jesus into your heart or fill you with so much joy to know that Jesus knows you to-the-uttermost and still loves you to-the-uttermost.

He Will Never Let Us Go

John 6:37 says this… “All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out.”

This also, would not be possible without our God being, at his Heart, the very nature of his being, gentle… think about the truth behind this short part of scripture… the first word is “All.” Not, those who are SUPER DUPER sorry for their sins, not those who have never committed one of the big 3 sins, not all baptists, no. It says All. No qualifiers. He says All. Thats first, secondly, it says the Father. Meaning God, not Jesus. Yes they’re one and the same, but this is God who is sending us to Christ. Who is sending everyone. Jesus isn’t trying to calm God down, and say “remember Dad, I want everyone. Not just the good people.” God is being gentle in His choosing. Which… is all.

Thirdly… and this is the point i want to get across… I will never cast out. I, Jesus, will never, NEVER EVER EVER, cast out. Jesus will never discard of you. He will never let you go, He will never say “thats it. You’re too far gone.” NEVER. There is nothing you’ve ever done that Jesus says “ahh i don’t want you.” NOTHING.

You could be a mass murderer and Jesus says “come to me and i will never cast you out.”

“But Jesus you don’t know the things I’ve done”

“I know. I don’t care.”

“Yeah, but its not only what I’ve done, but the amount of times i’ve done it.”

“I know. But i still want you.”

See… Jesus knows what you’ve done, what you’re doing, and what you will do. And yet, his heart is still the same… “I will never cast you out.”

What a gentle God we serve… Someone who sees our heart… who knows everything about us, every sin we’ve committed. Every angry word we said, every lustful thought, every time we’ve looked down on others, every time we’ve lied and cheated and stolen, everything… he knows it, and yet… those words still ring true. “I will never cast you out.” How beautiful is that.

I was lucky enough that I was raised by parents who truly showed this side of our God to me. As a kid growing up, and even into my high school year, I was a kid who was neck deep in to sin. Lying, lust, cheating, stealing, anger, pride, complaining, gossiping, all of it… I did it. But every time I was caught in a sin, they would, more times than not, come to me gently and confronted me about it. Most of the time. There were a couple times that wasn’t the case, but more often than not, it was a gentle word.

I specifically remember a time, I was maybe 16… and we had found out about my allergy to gluten about a year or so ago and I hattttttted it. (PAUSE) Like seriously hated it. So I would, without any knowledge to my parents or anyone would walk down to the Subway and buy a sandwich with regular bread… well, flatbread, but it wasn’t gluten. Then I would walk back home and dash up the stairs with my sandwich and eat it in my room. Anyway, all this happened and my parents found out about it one day and confronted me about it. But they weren’t angry about it… but gentle. They approached it the way God does with our sin.

“Your my son and I love you. Nothing you do can make me cast you out.” This is the response every one hears from God when they come to Him. So come to him today… Whether you’ve been saved and have dropped the ball on your faith, if you are a believer stuck in a cycle of sin, or never accepted this gift, his answer is the same. Despite your objections, excuses, and faults. God will always answer with the same words.

“But I have a terrible past.”

“I will never cast you out.”

“I’ve done things no one should.”

“I will never cast you out.”

“I have nothing to bring to you, Lord.”

“I will never cast you out.”

The answer is always the same, no matter what you’ve done, will do, or are currently doing. God’s answer is always the same… “I will never cast you out.”

Jesus knows you to-the-uttermost… He wants to know you to-the-uttermost… and yet… he will never cast you out, no matter how disgusting you are, no matter how sinful and despicable you are, Jesus loves you all the same… thanks to his gentle heart…

Wrap Up

So…I have a challenge for each of you today… first: if you’re here and you do not know Jesus Christ as your savior, come speak to me afterwards, I would love to talk with you about that decision if you’re ready for it… I encourage you, you’re not guaranteed tomorrow… you’re not guaranteed your next breath… so why put it off but if you’re ready… talk to me afterwards or talk to someone you know is a Christian… ask questions, pray, seek out the answers you need from trusted people who you know are following Jesus.

To you here who know the truth of the gospel, but continue to walk away from Christ, I urge you, come home to Him… come talk to him, ask forgiveness. Begin to live a life that glorifies God… He already knows you to-the-uttermost and is willing to intercede on a God who is gentle… there’s no reason to be afraid of Him. Come to Him. He is ready to forgive, love, and deal gently. Once you’re there… He “will never cast you out.”

And to you who are faithful followers… Live like this stuff is true. 1) Rest in Christ today, rest in the fact that your faith is secure in Christ. He says to you, “I will never cast you out.” So rest in that truth today. Because it is so so calming and good to know. 2) Lean into confession to Christ. He already knows you to-the-uttermost… So talk to Him like it. Confess, be honest with God. He literally already knows… so might as well not build any walls up in your relationship with Him. And finally, 3) Begin to inline your heart with God. Deal gently with others… You’ve been forgiven so much by God… you should live a life that illustrates Him to a world that is desperately in need.

Guys, we serve a gentle God who knows us so well… and yet, continues to love us… let’s live like it today. Come to Him, confess to Him, continue to live for Him. Let’s pray.