Growing in Gentleness

Well, good morning. Good morning balcony. Thank you very much. My name is Mark, one of the pastors. I want to welcome all of you. So glad that you're part of church here today and not only do we have people here but next door and venue, people tuning in via Facebook live. We're just glad, glad, however you're joining us, we are glad you're here.

We are in the home stretch of a series that we've been calling Miracle Grow in reference to the fruit of the Spirit. These are character qualities that God develops in our hearts, our lives, through the ministry, the power of the Holy Spirit. And today we're going to be talking about growing in gentleness. Gentleness is one of these character qualities listed in Galatians 5:22–23. Every week we've been reading these verses together so they might kind of seep down into our hearts and our memory. So I'm gonna invite you to do the same this morning. Read out loud with me from Galatians 5:22–23. Let me hear you church. Let's go. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

Well I gotta say, you know, what a milestone for René, 25 years. I haven't been a pastor that long, but I have been in full-time ministry between church and Camp Hammer for 31 years and over the course of those three decades I've been in a lot of gatherings or occasions where people were sharing a prayer request. Would you pray about this in my life? A concern, a desire, whatever the case might be. And I was thinking this week about if I had ever in 31 years heard anyone say would you please pray that the Lord would make me a more gentle person.

Now perhaps that did happen but I could not recall a single time that anyone asked for that type of prayer. And I think the reason for that is because in our culture, gentleness has to do with being soft, sweet, docile, passive. These are things that, you know, we appreciate in babies and puppies, but for ourselves, you know, we want to have a little bit more of an edge and we want to be more doers, kind of forward leading kind of people. And so gentleness, that's something that we aspire to. And yet I think the reason for that is because we don't understand what biblical gentleness looks like.

The biblical vision of gentleness is actually quite compelling and robust. And I'll give you an example of that. When I was 18 years old, I graduated from high school and I was hired by a Christian conference center for the summer called Hume Lake Christian Camps. Anyone been up to Hume Lake before? Beautiful, beautiful location east of Fresno up in the Sierra Nevadas next to King's Canyon State Park. Just lovely, lovely setting to have a job.

And I was one of three wranglers on staff that summer. They had about two dozen horses and so the three of us, we would take people for rides every day up into the beautiful mountains. I mean what an awesome job is that, right? I mean it's incredible. And part of our responsibilities were to also care for the horses. And in very short order I got to know their various personalities. It started with I got to actually pick the horse that I would ride for the entire summer. And I just, I hit the jackpot when I picked this beautiful Appaloosa. If you know what Appaloosa is, they have this beautiful painted coats.

And this horse, his name was Apache, this was an amazing animal. Fastest horse I've ever ridden in my life and completely trustworthy. I mean he just, we just had this amazing bond and so after a couple weeks he just knew exactly what I expected and we would often in the afternoons we would take campers on this 45 minute loop. And truth be told he got so good at just you know charting out the path and everything like that. I would at times I would take a nap while we were going along.

You're thinking well how do you sleep when you're sitting upright? Well some of you do it every week so it is possible. And I just doze off for 15, 20 minutes. I'd have you know seven or eight kids on horseback behind me. Did I mention I was 18 years old? And the great thing was as we approached the stables we would have to cross through this creek and it would be the splashing of his hooves that would wake me up and I kind of straight up and look back and go well I hope you all enjoyed your ride and it was a great having you along. I feel very relaxed and refreshed and that was Apache.

We also had a rather smallish swayback horse named Blaze and Blaze did not live up to his name when it came to speed. Blaze did not look forward to the summertime. He didn't like to take people on rides. Just kind of plugged along except when Blaze sensed that he had a timid or otherwise defenseless rider on his back and then Blaze became a completely different animal. Blaze would try to rub them off on fence rails against a bush, a tree, buck them off, whatever he could do. Blaze essentially was evil, just pure evil.

In fact, probably named him Blaze because he came from the hot place. I'm convinced of that. Our go-to horse for our smallest most defenseless riders, little kids, turned out to be a massive draft horse named Caesar. Caesar was huge, weighed 2,000 pounds and yet we would put five years old, five-year-old kids on his back. His back was so immense, so broad that they'd have to do the splits. There was like no way they're gonna reach the stairs. They're just like bringing legs sticking out like this and even though they were perched higher on Caesar's back than any of the other horses, longer way to the ground, we never worried about them.

They never went anywhere because Caesar, he just lumber along, nothing spooked him, nothing rattled him, the other horses didn't mess with him. He was the proverbial gentle giant. That's a picture of biblical gentleness because gentleness is power under control. You might want to write that down if you're taking notes. It's power under control and you see this picture in Scripture of God being the very same way. He's depicted in a similar way.

I'll give you an example. In Isaiah 40:10, it says, "See, the sovereign Lord comes with power and he rules with a mighty arm. See, his reward is with him and his recompense accompanies him." This is a picture of God as a conquering hero, God who is absolute in his power over opposition and when it talks about him, his reward and his recompense accompanying him, that's a picture of a king returning from battle with the spoils of victory and at times with those that he has conquered marching behind him in surrender and submission.

Again, this is a picture of God's absolute unquestioned power and this was an assurance to his people that he was up to the task of being their God and yet in the very next verse, Isaiah 40:11, it says, "He tends his flock like a shepherd. He gathers the lambs in his arms and carries them close to his heart. He gently leads those who have young." Now I want you to think about that. God could force us to follow him. God could compel us to do anything he wanted and yet he's not interested in a forced relationship with human beings. He's interested in a love relationship and so it's through his loving kindness and his gentleness that he calls us to himself despite his infinite power. He's gentle.

I'll never forget, kind of seeing a picture of this a little over a year ago, and I mentioned this, some of you might remember this, but I want to share it again today. It was about the end of summer, 2017, Memorial Day, or excuse me, Labor Day was right around the corner and I had to run an errand and so I'm pulling out of my driveway and I looked down the street for oncoming traffic and I don't see a car, I actually see a full-grown sheep running up the road towards me like just another day in Corraletus or something like that and I think to myself, "Well I probably ought to do something to help this animal. I don't want it to get hurt or its owners I'm sure value it again. It was a beautiful animal."

And so I backed my truck up into the driveway and by the time I get out of my car, the sheep has moved up onto the lawn. I want to call it, technically it was a you I guess, but I don't want to confuse you with the sheep so I'm just gonna call it a sheep. The sheep is now munching on my lawn and fertilizing it all at the same time. I try to approach it but it won't let me get very close to maybe eight feet max and then it would just move away and so I thought, "Well I'll bribe it." And I run into the house and grab a carrot out of the fridge and I offer it to the sheep and I discover that sheep are about as interested in carrots as people are. It's like, "Yeah, no thanks."

About this time I see this couple coming up the street. I think they live across the street from the sheep and so they know a little bit about this and so they run up and they've got this big leash in their hand and clearly they're gonna try to you know lasso it around his neck and then drag it back to its pen and that's what I found out just how athletic this sheep was. I mean the thing is darting all over my front yard and there is just no way it is gonna allow those people to get close to him with the leash and right about that time my next-door neighbor Lisa, she comes out of the house, she's been watching this unfold and she just glides past me, walks up to the sheep and starts talking to it very softly, very sweet like, "Well, how are you today? Well, what are you doing up here? You must be lost."

The sheep just kind of perches his head up and like trots right up to her like they're long-lost friends. It turns out Lisa was a sheep whisperer. I did not know this about her. We've been neighbors for a very long time and I'm thinking well the sheep probably sensed that the fair was coming up this was a good time to escape but there's Lisa to save the day and as she just speaks very kindly and gently to it it just follows her right down the street never had to touch it follows her down to its yard up into the back goes right back into the pen week later it was auctioned off of the county fair no I'm kidding if that didn't happen. I totally ruined it for some of you, huh? Yeah, sorry.

It's okay. My point is this, Lisa didn't have to force it, she didn't have to bribe it, it simply was drawn to the sound of her gentle voice and in this passage in Isaiah, if you read the whole chapter it's really about God's announcing hey I'm going to come I'm going to save and I'm gonna shepherd my people and centuries later when Jesus arrives on the scene he says I'm that good shepherd and in John's gospel chapter 10 he says my sheep listen to my voice I know them and they follow me and as we hear his voice as we follow him something miraculous happens he starts to change us.

We begin to little by little we start to resemble him in other words the fruit of the spirit is developed in our lives and back in Galatians 5 when we read those verses in 22 and 23 at verse 25 the Apostle Paul who wrote that he essentially says as we keep in step with the spirit the fruit will develop in our life so just keep in step with the spirit keep allowing yourself to be led by him.

And so I just want to point out this very simple sermon I just want to point out three things that have to do with gentleness that develop as we keep in step with the spirit and the first one is this I keep in step with the spirit I will become more gentle is as simple as that and if you're a note-taker you got to give me credit that's the shortest fillin ever in the history of this church right there one letter but you might be thinking to yourself well Mark that's probably true for maybe most people but me you understand I've always had someone of an aggressive personality okay I'm the kind of person who is easily aggravated I'm the kind of person who in fact struggles with anger and so I don't see how that would ever be me that I would be a more and more a gentle person.

But you know what it's not about you you might have the desire you don't have the power this is not about your willpower affecting this transformation this is about the spirits power doing the spirits work in you and over time he will be successful as we keep in step as we yield ourselves to him look what the Apostle Paul says in one of his other letters this is Colossians 1:9–10 and in chapter 1 verses 9 and 10 Paul says we continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all the wisdom and understanding that the spirit gives bearing fruit in every good work growing in the knowledge of God being strengthened with all power now let me ask you who's doing all the doing here God is as as Paul prays that the spirit would would fill them with the knowledge of the will of God and and bear fruit and and produce growth and strengthen us that's the the spirits ministry here and as as we keep in step these things will take place.

Reminds me of when Laura and I were engaged and like most couples we're talking about our wedding day and all the various details we're talking about the reception and the song that we would use for our first dance together as husband and wife and we chose that song at last by well I don't know it's not by Nat King Cole I think Etta James but we did the Nat King Cole rendition of at last you know the song any of you know this song good because I'm not gonna sing it for you if if you've gotten that King Cole playing in your head right now I don't want to ruin it for you but it's a beautiful song and you know that's a moment you know it's everybody is watching you and this one-time special first dance and I'm on my way to just messing up because I'm just gonna Laura I'm gonna look like a dork out there I'm really I'm just not up to the task.

And you know I've been to weddings perhaps you've been to weddings where that first dance it's cute but it's kind of awkward too because the the bride and groom their dance skills have not advanced since the seventh grade and that was me I was in that lane for sure and so Laura decides to call in some reinforcements and we go over to her parents house and we're in the living room and she says now I'm just gonna call my parents out here and we're gonna put on a song and I want I want you to see something and she does this the music starts to swell and then something magical happens her mom and dad they're just gliding around the room so graceful so smooth so elegant I mean I was totally stunned I mean stunned because I'd never seen them do this before stunned because they've been church people for a long time and church can sometimes kind of suck the dance out of you know what I mean I mean to being real here but anyway they were stunning they were amazing.

And so Laura says okay now you know we get up and we're dancing and I'm the whole time I'm holding Laura but I'm watching her father I'm watching his feet I'm watching his moves and I'm awkward and I'm clumsy at first and I'm awkward and clumsy at second but over the course of some time and some practice no one was gonna confuse me with Fred Astaire that's for sure or even her father but I did grow in the process of watching his steps and that's the beauty and the power of what Paul's talking about in Galatians 5 as we keep in step with the spirit the music of God's grace it fills us and we we caught up in who he intends us to be and we become more grace filled along the way and as it happens I become more gentle my heart starts to resemble his heart and also in in the process my speech will also become more gentle.

Now again we have some common objections to this some of us might say well you know what Mark I I've always been the kind of person you know I just say it like it is and I let the chips fall you know I'm just a blunt person that's the way I've always been I can't imagine I'd ever change or or you know I grew up in a family it's just we all run hot we're just passionate people we get each other's face and we just kind of hash it all out it's what we do it's how we roll.

Well that may explain why you speak to others the way you do but it doesn't necessarily excuse it you know what I'm saying back to Colossians 4:6 in chapter 4 verse 6 Paul says let your conversation be occasionally full of grace yeah that's what we wanted to say huh some of you are following along some of you are taking that 15-20 minute nap right now but let your conversation be what always always always full of grace which sounds like gentle speech to me.

Now this may look different from family to family or a culture to culture but the bottom line the test is really this because the opposite of gentleness is harshness you can't be gentle and harsh at the same time and so it may not have to do so much with the volume of my words as it does the impact and I ask myself do my words hurt or do they help and just as an aside I think people who are known for their gentle speech carry a lot more authority when they do perhaps raise their voice or have to say something in candor because they're not just you know being a hothead all the time those moments are few and far between.

But this is a real issue in our culture and I'm sure this doesn't come as a news flash to you but I mean you can you can tune into a heated argument on television or social media any time you want 24/7 it passes as entertainment in our culture now unless we just look out at the world and go yeah that's too bad this can be a real problem it is a real problem at times in Christian cultures in Christian churches.

Let me ask you if you've ever experienced this I know from my own life I have various friends guys I surf with or people I know in the community they would not profess to be Christians in fact they would say they believe either nothing or maybe a little at everything and yet I find them to be very pleasant delightful people I enjoy their company our friendship is genuine I like being with them and I hope to influence them in the ways of Christ and at the same time I've had experiences with Christians and perhaps you have as well all they ever want to do is argue or talk about what's wrong with everything and everyone is just kind of one harangue after the other and I go what's going on.

There's a historian and theologian named Martin Marty and he puts it this way he says people today who are civil often don't have very strong convictions and people who have strong convictions often aren't very civil you agree with that? Think about this the very first Christians the first century Christians those who followed in the years after Jesus they grew up in a very hostile environment in fact the more their numbers grew the more the opposition and the pressure against them intensified and leading them at least one of their leaders an elder statesman of the church in the decades following Christ is Peter and you've probably read about Peter and the gospel famously kind of spouting out the mouth and now here's Peter this winsome wisened man who in that context with that kind of hostility to people who are being treated unjustly they're not getting fair treatment in their community or by their government he says this he says in his first letter 1 Peter 3:15 he says always there's that word again always always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have but do this with gentleness and respect.

What about when I'm not being spoken to that way no always and think about it these folks did they have strong convictions you better believe they did they had to have convictions strong enough faith strong enough to withstand the intense pressure that was being levied against them see true power isn't just kind of blowing people away with your words true power is being able to speak with gentleness and respect in the face of hostile words and just as Peter would grow and gentleness so do we again as we keep in step with the spirit in my heart in my speech and finally in my view towards others as I keep in step with the spirit my view towards others will become more gentle.

In Ephesians 4:2 Paul says this in chapter 2 he says be completely humble and gentle be patient bearing with one another in love and this is one of a number of occasions where the Apostle Paul will mention humble and gentle right next to each other in the same phrase and there's a reason for this and the reason is that because humility comes when I have a clear view of myself before God you know humility isn't like thinking that you're just a worm humility is seeing yourself with clarity realizing God loves me but but everything I need in terms of the life that he has from him I'm completely dependent on him.

I mean the only thing that I brought to the to the table was my sin and yet through his grace he cleanses me and he empowers me to live the life I was created to live. I mean that will humble you the more you realize that the deeper that gets into your heart and soul the more it will humble you in a good and godly way and so when that happens it changes my view of others you might put it this way having a clear view of myself about my need for grace that's where humility comes from that gives me a charitable view towards others I realized hey we're all a work in progress here.

A pastor named Andy Stanley tweeted this week he said the more conscious I am of what God has yet to do in me the less critical I am of what he has yet to do in others and if you think about it you know that hey is there a time and place to voice our concerns or or challenge an assumption or something like that of course there is but at the same time we need to recognize and this will allow us to do that in a humble way the only person with with the pure moral high ground the only one who really deserves to be critical of others is God himself because he has perfect clarity a perfect vantage point and yet when God sends his son to the earth Jesus doesn't come to condemn it he comes to save it.

And it's that gentle Savior that we see in John 8 for example when some very self-righteous religious people they bring a woman caught in adultery and never mind the fact that they don't have the guy there they just have the woman there and they bring her before Jesus and they say well Jesus by law we can pick up these stones and we can kill her for the sin what say you and I love John's account there because it says that Jesus is drawing in the dirt he's down on his haunches and I don't he's just waiting for these guys to finish their speech their tirade take a breath and he stands up he says this is what I say let's have him who has no sin throw the first stone and you know the story one by one they all just walk away and he turns to this woman he says woman where are your accusers does no one condemn you in an amazement she says no one sir then neither do I go and sin no more.

And for some of you the person that you have the hardest time being gentle with isn't someone out there it's you you feel so unworthy you feel like such a fit you just beat yourself up over and over again it's almost like psychologically you stone yourself there is a gentle Savior who came to save you and forgive you Jesus Christ it's the same Jesus who in Luke 19 he's walking through town and the crowd swells to such a size that there's a little guy who wants to see him but he can't see over anyone else so he climbs up a tree and he waits for Jesus to come and Jesus looks up and there's Zacchaeus and everybody hates Zacchaeus because he's a tax collector but Jesus says Zacchaeus come down for today today I must come to your house stunning.

Maybe you feel small you feel unlovely you feel you're on the outs of your community or your family or whatever it is and Jesus says today I want to come to your house will you let him in will you let him bring his gentle presence and his gentle rule to your household because he wants to come today or maybe today like me you find yourself in a moment of grief Lisa who I mentioned earlier our dear neighbor and sheep whisperer she's so much more than a neighbor for us we we loved her so dearly our kids have only known a world with with Lisa who was in very very real way a member of our family in our household she would just pop in whenever and and we loved it we loved seeing her all the time so dear and generous to us and about ten days ago she passed away after a very valiant battle with cancer a journey that we went through with her.

I said to René and Valerie if there's only one time in my life that I will be able to say that I loved my neighbor as I love myself I did so with Lisa and so we're grieving we're sad our kids are very very sad and maybe you find yourself in a similar place.

Well I want to remind you just as I remind myself that we have a gentle and good shepherd who promises to gather us up in his arms and carry us close to his heart and that's not just poetry that's real but that's you or whatever your circumstances whatever your past Jesus says to all of us today as Matthew records says come to me all you who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest take my yoke upon you and learn from me for I am gentle and humble in heart and you will find rest for your souls doesn't that sound good.

Let's let's go to him right now in prayer heavenly father we thank you for the beautiful Savior that you've given us in your son Jesus Christ and Lord I thank you that you you are everything that we need and Lord I pray for those today they've been struggling in this area they find themselves at times speaking or behaving in a way that's more harsh than they would like when they have a moment to kind of cool down and and look back on it and that can be a very pernicious thing I pray for healing I pray for your your growth in their lives and your transformation of their hearts their tongues their actions and attitudes pray that for myself.

And Lord I pray for any of us Lord here today who wear like the woman that I spoke about or likes a key estate they've seen you from a distance but then when they encounter you they hear your voice calling them and drawing them and and so Lord I pray that if there's anyone in this room or within the sound of my voice that they would see Lord Jesus I want to respond to your call I want to I want to say count me in I will follow you I admit I need you I have sinned I have failed thank you for taking my sins upon yourself for taking the blame and the punishment on the cross for dying for me thank you that when they laid you in that tomb you didn't stay there and so Lord we're talking to a living Lord not a historical figure merely we know you hear us we know you're here by your spirit and so we place our lives in your hands and your care whether it's in this moment or after walking with you for decades.

And for any Lord who like me and my wife and kids I'm sure I'm sure there are people in this room that there's there's a fresh grief in their life or there's an old grief that just the way it just sticks with them just so deep pray for the tender care of our shepherd today bind our wounds continue to carry us close to your heart pray this in the matchless name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and all God's people said amen.