Living-loving like Jesus: Gentleness, episode 133 (rebroadcast)

0:00 If you love a prodigal, you can discover help and hope for your wilderness journey right here at When You Love a Prodigal and also help and hope for your own life journey. I trust our conversation last week with Ron Deal about blended families was helpful to you. If you missed it, you can go to any platform or my judydouglass.com site to listen to it. If you have a blended family, it could really be helpful to you. Today we are continuing our study of what it looks like to live and love like Jesus.

0:42 For certainly, if we could relate to our wanderers as Jesus would have, we just might see a difference in the atmosphere in our home and relationship. We have already considered compassion, kindness, and humility. Surely as we exhibit those qualities of Jesus, we could anticipate more peace and positive connection with our prodigals. This passage in Colossians 3 continues to be our guide. Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience.

1:35 Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Love as the Lord forgave you and over all these virtues put on love which binds them all together in perfect unity. Today we take up gentleness. So today in our world things seem harsh, angry, strident, contentious. Actions fly across social media, over the airwaves, in the streets, even in families.

2:18 Actions follow and violence sometimes erupts. We can easily be drawn into the debate, the disagreement, the conflict. Our opinion is right, of course, and we must affirm it. So we join the cacophony. This scene that I just described displays anything but gentleness and surely doesn't live out this word from Proverbs. A gentle answer turns away wrath. And most of us have experienced this result at some time in our homes and with our prodigals.

2:59 Yes, they, our wanderers, may start it. But for it to continue we will often let ourselves be drawn in and pursue our very right point of view. And sometimes we even initiate the conflict and draw them in. Yet Paul reminds us that all followers of Jesus are to put on gentleness. What does gentleness look like? How is it possible with a loved one who's choosing to rebel? How do we become gentle by learning from the tough but gentle Jesus himself?

3:44 See how he disarms discord and affirms the malign and encourages the despairing. First of all, we're going to look at how he reacts to children. When people brought little children to Jesus for him to place his hands on them and pray for them, but the disciples rebuked them, Jesus said, let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these. And he took the children in his arms, placed his hands on them and blessed them.

4:25 Now the children that are yours may not be little children anymore, but Jesus is still saying, let the children come to me. And so we need to have gentleness. Jesus in his interactions with a woman with an illness and an invalid, again displayed gentleness. This woman had been bleeding for 20 years and she reached out and touched his cloak and was healed. Then the woman, seeing that she could not go unnoticed, came trembling and fell at his feet because he had asked, who touched me?

5:09 In the presence of all the people, she told why she had touched him and how she had been instantly healed. When Jesus said to her, daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace. There was a man who had been an invalid for 38 years. When Jesus saw him lying there by the pool and learned that he had been in this condition for a long time, he asked him, do you want to get well? Sir, the invalid replied, I have no one to help me into the pool when the water is stirred.

5:49 While I am trying to get in, someone else gets there first. Then Jesus said to him, get up, pick up your mat and walk. At once the man was cured. He picked up his mat and walked. Then there was the sinful woman caught in adultery. The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group and said to Jesus, teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. In the law, Moses commanded us to stone such women.

6:33 Now what do you say? Then Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger. When they capped on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her. Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground. At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time. The older ones first until only Jesus was left with the woman still standing there.

7:14 Jesus straightened up and asked her, woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you? No one, sir, she said. Then neither do I condemn you, Jesus declared. Go now and lead your life of sin. There was a blind man. They came to Bethsaida, Jesus and the disciples, and some people brought a blind man and begged Jesus to touch him. He took the blind man by the hand and let him outside the village. When he had spit on the man's eyes and put his hands on him, Jesus asked, do you see anything?

7:57 He looked up and said, I see people, but they looked like trees walking around. So once more, Jesus put his hands on the man's eyes. Then his eyes were opened, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly. And then a leper came to him and bowed down before him and said, Lord, if you're willing, you can make me clean. Now lepers shouldn't have been where the people were or where Jesus was, but he had heard what Jesus could do. And that Jesus would not reject him. And so he came to him and Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him.

8:42 No one touched lepers and touched him and said, I am willing, be clean. And immediately his leprosy was cleansed. Jesus welcomed children, spoke gently to women in pain, touched lepers. Healed the blind, fed the hungry. He loved people, felt compassion for them, and treated them with great gentleness. But Jesus was also quite tough. He stepped out of heaven to become like us.

9:25 He stood up to the Pharisees, accepted the flogging and a crown of thorns, endured the cross. He was the greatest model of doth. He will give us the needed toughness that we should have and the wisdom to know how to use it. He is also the greatest model of gentle. And that gentleness that he has exhibited in all these interactions that I've talked about, that gentleness is available to you and to me. Hard to believe, isn't it? We don't have to be drawn into the demanding, mocking, quarreling that prevail today.

10:11 We have a promise from Jesus that every one of us who loves a prodigal needs. This is a promise that he's given for each of us. 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. And so Jesus, who could be so gentle with people who were going against everything that the culture called for, he still loved them and reached out and was gentle with them, whether in his words or in touching, in healing, in restoring, he was gentle.

10:57 And he was tough, obviously, with what he endured because of his love for us. And he says, if you'll come to me and become increasingly like me, I am gentle and humble in heart. And that will bring you rest for your souls. And you will increasingly be able to be gentle with people you encounter, but especially with your prodigal. You can work with them, talk with them, encourage them, treat them with gentleness, not harshness.

11:38 So now we have added gentleness to compassion, kindness, and humility as what we should be wearing. It's how we should clothe ourselves. It's what we should have on all the time. Compassion, kindness, humility, and gentleness. Next week we will look at another challenging one, and that is patience. So what about you? Is there a possibility that you could use a little more gentleness from the Lord as you interact with your loved one?

12:20 I find that that's really true so often. We may love them very much, but it's so easy to let our frustration and even our anger come out. Jesus says, come and let me be in control, and I will enable you to be gentle. God bless you.