Why is it that some situations cause us to lose our tempers? Why do we sometimes lose all sense of reason and just get angry all over? Why is it that when we are trying to get someone else to do what we want them to do, we can barely control our rage?
A few weeks ago I introduced you to our new puppy. I told you about her curiosity. I described how she would not leave anything alone, but seemed to feel a need to nibble at everything from houseplants to shoestrings to newspapers. As a tiny ball of fluff, she was curiosity in the flesh.
Today let me bring you up to date with Chloe, as we have named her. Chloe has moved out of the curiosity stage, and through the playful stage, and is now in the pest stage. This puppy is now a total pest, pure and simple.
What that means is that she will come at you to get your attention and absolutely will not give up until she gets exactly what she wants, If I put her in the basement, she will whine and weep at the top step forever. If I am trying to read the newspaper, she will lap at my elbow until I am awash in saliva. And nothing deters her. She is a pest.
To tell the truth, I feel like slapping that animal to kingdom come. I feel a surge out there in my foot; it wants to kick this hound. Now don’t call the SPCA; I have resisted thus far. But I surely haven’t resisted yelling at her or grabbing her up and shutting her behind closed doors. My way of dealing with the pest is either to punish her or to withdraw from her.
But Chloe is a pest to someone else besides me. Chloe is a pest to Scruffy. Scruffy, you see, is our old dog. And sometimes Scruffy cannot get a moment’s peace from Chloe. They are a sight to behold. Chloe nips at Scruffy’s legs, she nibbles at Scruffy’s ears, she climbs on Scruffy’s back and even runs at lightning speed from across the room and tackles Scruffy. She is a pest, do you hear me?! It is almost too much to take when she angles her head around and opens her jaws and begins to gnaw on Scruffy’s chin. This puppy is a pest. She is pest to both of our old dogs, the four-legged one and the two-legged one.
But Scruffy deals with the pest with a curious combination of patience and resolve, Scruffy defends herself against all this nibbling and snapping, but she never presses the advantage. She weighs a lot more than Chloe, but she never slams the puppy to the floor. She has adult teeth rather than little puppy teeth, but she never inflicts injury on the pest. It’s as though she is enduring what must be endured in order finally to teach the little monster how to behave.
In other words, one old dog, the two-legged one, loses it with the pest. The other old dog, the four-legged one, has mastered the art of gentleness.
I leave it to you to determine which one of us is the more spiritually mature! But let’s spend some time thinking about gentleness. The fruits of the Spirit include gentleness. And Paul goes on in this Galatian letter to tell us what we must do with pests! "My friends, if anyone is detected in a transgression, you who have received the Spirit should restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness" ... "in a spirit of gentleness!”
I’ve raised some questions. I’ve asked why we can’t control our anger, I’ve wondered why some of us can be gentle and some of us cannot. We’ve been reminded that gentleness is one of the fruits of the Spirit.
The thesis of my message this morning is that if we can see how God deals gently with us, despite our failures, then we will be empowered to deal gently first with ourselves and then with others. Let me say it again: God deals gently with our failures. That means we can learn to deal gently with our own failures. And it means that we will ultimately learn to be gentle with those who disappoint us.
Actually, the best way to communicate this message is simply to use the words of Paul himself, from another of his letters: "Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ has forgiven you.”
I
So first, we must recognize that God’s way is to deal gently with us. God’s way of relating to us is gentleness.
Now I’ve been using this word "gentleness", and I have vet to define it or describe it. "Gentleness" means a light touch with a firm purpose. A light touch but with a firm purpose.
One writer says that gentleness is a velvet-covered brick! A velvet-covered brick … it looks soft, it looks luxurious and attractive and easy. But inside it is a brick. It is hard, it is tough, it is definite.
Now I am saying that God deals with us using a velvet-covered brick. There is a light touch but a firm resolve to discipline us and to move us in the right direction.
Folks, can you just imagine what it must be like to be God!? Let me just do a little foolish fantasizing here! With all circuits open all the time, and the Bible says that He neither slumbers nor sleeps, God has to watch all this stuff we are all doing every day, every hour! Imagine watching the Serbians slaughter the Bosnians at the same time that the Somalis are self-destructing and Colombian drug dealers are plying their trade and politicians in Washington are polluting the airwaves! Let’s face it, God has a lot of pests nibbling at his heels!
And on top of it all, you and I, believers and church folk though we are, test His patience in a thousand thousand ways every day. Our sins may seem petty by comparison with others, but they are nonetheless sins. To tell the truth, I have a feeling that most of us are Chloe pests, hammering away at God’s attention!
But now how does God deal with us? How does He respond to our failures and our sins? You and I are tempted to respond to those who bother us either with withering anger or with abject withdrawal. You and I are tempted to respond either with hostility or with indifference. But God responds with gentleness. God responds with a light touch but firm resolve, God responds by offering us forgiveness if we will repent, by absorbing into His own heart all of our shortcomings and all of our sin. That’s what the Cross is; it’s God in Christ letting us bother Him, letting us pester Him.
God responds by absorbing into Himself our sin and then offering us forgiveness if we will repent and receive it. Like my old dog, Scruffy, you see, God takes it from us and takes it from us and takes it from us, but gently and firmly works to correct us and forgive us.
The greatest truth I know is that God in Christ is treating us gently. He is forgiving us but disciplining us. He has used a velvet-covered brick on us. He treats us with a light touch but with firm resolve, gentleness.
II
Now if that’s true, then it means we can learn to be gentle. "Be tenderhearted, forgiving ... as God in Christ has forgiven you." And in particular we can deal gently with ourselves. I really think this is an important matter. Because God has dealt gently with us, we first learn to deal gently with ourselves and then can we discover how to be gentle with others.
There is a phrase that someone used with me once. It’s stuck with me. Someone said, "Do you ever give yourself permission to fail? Think about that. “Do you ever give yourself permission to fail?"
You see, we are sometimes our own worst enemies. We are sometimes our own harshest critics. Some of us never really allow ourselves to be anything less than perfect; some of us are never enough at peace with ourselves simply to relax and enjoy what God has given us. Some of us cannot forgive others, though we may believe God has forgiven us, because we have never forgiven or dealt gently with ourselves.
My grandmother was a great cook. It was always a treat to be invited over to her home for a meal. My parents and my brother and I would stuff ourselves silly with all the wonderful things she would make. And we would, of course, compliment her and praise her work to the skies. When we would do this, Grandmother had one and only one answer every time. "Well, it’s not as good as the pie I made last week." "I don’t think I did as well on this roast as I did the last time.”
Which led us to think in amazement about what Grandmother’s very first meal must have been like. Since no culinary event was ever as good as the previous one, we figured that her very first effort in the kitchen must have been truly spectacular!
When will we give ourselves permission to be less than perfect? We can’t give ourselves permission to fail. We can’t accept our limitations. Some of us are perfectionists, and if we can’t do a task well, we don’t want to do it at all.
You’ve beard the saying, "Any job worth doing is worth doing well", right? You’ve used that to motivate somebody to do some job and do it right. Well, there’s another way to look at the issue. Try this. "Any job worth doing is worth doing badly", "Any job worth doing is worth doing badly". That means that even when we are not up to par, even when we cannot satisfy our own standards, we ought to give ourselves permission to try something and fail at it. We need to deal gently with ourselves.
So what if you cannot sing like an angel? So what if you have a hard time carrying a tune? You can sing in a church choir and do the best you can and give yourself permission to be less than perfect. You can deal with yourself gent1v. Any job that’s worth doing is worth doing badly. Those who know that they are forgiven by God deal gently with themselves; they use a ve1vet-covered brick on themselves. They give themselves permission to fail.
So what if you are not sure that you know how to share the Gospel with someone else? So what if you are afraid they will ask you a question you cannot answer? You can share what you do know and give yourself permission to be less than perfect. You can deal with yourself gently. Any job that’s worth doing is worth doing badly. Those who know that they are forgiven by God deal gently with themselves; they use a velvet-covered brick on themselves. They give themselves permission to fail.
"If you cannot sing like angels if you cannot preach like Paul, you can tell the love of Jesus and say He died for all." 8ecause God in Christ deals gently with us, loving us and forgiving us, yet never relaxing what He expects of us … because God in Christ deals gently with us, we can deal gently with ourselves. "Be tenderhearted, forgiving ... as God in Christ has forgiven you."
III
Now that means we are finally ready to be gentle with others. If our hearts respond to the gentleness with which God treats us, and if we can learn to be gentle with ourselves, then we will be ready to use the wonderful weapon of gentleness with others.
You see, this fruit of the Spirit, gentleness, is a weapon, a wonderful weapon. It is an instrument by which we can shape and influence others. To be gentle with others … and remember what gentleness is: gentleness is using a light touch, but with a firm and definite purpose ... to be gentle with others is to succeed in shaping them and influencing them.
When we see how God’s gentle forgiveness shapes us, and then we shape ourselves with that gentle touch, we will be able to influence others with the wonderful weapon of gentleness.
Let me illustrate. The week before last our church building was an emergency home to a small day camp, which had had to vacate another church building. As this day camp got under way, I noticed immediately how quiet it was, Ten or twelve children gathering at eight in the morning and doing various things until five or six in the evening would be expected to get pretty rowdy. But these kids were exceptionally quiet.
In the middle of the week the camp director and one of the boys in the camp appeared at my office door, and the boy was sobbing his very heart out, I don’t know when I’ve seen a ten-year-old boy weep like that. The camp director said, "This young man was using some bad language, and he wants to apologize." After we had taken care of that, I took the camp director aside and I said, "How did you get him to be that remorseful? And how do you keep this group so much in order?"
He said, "I don’t. I don’t. The kids do it themselves. I just lead them at the beginning of day-camp to agree together on what kind of behavior they will accept and what they will not accept. And so when somebody begins to act up, all I have to do is hint a little, remind them, and they put the pressure on the one who is misbehaving."
That’s gentleness. That’s the velvet-covered brick. That’s the light touch with the firm purpose. That shapes people, that influences people. That gentleness makes a difference. Listen to Paul: "If anyone is detected in a transgression, you who have received the Spirit should restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness."
Guess what? The Bible actually works! It works!
Gentleness with children goes a long way toward shaping them. We certainly let them know what we stand for, but if you use gentleness, you can do something far more than simply be irritated with the children or withdraw from them. You can befriend them and shape them with a light touch and yet a firm purpose.
Gentleness in our homes will be heard and will be effective. When I am counseling couples who are preparing for marriage, I frequently ask both bride and groom to tell me about their relationships with their parents. If these about-to-be-marrieds tell me something like, "Dad didn’t say a whole lot, but I knew what he expected" or "Mom never raises her voice, but her standards are clear" ... when I hear things like that, I know that they have at least a chance for a healthy marriage. Gentleness does shape our families.
And it’s all because, you see, our God offers us His love with a gentle forbearance and a gracious mercy. "The fruit of the Spirit is gentleness." "Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ has forgiven you."
The whole key is to know God’s forgiveness. The entire secret to a gentle touch is to be touched by Christ. The fundamental step toward holding our anger and shaping our children is first of all to become a child of God.
That’s what could happen today for somebody. Today some father could acknowledge his need and come to Christ. Today some mother could take that nagging feeling of failure and give it away to Christ. This morning some child, some youth could get on the path toward gentleness just by receiving Christ as Savior and Lord. "As God in Christ has forgiven you.”
Oh, by the way, about the pest. Scruffy is the gentle one. She does not press her weight advantage, she does not sink her teeth in at strategic spots. She just defends herself and sets a model of quiet restraint and dignity. I’ve noticed in the past week or so that when the dust settles, Chloe and Scruffy just lie down peacefully side-by-side and enjoy one another’s company. Gentleness does shape others.
But this two-legged old dog, who has never yet treated Chloe the pest with gentleness, finds that whenever he enters the room, Chloe dives under the nearest piece of furniture. No gentleness, no relationship.
