He is gentle and tender toward us. Always.
A call to worship.
Themes
The tenderness of Jesus • The gentleness of Jesus • Jesus’ affection for us • Christ’s solidarity with us
The deeper into weakness and into suffering we go, the deeper Christ’s solidarity is with us.
Scripture reading
Hebrews 5:2
This call to worship1 is from the New Testament book of Hebrews. There we read:
He can deal gently with the ignorant and wayward since he himself is beset with weakness.
Prayer
Father in heaven, we do like that Jesus is drawn to us. And we do like how He handles us when we seek Him. He’s always engaged. He never throws up His hands. He is calm and tender. He is soothing and restained. He always deals with us gently. That’s how He is when our failures are reasonable and moderate. But for us bigger sinners, He’s certainly more harsh. But, this is not true. The ignorant and the wayward are not categories for milder sinners. They’re basically us, Father. To us, He is always gentle, irrespective of any particular offense and regardless of how heinous our sin. In fact, His tenderness doesn’t have anything to do with our offenses — their type, or size, or outcomes. His tenderness has everything to do with His always unrestrained affection for us. So we confidently bring our mess to Him this morning. And He knows just how to receive us. It’s never rough. There’s never a scowl. We’re never scolded. He never lashes out. And this is not because He has some diluted view of our sinfulness. He knows our sinfulness far more deeply and far more painfully than we do. Anything we think we know of our sin is only the tip of the iceberg. Where, Father, then does all His restraint come from? It simply flows from his tender heart for us. He never has to hold Himself back from scolding us. And He doesn’t just dispense grace from on high. Instead, He gets right down with us. He sits with us. And He deals with us in a way that is just what we need. He deals gently with us. And with all meekness and gentleness and with patience and moderation, He bears our infirmities, our sins, our provocations. There’s nothing that chains His affections to heaven. Instead, they are always unleashed on us. His meekness, His gentleness, His patience… these are not a side thing; they’re not peripheral to who He is. He doesn’t have to try to be these things toward us, as if His truest delight is elsewhere. His gentleness towards us is what is most natural to Him. When He is gentle to us, He is doing and being what is most fitting and natural to Him. Father, this is our highest encouragement and consolation: to know that He is this way. Given just how deep our sin runs, a small measure of gentleness would never be enough. However deep out sin runs, his gentleness runs deeper still. But, why, Father? Why is this so? Because He is beset with weakness. Contrary, Father, to what we would expect, the deeper into weakness and into suffering we go, the deeper Christ’s solidarity is with us. As we go down into pain and anguish, we descend ever deeper into Christ’s very heart, not away from it. Gentle is the only way He knows how to be with us. So, Father, we won’t fix our eyes on our sin, where we’ll fail to see just how safe He is. Instead, we’ll look at Him this morning, failing to see how we can ever be in danger. In the name of Jesus Christ, on whom we look, on whom our attention is fixed, and from whom we can always anticipate gentleness and patience and tenderness, no matter what! Amen
Inspiring resources
A call to worship creates wonderment, amazement, curiosity, yearning, captivation, provocation, hopefulness, thankfulness, affection, rapture, delight. As these mix together, the response is worship.
If this call to worship leaves you wondering or curious or provoked or hopeful, consider diving into this awesome book by Dane Ortlund, who wrote many of the things in this call to worship.
1
This call to worship was given to the small assembly of Christians that gathered in Pathway Church, Beaverdam, Michigan, on Sunday, March 20, 2022
Thank you.