GENTLEMANLY

The Approachable, Compassionate Jesus C. Doug Blair, 2012

Jesus is a gentleman. To the hypocrite He is blasting words of fire. To the oppressor (a man such as Herod) He is terrifyingly silent. To the haughty and self-assured (a man such as the lawyer who elicited the parable of the Good Samaritan) He is succinctly challenging.

But to the needy, neglected and humbly petitioning He is patience, compassion, ready help and sensitive courtesy.

I love the story in Mark 7: 31-37. People have brought to Jesus a man who is deaf and dumb, beseeching that He might lay hands on him as other prophets of old would have done. Jesus takes him aside to a quiet and more private place. He wants to minister intimately and without embarrassment, fanfare or ostentation.

Then the Lord "looks to heaven". He will only give the credit to His Heavenly Father and wants to let the man know that it is entirely natural for Him to call upon such power in the here-and-now.

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Then Jesus sighs. There are worlds of comfort and encouragement in this act. Messiah has come, has grown, suffered, laboured and laughed in our mortal sphere. He identifies and offers sinless, vital intercession. He feels, as if real, the handicap, frustration and shame of the man before Him.

He helps the man's faith to receive by doing something physical; fingers into the deaf ears and spittled touch upon the tongue. Note the order. It is better to hear from Jesus, firstly and intently, before having anything much of significance to say. Otherwise our tongues may be a frequent cause for stumbling and harm. Have we not heard the Lord say often, "He who hath ears to hear: let Him hear"? Remember that Jesus gives the ears, the perception, to hear rightly.

And then the word, the creative word, spoken calmly and with authority which compels a trusting response. "Be opened". The result of health and wholeness, new purpose and praise is a foregone conclusion.

Sighing as He Sighs

Mark 7:

32There some people brought to him a man who was deaf and could hardly talk, and they begged him to place his hand on the man. 33After he took him aside, away from the crowd, Jesus put his fingers into the man's ears. Then he spit and touched the man's tongue. 34He looked up to heaven and with a deep sigh said to him, "Ephphatha!" (which means, "Be opened!" ). 35At this, the man's ears were opened, his tongue was loosened and he began to speak plainly.

Hear what is said by Alexander Maclaren about this beautiful illustration of Christ's compassion, courtesy and power:

The root of all our efficiency in this great task to which we, unworthy, have been called, is in fellowship with Jesus Christ. "The branch cannot bear fruit

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of itself; without me ye can do nothing." Living near Him, and growing like Him by gazing upon Him, His beauty will pass into our faces, His tender pity into our hearts, His loving identification of Himself with men's pains and sins will fashion our lives; and the word which He spoke with authority and assured confidence will be strong when we speak it with like calm certainty of victory. If the Church of Christ will but draw close to her Lord till the fulness of His life and the gentleness of His pity flow into her heart and limbs, she will then be able to breathe the life which she has received into the prostrate bulk of the dead world. Only she must do as the meekest of the prophets did in a like miracle. She must not shrink from the touch of the cold clay nor the odor of incipient corruption, but lip to lip and heart to heart must lay herself upon the dead and he will live.

The pattern for our work, dear brethren, is before us in the Lord's look, His sigh, His touch, His word. If we take Him for the example, and Him for the motive, Him for the strength, Him for the theme, Him for the reward of our service, we may venture to look to Him as the prophecy of our success, and to be sure that when our own faint hearts or an unbelieving world question the wisdom of our enterprise or the worth of our efforts, we may answer as He did, "Go and show again those things which ye do hear and see; the blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the poor have the Gospel preached unto them."

Note: Believers, can we enter into this compassion and boldness any other way than to be steeped in Jesus. Take long draughts from the Gospel. Set aside ethics and philosophy. Know for a certainty that closeness to Christ alone can impart eyes that see, ears that hear and a heart that weeps and understands. Christ alone can be entrusted with this sensitive mandate, and we His yoke-fellows. No room for pride in this.

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This Man Receiveth Sinners

Luke 15

1.Then drew near unto him all the publicans and sinners for to hear him.2.And the Pharisees and scribes murmered saying, This man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them.

That's just it. The Lord has come to minister to those who have a real sense of their deficit. If they attempt to bluff and claim self-righteousness, then He moves on. He says that the Physician has come to minister to the sick, and to those who will acknowledge that they are sick.

Consider how Jesus dealt with the woman who came to the well in mid-day heat as recorded in John 4. Presumably she chose that time to avoid numbers of other women. She had had many husbands and was the subject of much gossip. Presently she was living common-law. All this Jesus knew by the gift of knowledge. When he stated these facts to her, there did not seem to be condemnation in his countenance or a roadblock to the interview. He was there to dispense "living water" regardless. He was there for her alone.

There is a famous painting of this incident showing the Lord seated by a small well-lid at the base of a flight of stairs. His head appears cocked to hear the sound of one approaching from above. It is this woman of shame. He is there for her. He knows that she is coming.

The woman is so impressed with his willingness to bless that she accepts what he is there to offer. She runs off to tell neighbours that she has found the "promised One". A revival ensues in the community. Many come and listen to His teaching for themselves. He does receive sinners. They sense that he holds a certain optimism for their redemption.

If you can come to some quiet place, and lay yourself bare for His healing, and welcome Him to make His presence known, you will not be disappointed. You will find Him friendly, and more than a match for your sin. A new life awaits.

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John 6:

37 All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.

Nicodemus By Night

In the evening I approached him,In the secrecy of night;For I knew that he was wisdom,And I knew that he was right;And I knew he held the answersAnd was guided by the light.So I came to Jesus just to get it straight.

I had power in the CouncilAnd was held in high esteem,But I sensed the Jews had missed it,Missed Jehovah’s grander scheme;With our rules and regs ad nauseum,Lost the sight of mercy’s theme.So I came to Jesus when my hour was late.

I had struggled with obedienceTo a host of holy laws.But I couldn’t beat my failures,And I couldn’t beat my flaws.All my earnest resolutionsCouldn’t bolster my lost cause;So I came to Jesus, life to illustrate.

There was something fundamental,Yes, a change which must be wrought;And it couldn’t just be studied,And it couldn’t just be bought.It was of the Spirit’s working,

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Some strange new birth to be sought.This was how the Father planned to change my fate!

But so simple, Lord, now really!Can this be for older men?That they must dare to be child-like,And by faith renounce their sin?Seek some Holy Ghost infusion,And by grace be born again?Here’s the truth that I must now appropriate!

The Gentleman is Always Welcome

(Taken from The Analysis of Love contained in The Greatest Thing in the World by Henry Drummond)

The fifth ingredient is a somewhat strange one to find in this summumbonum: Courtesy. This is Love in society, Love in relation to etiquette. “Love doth not behave itself unseemly.” Politeness has been defined as love

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in trifles. Courtesy is said to be love in little things. And the one secret of politeness is to love. Love cannot behave itself unseemly. You can put the most untutored person into the highest society, and if they have a reservoir of love in their heart, they will not behave themselves unseemly. They simply cannot do it. Carlyle said of Robert Burns that there was no truer gentleman in Europe than the ploughman-poet. It was because he loved everything—the mouse, and the daisy, and all the things, great and small, that God had made. So with this simple passport he could mingle with any society, and enter courts and palaces from his little cottage on the banksof the Ayr. You know the meaning of the word “gentleman.” It means a gentle man—a man who does things gently, with love. And that is the whole art and mystery of it. The gentleman cannot in the nature of things do an ungentle, an ungentlemanly thing. The un-gentle soul, the inconsiderate, unsympathetic nature cannot do anything else. “Love doth not behave itself unseemly.”

Drummond Again on Love

"Then Paul contrasts it with sacrifice and martyrdom. And I beg the littleband of would-be missionaries and I have the honour to call some of you by this name for the first time—to remember that though you give your bodies to be burned, and have not Love, it profits nothing—nothing! You can take nothing greater to the heathen world than the impress and reflection of the Love of God upon your own character. That is the universal language. It will take you years to speak in Chinese, or in the dialects of India. From the day you land, that language of Love, understood by all, will be pouring forth its unconscious eloquence. It is the man who is the missionary, it is not his words. His character is his message. In the heart of Africa, among the great Lakes, I have come across black men and women who remembered the only white man they ever saw before—David Livingstone; and as you cross his footsteps in that dark continent, men’s faces light up as they speak of the kind Doctor who passed there years ago. They could not understandhim; but they felt the Love that beat in his heart. Take into your new sphere of labour, where you also mean to lay down your life, that simple charm, and your lifework must succeed. You can take nothing greater, you need take

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nothing less. It is not worth-while going if you take anything less. You may take every accomplishment; you may be braced for every sacrifice; but if you give your body to be burned, and have not Love, it will profit you and the cause of Christ nothing."

Henry Drummond (The Greatest Thing in the World)

The Good White Doctor

The old missionary continued the trek, ravages of malaria notwithstanding. His stretcher bearers manifested almost a woman's touch when the spells came on. There were numerous villages yet to be visited.

His reputation these days had always preceded him. Coming into a clearing he would be gladdened by the happy faces, the singing children and the studious though somewhat guarded faces of the elders.

Medicines would be distributed. In measured hours he would get himself upright and dress open wounds; relieve toothaches; set and splint fractures; consult the women on the progress of their pregnancies.

A modest supper, usually from his own caravan's supply, with tea and biscuits served generously around, would always settle the Good Doctor for the evening's event.

Word had traveled to each community that he carried with him a magical "light box which told stories up against a white sheet". This of course was a rudimentary projector equipped with transparencies to assist in the presentation of a Gospel message. All the basics were addressed: the miraculous birth, the sinless youth, the baptism and wilderness testing, the happy ministrations of mercy and absolution at the Lake side, the growing opposition of hypocrisy, the vacillation of His followers, the anguish of resolve in the garden, the hill-top death, the empty tomb, the joyful new community thrilled with the reality of resurrection.

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For the Doctor, David Livingstone, the focus had to be the Grand Old Story. Of course he would minister to the people's needs and graciously endeavour to make each one feel included. But in the Dark Continent, with death just around the corner in a thousand different ways, souls were the thing...and Jesus the only gift for such soul hunger.

On the last morning, the servants found the Good Doctor, kneeling bed-side in the posture of prayer. Arrangements were made to bury his heart right there in the land which he loved and served. The corpse was carried to the coast over a matter of weeks. His remains were identified by the scars of the large wound on the shoulder inflicted years earlier by lion attack.

Visitors now find Livingstone's remains commemorated in a focal place in Westminster Abbey.

It was said that for two generations following, in the East African territory, it was only necessary to mention the Good White Doctor. Everyone knew Livingstone was meant by the term.

A Kiss on the Cheek

The story is told of Francis of Assisi (1181-1226) walking a remote country lane and discovering a beggar sitting in the grass. The poor man said nothing but held up a beaten dish.

By reflex Francis reached into his robe for a small loaf of bread, smiled and placed the food in the dish. He continued on his way. About twenty-five yards farther he stopped knowing that something was not right.

Francis returned to the beggar, sat down beside him, gently kissed his cheek and said something to the effect of "God in Heaven loves you more than you could possibly imagine. He knows all about you."

They sat quietly for a moment, and then Francis continued on his journey. One more time he turned to give a parting wave of the hand. He saw not the

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beggar, but rather Jesus standing, smiling, at the roadside at that exact spot. Francis had kissed the cheek of his Master!

Fact or fiction? Does it matter? The story is worth telling as a reminder of the fact that we will be surprised with opportunities. Jesus threw down His challenge in Matthew 25:35,36:

For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in: Naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me.

Keep your eyes open, ambassador of the King.

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