“I am gentle and humble in heart”( Matthew 11:29).

Of whom do we sing of when we sing “O Holy Night”?   Who is it who comes on this silent, holy night?  Why would he come, whatever could be the heart motivation for such a journey?

There is just one place in Scripture where Jesus discloses his heart to us.  Of course, we see his heart “in action” throughout his life, throughout all of Scripture.  But it is here alone that Jesus speaks directly to us about the content of his heart: “Take my yoke upon you and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly (gentle and humble) of heart, and you will find rest for your souls.”

We have been taught, rightly, that God is omni.  Omni means all: God is omnipotent (all-powerful), omnipresent (present in all times and places), omniscient (all-knowing) and similar words.  Have you ever heard God characterized as omni-gentle, omni-humble?  But Jesus tells us that if we would understand God’s heart, it is a heart that is gentle and humble.

Gentle towards the weary and burdened; gentle towards the least and the lost; gentle towards sinners.  A few verses before the one we’re looking at here, Jesus quotes the dismissive accusation made against him, that he is a “friend of tax collectors and sinners.”  In other words, he is a friend to those whom God has no business befriending!  God may be willing to become friends, eventually, with the especially holy, the heroically obedient, the passionately pure.  But a friend of sinners?  Gentle towards sinners, with sinners?  Humble, willing to take his place alongside sinners, willing to lower himself that he might raise sinners up?  What kind of god does that?  How can a God who is all-powerful and all-holy be a gentle and humble friend of sinners?

Because that IS his heart.

Consider the most sensitive places in your heart, your soul, your life, the places you don’t want anyone to see or know about, the places you feel most deeply wounded or ashamed.  Jesus is gentle towards you right there, in those very spots.  Not angry, gentle.  Not condemning, gentle.  Not surprised or horrified or appalled: gentle.  

We are all in ruins.  But Jesus picks up the shards and scraps, all the bent, broken and twisted pieces.  He handles them gently and gently says about them, “I can work with this.  I can make something wonderful of this.  There’s nothing here with which I am unfamiliar, and there is nothing here that I cannot make new.”

And his heart is humble.  That means that he does not wait for us to come looking for him, to vainly attempt the impossible journey to find him.  He is humble of heart, so he takes the initiative, makes the journey, bears the burden, picks up the tab. It is his heart.

This piece draws on Dane Ortlund’s book, Gentle and Lowly: The Heart of Christ for Sinners and Sufferers (Crossway 2020).  It’s a wonderful read, for these weeks around Christmas, or as a gateway into a new year.