52b) Disposition of Biblical Oversight, #2 (2/17/97)

The Disposition of Meekness with Lowliness and Gentleness: Christ's Example

0:02 We continue with seeking to identify these aspects of the disposition required in the work of oversight. We spent the previous hour focusing on that which I have attempted to describe and explain as a disposition of assertive servanthood. And now we move on to the second element of the disposition that I've described as one of meekness with the attendance of lowliness and gentleness. Now in Matthew 11, 25 and following, we have our Lord speaking in a very unique way.

0:42 Rarely, apart from this passage, do you find the Lord Jesus speaking about his own internal disposition. We have him speak of his grief, his sorrow, but here he speaks of his own internal disposition. Again, in the context where he's conscious of the dignitaries. The dignity and the stewardship of his messianic identity.

1:07 At that season, Jesus answered. Parallel passage in Luke says, He exalted or rejoiced in spirit and said, I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you did hide these things from the wise and understanding and did reveal them unto babes. Yea, Father, for so it was well pleasing in your sight. All things have been delivered unto me of my Father.

1:32 All things delivered unto me. I'm conscious of my position. No one knows the Son save the Father. Neither does any know the Father save the Son.

1:41 And he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him. So that in the full consciousness of his identity, of his stewardship in messianic role and function, he then gives forth this marvelous invitation. Come unto me, all you that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke.

2:01 Upon you and learn of me. And then as an incentive to comply with that gracious invitation, he says, In coming to me and in taking my yoke upon you, putting yourself in the posture of one prepared to learn from me. This is the incentive. I am meek and lowly in heart.

2:24 This is the disposition with which I will take on this role of being your governor. And ruler, take my yoke upon you, your instructor, your master. You will find me to be meek and lowly in heart. And you shall find rest unto your souls, for my yoke is easy and my burden is life.

2:48 As our Lord summons men to attachment to himself, to take on a yoke, he discloses the disposition of his heart by which he will govern and teach them. And he ties together. He ties together meekness and lowliness. And there is a wonderful conjunction of those two things in conjunction with our Lord as we see him riding into Jerusalem in what we commonly call his triumphal entry in Matthew 21 and verse 5.

3:22 Tell ye the daughter of Zion, behold, your king comes unto you meek and riding. Upon an ass. Your king comes, the one who has the right and power and stewardship of rule, but he comes in a disposition of meekness manifested in his riding upon an ass and upon a colt, the foal of an ass. Now we see meekness joined in several contexts to lowliness on the one hand and gentleness on the other.

Scriptural Conjunctions and Definitions of Meekness, Lowliness, and Gentleness

4:01 Ephesians. Ephesians 4 and verse 2 where Paul puts forth the appeal that the Ephesians make conscious endeavor to keep the unity of the Spirit with all lowliness and meekness with long-suffering forbearing one another in love. Here meekness joined to lowliness on the one hand. And then over in 2 Timothy 2, 24 and 25, where Paul is admonishing Timothy not to be argumentative and combative in the discharge of his unpleasant task in ministerial responsibility of dealing with those who dabble in error, the Lord's servant must not strive but be gentle toward all, apt to teach, forbearing in meekness, correcting them that oppose themselves. Here you have the Lord's servant being, being gentle coupled with the disposition of meekness. And then in 2 Corinthians 10 and verse 1 where the apostle joins these two, I beseech you by the meekness and the gentleness of Christ. So I've tried to collate these and describe this element of the disposition as meekness

5:29 with the attendance of lowliness on the one hand and gentleness on the other. Now what can we say by way of conclusion? Well, this is not meant to be an exhaustive word study of these three words, but I trust it's accurate in as far as we go with it. Meekness is the disposition characterized by the absence of carnal self-assertiveness with its self-will toward God and its ill-will toward man.

6:07 Meekness is the disposition characterized by an absence and right in the word carnal self-assertiveness. And carnal self-assertiveness will be manifested when we choose our way against God's way and we have ill-will in our hearts toward our fellow men.

6:31 It seems to be the product of humility humility. In light of the Beatitudes, Matthew 5, verses 3 to 5, it does not preclude boldness since Moses is called a man meek above all others on the face of the earth. And the two words translated meekness in our English Bibles are praus and praotes. I've written them on the board.

7:00 I hope you can decipher them. Matthew 11, 29, there's the adjective. And then the other usages are primarily the noun praotes, 1 Corinthians 4, 21. The text that I've listed here, 10, 1, Galatians 6, 1, 2 Timothy 2, 25, and Titus 3, and verse 2.

7:23 So meekness is that disposition characterized by an absence of carnal self-assertiveness that would break out in defiance of God. In defiance of God's revealed will and in ill will toward our fellow men. Lowliness is the absence of arrogance and pride of mind and of spirit. Lowliness is the absence of arrogance and pride of mind and spirit.

7:53 Gentleness is the absence of harshness and of insensitivity. So when we put them together, they form that aspect of dispositional complex of disposition. So essential to real shepherding of God's people in their real circumstance. As I was driving over this morning, I was thinking of this concept, this truth, that in our Lord Jesus, all the perfections of the divine attributes existed from all eternity.

8:25 But there are certain aspects of those attributes that come to a heightened expression in our Lord Jesus ministering in our sinful condition. Ministering in a condition where pity and patience and long-suffering and all of these other attributes come to a heightened expression. And it is those things that must constitute the disposition of the under-shepherd. Shepherding in the midst of a fallen world.

Apostolic Exemplification and the Challenge of Maintaining Meekness

8:56 Shepherding people who will manifest elements of residual sinfulness that will manifest, need particular heightened expressions of these graces of lowliness, meekness, and gentleness. And let's look at several passages where we see this exemplified in the Apostle Acts 20 and verse 19. It's always fascinated me that the first thing Paul says in reviewing his ministry among the Ephesians focuses on this aspect of the disposition of a true under-shepherd. You yourselves know from the first day that I set foot in Asia after what manner I was with you all the time serving the Lord with all lowliness of mind. And there we have a word that in secular literature and in the pagan world was never used in a commendatory way. It always had a pejorative negative connotation. To be of lowly mind was something to be despised.

10:09 But what was despised by the world became a cardinal virtue among the people of God. And the Apostle said, This marked from the first day I set foot in Asia. I was with you serving the Lord with lowliness of mind. Now, was there assertiveness?

10:28 Just read the account of the Apostle's life and some of the bold endeavors that he had made. And he said, that he undertook while at Ephesus and yet the internal disposition was a disposition of meekness with its attendance of lowliness and of gentleness. In 2 Corinthians 10.1 we looked at earlier I beseech you, he says, I entreat you by the meekness and the gentleness of Christ.

10:55 And then I've also listed I think in this conjunction yes, Hebrews 5 and verse 2 and I've skipped through it. I've skipped over in the notes with you I'm sorry and I should have stuck more closely to the newly printed notes where I rearranged some of that material. Under the matter of lowliness the word used in a negative way in the secular world but used to describe humility in the New Testament the three texts Philippians 2.3 Colossians 3.12 and 1 Peter 5 and verse 5.

11:33 But then we come to this matter of gentleness the absence of harshness and insensitivity Hebrews 5.2 one of the marks of the priest the reason he was taken from among men though we don't have the same family of words used the concept is here he is taken from among men for this purpose that he can bear gently with the ignorant and erring for that he himself is compassed with infirmity a passage our brother Lyle dealt with in one of the messages I believe last year. So here in this element of pastoral ministry that has priestly overtones there must be this capacity to bear gently with the ignorant and with the erring. And then you have a use you have a textual variant as some of you are aware but the use of the gentleness of a nursing mother in 1 Thessalonians 2 and verse 7 the use of the word apios. Well here again when we think of the problems the disappointments amongst God's people the flack that we will receive from those that we seek to minister to how essential are these qualities. Think of Moses meek above all men upon the face of the earth.

12:55 Every time the people of God get into trouble they blame Moses. Blame him for everything. And remember it was in this very area that Moses fell toward the end of his life. And I never understood that until I got to be an old man or a much older man.

13:15 I said why? Why? Wouldn't you expect all of his graces to be their ripest in his old age?

13:23 But in the very area of meekness he failed. Okay you rebels you want water? Whack whack. God says you don't go in the promised land for that.

13:34 And so we need to cry to God that these disposition this disposition of meekness with its attendance of loneliness and gentleness be continually enriched and brought in us by the enablement of the Spirit of God. Without it we will not be like our Savior. Without it we will not fulfill the clear injunctions given to us in Scripture with respect to the manner in which we are to deal even with the difficult and the recalcitrant. And I would urge you to give prayerful consideration to each of those texts and make them your lifetime companion and pray in that God will give you that grace.

14:15 And there will be times as I indicated when you will actually sit there in a situation where you will be lifting up your heart to God saying Lord baptize my spirit with meekness with gentleness and loneliness of heart. Without it I'm going to be rock striking. I'm going to say I've had it enough is enough in any language as my mother used to say. But when did God say to you enough is enough?

The Disposition of Vulnerable Compassion: Christ's Heart for the Multitudes

14:43 When God ceases in Christ to be anything other than patient and meek and lowly and gentle in his dealing with you then you have warrant to be something less than that in your dealings with his people. Well then we hurry on now because I do want to cover these remaining two a disposition of what I have called vulnerable compassion or compassionate vulnerability. And I'm not sure which is the better term so I put both of them there. A disposition of vulnerable compassion if we are to be like our Lord Jesus in our shepherding of his people entrusted to our care then surely we must not only have a disposition of assertive servanthood of meekness and gentleness but also of vulnerable compassion. Here in Matthew 9 familiar words to us I'm sure that when Jesus beholds the multitudes when he saw them when he saw them he actually let his eyes be an inlet to his soul of their condition he was at that point upon seeing them and perceiving their true condition moved with compassion. And you know that that's one of those untranslatable Greek words. How do we translate it?

16:05 It has so much that is untranslatable but this moving with compassion is not a surface emotion it is not an undisturbing emotion it is something that shakes and disturbs and brings into tumult the whole inner being. He was moved with compassion and there was a vulnerability our Lord was willing to look at the multitudes and not only look at them to see them to register by means of the of the visual capacity that there's a bunch of people out there but to truly see their condition because he goes on to say because they were distressed and scattered as sheep not having a shepherd that wasn't their external condition that was their true spiritual condition.

16:55 It wasn't as though someone was going around scattering them with an Uzi no. Outwardly they seemed to be fairly well off but he saw their true condition under the tyrannizing teaching of the scribes and the Pharisees and as he sees them in that true condition distressed and scattered as sheep not having a shepherd you see the shepherding motif comes into this vulnerable compassion of our Lord Jesus. In Mark 1 in verse 41 here in the presence of very stark physical need in the person of this leper there came to him a leper beseeching him and kneeling down to him and saying if you will you can make me clean and doesn't say and being reminded of his messianic mission and the necessity to validate it by healing the sick Jesus stretched forth his hand no wherever that was it was in the background what is in the foreground is being moved with compassion our Lord opened up his whole inner being to the tragedy of the effect of sin in terms of this physical malady in this man and moved with compassion he stretched forth his hand this was not some automatic response of messianic

18:24 function and identity there was a present internal vulnerability to human need there was vulnerable compassion Luke 7 in verse 13 similar description of our Lord in the presence of real need here it is the widow who has lost her only child and she is her son verse 13 and when the Lord saw her he had compassion on her he opened up his own heart to feel what she felt to enter in to that present tragedy and said to her do not weep and he came near and touched the beer and the bearer stood still and he raises this young lad from the dead but here is that vulnerable compassion and we see it in the Bible compassion and we see it in the Bible and we see it in the Apostle in Acts chapter 20 again when he reviews his years of ministry among the Ephesians he could say along with the lowliness of mind in verse 19 that it was also with tears with tears with tears and then in verse 31 wherefore watch remembering by the space of three years I cease not to admonish every one night and day with tears and then in verse 31 there was a vulnerability a willingness

Apostolic Vulnerability and the Principle of Unregulated Affection

19:52 to so take to heart the reality of the spiritual condition amongst the lost and amongst the people of God as well that his inner being felt the impression and opened up his tear ducts not in the forced not in the forced mindset of the consummate actor but in the tender sensitivity of a true shepherd of souls and then in one of the most most moving expressions of this vulnerable compassion 2nd Corinthians chapter 6 in the midst of seeking to deal with the manifold problems in the church at Corinth the attacks upon his own person the realization that these false teachers had been so effective that they had pushed Paul out of the deep affections of many of the Corinthians and then in verse 11 he says our mouth is open unto you O Corinthians our heart is enlarged you are not straightened you are not compressed in us but you are straightened in your own affections now for a recompense in like kind I speak as unto my children be ye also enlarged do you catch something of the pathos our mouth is open to you O Corinthians and that is but an echo and a revelation of the condition of our hearts our heart is enlarged now what do we

21:20 normally do with people that hurt us again and again and again what is our natural tendency to close our hearts to them and say no way you are going to get in there and stab me again we want to put up a protective wall around the heart put some plate glass put some put some iron let our hearts be shriveled but no Paul under God was able to say to these Corinthians as much as you grieve me and pain me my heart my heart is not only maintaining its present and previous measure of love to you it's enlarged it's been stretched even in the face of all of these issues you are not constricted in us but you are constricted in your own affections this is what we're talking about attempting to talk about talk around when we talk about this matter of vulnerable compassion and then in 2 Corinthians I'm sorry in yes 2 Corinthians 7 in verse 3 another powerful expression of this when he's asking them to open their hearts to him and indicates that there was no just cause for them to shut up their hearts towards him and his companions we wronged no man we corrupted no man we took advantage of no man

22:48 I say it not to condemn you for I've said before that you are in our hearts to die together and to live together you are in our hearts and that means there's vulnerability and so whether we call it compassionate vulnerability or vulnerable compassion it's a disposition that is determined that one's affection toward those for whom we have God given responsibility will not be regulated by the present way in which they relate to us that's the crux of the issue we maintain the vulnerability and without it there will be no experiential awareness felt compassion toward those to whom we minister and I've listed Romans 12 and verse 15 again underscoring the principle that we must enter in with the state of others rejoice with them that rejoice with them that rejoice weep with them that weep there's the vulnerability because in rejoicing with those who rejoice and in drawing near and making their cause of rejoicing yours you are being vulnerable because those are the very people that can turn around and hurt you and though you may not be weeping with them you may be weeping

The Disposition of Self-Giving Love: The Good Shepherd's Example

24:16 because of them and when we are vulnerable enough to weep with those who weep we are vulnerable to have those very people cause us to weep as they would turn against us as they would disappoint us as they would grieve us as we seek to shepherd them but then finally for today there must be a disposition of self giving love and here the scriptural materials are so profuse that I just wondered what ones I could select and which ones to pass over but I've listed for you some of the major texts that point again to our Lord Jesus and his disposition of self giving love John 10 I've chosen that because it's in the shepherd motif where our Lord Jesus describes himself as the good shepherd of his own and he says in verses 11 and 12 the thief comes not but that he may steal verse 10 I'm come that they may have life I am the good shepherd the good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep and he that is a hireling and not a shepherd whose own the sheep are not beholds the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees and the wolf snatches them and scatters them he flees because he's a hireling and does not care for the sheep the sheep exist only as a

25:46 means of livelihood for the hireling that's all they are a commodity that he might get a commodity called his shekels that's all he's the hireling he's hired to do a job the sheep are part of his job he says the shepherd sustains a totally different relationship the sheep are his life I'm the good shepherd the good shepherd's ready to exchange life for their life and therefore when the wolf comes the true shepherd does not leave why because he's bound to them in a disposition of self giving love verse 15 as the father knows me and I know the father and I lay down my life for the sheep and other sheep I have that are not of this fold them also I must bring and they shall hear my voice and they shall become one flock one shepherd therefore doth the father love me because I lay down my life that I may take it again and if the other voice by which Jesus calls the sheep are his appointed sent ones then surely he sends out those to represent his message who also reflect his disposition what a contradiction to preach a message of a good shepherd who lays down his life out of the mouth of one who has something less than the disposition of self giving love who is self sparing and self serving

27:16 and self seeking rather than self sacrificing and then the clear emphasis of Ephesians 5 25 Christ loved the church and did not give something external to himself or something of himself but gave himself Christ loved the church and gave himself up for it and though we do not give up ourselves for the church in terms of redemptive accomplishment we do give up ourselves to the church for her salvation and perfection in terms of self abnegation self denial self giving love 1 Thessalonians 2 and verse 8 another very moving statement of the apostles internal disposition after underscoring his gentleness he says being affectionately desirous of you we were well pleased not we reluctantly as a matter of inescapable principle but we were well pleased to impart to you not the gospel of God only but also our own souls because you were become dear to us you see not only was the message dear to Paul but those to whom he delivered the message

28:44 had become dear to him and he says we were well pleased not only to deliver the message but our very souls our very life this disposition of self giving love and one of the most moving expressions of it the next text that I've listed the second Corinthians passage what do you do when you continue to love and there is no love in return what Paul tells us what he did verse 14 of second Corinthians 12 this is the third time I'm ready to come to you in the light of his previous treatment in the light of what he's received of news of how they regard him and how they've treated him many of them surely the apostle might find some other field that was more fruitful in terms of satisfactory returns but he said this is the third time I'm ready to come to you and I'll not be a burden to you for I seek not yours but you for the children ought not to lay up for the parents but the parents for the children notice again not I will most principally or I will out of dogged determination to do my duty no but I will most gladly I will most gladly I will most gladly spend and then be spent you have an intensified use of the verb you've got a prefix I will most gladly spend and be spent out or utterly spent for

30:14 your souls if I love you more abundantly so I did not myself burden you see what he's saying my self giving love is not determined by whether or not it's reciprocated most gladly will I spend and be spent out for your sake if I love you more abundantly am I loved the less so be it he's going to continue by the grace of God to pursue that course of self giving love in Philippians 2 and verse 17 Philippians 2 and verse 17 where again the apostle speaks in language that I frankly confess Lord if I can know something of this before I die how grateful I'd be and if I'm offered upon the sacrifice and service of your faith I joy and rejoice with you all not unprepared to be poured out in self giving love if principle demands it he said I rejoice if I can for the advancement of your faith be offered up as a sacrifice and then in Colossians 1 and verse 24 now I rejoice here again you see brethren this flesh will never rise to this level

31:43 it's one thing in principle submission to God to take your lumps and to go in the path of suffering but to say I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake and fill up on my part that which is lacking of the afflictions of Christ in my flesh for his body's sake which is the church what's it mean well we know what it doesn't mean Paul is not saying that there's something I must do in my ministerial service that will make up some inadequacy in the once for all redemptive accomplishment of the work of Christ that would negate everything scripture teaches but having said what it doesn't mean it's obvious that Paul does regard there are some afflictions of Christ that are marked out to be accomplished and experienced in his flesh for the sake of his church and he says I rejoice in my sufferings that are filling up that measure that is allocated for me and there's no way you're going to faithfully serve Christ without having a measure allocated by a sovereign God of your fellowship in the sufferings of Christ for his body's sake the church in Paul's case stripes imprisonment beatings stoned that may never come to us

The Spirit's Work in Cultivating Christ-like Disposition

33:12 but brethren just the sufferings that come from being a true shepherd will give you some experiential acquaintance with this that will cause you to say Lord only you can make me rejoice in this only you can make me rejoice in the sufferings for his sake that come in the path of faithfully administering that stewardship entrusted to you for the sake of his church and only a disposition of self giving love will make you to be able to rejoice in that I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake I don't go home and grouse to my wife and say but I'm not going to move my post and I'm not going to be budged from my place because of these that break my heart I'll stoically stay it out post that I rejoice and what a conundrum he must be must have been to those who figured let's stick in some more let's stick in some more stick in some more and all they do is cause his rejoicing to increase brethren who's sufficient for these things and that's why I've listed in the final two texts Galatians 5 22 the fruit of the spirit is love and only as the spirit of God imparts to us and suffuses our hearts with the very love that motivated our Savior are we going to be enabled to have a disposition

34:41 of self-giving love and how does the spirit of God impart that to us well in answer to prayer yes but the particularly in the light of 2nd Corinthians 3 and verse 18 the spirit of God works these things in us as we contemplate in loving reflection and in biblically framed meditation the very person of our Lord himself 2nd Corinthians 3 18 but we all with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord are transformed beholding we are transformed into the same image from glory to glory even as from the Lord the spirit in my latter years I have found myself more and more inclined wherever I'm reading in my Bible to make sure I expose myself to the whole counsel of God I'm making one of my baseline non-negotiable elements of devotional reading somewhere in the Gospels that I might have my eyes fixed upon my Savior in the only place I'm going to see him until I see him face to face and as I'm doing that several of my prayers are one of the several prayers is that in so doing this very reality might be affected in me even beneath the level of consciousness not only in the times when I see our Lord reacting

36:10 in a certain way and say oh Lord I'm so unlike that help me to be like that that's part of how it operates but there's an operation of this even beneath the level of our consciousness where we're just so taken up with what we see that we're not even thinking about ourselves and the spirit of God is affecting an internal change by degrees that at his second coming what does John say we shall be like him for we shall see him as he is and the moment we have that face to face sight of him the work is going to be complete and will be totally conformed to his image but now he's doing it by degrees one stage of glory to another by the secret inward but powerful operations of the Holy Spirit and that's why I've taken as my selective principle that Christ himself must be our fundamental pattern as we think of this whole issue of the disposition with which we ought to seek to accomplish and carry out the task of the oversight of his people God willing next week we'll look at at least another three and I'm toying with possibly two more that as I've been reflecting on this may legitimately come into this but we'll have at least three and possibly five elements that form part of the vital dispositional complex that ought to mark us in this task now I want to give you a couple of quotes from some of the masters of the past

Quotes from Owen and Baxter on Compassion and Self-Giving Love

37:39 with which to close our lecture this morning when we think of the matter of vulnerable compassion listen to Owen's statement again volume 16 page 87 he's listing the things that ought to mark a true shepherd of God's people and number seven is this a compassionate suffering with all the members of the church in all their trials and troubles whether internal or external belongs unto them in the discharge of their office nor is there anything that renders them more like unto Jesus Christ whom to represent unto the church is their principal duty that momentous statement what is your principal duty and mine as pastors it is to represent Christ unto the church not only by what we say but by what we are and how we relate to them the view and consideration by faith of the glory of Christ in his compassion with his suffering members is the principal spring of consolation unto the church in all of its distresses and the same spirit the same mind herein ought according to their measure to be in all that have the pastoral office committed to them so the apostle expressed it in himself who is weak and I am not weak who is

39:08 offended and I burn not 2nd Corinthians 11 29 and unless this compassion and goodness does run through the discharge of their whole office men cannot be said to be evangelical shepherds nor the sheep said in any sense to be their own for those who pretend unto the pastoral office to live it may be in wealth and pleasure regardless of the sufferings and temptations of their flock or the poor of it or related unto such churches as wherein is impossible that they should so much as be acquainted with the state of the greatest part of them is not answerable unto the institution of their office nor to the design of Christ therein and then Baxter as he addresses the matter of this disposition of self giving love he writes on page 117 in the reform pastor the whole of our ministry must be carried on in tender love to our people we must let them see that nothing pleases us but what profits them and what does them good does us good and nothing troubles us more than their hurt we must feel toward our people as a father toward his children yea the tenderest love of a mother must not surpass ours we must even travail in birth till Christ be formed in them they should

40:38 see that we care for no outward thing neither wealth nor liberty nor honor nor life in comparison with their salvation but could even be content with Moses to have our names blotted out of the book of life to be removed from the number of the living rather than that they should not be found in the Lamb's book of life thus should we as John said be ready to lay down our lives for the brethren and with Paul count not our lives dear to us so that we may finish our course with joy and the ministry we've received of the Lord Jesus this is a profound statement now brethren when the people see that you unfeignedly love them they will hear anything and bear anything from you and isn't that true when you're convinced a man really loves you listen to what Baxter goes on to say we ourselves will take all things well from one we know doth entirely love us we'll put up with a blow that is given us in love sooner than with an angry word that is spoken to us in malice or in anger most men judge of the counsel as they judge of the effect of him that gives it at least so far as to give it a fair hearing oh therefore see that you feel a tender love to your people in your breasts let them perceive it in your speeches and see it in your conduct

42:07 let them see that you spend and are spent for their sake and all that you do is for them and not for any private ends of your own isn't it true if you're convinced a man loves you it's amazing what you'll take from it but if you have reason to suspect that someone does not love you or has ill will toward you you're ready to pounce on even a word that is spoken with the wrong look in the left eyebrow well our people are that way and one of the joys of a lengthy pastorate is that as by the grace of God you weep with your people you suffer with them you struggle with them over their besetting sins you have a deeper and more firmly entrenched place in their affections then you'll ability under God to influence them for good and prepare them for heaven increases exponentially because they open their hearts more and more to you the true people of God and some of them will even be those who for a while restricted their hearts but when they saw you continuing to relate to them in the vulnerability of true compassion and self-giving love and under God they're worn back into the place of affection they will become some of those who will love you with a love that's almost embarrassing because they remember how you loved them when they were so unlovely and they will become those who will become your staunchest defenders when anyone starts to slander you you won't have to waste your breath to try to defend yourself

Prayer for God's Grace in Cultivating These Dispositions

43:37 they'll come to your defense and it's one of the great temporary and even present rewards that comes from a true flock of God's people when by the grace of God you relate to them in your work of oversight with these elements of the disposition so perfectly and beautifully exemplified in our Lord Jesus well let's pray ask God to help us our Father we confess in your presence that left to ourselves these things we've considered today will be nothing but noble ideals to be admired from afar but we do believe that you can take the likes of us men who are natively full of self-centeredness and self-sparing pride and arrogance either wimpishness or carnal lordliness you can give us godly assertive servanthood as we see in our Lord Jesus you can give us meekness lowliness and long suffering you can give to us our Father the grace of true self-giving love you can give us the disposition that reflects something of the heart and the disposition of our Lord Jesus and we pray that by the mighty operations

45:06 of the Holy Spirit you will work these things in us even now though we do not occupy officially the office and the position grant us these graces as we shepherd our wives and our children as we seek to reach out in godly shepherding concern to brothers and sisters in this very assembly who desperately need the loving concern and care of a friend oh Lord help us we pray write these things upon the fleshly tables of our hearts and work them out in our hearts by the power of the spirit we plead in Jesus name amen