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Gentle and Lowly: The Heart of Christ for Sinners and Sufferers
Dane C. Ortlund
Crossway (2020). 224 pp.
After Gentle and Lowly was released earlier this year, I kept hearing respected pastors and theologians commend it as the book of the year, or even of a lifetime, so I knew I should probably read it. And because of my natural disposition to doubt that Christ’s love is really more definitive than my sin, I knew I needed to read it.
The book is simple both in its premise and format. Starting with Jesus’s own words, “I am gentle and lowly of heart” (Matt 11:29), Ortlund aims to convince sinners and sufferers that the posture of Jesus’s heart toward them is one of gentle embrace. Simple, but profound.
In twenty-three short chapters, Ortlund attempts to undo “our natural expectations about who God is” and instead “let the Bible surprise us into what God says about himself” (p. 155). Each chapter focuses on a central Scripture as the subject of meditation. Ortlund combines his skill as a biblical scholar and theologian with his love for the Puritans and their writings to “[look] at the single diamond of Christ’s heart from many different angles” (p. 15).
After reading the first couple of chapters, I wondered what I was missing. It was fine. Good, even. But I had a hard time letting go of my doubting tendencies so that the truths he was writing about could penetrate my heart. I think I was experiencing a little of what Ortlund describes in the book:
The Christian life, from one angle, is the long journey of letting our natural assumption about who God is, over many decades, fall away, being slowly replaced with God’s own insistence on who he is. . . The fall in Genesis 3 not only sent us into condemnation and exile. The fall also entrenched in our minds dark thoughts of God, thoughts that are only dug out over multiple exposures to the gospel over many years (p. 151).
I kept reading. I read slowly, a little at a time, spread out over many weeks. And as I continued to read, the book kept getting better and better. Or maybe my heart was softening to its message. The effect seemed to be cumulative for me.
That is the value of this book. From the pages of Scripture, combined with a wealth of Puritan reflections, Ortlund confronts our fearful hearts with “God’s own insistence on who he is.” The chapters provide “exposures to the gospel” that helped me dare to believe that, in the words of Puritan John Flavel, God is “much more tender of you than you are, or can be, of yourself” (p. 133).
Ortlund is theologically astute, evidenced in the way he holds together the “emotional life of God” with divine impassibility (p. 73), or seen in his discussion of God’s simplicity alongside a reflection on God’s heart in relation to judgment and mercy (p. 140). I appreciated the carefulness he displays, but also his desire to let Scripture challenge the assumptions we can fall into as a result of our theology, assumptions that sometimes detract from the largeness of God’s heart revealed in Scripture.
Gentle and Lowly would be helpful for any Christian wanting to better understand the heart of Christ for us in our sin and suffering. I think, however, it is especially suited for pastor-theologians. We have the privilege of directing others into the heart of Christ week in and week out, and this book is full of moving reflections on Christ’s great heart. I’ve found the truths Ortlund writes about working their way into my sermons. But more than that, I’ve found them working their way into my heart. Ortlund says,
It is one thing, as a child, to be told your father loves you. You believe him. You take him at his word. But it is another thing, unutterably more real, to be swept up in his embrace, to feel the warmth, to hear his beating heart within his chest, to instantly know the protective grip of his arms. It’s one thing to know he loves you; it’s another thing to feel his love. This is the glorious work of the Spirit (p. 122).
I think this book is a means the Spirit can use to sweep us up into God’s gentle embrace. If, like me, you struggle to believe that God could be gracious and compassionate toward you in your sin and weakness, read this book. If you want to better communicate the compassionate and tender heart of Jesus to your people, read this book. In one of my favorite lines (and there are many), Ortlund exhorts: “Repent of your small thoughts of God’s heart. Repent and let him love you” (p. 170). This book will help you do that. I would encourage you, read this book.
Donnie Berry is an International Trainer with Training Leaders International. He holds a PhD in New Testament from the Amridge University and is a member of the St. Basil Fellowship of the Center for Pastor Theologians.
