Praying for My Pastor: Encountering Jesus with Dane Ortlund

Dane: I don’t want my kids to feel like they’re a commodity or something that is a hurdle to me doing my life. I want them to feel like, at any point within reason, they can approach me, and I will give them unhurried attention and care.

Shelby: Welcome to FamilyLife Today, where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I’m Shelby Abbott, and your hosts are Dave and Ann Wilson. You can find us at FamilyLifeToday.com.

Ann: This is FamilyLife Today!

Dave: We’ve got Dane Ortlund back with us today.

Ann: I’m so excited about today. Dane’s here; Dave’s here.

Dane: Ann’s here.

Dave: But we’re going to defer to Dane. [Laughter]

I thought, let’s do this today; let’s talk about ways that we as husbands or wives or dads or moms can model the heart of Jesus, gentle and lowly (we’ve been talking about the last couple of days) to our kids or to our spouse.

Dane, start us off.

Ann: We’ll all give some.

Dave: Alright.

Dane: It’s such an urgent question, isn’t it? I feel the need in my own life. Do you all confess sins on this show or not? I don’t know where the lines are. What’s appropriate here.

Dave: I think that’s all we do. [Laughter] We turn on the mics, and Ann and I just confess our sin over and over.

Ann: Dane, are you confessing yours now?

Dane: I’ll keep this brief. No one will feel uncomfortable, guys. Don’t worry. [Laughter] We were preaching through Ephesians; we got through chapter four. We got to the second half of Ephesians just this past Sunday. “I, Paul, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all…” “…evangelistic zeal?”  No. “…courage and fortitude?” No. “…with all humility and gentleness.” [Ephesians 4:1-2, Paraphrased]

All of the glorious doctrine of Ephesians 1-3 about salvation through faith and calling and—

Dave: —identity, everything.

Dane: —identity.

Dave: Yes.

Dane: —it all funnels down into the first thing out of Paul’s mouth for the back half of Ephesians: “…therefore, be gentle.”

I called a family meeting yesterday. I said, “Guys, I’m sorry for not consistently obeying Ephesians 4:2, ‘…with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love…’

“Those are the four things: gentleness, patience, humility, bearing with one another in love. I would like to grow in that. Would you pray for me? I want to be a dad who, in 2024 and beyond, is more Ephesians 4:2-ized. This is part of how I roll. I want our home to be an Ephesians 4:2 home.”

What I’m saying for number one here, Dave, is—

Ann: Wait, wait, wait. You can’t get away. No! Okay, give us the ages of your kids; and I need to know how they responded when you—

Dane: —four boys and a girl: seventeen, fourteen, twelve, and eight; the girl is ten, so boy, boy, boy, girl, boy. [They reacted] in diverse ways. A couple of them were hard to read; a couple of them were really locked in. I don’t know all that they were thinking.

But I want them to hear that from me regularly. I don’t want to go back to them when they’re 32 and say, “Here’s the laundry list of things that I need to apologize for.” I want to do it in real time as we are going along. Acknowledging [and] owning our own sins with our kids could be, Dave, one way that we’re displaying Christ’s heart to them.

Ann: Dave, I think you’ve done that, as well. I think you are super-humble when the kids come to you, even now, and confront you; or when they were—

Dave: —Hey, Dane, these days are coming. [Laughter] They’re going to come to you as adults, and they’re going to say things.

Ann: I’m recalling some hard conversations that our kids have had with you; like one of them saying to you, “Dad, you’re dead spiritually.”

Dane: Ouch!

Ann: That is an “ouch.” That is a hard thing to hear.

Dave: He was right; he was right.

Ann: I remember thinking, “Oh, boy. Oh, boy.” But you generally are not quick to react, and you are slow to respond. I think you’ve done a really good job of that.

Dane: Way to go, Dave.

Dave: That’s my fear. But it’s interesting, one of my thoughts of one of the ways to model gentle and lowly to your kids—and just to say we’ve said this a couple of times on the program this week—you can’t do this apart from Christ.

Ann: Yes.

Dave: It isn’t like, “Try this, and go home and do it.” You can’t do it. You are going to fall on your face, and you are going to have to say, “Jesus, I surrender. You are going to have do this through the power of resurrected Christ in me, or I don’t have a chance.”

But it comes off of what you just said, Dane. I think it’s also learning to handle or manage your anger in a way that doesn’t push your kids away but draws them near.

You know, I had a struggle with anger. I didn’t understand where it was coming from; but it had a lot to do with [not] forgiving my dad. So, I would snap. I’m smiling now, but I remember one time we were driving somewhere, and the kids were toddlers. They were in their car seats in the back, and they were loud. They were just being kids.

I said, “Be quiet!” I was yelling. I grabbed whatever was in the middle of the console, a little stick or a pencil or something, and I started swinging it. [Laughter] Ann was looking at me [as if to say], “What are you doing?” I’m not hitting anything. “Oh, my goodness. I’m almost an abusive dad.” I didn’t hit anybody.

Ann: No, and you wouldn’t have hit somebody.

Dave: I would never do that.

Ann: But you were so—

Dave: —but I snapped.

Ann: —mad. You snapped. I said, “Dave, calm down.” I got it, because, as mom, I was right there.

Dave: But again, over days and months and years, I had to wrestle with: “Where does this anger come from? What’s it plugged into?” I figured it out and started this journey. I think one of the ways that we can model that for our kids is, we have to get a handle on that.

If your spouse is saying to you, “Sometimes you react in a way that is beyond rational,” that should be a dash light from God to say, “Okay.” She’s telling you (or he’s telling you) something you need to address.

I don’t think my kids would say I was an angry dad, because most of their growing up time, I got it under control. But at the beginning I was. I think that’s important.

Ann: But the other thing you did, too—I can remember that night when they were going  to bed, just as you said, Dane; Dave went into their room. He was praying for them that night, [and said], “Hey, guys, I’m sorry that I lost my temper. It was wrong. I shouldn’t have done that. I had to talk to God about that, but you guys don’t deserve that.”

I think that continual repentance to God, to our kids,—

Dave: —owning your sins and apologizing, repenting.

Dane: Yes.

Ann: Yes.

Dave: —a posture of it.

Ann and Dave: Yes.

Dave: Alright, you’ve got another one?

Dane: What do you guys think about this? I am so put together, and maybe it’s part of my own fallenness or something, but I love efficiency. [Laughter] I love efficiency.

Ann: I do, too.

Dane: I love efficiency. The problem is—

Dave: “—not everybody else does.” [Laughter]

Ann: Why can’t our kids just get on board with it?

Dane: “What do you want to say? Say it in ten seconds, and let me get back to my email.” [Laughter]

Ann: I’m not that bad. [Laughter]

Dane: Time versus efficiency. The messiness of allowed time—what about this—versus the need for efficiency. In other words, I don’t want my kids to feel like they are a commodity or something that is a hurdle to me doing my life. I want them to feel like, at any point within reason, they can approach me, and I will give them unhurried attention and care and listening.

I need to work on this in my marriage, too. “Get to the point here.” [Laughter] No, just depressurize the conversation; depressurize the date with Chloe, my ten-year-old. Just don’t look at the time. You might have to but try not to. Have the culture of the conversation, the culture of the meeting, be one of the way Jesus is with us. He’s not hurrying us, guys. He is giving us all the time in the world, and He happens to be running the universe. [Laughter]

He makes all the time that I need, so what about one way we can reflect Christ’s heart to our kids is simply unhurriedness when we are with them.

Ann: That’s good. I wrote down, as you were saying that, the way I would say it. [It] is, “Be present in the moment.”

Dane: Yes, not preoccupied.

Ann: We can do that as women, too. I feel like I was not great at that because, I am very task oriented. So, to be present, to be there, to look them in the eyes and say, “Tell me more,” without looking at my phone, my watch, all of that. I think that’s a good one.

That makes us, as women—I’ll just say, as a wife—if Dave would say, “Tell me more” then what would happen? I would say, “What? You want to hear this?”

Dave: I do that every day, girl. [Laughter]

Ann: But I can see we have granddaughters now—because we only had sons, [but] we have granddaughters. Man, they can talk! [Laughter] They can go into such detail. I’m watching Dave; his eyes are glazing over.

Dane: Funny, isn’t it? The boys, we’re trying to get them to talk. [Laughter]

Dave: Yes. I remember—I don’t remember how long ago, but it was a long time ago—I did a funeral for a man I didn’t know very well. He was in our church. They asked me to come in and do it.

At some point, I said, “We are going to do an open mic, and here are the ground rules; keep it short.” Sometimes nobody says anything, and other times—this was one of these everybody wanted to say something. It wasn’t a huge funeral, but every single person said the same thing. It was what you just said: “He never was in a hurry.”

Coworkers, people that he was the boss of, [said], “I always felt so valued and seen by him, because every time I had an issue, he stopped, he looked me in the eye, and he never had to hurry away.”

Dane: Wow!

Dave: I was talking about it years later. That marked me. It was: “Is anybody saying that about me? Are my kids saying that? Is my wife saying that about me?”

Dane: I love that.

Dave: That’s a quality that Jesus carried.

Dane: Exactly.

Dave: Nobody felt like, “Oh, Jesus has got to go do another miracle. Some other guy is more important than me.” I don’t think anybody ever felt that.

Ann: How did He do that? Because everybody was pressing in on Him. Everybody wanted a piece of Him, but each person felt so special.

Dave: Even the woman with the blood disease: “Who touched Me?” [Luke 8:45]

Ann: Yes, He was on His way to heal.

Dave: His disciples [said], “Wait a minute. Everybody is touching You. What do you mean?” That’s sort of the heart of God. It’s like, “I know.”

Dane: He had an appointment to get to.

Dave: Yes.

Dane: He allowed Himself to be interrupted.

Ann: It was a death. Somebody was dying.

Dane: Yes.

Dave: You’ve got another one?

Ann: Wait. What have we done so far?

Dane: Owning your sin,—

Ann: —controlling your anger,—

Dave: —managing your anger,—

Dane: —unhurried time,—

Dave: —yes, being present.

Ann: I think the one that I would say that I love—and our kids would love, and they’ve come back to talk to us [about]—is they want (we, as wives, and I think our kids want) the heart of our husbands and our dads.

Our kids have wanted, Dave, your vulnerability, the things that you were afraid of, the things that you felt weak in, the things that you were feeling. It’s that level five communication of: “This is who I am. These are the things that make me excited; these are the things that make me fearful.”

I know that I long for that, and our kids have come back to you and said, “Dad, we wanted to know you.” Would you say that’s true?

Dave: Yes, I don’t want to talk about it. [Laughter]

Dane: “What lovely weather we’re having. Back to the frothy.”

Dave: “What are we having for dinner?”

Ann: But was that hard for you to hear?

Dave: Oh, yes. Dane, you don’t know this. We’ve said this many times: two of my sons, as adult men, said, “You were more intimate with the congregation in your sermons than you were with us in the kitchen.

They were right. It was like I would be vulnerable [during] the week on the stage and share my sin and my struggle. Yet, they longed to hear the stories I would tell. They would say, “I wish you had told us in the family room before a thousand people heard it.”

I [responded], “You’re right.”

Dane: Okay, time out. We have to notice something here, Ann. Twice as we’ve been talking today, some failure of some kind has come up from Dave’s life, and both times you caught what he said. He said, “And they were right.” That is such a sign of not spiritual deadness. That is such a sign of life and the Holy Spirit.

The world can’t do that. But to say, “Yes, they were right.” That is humility.

Ann: I know.

Dane: That is honesty.

Ann: He’s so good at that, and it comes from not just—

Dane: —I respect that.

Ann: Me, too. I think our boys would say—

Dave: —they were wrong; I’m going to change it. [Laughter] They were right.

Ann: I think our kids would all say, “I could come to Dad with anything.” Now, with me, they’d be a little bit more scared, because I’m way more intense and all that. But with Dave, they could bring anything to him. And they still don’t know what a gift that is, that he gave them, and he’s been giving them. That’s a big one.

Dave: You are being nice, but let’s talk about another one. [Laughter] Do you have one?

Dane: I’ve done two already.

Dave: Here’s one. It somewhat comes from your book, Gentle and Lowly, and this new one written for younger generations. If we can sympathize with our child and our spouse’s pain or struggle or weakness they’re going through, rather than standing far away—we enter in, and we don’t coach them how to get out, but we just live in their pain with them. That, don’t you think? You respond. What does that mean?

Dane: Oh!

Ann: Sure.

Dane: I want to grow in that and do that. We experience sympathy towards us as a deep form of love, because what someone is doing is, they’re not writing us a check, they’re not bringing us a meal; they’re bearing pain with us. They are coming alongside. We’ve got this 200-pound weight of some pain, and they are taking 100 pounds of it or 50 pounds of it.

The Greek word, sympathize, means literally to co-suffer. You are getting in the ditch with them, in the foxhole of life with them, and taking some of the shrapnel that is hitting them. That’s what it feels like.

J.C. Ryle, the Anglican bishop, said 150 years ago: “Friendship doubles all our joys and halves, H-A-L-V-E-S, all our sorrows.” The sorrow you are in, taking the last part of that, that’s sympathizing with. They are bearing it with you.

Guys, we can endure anything if we’re not alone.

Ann: Yes.

Dane: The greatest thing is Jesus is with us, so we’re not alone, and it sure helps to have a human being or two who sympathize with us.

Ann: It makes me think of the Navy Seals. Remember they do whatever—what is the night that they have to be up all night, and they lock arms—

Dane: —Hell Week.

Ann: That’s it. They lock arms together, and then they’ll sing a song. That’s a picture of the Christian life. We’re locking arms, we’re singing praise to God, we’re in the midst of this battle that’s raging, but we can’t do it apart.

Dane: Amen. It’s so good, isn’t it, too, [that] this conversation here directly applies to our kids and as parents. Because what I’m too quick to do is: they’ve had some distress—Chloe has had a falling out with a friend, or whatever it might be; garden variety sufferings when you are in second grade, fourth grade—it’s easy for me to brush it aside or minimize it or say, “Oh, it’s not that bad.”

What if I actually found a fourth-grade way for her to, in her own way, be thinking, “Dad’s feeling the pain of this with me?” Even if I think it’s kind of silly to feel that with them, they would feel so loved by that.

Ann: This is my weakness. When we’re around our adult kids, some of this stuff comes out. As I watch them, my kids, parent, [I think], “Man, they’re incredibly sympathetic.” They get right in there and say, “Oh, that must be so sad for you.” Because I never had that in my upbringing. It was: “Suck it up.” Nobody hugged us or sympathized. Are you kidding?

Dane: Yes.

Ann: This one child said, “Mom, I’m trying to think of a time you hugged us and said, ‘Tell me more about how sad you are.’” Oh, I didn’t do that at all. [I would say], “You’re fine.” That’s what I would say, “You’re fine, hon. You’re fine.” He said, “I could have broken my leg, and my mom would say, “Just get up and walk it off.” [Laughter]

But I wish I had done that. I can do that. They say, “You are getting better” (with our grandkids). I didn’t know!

Dave: I mean, we were sort of proud of the fact that we didn’t.

Ann: Because we were tough.

Dave: Like, “Hey! We’re running the stairs!” “Let’s go! Get up here. I know you’re hurting! What are you doing? You want to be something with your life?! You’ve got to….” We did that.

Ann: I still don’t mind that as much as: “My friend really hurt me at school, and I feel rejected,” and I would brush that off instead of going into that a little deeper to see what it was.

Dane: Right.

Dave: Dane, when you say that, I know I have a tendency now—my youngest son is a pastor; he’s starting a church. It’s starting small, and he’s got staff issues. Every time he starts to talk about it, I want to coach him.

Dane: Right.

Dave: I want to say, “Hey, I did this for 30 years. I can fix this in five minutes.” [Laughter]

I am realizing that he does not even care. But if I say, “That’s hard. Leading people is really, really hard,” that’s what he wants. If he asks for advice, I’ll give it, but he does not want it.

Ann: He wants you to pray for him, though.

Dave: He wants a dad to come beside him and say, “Man, I know that’s really tough.”

Dane: That’s really good.

Dave: I was thinking of 1 Thessalonians 2, [where Paul] says, “But we were gentle among you, like a nursing mother taking care of her own children. So, being affectionately desirous of you, we were ready to share with you not only the gospel of God, but also our own selves, because you had become very dear to us.” [verses 7-8]

Ann: Oh!

Dane: If the rugged apostle Paul—

Ann: —yes.

Dane: —can compare himself to a breastfeeding mom—“nursing” is what it says there,—

Dave: —yes, yes.

Dane: —I’m pretty sure there’s an example there for us to follow, too.

Ann: Oooh, that’s a good one.

Dave: Yes.

Ann: Okay, I have one more, guys.

Dane: Great.

Ann: I think to have a husband or dad who is serving the family!

Dave: What’s that look like?

Ann: Whew! That is attractive, men.

Dave: I’ve heard this many times. I wanted you to tell everybody. [Laughter]

Ann: I think many wives feel like they’re doing it alone. They’re taking care of the kids, the house; they might be working. They have everything on their plate.

But to have a partner that’s in it with us, that’s even going beyond that and seeing needs—I know sometimes I don’t ask you for help, because I expect you to know. But sometimes when you just do—you did it last night! You did the dishes. I walked in [and said], “What?!”

Dane: That’s a profound ministry.

Dave: I did it—

Ann: —it is a ministry!

Dane: The ministry of dishes.

Dave: I did it hoping she’d talk about it today on the show. [Laughter] No, I didn’t.

Dane: Mission accomplished, Dave.

Dave: I didn’t, but I was sitting there watching the NBA playoffs, and I thought, “Look at those dishes.”

Ann: I was gone.

Dave: You were working out, out in the garage.

Dane: Hang on a second. Did you do it only during the commercials, or even during game time? [Laughter]

Ann: He could see the TV.

Dave: I did it during game time.

Dane: Oh, lay down your life sacrifice, Dave. [Laughter] Come on!

Dave: But I did think, “Look at all this that she’s going to come in and do.”

Dane: Yes.

Dave: I [thought], “This is what a man should be doing every hour—”

Dane: —amen!

Dave: “—for his wife and children. We are called not to be served but to serve and give our lives as a ransom for others.” That’s gentle and lowly Jesus.

Dane: I love it. Okay, here’s—

Dave: —see? Now you’ve got another one.

Dane: No, just an asterisk to what you guys are saying. How about this street level, practical take away? Dad is coming home. It’s five p.m. or whatever. He’s fried and exhausted and maybe a bit discouraged from some meeting he had at work. What if he just said, “God, I’m fried. I’m upset. Would you please help me to serve, in gentle humility, my family?”

Here's the practical thing—well, that’s practical, too; but you walk in, and you ask a single question of your wife: “How can I serve you tonight?” Then, there is no wrong answer. She gets to fill in the blank. That, to me, sounds like a healthy, flourishing marriage.

Dave: Oh, yes.

Ann: Amen! [Laughter] Whooo! I mean thinking about that: “How can I serve you tonight?” Dave, you’ve gotten really good at that lately.

Dave: Lately. Did you hear that? That means like within the last day.

Ann: No, that’s a victory!

Dave: I would add, even as we wrap up, what Dane just said—and I know that women resonate with this, too, but I know guys are thinking: “I’ve been there, pulling into the driveway. I’m exhausted; I’m discouraged.”

Dane: Yes.

Dave: “Things haven’t gone well, maybe today or this month or this week, and I can’t. I don’t want to walk in and serve. I want to be served.”

That is a move of God to say, “Jesus, I don’t want to do this, but I’m wanting to do this. I need Your power to do it, so give me the power that, when I step into that family room (or step through that garage, whatever it is), You’ll meet me right there, so when I say, ‘How can I serve you?’ I’ll mean it, and I’ll do it.”

Dane: And we’re never going to out serve Jesus serving us.

Dave: Yes, this could change your marriage tonight.

Shelby: What great, practical tracks to run on: “Ask God to give you His strength when you interact with your family, and then transform your heart into a heart of service toward them.” We love others because He first loved us.

I’m Shelby Abbott, and you’ve been listening to Dave and Ann Wilson with Dane Ortlund on FamilyLife Today. Dane Ortlund has written a book called The Heart of Jesus: How He Really Feels about You.

You can get your copy right now by going online to FamilyLifeToday.com, or feel free to give us a call at 800-358-6329 to request your copy of Dane Ortlund’s The Heart of Jesus. Again, that number is 800-“F” as in family, “L” as in life, and then the word, “TODAY.”

Well, I know we’re in the middle of September here, but believe it or not, February is going to be here soon. You are saying, “February! What are you talking about?” Well, departing February 8^th through the 15^th is the FamilyLife Love Like You Mean It^® marriage cruise.

That’s right. It’s a cruise designed exclusively for couples. It offers an immersive experience featuring uplifting Bible teachers like Dave and Ann Wilson, Derwin and Vicki Gray, and Jared and Becky Wilson. They’re all going to be there, teaching us about the Scriptures. In addition to that, there will be entertaining Christian performances from musical artists and entertainers, along with several evenings filled with romance.

So, don’t miss out. You can head on over to FamilyLifeToday.com and click on the Love Like You Mean It marriage cruise banner. There you can secure your spot on the boat and be assured that your voyage on the seas is going to be dedicated to two things: renewing your relationship with your spouse and growing closer to your Savior.

Again, you can head on over to FamilyLifeToday.com and click on the Love Like You Mean It marriage cruise banner.

Now, coming up tomorrow, Jimmy and Kelly Needham are going to be here with Dave and Ann Wilson to talk about teaching kids about moral complexity and the need for redemption. How do you talk to your kids about that? Well, we’ll discuss that tomorrow with the Needhams and the Wilsons. We hope you will join us. 

On behalf of Dave and Ann Wilson, I’m Shelby Abbott. We will see you back next time for another edition of FamilyLife Today.

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