How to Embrace Jesus’ Love for You: Dane Ortlund

Dane: Jesus is flipping tables in the temple. The religious PhD’s are over here indignant, it says, shaking their fists at Him, and the kids get it. The kids are singing a worship song. So, time and again, apparently, there’s something very open-hearted and able to hear what Jesus is like and the gospel that kids have.

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: So, I’ve said here before about the picture that hung over my fireplace in my childhood home. It was the picture of Jesus, and His look was somewhat stern and disappointed. I know that in my teenage years of making bad decisions—and I know they’re bad decisions; I’ve been raised better than this—and I’d walk through the family room.

Now I smile, because it was like His eyes just followed me, like “I’m disappointed in you.” That’s what I felt, so I would sort of run through that room, because I felt, “That’s the heart of Jesus.” Today we’re going to talk about the heart of Jesus, because that was not how He was looking at me, even though I think I and many people have felt that.

Dane: Yes.

Dave: So, we have the heart of Jesus man himself, Dane Ortlund. [Laughter]

Dane: Wow.

Dave: How’s that for an intro?

Dane: Interesting wording there, Dave. [Laughter]

Dave: It’s not the – but you wrote the book, I believe. Gentle and Lowly, and now we’re talking about sort of a condensed version for younger generations, The Heart of Jesus: How He Really Feels about You. That really did capture for a whole generation of us a fresh biblical—it’s always been there; it’s all over the Bible but somehow, we sort of missed it—view of Who the heart of God really is.

Ann: Isn’t it fun to have Dane back on?

Dave: Oh, yes. It’s awesome.

Ann: Dane Ortlund, pastor, author, father, husband. How many years have you guys been married now?

Dane: Twenty-three. Twenty-three.

Ann: Twenty-three years of marriage.

Dave: And you’re about to launch your first son off to college.

Dane: Yes.

Dave: How does that feel?

Dane: Well, we love him with all our heart, and the home is going to feel very different without 20 percent of the offspring around. But we’re proud of him and he’s going to do great in life.

Ann: That’s cool. Okay, Dave, I’m going to ask you, if you had to say right now, how do you picture Jesus and his view of you, because you just shared what you used to think He thought of you. What would you say now?

Dave: It’s been a journey over 40 years, and the image that comes to me is the Prodigal’s father. He’s running; He’s running to me in my sin, running to me in my weakness. He loves me. He picked up His robe and He’s running. I think that was the purpose Jesus told the story. He’s sitting with tax collectors. [People were] saying, “I can’t believe you’re sitting with these tax collectors.”

I think He was thinking—am I right, Dane? I’ve preached this; I’m sure you have. It was like, “I don’t think you guys understand Who I am and Who my Father is. Let me tell you three stories—boom, boom, boom—and they all sort of nailed the same thing: “This is the heart of God, and you’ve missed that.”

Dane: Right, right.

Dave: I think it’s what your book has helped us do. We’ve missed how He described Himself as gentle and tender and accessible. Lowly.

Ann: You talk about Jesus’ heart in action, and you go through some Scripture.

Dane: Yes, Right.

Ann: Let’s talk about that, because I feel it would be a great question to ask at your dinner table too.

Dane: It would.

Ann: How do you think Jesus sees you?

Dane: It really is a good question. I love your answer, Dave. I’m not there, yet, because tomorrow morning I will slide into consciousness, and what I will believe at least instinctually is the picture hanging over your mantle growing up.

Ann: Really? Instinctually.

Dane: This is why I have to have devotions each morning and not do it at the end of the day but start my day by becoming a Christian all over again.

Ann: Yes!

Dane: I have to figure out, “Oh, hang on! Luke 15? Oh, God is like that! Thank you, Dane. Thank You, Lord! Thank you, Bible!”

Dave: That’s good. Yes.

Dane: Because it takes me a good night’s sleep and nothing more, kind of functionally, to become a pretty good atheist, or not an atheist, but a gospel stiff-armer, and I need to know, “Oh, Luke 15 is in the Bible after all, which is the message of the whole Scripture, really, that He’s a non-reluctant rescuer,” because I deeply believe that He’s like me, namely, seeing someone in need, I might rescue, I might help annoyedly, reluctantly, irritatingly. [ Laughter]

 “I have my day to deal with here. I have my schedule and my agenda,” and you just reminded us, Dave, Jesus ain’t like that.

Dave: Yes.

Dane: So, I have to get up with some strong coffee and the Bible—reverse order in terms of importance—[Laughter] and in a sense become a Christian all over again.

Ann: I see the same thing. The reason I go through the Bible every year isn’t because I’m so spiritual and holy. It’s because I’m so desperate and in need of Him.

Dane: Right. It’s our weakness.

Ann: Yes, to remind myself, “Oh, this is Who He is. Oh, this is what He thinks of me.”

Dane: Yes.

Ann: So, if you’re not in your Word, if you’re not reading, He’s wooing you. It gives you a better indication of how much He loves you.

Dane: Amen. I was on the plane coming up this morning, reading Matthew’s Gospel where He raises Jairus’ daughter. Did you ever notice the text says that Jesus doesn’t go in and from across the room says what He at times says to others, “Rise and walk.” The text says He goes over, and He took her by the hand. Jairus’ daughter woke up out of death to the experience of Jesus Christ holding her hand and picking her up out of her bed.

He was a carpenter, so He was probably pretty, as my eight-year-old Ben would say, “jacked.” [Laughter] So he ruggedly and strongly, firmly, tenderly, helped her up. Well, I’m 45 and I’ve been walking with Christ, reading the Bible for some decades now. I don’t know if I ever really noticed that; the tenderness of the touch of lifting her up by the hand.

One reason I’m excited about younger people hearing this message is they need it just as much as adults. We often articulate, and it’s right and healthy to do so, the difference between kids and adults, and what they need differently than adults and so on. This is common, the view that He loves me disappointingly. That is so way down deep in all of us. I believe that one manifestation of our fallen nature is believing that, resisting what Jesus is actually like in His heart.

So why would we wait till our kids are 17, and “Oh, they’re leaving the house in a year. Oh, let me tell you what Jesus is really like before you leave.” Why not help them in what we say and how we embrace them physically, and God helping us, making lots of mistakes and apologizing for them along the way, help them see what Jesus is really like.

Ann: This is so true.

Dave: That very fact of them learning this at a young age as a dad and a mom—that’s our job.

Dane: Yes.

Dave: I think so often we fail because we don’t understand, and we misrepresent. As I think about my mom and dad, I thought God was sort of like my dad. He’s disappointed; he’s walking out. I’m not saying every time that your father image becomes your Holy Father image, but there’s a deep correlation, right?

Dane: For sure, yes. Our parents deeply shape.

Dave: And now we’re the parents.

Dane: Yes.

Ann: I was thinking, I was just with two of our grandkids last week, a five- and a three-year-old. We were at Walmart, and they’re watching us. They’re watching how we interact with people, and so the cashier who’s checking us out, super-talkative, really nice, and we were talking about “Let’s go get some pizza.” And she was awesome.

She said, “I’d like to get some pizza right now! I’d like to get some fried chicken right now, and I’d like to get some ice cream all day long.” These grandkids were thinking, “This lady’s amazing!” and we’re all like, “Yes, us do! We want to do that.” So, we get done with our shopping, and I got down to talk to them. I said, “What if we blessed her today, and we went and we get her some fried chicken?”

So, these guys were so excited, because I think as parents, we allow our kids and our grandkids to see people the way we do.

Dane: Right.

Ann: We can either be irritated with them, or we can put our—as our one son says—our God goggles on and see people the way Jesus does. So, I’m telling you, these kids were geeked out of their minds as we handed this lady her wings. They kept saying, “What do you think she’s going to say? What do you think she’s going to say?”
 

Dane: I love that.

Ann: She said, “Thank you! Thank you! I can’t believe you went and got me chicken! Thank you!” And I asked them, “Bryce, how many times did she say, ‘Thank you?’” He said, “She said it four times!” [Laughter] And later we prayed for that woman on the way home, like “Oh, Lord, we pray that she would just know how much You love her.”

Let me just say this: It’s not out of “I’m going to conjure this up today.” This comes out of sitting with Jesus and asking Him, “Lord, I’m so self-centered that I’m only seeing what’s going on in my life. Help me, Jesus, to have Your eyes and Your ears and Your mouth to love people the way You would.”

Dave: Yes, and the tension is, Dane, as I hear that story, in the same moment I was thinking about a week earlier we were doing a marriage conference in Indianapolis. We went out to dinner, and we were walking back and there was a homeless guy sitting on the sidewalk. Ann pulls a $20 out of her wallet and hands him $20. I would love to tell you I had the heart of God in that moment. [Laughter] “Let’s help this guy out.” I looked at her like, “You couldn’t give him a one or a five? You gave him a $20!” [Laughter]

Dane: You tightwad, Dave.

Ann: Our listeners are going to think, “Dave, you shared this story three times!” That’s how mad he was at me.

Dave: I think you understand. That’s the tension in our soul. We have both sides of us.

Dane: Guys, it’s messy. It’s messy. [Laughter] We’re up and down. We don’t want to communicate to anyone listening that this is a neat and tidy formula that you download, and then there you have—

Ann: Yes.

Dane: Read Matthew 11. There you go. Goodbye. You’re now going to—It’s up and down.

Ann: Yes.

Dane: It’s up and down.

Ann: Take us back into the Scriptures, but even you talking about Jesus healing Jairus’ daughter, when you talk about Jesus’ heart and His action, what other things come to your mind?

Dane: As I mentioned, I was in the plane in Matthew’s Gospel. I just did a very quick fly-through of Matthew’s Gospel, and what I was wondering about was “Where do the kids show up?” And that was where I noticed Jairus’ daughter.

Ann: Oh.

Dane: I noticed a few other things. The feeding of the 5000 and then the 4000—you know He does both.

Ann: Yes.

Dane: The text says not that Jesus multiplied the fish and the loaves and told his disciples, “Make sure that you only make enough for the adults.” It says the women and the children—in both accounts—the women and the children also ate and were satisfied. This is a profuse feast, and it wasn’t like, “As long as you’re at least 18.” The three-year-olds were included.

 He said, “Turn and become like a little child.” Exhibit A in what it is to be a part of the Kingdom of God: Give me a five-year-old. “If any of you misleads or mistreats one of these little ones, it’s better that someone wrap a rope around your neck with a huge 200 pound weight, take you to the bridge, and drop you over in the water. That’s a better fate for you, than if you mistreat the kids.

Here was a new one. When in Matthew 21—here’s something I never noticed. I said, “Stace, look at this. Jesus entered the temple, drove out all who sold and bought in the temple. This is Matthew 21:12. “And He overturned the tables of the moneychangers and the seats of those who sold pigeons. The blind and the lame came to Him in the temple. He healed them.”

Now look: “But when the chief priests and the scribes saw the wonderful things that He did and the children crying out in the temple, ‘Hosanna to the Son of David,’ the chief priests and the scribes were indignant.” Now hang on. Jesus is flipping tables in the temple and apparently, He’s operating in such a way that the blind and the lame are like, “I can’t see, I can’t walk, but He’s flipping tables. I want to go hang out with that guy.”

So, they go up to Him. The religious PhDs are over here upset, indignant, it says, just shaking their fists at Him and the kids get it. The kids are singing a worship song to Jesus while the guys with all the Bible degrees are not getting it. So, time and again, apparently, there’s something very open-hearted and guileless and able to hear what Jesus is like and the gospel that kids have.

That was one reason I’m fired up about trying to get this message of Christ’s heart to a younger generation. In our parenting, let’s not hold back. Let’s just flood them, irrigate their ears with this message of what He is like, because that’s what Jesus was like.

Ann: Have you ever noticed that in that Scripture?

Dave: No.

Ann: I haven’t either.

Dane: I had not either until a few hours ago.

Ann: I’ve read that so many times.

Dane: Yes.

Dave: What is the journey that happens from childhood to adulthood where we lose that? What do you think will happen?

Dane: That’s a great question. You two probably could answer that better, but we get cynical. We suffer and therefore we put up various defense mechanisms because we don’t want to hurt again, so we hold people at arm’s length. We’re trying to guard our heart from getting hurt, so we might guard it from getting hurt again, but that also, at the same time, closes it off to receive healthy love, and that would be one.

I do think that as we go through life, I can only look at life through my own eyes, but I think I see this in other Christians, too. We grow in many ways. We grow in maturity and wisdom and knowledge, and I feel my sins more acutely now at 45 than I did at 25.

Dave: Yes.

Dane: But we’re going through life, and it’s not like when you become a Christian you get your act together. We need the gospel every day.

Ann: I think, too, what happens is we all, every single person on the planet, go through disappointment and heartache.

Dane: Yes, right.

Ann: Every person, and I have found the times that I have been so heartbroken, I have that choice of drawing toward Jesus, because He’s already drawing toward me.

Dane: Yes.

Ann: Or I can turn and walk away or pull away. I love your picture of Jesus, as you just said, that He’s coming toward me all the time; of the Prodigal father; He’s running toward me. So we think and we feel like, “He’s abandoned me; He’s gone, He’s not with us,” when in truth—and that’s why we have to be in the Word, because the Scripture tells us “He’s for us,” “He’s running toward us,” He’s fighting for us.”

That’s why I need the Word, because it would be easy to think “He’s forgotten me.” I talk to so many people who say, “He’s forgotten me,” “He doesn’t answer my prayers,” “He never talks to me,” “I see nothing.” I say, “He loves you,” but they just aren’t in it.

Dane: Yes. We think we have to work so hard to earn and get His help.

Ann: Yes.

Dane: But He is bursting to help us if we will allow Him to. In Revelation 3, Jesus, the Risen Christ, describes a church, and the words that He uses to describe them are the words that many of us, many weeks walk into church feeling, namely “Wretched, pitiable, poor, blind. Wretched, pitiable, poor, blind.” [Revelation 3:17] Yep! Four for four. That’s how I tend to wake up on Sunday morning to go to church.

Ann: And you’re the pastor!

Dane: And I’m the pastor! [Laughter] What is Jesus like to that kind of person? We don’t have to wonder. He says, “Behold,” to the same people two verses later, “I’m standing at the door and I’m knocking on the door.” As you just said, Ann, “If you’ll let me in,” Jesus says to wretched, pitiable, poor, blind people, “May I please come eat lunch with you?” [Revelation 3:20]

“Behold, I stand at the door and knock.” We spiritualize this. “Behold I stand at the door and knock.” We put it on plates and mugs. He said, “I want to come have fellowship with you. I want to hang with you. I want to be with you. Love one another.”

“Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me.” He didn’t say that to the A-minus or better Christians. He said it to wretched, pitiable, poor, blind.

Dave: Yes, and the beauty of that as we all know is He made the walk to our door.

Dane: Yes, right.

Dave: It isn’t “I’m over here. I’m righteous; you’re pitiable. Come over; when you’re ready to clean it up, here I am.” No. He’s coming down the street to our door. I know what happens—when He knocks, we hide. [Laughter]

Dane: Yes.

Dave: I hide. I think, “I’m too dirty for You to even come in here. I’m not going to let You in.”

Dane: We do.

Dave: “And I know You don’t want to come in and have a meal with me. You want to come in and drag me out and clean me up.”

Dane: “Give me a pep talk.”

Dave: Yes. But to think that He wants to have intimate fellowship in my place—

Dane: Amen.

Dave: —where the wretched life I live is all around is a picture of God we need.

Ann:  To Zacheus, and the tax collectors, Matthew, He says, “I’m coming to your house tonight.” It’s exactly what you’re saying. “I’m coming to your house.” That had to be the most mind-blowing thing, not only for Matthew or Zacheus, but for anyone around them.

Dane: I love that.

Ann: Like, “What in the world?!?”

Dane: Yes, “Don’t you know who this guy is?”
 

Ann: Yes. It’s like going to the crack house for dinner.

Dane: Right.

Ann: “I’m coming to your house, crack dealer.” He’d think “What?!?”

Dane: “I’m going through the drive-through, Mafia. Whadda ya want? “[Laughter] “We’re going to get some lunch together.” Hey, Dave. You just said, “Dirty. We feel dirty.” Just to add a footnote to that, I am very fired up right now about the biblical truth that we are not only justified, legally acquitted, righteous, but we are also clean. The word the Bible uses is “saints.”

We’re preaching through Ephesians right now. I don’t think I’ve ever grappled with this, “To the saints. To the cleansed ones, the clean ones.” One of the fun phenomena going on in our church right now is we’re calling one another, “Saint Dave,” “Saint Ann,” [Laughter] because we deeply do not believe that that is who I am. “I am dirty; I am defiled.”

Ann: Yes.

Dane: Oh, no. The whole church at Ephesus, the worst Christian at Ephesus was as much a saint as the Apostle Paul and as the best Christian, objectively. Oh, we go up and down in our saintliness; we do not go up and down in our sainthood.

Ann: Good.

Dane: We are saints. We may betray it by the way we act, or we might reflect it by the way we act, but we can never lose it. We are saints. Live out of that identity.

Ann: That’s good.

Dave: I was just thinking this could be one way to wrap this thought: There is a woman that we know in our church in Detroit. For years she drives the streets of Detroit, and she helps the prostitutes and the drug dealers, and she brings supplies to them. She prays for them. When they see her, man, they run to her van.

Dane: Wow.

Ann: Because they’ll pray.

Dave: They don’t run away; they run to the prayer van.

Dane: That’s the heart of Jesus.

Dave: That’s the heart of God.

Dane: Yes, it is.

Dave: People say, “You go down there and love those people?” She says, “Yes, I love them.” And many of them come to Jesus because they feel seen for the first time, somebody that loves them. It’s sort of like the Jesus van coming into the dirty parts of the town where a lot of the saints don’t want to go.

Dane: She knows what Jesus is really like.

Ann: Yes, and sometimes that’s easier than loving the person in the carpool line that’s driving us crazy, or their child is not being nice to our child.

Dane: True. Right.

Ann: And that love of Jesus permeates everything.

Shelby: How does the love you have for Jesus spill over into your love for other people, even the difficult people to love, not just the easy ones? This is super-convicting, and it makes me want to cry out to God for His power to help me love others in ways that I know are just simply impossible for me to do. With man it might be impossible. With God, however, all things are possible. I love that reminder.

I’m Shelby Abbott and you’ve been listening to Dave and Ann Wilson with Dane Ortlund on FamilyLife Today. Dane has written a book called The Heart of Jesus: How He Really Feels about You. This book is super-helpful to help you really encounter the heart of Jesus as described in Matthew 11. It really highlights God’s deep love and longing for His people to find rest in Him.

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

It might seem like it’s really far away, but February is just around the corner. You’re thinking, “February? That’s what? We haven’t even hit the holidays yet.” Well, it will be here soon, and the reason I’m mentioning it is because from February 8 to 15 we’re setting sail on the Love Like You Mean It^®marriage cruise. This is the unique cruise experience that you probably always wanted, but didn’t even know about. It offers a full ship experience tailored for married couples seeking to rejuvenate their relationship.

You can secure your spot right now by going online to FamilyLifeToday.com and clicking on the Love Like You Mean It marriage cruise banner. When you do, you’re really going to treat yourself to a week dedicated to celebrating your love with your spouse and strengthening your relationship with God. Again, you can head over to FamilyLifeToday.com and click on the Love Like You Mean It marriage cruise banner.

Now, tomorrow Dane Ortlund is here with us again, to talk about how personal encounters with Jesus transform our leadership and our family lives. That’s coming up tomorrow. We hope you’ll 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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