Over the next the next five posts I want to give you a definition of “gentle power.” By using the word P-O-W-E-R as an acrostic, I believe it will help us understand what Paul was saying when he said, “For the fruit of the Spirit is…gentleness.”

The “P” in power stands from personaility.  A gentle person takes the personality that God has given them, unique as it is, and places it under the control of God. I think of Jesus’ three closest friends, Peter, James, and John. Now, this is a great illustration of how God doesn’t give up on us when we’re not meek or we’re not the person we need to be.

Remember the time when the Lord sent James and John ahead to Samaria? This was a time when Jesus was extremely unpopular. They weren’t well received and really, the bottom line is that Jesus and the disciples couldn’t stay at the Samaritan Hilton that night. And they were really ticked and said, “Let’s call fire down from heaven.” That is not a gentle person.

Remember the time when James’ and Johns’ mother came to Jesus and said, “Lord when you come into your kingdom can Jim sit on one side and Johnny sit on the other?” That is not a gentle request. That’s truly looking out for number one.

How about Peter? There are many illustrations of Peter demonstrating not gentleness, but an impulsiveness and arrogance. What blesses my heart is, despite their personalities, Jesus never gave up on them, but He kept working on them and maturing them. Today you may not be the gentle person that you want to be, but the good news is that through God’s grace and maturity and seasoning, you can become that person. You see all four different temperaments. We all know them:

• The choleric wants to control everything.

• The melancholic needs a lot of gentleness, training and teaching, because they’re judgmental and highly critical.

• The phlegmatic is good under pressure, witty, enjoys humor.

• The Sanguine is optimistic is driven by their feelings and a slow finisher.

So no matter what personality we have, we don’t want to change the personality. We don’t need to make a choleric a phlegmatic, but what we have to do is put our personality under the control of God.

1. mark Says:
   April 15th, 2009 at 8:08 am

   Incredible site!