Jesus Meek and Mild?

By David Hobbs

We all know the classic stereotype of the church—how God the Father is this vindictive tyrant of the Old testament, commanding His people to fight wars of bloody extermination and penalizing the gathering of sticks on the Sabbath with death (Num. 15:35). Jesus, on the other hand, is the meek and mild version of God seen in the New Testament. Jesus is the lover of mankind, the gentle Savior who forgave the woman caught in adultery, who will not break the bruised reed nor snuff out the smoldering wick (Mt. 12:20). Yes we all know the stereotype, but how many of us know the truth!?

Back when I first got saved, I wrote to the minister of the liberal church I grew up in, telling her about the glorious thing that had happened to me when I met Jesus. She wrote back saying that she loved Jesus too, that it was so wonderful how He came to bring “peace on earth” and “good will toward men.” [Luke 2:14, KJV]

But by this time I had gotten into the Bible and what it really said, as opposed to what we’ve been led to believe. I had to write her back, saying that the King James Version’s translation of that verse was misleading. Instead of “good will toward men,” referring to a generalized peace to everybody, it more accurately reads “Peace on earth to men of good will.” Not just to everybody, but to men whose hearts are right with God. As The Message puts it: “Glory to God in the heavenly heights, (p)eace to all men and women on earth who please him.” And how do we please Him? By accepting His gift of Christ our Savior.

But I had to go on from there to quote Mt. 10:34+ which deals directly with the idea of Jesus coming as this gentle influence wafting peace over the earth. There Jesus said,

"Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. 35 For I have come to turn ‘a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law— 36 a man’s enemies will be the members of his own household.’"

Well that kind of dealt with those stereotypes, and I didn’t hear from her again.

Then there’s a parable in Luke 19 which we’re familiar with: the parable about “12 a man of noble birth who went to a distant country to have himself appointed king and then to return.” Jesus went on to say, “14 But his subjects hated him and sent a delegation after him to say, ‘We don’t want this man to be our king.’”

Most of the parable deals with the nobleman (Jesus) giving out money to his servants to be put to work until his return. And how one turned a mina into 10 minas, another into 5, etc. We get so caught up in the drama of the servants and their money that we tend to miss the subplot of the citizens who sent the delegation to express their opposition to his kingship. In the very last verse of the parable, after Jesus is finished dealing with the money and the servants and their stewardship and the lessons to be learned, there is this one, almost throwaway line: "27 But those enemies of mine who did not want me to be king over them—bring them here and kill them in front of me.” Whaaaat?? You want to say that again Jesus? Kill them. In front of you? My stereotypes are spinning! Meek and mild Jesus? “Kill them in front of me.” This sounds an awful lot like the God of the Old Testament, as in Deut. 7:10 (NKJV)—“ [God] repays those who hate Him to their face, to destroy them. He will not be slack with him who hates Him; He will repay him to his face.”

I mentioned this verse to a Christian friend of mine, the editor of a Christian newspaper, and he said he’d never heard it before, and had no idea it was in the Bible. But it is in the Bible, in red, just like John 3:16.

Yes, meek and mild Jesus. The same Jesus that in Rev. 19 “treads the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God Almighty” and slays the armies of the antichrist with the sword that comes from His mouth; the same Jesus who slew Ananias and Sapphira for lying to the Holy Spirit, the same Jesus whom the evil spirits many times begged not to torture them (Luke 8:28).

Friends, the Bible has a lot to say about the fear of the Lord: that it’s the beginning of wisdom; that it’s clean, enduring forever; how the whole duty of man is to fear God and keep His commandments; how God accepts men from every nation who fear Him and do what is right; etc. etc. But how can we fear a God of “sloppy agape grace” as we have made Jesus out to be in the New Testament? If there is nothing to fear about such a God, then we have none of the benefits given to those who fear God either!

We need to get back to the whole counsel of God as taught in the Bible, and abandon our modern church stereotypes. Yes He loves us with an everlasting love, but it’s a love not to be trifled with!