The Surprising Power of Gentleness (Short Version)
Good Morning Friends,
Christians confess that Jesus Christ will come again to judge the living and the dead. Scripture points toward the day when evil will be confronted, injustice put right, death defeated, and God’s creation restored. But what kind of King are we waiting for?
Psalm 2 pictures God’s anointed King ruling the nations. Psalm 110 pictures him victorious over his enemies. Isaiah 40–55 announces that God is returning to reign, end the exile, renew his covenant, and bring new creation.
Perhaps we expect thunder. Yet when God comes among us, something astonishing happens. The Creator becomes a servant. The Word becomes flesh. The King becomes a Sower. The Word becomes Seed. The Judge bears judgment himself.
The first coming teaches us how to understand the second. The Jesus who returns is the Jesus who was crucified for sinners and raised from the dead. His gentleness is not the absence of power. It reveals what God’s power is like. So, today’s question is: What Does It Look Like When Jesus Comes to Power?
Scripture Summaries:
Isaiah 40–55 announces the end of exile because Israel’s God is returning as King. Yet victory comes through the Servant who establishes justice without crushing the weak and ultimately triumphs through suffering.
Psalms 2 and 110 envision God’s anointed King ruling the nations and overcoming everything opposed to God’s purposes.
John 1 takes us back to Genesis. The Word through whom creation came into being becomes flesh. The Creator enters his creation.
Mark 4 gives us Jesus’ surprising picture of the kingdom. The victorious King is like a farmer scattering seed, and the seed is the Word.
Message: Isaiah announces that God is coming back. But what will it look like when the King comes to power? Perhaps Israel expected thunder. Jesus brought seed. They expected armies. Jesus gathered fishermen. They expected Israel’s enemies to be defeated. Jesus came to defeat the deeper enemies of sin, evil, and death. Jesus touched lepers, welcomed sinners, forgave enemies, washed feet, and announced God’s kingdom. Isaiah had already hinted at this strange kind of power: “A bruised reed he will not break.” God’s Servant establishes justice not by crushing broken people, but by restoring them. Perhaps this explains why the disciples were so often clueless. They believed the Messiah would come to power. They simply misunderstood how God exercises power. Then Jesus describes the kingdom in Mark 4 not as an advancing army, but as seed disappearing into soil. John tells us, “In the beginning was the Word.” The Creator steps inside creation. And then something extraordinary happens: The Word becomes Seed. The Sower scatters the Word into the world. Some reject it. Some allow competing loves to choke it. But somewhere the Word takes root, and almost invisibly new creation begins. Isaiah had promised that God’s Word would go out and not return empty. The mountains sing, the trees clap their hands, and thorns give way to flourishing life. Then comes the deepest mystery: the Cross is not the failure of God’s kingdom. Jesus fulfills the royal promises by redefining divine victory. The hands that created the universe do not grasp for power. They open themselves in love. The seed falls into the earth. And resurrection happens. New creation begins.
And So, perhaps we are we sometimes as clueless as the disciples. We still tend to look for power where the world tells us it resides: political influence, cultural dominance, money, numbers, celebrity, or control. But Jesus keeps scattering the Seed of the Word made flesh.Someone forgives. Someone serves unnoticed. Someone welcomes the lonely. Someone speaks truth without hatred. Someone cares for the weak. Someone makes a disciple. Someone loves an enemy. And perhaps we wonder, “Is that really how God’s kingdom comes?” The disciples wondered too. Maybe our greatest temptation is not failing to believe Jesus is King. It is believing Jesus is King while still imagining power the way Caesar imagined it. Isaiah offers another vision: The Creator becomes the Servant. The Word becomes flesh. The King becomes the Sower. The Word becomes Seed. The Servant gives his life. And the crucified King rises. That is what it looks like when Jesus comes to power. So today, consider where you still expect God to work primarily through force, control, influence, or spectacular success. What seemingly small seed of God’s Word might Jesus be asking you to plant today? Perhaps the gentle, patient work of loving God, loving others, and making disciples is more powerful than we imagine.
Pray to our Creator and Covenant-Keeping God. Confess that, like the disciples, we often misunderstand his power. Ask him to open our eyes to Jesus, the Word made flesh and the Servant King who conquered through self-giving love.Pray that he will plant his Word deeply within us, break up the hard soil of our hearts, remove the thorns that choke our faith, and make our lives fruitful soil for his new creation. Pray that we will trust the gentle power of his kingdom and faithfully scatter its seeds until the day when all creation rejoices that Jesus Christ is King. Amen.
Blessings,
John Lawson
