James 3:13-18
September 30, 2012
Who is wise and understanding among
you? Show by your good life that your works are done with gentleness born of
wisdom. But if you have bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not
be boastful and false to the truth. Such wisdom does not come down from above,
but is earthly, unspiritual, devilish. For where there is envy and selfish
ambition, there will also be disorder and wickedness of every kind. But the
wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full
of mercy and good fruits, without a trace of partiality or hypocrisy. And a
harvest of righteousness is sown in peace for those who make peace.
No matter what you think of football, and especially of the
Indianapolis Colts, you still have to love its former coach, Tony Dungy. There
are two clear reasons. First, and maybe most important for us Pittsburghers,
he’s really a Pittsburgh Steeler at heart. He began his professional career
with the Pittsburgh Steelers, and led the team in interceptions during its 1978
Super Bowl winning season. He also began his professional coaching career under
coach Chuck Noll, eventually becoming defensive coordinator in 1984.
You also have to love Tony Dungy even more, as
Christians, because he understood deeply how to bring Christian faith into a
vocation that isn’t entirely friendly to Christianity. The fact is that
football isn’t a religion-friendly profession, no matter what Tim Tebow does,
and no matter how many players pray, genuflect, or gesture religiously on the
field. Just the fact that it’s played on Sundays takes it out of the religious
sphere. Football is a harsh sport filled with cursing, trash-talking, violent
players and coaches. But Dungy brought a different spirit as coach. According
to players, he never cursed, and over time the players said that it diminished
their desire to curse. They also said that playing for him made them better
people. Not just better football players, but better public figures, husbands,
fathers, and men.
Where did Dungy learn to be this way? Much of it he
learned from his father. He cites one specific incident that taught him how to
cultivate the fruit of gentleness throughout his life—personal and
professional. He says, “My dad was
usually a quiet, thoughtful man. A scientist
at heart and by training, Wilbur
Dungy loved to be
outside, enjoying the scenery. Fishing allowed him
time to
contemplate, to listen, and to marvel at God's
creation. My dad used fishing to
teach his children to
appreciate the everyday wonders of the world God
created—the
sandy shoreline, the dark, pine forests, the shimmering water, and the abundant
wildlife. The lessons were always memorable, whether we caught a lot of fish or
not.
Although
we fished countless times together throughout our lives, one particular day
stands out in my mind. It was a summer day in 1965. Summers in Michigan are
beautiful, with comfortable temperatures and clear, blue skies. I was nine
years old, and my brother was five. My dad had taken us fishing at one of the
many small lakes around Jackson. On that day, my dad was teaching my brother
and me how to cast. We were both working on it, mostly in silence, until my
dad's voice finally broke a period of stillness. ‘Hey, Linden, don't move for a
minute, please.’ I looked back and watched my dad move his hand toward his
face. Calm and deliberate, he continued to speak.
“’Now,
Linden, always make sure that you know not only where your pole is when you're
starting to cast’—at this point, I realized my dad was working my brother's hook
out of his own ear—‘but also make certain that you know where everyone else is
around you.’
“I
learned something about proper casting that day, but I also learned something
about patience. Years later, when I got hooked myself, in my hand, I realized how much it hurts. Remembering my
dad's patience that day when Linden's hook was caught in his ear, I finally
understood the importance of staying calm and communicating clearly.” (from the book, Quiet
Strength: The Principles, Practices, and Priorities of a Winning Life, by
Tony Dungy and Nathan Whitaker).
What Tony Dungy also learned is how important the
spiritual fruit of gentleness is. The fact is that we do not live in a gentle
culture. Americans have a lot of virtues—creativity, faith, hard work, respect
for freedom, and things like that—but we aren’t necessarily a very gentle
people. You’re welcome to disagree, but if you look at our politics, most
prominently our present election season, you’ll see that we aren’t very gentle,
especially with those who disagree with us.
Americans have a hard time with gentleness. It’s not just
in politics. We aren’t particularly gentle with our sports teams. If the team
is doing well we’re supportive, but if they aren’t we want to throw the bums
out and fire everyone. If a player makes a mistake, especially a big one, we
can be incredibly harsh in our criticism.
The television shows we watch are harsh. If you are a
devotee of reality t.v., you are a devotee of a particularly harsh form of
television that celebrates conflict, subversiveness, and criticism. Dramas also
lack gentleness, with a focus on the drama of conflict. There may be periods of
gentleness, but that belies the harshness underneath. And most comedies find
their humor in the bite of repartee and witty criticisms.
You know, it’s because of the need of for the fruit of
gentleness that Fred Rogers—Mr. Rogers—got into television in the first place.
He had been a seminary student at my seminary, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary,
in the 1950s when he first saw television at his parents’ home. He was shocked
by its harshness, especially in children’s television. Instead of walking away
from it, though, he was fascinated with it. He was convinced that television
could be a gentle influence on children’s lives. So he postponed his seminary
education and moved to New York City to work in this new medium with NBC.
Eventually he moved back to Pittsburgh and started
working for WQED, a new public television station. His focus was children’s
programming. For the next eight years he developed characters that would
eventually find their way onto Mr.
Rogers’ Neighborhood. During that time he also took classes at Pittsburgh
Seminary, eventually graduating and being ordained as a Presbyterian pastor in
1963.
In 1963 he moved to Toronto to work for the Canadian
Broadcasting Company, and developed a 15-minute show, Misterogers. Moving back to Pittsburgh and WQED in 1966, he bought
the rights to his show, and developed it into Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood. The purpose of his show was to gently
teach children principles of the Gospel and of life. Mr. Rogers was an icon of
gentleness in an otherwise harsh world, and through his actions he embodied the
gentleness of Christ.
In a lot of ways, the fruit of gentleness is the simplest
of the spiritual fruits, but it can be really hard to forge deeply in our lives
because of the pressures of culture. This is especially for men. We’re taught
to be strong, tough, not to cry, and to be mini-John Waynes. We tend to confuse
gentleness as weakness, and we think that to be gentle means to have no
backbone. To be gentle as a man can feel as though we are breaking a taboo,
which says that we must be tough and gruff.
What helped me to work my way through this gentleness
dilemma was was something Adrian van Kaam taught. He said that to live a deeply
Christian life we need to be both firm and gentle. We can’t become so gentle
that we become sacrificial lambs, but we also can’t become so firm that we
become rigid and harsh. When we are firm with others, we need to be so in as
gentle a way as possible, seeking what is good and best for everyone. When we
are gentle, we need to also maintain a sense of firmness with others that tells
them that we have limits and boundaries that need to be respected.
Jesus was the epitome of gentleness and firmness, and
what is most interesting to me in this context is that Jesus was gentle with
the weak and hurting, but firm with the strong and powerful. This is a reversal
of what’s typical in our culture, where we are gentle with the powerful and
firm and harsh with the weak.
We are called to be a gentle people—gentle with each
other, gentle with strangers, gentle with life. How is this fruit growing in
your life?
Amen.
