Meekness - The despised virtue

Posted by Mike Smith at 11/4/2007 10:31 PM
Categories: meekness, beatitudes, Humility

Matthew 5:5 Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth. [NIV]


Meekness is the most misunderstood and least appreciated virtue the Bible calls us to emulate. Our society places no value on meekness. Instead of admiring the meek, we look down on them. We think of the meek as cowardly wimps. Our models for weakness are Walter Mitty, Casper Milquetoast and Wally Cox. We fail to realize that our real model for meekness is Christ.

 

This is because we don't know what meekness really is. We think the meek are that way because they have no choice. We think that meekness comes from weakness, from having no choice. Our models for the meek show this quality because they lack the strength and the courage to stand up for themselves. The truth is different.

 

As with other virtues, Christ models meekness for us. And in Christ, we see that genuine meekness comes from power and strength rather than weakness. Part of the reason we don't recognize genuine meekness is because we have distorted images of Christ. Some people tend to think of Christ as weak, a victim on the cross, gentle and mild because he had no strength. The Bible does not support this view.

 

Remember when they went to arrest Jesus? They sent several hundred armed men to the Gethsemane. Hundreds of professional Roman soldiers and temple guards. Why such a huge force to arrest an unarmed carpenter backed only by a few fishermen? Because they were afraid of Jesus. They had seen his power and strength when he cleared the temple, throwing out all the vendors, while temple guards stood by unable to interfere with him. They had seen him work miracles. When Jesus stepped forward and announced to them that he was the one they sought, they jumped back. This huge force of hundreds of armed professional soldiers was afraid of this one carpenter.

 

Jesus was the most powerful man who had ever walked the face of the Earth, and people around him could sense that power. Yet he was meek. His meekness came from power. Meekness is not submitting to others because you have no choice but to cower before them. Meekness is a conscious decision to put the interests of others ahead of your own, looking out for others first and not yourself. It goes hand-in-hand with humility. Meekness, like humility and love, does not insist on its own rights. It springs from a proper perspective on who I am and who God is, on what is important and on doing what God wants us to do.

 

If I know who God is, and I know that he loves me, and I know that I work for him and belong to him and am working in his will, that gives me tremendous authority and puts God's power behind me. Yet, in these circumstances, we are called to be meek. What this means is that we take care of other people. We are considerate of their needs and do what we can to help them.

 

The NASB and the HCSB translate meek in Matthew 5:5 as "gentle." We are gentle with others. We treat them with respect, consideration and kindness through humility. We try to help them with their needs. We take care of them. This is true meekness. And it comes from the overwhelming power of God through his love.

 

Even if the world understood real meekness, it wouldn't like it any better. It goes against the grain of this world. Human society tells us to look out for number one. Don’t be a doormat. Take care of yourself and let others worry about themselves. This is the real position of weakness. They always have to look toward their own interests because no one else will do it and because they don't have the power to secure those interests once and for all.

 

God tells us to look out for others, and he will look out for us. This is our position of strength, from which we can be humble and meek. When we can focus on looking out for others, trusting God to look out for us, we are on our way to humility and meekness.

 


 

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