Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth. Matthew 5:5.
It is good to know that God is going to turn the earth over to the meek, and it is important that we understand who the meek are.
Those who inherit the earth are those who will receive the reward of glorified bodies because of their faithfulness to live by every word that proceeds out of God’s mouth, not every believer inherits one. They receive a resurrected body that enables them to live in heaven, but a glorified body enables us to live physically on the earth and to rule it.
What does it mean to be meek? To be meek is to have aggressive faith that does not ambitiously strive in the flesh for the fulfillment of God’s will.
The meek inherit because they have an aggressive faith to come into something that is great. That aggressive faith refuses to strive in the flesh to fulfill the promises of God. It simply rests in God’s word and acts accordingly.
Abraham was a prime example of what it is to be meek and have aggressive faith. With his servants, he defeated five kings of that day in battle, renowned for their great abilities in organization and war.
When Abraham returned victorious, the king of Sodom was so happy that everything was recovered that he offered him great riches, but he would not take a shoelace lest the king should say he had made Abraham rich (Genesis 14:23). God had promised to make him rich, and he refused to see it fulfilled on an earthly plane.
This meekness in the Lord was in no way a sign of weakness. It takes strength to be meek, to just bow to the will of God instead of doing something about a situation yourself. It requires the kind of faith that humbles itself in the face of disaster.
One of the first things that God did to Israel was put the people in a position of enforced meekness. With Pharaoh pursuing, the Red Sea before them and no way of escape, they were told to stand still!
Every one of us under such impending disaster would want to run and take matters into our own hands; for you can stand still just so long and then you feel you must do something about it.
But to just trust God requires that even when it seems like it is too late, you still trust the Lord. You do not say, “Lord, if You had been here my brother had not died.”
But you know whatever you ask, God will give it to you. It is a faith that knows it is never too late to see God work the greatest miracle you have ever known in your life.
The meek are those who refuse deliverance on a fleshly plane, knowing it would not be of God, and knowing that God can work apart from human effort as they trust Him and aggressively go about doing exactly what He wants them to do.
A passage on meekness is Matthew 11: 27 All things have been delivered to Me by My Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father. Nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and the one to whom the Son wills to reveal Him. 28 Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. 29 Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”
People do not understand what this Scripture really means. In it, Jesus is showing you the way of the path of rest.
“All ye that labor and are heavy laden”-this speaks of fleshly striving.
He is saying, “Everything has been delivered to Me of My Father, and it is all in My hands. And how did it get that way?
The Father put everything in Jesus’ hands because he was meek and lowly. The meek inherits the earth.
You who are worrying, working tireless to please God, and striving in the flesh to be perfect, come and learn what it is all about.
I am meek and lowly in heart. Learn that, and you will find rest for your souls.
Take My yoke upon you and learn of Me. We become a true success in the eyes of YHWH on the earth, by meekness and lowliness of heart.”
Take notice of what Jesus said-Mat 11:27, …no one knoweth the Son, save the Father; neither doth any know the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son willeth to reveal him.
There must be revelation through the Holy Spirit to our spirit. There must be an endowment by God.
It rested upon Jesus in His meekness and lowliness. Everything was delivered into His hands, even the ones upon this earth who are going to receive this revelation from God.
The meekness that Jesus manifested was being completely submissive to do the will of the Father.
Meekness could also be termed “absolute submission.” Or “absolute surrender.”
He was meek, yet he had authority over the earth in his earthly walk because he was the last Adam, but he partook of the way of the tree of life, and the first Adam did not.
Although Jesus had authority over the earth, he did not yet have authority over the heavens, the realm where fallen angels are operating over cities, because after Jesus’ earthly ministry the city of Jerusalem was worse off than before he began his earthly ministry.
It was not until he died as a substitute for the whole adamic race and was resurrected, “the first born from the dead” did he receive authority over the heavenly places.
In our natural thinking, meekness and authority do not seem to go together. But in the meek there is that refusal to take things into one’s own hands to work out their own destiny.
They are trusting God in rest and doing it God’s way.
Jesus said, “Come, learn of Me, see how I am doing it: I am completely submissive to the Father and everything has been put in My hands. Learn of Me and you will find rest for your souls.” No more seeking and striving in your human strength.
This is also taught in the fourth chapter of Hebrews, which speaks of entering into His rest.
For those who labor and strive in and of themselves, there is no rest.
But those who enter into His rest cease from their human labors as Christ did from His.
There is a ceasing from laboring in yourself and coming into that which is of God and is rest.
As our spirits are perfected, much of the confusion, striving, and turmoil that we experience will disappear.
Upon the people of God in this hour, who will go forth to turn the world upside down once again like the early church, yet with a double portion of what the early church had, we will see the most explosive outburst of divine energy, yet there will appear a contentment, a calm, a peace, a rest, because they will have that one indisputable thing that can never be substituted: a meek spirit and the peace of God that transcends all understanding (Philippians 4:7).
The meek have a quality about them that God will bless beyond anything we could ever understand. The meek are without the striving that is born of doubt and insecurity.
Some people try too hard because they feel insecure in themselves and of their place in life.
The meekness that God wants accepts what God says and rests in it without striving or contending for a place, knowing God will establish it and none can take it away.
They that are meek reject the verdict of man as to their failure, and they rest in God’s victory.
The judgement of man may be that you are a failure, but if you are meek you do not rise up and contend against it: “Well, I’m not a failure!” It does not matter to you what others say, for you rest in God’s victory and what He says.
You do not need the judgement of man, “My, isn’t he a success? Isn’t he a great man or woman?” You are not interested in building up your ego and self-esteem by contending that you are a success, because to you it is not important what man thinks of you.
Meekness is aggressive faith that wants only to move in God and refuses to put a hand to the ark or go back to old traditions.
The meek wait on God until God tells them exactly what to do. They shift to the new day, to what God says to do, not just continuing that which appears to have financial or numerical success.
We do not yet understand much about the early Church. Paul said, “I was with you in much meekness and lowliness. My speech is nothing, contemptible; my bodily presence is weak.”
When Paul came to Corinth, the people exclaimed, “That’s the Apostle? He’s nothing! He can’t even talk. His presence is disgraceful!”
But Paul said, “When I come, I will know not the speech, but the power. The Kingdom of God is not in word, but in power.” So poor little meek Paul went about upsetting the world. He said, “I was with you in much trembling and fear. My words were not enticing words of man’s wisdom, but in the demonstration of the power of the Spirit” (words that exploded and upset the world!). You must watch out for the meek; they have something going for them that the world does not understand.
The Kingdom of God is not showmanship, not a put-on, not a molding of people’s emotions as if by an actor or a great orator.
The Kingdom of God is manifested on earth through the aggressive faith of men and women who have renounced fleshly efforts that it may be wholly of God.
In days when they could have had much material success, the meek …were stoned, they were sawn asunder, they were tempted, they were slain with the sword: they went about in sheepskins, in goatskins; being destitute, afflicted, ill-treated (of whom the world was not worthy), wandering in deserts and mountains and caves, and the holes of the earth. Hebrews 11:37, 38.
“Who are these men? The scum and offscouring of the earth? Now does this sound like anything a decent Christian would want to be identified with today-sawn asunder, tortured like that.
Are you sure that you want to get mixed up with these remnant of believers and live that way: dens and holes in the earth, going about dressed in sheepskins and goatskins?”
Do you know how effective the early Church was? Within the span of a little more than one generation, half of the Roman empire were believers, at a time when it could cost one’s life to confess Jesus Christ as their lord or master. Only Augustus, Tiberius, Claudius, and Nero were Lord, or ruler in those times, to say otherwise meant death.
Do you want to be like those back in Bible days who lived in caves and holes, destitute and afflicted, were fighting armies, quenching the violence of fire, receiving their dead back to life again, and walking in miracles.
The meek are something to be reckoned with.
When the Church comes out of its lukewarmness and pride and returns to the meekness of Christ, the Kingdom will be manifested on the earth in short time.
The pride and arrogance that Satan is promoting afflicts and weakens the life of the Body of Christ by contamination from the environment of the world around it.
We do not need a regulation of conduct, but rather we need to come into a purity of spirit.
The world can get into you in all its arrogance: 16 For all that is in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—is not of the Father but is of the world. 17 And the world is passing away, and the lust of it; but he who does the will of God abides forever (1 John 2:16, 17). The pride of this world? Get rid of it!
We have seen that the meek are without the self-striving, but they are bold to assume the position in Christ and the victory God declares for them.
There is nothing timid about a meek man or woman. It is just that they are not arrogantly striving in themselves.
But try to move them off the place that they put their foot upon by faith, and you will find a warrior.
When they battle in the Spirit, they know what they are after the thing that God has for them; they will stand there and claim it; they will fight and always win because they know how the Word says it is done.
The meek are like Joseph in the Old Testament: preoccupied with the dream they received in their youth.
They know the way to its fulfillment is often the path of the downtrodden, the oppressed, the forgotten, the despised and the forsaken—the offscouring of the earth.
Joseph was stomped on, all the way down, until he reached the throne of the earth.
But he carried his dreams in his heart, he didn’t fall into that pit; he was deliberately thrown there by his brothers.
He didn’t manage to climb out; he was snatched out and turned over to the slavers.
He didn’t want to be in Potiphar’s house; he was sold there. He was lied about by Potiphar’s wife.
He didn’t want to go to jail; they put him there and threw away the key. There was nothing he could do about it. Down, down, down he went until the day he became the second greatest to the throne of that time, next to Pharaoh himself (Genesis, chapters 37–41).
Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth.
“Joseph, don’t you look for the day when you can get even with those wicked brothers of yours?”
But when he revealed himself to them, he said, “Don’t feel bad, you meant it for evil, but God meant it for good to save many souls alive.”
Joseph was a meek man, not battling or self-striving, not on the defensive, just serving God.
“My dear brother or sister, they are talking behind your back. Do you know what they are saying about you? Do you know what is going to happen to you?”
The meek have a beautiful nod that says, “What does it matter? My life is in the hands of God.
Out of my way, I have some things to do. I must do everything God tells me to do. I must listen to His voice and be about His business. I am an aggressive soldier in the army of Christ; don’t bother me with those other things!”
We read in II Timothy 2:4 that no man called to be a soldier is involved with the things of this life, that he may please Him who has called him to be a soldier.
“Will you join the army of God? but I want to take my color television with me. I’d like to take my stereo set; you know how I love to listen to my music and a few other choice things in my suit case in order to take a break at some point.
Maybe I can have a nice time with a little sports and recreation.” The first time out on the battlefield with that—boom! Television and everything else would be blown up.
What should you do? Travel light! Hold this world loosely. Enjoy it, but don’t get attached to it. Press on and possess the promises God has for you. You don’t need to hang on to a little piece of this world. The whole earth will be yours. You will inherit the earth because you are meek.
The meek are forgotten, unnoticed by men, but remembered by God.
I have heard of preachers in time past, who gave their lives for God; they sacrificed and died without recognition, sometimes without even a marker for a tombstone. All that matters is that God remembers them.
How many generations do the dead have that they can say, “I’ll be remembered for so many generations, I will make a name for myself that nobody is going to forget”?
But when you trust God and walk humbly before Him, He remembers you and your generation after you, to a thousand generations (Psalm 105:8).
The meek are the heirs of God. They are the kings and priests who find it unnecessary to build an image of themselves before men.
They believe in their position. Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth.
The meek are those who strive and labor in God, not in themselves. They are the martyrs who are put under in the book of Revelation (Revelation 6:9). They cry from beneath the throne, from beneath the altar of God. These are the ones whom God has destined to rule and reign.
It seems that the meek are disguised. They go through the world, and you don’t seem to see them.
They are not appreciated by man; they are Nobodies as far as the world is concerned; YHWH is the one who really appreciates them.
You don’t realize what a force they are in the church because they are unassuming.
If they have problems, you don’t seem to hear much about them. In quietness and meekness, they go about their work, yet few people realize the spiritual authority they really have.