Our scripture reading for this evening is from the Gospel of Matthew, Chapter 5, as we continue our consideration of the Beatitudes. Matthew, Chapter 5, we'll read from 1 through 20. And seeing the multitude, he, that is Jesus, went into a mountain. And when he was set, his disciples came unto him. And he opened his mouth and taught them, saying, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled. Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God. Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are ye when men shall revile you and persecute you and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely for my sake. Rejoice, and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you. Ye are the salt of the earth, but if the salt hath lost his savour, wherewith shall it be salted? It is thenceforth good for nothing but to be cast out and to be trodden under foot of men. Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick, and it giveth light unto all that are in the house. So let your life, I'm sorry, let your life so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father, which is in heaven. Think not that I am come to destroy the law or the prophets. I am not come to destroy, but to fulfill. For verily, I say unto you, till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law till all be fulfilled. Whosoever, therefore, shall break one of these least commandments and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven. But whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I say unto you that except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven. Beloved in the Lord Jesus Christ, as we continue our study of the Beatitudes tonight, we are reminded that these come directly from our Lord Jesus. They are the opening words of his most famous and most lengthy sermon. They describe in a most unique way the fundamental character of a true believer. For those who are young among us, Jesus is painting a picture for us in the Beatitudes, not so much with colors, but with words. He is putting before our mind a sketch. He's showing us a picture of what a true Christian looks like, not so much on the outside, but particularly on the inside, what goes on in a Christian's heart. So, he has called the poor in spirit, he has called those that mourn over sin, over missing God, he called them blessed, favored of God, happy, is another way of translating blessed. Now we want to move to a third beatitude, blessed are the meek. And I have to confess, beloved, that I was actually quite surprised in preparing this message. And I hope that what I learned, we may also grasp that meekness, the word translated meek here, is actually a more celebrated word in the scriptures than even the word humility. The two actually are distinct, as we hope to see in a moment. So let us pray, God, that we may not just understand this distinction, but by the grace of God that we may be a meek person in this sense of the word. So our text is Matthew 5, verse 5, Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Blessed are the meek. From the little paper that I sent out in the email a few days ago, I'm going to change just a couple of things in our thoughts tonight and our points. We're going to first consider the meaning of the verse. Then we're going to see how this verse fits in the sequence of the Beatitudes. And then finally, we'll look at the promises that Jesus attaches to this Beatitude. Now, we've already considered some time ago the setting of this Sermon on the Mount in the Gospel of Matthew. It's the beginning, or at least near the beginning of Jesus' ministry. He is up on a mountain, we read. He has gathered together his disciples, and there are others in the multitude. And he begins by describing, as we said, rather than starting with the doing of a Christian, he starts with the being of a Christian. Who is this person who follows me? Now, as we mentioned, we already considered two of the Beatitudes. Let's just briefly review them. Blessed are the poor in spirit. Theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted. So, poverty of spirit, as we saw a couple of times ago, doesn't just mean a person who's depressed, a person who's sort of down, A poverty of spirit with regard to the Beatitudes means a sense of emptiness and poverty that we experience on account of sin. It is a feeling of indebtedness to God. Do we really feel poor that way? Beloved, are we really bowed down on account of sin? Are we burdened from time to time, maybe more frequently, by the very spiritual tendencies of our heart towards sin? And then we understand that blessed are they that mourn, they shall be comforted. This is a sense of where this spiritual poverty brings us. It is, we would say, a reaction to this sense of spiritual poverty. We mourn. So it's not just that we are sad because of the consequences of sin, the effects of sin, how it affects our lives. There is that. But how God would have us to truly mourn over sin to Him. How He would have us to recognize sin as an affront, as a grief to Him, and to bring that mourning to the Lord. He would have us turn to Him from our sins, confessing them, and pleading His grace to enable us to do these things. Now, for those who know this poverty and who mourn over sin, they are blessed. Jesus says this. So, not the Christian who is always okay, not the Christian who is always up and who is sailing along through life and who doesn't, is not acquainted with the struggle within dwelling sin. It isn't that person being described by Jesus. In fact, such a person ought to suspect the genuineness of their Christian profession. Because, after all, this is Jesus' description of a believer, not mine. So this is a person who may experience distance from God. This is a person who may be wracked with temptation, who may be feeling bombarded by the world and almost hopeless in the face of opposition and yet come to God mourning over these things, repenting over these things, pleading the mercy and the grace of God. So true believers are spiritually poor and they do mourn over sin and Jesus calls them blessed. And so if we're strangers of these things, we have to ask ourselves tonight, are we truly blessed? But then we also saw the promises Jesus gives to such people. Those that are poor in spirit, theirs is the kingdom of heaven. So in other words, and it's kind of a beautiful irony, those who in their own eyes have nothing, who deserve nothing, Jesus says they have everything. They have the kingdom of heaven, the world to come. They shall receive a kingdom. In fact, the way it's worded, as we saw, they have the right and the title to the place already now. But it's held in trust. It is reserved, as Peter would say it, in heaven for them soon. So even as they struggle with their poverty, with their sin, with their weakness, the entitlement is sure. The deed, as it were, is signed. Theirs is the kingdom. Those that mourn, Jesus says, shall be comforted. Now, that doesn't always mean right away. that doesn't always mean necessarily fully in this life. God does in fact from time to time give us spiritual comforts in the midst of our mourning, relief at times in the strife, encouragements certainly, hope undoubtedly, peace, and yet the comfort of which Jesus is speaking here, you'll notice, is future. It's in a future tense. They shall be comforted. And so we don't want to read this and come away with a distorted view of the Christian life, so that if we are down and do mourn and are not terribly comforted, we ought not to conclude that means we're not a Christian. The comfort will come when the work that the mourning and the revealing, the uncovering of ourselves to ourselves does its work, then is when God often gives the comfort. It's largely reserved, however, for the future. 1 Peter 1, verse 4, I alluded to that. An incorruptible inheritance, undefiled, fades not away, reserved in heaven for you. Paul says something similar in 2 Timothy 4, verse 8. Henceforth, meaning in the future, there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord the righteous shall give me at that day. and not to me only, but also unto all them that love his appearing. And so, it's because sometimes, often, the full relief, the full salvation, the full blessing, the full deliverance from sin, from ourselves, from our nature, is future. That's why so often the scriptures tell us to hold fast. We are commanded to stand. We are commanded to press on. We are to look as Jesus did. For the joy set before us as it was before him. He endured the cross. He despised the shame. But he was set down at the right hand of the majesty of God on high. Let's take a closer look at the meaning of the beatitude before us tonight. Now here again is where I found some surprises. I had always thought blessed are the meek meant more or less blessed are the humble. But in fact the two words as I mentioned are quite distinct as are the concepts behind them. And so it would do us well to see first of all what exactly Jesus was saying And second of all, once we do understand what he's saying, to see how beautifully it actually fits in the chain of thought that the Beatitudes represent. Now, first of all, the Greek word translated in the New Testament, humility, has a range of meaning, but it's not the word used here. In the natural use of the word humility, it means lowly, It means powerless. And it's interesting because in the Greek culture in which Jesus was living and preaching, this was considered by the Greeks as a shameful thing. Humility was not honored, it was despised. People ought to be something, to be on top, to be proud, to be accomplished. That was considered laudable. And you can see how that understanding of things is very suitable to us as natural people, sinners, same thing in our society. But that's one of the reasons, beloved, why the Gospel, of course, has so little appeal to natural man. Because for us to decrease and for God to increase is counter-cultural and it's counter-human nature. The word humiliated, even today in our own vernacular, is considered a negative, isn't it? When we think of humiliated, we think of put down, we think of shamed, made fun of. But in spiritual life, of course, everything is measured by God, is measured by His Word, is measured by His standards. It is only when we begin to see ourselves for what we truly are, apart from the grace of God, that there's anything real concerning humility in us. When we begin to see God as the majestic being that he is, when we begin to have uncovered the kind of person we actually are, then we begin to understand for the first time in our lives what true spiritual humility is. How compared to God we are really nothing. We have nothing to boast of because everything we are, everything we have is a gift of God. So, all this empties us of any sense of self-importance, and it fills us with a sense of need, a sense of debt, a sense of dependence upon the Lord and His grace. But, as I said, that's not the word, that's not the concept that Jesus uses here. He says, blessed are the meek. How is that different? The word translated meek is actually far more common in the New Testament than humility. In fact, the word meek in the New Testament is actually highly exalted by God, even more than humility. In scripture, meekness means, among other things, gentle, considerate, unassuming, even in the face of opposition, wrath, malice, and so on. In the New Testament, its use and its application is truly laudable. It's exalted, in fact. Blessed are the meek. The very reign of Christ The very ministry of Christ on earth was characterized, says the scripture, by this word, meekness. You remember the famous words of Christ in Matthew 11, 29, Take my yoke upon you and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart. If you do that, you shall find rest unto your souls. Matthew 21, verse 5. He's quoting the Old Testament. Tell ye the daughters of Zion, behold, the king cometh unto thee. What is this king like? Meek and sitting upon an ass. Occult, the fall of an ass. Paul even appeals to us Using Christ's meekness, when the Apostle exhorts the Corinthians, Now I, Paul, beseech you by the meekness and gentleness of Christ. Then he goes on to exhort them to be meek. Now on the very face of it, the fact of Jesus being meek is actually, when you think about it, remarkable. Here is God Himself, the Almighty God, the Eternal Son, the King of kings, in whose hands are all power in heaven and in earth. He is meek. He is gentle. He is easy to be entreated. Consider it. What an amazing God He is. What a remarkable Savior this is. Now, we've seen throughout His life, instead of destroying His enemies, casting them off the earth, He bears with their insults, with their mockery. He even bears with the cross, with crucifixion itself. Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. and then to poor sinners like ourselves. This high and lofty one stretches out a hand of mercy, of forgiveness. Matthew 9, 13, I will have mercy and not sacrifice, for I am not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. Then in Luke 19, for the Son of Man is come to seek and to save that which was lost. In Hebrews 4.15, For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities. In other words, he can, he does, he is. But was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. Then you think of Isaiah 53. He bore our griefs. He carried our sorrows. So then when Jesus is saying, blessed are the meek, He is essentially saying, blessed are they who are like me, who have the disposition I have. So in other words, if we want to understand the relationship of meekness and humility, it goes like this, meekness flows out of humility. So in other words, humility is a state of being. Meekness is the outpouring, the outworking of humility. Humility is what God does to us. He humbles us. so that we have our rightful place before Him. Meekness is the expression of humility to God and to others. It is a characteristic of the truly humble. And so, using that sense of the word which we have, instead of vengeful, we become forgiving and compassionate. Instead of proud, we become humble. And humility flows out of the heart in a meek and gentle disposition, both toward God when we address Him, and toward others as we deal with them. And we can hide behind our character. Well, I don't have a meek character. I'm kind of a hard person. But you see, time and again, when the grace of God settles into a man's heart, he may never be free of his character entirely, but his character will not be what it always was. Peter remained a forefront person, always out in front, but what a huge difference between the Peter before Pentecost and the Peter after Pentecost. how that boldness was used not for himself and not boasting of himself, he was now bold for the Lord Jesus Christ. But if you read his letters, he was as humble about himself as could be. So we ought not to confuse meekness either with indifference or meekness with being spineless or weak. Moses was called the most weak, the most meek man on the earth, and yet how bold he was for the cause of God, how fierce he was against sin in the people of God and in himself. Meekness, beloved, is not an option. Jesus isn't saying here, it'd be so nice if my people were meek. He's saying they are. My people are made this way by my grace. In Galatians 5.23, meekness is actually giving as one aspect of the fruit of the Spirit. First Timothy 6.11, Paul says to Timothy, follow after meekness. So meekness is not just something that's given, meekness is something that's asked for, that's pursued. It's one of those graces that we ought to be pleading with the Lord to develop. Peter says meekness is an ornament, a jewel that godly women should be wearing. James says our speech ought to be characterized not only by wisdom, but also by meekness. Meekness is something Paul told Titus that the people should be reminded of time and again. Meekness characterizes or ought to characterize any effort we make to restore the spiritually fallen, according to Galatians 6. Do that work in the spirit of meekness. James says that a wise man is endued with knowledge, but he should show in his daily life good works with meekness of wisdom. So, in other words, a proud Christian is an oxymoron. Those two terms are incompatible. Pride is our nature. Meekness is our new nature. Paul says in 2 Timothy 2.24, gentleness is to characterize the servants of God. Do you see, beloved, first of all, how highly God values meekness? Never mind how pleasant it would be in us, how useful it would be in our relationships, how laudable it would be in the Christian life. See how the Lord himself so values it that he adorned his own son with this grace. In fact, the more we consider biblical meekness, the more it actually is the characteristic in 1 Corinthians 13 of charity, of love. Just think about it. It suffers long, meekness does. It is kind. It doesn't envy. It doesn't want itself in pride. It is not puffed up. Meekness means not easily provoked, easy to be entreated, entreating others, bearing all things, believing all things, and so on. And not only does the grace of God make us meek before the Lord, should be obvious, considering the difference, but when we think of the kindness and the mercy of God toward us, sinners, it certainly is befitting that we ought to have the same toward fellow sinners. If God, who is sinless, could have such compassion on enemies as we were, and by nature are, how then ought we to be bountifully patient, loving and long-suffering toward others, even when they are nothing of the kind toward us. And again, the reward, if I may so say, of grace for this won't come from man. It will come from God. The person toward whom you show these graces may not appreciate it. In fact, may hate you for them. But the Lord will bless you. Because Jesus said, blessed are the meek. So that's a sense of what the Bible means to be meek. I have seen this grace of meekness turn what I could describe as brawny, tough men into teachable babes in grace. I have seen this particular grace transform the roughest, ungodliest characters into humble saints. This fruit of the Spirit is beautiful. This fruit of the Spirit is useful. This fruit of the Spirit does wonders. It's Christ-like. We all need it. Jesus says, here we all must have it. We need to pursue it from the Lord. and in God's eyes it is of great value. And so it ought to be in ours. Now, much more briefly, having some sense of what this beatitude is saying, why is it put here? How does it fit the sequence? And that's, very briefly, our second thought. You see how Jesus began with poor in spirit. Poverty of spirit, of course, is an internal disposition. Then, poor in spirit leads to mourning. We saw that. So, the poor in spirit are affected by what they discover inside. They are overwhelmed by the perfect demands of God's law. they find quickly their utter inability of themselves to obey the law as they are called to. And so, that leads to mourning. We are sorrowful over this. We are broken-hearted over our sin-inclined and depraved hearts. We mourn not only over that, but we mourn over the separation which sin makes between us and God. begin to feel, as we never did before, the missing of God, the distance from God, the fact that we lost God in the fall and in our lives. And then, of course, there are bitter effects that we see in our own lives and over other people's lives, and we mourn that too. But then we see how those first two Beatitudes, so closely linked, almost like cause and effect, lead us directly to the third. Those that are poor in spirit, those who are brought to this morning, there is a reaction. And what is that reaction? Meekness. In the face of utter failure, in the face of unquestionable depravity, in the face of the distance that exists between God and us, and that great gulf fixed, which only a perfect Savior could affect, could overcome. That has to make us weak. And because of that, it's impossible, when we're in our right place, when this grace is in full exercise, it is simply impossible to look down on other people. Our own spiritual poverty prevents it. Our own sense of need. Our own sense of guilt. Our own sense of sorrow. The after effects of sin. And then we come to realize God teaches us what we actually deserve. And how we've never received what we actually deserve. The condemnation of God. And that makes us meek. It makes us lowly. It makes us tender. It makes us considerate. It gives us a soft conscience, a tender conscience, a speaking conscience. And the amazing thing is, when we feel this utter lowliness, when we are in our place, when we see God more and more for who He is, ourselves for who we are, when it makes us this way, God loves it. Blessed are the meek. Blessed are the meek. Jesus in Luke chapter 6 said, when he said, Love your enemies, do good and lend, hoping for nothing again, and your reward shall be great. Why? Ye shall be the children of the highest, for he is kind. To whom? To the unthankful and to the evil. Romans 5 verse 8, For God commendeth his love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. When Jesus was reviled, he reviled not against us, Peter. When he suffered, he threatened not, but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously. Here is another surprise. When I read verses like that, when I think about the suffering of the Lord Jesus, of course, the first thing we think of is he is the Lamb of God. He is going through all this without murmuring, without complaining, without threatening because of his atoning work. We would say he couldn't do that because it would spoil that perfect sacrifice. But there's more to it, beloved. It was because of his intrinsic, his inborn meekness that he would not, even though he could. What we read in those verses, those descriptions, are the characteristics of meekness. So when we have been shown our spiritual poverty, when we become poor in spirit, when we mourn and lament over sin, when we are truly humbled, it's going to flow out of us in meekness. So in other words, we don't just act meekly. We are meek. We become meek. And as we hope to see that this grace will, in turn, lead to other graces. This isn't the end of the process. This isn't the end of what God is doing to mold us into Christ-likeness, but it's an essential part. And may I simply ask you, as I ask myself, has God made you meek? I'm not asking, had there been times in your life when you acted in meekness? When perhaps you felt meek? The question is not, did you learn about meekness? I'm not asking if you're joyful, if you're assured, if you're steadfast for the truth. Has God brought you down? Has God kept you there? for the very purpose, and this is the key, for the very purpose of making room and need and desire in your heart for Jesus Christ. God never afflicts the children of men willingly, but he afflicts us purposefully. And it's a good purpose. He empties us of all the rubbish that our natural dispositions hold. He makes this meekness part of our life to open us to the counterweight of our sin, the blood of Jesus Christ. To put it maybe more simply, have you, over time, become less and less in your own estimation, and has the Lord Jesus Christ become more and more? Because that's the essence of what meekness is all about. If we're just meek and it doesn't lead us anywhere, it doesn't bring us anywhere, it doesn't cause us to esteem and extol the Lord all the more, it's useless. It's just another Greek virtue to hang on a wall and to become proud of. But it needs to bring us to that place, not just once, not just initially, but time and time again, where the Lord opens us wide for Him who we cannot miss. Now, mind you, As we alluded to earlier, there is a growth in this grace. It isn't like we have it and that's it. The Apostle Peter says we are to grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. But this shows itself in trusting ourselves less and less over time, trusting more and more in the Word of God, praying that we would be more and more like Him and less and less like ourselves. All this work the Spirit of God does on us, He does it in us, He makes us meek. Now that doesn't mean we're not going to retain, as I said earlier, some of the remnants of the old man, some of the characteristics of who we were before. But don't be the least surprised if God takes those ugly characteristics of pride or whatever it was that plagued you and somehow turns them, beautifies them and channels them into something that he will use for his glory and the good of others. So maybe you're a determined person and before that determination looked like stubbornness. Now that determination is zeal for the Lord. Maybe you're a very thoughtful person, don't speak much but think deeply. But maybe those thoughts were all about the things of the world before. Now, you're pondering the things of God. You're turning over and over in your mind the excellencies of Christ. But whatever your gifts or characters may be, one thing is for sure. If God has got a hold of you, if this true meekness is being developed in you, Unquestionably, others will see in you this man, this woman, this child, this boy or girl, this young person is more and more resembling Jesus. For whom he did foreknow, Paul writes, He also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son. And you know that promise that He will work all things together for good to those who love Him, those who are called according to His purpose. What is that purpose? That good that we would bear. that we would carry, that we would exemplify, that we would live out the image of Christ. Blessed indeed are the meek. The first promise is immediate. The meek are blessed. The very first blessing is the receiving of this grace. How many sins doesn't meekness thwart? When our conscience becomes tender, when we recognize our dire straits, when we see the holiness and magnificence and worthiness of God, when we are made meek, how many sins are not prevented? How many bridges in our life are built perhaps bridges that we burned. First and foremost, our connection with God, but also with other people. They are blessed to be meek, to be Christ-like. And again, remember, the Greek word translated blessed means happy. Being meek means gentle, teachable. That's a happy place to be. Think of the opposite. When we're stubborn and won't listen, but rather are now open to instruction, to reproof, that's a good thing. When we become the least and God becomes the most, that's a good thing. When we are gentle and patient and considerate and prayerful of other people, when we're patient toward them in some sense as God was toward us, that's a good thing. So there's a blessing in the grace itself, but then there's the promise, they shall inherit the earth. Now I can imagine one of our youngsters here thinking, why would the meek, after the way you described them, lowly, considerate, thinking highly of God, little of themselves, why would they want to inherit the earth? I can see maybe dictators, tyrants, you know, those kinds of people wanting to take over the world. Antichrist wanting to take over the world, but why would the spiritually meek, what would he do with the earth? First of all, the Beatitude doesn't say they're expecting it. It doesn't say they feel worthy of it. It doesn't even say they want it. The meek of all people, by the grace of God, learn to be content. So Jesus, who lived this meekness, was never scheming, was never covetous. When Satan offered him the glory of the kingdom of the world, he despised that temptation. He dismissed it. But the earth that the meek will inherit, you'll notice, is future. not present, they shall inherit. And it isn't the earth as we know it now, it's the new heaven, it's the new earth, the renewed, the restored, the earth we read in which dwells righteousness. So, what do we see here? We see a people who are little in their own eyes, But beloved, they are great. They are great in the eyes of the Lord. There is none other than the meek who will enter heaven. I'll never forget a minister, oh, I might have heard this 40 years ago. He said, we are never too low to enter into the gate of heaven. But we can certainly be too high. And you know what he means. Lacking this meekness, we're proud. We can even be proud of our humility, of our spirituality. But this meekness is God's key to the gate of heaven. And you just think about it. The meek, nine times out of ten, probably possess very little of this earth. Theirs is the kingdom in glory. In this life, they are, by the grace of God, gentle toward others who hate them. What does God do? God is extremely generous to them, placed them in a world where all will be gentle, where all will be in perfect harmony and enmity. This is actually the same earth that Paul refers to in Romans 8. The present earth groans, travails under the weight of the curse now. It's waiting, it's, as it were, longing for the redemption to be relieved of that burden forever. And then this perfect earth that awaits the meek, this is theirs. This is ours. And the title is sure, though held in trust. Now, it'd be one thing if blessed are the meek, they shall inherit the earth, would be all there is to say. Great as that is, but the fact of the matter is, there are many promises for the spiritually meek. Let me just give you some of them. Psalm 22, 26, the meek shall eat and be satisfied. They shall praise the Lord that seek him. Your heart shall live forever. So God will sustain the meek. He will supply the meek. He will give them spiritual food enough. And they shall live forever, praising the Lord who seek Him now. Psalm 25, 9. The meek will God guide in judgment. The meek will He teach His way. The meek don't have to figure everything out. They don't have to know where God is going. They don't have to make every decision themselves. They don't have to control everything in their lives. The meek realize what folly that is, because if God is so great, and He is, and if I am so little, and I am, the meek says, Lord, have it your way. Lead me in the way that you choose, and He will guide them most assuredly. It doesn't say the meek might be taught his way. He will guide them in judgment. He will teach them his way. Psalm 37.11, But the meek shall inherit the earth. There it is again. Shall delight themselves in the abundance of peace. Well, you know that's not talking about life in this world. Because we don't have peace in abundance. But there is a world to come that is all peace and always peace. He promises that. Then in Psalm 76 9 and 147 6, God arose in judgment to save whom? All the meek of the earth. The Lord lifteth up the meek, he casteth the wicked down to the ground. So in other words, in the eyes of man, just like the Greeks thought about humility, meekness is nothing. Meekness is despised. They'll run all over you. They'll take advantage of you. You can't be that way in this world. God says, oh really? The meek may seem so helpless. They have the mightiest helper ever behind them, around them, empowering them. God shall arise, scripture says, to their defense. They put their trust in Him. Psalm 149, verse 4, For the Lord taketh pleasure in His people. He will beautify the meek with salvation. Is that precious? Clothed in a beautiful garment of salvation. Isaiah 29, 19, The meek also shall increase their joy in the Lord. The poor among men shall rejoice in the Holy One of Israel. So the more and more that we turn to the Lord, the more and more this grace is poured in our hearts, the more and more we're in our place and God is on the throne, the more joy we have in him. The more we value him, the more we'll commune with him, we'll seek his presence and access to him. Isaiah 61 verse 1, a beautiful messianic promise. The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, Jesus, because the Lord hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek. So in other words, the first characteristic of the person to whom Jesus was sent to preach is this. He sent me to bring the gospel, the good news to the meek. Zephaniah 2, 3, Seek ye the Lord, all ye meek of the earth, which have wrought his judgment. Seek righteousness, seek meekness. It may be ye shall be hid in the day of the Lord's anger. Well, this is just a sampling of the value in God's eyes of spiritual meekness. How manifold are their blessings. They are blessed now, Jesus says. They shall be blessed hereafter. God resists the proud. He gives grace to the humble. And so, as we learn His ways, as we are molded and fashioned into the likeness of Christ, as we bear one another in meekness, as we show all meekness to all men, as Paul writes to Titus, as we put on meekness, as Paul writes to the Colossians, as we receive the Word of God in meekness, as James writes in his first chapter. The world may account us as fools. but God accounts us as blessed. Let us, therefore, hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering. For He is faithful, that promised. And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works, and that includes to meekness. Amen.