THE PRIVILEGE OF THE BRIDLED

Matthew 5:5

 

INTRODUCTION:           

Are there any images that come to mind when you hear Jesus’ words, “Blessed are the meek”?  What does meekness mean in our culture?  What does meekness mean to you?

To most of us, meekness means weakness.  It even rhymes.  And the dictionary doesn’t challenge that thought.

The English dictionary defines “meek” as an adjective meaning patient and mild, not inclined to anger or resentment, tamely submissive, easily imposed upon, spineless, spiritless…cowed submissiveness, deficient in courage.

So what do you think? 

·         What if you heard that someone was out there talking about you and that he was saying that you are very meek?  What would you think about that?

·         If you were hiring someone for an important position of major responsibility and one of the candidates put on his resume that his greatest strength was that he was meek: would you hire him?

·         If, in the presidential debates, one of the candidates were to say, “vote for me because I’m very meek.  I believe I’m the meekest person on the platform tonight.”  Would you vote for that one?

·         Would you want to go to battle with a meek soldier by your side or covering your back?

Most of us would go fishing with meek.  We’d crochet with meek.  We’d watch TV with meek.  But when something big needs to be done, we wouldn’t trust it to Mr. Meek, would we?  We’d want someone who is assertive, even aggressive; someone who is firm and forceful; someone who is self-assured and self-confident.

Conventional wisdom says that the assertive get the goodies and the meek inherit…nothing!  They get overlooked, over-passed and overrun. 

To our minds, there is not much blessedness about being meek.  But Jesus says there is.  I propose that this means that we’d better take a closer look at what “meekness” means as Jesus used the word, rather than as we use the word.

I.    THE DEFINITION OF MEEKNESS

The Greek term that Jesus used for meekness is praus. 

·         It is used of medicine that sooths an injury or heals a wound.

·         It is used of a gentle breeze that brings relief on a stifling day.

·         It is used of a substance that can be molded.  So clay, that is of the right consistence to be worked by the potter, would be called “meek clay”.

·         And, perhaps most telling, it is used to refer to a horse that is trained to the bridle. 

I really want you to get that image.  Visualize a wild mustang galloping over the prairie or running across a meadow.  That is a picture of strength and beauty.  That is something that, to a horse-lover, is a wonder to behold!

But that is also an image of potential that has not been harnessed.  That mustang is beautiful to behold but he is not useful to anyone but himself.  Now picture that same horse trained to the bridle, broken to the bit and calm under the saddle.  Now you are looking at what the Greeks would have referred to as a “meek” horse.  All of the strength of the steed is still there but it is now harnessed toward a useful purpose.

Here is the shorthand definition of praus as the Greek language uses it: it is strength under the control of the master.

Have you ever known anyone who was like that wild mustang: full of potential but lacking the discipline to accomplish anything with it?  Someone who was extraordinarily talented at many things but not disciplined enough to excel at anything?  Someone who had all the gifts but none of the restraint necessary to maximize them? 

In the 1954 movie, On the Waterfront, starring Marlon Brando, Brando’s character, Terry Malloy dreams of being a prize-fighter but instead falls into the seedy underworld of organized crime.  Looking back on what might have been, Terry laments: “I coulda had class. I coulda been a contender. I coulda been somebody, instead of a bum, which is what I am, let's face it.”

There are a lot of Terries out there and they are Terries because they are not disciplined to the hand of their Master.

II.    THE DESCRIPTION OF MEEKNESS

There have been some sterling illustrations of meekness.

·         In Numbers 12:3, Moses was described as “a very meek man, the meekest man on the face of the earth.”  This was a man who was educated in the Pharaoh’s court; who tended flocks and herds in the open range until he was 80 years old and who led 2.5 million people on a wilderness journey that took over 40 years.  He was a strong man but he was a meek man because his strength was under the control of his Master.

·         In Matthew 11:29, it was said of Jesus that he was meek and lowly of heart.  But do not be deceived into thinking that he was a weak man.  He lived a robust life, died a grueling death and did it all willingly.

·         A more contemporary example of meekness might be Mahatma Gandhi.  It took him 17 years of non-violent action and cost him his life but he won the cause of independence for India and civil rights for her people.  We think of Gandhi as a weak, skinny, white-robed beggar.  In fact, he was a British educated, highly-trained attorney who could have been exceptionally wealthy but who bridled his personal desires for the advancement of his people.  He was meek but he was not weak.

Now if those three illustrations give us an accurate description of meekness, lets see how meekness demonstrate itself, how it manifests itself in the life of a disciple of Jesus.

III.    THE DEMONSTRATION OF MEEKNESS

First of all, meekness demonstrates itself in a certain tenderness.  Remember that one of the uses of the Greek word praus was a soothing medicine?  When I was a kid, my Mom would paint any of our open wounds, sores, bites of scrapes with iodine.  In case you never had the pleasure, let me inform you that iodine stings, burns, smarts and hurts like furry.  I doubt that it did much good except that it had the wondrous side-effect of keeping us from telling Mom about any future minor injuries – and by minor, I mean anything requiring less than twenty stitches.   

Iodine was not a soothing medicine.  The Greeks would never have described it as “meek”.  Meek would be like an ointment that cooled a sunburn.  And meek people demonstrate a tenderness that has that same soothing effect on hurting people.

Another demonstration of meekness is a toughness of faith that obeys God even when we can’t see the end from the beginning.  Meek people are disciplined and bridled for their Master and they trust him and they obey him even whey they do not know why he is leading them in the paths that he is.

Meekness demonstrates itself in teachability.  Meek people are disciplined and they are like a material that can be molded.  James 1:19-21 reads:

^19 My dear brothers, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, ^20 for man’s anger does not bring about the righteous life that God desires. ^21 Therefore, get rid of all moral filth and the evil that is so prevalent and humbly accept the word planted in you, which can save you.

Meek people are teachable and humbly accept God’s Word, planted in them, which can save them. 

Meekness is also demonstrated by trusting.  Moses, declared by God to be the meekest man on the face of the earth, trusted God to defend him when he was accused, abused and misused, even by members of his own family.  Check it out in Numbers chapter 12.  It was his meekness that permitted him to wait for God to take up his cause for him.

IV.    THE DERIVATION OF MEEKNESS

Just in case you’ve decided that Jesus may be right and that there is a blessing in meekness and you want to become meek, then the question arises, “How do we get meekness? 

You don’t go down to Wal-Mart and buy a pound of meekness.  But you know what else?  You can’t get it from a sermon, either.  You don’t become meek by striving to act meek. 

And it doesn’t come from bucking-up and coping with the trials that come your way.  Coping is endurance in the power of the flesh and meekness is produced by the Holy Spirit.

Well, if meekness doesn’t come from any of those sources or by any of those methods, how do we get it?

It is a natural result of brokenness.  Do you remember how Jesus began the Sermon on the Mount?  He began with the foundational truth of the blessedness of brokenness.  He said, “Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs, and theirs alone, is the Kingdom of Heaven.”  It all starts there and it all keeps coming back to there.  For any of the other blessed virtues to be found in us, we must first of all become broken people who acknowledge that we need a savior.

So who would want that?  Who wants to give up being aggressive, striving to be in control and forcefully seeking the top spots?  Of what value is a meekness that first requires brokenness? 

V.    THE DOMINION OF MEEKNESS

Well, Jesus said that the meek inherit the earth.  Really??  It certainly doesn’t seem to work that way in the real world, does it?  The aggressive get the goodies and the meek get nothing.  That’s what my observation would tell me. 

The aggressive seem to take the earth.  We even say that they take the world by a storm.  But the meek will inherit the earth.  It will be given to them.

Ecclesiastes 2:24-26 reads:

^24 A man can do nothing better than to eat and drink and find satisfaction in his work. This too, I see, is from the hand of God, ^25 for without him, who can eat or find enjoyment? ^26 To the man who pleases him, God gives wisdom, knowledge and happiness, but to the sinner he gives the task of gathering and storing up wealth to hand it over to the one who pleases God.

Isn’t that telling?  To unrepentant sinners, God gives the job of gathering up wealth and storing it so that he can hand it over to the one who pleases God.

 

Now which would you rather be: the one who gathers it, stores it and loses it?  Or the one who receives it?

 

The people who master the world’s rules and seize the earth will get it.  But I read the back of The Book and I can tell you that one day, this world and everything that is in the world and everything that is of the world will be destroyed by fire.  Then, God is going to create a Hew Heaven and a New Earth and He is going to give it to His children as their inheritance.

I don’t know about you but I don’t want this earth.  The inconvenient truth is that it has been ruined by sin.  It is polluted, tainted, contaminated and corrupted.  I wouldn’t know what to do with this one if I had it.  I think I’ll wait for the Lord to give me the New Earth.

CONCLUSION:           

A wild horse is full of potential but dangerous.  A broken and bridled horse is no less strong but he is useful to his master because his strength is under the master’s control.

No truly great person ever lacked discipline.  To be gifted or energetic or impassioned without self-control is to be wild and full of unrealized potential.  To have our passions and our instincts and our impulses under the Master’s control, however is to be bridled.  Only those who are thus disciplined reach their full potential and receive their just inheritance.

Are you ready to discipline yourself as a disciple of Jesus?  Are you willing for you strength, your passions, your instincts and impulses to come under the control of Jesus, as your master?  If so, come forward and declare that as we stand and as we sing:

INVITATION:              #152 – “Take My Life and Let it Be”