In case you’re hungering for more, after my last post’s look into the verse, Matthew 5:5, “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.” That adjective for meek (or gentle or humble), the Greek word praÿs, is found in three other places in the Bible.

• Matthew 11:29 “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.”
• Matthew 21:5, “Say to the daughter of Zion, “Behold, your king is coming to you, humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a beast of burden.”
• 1 Peter 3:4, “but let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God’s sight is very precious.”

Jesus Himself was gentle and humble. And God wants our hearts to be filled with gentleness and quietness.

This brought to my mind, Galatians 5:22-23 which lists the fruit of the Spirit – love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. So, yep, I looked that up, and in fact, that word gentleness has the same Greek root as “meek” in Matthew 5:5. (It is the noun form of the adjective.) This Greek word for meekness/gentleness is found in:

• Ephesians 4:1-2, “walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love…”
• Colossians 3:12-13, “Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness and patience, bearing with one another and if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.”

God wants us to be compassionate and kind, humble and meek and patient, and forgiving – and He is all of these things toward us. He is not asking us to do anything that He didn’t do first. He modeled it for us. He loved us first, while we were sinners – and now He’s telling us to go and do likewise.

• James 1:21, “Put away all filthiness and rampant wickedness and receive with meekness the implanted word which is able to save your souls,”
• James 3:13, “Who is wise and understanding among you? By his good conduct, let him show his works in the meekness of wisdom.”

James is pointing out (1) that we should receive God’s Word with meekness and (2) the meekness that wisdom gives us.

In our modern American society, meekness is too often seen as weakness, rather than strength. Yet, I have learned from the struggles of my daily life what strength it takes to be meek and gentle, that it is actually weakness that causes me to give way to all of those Colossians 3:8 deeds of the flesh (anger, wrath, malice, slander and obscene talk).

Would you join me in praying that God would strengthen us as women, wives and mothers, to have the strength to be meek, and the power to be gentle?

TWIG