matthew

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Don’t Be Afraid, I’m With You

“He saw them straining at the oars, because the wind was against them. Very early in the morning he came toward them walking on the sea and wanted to pass by them. When they saw him walking on the sea, they thought it was a ghost and cried out, because they all saw him and were terrified. Immediately he spoke with them and said, ‘Have courage! It is I. Don’t be afraid.’ Then he got into the boat with them and the wind ceased.“

Mark 6:48-50

I’m not a very good swimmer. I can admit that, and while I don’t shy away from it, I also don’t usually plan any long distance swims in open water, just for fun, either! Like a lot of people, there’s something about deep water that just scares the bajebers out of me. It’s unsettling, and when the water is rough as well and I’m struggling to stay afloat, the survival instinct kicks into high gear, creating an emotional state of sheer panic. I think that’s what the disciples must have felt as the wind kicked up and they began to struggle. I can relate to the fear they felt as they struggled with their task. There have been times that I have struggled, too, and to make things worse, right in the middle of it all a storm pops up to add yet another layer of fear and anxiety.

Earlier in the chapter (v. 45) Jesus made his disciples get into the boat and go ahead of him to the other side, to Bethsaida, while he went up to the mountain to pray. He set them to their undertaking. God does this sometimes. He puts us to a task, watching and praying over us from afar as we struggle with it, trying to figure it out on our own, saying “I got this” while He waits for us to realize that the task is given to us so that He may work through us. His purposes are not at all clear to us, catching only small glimpses at times, but His simple request of us is that we yoke ourselves to Him and trust that He’s got this.

This whole tale, as Mark tells it, is a metaphor, an observation about just how difficult it can be to follow Jesus. He sets us in our boat (life) and sends us out into the deep (the world) to accomplish his will. It’s not easy. We push against the oars, struggling with the prevailing winds of popular opinion and “consensus” that surround us with doubt and uncertainty. We become mired in the moment, following fear rather than faith.

Similarly, this same story in Matthew, where Peter tries to walk on water, is also a commentary about how we handle the tasks that God gives us to do. It goes further by illustrating how hard it can be to keep our faith during times of turmoil, even when we know that Jesus is right there in front of us, ready to help as we call out to Him. We still stumble, lose our focus and let the fear of the unknown control our actions as He stands by with outstretched hand. He simply asks us to not only believe in Him, to also believe Him, to keep our faith, to trust, to let Him take control of the yoke that guides us to where He would have us go, all the while telling us, “have courage! Don’t be afraid. I am with you.”

A Prayer: Heavenly Father, Help me to know beyond all doubt that you are there, beside me as I struggle through this life. Give me Your strength, Your courage to move forward without fear. Give me eyes to see Your will for my life and ears to hear Your voice as you whisper, “I am with you.” Amen

~SLM

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How We Measure

For you will be judged by the same standard with which you judge others, and you will be measured by the same measure you use. Matthew 7:2

Making a judgement call seems to be human nature. We see, we assess, we decide in the blink of an eye. We do it all the time without even giving it a second thought, not only with our words, but also with our tone, and our demeanor. When we say that some one is “unbelievable” or “ridiculous” what we’re really doing is measuring their worth. The word ridiculous means that what we’re commenting on is worthy of ridicule, and we say it regularly, without thinking of what we’re really saying. When we say that someone is unbelievable, what we’re really saying is that we think their behavior is unacceptable to us, or that they are scarcely credible, they are too improbable for us to believe. And when we use these types of terms in these ways, we’re not complimenting someone, we’re belittling them.

It is so easy for us to belittle others when we think we are seeing rightly. We call them sick, brainwashed, crazy, idiots, disgusting, and worse. It’s not just how we measure that will be handed back to us, but also what we measure. If we measure hate, distrust, self-righteousness, disgust, discord, or whatever we fill that cup up with, that’s what we’ll get right back in our laps. “A good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over” (Luke 6:38). Usually, when we reap the seeds we’ve sown, enough time has passed that we have completely forgotten that we are responsible for what we face. We judge, we blame, and we blindly measure out a little more, resulting in a downward spiral that’s difficult to break. It becomes us (the righteous) or them (the whichever derogatory name we choose).

I think this is why Christ advised us not to point out the splinter in someone’s eye, while we have a board in our own. It’s not a very good idea, because we tend to look at life through the narrow prism of our own desires and preconceived ideas, and no matter how smart we think we are, we have a limited view of truth. We are constantly barraged with opinions about reality, and we’ve become reliant upon those opinions. Frankly, one of our downfalls, since the fall, is that we’re quite lazy creatures. We gravitate toward what appears to be accurate, or worse yet, what we want that accuracy to look like, and not what our spidey-sense tells us is really true. It’s easier to reiterate what someone else tells us is right, than to use discernment. Discernment requires effort. It entails using our ears more than our lips, and making the effort to see the whole picture, not just the part that pleases us. Many times it’s those desires and ideas that become the “board” that blocks our vision.

Lately, I’ve seen so many people willing to throw away life-long friendships, or decide they will no longer speak to a relative, because they have convinced themselves of their own righteousness, their infallible perception of truth. I find it very sad. It brings to mind Matthew, the publican and disciple, with whom the Pharisees condemned Jesus for associating. The man who ended up recording the life of the One, Christ Jesus, who called him to a higher purpose and altered his life irrevocably. Or the Apostle Paul, who was hell-bent against Christ and his disciples, had an awakening, and found himself 180° from where he began. What did Paul see and what did he come to understand? Whatever the Lord had shown him, we know through Acts 9 that “the scales were removed from his eyes,” and unless the scales are removed from our eyes, too, we cannot perceive the truth at all. Without having eyes to see, we are bound to continue our default pattern of inappropriately consigning others to damnation by accusing them of all the butt-headed things of which we ourselves are guilty of as well. Whenever we “point the finger” at someone else, there are three that point back to us, that accuse us of what we find so offensive, so condemning.

A Prayer:

Heavenly Father,

Forgive us for clinging to our short-sightedness, to our preconceived notions. Open our eyes, let the scales fall away so that we may see as you see, so that we can love like you love. Help us to be aware of how we measure, to remember that all fall short in Your sight. Give us eyes to see that we may look at others with compassion in our hearts, forgiving their faults as you have so graciously forgiven ours.

Amen

~SLM

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What’s In The Water

“But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this defiles a person. For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander. These are what defile a person…”

Matthew 15:18-20

Sometimes in life, it’s hard to keep things in perspective. We get wrapped up in the drama and begin pulling it into our lives. We get so involved with the whirlwind that rages about us, the insignificant crap, the little minute details that we’re so sure make us better than others, that we forget to guard our hearts from destructive outside influences. With everything that 2020 has offered up, it has become easy to drink from a poisonous cup, to join in the clamor without a second thought, and forget to check what’s in the water before we gulp it down.

Recently, a  friend posted this note on social media in reference to Isaiah 43:2 as a reminder to put things into perspective: 

It was a welcome reminder about how and why ships sink. It’s not what is raging about us, but rather all the crappy things we drag into our boats that weighs us down, that causes catastrophic failure, sending us spiraling to the bottom of the abyss. That’s why Jesus warned us in Matthew 15:18-20 to guard our hearts; to be aware of the thoughts and energies we pull into our boats, to be cognizant of all that we chewing on both mentally and spiritually. When he says “it’s not what goes into the mouth, but what come out of it,” He tells us exactly what it is that defiles us in God’s eyes, and to be honest, it’s not pork and beans or crab legs. It’s the thoughts and actions that spring forth from what we’ve pulled into our hearts.

It’s interesting how scripture seems to wrap in upon itself, folding together like origami. Matthew 15:19 tells us what’s in the water: It spells out the things that Isaiah 43:2 tells us lurks in “deep waters” and “rivers of difficulty.” When we face the obstacles of which Matthew 15:19 warns, Isaiah 43 assures us that those frightening, crazy things happening all around us, trying to jump into our boats, will not sink us. When we keep our focus on the Godly rather than the worldly, we need not fear being carried away, being overwhelmed or drown, because God is with us.

When you go through deep waters, I will be with you. When you go through rivers of difficulty, you will not drown. For I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior;

Isaiah 43:2-3

Isaiah 43 also tells us that God has called us by name, that he has chosen us to be His treasure, and that because of His love for us, he has redeemed us and is our salvation. He reminds us that no matter what surrounds us or how impossible the odds appear, He is there to guide and protect us, to see us through every sort of adversity. Whatever happens in our lives, no matter what outside influences threaten to drag us under, we need not be afraid, because He is our salvation. He has already done all the work, and our job is to simply keep all the crap out of our boats and to remember that we are redeemed.

~SLM

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What God Sees

When evening came, the disciples approached him and said, “This place is deserted, and it is already late. Send the crowds away so that they can go into the villages and buy food for themselves.”

 “They don’t need to go away,” Jesus told them. “You give them something to eat.”

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is five-loaves-two-fish.jpg

“But we only have five loaves and two fish here,” they said to him.

“Bring them here to me,” he said. Then he commanded the crowds to sit down on the grass. He took the five loaves and the two fish, and looking up to heaven, he blessed them. He broke the loaves

and gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the crowds. Everyone ate and was satisfied. They picked up twelve baskets full of leftover pieces.

Matthew 14:15-20

There are so many things happening in the world right now that are hard to wrap my head around, and it has me thinking of the miracle of the fishes and the loaves, and the fact that what God sees is vastly different than what we see.

So many times, we are so focused on our lack, that it’s impossible for us to even consider what God has in store for us. Like the disciples, we see an impossible task. We see what it will take, and compare that to what we think we have. Jesus told them to feed the multitude. He tells us to “feed our multitude” too, and like them, the first thing we think to do is argue, to say to God, look this is all we have, how can we get more at this late date? It’s impossible. We’re so concerned with how we’re gonna do it that we forget two things: One, we forget that no matter how great or small, what we have was given to us by God, and more importantly, we forget that God can do anything, nothing is greater than His ability!

In his book, The Circle Maker, Mark Batterson tells a story about how his struggling church was led to start a praise band. An opportunity presented itself for them to buy an awesome set of drums, but they weren’t sure what to do. They had no drummer, and they had no money. So they prayed about it, and God told them to buy the drums, and they threw caution to the wind and used money they needed for other things, which in human terms seemed to be more important than a set of drums.

No sooner than they took their “imprudent” step, a new fellow started attending their church, and he was a drummer. You see, God knew he was sending them a drummer and He needed them to be prepared. They didn’t know what God had planned, and the whole thing seemed like an insane idea, but from that praise band their numbers swelled. God blessed them.

Many times God asks us to do something that goes against all logic. While we see two fish and five loaves, God sees a multitude fed and twelve baskets of leftovers. 

“For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways,” declares the LORD.

 Isaiah 55:8

God  see things differently than we do, and He simply wants us to give Him what we have, so that He may bless it. Even if what we have seems woefully inadequate to cover the need. All we need to do is offer it to Him and let Him bless it, let Him multiply it, let Him do miraculous things far and above our wildest imaginings.

~SLM

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Mustard Seeds

Recently, our Pastor gave a sermon on Matthew 17:14-20. In this story, Jesus is up the mountain with Peter, James and John, and when they come down a man approaches Jesus to ask him to help his son, who is demon possessed. The man had asked the disciples to help, but they could not do it, so Jesus rebuked the unclean spirit, telling it to leave the boy, and it did. The disciples didn’t understand why they were unable to cast it out, so Jesus tells them about a mustard seed.

Our pastor was using these passages in scripture as an example of how faith works. That it only takes the smallest, really almost microscopic, amount of faith to move whatever your mountain, because nothing is too large for God to accomplish. But as he was telling the story, I couldn’t help but think that maybe there was more to the story, maybe it wasn’t just about how faith works, but also about how misplaced faith never works.

In the story, Jesus says, “You unbelieving and perverse generation,” and I love the Contemporary English Version which states, “You people are too stubborn to have any faith.” When he says this, Jesus is not only talking to the people who are continually hounding him for a miracle, but because they ask about why they couldn’t do it, he’s also talking to his disciples. He tells them they have a faith problem, that they “don’t have enough faith,” and that if they had “faith no larger than a mustard seed, they could tell a mountain to move and it would.” A mustard seed is really, really small, and Jesus tells them that they didn’t have even the tiniest bit of faith. 

Wait, what? They didn’t have faith the size of a mustard seed? That would be like having no faith at all, and they’d been healing the sick and such all day, so they had to have something, right? It occurred to me right then, what Jesus was alluding to. It wasn’t necessarily that they had no faith, but moreover that their faith was resting in the wrong hands. It was misplaced. They had started to convince themselves that they were the reason the miracles were happening, they got full of themselves, and when they came up against a hard one, they lost sight of God, lost faith and gave up. Their faith in their own abilities had begun to eclipse their faith God’s ability, and because of that, they had no faith.

Whenever we forget about the “one who brought us,” failure is always waiting in the wings.  We lose faith, because we realize that we can’t, and we forget that with and through God, nothing is impossible! That’s why he told them about a mustard seed. Saying look you don’t even need a lot of faith. All you need is faith the size of this small seed, because that small seed, when planed in your heart grows into something much larger than yourself – trust me just this little bit and see where it takes you, and what you are able to accomplish, put your faith in me, instead of in yourselves.

It also got me thinking of Lazarus. Jesus wept for his friend, and just before he called Lazarus out of the tomb, he said a little prayer, he said, “Father I thank you that you have heard me. I knew you always hear me, but I said this on account of  those standing around, that they may believe…” And this, to me, is the most powerful example of faith; a simple prayer that doesn’t ask God if He can, but rather states, “I know You hear, I know You can – thank You.”

~SLM

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And When You Pray…


Prayer is such a tricky subject. It’s a concept we all think we know, one that we tend to overuse as well as over simplify, but is it really as straight forward and easy as we assume? When asked, most people today, would say that it’s a one-on-one conversation with God, and that’s not entirely wrong. It is that, but it is also a great deal more.

For context, here’s how the Merriam-Webster’s online dictionary defines prayer:

an address (such as a petition) to God (or a god) in word or thought; an earnest request or wish

And the word pray is defined as:

to entreat, to implore, to address God (or a god) with adoration, confession, supplication or thanksgiving

In Matthew 6, Jesus teaches us about prayer, what it is, what it is not, and that we should pray in a certain way. He says, “don’t make a big show of it, so that others can congratulate you on how great a “prayer” you are. If you do that, you are really praying for your own benefit, for your own praise. And, he says that there is no need for using lots of empty phrases, thinking that the bigger and more elaborate your prayer, the better. God knows what you need, before you ask him, so pray like this:”

Our father who art in heaven hollowed be thy name – Our creator, our progenitor, who resides in eternity, whose name is sacred to us, holy. We acknowledge and remember Your rightful status, Your greatness.

Thy Kingdom come and thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven – We recognize your sovereignty and authority in all things, and pray for Your will to be done, not ours, even when we don’t understand it, and especially when we think it is “wrong.”

Give us this day, our daily bread – Feed us, Lord, each day, not just our bodies, but also with “the bread of life.” Help us to know and understand your Word, fill us with your wisdom.

Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us – Forgive us for our transgressions into your realm, for trying to fill your shoes, for how we fall short, for grieving your Holy Spirit, and give us the courage, the strength and temerity to forgive those who have wronged us.

Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil (the evil one) – Lead us away from the things that tempt us, the things that ensnare us and hold us in bondage, that mire us down in hopelessness and deceit, and save us from ourselves, from our propensity to make the wrong choices. Help us to recognize evil in all its forms and give us the strength to overcome, to turn our back, to walk away from it, as You did in the desert.

For thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory forever – It’s your creation, Lord, your playground, you are the potter, and it is through your might, your will, your love that you distinguish yourself, striking awe into the hearts of men that they may sing your praises without end.

I find it rather curious that in his example, Christ uses “our” and “us,” not “me” and “my.” As if to say, pray collectively while you pray individually. It also occurs to me that prayer was never meant to be about us individually, like a laundry list of things we’d like to get done, but an all encompassing notion that’s done best when we pray for more than just ourselves. Daniel didn’t pray for just himself, but for the whole nation of Israel (Daniel 9:4-19), and when Job prayed, it was his friends that he prayed for. As a result, the Lord restored his fortunes, giving him twice as much as he had before. (Job 42:10)

Whether we call it meditation, supplication, or whatever other name that strikes our fancy, prayer is a powerful tool. It’s something we all practice in one form or another, whether we realize it or not.  In Ephesians 6:18, Paul encourages us to “pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people.”

~SLM

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Our Daily Bread

“Give us this day our daily bread…” (Matt 6:11)

Flat Breads
When I was a kid, I could tell when my mom was baking from halfway down the block. Even today, the smell of goodies fresh from the oven evokes a certain sense of comfort, abundance, blessing and love. There’s just something about bread that speaks to the human psyche. It’s something we share with each other in the spirit of fellowship, something for which many people around the world will stand in line for hours hoping to get, and something we long for in our daily lives.

Sometimes, we are forgetful about how lucky we are to have “daily bread” in our lives and how thoroughly God provides for us. I’m reminded of Exodus 16, which tells the story of the manna, and how the Israelites, who had been liberated from their oppression for just a little over 2 months, began grumbling and complaining. All they could think about was food, not how they had been miraculously saved from oppression, but how hungry they were, even telling themselves how much better it was in Egypt, because there, at least, they had their “daily bread.”

The Israelites were indeed hungry, and in a way that went far beyond their physical need for food, they just didn’t know it. Daily bread is more than mere sustenance. It’s a yearning to recover what was lost at the fall of Eden, an unconscious desire to hear the voice of God. In Matthew 4, after he had fasted for forty days, Christ was confronted by the “tempter,” who said, “If you are the son of God, order these stones to become bread.” Jesus replies by quoting Deuteronomy 8:3, stating, “it is written, that one does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.”

Today, we’re not so unlike the Israelites of Moses’ day. We, too, are hungry, to the point of starving. We pine for our youth, for that time when every word from the mouth of God seemed far simpler to believe, and far less complicated to hear. We search for it in churches that seem to be more like social clubs, than sacred spaces to “tabernacle” with the Lord. We listen to preachers who are more interested in teaching us “political correctness” rather than God’s righteousness. When we pray for daily bread, we’re asking God to provide us with more than a marble rye to fill our bellies, or a good story with some anecdotal truth attached, we’re asking Him to fill us with the everlasting bread of His holy spirit, His presence in our daily lives so that we may be counted among the blessed.

How blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness! For they will be filled. (Matt 5:6)

~SLM

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What About The Law

Many Christians today don’t think they should follow the law, because they reason, they are covered by the blood of the lamb, and therefore are not in need of the law. We don’t need to follow the “Jewish” laws, because that’s legalism, and isn’t legalism what Christ taught against, when he called the lawyers and teachers of his day hypocrites?

Is this, in fact, truth, or just something we want to be true, something we tell ourselves in order to justify our own idea of what God’s plan entails? What about the Ten Commandments? Christians certainly believe in those. Are they not a part of the law? Christ himself said that he did not come to abolish the law, but to fulfill it (Matt 5:17). In fact, he goes on to say that “not one pen stroke of it would pass away until God’s purposes were complete.”

So what about the law, and what does it mean to be under the law? I heard an excellent example the other day from Adam at The Parable of The Vineyard YouTube channel, and it went something like this:
When you drive your car down the street and you go the speed limit you are abiding by the law. But let’s say you roll through a 25 mph school zone at 35 mph and you get pulled over. The police officer gives you a ticket, and a summons to appear in court. You are now no longer abiding by the law, but are under it. You can only be under the law, when you violate it and a penalty has been assessed, in this case a fine.

So, let’s also say that when you get to court, a concerned parent from the school offers to pay your fine, and all he asks in return is that you abide by the law, and not speed in the school zone. The judge then releases you, and are once again living according to the law. Now, when you leave the court, do you immediately go out and race through a school zone again, or do you think of the concerned parent who paid your debt?
Here’s the paradox: If we live by the law, we are not under it. It is only when we break the law that we find ourselves under it, because breaking it, like living by it, has consequences.

This is how it is with Christ. We acknowledge that he paid the penalty for us, but does that mean we are free to ignore the law, say that it doesn’t matter, because Jesus paid and I don’t have to? He told the adulteress, when all her accusers had disappeared, “Go, and sin no more.”

God’s commandments are not an arbitrary set of rules that we can follow or not according to our own desires, but an expression of the attributes of love, God’s love for us. In total, he gave Israel, his set-apart people, 613 commands. Of those 613 rules to live by, He wrote the first 10 with his own hand, which suggests they must be pretty important. In fact, all 613 can be encapsulated in those first ten. They are how we show God our love, and how we can also reflect His love to others. And, the ten can also be subdivided into just two, the two Christ spoke of in Matthew 22, when he said all the law could be summed up by this: Love God, and love your neighbor.

“Love God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength.” One to four are all about loving God.

1. You shall have no other Gods before me. Number one is about loyalty: Love is Loyal.
2. You shall not make for yourself graven images, no idols that you might bow down to or serve. Number two is about faithfulness: Love is Faithful.
3. Don’t take the name of the Lord your God in vain, don’t misuse it, do not bring God’s name to naught. Number three is about reverence: Love is Revenant.
4. Remember the Sabbath to keep it holy. Time set-apart on a recurring and regular basis to spend with God. Number four is about intimacy: Love is Intimate.

“And the second is like unto it; love your neighbor as yourself.” Six to ten are about loving your neighbor.

5. Honor your mother and father. Show them you are grateful for all they have done for you, indeed given up for you, and that you value their guidance. Number five is about respect: Love is Respectful.
6. Do not commit murder. This one seems straight forward, right? But it’s not because it also applies to gossip as gossip is, in reality, a form of murder, since it assassinates character. Number six is about harmlessness: Love is Harmless.
7. You shall not commit adultery. Keeping sacred the special bond of marriage that is the foundation of the family unit. Number seven is about purity: Love is Pure.
8. You shall not steal. Taking what does not belong to you is the epitome of selfishness, and emphasizes getting rather than giving. Number eight is about generosity: Love is not selfish, but Generous.
9. You shall not bear false witness. Don’t speak falsely, lie, speak unjustly, or devise ways to deceive others. Number nine is about truthfulness: Love is Truthful.
10. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife or goods. We should not crave nor desire what is not ours. Number ten is about contentment: Love is Content.

Christ tells us in John 14:15, “If you love, keep my commandments.” 1 John 2:5 says that if we keep doing what he (Jesus) says, then love for God has truly been brought to its goal in us, and we are also told in 1 John 5:3 that loving God means obeying his commands, and that his commands are not burdensome.

~SLM

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Do as I Say…

Funny how this seeking for a higher meaning works, just when you think you’ve got something figured out, your turn your perspective a fraction of a degree, and suddenly it’s a whole new landscape.  There are certain verses that seem to return again and again, to show you that what you thought you knew was, in reality, only a small sampling of a greater truth, a greater equation, and that’s why I’ve landed back on Isaiah 29:13, which states, “These people come near to me with their mouth and honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me,”  It’s not just about being estranged from God, but also about duplicity; about our persistent habit of commingling words and actions, our false logic of substitution in which we assume our words and actions are interchangeable, and our expectation that others do what we cannot ourselves do.

We can say all the right things in flowery prose and elegant verse. We can talk our fool heads off about what is right, what is fair, what we think others should do, or be willing to do. We can be as socially acceptable and politically correct as the best little soldier out there, but the true test of where we live is in the heart, and while we can say anything, and oft times we actually do, our actions are the reflection of our thoughts and beliefs. The heart is where action resides. If we say we are against bullying, but bully others in order to prove they are bullies, then we become what we call, we use our lips to prove our “rightness” while showing what lives in our hearts: a bully. We can talk of peace and cooperation, we can take others to task for what they say or don’t say, but if our actions don’t back up our lips, we are nothing but liars, hypocrites.  We can talk a big game, but when it comes right down to it, our hearts reveal our true intent, our true thoughts and feelings, our true core beliefs, and how we act speaks to what is in our hearts.

Words and actions are not the same; they do not bear the same weight. While words can be illuminating, clarifying, and insightful, they can also be deceiving, misguided and false. Actions on the other hand, are like a mirror; they merely reveal and reflect who we are in our heart of hearts.

“Do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others.” (Matthew 6:5)

~SLM

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The Meek

In my quest to find wisdom through scripture, I come back again and again to certain passages. Today I’m stuck on the Sermon on the Mount and the meek. In Matthew 5:5, we are taught, “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth,” and I’m preoccupied with how we apply this teaching to ourselves, so we can live wiser, more peace-filled lives. Perhaps it would be better understood, if it read, “Blessed are the gentle, the humbly patient, for they will reap the rich reward of their calm endurance.”

This goes hand-in-glove with being “poor” in spirit. It has everything to do with humility, and it means; don’t think you’re all that, because generally, you’re not.  In fact, when we’re full of ourselves, it’s nearly impossible to be humble, let alone be patient. In truth, when the ego is inflated, all else shrinks back, all else  becomes secondary, and we’re easily offended, easily angered, easily whipped up into a frenzy of self-righteous indignation over the tiniest of perceived slights – real or imagined. We convince ourselves that others think about us above all else, plotting, acting in a certain way, or doing something to us on purpose, when in reality, nothing could be further from the truth. When we’re “filled with the yeast of the Pharisees,” we leave little room for meekness.

When we’re meek, we understand and accept our own limitations. We are yielding and unassuming, filled with fortitude. It takes great strength and courage to admit to ourselves (and to God) that we don’t have it all together, don’t have any clue what to do next, don’t have all the answers. But meekness also suggests that we know and understand our strengths as well. If one is quiet and gentle, unassuming and calm, it’s an indication of conviction, of certainty. Understanding our strengths and weaknesses is what gives us the poise to remain calm in the face of controversy, to intentionally accept disagreeable circumstances which are beyond our control, to be still and wait for His direction, before charging forth into questionable actions and circumstances. 

There’s a profound connection between gentleness and not thinking you’re all that, and there’s also a connection between the “fear” (as in awe) of the Lord and meekness. The “fear” of the Lord is the cause of gentleness, of humble patience. Because, respecting God and being certain of His hand gives us the quiet confidence we need to press on, to endure with gentle patience the long tunnel, keeping our eyes fixed on the light, however dim it may seem at times, confident of the tunnel’s end, and the rich reward awaiting there. 

~SLM