God Alone Is Good.

 Meekness-

'It's enduring injury with patience and without resentment. The Holy Spirit enables us to produce meekness a necessary attitude for understanding God's word.'  (Bibletools Online)

Let's think about this statement for a moment. Meekness- something we have come to believe means being timid, reserved, more of a scaredy cat lacking bravado, a mouse in comparison to a lion. Yet Jesus was none of those things. Jesus wasn't timid, reserved, afraid, and still He was meek and our example of being meek. When we read the Bibletools.org definition and it states - meekness is ENDURING INJURY WITH PATIENCE AND WITHOUT RESENTMENT, this opens up a whole new insight into what it means to be meek. 

Enduring- when we think of enduring we automatically imagine putting up with something that is unpleasant. We endure sitting through a long, boring, monotonous speech. We endure the pain of childbirth. We endure our long work days. We endure sickness and injury.  What sort of injury did Jesus endure? He was never physically injured until a day before His crucifixion.  The injuries He endured were those of His heart. He was also abused verbally with words that struck deep chords of agony in His being. Emotional, mental pain from the refusal of so many to comprehend His real reason for taking on flesh tore at the heart of our Savior. 

Jesus' love overrode any resentment- any lingering anger felt in righteousness for the blatant wrongs all around Him. Jesus' righteous indignation was a reality- He overthrew the moneychanger's tables at the temple, but that anger was not resentment. Jesus' heart broke for the hard-hearted sinners, as it still breaks today over those who are determined to remain lost to Him. 

Jesus is the brightest example of enduring injury of any kind with patience and without resentment. Jesus NEVER felt slighted in the way we are constantly feeling our pride injured. It happens to us on a daily basis. A simple glance given to us that seems somehow offensive is enough to make us take up mental arms to defend our pricked pride. No, it really doesn't take much and we are setting up defenses for ourselves. We take such great stock in ourselves having the right to an existence without any interference in what we perceive is our path to rightful contentment with the world around us. The trouble is, that perception is different for everyone and then it comes down to trying to determine who has the real right over another's right? To say we all need to get along when what I think is the path to getting along is different than yours is to have to make a determination over whose path is that right path to getting along. You say that's where compromise comes in, and there again we have to determine who needs to compromise what, again making the idea of right subjective to personal beliefs of each other. It's one of those circular arguments in this sin-filled world. 

We hold fast to our SELF and SELF is so easily and quickly injured. 

Have you ever hurt someone (not physically, I'm not going there) only to see them take that hurt without retaliating? You can tell you've hurt them, they wince, or their expression has it written all over that you've just inflicted pain- downcast eyes, lack of any visible smile and maybe actual turned down lips- you know what I'm talking about. That expressionless expression, that void of expression is its own expression.  You've hurt someone and yet they say nothing, inwardly they are writhing in the pain you've caused them. They grow sad over the hurt you've caused and still they aren't angry at you, just hurt by you.  They endured the injury you've inflicted and often that is worse to you than if they had been provoked to anger by your wounding them. 

Still, is taking the hurt and being filled with obvious sadness truly enduring with patience? Is the sadness another form of resenting how you were treated? Jesus did not go moping about with His heart broken, though He'd have every right to. Jesus had moments of great sadness but He kept on with His purpose not letting what had to be overwhelming emotional anguish - crush His spirit. He kept on because he was living for the FATHER, and not for Himself. He endured with patience and without resentment because He kept the Father's will in His mind first and foremost. He did NOT focus on personal injury. He did NOT focus on the Father being injured. He focused on the will of the Father which is the salvation of mankind- the salvation from sin and this sin-filled, sin-wrecked world.

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Tozer had this to say about meekness-  

'Artificiality is one curse that will drop away the moment we kneel at Jesus' feet and surrender ourselves to His meekness. Then we will not care what people think of us so long as God is pleased. Then _what we are_ will be everything; what we appear will take its place far down the scale of interest for us. Apart from sin we have nothing of which to be ashamed. Only an evil desire to shine makes us want to appear other than we are.

The heart of the world is breaking under this load of pride and pretense. There is no release from our burden apart from the meekness of Christ.'

Surrendering ourselves to Christ's meekness, to Christ's way of living. Christ lived to please the Father in all things, this was His first and foremost goal. In all He did, Christ pleased God.  Christ did NOT seek to please Himself, if He had, then He would have called those ten thousand angels and saved Himself from the torture He was soon to endure. Christ is our example of SELFLESSNESS.  Christ did NOT care what people thought of Him, not at all in any way. His only thought was of the Father's view of Him.  

Tozer saying- 'Then what we are…'   Means just that, what we are rather than what others perception of us may be. We get so caught up in the perception of others. I don't want this or that person thinking this or that about me. How many of our actions are governed by considering what others may think of us? We are taught really young to BEHAVE. Have any of you ever heard the words- "You're in public, stop behaving that way?" Or, "You don't behave like that in public."  Maybe at home you were allowed more leeway to act goofy or such, but once you stepped out into public there was a different standard of public behavior expected. Embarrassing yourself, or others by unconventional behavior is frowned upon. We are taught to care a lot about the thoughts of others, and being acceptable to them.  I am NOT advocating acting out in bizarre ways just to free yourself from caring what others think. The point I'm trying to make is how we've been trained to care about what others think and some do so to the point of obsessing over themselves and caring more about what others think than what GOD thinks. Some care too much about what others think (I'm guilty). When I read that WHAT WE ARE as OPPOSED to what we appear should mean more to us if we belong to Christ, I must take this to heart, I must contemplate this.  What we are… are we God's? This is what we need to be asking ourselves every time we get caught up in thinking about how we appear to others. How do I appear to God? Am I God's? I need these words tattooed on my mind to be triggered whenever my thoughts turn to how others are perceiving me. What OTHER'S think should not matter! If I am God's that should be my standard of being, of appearing, of existing. What am I? GOD'S!  What do others think of me? WHO CARES IF I AM GOD'S. 

Tozer says- 'Apart from sin we have nothing of which to be ashamed. Only an evil desire to shine makes us want to appear other than we are.'

Wanting to be prettier, skinnier, more outgoing, a better speaker… wanting mySELF to shine, this truly is an evil desire because the focus is on SELF and off of God.  If my focus is on God and not myself it is placed in the right way. Even if I say I want to be kinder, nicer, once more I am focusing on SELF and self taking the credit for being those things. GOD in our lives as our main focus will be those things for us, through us, as long as we are NOT bent on ultimately taking credit for being good. GOD ALONE IS GOOD.

Luk_18:19  And Jesus said unto him, Why callest thou me good? none is good, save one, that is, God.

GOD!

Tozer says- 'The heart of the world is breaking under this load of pride and pretense. There is no release from our burden apart from the meekness of Christ.'

This is TRUTH, GOD'S TRUTH.  Enduring injury, insult, suffering all things the world has ready to give us over and over again, enduring this with GOD in us, allows for no resentment, but rather allows PATIENCE. With GOD'S goodness our sole focus, self disappears into meekness, the meekness of Christ.

God be our all in all, so that we are not considered, only You. Let the Holy Spirit fill us with You.