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Living by Faith: Meekness

Delight in Grace / Grace Bible Church / Rich Powell
The Truth Network Radio
January 22, 2025 10:00 am

Living by Faith: Meekness

Delight in Grace / Grace Bible Church / Rich Powell

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January 22, 2025 10:00 am

Self-preeminence says, “I will advance myself”. Biblical meekness says, “I am free through submission to Christ, and I will advance others toward Him.” What God says to us in His Word, about Himself and about His relationship to us, will free us from the preoccupation to protect ourselves and seek more and more for ourselves. It frees us to be meek. Let’s listen as Pastor Rich shares this message titled Living by Faith: Meekness

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Welcome to Delight in Grace, Rich Powell. Can you see the spiritual warfare here? Here's what the text of Psalm 37 tells us. For those who counter God, whether it's actively or passively, their agenda will, first of all, be frustrated. For those who counter God, their agenda for life will be frustrated. Look at verse 15, their sword shall enter their own hearts and their bows shall be broken. For those who counter God, whether actively or passively, not only will their agenda for life be frustrated, but it will feed their own despair.

The text makes that clear, does it not? What is the divine perspective on this? What is God's view? What does God think of this? Of those who would counter him, whether he actively or passively. Look with me at verse 13, but the Lord laughs at the wicked.

Wait, what? Does the Bible say that? Yeah, it kind of does right there, doesn't it? The Lord laughs at the wicked.

Is God being cynical? No. You know what this is? This is like the tree, and a tree has branches. What if a branch chooses to sever itself from the tree because it thinks it can do life on its own? Doesn't make a lot of sense, does it? And yet that's what we have done in our humanity, in our human self-preeminence.

That's what we've done. We have severed ourselves from the source of life. So you know what this is? God is the tree, and he's looking at the branch who thinks it knows better than God, so it severs itself. And God, the tree, is looking at the branch and saying, how's that working out for you?

It's not doing so good, is it? And he does it with a smile. You know, if God were a southerner, he would say, how's that working out for you? Bless your heart. Because really, it doesn't make sense what we've done. It doesn't make sense what runs through our hearts and minds on a constant basis thinking that we know better than God. Demanding what we believe, we deserve what he owes us. Does God owe you 90 years of life under the sun?

But how many of us truly believe that? Because if something threatens that, we demand an explanation from God. That's countering God passively. To those who passively counter him, God is saying with a smile on his face, really, you think you can do life better than the one who designed it. I think that's the idea behind what Mark records in chapter 6, where it says, Jesus marveled at their unbelief. It's an amazing thought, isn't it?

Jesus marveled at their unbelief. You know why? Because autonomy is a delusion. It's tantamount to the kitchen mixer, and my wife has a big, beautiful, powerful mixer in our kitchen. But that mixer is only good if what?

It's plugged in. Otherwise, it's a glorified paperweight. Autonomy, the delusion of autonomy makes as much sense as the kitchen mixer or even the electric stove unplugging themselves and then thinking they can bake a cake just fine. And that's what we've done with life in our autonomy, in our craving for autonomy, our self-preeminence, our countering God. And God laughs.

He smiles and he says, How's that working out for you? John Stott said, Pride is your greatest enemy. Humility, your greatest friend. To those who counter God passively, God smiles and says, How's that working out for you? To those who actively counter him, it's kind of like, you know, God is like a tank, you know, a military tank. You don't like that tank. So what do you do? You go up and you kick that tank.

Who gets hurt in the scenario? Hear God again saying, How's that working out for you? Man can muster all the armies of Earth, whether those armies are intellectual armies, political armies or even physical armies, but God can judge them with a word out of his mouth. C. H. Spurgeon said, in line with how this psalm begins, Fret not yourself because of evildoers. He said, Why need we fret at the prosperity of the wicked when they are so industriously ruining themselves while they fancy they are injuring the saints? Who is sovereign here?

Proverbs 13 22 says, The sinner's wealth is stored up for the righteous. What this text makes clear is that ultimate justice is coming. You see, we crave justice, and there are many today who fight for justice, and they break the law to fight for justice.

And they are destructive fighting for justice. But God is the one who brings ultimate justice, and he is the only one who can, and he has said that he will. You see, a reckoning is coming. Look with me at verse 10 once again. In a little while, the wicked will be no more. Isn't that something?

That's just kind of final, isn't it? In a little while, the wicked will be no more. Though you look carefully at his place, he will not be there. Look at verse 13. The Lord laughs at the wicked, for he sees that his day is coming. His day is coming on those who demand autonomy, whether they actively counter God and his people or whether they passively marginalize the creator. His judgment will be just, indisputable, and final.

This is truth. Thankfully, it doesn't end there. There is hope in God. There is hope in God. And tucked in here, in this paragraph, there is one verse to which we now take our focus, and it's verse 11. In contrast to the wicked, in contrast to those who counter God, in contrast to those who think they know better, in contrast to those who make demands from God because of what they think they deserve. In contrast to that, verse 11, the meek shall inherit the land and delight themselves in abundant peace. The word meek means bowed down, one who is humbled or to find oneself in a lowly position.

We sang about it this morning. Who is the supreme example of meekness but Jesus Christ? The creator of the universe who sets aside his glory and comes down in frail humanity.

And what does he do? John 13, he washes our feet. You see, he wasn't demanding the accolades that he deserved. He found himself in low position.

Meekness is defined as this, it is a quality of behavior that suggests a lack of arrogance and pride. You see, there is hope in God through this redemptive work of Jesus Christ. He died because of our craving for autonomy, because of our self-preeminence, because we counter God. He died so that we can be reconciled to God. And as Paul described it in Colossians 2, verse 14, he took my guilt and nailed it to the cross.

It's a good picture, isn't it? He took my guilt because who of us is not guilty? He took my guilt and nailed it to the cross. And by faith I get his righteousness credited to my life. And that makes me acceptable to be reconciled to God.

You see, there is hope in God. And in that there is no ground for boasting or pride except in Jesus. Let's understand meekness for what it is.

I think E.W. Tozer paints a beautiful portrait of meekness. He says this, he writes this, The meek man is not a human mouse afflicted with a sense of his own inferiority. Rather, he may be in his moral life as bold as a lion and as strong as Samson, but he has stopped being fooled about himself. He has accepted God's estimate of his own life. He knows he is as weak and helpless as God has declared him to be, but paradoxically he knows at the same time that he is in the sight of God more important than angels.

He knows well that the world will never see him as God sees him, and he has stopped caring. It's good, isn't it? Get this. Get your pens out.

Write this down. A good and successful life is not measured in time or things or titles, but in one's personal investments in others. You've been listening to Rich Powell, the lead pastor at Grace Bible Church in Winston-Salem. The Delight in Grace mission is to help you know that God designed you to realize your highest good and your deepest satisfaction in him, the one who is infinitely good. We hope you'll join us again on Weekdays at 10 a.m.
Whisper: medium.en / 2025-01-22 10:06:53 / 2025-01-22 10:10:46 / 4

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