FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT
GENTLENESS
DR. JIM DIXON
ROMANS 12:1-21 1 GALATIANS 5:22-26
JANUARY 31, 1993
Mahmud of Ghazni was an Islamic sultan, an Afghan king, who conquered 680,000 square miles of the earth. Napoleon Bonaparte, the French general, and the self-proclaimed emperor, conquered 720,000 square miles of the earth. Adolph Hitler, the Nazi dictator, conquered 1,360,000 square miles of the earth. Atilla the Hun, King of the Huns, called the “scourge of God,” he conquered 1,450,000 square miles of the earth. Cyrus the Great, King of the Medo-Persians, conquered 2,090,000 square miles of the earth. Tamerlane, this Islamic Mongol chieftain, conquered 2,145,000 square miles of the earth. Alexander the Great, the Macedonian King, conquered 2,180,000 square miles of the earth. Genghis Khan, the great Khan, conquered 4,860,000 square miles of the earth. These eight men conquered more of the earth than any other men who have ever lived. All of them were arrogant. All of them longed to rule the known world and all of them, without exception, failed.
The Bible tells us that there will come yet another arrogant man and he will seek to rule every tribe, tongue, people, and nation. The Bible calls him Antichrist and the Bible tells us that he, too, will fail because, the Bible tells us, this earth is not destined to be ruled by arrogant men. This earth is destined to be ruled by the meek. In one of the most incredible proclamations of Holy scripture, our Lord Jesus Christ proclaimed, “The meek shall inherit the earth.”
I think many of us have a hard time understanding the reality of this or appreciating how it could be so, simply because we do not understand the true meaning of the word meek. The Greek word for meekness is the word “praytus.” This word has two meanings. I would like us to examine both of them this morning.
First of all, the word meek, the word “praytus,” means “power under control.” Now you can go down to the Denver Zoo. You can go to a special enclosure where you will find zebras indigenous to southern Africa. Zebras live on the grassy plains. They live in the rough mountains. Zebras live in bands. A stallion leads each band. Zebras are fierce fighters, and they are exceptionally strong. Zebras are, of course, a member they are members of the horse family, but a zebra is different than a horse. The most obvious difference is the stripes that a zebra has but that is not the greatest difference. The greatest difference between a zebra and a horse has to do with their nature. It has to do with their disposition.
You see, you can tame a horse. In fact, you can tame any horse, even the so-called wild horses. They can all be domesticated. Some of them take more work than others but all horses can be tamed. This is not true of zebras. Many zebras cannot be tamed. It is a rare thing to tame a zebra. Now in southern Africa, they have tried to tame zebras, partly because zebras are immune to “negana,” which is the horrible disease that afflicts so many animals there. They have seen the power of the zebra and they thought, “What a great thing it would be if we could harness that power, if we could use it, if we could control it for the service of mankind.” But, you see, they have not been able to do that not effectively. For this reason, and for this reason alone, zebras are not as valuable to mankind as horses are.
Now in the Greek world, whenever an animal was tamed, whenever an animal’s power was brought under control, that animal was described by this word “praytus,” by the word meekness. That animal was said to be meek. Now most of you know the old story of the Arabian horses and the legend of how Muhammed searched the world over for a hundred of the finest horses, brought them back to his native Arabia, trained them to respond to the sound of his bugle. Whenever he would blow his bugle, the horses would come to him. He put them then in an enclosure on top of a mountain or a hill overlooking a freshwater stream. He did this to test them. He denied them water. When their thirst was great, suddenly he opened the gates. Those hundred horses just thundered down that mountain, nostrils flared, mouths foaming, tails flying, hoofs pounding. When they were almost to the river, Muhammed took out his bugle and he blew it and ninety-six of those horses went right into the river and drank but four of the horses dug their hooves into the earth and they stopped, and they returned to Muhammed. It is said, of course, that from those four he breed the great race of Arabians.
You see, those four were the meekest of all, and because they were meeker, they were greater. In the Bible, greatness is associated with meekness. “Strength under control.” Now, you are not an animal. God knows that. You are the crown of His creation. You have been created in the very image of God, male and female, but God wants you to understand that if whatever strength is yours if whatever power is yours, if it is wild, it is of no use to Him. He wants you to understand that unless you become meek before Him, you cannot even be a Christian. You will never enter the kingdom of heaven. You see, a Christian is somebody has embraced, at least in some measure, the Lordship of Jesus Christ. To become a Christian, you must embrace Christ as Lord. You must allow Him to sit on the throne of your life. You must invite Him to sit there. You must become meek before Him.
You have all heard of Nebuchadnezzar, the King of the Babylonian Empire. Secular historians esteem him highly. The Bible tells us much about him. The Bible indicates that Nebuchadnezzar was initially a very arrogant man. Nebuchadnezzar had a vision wherein he saw his own empire, the Babylonian Empire, he saw its rise—he saw its fall. He saw the rising up of a subsequent empire, the Medo Persian Empire. He saw its fall. Then he saw the rising up of still another empire, the Greek Empire, and its fall. Then he saw the rising of still another empire, the Roman Empire, and its fall.
Then he saw, through the portals of time by the power of the Holy Spirit in his vision, the final empire, a great empire, an eternal empire that would never fall. He saw an empire come from heaven. He saw the kingdom of heaven and that vision was meant to humble this Babylonian king. It was meant to humble Nebuchadnezzar that he might know that he was one king among many kings, that he might know that there is another king who is King of Kings, that he might know that his time was only temporary in this world and that in truth he was but a steward and that one day his stewardship would be evaluated. He was meant to be humbled, but he refused to be humbled.
Shortly after that, this Babylonian king built a statue, an image, out on the plain of Dura, outside the royal city of Babylon, ninety feet high, laden with gold. He issued a decree that all the people within the Empire had to come and kneel and bow down and worship the image. Many historians believe that it was an image of Nebuchadnezzar himself. Not a very humble act. Now as he issued this command that all would come and bow down, he had bands playing. The orchestra was there but there were three sour notes called Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. They refused to bow down. Reluctantly, because they were friends of Daniel, who Nebuchadnezzar esteemed, he placed these three in the blazing furnace.
But Yahweh the God of Israel, the one true God, protected them. This Babylonian King was impressed. With that miraculous experience, he declared that, indeed, the God of Israel is God and there is only one true God, and He is Yahweh. But he still refused to live for Him. Nebuchadnezzar still lived only for himself. Shortly after that Nebuchadnezzar was standing on the top of his palace looking out on his royal city and he saw palaces. He saw broad boulevards. He saw ornate temples. He saw the seven-storied ziggurat. He saw the Temple of Marmaduke. He saw the wonder of the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. He said to himself, “Is this not great Babylon that I have built by my mighty power for the manifestation of my own glory?” At that very moment, the judgement of God fell upon him. The Bible says he was stricken with a kind of “lycanthropy.” He became as an animal, and he began to eat the grass of the fields and he became wild. Even secular historians recount or account this bizarre period in the life of the Babylonian king. The Bible says it was all intended to make this king of the Babylonian Empire meek before God, to bring his power under God’s control.
You can go through the Bible and you can see time and again where God works in the lives of people to seek to bring them under His control, under His reign, to seek to make them meek. I promise you there are events in your life and mine that God would use to make us meek. Now you know about Moses. Michelangelo carved him like a titan because he was a great man. He was a leader of men. He was perhaps the greatest leader in the history of Israel. he stood and challenged the Pharaoh of all Egypt. He led two million Jews out of bondage. He parted the Red Sea. He struck the rock in rage he struck the rock at Meribah twice, bringing water to a thirsty people. He was a man of power and passion and yet the Bible says of him, “Moses was the meekest man, the meekest man in all the earth.” Why was he the meekest? He was the meekest simply because he longed to please God. He longed to serve God. He was willing to obey God, to do what God wanted him to do.
Now there came a meeker man called Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ said, “Come unto Me all you who labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you. Learn of Me, for I am meek. I am meek and lowly of heart, and you will find rest for your soul.” You see, Jesus Christ was the meekest man who ever lived. Did He have power? Unbelievable power. The Bible says, “Jesus Christ has all power in heaven and on earth.” All power, all authority has been given to Him, but He’s meek. He is meek because He lives to do the will of the Father. Jesus Christ said, “My will is to do the will of the Father who sent Me.” Meek.
And He’s looking for a people who are meek, people who long to do the will of God. God does not want to take your strength away. God does not want to take whatever power you have away. He may want to give you more power. In fact, I believe He does, but He wants that power to be under His control. He wants you to be meek, and unless you become meek, you will never inherit the earth. You will never inherit the kingdom of heaven. You will never reign and rule with Christ until you embrace the reign of Christ.
Some of us say we are Christians. We say we believe in Christ. We say we have embraced His kingship. We say we have embraced His reign and yet we live in blatant disobedience to God’s word. To us, God would say to us Christ would say, “Why do you call Me Lord and not do what I tell you to do? He who hears My words and does them, I will tell you what he is like. He is like a wise man who built his house upon the rock. The wind blew, the rain came, the floods came. The house stood firm, for it was founded on the rock. But he who hears My words and does not do them, I will tell you what he is like. He is like a fool who built his house upon the sand. The wind blew. The rain fell, the floods came, and the house fell down and great was the destruction of it.” Meekness. Power under control.
There’s another meaning, however, to meekness. Meekness not only means “power under control,” but it means “strength expressed in tenderness.” Meekness refers to power that is manifested in tenderness. You see, if you have really embraced the reign of Christ and if I have really embraced the reign of Christ then we are going to begin to manifest something of the heart of Christ. That is why the word meek oftentimes meant tender. I think a lot of men particularly struggle with this concept of tenderness and the meekness that the Bible demands.
I want to tell you a little story about Adolph Hitler. It is a true story. Adolph Hitler, during World War II, the OSS, Office of Strategic Services, believed that Hitler’s power over the German people was very much related to his masculine leadership. They also believed, and particularly Stanley Lovell, who was the head of the OSS, that Hitler was very close to the male/female line—that sexually he was very close to the masculine/feminine line. His desire was to push Hitler over that line. He thought if he could make Hitler feminine, effeminate, if he could raise Hitler’s voice if he could remove his mustache that somehow, he would undermine Hitler’s leadership. I know that sounds bizarre, but it is true.
So Stanley Lovell and the OSS developed this plot to effeminize Adolph Hitler. They worked out an arrangement with Hitler’s gardener to put estrogen, female sex hormones, in the Fuhrer’s carrots. I mean, this is true. They paid Hitler’s gardener. Of course it did not work. In fact we will never know if it would have worked because the gardener did not come through with his end… he kept the money. He kept the money, but he refused to put the estrogen in the carrots. Now I think I really believe a lot of men in this country believe Christianity is a kind of plot to feminize them. I really do. Now, of course, God does not want to feminize men. God does not want to masculinize women. God does not want to make men or women weak, and men and women do not want to be weak. But God wants you to know meekness is not weakness. God wants all people, all men and women, to learn tenderness. There’s great power in tenderness. There’s great strength there. We will never, ever be able to serve Jesus Christ without tenderness.
Now when Drew, our son Drew, was about 3 years old I remember a night when he was sitting on the sofa with Barb and Heather and me. We were just sitting around as a family. I have to tell you, Drew right now he is in high school and he plays football. He is kind of a tough little guy, but I have to tell you when he was 3 years old, he looked like the Pillsbury doughboy. He really did. He was really cute. You know, Barb looked down at Drew and she smiled, and she said, “Drew, whisper something soft and sweet in my ear.” You could see Drew’s eyes kind of thinking. You could see him thinking what he should say. Then he turned over. He leaned up and he whispered in Barb’s ear, and he said one word. He said “yogurt!”
Now yogurt is certainly soft and sweet but, you see, what Barbara wanted Drew to do was to whisper something tender. She wanted him to whisper something tender. The word “tender” comes from the Latin word “tenare,” which means “soft,” but it refers to being “soft of heart,” being “soft hearted” and that is what God wants us to be. That is what Christ wants us to be. He wants us to be soft hearted towards each other. He wants us to be moved by the needs of each other. He wants us to feel the hurts of each other. He wants us to enter into ministry to each other. Only the meek can do this. He wants us to have His heart and to be moved by the things that move Him.
Now I want to conclude our time together by telling you a story, a true story, about a woman named Katie. Katie attended a church in Chicago, Illinois. It was called the Philadelphia Church, the “church of brotherly love.” When Katie first started attending that church, she wore three or four dresses at the same time. I mean, when she would come to church wearing three or four dresses at the same time. Over those dresses she would wear a big coat even in the summertime. Katie always had on a red wig. She could never get it, you know, in the center of her head. Somehow it was always slipped to the side. It was kind of held there by a tightknit cap. Katie always had a shopping bag in each hand. They called her the bag lady.
When Katie would come into that church, she would always look for a seat at the back and people would put a purse or a coat or even a Bible on the seat next to them to make sure that the bag lady did not sit next to them. She would work her way down the center aisle and eventually she would always find a seat, usually next to a visitor. Before she would sit in a seat, she would kneel, and she would cross herself. Then she would get into the seat. During the service, Katie would mumble, and she would just say a lot of meaningless words. Sometimes she would kind of be looking at the person next to her and they would just ignore her. She would kind of mumble gibberish. She would gesture. She would just gesture during the service. She would look up at the minister and mumble at him and gesture and he would try to ignore her.
Whenever they had communion and the bread was passed, she would always reach into one of her shopping bags. She always had her own bread, her own loaf of bread. She would take it out, break off a piece and offer her bread to the people around her. They would always turn it down. Well, one day, the minister of the church felt convicted by Christ. I mean, he had ignored Katie. The whole church had ignored Katie. He felt convicted that God wanted him to befriend her. The Bible says, you know, to welcome strangers, and I am sure it occurred to him that nobody was stranger than Katie. So he decided, you know, that the Bible says to “comfort the feebleminded.” So this pastor, a man named Dennis Sawyer, invited Katie to come to his house for Thanksgiving.
This pastor and his wife had Katie there for Thanksgiving dinner. That was just the first time they had had Katie to their home. They began to have her there frequently. She came at Christmas, and she began to come regularly, and they got to know Katie. They discovered that she had been born in Germany. She was born pretty much deaf, and she could barely hear and was also mute. She could not speak. She had a speech impediment. When she was 3 years old, she came to the United States. She lived with her mother. Her father died when she was very young. Her mother took care of her. Her mother loved her. They were very poor. When Katie was 14 years old, they discovered that Katie was literally tongue-tied, that her tongue was somehow just sealed to the bottom of her mouth. Her mother, being poor, took the scissors, sewing scissors, and just clipped the bottom to free the tongue and Katie could speak a little better after that healed.
When Katie was 33 years old her mother died. Katie was all alone with nobody to love her as her mother had. Katie was placed in an institution for the intellectually disabled and Katie remained in institutions for the intellectually disabled for another 33 years until she was 66 years old. Then when she was 66 years old, they gave her, for the first time, hearing aids and they made an amazing discovery. They discovered that she really was not intellectually disabled. She obviously was undeveloped socially and relationally, but intellectually she was not really intellectually disabled. They let her free. So at age 66, she was free. She actually found a job stuffing envelopes.
She had made her way to this Philadelphia church, and she was coming to that church every Sunday. One day at the pastor’s house, Katie began to sing a song. The words said, “I’ll live for Him who died for me.” The pastor asked her where she had heard that song. Katie said that her mother used to always sing it to her. The pastor kind of used that as an opportunity to share the gospel with Katie because Katie had never become a Christian. So the minister shared with Katie the gospel of Jesus Christ and Katie embraced Christ. She asked Jesus into her heart. She gave her life to Christ.
It was not long after that where they had a prayer time up in front of the church where a little baby who was dying was brought up front and the elders were invited to come forward. The elders were asked to lay hands and pray over the baby. The whole congregation was shocked as Katie came down front. She was not invited but she came down front and joined the elders. She laid hands on the baby and prayed for the little baby and the baby was miraculously healed. Soon, as the weeks passed, they discovered that whenever Katie prayed, God seemed to really listen. There seemed to be a particular anointing on her prayers. Pretty soon, everybody in the church wanted Katie to sit next to them. No more Bibles or coats or purses put in the pew to block her way. They all wanted to sit next to her.
Then there came a Sunday when the minister asked Katie to come up front and share her testimony. She did that, and with tears in her eyes she just thanked the congregation for loving her. She said, “You know, I can speak better now because for the first time in my life people are speaking to me.” Is not that amazing? “For the first time in my life people are speaking to me.” The pastor of that church said he thinks every church in America and around the world needs bag ladies, one or two. Perhaps that is true.
I know this. We all need a lot more compassion. We need a lot more humility. We need a lot more tenderness. We need a lot more meekness. The truth is we all have eccentricities. There is something a little bit off about each of us and we all need people to really love us and to accept us, to minister to us, to heal our hurt, to care for us. This is at the very heart of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
When I talk to people and I have never met them before and I just meet them somewhere, they ask what I do, and I tell them I am a pastor. They say what church and I say, “Cherry Hills Community Church.” Then they say, “Oh is that that church that’s moving to Highlands Ranch?” I hate to be identified like that. I would like them to say, “Oh, is that the church that’s doing the great ministry in the inner city?” I mean, “Is that the church that really loves people?”
I was talking to Maxine Jones. Maxine Jones, you know… she is on our staff, and she works with the Manna Ministry here in the church. I think they have a lot of bag ladies. A lot of people are kind of down and out. Really there is a cross-section socio-economically, but she is certainly seeking to minister to people who are hurting. She told me this week that she feels like maybe, as a church, we need a little more compassion just throughout the church we need a little more love… we need to be little more tender. So I share this with you as I think God’s will for us is that we might pray that God would break our hearts and then fill us with His Holy Spirit and empower us to love as we are meant to love. Meekness is power under control It is also tenderness. Let us close with a word of prayer.