Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 3065
“Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth.” Matthew 5:5.
[Other Sermons by Mr. Spurgeon upon the Beatitudes are as follows—#422, Volume 7—THE PEACEMAKER and #2103, Volume 35—THE HUNGER AND THIRST WHICH ARE BLESSED.]
I HAVE often reminded you that the Beatitudes in this chapter rise one above the other and spring out of one another and that those which come before are always necessary to those that follow after. This third Beatitude, “Blessed are the meek,” could not have stood first—it would have been quite out of place there. When a man is converted, the first operation of the Grace of God within his soul is to give him true poverty of spirit, so the first Beatitude is, “Blessed are the poor in spirit.” The Lord first makes us know our emptiness and so humbles us. Then next He makes us mourn over the deficiencies that are so manifest in us. Then comes the second Beatitude, “Blessed are they that mourn.” First, then, is a true knowledge of ourselves and then a sacred grief arising out of that knowledge. Now, no man ever becomes truly meek, in the Christian sense of that word, until he first knows himself and then begins to mourn and lament that he is so far short of what he ought to be. Self-righteousness is never meek. The man who is proud of himself will be quite sure to be hard-hearted in his dealings with others. To reach this rung of the ladder of the Light of God he must first set his feet upon the other two. There must be poverty of spirit and mourning of heart before there will come that gracious meekness of which our text speaks.
Note too that this third Beatitude is of a higher order than the other two. There is something positive in it as to virtue. The first two are rather expressive of deficiency, but here there is a something supplied. A man is poor in spirit— that is, he feels that he lacks a thousand things that he ought to possess. The man mourns—that is, he laments over his state of spiritual poverty. But now there is something really given to him by the Grace of God—not a negative quality, but a positive proof of the work of the Holy Spirit within his soul so that he has become meek. The first two characteristics that receive a benediction appear to be wrapped up in themselves. The man is poor in spirit—that relates to himself. His mourning is his own personal mourning which ends when he is comforted. But the meekness has to do with other people. It is true that it has a relationship to God, but a man’s meekness is especially towards his fellow men. He is not simply meek within himself—his meekness is manifest in his dealings with others. You would not speak of a hermit who never saw a fellow creature as being meek. The only way in which you could prove whether he was meek would be to put him with those who would try his temper. So that this meekness is a virtue—larger, more expansive, working in a wider sphere than the first two characteristics which Christ has pronounced blessed. It is superior to the others, as it should be, since it grows out of them. Yet, at the same time, as there is through the whole of the Beatitudes a fall parallel with the rise, so is it here. In the first case, the man was poor—that was low. In the second case, the man was mourning—that also was low. But if he kept his mourning to himself, he might still seem great among his fellow men. But now he has come to be meek among them—lowly and humble in the midst of society—so that he is going lower and lower! Yet he is rising with spiritual exaltation, although he is sinking as to personal humiliation, and so has become more truly gracious.
Now, having spoken of the connection of this Beatitude, we will make two enquiries with the view of opening it up. They are these—first, who are the meek? And, secondly, how and in what sense can they be said to inherit the earth?
I. First, then, WHO ARE THE MEEK? I have already said that they are those who have been made poor in spirit by God and who have been made to mourn before God and have been comforted. But here we learn that they are also meek, that is, lowly and gentle in mind before God and before men.
They are meek before God. And good old Watson divides that quality under two heads, namely, that they are submissive to His will and flexible to His Word. May these two very expressive qualities be found in each one of us!
So the truly meek are, first of all, submissive to God’s will Whatever God wills, they will. They are of the mind of that shepherd on Salisbury Plain, of whom good Dr. Stenhouse enquired, “What kind of weather shall we have tomorrow?” “Well,” replied the shepherd, “we shall have the sort of whether that pleases me.” The doctor then asked, “What do you mean?” And the shepherd answered, “What weather pleases God always pleases me.” “Shepherd,” said the doctor, “your lot seems somewhat hard.” “Oh, no, Sir!” he replied, “I don’t think so. For it abounds with mercies.” “But you have to work very hard, do you not?” “Yes,” he answered, “there is a good deal of labor, but that is better than being lazy.” “But you have to endure many hardships, do you not?” “Oh, yes, Sir!” he said, “a great many. But then I don’t have so many temptations as those people have who live in the midst of towns, and I have more time for meditating upon my God. So I am perfectly satisfied that where God has placed me is the best position I could be in.” With such a happy, contented spirit as that, those who are meek do not quarrel with God! They do not talk as some foolish people do of having been born under a wrong planet and placed in circumstances unfavorable to their development! And even when they are smitten by God’s rod, they do not rebel against Him and call Him a hard Master, but they are either dumb with silence, and open not their mouth because God has done it or, if they do speak, it is to ask for Grace that the time they are enduring may be sanctified to them, or they may even rise so high in Grace as to glory in infirmities that the power of Christ may rest upon them! The proud-hearted may, if they will, arraign their Maker. And the thing formed may say to Him who formed it, “Why have You made me thus?” But these men of Grace will not do so. It is enough for them if God wills anything! If He wills it, so let it be—Solomon’s throne or Job’s dunghill—they desire to be equally happy wherever the Lord may place them, or however He may deal with them!