Eight blessings (3):
The blessing of the meek
[Matthew 5:5]
There is a Korean proverb that says, 'When your cousin buys land, your stomach hurts'. Do you think this proverb makes sense? Does it really make your stomach hurt when your cousin actually buys land? I think it's a proverb that I don't quite understand. If our cousin buys land, we should be happy. So why should we have a stomach ache? If our cousin buys the land, shouldn't we be truly happy? I saw an internet blog and there is an article I would like to share with you about this proverb: ‘Happiness is simply the act of feeling satisfied with where you are, nothing more, nothing less. So there is no need for you to show jealousy. The same is true when a cousin buys land. You can think of it as buying the land because your cousin needs it. How happy is it to think that your cousin will even grow a farm on the land and share it with his neighbors? If you have a warm heart to cultivate the land together, your heart will be richer and happier’ (Internet).
Look at Matthew 5:5 – “Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.” The third blessing that Jesus teaches us today is “the earth”. Do you know what is the most popular sport in America? It's not soccer or basketball or baseball. It's football. As for how popular American football is, Super Bowl Sunday, the American football final, has the highest food consumption just after Thanksgiving, one of America's biggest holidays. This means that many people gather together to eat and watch the game together on TV. The 2011 American football final broke the highest ratings in American TV history, with over 100 million people watching the game (Internet). I also watch the football final every year. Although I don't even like sports very much, if I try to explain football to people who ask me, I briefly explained this to them since the rules may seem too troublesome: ‘American football is simple. That sport is about winning the land.’ In fact, some netizens have said that football is basically a game of winning the land and the reason why the sport is so popular with Americans is because America is historically a pioneer country. That's why he said that American football is popular as sports are related to this pioneering ideology (Internet). I think it's an interesting observation. We all know that the United States has historically been a pioneer. After the Puritans who came to the new continent in search of freedom of religion from Europe arrived in the East, they later drove out the native Indians and pioneered the unexplored West. This America is truly a country blessed by God. In fact, a Christian Post survey of 1,400 adults nationwide in October 2008 found that 80% of those who regularly attend worship and 61% of Americans said 'America is a blessed country' (Internet). I also think that the United States in which we live is a country blessed by God. And personally, when I think of this land of America, I think of it in connection with the land of Canaan, the promised land of God in the story of Moses in the Old Testament, and there have been many times when I have preached that. The reason is because according to the Bible, the land of Canaan is a beautiful and vast land (Exod.3:8; Num. 14:7), a land flowing with milk and honey (13:5; Num. 13:27; 14:8), and a fertile land (Exod.3:8; Num. 14:7). 3:8). From Deuteronomy 8:7, the Bible says, “For the LORD your God is bringing you into a good land--a land with streams and pools of water, with springs flowing in the valleys and hills.” The Bible says that it is ‘a land where bread will not be scarce and you will lack nothing” (v. 9). Isn't this American land lack nothing? Just like the land of Canaan, where there is no shortage, this land of America we live in is a country with abundant produce. According to Deuteronomy 8, when the Israelites enter the land of Canaan, they will eat and be satisfied (vv. 10, 12), will build fine houses and settle down (v. 12) and their herds and flocks will grow large and their silver and gold will increase and all they have will be multiplied (v. 13). When God promised and blessed Canaan, a land of such blessing, in Genesis 12:1, God said to Abraham that the land was “the land I will show you.” So, the Bible refers to the land as the land sworn to the ancestors of Israel (Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob) (Num. 14:23; Deut. 31:4) and given to Israel (Num. 20:24, 1 Sam. 13:19, 1 Chron. 21:4). In addition, the Bible speaks of the land of Canaan as the land the Lord God will give them (Deut.3:20) and the Lord’s land (Hos. 9:3). And in Deuteronomy 2:12, the land of Canaan is said to be the land of their possession which the Lord gave to them.
The land of this inheritance, Canaan, symbolically means heaven. In other words, the very beautiful land of Canaan flowing with milk and honey that God promised to give to Abraham, the father of faith, and his descendants in the Old Testament refers to heaven, in the New Testament, the true land of Canaan that God promised to give to Jesus and His church. God promised to give this land to Abraham, the father of faith, as a blessing. In Hebrews 11:8-9, it is said that the land Abraham would later receive as his inheritance (v.8) or the promised land (v. 9). Isaac son of Abraham, and Jacob son of Isaac, who had inherited this Promised Land with Abraham lived in tents (v. 9) and Hebrews 11:10 explains why: “For he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God.” What does it mean? Although Abraham lived in tents with his son Isaac and grandson Jacob, by faith he looked forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God. The Bible speaks of this city as the city that God has prepared for God's people, that is, a better country – a heavenly one (v. 16). In a word, by faith, Abraham looked to the heavenly city he would enter, that is, the kingdom of heaven. In today's text, Matthew 5:5, Jesus is saying that the meek will inherit this blessing of heaven. So who is “the meek” Jesus is talking about here? When we say “the meek”, I think of Moses in the Old Testament, Numbers 12:3 – “(Now the man Moses was very meek, above all the men which were upon the face of the earth)” (KJV). The Bible clearly states that Moses was very meek, above all the men on the face of the earth. Then, as Jesus said in Matthew 5:5, he should have inherited the land of Canaan. But Moses could not enter the land of Canaan, but died in the land of Moab and was buried there according to God's word (Deut. 34:5-6). Why couldn’t Moses enter the promised land of Canaan and die in the land of Moab? We can find the answer in Numbers 20:12 – “And the LORD spake unto Moses and Aaron, Because ye believed me not, to sanctify me in the eyes of the children of Israel, therefore ye shall not bring this congregation into the land which I have given them.” The reason Moses could not enter the land of Canaan was because he did not believe in God and did not show the holiness of God in the eyes of the children of Israel. God told Moses to take the staff, and gather the assembly together and speak to that rock before their eyes and I would pour out it water (v. 8). So Moses and Aaron gathered the assembly together in front of the rock (v. 10). But he struck the rock twice with his staff (v. 11) after he said to them, “Listen, you rebels, must we bring you water out of this rock?” (v. 10) As a result, Moses was not allowed to enter the land of Canaan. It is little bit hard to understand. I wonder how Moses could not enter Canaan, the promised land, because he disobeyed God's word only once. There is an article that explains the reason in an interesting way. To summarize the content of the article briefly, the reason why Moses could not enter the land of Canaan is that when we hear “Moses,” we cannot but think of the “law”. Since God did not allow Moses, who represents the law, to enter the land of Canaan when he did not show God's holiness through his disobedience, the symbolic lesson to Jews and us is to teach the truth that the true land of Canaan cannot enter the kingdom of heaven by obeying the law: ‘ In the case of Moses, he recalls the Ten Commandments, which is the symbol of the law. This is because even though Moses, or the law, shows the way to the land of Canaan, or heaven, it shows symbolically that we cannot by any means enter heaven through the law. Because it is a scene that shows that without the law, we cannot realize our sins and cannot enter the kingdom of heaven without resolving our sins. This is because, although Moses shows the way to the promised land of Canaan, that is, the kingdom of heaven, it contains God's intention to symbolically mean that we can never enter the kingdom of heaven through this law of Moses’ (Internet). I think it's an interesting point of view. The fact that Moses, who represents the Law, did not enter the promised land of Canaan symbolically means that we could not enter the real promised land of heaven through the Law. What do you think of this interpretation? Most of the positive expressions in the Bible refer to the land of Canaan, such as an exceedingly good land and a land that lacks nothing (Num. 14:7; Deut. 8:8-9). But the Bible also describes the land of Canaan as 'a land stained with sin (Lev. 18:15; Num. 35:34; Ps. 106:34, Mic. 2:10). This means that the land of Canaan, which God promised to Abraham and his descendants, was not the perfect promised land. The perfect Promised Land is the heaven to which only the land of Canaan is pointing. Jesus is saying that this kingdom of heaven is a blessing that the meek will inherit.
So who is the “meek” Jesus spoke of? To answer this question, we must return to the Gospel of Matthew. Matthew, the author of the Gospel of Matthew, uses this Greek word for “meek” only twice in Matthew's Gospel, outside of today's text (11:29, 21:5). One of those two times was used in the very famous saying, “Come to me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest” (11:28), after which Jesus spoke of who he was. Look at Matthew 11:29 – “Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls” (KJV). Here, when Jesus said of himself, ‘I am meek’, he is saying that Jesus’ heart was humbled and that the humbled heart of Jesus was fixed only on God. And the humble heart of Jesus, fixed only on God, when he came to this earth, implies that he came in a humble, insignificant and weak form (Kittel). It is in Matthew 21:5 where the author Matthew uses the word “meek” again in the Gospel of Matthew: “Tell ye the daughter of Sion, Behold, thy King cometh unto thee, meek, and sitting upon an ass, and a colt the foal of an ass” (KJV). This verse is a quotation from Zechariah 9:9, and “thy King” here refers to the Messiah who will be the true King of Israel, that is, Christ Jesus. This saying that Jesus Christ rode on the colt, as we have heard well on Palm Sunday, is the one who entered Jerusalem to be crucified and die on Good Friday to forgive us our sins and to save us. After all, if you look at the biblical story about Jesus' coming to this earth and his final death on the cross, Jesus' beginning on this earth was humble and his end on this earth was also humble. Then what is the humble heart of Jesus? Look at Philippians 2:5-8: “Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death-- even death on a cross!” The humble heart of Jesus empties himself and humbles himself. And the humble heart of Jesus is to submit to the will of God the Father even to the point of death on the cross.
The meek are those who empty themselves, humble themselves and submit to the will of the Lord by imitating the humble heart of Jesus. And the blessing that this meek person receives is that he will inherit the real Promised Land, Heaven. Jesus said that he will inherit this kingdom of heaven. What does the phrase “inherit” mean here? It means what a child will receive from his father (Park). Look at Romans 8:17 – “Now if we are children, then we are heirs--heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.” We who believe in Jesus are heirs of God and joint heirs with Jesus Christ. Therefore, by God's exclusive grace, we believe in Jesus Christ and become heirs together with Christ, and will inherit the kingdom of heaven in the future.
This is what Psalms 37:11 says: “But the meek will inherit the land and enjoy great peace.” In fact, the Bible refers to the heavenly land as “the Beautiful Land” (Dan.8:9). Although there is no real peace in this world, only wars and battles, the coming world, the kingdom of heaven, is full of God's peace. The Bible also refers to the kingdom of heaven as “good land” (1 Kgs. 14:15) and “the holy land” (Zech. 2:12). Although the land we are living in now is a bad land, a dirty and ugly land, and the land of Satan, the kingdom of heaven we will enter in the future is the good land and the holy land. Not only the psalmist (Ps.37:11) but also Jesus (Mt. 5:5) is saying that the meek will inherit this Promised Land, the kingdom of heaven. I hope and pray that we will all be blessed with this wonderful heavenly blessing.