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Crosses and Cowards
Presenter: Larry Kirkpatrick
Location: Mentone Seventh-day Adventist Church, California, USA
Delivery: 2007-01-27
Publication: GreatControversy.org 2007-01-27 23:40Z
Type: Sermon
URL: http://www.greatcontroversy.org/gco/ser/kir-crossesandc.php
One of the most widely known teachings of Jesus is found in Matthew 5:5: “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.” And we all think we are the meek, don’t we? We think that by the word “meek” is meant a character quality of timidity and submission. Is this what Jesus means?
The Meekest Man
Moses, says the Bible, was very meek, moreso than any other man (Numbers 12:3). Yet this is the man who confronted pharaoh, led Israel into the wilderness, broke the tablets when he came down from the mount, called the Levites to slaughter the Hebrews who were sinning, went face to face with Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, faced down the frenzied nation upon the return of the 12 spies, led God’s people back into the wilderness, and defeated foreign armies. O for more meek men!
Jesus’ Vision of Meekness
As usual, Jesus was bringing us a quotation from the Tanakh (Old Testament). And it will help us to hear the statement in its original context—the context from which Jesus draws it. We find it at Psalm 37. Listen for the two contrasted kinds of persons:
Fret not thyself because of evildoers, neither be thou envious against the workers of iniquity. For they shall soon be cut down like the grass, and wither as the green herb. Trust in the Lord, and do good; so shalt thou dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed. Delight thyself also in the Lord; and He shall give thee the desires of thine heart. Commit thy way unto the Lord; trust also in Him; and He shall bring it to pass. And He shall bring forth thy righteousness as the light, and thy judgment as the noonday. Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for Him: fret not thyself because of him who prospereth in his way, because of the man who bringeth wicked devices to pass. Cease from anger, and forsake wrath: fret not thyself in any wise to do evil. For evildoers shall be cut off: but those that wait upon the Lord, they shall inherit the earth. For yet a little while, and the wicked shall not be: yea, thou shalt diligently consider his place, and it shall not be. But the meek shall inherit the earth; and shall delight themselves in the abundance of peace. The wicked plotteth against the just, and gnasheth upon him with his teeth. The Lord shall laugh at him: for He seeth that his day is coming. The wicked have drawn out the sword, and have bent their bow, to cast down the poor and needy, and to slay such as be of upright conversation. Their sword shall enter into their own heart, and their bows shall be broken. A little that a righteous man hath is better than the riches of many wicked. For the arms of the wicked shall be broken: but the Lord upholdeth the righteous. The Lord knoweth the days of the upright: and their inheritance shall be for ever. They shall not be ashamed in the evil time: and in the days of famine they shall be satisfied. But the wicked shall perish, and the enemies of the Lord shall be as the fat of lambs: they shall consume; into smoke shall they consume away. The wicked borroweth, and payeth not again: but the righteous sheweth mercy, and giveth. For such as be blessed of Him shall inherit the earth; and they that be cursed of Him shall be cut off. The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord: and He delighteth in his way. Though he fall, he shall not be utterly cast down: for the Lord upholdeth him with His hand. I have been young, and now am old; yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread. He is ever merciful, and lendeth; and his seed is blessed. Depart from evil, and do good; and dwell for evermore. For the Lord loveth judgment, and forsaketh not His saints; they are preserved for ever: but the seed of the wicked shall be cut off. The righteous shall inherit the land, and dwell therein for ever. The mouth of the righteous speaketh wisdom, and his tongue talketh of judgment. The law of his God is in his heart; none of his steps shall slide. The wicked watcheth the righteous, and seeketh to slay him. The Lord will not leave him in his hand, nor condemn him when he is judged. Wait on the Lord, and keep His way, and He shall exalt thee to inherit the land: when the wicked are cut off, thou shalt see it. I have seen the wicked in great power, and spreading himself like a green bay tree. Yet he passed away, and, lo, he was not: yea, I sought him, but he could not be found. Mark the perfect man, and behold the upright: for the end of that man is peace. But the transgressors shall be destroyed together: the end of the wicked shall be cut off. But the salvation of the righteous is of the Lord: He is their strength in the time of trouble. And the Lord shall help them, and deliver them: He shall deliver them from the wicked, and save them, because they trust in Him (Psalm 37:1-40).
You cannot hear without noting its basic black and white nature. It reminds you of 1 John. Here, we have evil-doers versus doers of good, wicked versus meek, transgressors versus the perfect who keep God’s law (verses 31, 37, 38). Notice that the wicked aggress, they watch to destroy the good (verses 12, 14, 32, 40). Meanwhile, God who stands with the good, appeals to the wicked to depart from evil and do good (vs. 27). God promises to exonerate the just (vs. 6).
Psalm 37 puts Jesus’ words in an intriguing light. How common it is in our day that the difference between good and evil is ignored and papered-over. Isaiah warned (5:20) that God is appalled by those who call good, evil, and evil, good. There is right and there is wrong; there is good and there is evil. The whole of the psalm addresses the question as being one of what kind of “doer” one is. It puts a positive spin on do-gooder and negative on evil-doer.
True meekness does not mean surrender to evil. It means standing for what is right, in the world and certainly in the church. If Moses was the archetype of meekness, and if Jesus is right in pointing us back to Psalm 37, then true meekness means upholding the truth, insisting upon godly behavior, even when it is uncomfortable.
We come in from a world that has many twisted expectations. Our culture leads us to think that we are entitled to so many things, that we begin to feel that, regardless of our behavior, we are owed this or that. Even at church.
But wait. A church, among all the other things that it is, is a voluntary association of people. No one forces you to go to church or belong to a church. You join because you want to identify with the beliefs it teaches, the behaviors it upholds, the moral fiber it partakes of. This is a free choice. If you are willing to join it, and it is willing to have you, then you become a member. Now you represent its vision and ideal to the world.
Remember, no one forced the Hebrews (and mixed multitude) to leave Egypt when that became an option. They could have stayed. If they would come along, then they would have to work together as a team. God’s presence was going up with the people, and an upgrade in behavior was necessary because God is a holy God. Is it any different today?
No Cross in the Beginning
But how do you become meek? It all comes back to the way the Fall affected our human nature. Genesis 1:31 reports that when God finished making man, our nature was not just good, but “very good.” But when Adam chose to sin, he damaged his humanity. Now his nature was bent. Now he was inclined to do evil. Now the members of his disordered human organism sent forth their cravings to his brain. Now he was his own tempter. Now there would be a cross.
When God forbade Adam and Eve to eat the forbidden fruit, was He demanding of them the bearing of a cross? Was it a part of His plan for unfallen beings to bear crosses? No, they were called simply to obey.
The very symbol of the cross stands for what? Murder and transgression and self-sacrifice. When we think of the cross, we think of Jesus.
One of the three persons of the Godhead left infinitude behind, came down, and became a man. He took on human flesh. He had to take on a humanity that was liable to death. The reason was that God has a perfect character and He made man for perfection as well. Man was made in God’s image, like God, in that he could appreciate moral things and choose for or against them. In sinning, he transgressed God’s law, he placed himself in opposition to God’s character. The consequence was his psychological disordering, his acquisition of a freakish attraction to the evil. His original attraction to good was distorted now, and he needed a power from outside himself in order to control himself. When a person has followed the clamor of his bent humanity (as all but Jesus have), he has created a situation where he needs what we have come to call “conversion.”
Conversion means a man wants to make his connection with God, be changed by Him, become all that he is intended to be, morally, through Him; he wants to and he reaches out to God’s reaching out. His whole being not only says to God, “please change me,” but it cooperates with Him as He works the change.
But in his rebellion man was hopelessly weakened. So Jesus came, lived life as a man without sinning, then sacrificed that life for man as our heavenly Father’s sacrifice. On the cross, He died in our place. He bore punishment for our sins. His character was counted for us in place of our own; the penalty was paid, a fresh opportunity was wrought for us to choose the better path. He was innocent but He willingly suffered for us. His sacrifice was accepted. He went back to heaven to serve as our high Priest in the heavenly sanctuary (See Leviticus 16; Hebrews 5-9). He is there now, when Christians pray, interceding with the Father for us, sending us divine help for overcoming.
But here is where we come to the title of this message: crosses and cowards. Before Adam and Eve sinned, obedience was still necessary. But not self-denial. There was nothing in their nature that inclined to self-indulgence. Their nature was good; obeying was easy and natural. After they had chosen to sin, it was different. They had bent their nature and inclined that nature to evil. They had chosen rebellion, even if uncritically, non-committally. In doing so, the damage was done. Their natures were changed.
Before their sin, no one was born with a disordered kind of humanity. (Of course, before God made them, the first couple, no one was born.) But now the nature was distorted. Now they inclined toward evil. Now they needed, against their nature, to choose to cleave to God. Now there was a personal cross. But now there was also a pull away from that cross. Now, there was the question of moral commitment. Now it was immeasurably more difficult to cleave to the good. Now it was easy, faced with that kind of decision, to choose wrongly. God made men and women for heroism, but now it was easier for them to choose cowardice.
A Personal Cross
You see, after he sins, he faces his own personal cross. Christ’s cross is the one that atones for sin; our cross is the one that shows He is living in us (Galatians 2:20; Colossians 1:26-29; Philippians 2:12, 13). Jesus’ cross enables our restoration; our personal cross does not function as a legal atonement. Self-surrender can occur in us but only through His power. We do not attain perfection through the law. It is through Christ that we are changed, that we become what we become. Obedience does not earn us salvation, but marks the union of His divinity with our humanity, His divinity giving and our divinity-empowered humanity seeking. He makes it possible for us to come to Him. He draws us to Himself. It is the gospel.
What are we? The choice is ours. In us is the capacity to be His children or villains, holy or sinners, do-gooders or evil-doers, heroes or cowards. I am born neither sinner nor coward, neither saint nor hero. I am born wrongly bent. Through my choices I join myself to the self-indulgences proposed by my disordered humanity. I become a sinner. But then He is ready to repair me.
Infancy gives way to adulthood. God comes to me, challenges me, and appeals to me. Then what? To refuse to seek truth—when one understands what it is and where it may be found—is to live in fear. To refuse to surrender self—when one understands what it is and how it may be relinquished—is to live as a moral coward. What will we be? He allows us to choose; He helps us to choose; He makes effectual our choice; with our consent He rebuilds what we have broken.
All the universe has been waiting for us to choose Christ; to choose cross or cowardice. Remember, the Bible says that when Jesus returns, He comes “to be glorified in His saints, and to be admired in all them that believe” (2 Thessalonians 1:20). Will He be glorified in you? Will He be admired in you who believe?
We have been slow to take up our crosses. We have been slow to surrender self, to crucify self, to give up our moral cowardice.
Heaven wants us—you and I—to step up to the need. What is the need? We need to reform. In what? How we eat, how we drive, what we listen to, what we watch, how we talk, how we dress. Why? Because in what we eat, we are representing Jesus. In how we drive, we are representing Jesus. In what we listen to, we are representing Jesus. In what we watch, we are representing Jesus. In how we talk, we are representing Jesus. In how we dress, we are representing Jesus. No, its not about cold rules; its about a living relationship. Not about showing others that God has already perfected us, but that He is a God who is working now in us.
Conclusion
The meek shall inherit the earth—not the timid, not the milquetoast. Those who would inherit the earth, Jesus meant, would be persons willing simply to follow where He would lead. He meant the men, the women, made in His image, unwilling to settle for a faked kind of Christianity. Very simply, the meek are serious people, repelled by cowardice, surrendering self in order to follow their Lord fully, men and women who would endure the cross for Christ. These, in the final analysis, are the meek. In receiving Jesus they inherit the earth. In holding firm to their principles, they are the hope of the church today. They are those who most resemble the faith of the earliest church. Their return heralds the return of Christ. Long has He waited, and now, if we choose the cross, He will return for His own.
Crosses and cowards: following Jesus or the indulgence of self. What a spectacle. The latter portion of the Great Controversy War is raging. Who is on the Lord’s side? GCO
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