Shabbat shalom kol beit Yisra'el and Mishpachah and welcome to this assembly. This will be a rather shorter than usual address, I'm afraid, as many of us here are down with an autumnal bug which has severely weakened us, myself included, so I hope you will be patient with me if I stumble over my words a little.

Today I thought I would discuss with you a false image that both believers and non-believers have about Christians/Messianics and that is the idea that we are not only weak by created nature but that we are commanded to be weak. Not uncommonly this view is backed up by something the Saviour told Paul:

"My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness" (2 Cor.12:9, NKJV).

There are a number of passages in the Messianic Scriptures that speak of the desirability or advantage of being 'weak' but it needs to be said from the outset that this has nothing to do with timidity, plasticity, or moral deficiency. What is absent in us yet desirable and necessary is to be linked to what is present in Christ, and that absence - which makes us "weak" is joined to the the word "strength" or "power" which in this passage comes from Elohim (God) alone.

The idea of strength emerging or coming out of weakness or loss, or power coming from from meekness, is a hard one for the world to understand, I'm sure you'll agree. Paganism, like secularism (which is a kind of atheistic paganism) teaches the opposite. It has always taught the importance of physical strength and the gaining of power and influence over others as a virtue. And because we are daily immersed in the secular world at work, in school, and on the Internet and TV, even we as believers often struggle with the revelation that Yah'shua (Jesus) gave to the apostle Paul:

"My grace is enough for you: for where there is weakness, My power is shown the more completely" (2 Cor.12:9, JBP)

I think if we're to understand this revelation better, we have to go back to a teaching of the Master given in the famous Beattitudes from the Sermon on the Mount:

"Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth" (Matt.5:5, NKJV).

What is meekness? Well, it is not, as some think, indifference. 'Not caring' is not meekness or humility. Being phlegmatic (not easily excited to action) is not meekness. Neither is being lazy, fragile, effeminate (if you're a man), feminine, sentimental, indifferent or simply showing 'affable neutrality'. Indeed, I will go far as to say that meekness is not weakness! When you think of Moses, do you think of a weak, feeble man? And yet he is described as the meekest man on the planet in his day (Num.12:3). This is the man who killed an Egyptian (not something, of course, that you should imitate), smashed the two tablets of stone, grinded the golden calf into powder, throwing the dust onto the water and forced the Israelites to drink it. I do not think you will find any signs of weakness there! And yet what do we learn of Yahweh in the Psalms:

"The humble ('meek' - KJV) He (Yahweh) guides in justice" (Ps.25:9, NKJV).

And what shall be a fruit of the meek?

"The humble ('meek' - KJV) also shall increase their simcha (joy) in Yahweh" (Isa.29:19, NKJV).

Now the strange and interesting thing about the Son of Elohim (God) is that He has a dual nature. Most have little difficulty equating Him with 'meekness' or 'humility' and that indeed is what you are supposed to conclude when you visualise Him in nature...like that of a lamb. But He was, and is, also the "Lion of the Tribe of Judah" (Rev.5:5, NKJV). Yet this Lion also said of Himself:

"Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle ('meek' - KJV) and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls" (Matt.11:29, NKJV).

There is no contradiction between strength, on the one hand, and meekness, humility, gentleness and lowliness on the other. The problem is, the 'meekness' part of the 'strength-meekness' combination is the hardest part to 'get', and that is why Yah'shua (Jesus) instructs us here to go to Him to learn how to acquire it. It doesn't come naturally and it doesn't come easily! Being tough and aggressive is far easier than being meek - and being 'affably neutral', as Elisabth Elliot puts it, is really just a cop-out that avoids both strength and meekness.

To be meek means, for one thing, to be teachable:

"[Yahweh] leads the humble (meek) in what is right, and teaches the humble (Meek) His Derech (Way)" (Ps.24:9, NRSV).

"...the readiness to be shown, which includes the readiness to lay down my fixed notions, my objections and 'what ifs' or 'but what abouts', my certainties about the rightness of what I have always done or thought or said. It is the child's glad, 'Show me! Is this the way? Please help me.' We won't make it into the kingdom without the childlikeness, that simple willingness to be taught and corrected and helped" [1]

For Moses the Meek to have received so much revelation - the entire Torah, in fact - means that he had to have been teachable. Paul, to have received so much revelation, means he had to have been teachable and been willing to relearn what he grew up being taught by men. Teachability is a sign of meekness, or humility, and such will not only receive instruction but tangible things like divine power too. Are there examples of this? Yes, a long list in Hebrews 11, that long discourse on emunah (faith), starting with Abel. In the middle of this list of list of faithfulness we see written:

"For the time would fail me to tell of Gideon and Barak and Samson and Jephthah, also of David and Samuel and the nevi'im (prophets): who through emunah (faith) subdued kingdoms, worked righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, out of weakness were made strong..." (Heb.11:32-34, NKJV).

Yahweh has been making His qadoshim (saints, set-apart ones) strong out of their weakness because of their what? Theit emunah (faith), their trusting...and because biblical emunah (faith) is always pro-active, leading to deeds produced by that emunah (faith), leading them also to faithfulness:

"...[they] became valiant in battle, turned to flight the armies of the aliens. Women received their dead raised to life again. And others were tortured, not accepting deliverance, that they might obtain a better resurrection. Still others had trial of mockings and scourgings, yes, and of chains and imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn in two, were tempted, were slain with the sword. They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, tormented -- of whom the world was not worthy. They wandered in deserts and mountains, in dens and caves of the earth. And all these...obtained a good testimony through emunah (faith)..." (Heb.11:34-39, NKJV).

The weak are made strong through their trusting. Their emunah (faith), valiance, endurance and self-sacrifice not only made them strong where before they had been weak but also ensured them a "better resurrection". If there is a 'better resurrection' then there must be an 'inferior resurrection', must there not? In other words, there is more than one type of resurrection for the people of Elohim (God), an emet (truth) that causes such consternation and anger amongst Calvinists and others who deny that there is more than one resurrection for the saved of every degree of faith, obedience and self-sacrifice, and one for the unbelievers and wicked. Should we, then, desire a "better resurrection" as the ancients did, and invest in that resurrection as the ancients did, and as Christ taught us to do when He told the parable of the Precious Pearl?

"Again, the kingdom of heaven is like unto a merchant man, seeking goodly pearls: Who, when he had found one pearl of great price, went and sold all that he had, and bought it" (Matt.13:45-46, KJV).

That is what is called a 'total investment', is it not? Does anyone deny it? If there are believers willing to make a total investment into the King and His Kingdom, will there not also be those believers willing only to make a partial investment? Quite plainly, and yet the disobedient believers have consistently denied this for centuries. Yet we proclaim and teach it because it is the emet (truth). Who is teachable enough to receive the plain sense of the Master's teaching? The one who is meek, the one who is humble.

How inconvenient these pearls are to the lazy. Who, today, will invest all in Messiah Yah'shua (Jesus)? Weigh the cost before you do by reading that list of the deeds of faithful in Hebrews 11 to see what they were willing to endure in order to "obtain[] a good testimony through emunah (faith)" in order to "obtain a better resurrection" than those unwilling to endure. Why should this be regarded as something terrible if Yah'shua (Jesus) Himself teaches it? Are we teachable - meek, humble - enough to receive it?

Now I am not for one minute saying this is easy to do. In fact, without empowerment from Elohim (God) it is probably impossible. Yet believers are martyred today, and in large numbers. They are willing to make the ultimate sacrifice for the Saviour. Yet millions of over-indulged (principally decadent Western) Christians think they should be spared this and instead qualify to be whisked away by a cosmic vacuum cleaner in a coward's 'rapture', a piece of 'Christian Hollywood' if ever such a thing existed - make-believe fantasy. The 'prosperity' or 'health-and-wealth gospel' likewise breaks down in the light of such demands and in the light of the witness of historical sacrifice. We're told, 'sell everything for that pearl of great price', not lust after more earthly wealth "where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal" (Matt.6:19, NKJV) but rather invest in heaven:

"But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also" (Matt.6:20-21, NKJV).

This is the Davar (Word) supernaturally written by the Ruach haQodesh (Holy Spirit) on our hearts even as it was prophesied by the navi (prophet) Jeremiah:

"I will put My Torah (Law) in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their Elohim (God), and they shall be My people" (Jer.31:33, NKJV).

The apostle James warned against easy-go-lucky armchair Christianity by admonishing believers:

"Therefore lay aside all filthiness and overflow of wickedness, and receive with meekness (humility) the implanted Davar (Word), which is able to save your souls. But be doers of the Davar (Word), and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves" (James 1:21-22, NKJV).

This Davar (Word) is Elohim (God) (Jn.1:1), it is Resurrection Power itself, New Creation Life, the very substance and power that transforms weakness into strength, enabling the bearer to do what he or she has been called to to - his or her mission in this world, to live and die for the glory of El Elyon, the Most High, and that better resurrection promised the faithful ones. Our inspiration and empowerment is, and is because of, the cross.

May Yahweh bless your coming week and I look forward to seeing you in our Bible Study three days' hence. Amen.

Endnotes

[1] Elisabeth Elliot, Keep a Quiet Heart (Revell, Grand Rapids, Michigan: 1995), p.107

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