open your Bibles if you would
to Galatians chapter 5 the name of the message today is meekness.
Meekness we've been looking at the nine things which are called
the fruit of the Spirit and we are now on the eighth one mentioned
which is meekness. Now humility and lowliness of
mind which our Lord Jesus Christ was an excellent example of right?
Lowliness and humility and lowliness of mind was a preeminent example
of that pattern. And that's worked in us by the
Holy Spirit. He has it naturally. He has it
naturally, being God. But it's something that's not
natural for us. Humility and lowliness of mind
is not natural to man. But we're going to see the Holy
Spirit works this in us. And it's all part of being conformed
to the image of Christ. It's all part of that. And God,
the Holy Spirit, works humility in His blood-bought people. Again,
we're not humble by nature. But what this humility does,
it acknowledges God's mercy shown to us in Christ. It's a lowliness
of mind where we say we're nothing and He's everything. We're just
sinners, but He's a great Savior. Never forget, we may be great
sinners, which we all are, to our shame, but, oh, He's a great
Savior. He is a great, great Savior.
His name is the Lord Jesus Christ. And so what do we do now? Well,
we do what Micah penned knowing that God has showed us mercy,
he wrote these words, he has showed thee, O man, what is good
in what the Lord doth require of thee, but to do justly and
to love mercy and to walk humbly with thy God. Now, the only way
we walk humbly with our God now is because he's working in us
that humility, that lowliness of mind, which again acknowledges
every goodness that occurs to us comes from God and His mercy
comes to us through Christ Jesus our Lord and Him alone. And we
who are the people of God, we are utterly dependent upon Christ. I mean we are utterly dependent
upon Christ. Remember He's the vine and you're
the branches? And what did He tell us? Without me you can do
nothing. Nothing. There's nothing we can
do. It all depends upon Him. And
that's why, by God-given faith, we rest and trust in Him because
we acknowledge our sinnership before God. We acknowledge that
it's God who we've sinned against. And we acknowledge the mercy.
Oh, what mercy, beloved, we've received in Christ. Deathless
mercy. You can take all the mercy anyone's
ever shown you or any people have ever shown you in your life
and it doesn't even come close to the mercy that God shows us
in Christ. The grace that he's given us. Let's read now verses 22 and
26 and let us remember too that he works all these things in
us for our good and for his glory. But the fruit of the Spirit is
love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith,
meekness, temperance. Against such there is no law.
And they that are Christ have crucified the flesh with the
affections and lusts. If we live in the Spirit, let
us also walk in the Spirit. does not be desirous of being
glory, provoking one another and being one another. So we
see here, the next fruit that we're going to look at in that
cluster of like a cluster of grapes, remember the same fruit
from the same vine is meekness. I looked up the English definition
of meekness. It's an attitude or quality of
heart whereby a person is willing to accept and submit without
resistance to the will and desire of someone else. I'm going to
read that again. This is what God's worked in
us that we are now submitted to. Remember Christ came and
submitted to the Father's will. He was naturally meek. He's sinless. He's spotless. He's the Lamb
of God. The definition, again, is an attitude or quality of
heart whereby a person is willing to accept and submit without
resistance to the will and desire of someone
else. We've been made willing. See,
this is now ties it. Now it makes that verse even
come alive even more. We've been made willing in a day of God's
power. not only to come to Christ, but
to submit to Him. Remember, He's a nail in the
sure place. What a nail in the sure place is a nail where you
can hang something, you know it ain't gonna fall. We used
to work on a construction site, we'd see them all over. Nails
on the sure place where the guys would hook their stuff when they
were first framing the building. My oh my. And this is also brought forth
in the Greek definition for this word, for meekness, it's this,
gentleness by implication humility. So it also includes gentleness
as well. And it's defined in our text
as an inward grace of the soul, something that's worked in us
by the Holy Spirit of God, a calmness towards God in particular. See,
it ties in with faith, because remember last week when we looked
at faith? That is also where it gives us the ability just
to rest in what God's doing in the world. This is what this
meekness does too. To just be at rest. God's sovereign. I don't have to worry. I don't
have to worry about what's going on. I'm aware of it. But I don't have to pull my hair
out about it. Right? And acceptance, it also has to
do with an acceptance of God's dealing with us, how He deals
with us. Fully submitting to whatever
His will is in our lives. Not our will, not our desires,
but what His will and His desires are. See, we can sometimes try
to put our will and desire before God's. Ultimately, God will just either
let us go do it, and we'll reap the consequences of it. Either
way he knows it's going to happen, right? Or he'll restrain us. Oh my. And also this meekness brings
forth that we consider the workings of God with us and in our lives
is dealing with us considering It is our good, but also withdrawing
us closer to the Savior. I'll never forget talking to
Marge, Sister Marge, on the phone one time. And she said, Wayne,
I thank God for the cancer I have. I've never heard anyone ever
say that before. And I said, well, why, Sister? She goes,
because it's drawn me so close to the Savior. That's God giving grace, isn't
it? That was a vehicle that the Lord
used to take her home, and he gave her grace and meekness to
be able to say, well, Lord, this is for my good. I never met Sylvia,
but I heard it was the same with Sister Sylvia. God just gives meekness. Brother
Wayne, too. He was ready to go home. is the Lord giving that grace,
that meekness, to say, You're in control, Lord. I'm going to
rest in your sovereignty, whatever your will is. And let we who are the redeemed
never forget that our great God humbled himself. We're proud
and arrogant beings, aren't we, by nature. And our Lord left
the glory of heaven and humbled himself and became a man. to
redeem our eternal souls. And if we're being conformed
to the image of the Son, now we'll never see this humility
in us. Others will see it. The Lord, of course, sees it
because He's working it in us. But we'll never see it. I know my pride. I know how I
can be. Is it the same for you? Mine. my oh my, but he's working in
us this meekness. Here we were. We were proud,
arrogant, rebellious sinners running from him at one time.
We had nothing but enmity in our hearts towards him. Even though we might not have
verbalized it, it was in us. Some of us verbalized it. But
praise God, he rescued us. He saved us. Now, the fear of
the spirit, love, joy, peace, long-suffering, faith, meekness,
temperance, it's all being worked in us. Why do you have faith
and keep having faith? Is it because we make our faith
stronger? my faith is like a mustard seed
is yours. But it's faith, isn't it? And
it's God given. And it's God is working it in
us, isn't it? See, that's why we keep on because
he's working in us. He keeps us. I'll tell you, the
more we learn about this, The more we see the Holy Spirit working
in the believer and teaching us the things of Christ, the
more we see the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit all in action
in our salvation. And it's glorious. It's absolutely
glorious, beloved. And by His Holy Spirit working
in us, He keeps us humble. He keeps us low. Keeps us low. And think of this. Each one of
us who are believers here, We have the honor of serving Christ. We have the honor of serving
Christ. And every one of us is serving. I could not do what I do here
without you. And neither of us could gather
even together. None of us could gather together.
We wouldn't desire it without Christ. Without the Holy Spirit
working in us. If we weren't saved, I know where
I'd be. I'm not even going to say, but I know where I'd be
today if the Lord hadn't saved me. My, oh my. But here I am with
you now, loving to be with God's people, loving to preach the
word. My, oh my. And God works in us
meekness and mildness, forbearance as well. It has to do with this.
The definition of this word has meekness, mildness, forbearance. Paul says this in 2nd Corinthians,
he says, Now I, Paul, myself, beseech you by the meekness and
gentleness of Christ, who in presence am based among you,
but being absent, am bold toward you. But I beseech you that I
may not be bold when I am present with that confidence wherewith
I think to be bold against some, which think of us as if we walked
according to the flesh." Now Paul's dealing with false teachers
here. They were saying, well, you're bold when you're here,
but you're not bold. Or you're bold in your letters, but you're
not bold when you're here with us. Paul's a very meek man. He's been made meek by the Holy
Spirit of God. See, God's preachers, we're not
here to shear sheep. That's not what we do. I'm not
I'm not here to shear no sheep. I'm here to present Christ to
you. And hopefully the Holy Spirit will take the teachings that
we learn and build you up in Christ. But I am sent to preach the gospel. This is why you won't hear from
me, 50 ways to be a better Christian. That's not humanly possible,
is it? Because when those false preachers
tell you to do something and you fail 50 times, you feel no
good, do you? And you don't have any hope because
you're looking to yourself, right? That's what I realized when I
was in religion and all that stuff. I was looking to myself
to solve problems. I can't solve my problems, but
Christ does. And I had a sin problem. And
I still have a sin problem, do you? But praise God, we're forgiven
in Christ. His blood has washed us clean.
And the Holy Spirit keeps us humble before God. Imagine what
it would be like if he didn't restrain us. Imagine what this world would
be like. You know, God the Holy Spirit is even now restraining
evil in this world. We get little glimpses of how
man can be by horrible things which occur in the world. But
imagine if he didn't restrain things. Oh, my. I remember one preacher, I think
it was Henry, said it'd be hell on earth. My, oh, my. So Paul's enemies, that portion
I read there in 2 Corinthians 10, Paul's enemies had charged
him with being meek, gentle, and humble when he was present
with them. But when he was away, he wrote forcefully and bold
and commanding letters. But let us look to our Lord who
did not compromise. He never compromised the truth
about man. He was meek and gentle and patient
toward all. right toward everyone. Now when we find ourselves to
be rough and angry with men, let us think of the gentleness
of Christ. Let us be aware of our own infirmities,
and yet be bold. Be bold, though, in presenting
Christ. Look at over in chapter 6 of
this wonderful book. Look at verses 1 to 2. Paul pens
these words to the Galatians. We're going to look at them in
the future down the road. He says, Brother, if a man be
overtaken in a fault, in a sin, what do we do? Are we supposed
to kick him while he's down? Religion does that, doesn't it?
I think some of us have experienced that. They kick you while you're,
oh my, I'll tell you what. Look at this. Brethren, if a
man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual, restore
such an one in the spirit of meekness. Look at this. Considering
thyself, lest thou also be tempted. Now that's sound advice, isn't
it? Let us not point the finger at others when they fall into
sin, because we could fall into that sin just as easily as they
have. See, that's the difference between religion and grace. Grace
comes alongside you and says, come on brother, come on sister. Lift me up. I'm just a sinner
saved by grace like you are. And it says, bury one another's
burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ. Bury one another's
burdens. Let's never forget we're redeemed
children of God, indwelt by by God's Holy Spirit, but we're
still sinful human flesh, aren't we? That's what those verses
remind us. We're redeemed, we're saved, but we still have this
sinful flesh with us. And the motions of sin, the desires
of the flesh, and the potential to fall are in every single one
of us. And are we not reminded of that
every day? Can you sit there? I can do this.
Can you sit in a chair? Put your feet up? Donnie Bell
said this one time. He said, and I thought, oh my
gosh, that's all of us. He said, I can sit back in my
easy chair and get so mad at somebody and be just fuming. They don't even know it. And
I'm just fuming at them. And the only person I'm hurting
is myself, right? It's true. It paralyzes us, doesn't
it? The only one we're hurting is
ourself. We're not hurting no one else. The person doesn't even
know you're mad at them. Right? Oh my. We're all smiling
because we've all done it, right? All of us. See, we're just sinful
flesh. So if a brother or sister fall
into some grievous sin, or just sinfulness, Maybe an attitude. We can get bad attitudes easy.
Maybe an attitude or something in the flesh. We're to make every
attempt to recover that brother or sister. To recover them. To come alongside of them. And the attitude of a strong,
mature, restrained, believer toward our fallen brothers and
sisters is not to be critical or holier than thou. That's what
religion does. No, we're to come alongside them
and bear their burdens with them. Be with them. Share that burden with them.
And that's the spirit of humility and meekness that's being worked
in us. Again, we know the potential's in us. We're sinners. Even now,
we're sinners saved by grace. So the potential in us, this
is what this verse, that verse in chapter six is bringing forth,
the potential in us is for us to sin just like our brother
and sister does. It's in every one of us. Because there's nothing
new under the sun, is there? David struggled with this. Paul
struggled with this. All of our And here's Paul, by
inspiration of the Holy Spirit, penning these words, saying,
don't kick your brother while he's down. Bear your burdens
with him. You know, Henry said this, and
I found this to be true. If you're mad at someone, pray
for them. You can't stay mad at them. You
can't. It's impossible. If you're praying
for them, you cannot be mad at them. You just cannot. My oh
my. So this meekness is an inward
grace produced in us again by the Holy Spirit of God. It comes
from God. It's produced in us by God. He's working it in us.
And it's in all believers by God the Holy Spirit. And after
we're born again, we learn as we grow in grace to accept God's
dealing with us. And that's what this meekness
also does. It accepts God's dealing with us. Whatever station, place
we find ourself in life, I couldn't hardly walk the last two, three
weeks. And Jane, you were going through the same thing. But you have to resolve that
this is where God's God is. This is the place that I'm in.
And there's nothing you can do about it except pray and ask
the saints to pray and rest in Christ. That's all we can do. And you
know whenever something like this is happening to me, I always
think, there's people a lot worse off than I am. There is. A lot worse off than
I am. My oh my. So this meekness again, does
not blame God for our persecutions. Now natural man, something will
happen to a natural man and they will blame God. Usually when someone dies, they
say, well, God could have kept them alive. Why do you do that? Well, why are you blaming God?
The person has an appointment like everyone else, right? But natural man will blame God
for things. You see or hear about a huge
earthquake or something. Why didn't God stop that? He allowed it to happen. He's
sovereign. He doesn't have to answer to
you and I, does he? He doesn't have to answer to
no one. Who are thou who replyest against God, the scripture says.
Who are we? Who are we to reply against God? So this meekness works in us
where we won't reply against God. We'll just rest in his truth
and rest in his sovereignty. Isn't it wonderful to be able
to do that? To be able to just say, to look at all the chaos
in the world right now and go, well, God's in control. And I
don't mean in a fatalistic way either. I just mean to say, well,
he's in control. This is his world. And I'm going to pray, as the
Lord puts people on my heart, I'm going to pray for them, even
in far other countries, right? But I can't change that. But
I can pray for them, that God will save them, if it be His
will. And even down into our lives,
this meekness gives us a resolve to just rest in Christ. To rest
in His dealings with us. His providential dealings. And the fear of the Spirit is
a result of God the Holy Spirit working in us. When we're born
again, we're given faith, which is one of the fruit of the Spirit.
We're given love for God, which is one of the fruit of the Spirit.
We're given joy, aren't we? Oh, we're so thankful. And we continue
to be thankful. And the more God works these
in us, the stronger they get. And again, it's Him working it
in us. We can't muster it, we can't make it more or less, but
don't you rejoice the more you learn about Christ. My goodness,
this is wonderful. See, that's that joy working
in you by the Holy Spirit of God. revealing more and more
about Christ to us and his redeeming blood, saving us from all our
sins. And it all comes from the indwelling
of the Holy Spirit of God. He is the motivating force which
produces the fruit of the Spirit. I remember when I was in religion,
you used to have to try, oh, I need to be more joyful. I need
to do more of this. I was the most miserable man,
because I couldn't make myself happy. But when the Lord saved
me, my, when I heard the words, it's finished, and really heard
them, it's finished. When I heard that we're no longer
under the law, that Christ became a curse for us and freed us from
under the law, from under the law, what liberty we had, eh,
Brother Zane, what liberty, it's wonderful. Make sure your heart,
you might not say hallelujah in words, but in our heart we're
saying that, aren't we? Oh my, it's that inward joy that's
within us. And then we get together and
we just, it just gets stirred up. If you don't notice that
too, it just gets stirred up like someone's stirring a pot.
My oh my, it's wonderful. And then we say, did not our
hearts burn within us just like the disciples? My, isn't that
wonderful? That's God the Holy Spirit working
in us. You know, it's amazing. Then verse 25 says, if we live
in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. Again, notice
in our text that the word fruit, again, is singular. Again, it
serves to show that all the elements of character spoken in these
verses, right, are unity. You can't have one without the
other. You ever think of that? This fruit that's being worked
in us, it's all connected. You can't find a believer without
true love for God. There's a danger when we say,
for us right away to go, well, I look at these and they're so
weak. We won't see them. And say, well, am I even saved? God, the Holy Spirit's working
these in us. It's not something we do. Do you love Christ? Do you have a joy in your heart?
Do you have peace with God? You see? This is all through
Christ. Who are you looking to? Christ. The fact that we're here and
we believe God is a miracle of grace. That alone is a miracle of grace,
that we've been given faith to believe. Now, we are to examine
ourselves. And how have I always told you
that we examine ourselves? Who are we looking to right now?
Not in the past. Who are we looking to right now?
Well, I'm looking to Christ. Are you? Amen. As long as God gives me
the grace to do so, I'm going to keep looking at him. And if
I lose my mind, that's okay. God's got me. I remember Henry
saying sometimes, well, somebody asked him, well, what happens
if a brother or sister gets Alzheimer's and starts to stay in all these
things and start forgetting about Christ? And he says, did Christ
forget about them? Nope. So we don't even have to worry
if we lose our minds. We'll finish it, brother. Amen. Amen. This Greek word is also
used by other Greek writers of the past, and it refers to qualities
of mildness, gentleness, meekness in dealing with others. So it
also not only gives us the ability to just rest in God's providence,
but it also gives us the ability to be gentle with others, to
be gentle with other people. First and foremost with the household
of faith, right? But others too in the world.
Others too in the world. Listen to this. I therefore,
the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy of the
vocation wherewith ye are called, with all lowliness and meekness
and longsuffering for bearing one another in love. endeavoring
to keep the unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace. Ephesians
chapter 4 verses 1 to 3. So this meekness that's mentioned
there, this lowliness, and notice Paul there, he mentioned meekness
and long-suffering, which are two of the fruits of the Spirit.
And they go hand-in-hand, don't they? See, all these fruits are
united, like I said earlier. They form a unity. If you find a supercritical person
who professes Christ, and I mean someone who just causes trouble,
and there's a pattern to it, there's something wrong. There's
something wrong. Because God the Holy Spirit will
work in us this fruit. We're not the same as we were.
I met my brothers, I told you guys, I saw my brothers last
night. They still see Wayne as Wayne. But I know I'm not the
same person I was. And it's nothing I did. And it's
nothing you did. When your family members see
you, and they say, there's something different about that. Yeah, we have new love. We have
faith given to us, with the Holy Spirit's working in us. These
things that we don't see in ourselves, but others see it in us. I know, I've seen a change in
the congregation here in the last three years that's been
absolutely astounding. Not that it wasn't good before,
but I'll tell you why. the growth in the body. And you
might not see it in yourselves, but I see it in you. And it's
been amazing, the unity that the Lord's brought together.
That all comes from Him. There's nothing we can do about
that. It's His work, beloved. And it's
wonderful. It's wonderful. My oh my. That's why Paul wrote, endeavoring
to keep the unity of the Spirit. And that's where our unity comes
from, right? Anytime this church has ever had unity in the past,
and even now, it all comes from the Holy Spirit of God. It's
His work. He works that in us. And we get
the blessed, think of this too, we get the blessedness of the
fellowship from that unity in Christ, and the love that we
have for one another. Isn't that amazing? It's absolutely incredible. I
told you guys last week, this will be eight years I've been
with you. And I'm looking forward to however long the Lord has
for me here. And I'm excited. But you know,
I went up to Canada, saw my daughter, who I just love dearly, right?
Saw my brothers, but I couldn't wait to get back home to be here
with you today. Isn't that amazing? That's the
Lord working that in us. And you may have felt the same
way about coming to church. You're here because you wanted to be
here, right? Isn't that amazing? In itself, when all the world
around us is going and doing whatever they want, and here
the Lord's changed us. We're new creatures in Christ. We got
Dave singing songs for us. You got me preaching, man. What's
going on here? God's so good, isn't he? Isn't
he so good, beloved? I've got nowhere near done my
message, but we ran out of time. But just relish that today and
this week. Just relish that love that God
has for us and that he's working all these things in us. This
wonderful fruit of the Spirit is God the Holy Spirit working
mightily in us. You know, Paul said, I labor,
I strive to preach the gospel only by the Holy Spirit working
mightily in me. And whether we see it or not,
he's working in us, beloved. Isn't that wonderful? Praise
his mighty name for his mercy and his goodness in Christ towards
us. Brother Jim, can you close us
in prayer?