Strength Under Control

Week 3 of 4

Inherit, do not seize

The world grabs. The meek receive. The world demands. The meek trust.

The humble will inherit the land and delight themselves in abundant peace.

Psalm 37:11

Psalm 37 was written for a man watching someone else get away with it. The wicked prosper. Your lot looks small. The blood says, take it. David says, do not fret, cease from anger, commit your way to the Lord, and wait. The inheritance goes to the man who can wait without becoming bitter. Jesus lifts that promise into the Beatitude. Paul shows you the pattern in the Son, who did not treat equality with God as something to be seized. Peter shows you the same Son, cursed and not cursing back, because he handed himself to the Judge.

Scripture

Formal study reading, written for this series

Psalm 37:5-11

Commit your way to the Lord. Trust him, and he will act. He will bring forth your righteousness as the light. Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him. Do not fret over the one who prospers, over the man who carries out evil schemes. Refrain from anger and forsake wrath. Do not fret; it only leads to evil. For the evildoers shall be cut off, but those who wait for the Lord shall inherit the land. In a little while the wicked will be no more. But the meek shall inherit the land and delight themselves in abundant peace.

The land is inherited by the man who stops fretting.

NASB 2020AmplifiedESVLegacy Standard
Philippians 2:5-8

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

The Son did not grasp what was already his.

NASB 2020AmplifiedESVLegacy Standard
1 Peter 2:21-23

For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps. He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. When he was reviled, he did not revile in return. When he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly.

Meekness can suffer without threatening, because the Judge is real.

NASB 2020AmplifiedESVLegacy Standard

NASB, the Amplified, and the ESV open on Bible Hub. The Legacy Standard Bible opens on its own reader. Close, Expanded, and Easy on this page are original study readings. WEB is the World English Bible, public domain.

Two ways to get the earth

There is a way of taking and a way of inheriting. Taking is fast, and it feels like faith because it is active. Inheriting looks slow, and it feels like loss because your hand is open. Psalm 37 is pastoral care for that feeling. David does not deny that the wicked man is prospering. He denies that the prosperity is the verdict. “Yet a little while.” The meek inherit because God is the kind of God who gives the land, not because they outmaneuvered anyone.

Jesus does not soften the promise into a mood. Matthew 5:5 is Psalm 37:11 with the King standing in front of you. The land of Israel, in the prophets’ hope, opens into the renewed earth. The meek do not inherit a feeling. They inherit a world. That is why meekness is eschatological. You can afford not to seize this quarter, this argument, this reputation, because the future is not in the hands of the man who grabs first.

The mind of the Son

Philippians 2 is the inner life of meekness. Equality with God was not, for the Son, a thing to be snatched. Scholars argue whether harpagmos means a prize to be seized or a privilege to be exploited. Either way the posture is the same: he does not grasp. He empties himself, not of deity, but of the display and the rights, and he takes the form of a slave. Meekness at its highest is not a man discovering he is small. It is the One who is great refusing to use greatness for himself.

That keeps you from a false humility that says, “God could never use me,” which is just pride in a lower voice. And it keeps you from a swagger that says, “I will make my name.” The Son did not become less God on the road to the cross. He became obedient. Your meekness will not make you less of a man. It will make you less of a thief.

First Peter 2 shows the same mind under insult. The pattern is not denial of the wrong. The pattern is refusal to become the wrong in order to answer it. He kept entrusting himself to the Judge. A man who does not believe in a final judgment will always try to hold court in the hallway. A man who believes the Judge will rise can absorb a curse without paying it back. That is not weakness. It is a longer court calendar than yours.

What you are still grabbing

Name the thing. Credit at work. The last word with your wife. The way your father still ranks the brothers. The ministry platform. The body you used to have. The apology you think you are owed before you will be kind. Psalm 37 calls the heat over that thing “fret,” and says fret leads to evil. It does. It leaks as contempt, pornography, overwork, or a cold house.

Inheriting, this week, is concrete. You will not fix the wicked man. You will roll one path onto the Lord in prayer, by name, and you will stop prosecuting it in your head for one day. If a real injustice must be named — to protect a person, to tell the truth — you name it once, cleanly, without the extra threat. Then you hand the verdict back. Peter’s Christ did not pretend the cross was fine. He refused to threaten.

Seven days

At the table

  1. 1Where are you still grabbing, demanding, or defending instead of receiving?
  2. 2What would change this month if you trusted the Giver more than the opportunity in front of you?
  3. 3Philippians 2 says the Son did not grasp. What are you grasping that was never yours to clutch?
  4. 4Is there a wrong you are still threatening over, in words or in silence? What would entrusting it to the Judge look like by Friday?

Your note

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A prayer

Father, I fret, and my fretting is turning into sin. I confess the thing I am trying to seize. I roll that path onto you. Give me the mind of your Son, who did not clutch equality with you and who did not threaten when he suffered. I want to inherit, not steal. Keep me until the little while is over. Through Jesus Christ, the meek King. Amen.

Week 2Week 4: Hand him the reins

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