How Meekness and Humility Relate to Power

The visiting teaching message for August is “Divine Attributes of Jesus Christ: Meek and Humble.” One thing that really stood out to me as I was reading through the message is the connection between meekness and humility and power. Elder Ulisses Soares said, “Being meek does not weakness, but it does mean behaving with goodness and kindness, showing strength, serenity, healthy self-worth, and self-control.”

Digging a little deeper into the meaning of being meek, I found that meekness can mean being “gentle, forgiving, or benevolent” (footnote to Matthew 5:5). Harold B. Lee said “A meek man is defined as one who is not easily provoked or irritated and forbearing under injury or annoyance. Meekness is not synonymous with weakness. The meek man is the strong, the mighty, the man of complete self-mastery. He is the one who has the courage of his moral convictions, despite the pressure of the gang or the club.”

I also found a Christian website that said the Greek word is “praus” and that it has been:

a. Used to describe a soothing medicine. 

b. Used by sailors to describe a gentle breeze. 

c. Used by farmers to describe a broken colt. 

That website went on to ask, “What do all these definitions have in common? They all describe great power under control.” (http://www.christianlibrary.org/authors/Grady_Scott/matt5-5.htm)

Putting those together, it seems that a meek person is strong because he or she has self-control; meekness isn’t the absence of power or strength but rather the ability to control the power that one has.

Looking then at humility and how it relates to power:

One of the additional scriptures suggested in the message is Helaman 3:35, which says, “Nevertheless they did fast and pray oft, and did wax stronger and stronger in their humility, and firmer and firmer in their faith of Christ, unto the filling their souls with joy and consolation, yea, even to the purifying and the sanctification of their hearts, which sanctification cometh because of their yielding their hearts unto God.” I thought it was interesting to note that it says they “did wax stronger and stronger in their humility”; I’ve always thought that meant they became more and more humble, but Richard G. Edgley, when he was serving as a member of the Presiding Bishopric, said, “Humbly submitting our will to the Father brings us the empowerment of God—the power of humility. It is the power to meet life’s adversities, the power of peace, the power of hope, the power of a heart throbbing with a love for and testimony of the Savior Jesus Christ, even the power of redemption.” So that made me think that the scripture isn’t just saying that they became more and more humble; it’s saying that they became stronger because of their humility.

So, the message that I took away from this is that as we are humble and submit to Heavenly Father, that gives us strength and power, and as we exercise self-control, we are meek. Some of the definitions of meekness that I looked up on the internet made it sound pretty wimpy—easily imposed on, unresisting, like a lamb to the slaughter, submissive, yielding, compliant, biddable, etc” But when we think about it, it takes some pretty serious strength sometimes to be able to submit, to be able to trust that God wants what is best for us and to accept what He gives us—or what He doesn’t give us. There are times when it is MUCH easier to protest something than it is to accept it. I think a perfect example of this is when Christ Himself went like a lamb to the slaughter, when He didn’t use the power that He had to defend Himself and to do miracle after miracle to convince His accusers that He was truly the Son of God—or when He DIDN’T use His power to save His own life. As Richard G. Edgley said, “The Savior is our supreme example of the power of humility and submissiveness. After all, His submitting His will to the Father brought about the greatest, and even the most powerful, event in all of history.”