Back in the early 70s when I lived in Australia, there was a period of time in Australia,

that particular time was so many strikes. There was such a ferment between the labor union

and the employers and companies. And there were constant strikes. Every single day there's a strike.

And sometimes you get a national strike that cripples the

whole country. And the man who headed up the trade union movement at the time was a man by the name of

Bob Hawke, who later became the Australian Prime Minister. When things were coming to the boiling

point, one of the reporters came to Mr. Hawke and he said, Mr. Hawk, your father was a congregational minister.

Can't you just give in a little? Haven't you heard what the Bible said that blessed are the

meek for they shall inherit the earth? Well, this rough talking road's color without a moment's

hesitation says the Bible is wrong. The meek will never inherit the earth. The meek

will never get anywhere. The world belongs to the aggressive and to the assertive and to the

strong. Now to Mr. Hawke and indeed to most people, meekness is weakness. This is a common perception in our world.

The moment a person mentioned the word meekness,

and they think of someone who is a doormat, someone who is weak,

someone who is indecisive, someone who is

timid, someone who is a loser, someone who is

fearful, someone who's a spineless, someone who is

coward, someone who's told what to do, where to go.

And to put it in a vernacular, in case these things did not make any sense to

you, a first-class wimp.

But the true meaning of the word meek has nothing to do with all of these descriptions.

In fact, I was reminded recently of a story of the teacher who asked her students to write a short essay about how meek the Quakers are.

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