Who are the meek? The shy people?

Meekness is a fruit of the Spirit, and an evidence that we are branches of the living God. The abiding presence of meekness is an unmistakable evidence that we are branches of the True Vine, and are bearing much fruit. It is an evidence that we are by faith beholding the King in his beauty and becoming changed into his likeness. Where meekness exists, the natural tendencies are under the control of the Holy Spirit. Meekness is not a species of cowardice. It is the spirit which Christ manifested when suffering injury, when enduring insult and abuse. To be meek is not to surrender our rights; but it is the preservation of self-control under provocation to give way to anger or to the spirit of retaliation. Meekness will not allow passion to take the lines. {ST, August 22, 1895 par. 3}

Will this kind of meekness automatically make you prosper, be happy, successful in life?

Will this kind of meekness automatically make you prosper, be happy, successful in life?

I don't know that Paul told us to always be happy. But he did tell us to always rejoice. And when we keep in mind all the good things that stem from suffering, why wouldn't we rejoice?

Wasn't it also Paul who said in 1 Thess. 5:18, "In everything give thanks, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you."?

"If you think that meek is weak,
Try being meek for a week."

How about Jesus? He said "Blessed are the meek" - and blessed means to be exceedingly happy.

They are happy in the final outcome, for they shall inherit the earth. But that doesn't mean that they are happy to be persecuted, especially when one realizes that the persecutor is hurt more than the persecuted. How can the meek be happy that someone is hurting themselves, being slaves of sin?

Matthew 5:11"Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. 12Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

Perhaps it is how we look at things that determines how we respond to those who mistreat us and dispitefully use us?

To be meek is not to surrender our rights; but it is the preservation of self-control under provocation to give way to anger or to the spirit of retaliation. Meekness will not allow passion to take the lines. {ST, August 22, 1895 par. 3}

He who can stand unmoved amid a storm of abuse is one of God's heroes. To rule the spirit is to keep self under discipline; to resist evil; to regulate every word and deed by God's great standard of righteousness. He who has learned to rule his spirit will rise above the slights, the rebuffs, the annoyances, to which we are daily exposed, and these will cease to cast a gloom over his spirit. {AG 256.2}

Matthew 5:11"Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. 12Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

Again, the happiness is because of the final outcome - reward in heaven - not because of present evil. It is not rejoicing because of evil, but in spite of evil. I don't think that the truly converted can be happy about the existence of evil.

Consider what you just claimed, and answer this: Did Jesus' experience in Gethsemane match what you have in mind?

He was encouraged by angels who came to him. They gave him the joy and courage he needed to meet his enemies, or he would not have endured until he was crucified. How else could he pray for the soldiers?

Blessing means joy, and I believe it is real joy now, at this moment, if Christ has entered into our being and consciousness.

Matthew 5:6 - Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, For they shall be filled.

Let's not confuse future facts with present feelings. Though one can and should be happy because of future bliss, that does not necessarily mean that one should be happy about present problems.

Matthew 5:6 - Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, For they shall be filled.

Does that mean that we should be happy that we currently hunger and thirst for righteousness? No. It means that we should be happy that in spite of our current lack, we shall be filled.

We should be innocent enough to enjoy the rose, but wise enough to see the thorn.

Since when have we been instructed to let our present feelings rule our lives?

How much innocence does it take to be able to enjoy the rose?

What do these quotes tell you?

He is despised and rejected by men, A Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. And we hid, as it were, our faces from Him; He was despised, and we did not esteem Him. (Isaiah 53:3)

It was to redeem us that Jesus lived and suffered and died. He became "a Man of Sorrows," that we might be made partakers of everlasting joy. God permitted His beloved Son, full of grace and truth, to come from a world of indescribable glory, to a world marred and blighted with sin, darkened with the shadow of death and the curse. He permitted Him to leave the bosom of His love, the adoration of the angels, to suffer shame, insult, humiliation, hatred, and death. "The chastisement of our peace was upon Him; and with His stripes we are healed." Isaiah 53:5. Behold Him in the wilderness, in Gethsemane, upon the cross! The spotless Son of God took upon Himself the burden of sin. He who had been one with God, felt in His soul the awful separation that sin makes between God and man. This wrung from His lips the anguished cry, "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?" Matthew 27:46. It was the burden of sin, the sense of its terrible enormity, of its separation of the soul from God--it was this that broke the heart of the Son of God. {SC 13.1}

They forget the Man of Sorrows, who was acquainted with grief. The sufferings of Jesus in Gethsemane, His sweating as it were great drops of blood in the garden, the platted crown of thorns that pierced His holy brow, do not move them. They have become benumbed. Their sensibilities are blunted, and they have lost all sense of the great sacrifice made for them. They can sit and listen to the story of the cross, hear how the cruel nails were driven through the hands and feet of the Son of God, and it does not stir the depths of the soul. {1T 155.1}

Christ's agony did not cease, but His depression and discouragement left Him. {DA 694.1}

One more quickie:

His depression left Him. You know what that means, don't you?

The Thursday section in Lesson 11 shows us how to be happy, does't it, or is the lesson incomplete?

Doesn't it mean, that before His depression left Him, He was depressed?

It shows us how to be happy IN SPITE of circumstances, not BECAUSE of them. (Deja vu all over again...)

The lesson seems complete. But it sounds like you want it to say something that it's not saying.