heirs of the earth

"Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the earth."

I've been digging into a theology of heaven and hell for a while now, and the thing that I keep noticing is how the Bible begins and ends with Creation. The earth as it was created was perfect and it once again will be made perfect by God. Eternity will not be spent in some far off hard to understand place, but it will be on the new earth now inhabited fully by God; his kingdom come.

The oft quoted beatitude above had new meaning today as I read it with this image of the age to come in my mind. The meek may well inherit the earth as it is now. Surely we have seen a move toward the lowest common denominator in our society so that the meek (which we so often read as weak might as well have it), but in reality what this says is that the meek, those docile and seemingly submissive few, are heirs to the world to come as well. The earth as the Kingdom of God is theirs for they have taken the obsolete meaning of meek; kind and gentle. They are not war-mongers, they do not seek to get ahead no matter the cost, they might even be tramped on and ignored, but the meek will get what that kind of humility deserves; a great reward; the greatest reward; the earth as the Kingdom of God.

Now if I could only find that spirit of meekness inside me.