The last time I spoke, I talked about “The Joy of the Lord.” And I said something regarding the difference between joy and happiness. Happiness is often a feeling that we get when something good happens, or we have a good day; but joy is something that can only come from God, that we have that wells inside of us no matter what the circumstance.
So, to dovetail off of that, today, I’m going to share with you what God has to say in the area of simple, everyday blessings. Turn with me to Numbers 6:22-27.
I found it hard to settle on verses today. There are so many verses on blessings, and one of the things that I found is that many of them are given as words of encouragement for people while they are enduring hard times. You have great Psalms that are often written by David who was going through hard times, or Jesus’ beatitudes, where he begins with “blessed are…” and some are for those going through hard times like mourning or those who are being persecuted.
Then you have where God grants great blessings to people in the Old Testament after they had to endure suffering, like Joseph, Job, and God’s promise to Israel in Jeremiah. We’ll look at that in a few minutes.
So, how do we talk about God’s blessings for us here in Watkins Glen? What does that look like? You turn on the TV and you hear how God’s blessings for us–according to some–are all about the more we give to their ministry, then in turn, the more abundantly God is going to bless our finances. That, to some, is what blessing means. Kind of like investing in God’s stock market with a guaranteed return on our investment. Though I have heard personal testimonies from people who have seen their finances grow the more faithfully they tithed, I am cautious about preaching on that––even though I just preached on tithing not too long ago, because I don’t want to give you the impression that if you start giving more to the church, then you’re going to get some kind of easy, financial blessing.
So how do we properly look at blessings? Well, if we are to study scripture, we have to go back to the tough stuff I just mentioned. The blessings that come after people endured hardships. Joseph, Job, Jeremiah, Paul, and James. Let’s take a look at a couple of scriptures from the Old Testament, and see what it says.
Scripture: Numbers 6:22-27
The Priestly Blessing
22 The Lord said to Moses, 23 “Tell Aaron and his sons, ‘This is how you are to bless the Israelites. Say to them: 24 “‘“The Lord bless you and keep you; 25 the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; 26 the Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace.”’
27 “So they will put my name on the Israelites, and I will bless them.”
Central Truth: Okay. That’s all well and good. It sounds nice. They are nice words. But, I mean, I have bills to pay. Everything is getting more expensive. It’s getting more stressful to put food on my table. The TV preacher said that if I just give to his or her ministry, then I could just claim my blessing like a lottery ticket or a door prize. How do I do that?
Well, that’s not what the Bible says, and that’s not what experience has taught us. The word, “blessing” according to most dictionaries in both Hebrew and Greek, means happiness. Can material wealth bring happiness? Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn’t. Last Sunday afternoon after we spent the morning with Rose and Matthew, Diana and Evelyn had to work and I’ve been going through my James Dean blu-rays and watched his final film, Giant with Rock Hudson and Elisabeth Taylor. And in that film he plays a ranch hand or a farm hand who––of course is a bit of a misfit. He ends up inheriting a lot of land and well, there’s oil on that land. So he becomes a competitor of Rock Hudson and Elizabeth Taylor’s characters.
Only, James Dean’s character becomes worse rather than better. All the money and success have not made him a happier or a better person. The point of the story can be summed up in Jesus’ words: For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in return for his soul?
Another old film that fits into that category is Citizen Kane.
As we talked about last week in the sermon about joy, more money can make you happier, if you are already fairly happy, but it can’t make you happy if you are already miserable. God’s blessings of happiness can be summed up in what we just read in Numbers: God shining down his face towards us, his favor resting on us, his peace, his grace. As Jesus put it in John 10:10, “10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.” Like joy, true happiness goes beyond the material to the spiritual. That is something that only God can give, and it’s something that no money can buy.
I talked about the TV preachers and their misconstrued understanding of blessings, and this is one of the verses that they use to back up their claims of prosperity if you only give to our ministry. Jeremiah 29:11 says, “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”
Now, just to clarify. That is one of my favorite verses in The Bible. I love that verse. And it’s a promise for us. It shows us God’s heart towards His people. It shows us how God looks at us and wants to bless us–whether it’s Israel or whether it’s us. It’s God’s heart for his people. And it goes with our topic for today.
But you can’t put a specific guarantee on what that word, ‘prosperity’ means. It’s a pretty broad word. In our 21st Century thinking, prosperity in today’s American English and in Old Testament Hebrew meant two different things.
In fact, the Old Testament Hebrew word ‘prosper’ there is actually the word, ‘shalom.’ You may have heard of it. It means ‘peace.’ That changes the meaning, doesn’t it? Prosper is in the list of synonyms when you look into it, but the main definition of shalom is peace. It means we will prosper peacefully. It’s akin to the meek inheriting the earth.
Some translations have corrected that. In fact, King James had it right all along. It reads:
“For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the LORD, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.”
So, looking at that verse, we can see God’s heart to bless us, or to make us happy, is not prosperity as we understand it in our 21st Century thinking. It’s to bless us with peace, goodness, and a life that we can look forward to. And that may mean different things to different people. It could mean wealth, but that’s not a guaranteed blessing for everyone.
In the grand scheme of things, it means, ‘peace.’ It means that God looks down upon us and wants us to have a good life. A life of joy, a life of fulfillment. Even if we don’t have much financially, even if God does not increase our finances, we can still have a blessed life.
We can have laughter. We can have family and friends that love us. We can have a puppy dog. Yesterday we had a graduation party for Evelyn and a birthday party for Diana. It was sort of a surprise and was really just a cake and a recognition, but with all the stuff going on in the world, with all of our daily responsibilities, it was nice to have this celebration with friends and family.
What other kinds of blessings can we receive? God can direct us to a career with meaningful work where we are acting in our giftings. He can lead us to a nice little town like Watkins Glen to live. Those are blessings.
There are even blessings that he can give us that we might not even be expecting. A lot of blessings in my life over the past 20 years are things that I wasn’t even expecting. I would have actually missed out on them if I had the life I was praying for. Think about that. God surprised me with blessings. I took a detour in life, and I ended up on the scenic route. The life I wanted was actually kind of boring in some ways, now that I look back on it. But God saw to it that he would add a little spice to my life, and with the newspaper job, I got to meet a lot of people and went to a lot of places that I never would have otherwise, and I did it being financially poor. But it brought a lot of blessings in my life. It made this life more enriching.
He looked down upon me and shined his face upon me. He was gracious. And He gave me peace. The favor of the Lord was upon me.
But it wasn’t without its hardships. Life wasn’t perfect. Turn with me to Jeremiah 29. I’d like to read the whole section, now in context.
We’re going to tie that in with what I said earlier, things like Jesus’ beatitudes, and Paul talking about joy and contentment while suffering tremendous persecution. The blessings I talked about, the blessing that Jesus talked about–life abundantly–can come in and around hardships. Before, after, and during troubling times. Let’s take a look at Jeremiah 29, starting with verse 10.
10 This is what the Lord says: “When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will come to you and fulfill my good promise to bring you back to this place.”
In other words, for the Israelites, God’s promise is coming. This was a prophetic word, this hadn’t happened yet, and many hearing this word wouldn’t even see the promise fulfilled. So they had to endure 70 years of captivity in Babylon first. Then, God gives them this promise:
Let’s keep going:
11 For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. 12 Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. 13 You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. 14 I will be found by you,” declares the Lord, “and will bring you back from captivity. I will gather you from all the nations and places where I have banished you,” declares the Lord, “and will bring you back to the place from which I carried you into exile.”
Not only do the Prosperity Gospel preachers get the Old Testament word wrong, but as I said, it’s not a lottery. It’s not a get-rich-quick scheme. If you want God’s blessings, you’ve got to be in right standing with God first. I’ve said it before, it only makes sense. The closer you are to God, the more he is going to bless you.
And maybe you’ve been right with God, but you’ve felt as if you’ve been in Babylon for 70 years, and you’re still suffering. The New Testament Apostles had to deal with hardships, too. Yet, they considered themselves blessed.
Vaneetha Rendall Risner wrote that the English Standard Version of the New Testament (ESV) has 112 references with the words bless, blessing, or blessed, none of which connects blessing to material prosperity. That’s just in the New Testament.
She went on to say:
There is no hint of material prosperity or perfect circumstances in any New Testament reference. On the contrary, blessing is typically connected with either poverty and trial or the spiritual benefits of being joined by faith to Jesus.
According to the Keyword Study Bible, “The Greek word translated blessed in these passages is makarioi which means to be fully satisfied. It refers to those receiving God’s favor, regardless of the circumstances.”
Did you hear that? God’s favor. What is that? GotQuestions.org put it this way: The best definition of the word favor is “demonstrated delight.” The favor of God can be described as “tangible evidence that a person has the approval of the Lord.”
In other words, when we have favor with God, He demonstrates his delight over us by blessing us with a good life. Whatever blessing it might be, it’s going to resonate in our hearts. We will be filled with a heart of gratitude for the blessing that God bestows upon us. We can experience the favor of God while going through unfavorable circumstances. We can have joy that surprises ourselves and everyone else around us.
I want to say one more thing about blessings. You know the old song, “Count Your Blessings?” A while back, one of my first sermons here was called, “Count Your Troubles.”
I think it’s worth discussing the fact that we are already blessed with a lot of things, many of us just don’t know it. We are down to one vehicle now. It’s the dilapidated truck that’s still at the mechanic’s, so we’ve been borrowing Caleb’s Jeep. My stinkin’ thinkin’ kept asking, ‘What is wrong with me? Why do I live this way? Why does it seem that no matter what I do, I can’t get ahead? Am I cursed? Why is everything I own falling apart?’ But then I was told that if you own two cars, you are among the richest four percent in the world.
And how do we look at that? Are we even aware that we are that wealthy? In the United States, two cars seem like an absolute necessity in the same way clothing and food, and shelter are a necessity. People look at you funny when you tell them you only have one car.
Diana watches a lot of HGTV, and if you’ve seen it, you’ll know what I mean about the demands of homeowners. When they’re getting a remodel, or they’re looking for a new house, my goodness they think that every single little detail is an absolute necessity. The windows are not right, the floor doesn’t have the right shade of stain, the ceiling is too high, the ceiling is too low, there are only two and a half baths, not three full baths, there’s an island thing in the kitchen, there’s not an island thing in the kitchen. I mean, they’re already spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on a new home. But if it doesn’t have a certain view of the ocean, or it’s not within a certain driving distance to work or to the park, or doesn’t have this amenity or that, it’s not perfect.
I can’t even imagine that. With my home, I’m just happy that the roof hasn’t caved in.
I, like many of you, have gone without water and heat when a storm knocked the electricity out for two days. With our budget, we’ve had to make do with buying second best—or third best. And yet we are still considered the richest four percent in the world.
Can we be grateful for what we have? We, ordinary, average, everyday people have it better now than some of the world’s richest kings had it 100 years ago just because of the simple amenities that we take for granted.
Two friends met each other on the street one day. One looked forlorn, almost on the verge of tears. His friend asked, “What has the world done to you, my old friend?” The sad fellow said,
“Let me tell you: three weeks ago, my uncle died and left me forty thousand dollars.”
“That’s a lot of money.”
“But you see, two weeks ago, a cousin I never even knew died, and left me eighty-five thousand dollars, free and clear.”
“Sounds to me that you’ve been very blessed.”
“You don’t understand!” he interrupted. “Last week my great-aunt passed away. I inherited almost a quarter of a million from her.”
Now the man’s friend was really confused. “Then, why do you look so glum?”
“This week—nothing!”
We can often come to the point where we expect to get certain blessings that God never promised us, and when they do not come, it is easy to get bitter.
One morning, Diana was eating her breakfast when all of the sudden she blurts out, “holy cow! I have 80 likes on my Mother’s Day post!” She posted up a selfie of her and our three kids that says, “Top 3 best Mothers Day gifts ever.” 80 people hit the like button. Why? Because we can all resonate and rejoice when we see someone else rejoice with God’s greatest blessings.
On Memorial Day, I took Caleb to go see Ringo Starr and his All Starr Band, and then the following week I took Diana and Caleb to see Paul McCartney in Syracuse. That made me happy to go to those concerts. But it made me happy because I got to do that with my family. If I went all by myself–it wouldn’t have been as big of a blessing.
So what I am saying to you today is, that maybe our blessings are right in front of us and we don’t even know it. Caleb is living on his own, Rose is married and Evelyn graduated high school and is about to go off to college. Where did the last 20 years go? How much of it have I taken for granted? How much of it seemed like it was just ho-hum everyday life?
Now I look at it, I want it all back again, so this time I can appreciate it more. What blessings do you already have that you are not paying attention to? What blessings has God shined down on you that maybe you’re forgetting to thank him for? What blessings are we longing for so much that we haven’t taken the time to appreciate what we have? And what blessings are we missing? Are we missing out on God’s favor? Is it because of our attitude toward what we think is a ho-hum ordinary life, but is really a blessing in disguise? Maybe you feel like you’re in Babylon? If so, hold on, your promise is coming.
This is an updated edition of a post originally published on First Baptist Church of Watkins Glen
Featured Image by Denise Husted from Pixaba
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