Sometimes I hesitate to call myself “blessed.” I wonder, “if I am blessed because I have something, then what about those who don’t have the same thing? Does that mean God has not blessed them?” It makes me feel a little guilty.
Furthermore, the idea of being “blessed” is sometimes associated with prosperity gospel teaching, where it can seem that Christianity, and even our salvation, can become self-focused—all about being #blessed.
In this post I will face my hesitations to reclaim (or reaffirm) the blessing of God.
The Blessings of the Lord
Despite my hesitations, the reality is that God does, at times, bless people. The theme is especially prominent in the Old Testament.
- “Let your wife be a fountain of blessing for you” (Proverbs 5:18, similarly Ruth’s husband in Ruth 1:9). My wife is surely a blessing to me!
- “The Lord blesses them with peace” (Psalm 29:11).
- “How blessed you are, O Israel! … He is your protecting shield and your triumphant sword!” (Deuteronomy 33:29).
- “I will bless you with food and water, and I will protect you from illness. …and I will give you long, full lives” (Exodus 23:25-26).
Overall, one can be blessed with a generally good and pleasurable life:
Your towns and your fields will be blessed. Your children and your crops will be blessed. The offspring of your herds and flocks will be blessed. Your fruit baskets and breadboards will be blessed. Wherever you go and whatever you do, you will be blessed” (Deuteronomy 28:3-6).
Wealth or Not?
Those who preach prosperity are correct that sometimes God blesses with riches and wealth:
- “The blessing of the LORD makes a person rich, and He adds no sorrow with it” (Proverbs 10:22).
- “And the LORD has greatly blessed my master [Abraham]; he has become wealthy. The LORD has given him flocks of sheep and goats, herds of cattle, a fortune in silver and gold, and many male and female servants and camels and donkeys” (Genesis 24:35).
But the blessing of wealth is not a promise for every Christian. In fact, sometimes God’s blessing means that we have what we need, even when we don’t have much. Consider what the Bible says about the Israelites when they were wondering through the wilderness for forty years.
For the LORD your God has blessed you in everything you have done. He has watched your every step through this great wilderness. During these forty years, the LORD your God has been with you, and you have lacked nothing” (Deuteronomy 2:7).
That was not a time of wealth and abundance! But they were blessed.
Claiming and Declaring Blessings
All of the above blessings are not guaranteed for every Christian. God doesn’t bless everyone in the same way. That’s why I’ve used phrases above like “God’s blessings can include,” and “sometimes God blesses with riches.”
So, how can we ensure we receive God’s blessing? We can’t.
It is very clear that the Bible never says we need to claim God’s blessings as though they are all rightfully ours.
(I have no Bible verses to quote here because it isn’t in the Bible—that’s my point.)
The Bible also never says that God will bless us only if we have enough faith.
And it certainly never says that we will receive God’s blessing only if we decree or declare them over our lives.
(The Bible verse you are thinking of doesn’t work if you consider it’s context.)
In many respects, God’s blessings are not promised to us. At least not all of them. Rather, to some extent, we receive God’s blessings as gifts that come from God’s grace. The result is that we can even speak of receiving “one gracious blessing after another” (John 1:16).
The Secret to Receive God’s Blessing—For Real!
At the same time, the Bible does make it clear that many of God’s blessings are in response to what we do—and in that sense, I’m not so sure blessings are only gifts.
If there is any secret to receiving God’s blessing, it is this—living a righteous life, in obedience to God. This is a theme from the beginning to the end of Scripture.
God told the Israelites on many occasions, “You will be blessed if you obey the commands of the LORD your God that I am giving you today” (Deuteronomy 11:27). We also read, “You bless the godly, O LORD” (Psalms 5:12). And “The LORD … blesses the home of the upright” (Proverbs 3:33). This includes, specifically, those who are generous with the poor (Proverbs 14:21 and 22:9).
Jesus taught that those who are humble, just, merciful, pure in heart, and peacemakers will be blessed (Mathew 5:2-12). And in the book of Revelation, Jesus says, “Blessed are those who obey the words of prophecy written in this book” (Revelation 22:7).
In direct contrast to those who receive blessing in response to their obedience, Jeremiah informed those around him, “Your wickedness has deprived you of these wonderful blessings. Your sin has robbed you of all these good things” (Jeremiah 5:25).
I say that living in obedience to God is the “secret” to blessing, because I don’t get the sense that prosperity preachers give as much emphasis to obedience as they typically do to having faith. Having said that, if we rightly understand faith, then our faith should lead us to obedience.
The Problem of Blessing
The reality is that even godly living doesn’t guarantee God’s blessing…at least not in this present life. And a lack of blessing doesn’t necessarily point to disobedience. For example, consider that “the LORD blessed Job in the second half of his life” (Job 42:12), even though he first experienced significant suffering.
I also often remind myself that some of the heroes of faith who are listed in Hebrews 11 faced a lot of challenges in life, like being destitute, mistreated, tortured, put in prison, or cut in half (verses 35-37)! This happened even though they were “too good for this world” (Hebrews 11:38). Where was there blessing?
We might call this the problem of blessing—but really it is just another instance of the problem of evil.
And to make matters worse, those who are disobedient to God, sometimes seem “blessed.” We take caution from the prophet Malachi:
You have said, ‘What’s the use of serving God? What have we gained by obeying His commands or by trying to show the LORD of Heaven’s Armies that we are sorry for our sins? From now on we will call the arrogant blessed. For those who do evil get rich, and those who dare God to punish them suffer no harm.” (Malachi 3:14-15)
And, here again, the problem of blessing rears its ugly head.
Answers to the Problem of Blessing
What can we say about those who do not seem so “blessed,” especially if it seems that they are living in complete obedience to God? Maybe they are even “entirely sanctified” (if you believe in that).
I can think of at least three possible answers.
- Maybe the person is not blessed in the same way as you, but maybe you are looking for the wrong blessing. In other words, maybe God is blessing them in ways that aren’t immediately obvious to you.
- We trust that God in his wisdom, love, and sovereignty, knows best when it comes to how and when to bless people.
- We understand that God will also provide blessing in the afterlife.
A Blessing for YOU 😊
I will close this #Blessed blogpost with a blessing for you.
The Lord “will bless those who fear the LORD, both great and lowly. May the LORD richly bless both you and your children. May you be blessed by the LORD, who made heaven and earth” (Psalms 115:12-15).
Amen.
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You might also be interested in these posts:
- 10 Bible Verses You Can Legitimately Declare Over Your Life
- There is Power in the Tongue, but Not for Declarations and Decrees
- 10 Ways to Pray the DEMONS out of Your Heathen CAT
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Andrew K. Gabriel, Ph.D., is the author of Simply Spirit-Filled: Experiencing God in the Presence and Power of the Holy Spirit as well as three academic books, including The Lord is the Spirit. He is a theology professor at Horizon College and Seminary and serves on the Theological Study Commission for the Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada. You can follow him on Facebook or on Twitter.
Thoughtful, Scriptural insight on a perennially challenging topic, Andrew. Blessings on you and yours, Maurice Vellacott, DMin TEDS of TIU, Deerfield, IL, PhD cand. North-West University, Potchefstroom, South Africa
Nearly 20 years ago as laity, I was in a 2 year Bible study that was using a curriculum developed by Lutherans. That study introduced me to the concept that we are “Blessed to be a blessing” to others, and we see that starting in Genesis 12:1-3. Although that passage is a promise to Abram, we do see this concept in various ways throughout the Bible.
One of the reasons I reject the prosperity gospel is that I sense the people who have bought into it look like the people in 1 Cor.11:18-22, not the Macedonians Paul exemplifies in 2 Cor. 8 when Paul is trying to get the Corinthians to honour their pledges to the collection for the poor in Jerusalem.
Psalm 67 is an example where the material blessing result in the spiritual blessings of others.
Regarding Psalm 67, John Piper suggests that God has this message for the western church today, “I have blessed you—beyond the wildest dreams of any people in history. I have blessed you with unprecedented and overflowing wealth. This not a curse. It is a blessing. But it will become a curse if you do not use it for what I have designed.”
John Piper, “Let the Peoples Praise You, O God! Let All the Peoples Praise You!,” in Finish the Mission: Bringing the Gospel to the Unreached and Unengaged, ed. David Mathis (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2012), 146
Thanks for sharing, Randy.
Thank you for sharing these thoughts and Scripture verses. I appreciate the three possible answers you shared.
Several Christmas seasons ago, I was reading the book of Luke. Verse 28 of chapter 1 struck me. “And having come in, the angel said to her, ‘Rejoice, highly favored one, the Lord is with you; blessed are you among women!’ ” In verse 30, the angel tells Mary that she has found favor with God. This gave me pause. By earthly standards:
– Mary was pregnant out of wedlock;
– Mary gave birth to a child in a stable;
– Mary was widowed;
– Mary had to watch her son be persecuted, rejected, tortured, and crucified;
– Mary had to surrender her child to Heaven as a fairly young adult.
Even knowing that Jesus was the Son of God and not a child like any other, as His earthly mother, Mary lived extremely painful moments. These are probably not the type of situations we reflect on when we think of blessing.
Since this time, I’ve used the salutation “Blessings,” less frequently in communications – not because I hesitate to see others blessed, but because blessing doesn’t seem so casual. I’m also not sure how it’s interpreted.
I ask God to prepare my mind and spirit to recognize His immediate and eternal blessings, in whatever form He grants them.
Thanks for sharing your reflections, Renée.