TO BLESS AND BE BLESSED

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In Christ, Mark

The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

Blessed are those who act justly, who always do what is right.

Psalm 106:3

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

What is it mean to be blessed?

We hope for blessings, praying for the Lord to bless us. We wish for others to be blessed. But do we know what we are asking for?

At its core, the word “bless” means to bring one happiness or welfare in the form of fulfilling a need or providing a gift.

To bless someone is to provide them with something of value and it doesn’t need to be material in nature. You can bless someone with a tangible item but you also can bless them with your time or a talent God has given you. Sometimes you can simply bless someone with a card or a phone call or maybe something as simple as a prayer.

Indeed, there are many ways we can bless others who need it.

Now, consider all the ways God has blessed you. In fact, take some time today and start to form a list of all the many ways God has provided for you. Take your time and make sure you don’t overlook anything. I believe you’ll find your list is extremely extensive when you commit yourself to documenting everything God has done for you. We all have so very much to be thankful for.

The end product of this exercise, of listing and accounting for all we have to be grateful for, is that we’re left in a spirit of praise, praise grounded in joy and happiness.

In other words, we feel blessed.

There is a rich happiness and satisfaction that comes in knowing God is with us and cares for us more than we maybe deserve. Despite our sinful nature, the Lord still chooses to bless us as He forms and shapes us to be the people He wants us to be. And that includes living justly and righteously. Consider the words of verse 3 in the 106th Psalm:

Blessed are those who act justly, who always do what is right.  

In other words, there is an added joy and happiness that comes from being obedient to God’s will and way. The more we live justly and right, the happier we are, knowing we are living in a way that finds God’s favor – and His blessing.

To reinforce this, consider this proclamation by Jesus as He delivered the Beatitudes during His Sermon on the Mount:

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

Not only are we blessed when we live righteously but we are blessed along the way as we yearn more and more to become the people God wants us to be. When we’re fully committed to God we develop a hunger and thirst for righteousness that can only be satisfied through His word and way. We seek Him and find Him, guided by the scriptures and the Holy Spirit.

Friends, in the end translation, we are to bless, to bring happiness and joy to the hearts of others - and just and righteous living will lead us to do just that as we live as the Lord leads us. In return, we will be blessed, receiving joy and happiness into our own hearts by knowing we are pleasing God with all that we do.

It’s really the ultimate win-win-win. Those we bless are pleased, we’re pleased in blessing them, and the Lord, the Author of everything to include blessings, is pleased by it all.

Amen

In Christ,

Mark

PS: Please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it.

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