Nothing but Blessed

Well, I want to go ahead and jump to Psalm 73 to begin our sermon this morning. That's not where we're going to end up. Um, but I want to read the beginning of that psalm because I think it captures very well a struggle that many of us have or have had at some point in our lives. Let me just read the first few verses of this psalm. Psalm 73. Truly, God is good to Israel, to those who are pure in heart. But as for me, my feet had almost stumbled. My steps had nearly slipped. For I was envious of the arrogant when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. For they have no pains until death. Their bodies are fat and sleek. They are not in trouble as others are. They are not stricken like the rest of mankind. Therefore, pride is their necklace. Violence covers them as a garment. Their eyes swell out through fatness. Their hearts overflow with follies. They scoff and speak with malice. Loftily they threaten oppression. They set their mouths against the heavens. Their tongues strut through the earth. Therefore his people turn back to them and find no fault in them, and they say, "How can God know? Is there knowledge in the Most High?" Behold, these are the wicked; always at ease, they increase in riches. All in vain have I kept my heart clean and washed my hands in innocence. For all the day long I have been stricken and rebuked every morning.

This is the classic "life doesn't seem fair" dilemma. It's the age-old problem that we look at people who are living lives that are totally opposed to God and the things of God, and yet it seems like everything just sort of falls into their lap. They have no struggles. They, you know, everything goes exactly the way that they planned. And as for those people who are living on the straight and narrow, as it were, whether it's just toil and drudgery and pain and weariness, and it just seems like it's the complete opposite of the way it should be. It's the classic, you know, why is it this way? Shouldn't it be the exact opposite?

Now, if that's the way it feels to you, if that's the way life seems to you, um, maybe you really are surrounded by those kind of people that do seem to have everything just sort of fall in their lap and everything goes exactly the way they want. Chances are that's a mirage, that that perspective is not true, that they would disagree with you. But nevertheless, it might feel that way. That's why I think there's an important reminder to us about sort of the reality of not only how things really are, but what does it mean to truly be blessed? What does it mean to really have God's blessing upon us? And for that, I want to turn to the book of Numbers. Numbers chapter 6. This might be the most well-known passage in the entire book of Numbers, certainly one that gets read regularly in Christian worship. Numbers chapter 6. Look at verses 22-27. The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, "Speak to Aaron and his sons, saying, 'Thus you shall bless the people of Israel. You shall say to them, "The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you. The Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace."' So shall they put my name upon the people of Israel, and I will bless them."

Doesn't that sound so nice? Just hearing it, it just kind of feels like a breath of fresh air. Wouldn't you want that? Wouldn't you want the Lord to bless you and keep you? Wouldn't you want him to make his face to shine upon you and to lift up his countenance towards you? There's a comfort in hearing that. This is a passage of scripture that has often been read at the close of weddings as a blessing over the new couple. Um, ever since the days of Luther, this has historically been included in regular Sunday liturgy as a close of a sermon, as a benediction over the congregation. I typically read this section of scripture at the end of a funeral or a memorial service as a way of praying that God would show gracious kindness to these families in their grief. And clearly God's blessing is the focus. The word "blessing" comes up again and again and again. Even as God is instructing Moses how to instruct Aaron, it's framed as a blessing. And then at the close of it, there is a reminder that in pronouncing this blessing over the people of God, the priest would put my name upon the people of Israel, and I will bless them. Clearly, blessing is the focus.

Let me sort of set the context of this because I think that's helpful. In Numbers chapter 6, the preceding verses are all about the Nazirite vow, instructions for Nazirites. And what was special about the Nazirite vow is, if you just flip over to the beginning of chapter 6, the first verse, it says, "And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 'Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, When either a man or a woman makes a special vow, the vow of a Nazirite, to separate himself to the Lord...'" And I want to just sort of stop right there. What's special about this is that that means the Nazirite vow was for anyone and everyone within the people of God, within the nation of Israel. Anybody could dedicate themselves as a special act of worship to God. You didn't have to be born into a certain tribe or a certain clan. You didn't have to have a certain affiliation within the nation. Any man or any woman could dedicate themselves in this special act of worship to God. And really, this Nazirite vow illustrates what God desires for all his people. He desires them to be separate, to be set apart as holy, separate from the world and its prideful, idolatrous desires, and devoted to the worship of God, devoted to living for God, devoted to glorifying God with their lives. Israel, after all, was literally God's chosen people. They were called out specifically by God to be separate from everyone else, to be different, to be distinct. And that distinction was to be focused on him. They were supposed to be sanctified for him. And this Nazirite vow is a reminder to them of that significance and that anyone within the congregation was invited to participate in that special act of separation by taking this vow.

This blessing, if you go back to the end of chapter 6, was a blessing that Aaron or the priests were supposed to pronounce over the people. It's not a blessing from the priests though, is it? It's a blessing from God. The priests were simply the ones relaying this message. And what captures me when I read this, in contrast to the struggle that Asaph expresses at the beginning of Psalm 73 where he looks around and sees that all the wicked people have all the nice toys and all the fun stuff and have everything going for them—what this captures for me is this idea that even more than what God does or what he gives to us, God himself is the blessing. And this is important for us to lock into our minds because it's going to really help us to deal with that dilemma that Asaph struggles with of looking all around us and seeing everybody else with all the goodies, with all the freedom, with all the whatever, and conclude that that equals blessing. This means that blessing is for the rich and the poor. It means that God's blessing is for the young and the old. It's for the healthy and the sick. It's a blessing for all of God's people. It's not just for a select category.

So when you look at this blessing, the next time you read it, the next time you hear it read in a worship service, you should really be reminded of this reality that you cannot separate God from God's blessing. There are these three lines in this blessing. And in fact, maybe some of your Bibles are even formatted so that these lines are parallel to one another rather than in paragraph format. And the blessing is first of all just blessing, peace, and grace. The first blessing is "may the Lord bless you and keep you." Clearly, whatever this blessing is, it can't be had without the Lord because the Lord is the beginning of each one of these statements. The Lord bless you. The Lord make his face to shine upon you. The Lord lift up his countenance to you. The Lord is himself the source of this blessing, of this grace, of this peace. Even his posturing towards you—his face shining upon you, his countenance lifted up towards you—is a reminder to us that he ultimately is the source of these blessings. And so you cannot expect to have God's blessing apart from God. It's a helpful reminder to us that a prayer for God's blessing must always first be a prayer for God himself. We want his presence. We want his gaze. We want his active involvement in our lives. We don't just want his stuff. We don't just want comfort. We don't just want an absence of any reason to need to trust him.

Have you ever thought about that? That so often when we equate God's blessing with the things of this earth, really what we're asking is, "Lord, could you just give me a reason not to have to trust you? Could you just give me a life of comfort and ease where I never have to actually depend on you? I can just depend on all the things down here." We would never say that, would we? But oftentimes, that's really what we're hoping for, that God would give us no reason to ever have to depend on him. But this blessing reminds us that we should desire God to be intimately involved in every aspect of our lives, at every moment of our lives, that we want God more than we want the stuff.

You don't have to raise your hand because I know that 100% of you heard "I'll Be Home for Christmas" 978 times over the past month. You did. I completely know it. There's no doubt in my mind. I might be understating it. Actually, "I'll Be Home for Christmas" is a song about soldiers in World War II. It was written, I think, by Bing Crosby. And the idea is that they're separated from their families at Christmas, and all they want is to be home. And yes, the song does talk about snow and mistletoe and presents under the tree, but it's clear that really what the person singing this song is wanting is to be in the presence of their family, to be back with the ones that they love. Right? Maybe there would be snow, but that's not really what they're longing for. Maybe there'll be presents under the tree, but that's not really what they're longing for. They're longing for being with these people. And really, the attitude of that song captures well the spirit of this blessing: that ultimately the blessing is God connected to the ways in which he blesses us. It's not that God will give us all the stuff, that we'll have all the comfort, that we'll be surrounded with all the goodies of this life.

At our annual associational meeting, which was in October, one of the things that was a part of that was a gentleman who came up and shared his testimony. He had been a prisoner at San Quentin and had gotten saved while he was in San Quentin and gotten his diploma of theology through the North Bay School of Theology, which our association runs on the campus of San Quentin. We have people from our association—pastors—who go in there every week and teach theology classes to inmates at San Quentin. And it's an amazing ministry. But one of the things that he shared was the struggle of being a Christian in that environment. And yet, even in the midst of having to endure a lot of hostility towards him while he was in there, he still considers it a blessing that God has given him: the gift of his salvation and the presence of God that sustained him in the midst of a very difficult time in his life. In that circumstance, for, let's say, a Christian inmate in a maximum-security prison like San Quentin, the hope of the blessing of the stuff of this world wouldn't be a huge encouragement. The presence of God, though—the blessing of God himself—would be an amazing encouragement. I think that's one of the reasons why in Psalm 23 the psalmist says, "The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want," and it's not because this person has all the stuff of this world; it's that the Lord's presence is there with them. So he can be in the valley of the shadow of death and have no fear, "for you are with me."

Please don't hear me say that God's blessing can't ever come in the form of material blessing. And in fact, the people to whom this blessing was originally given would have definitely considered things like fruitful harvest and abundant cattle and productive land as blessings from God. Think about Job. In Job chapter 1, when Satan comes to God and says, "Does Job fear you for no good reason? Have you not put a hedge around him and his house and all that he has on every side? You have blessed the work of his hands, and his possessions have increased in the land." There's an understanding that that can be blessing from God. So don't misunderstand. That's not what we're saying—that God can't ever bless you with the things of this earth. He does. But Job had to come to terms with the reality that that was not the exclusive blessing that God had given him. That it ultimately was God himself—that the blessing of God for his people extends beyond the possessions and the circumstances of this world.

And I will give you three examples from scripture of this. In Psalm 1, we're told not to associate with or indulge ourselves in the counsel of the wicked. But what is the person who is blessed? The person who is blessed is the one, the psalmist says, who delights in the law of God. In James chapter 1, we're told that we are to consider it pure joy when we encounter trials of many kinds, that those are to be regarded as blessings from God, that the blessed people are those who are able to remain steadfast under trials because those trials are indeed good gifts from God and they produce in us good things that are blessings from him. And then maybe the clearest illustration of this is Christ's own words in the Sermon on the Mount, where he begins with what we refer to as the Beatitudes in Matthew chapter 5: "Blessed are the poor in spirit. Blessed are those who mourn. Blessed are the meek. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. Blessed are the merciful. Blessed are the pure in heart. Blessed are the peacemakers. Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake. Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account." All of these things illustrate for us that God may bless us with the things of this earth, but ultimately the blessings he gives us are more, shall we say, sophisticated than that and more intimately connected with who he is—that we might not have any of the things of this earth and we can still consider ourselves to be blessed if God is our keeper, if God's face shines on us, if he lifts his countenance towards us, that you cannot separate God from God's blessings.

Which leads us to what this benediction is ultimately pointing us towards: to recognize that it is the Lord himself who is our greatest blessing. That's why I love the way this is all summed up in verse 27 when God, in giving his instruction to Moses to give to Aaron, he says, "So shall they put my name upon the people of Israel, and I will bless them." They're going to stamp my name on my people when they pronounce this blessing over the people. These three lines of this blessing are parallel to each other, but they expand on one another and elaborate on each other. The first is the most simple: "The Lord bless you and keep you." We're really emphasizing God's protection and preservation of his people. "The Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you" is that second line. The shining face is a figure of speech for benevolence or favor. It is the blessing of kindness that reveals God's gracious character to his people. And then finally, "The Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace." It's a blessing of peace that demonstrates God's love.

Listen to this description of this idea of his countenance lifted up to you. The idea of the fallen face is one of anger. And the idea of the hidden face is that of withholding support, favor, or peace. If God lifts his face towards his people, it means that he has given them peace—peace, prosperity, completeness, health, safety, general well-being, and the like. Has it ever occurred to you that peace is largely a negative concept? Negative in the sense that it's more about what we don't have than what we do have. It's described as an absence of things in our lives. It's an absence of war. It's an absence of conflict. It's an absence of strife and quarrel and disruptions, even noise, because don't we say "peace and quiet"? It's often not what we have, but what we don't have. I've mentioned this for probably three Sundays in a row. The Hebrew concept of peace or shalom is this idea of wholeness or completeness. And it conveys a positive notion of blessing, especially that of a relationship with God.

Hebrews chapter 13 verse 20 and following says, "Now may the God of peace, who brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant, equip you with everything good that you may do his will, working in us that which is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen." The God of peace—the God who brings us that wholeness, that completeness, the God with whom we want to be in right relationship. In Ezekiel chapter 37, talking about the new covenant, God says through the prophet Ezekiel, "I will make a covenant of peace with them. It shall be an everlasting covenant with them. And I will set them in their land and multiply them and will set my sanctuary in their midst forevermore. My dwelling place will be with them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Then the nations will know that I am the Lord who sanctifies Israel, when my sanctuary is in their midst forevermore." What is so special about this looking forward to this new covenant blessing—the new covenant that's ratified by the blood of Jesus Christ? It will be a covenant of peace. And the most overarching and significant aspect of this covenant blessing will be the presence of God himself. "I will dwell with them. I will be in their midst." Signifying the fact that the Lord himself is his greatest blessing to his people. The covenant of peace was a never-ending promise that God would dwell with his people forever.

In the Gospel of John, before Jesus is crucified, resurrected, and ascends into heaven, he's talking with his disciples and he's telling them that he's going to go away, that he is going to leave them, that there's going to be a point in the near future when he will no longer be with them. But this was actually good news for two reasons. Number one, he was going to send the Holy Spirit—his Holy Spirit—who would not only dwell with his people but would dwell in his people. And number two, he says that he was going to prepare a place for his followers to dwell with him. And that culminates in John 14:27 when he promises, "Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid." He was going to give them a special peace unlike any that can be offered by any sort of earthly agency or any sort of earthly circumstance. Christ promises that we have a peace that is ours that is special and unique because of our relationship with God—the Holy Spirit himself dwelling in us.

This blessing of God is meant to tell the world truths about God: that he is the God of grace and peace. "The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you. The Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace." It's about God being the source of our joy forever. Once again, this brings us right back to a Christmas connection. It's so great; Christmas gives us all sorts of opportunities to talk about these amazing truths. In Isaiah chapter 7 verse 14, speaking to the prophet Isaiah, the Lord says, "The Lord himself will give you a sign. Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and you shall call his name Immanuel." And Immanuel means "God with us." God himself dwelling with us is going to be the ultimate gift that is given. Christ's giving of himself to redeem sinners—and what that redemption means, what salvation ultimately means—is that there is given to the believer that shalom, that peace that means we are reconciled with God. We're made whole with God. We get God forever. It is yes, the promise of his indwelling Holy Spirit, but it's also promising a future where we literally dwell with him forever—that for those who put their trust in the work of Jesus Christ, who believe that what he did was sufficient to atone for our sins, was sufficient to satisfy the just demands of a holy God, that those who are trusting in that and that alone are promised this eternal peace and this eternal dwelling with God. The gospel means we get the best possible gift for all eternity. We get God himself. That is the ultimate blessing.

In February of 2015, there was a picture and an accompanying video that was released to the world by the Islamic State, and it became sort of iconic for its horrific nature. And it was a picture of 21 ISIS soldiers, all wearing black, standing over 21 Egyptian Coptic construction workers wearing orange jumpsuits. And you know what I'm talking about. You've seen the picture. Twenty of them were actual Egyptians, Coptic Christians. And the 21st individual was from Ghana. And there's some debate as to whether or not he was a Christian prior to his capture or whether he was converted during the time of his imprisonment as a result of the faith of these 20 other Christians. But what all accounts agree on is that prior to his beheading, his execution, his statement—refusing to renounce his faith and embrace Islam—his confession was, "Their God is my God." In a moment like that, where you are facing your end here on earth, God himself is your only comfort. No promise of riches, no promise of earthly joys, nothing like that really is of any significance to you in that moment. And I pray none of us ever has to experience something like that. But we can look to individuals like these 21 men in that circumstance and have the reassurance that they understood the nature of a blessing like this: that even in the face of imminent death, there can be no greater joy and no greater blessing than God himself.

And that's exactly the same conclusion that Asaph came to in Psalm 73. Remember how we began our sermon looking around at all of the seemingly easy living of the wicked, and yet his conclusion in verse 25 is, "Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever." God is my greatest blessing. Even if I don't ever get the good things of this earth, even if I don't ever have material blessing and prosperity and health here on this earth, God in heaven is my greatest possession, is my greatest blessing, is my greatest joy. The wicked may seem to prosper, but God himself is our great blessing.

So let me say to you right here today: May the Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you. May the Lord lift up his countenance toward you and give you peace.

Let's pray. Dear Lord, I thank you so much for this simple but so powerful blessing that you gave to your priests to speak over your people as a reminder that you are their greatest blessing, that their dependence on you was not a liability but actually was a great reward. May you help us to thank you for your abiding presence. May you help us to look forward to our eternal future where we who have put our faith in Jesus Christ have the promise that we will dwell in your presence forever and that there is no greater blessing that we could possess in heaven or on earth than that. May you use that to fill our hearts with joy, to help us to live each day as a gift of joy to you. We ask all this in your name. Amen.