Genesis 12:1-3; 27 (selected); Sept. 20, 2009
James 3:5b-12
“The Power of the Blessing, Part 2”
Rev. Meagan M. Boozer
Last week I started a five-part series of sermons on the Power of the Blessing. We learned that some form of the word ‘bless’ is found 64 times in Genesis, the first book of the Bible, with the first 2 occurrences coming in the very first chapter. It is obvious that the words and action of ‘blessing’ is an important one to God, and therefore should also be important to us as God’s people.
When I talk about blessing here, let’s be clear what I’m not talking about: I’m not talking about what we say around the table before we eat, and I’m not talking about something that ‘blesses’ us. Surely I’ve said these words, “That was such a blessing to me.” You’ve probably said something like that, too. I’m also not talking about what we say when someone sneezes, “God bless you!” The biblical concept of blessing is not nearly as diverse as the ways we use the word; the biblical concept of blessing is specific.
Last week I tossed out two words to help us understand the biblical teaching of ‘blessing’: capacity and result. I didn’t come up with those words on my own - I discovered them in Dr. Walter Kaiser, Jr.’s book, Toward an Old Testament Theology. In his book, Dr. Kaiser quoted Johannes Pedersen’s words about the blessing in his book, Israel: Its Life and Culture. I had Dr. Kaiser’s book, but not Pedersen’s book – however because I had to go to Gettysburg Seminary several weeks ago to meet with the internship program coordinator and Dennis Dillman, our potential pastoral intern, I was able to find Johannes Pederson’s book in the seminary library. I am so glad I did! Listen and learn with me from p. 182, “The soul is a whole saturated with power. It is the same power which acts in the centre and far out in the periphery, as far as the soul extends. It makes the soul grow and prosper, in order that it may maintain itself and do its work in the world. This vital power, without which no living being can exist, is called by the Israelites b’rakha, blessing. The Israelite does not distinguish between the power, as it acts in the soul, and as it manifests itself outwardly. For him the capacity and the result is the same: where the capacity exists, the result of its action is a matter of course. The blessing, therefore, means at the same time something internal and something external.”
Last week I used the example of John’s truck to help us understand this in a very practical way. If you’re a truck, you have a specific bed length: short, standard, or long. If you have a short bed, you have less capacity than if you have a long bed, right? As a pastor, I am concerned that many of us, though we may be followers of Jesus, and therefore have the gift of the power of the Holy Spirit living within us, are living a short-bed life. I know that many of us are struggling in our lives because we allow the troubles of the world to overcome the truth that WE HAVE BEEN BLESSED by God. We are blessed. In Genesis 1:28, we read: “Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness…” “God blessed them, and God said to them ‘Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.’
God has never withdrawn or cancelled the blessing he spoke over humankind. We are a blessed people, made fully obvious in the life, death, and resurrection of the Son of God, our Savior, Jesus Christ! God has placed within each of us an overflowing capacity to be life-givers, to speak out of our fullness into the lives of others, rather than be life-suckers, (those who drain the life out of us), speaking only out of what we perceive as the scarcity, or the emptiness of our lives.
Folks, there is incredible power in our words. We can, with our words, be part of God’s creative work of calling forth significance in another person’s life, or we can be part of the devil’s destructive work, and shut down each other’s enormous possibilities. We don’t hear people walking around saying, “Oh, if someone would just speak words of blessing in my life,” but we all yearn for it. Listen to the following Scriptures with me, starting with several blessing accounts from the Old Testament.
Genesis 12:1-3 Now the LORD said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. 2I will make of you a great nation (capacity=great), and I will bless you, and make your name great (capacity), so that (result) you will be a blessing. 3I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” The Lord called forth greatness in Abram, and through him, called forth a blessed people who would be fruitful (life-givers) and multiply those who would continue to pass on God’s blessing.
Genesis 27 (selected) 1When Isaac was old and his eyes were dim so that he could not see, he called his elder son Esau and said to him, “My son”; and he answered, “Here I am.” 2He said, “See, I am old; I do not know the day of my death. 3Now then, take your weapons, your quiver and your bow, and go out to the field, and hunt game for me. 4Then prepare for me savory food, such as I like, and bring it to me to eat, so that I may bless you before I die.” (What follows in the chapter is the account of how Jacob, the younger son, tricked his father into giving him, the younger son, the blessing instead, with the help of his mother. Then we pick the story back up.)
30As soon as Isaac had finished blessing Jacob, when Jacob had scarcely gone out from the presence of his father Isaac, his brother Esau came in from his hunting. 31He also prepared savory food, and brought it to his father. And he said to his father, “Let my father sit up and eat of his son’s game, so that you may bless me.” 32His father Isaac said to him, “Who are you?” He answered, “I am your firstborn son, Esau.” 33Then Isaac trembled violently, and said, “Who was it then that hunted game and brought it to me, and I ate it all before you came, and I have blessed him?—yes, and blessed he shall be!” 34When Esau heard his father’s words, he cried out with an exceedingly great and bitter cry, and said to his father, “Bless me, me also, father!” . . . 38Esau said to his father, “Have you only one blessing, father? Bless me, me also, father!”
It is obvious that there was incredible weight and power in the words of the blessing, wasn’t there? Esau was absolutely devastated.
What can we learn here? Well, one thing we can learn is this: children desperately desire the blessing from their parents, and most particularly as seen from the Isaac, Jacob, & Esau account, children long for the blessing of the father.
Unfortunately, throughout all of history, many, many children grow up without parental blessing. Many children grow up with parents who only seem to emphasize what the child can’t do, instead of calling forth the best within them.
In a book I’ve been using in my sermon preparation, I read the following, “In a family in Maryland with three daughters, the oldest describes the immediate impact of receiving their father’s blessing: “He sits us in a circle and puts his hands on ours and prays a blessing individually on each of my sisters, my mother and me. He asks God to give me strength and wisdom because I am a leader; he prays that I will lead my younger siblings in the right direction, along with the children and teenagers in our church. He then prays a blessing on my sister, who is fourteen – that she won’t follow the wrong crowd and that she would always have a sweet spirit. He prays that my eleven-year-old sister will follow the right crowd and that she will have a servant’s spirit, willing to help out in any area of the home and the church. Every time my father gets through blessing us, the most amazing thing happens. My sisters and I don’t quarrel! My eleven-year-old sister will hug me and tell me that she loves me. I do the same to her. Before being blessed, we would never do that! My sisters and I are getting closer and closer, and our family devotions have more meaning.”
Parents who walk consistently with the Lord (not just coming to church on Sundays, but who follow Jesus every day), and who verbally bless their children from a sincere spirit of love often see an immediate impact. And this is not just for parents of young children and youth – this is for parents with children of all ages – and this is for all of us who are part of the family of God – because we have children as part of our family, don’t we? Why else do we remember the teacher, or the coach, or the pastor, or the aunt or uncle who said something to us as kids that brought forth hopes and dreams and the very best in us? We remember those people, we remember those moments. Here’s another story about the author of the book, The Power of Spoken Blessings,” that I think will help us understand. “When I was about 10 years old, I was rowing on a lake one day with a neighbor boy. He wasn’t a believer, and there in the boat I began telling him how to become a Christian. He didn’t seem at all interested. My effort seemed futile. A few days later however, my father told me, “Billy, I hear that you witnessed to your friend at the lake.” I wondered how he knew, since I hadn’t mentioned it to anyone. Apparently the boy informed his mother, who must have told my parents. “Yes,” I answered my father. Then he said, “You are a real little soul-winner!” I knew that my father’s greatest love was leading people to Christ, so his description honored me from my head down to my shoes. I also knew I was unworthy of it, since I didn’t actually lead the boy to salvation. I remember clearly thinking, I’m not worthy of this title, but if I keep growing in the Lord, maybe one day I will be. My father’s words that day represented such a decisive moment for me that I vividly recall the details of when he uttered them. We were in our green Chrysler, going west on Hillgrove Avenue, with only the two of us in the car. I was in the backseat, and I can still see the slight turn of his head as he spoke over his shoulder to me. Empowered by his statement, I began looking for opportunities to bring my friends to gospel meetings. Later, in high school, I made it my goal to explain the gospel to every student. After graduation I began door-to-door witnessing in a small town, and then God used me to lead young Chicago gang members to Christ. I can trace everything that has flowed from my ministry through the years back to that simple word of blessing from my father.”
Here’s what I want you to remember from today:
God blessed humanity – that includes you and me. God has blessed us from the beginning of time by creating us with a capacity to partner with him in calling forth abundant LIFE from the people he places in our lives (be fruitful and multiply…);
Some of us grew up with parents who understood their humanity, but never possessed the awareness of God’s blessing in their lives. Some of us grew up with parents who only knew the short-bed way of living, and so they were incapable of calling forth long-bed living from their children. A lack of parental blessing however, DOES NOT LIMIT the son or daughter to short-bed living. Deep inside, we think it does. Deep down, when we miss the blessing from our father or our mother, we feel unworthy, unloved, unappreciated, dissatisfied, sort-of irritated by life, lonely, and lost. No amount or type of success fixes that for us. The devil wants those who have never received the blessing from their parents to continue that lack-luster legacy. But you can break out! You CAN begin to realize a greater capacity for love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control than you think is possible! I AM LIVING PROOF! I did not receive the blessing from my father. Ever. I know he loved me, but he didn’t show it very well – and he surely didn’t have a clue how to pass on a father’s blessing. I know he never received it from his father. I know that I never received the blessing from my mom until the day I was ordained as a minister. That was only 10 years ago when I was in my early 40’s. But I was passing on the blessing way before that! YOU can live a full capacity life even if you missed the parental blessing!
We must start TODAY helping people around us become aware of God’s blessing in their lives. We do that by the words we choose to say. Proverbs 16:24, “Pleasant words are like a honeycomb, sweetness to the soul and health to the body.”
Listen to the following scriptures with me, please:
James wrote in 3:5b-12 the following, “How great a forest is set ablaze by a small fire! 6And the tongue is a fire. The tongue is placed among our members as a world of iniquity; it stains the whole body, sets on fire the cycle of nature, and is itself set on fire by hell. 7For every species of beast and bird, of reptile and sea creature, can be tamed and has been tamed by the human species, 8but no one can tame the tongue—a restless evil, full of deadly poison. 9With it we bless the Lord and Father, and with it we curse those who are made in the likeness of God. 10From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this ought not to be so. 11Does a spring pour forth from the same opening both fresh and brackish water? 12Can a fig tree, my brothers and sisters, yield olives, or a grapevine figs? No more can salt water yield fresh.”
Jesus said, as recorded in Luke 6:45, “The good person out of the good treasure of the heart produces good, and the evil person out of evil treasure produces evil; for it is out of the abundance of the heart that the mouth speaks.”
So here’s the thing: It all comes back to our own hearts. It all comes back to whether we have chosen to receive, or should I say received and possessed for ourselves the reality of the blessing from God. It is when we have truly gotten that, that blessings begin to flow from our softened hearts into the lives of others. It’s the short-bed to the long-bed transition!
Parents who have children & youth still living in your household, may I plead with you today? Bless your children, bless and do not curse. Call forth the best in them, and the result will be that the best in you emerges as well.
Let us pray: O God, gracious & merciful God, thank you for blessing us in spoken word, and in the word made flesh, Jesus Christ. Nothing compares with that! Nothing can cancel our blessing in Christ! Thank you. Heavenly Father, for those who have never received the parental blessing, I pray that you would help them find freedom from their disappointment. I pray that you would fill them with an overwhelming assurance of your approval, of your love, of your power that lives within them. I pray that those who need to forgive, would forgive completely. I pray that you would help us bless those who have hurt us, neglected us, persecuted us, and even cursed us. Let us not be those who, out of the same mouth, speak blessings over one, and curses over another. May we be life-givers by our words and our deeds – calling forth the greatest capacity and eternal results. In Jesus’ name we pray, Amen.
James 3:5b-12
“The Power of the Blessing, Part 2”
Rev. Meagan M. Boozer
Last week I started a five-part series of sermons on the Power of the Blessing. We learned that some form of the word ‘bless’ is found 64 times in Genesis, the first book of the Bible, with the first 2 occurrences coming in the very first chapter. It is obvious that the words and action of ‘blessing’ is an important one to God, and therefore should also be important to us as God’s people.
When I talk about blessing here, let’s be clear what I’m not talking about: I’m not talking about what we say around the table before we eat, and I’m not talking about something that ‘blesses’ us. Surely I’ve said these words, “That was such a blessing to me.” You’ve probably said something like that, too. I’m also not talking about what we say when someone sneezes, “God bless you!” The biblical concept of blessing is not nearly as diverse as the ways we use the word; the biblical concept of blessing is specific.
Last week I tossed out two words to help us understand the biblical teaching of ‘blessing’: capacity and result. I didn’t come up with those words on my own - I discovered them in Dr. Walter Kaiser, Jr.’s book, Toward an Old Testament Theology. In his book, Dr. Kaiser quoted Johannes Pedersen’s words about the blessing in his book, Israel: Its Life and Culture. I had Dr. Kaiser’s book, but not Pedersen’s book – however because I had to go to Gettysburg Seminary several weeks ago to meet with the internship program coordinator and Dennis Dillman, our potential pastoral intern, I was able to find Johannes Pederson’s book in the seminary library. I am so glad I did! Listen and learn with me from p. 182, “The soul is a whole saturated with power. It is the same power which acts in the centre and far out in the periphery, as far as the soul extends. It makes the soul grow and prosper, in order that it may maintain itself and do its work in the world. This vital power, without which no living being can exist, is called by the Israelites b’rakha, blessing. The Israelite does not distinguish between the power, as it acts in the soul, and as it manifests itself outwardly. For him the capacity and the result is the same: where the capacity exists, the result of its action is a matter of course. The blessing, therefore, means at the same time something internal and something external.”
Last week I used the example of John’s truck to help us understand this in a very practical way. If you’re a truck, you have a specific bed length: short, standard, or long. If you have a short bed, you have less capacity than if you have a long bed, right? As a pastor, I am concerned that many of us, though we may be followers of Jesus, and therefore have the gift of the power of the Holy Spirit living within us, are living a short-bed life. I know that many of us are struggling in our lives because we allow the troubles of the world to overcome the truth that WE HAVE BEEN BLESSED by God. We are blessed. In Genesis 1:28, we read: “Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness…” “God blessed them, and God said to them ‘Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.’
God has never withdrawn or cancelled the blessing he spoke over humankind. We are a blessed people, made fully obvious in the life, death, and resurrection of the Son of God, our Savior, Jesus Christ! God has placed within each of us an overflowing capacity to be life-givers, to speak out of our fullness into the lives of others, rather than be life-suckers, (those who drain the life out of us), speaking only out of what we perceive as the scarcity, or the emptiness of our lives.
Folks, there is incredible power in our words. We can, with our words, be part of God’s creative work of calling forth significance in another person’s life, or we can be part of the devil’s destructive work, and shut down each other’s enormous possibilities. We don’t hear people walking around saying, “Oh, if someone would just speak words of blessing in my life,” but we all yearn for it. Listen to the following Scriptures with me, starting with several blessing accounts from the Old Testament.
Genesis 12:1-3 Now the LORD said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. 2I will make of you a great nation (capacity=great), and I will bless you, and make your name great (capacity), so that (result) you will be a blessing. 3I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” The Lord called forth greatness in Abram, and through him, called forth a blessed people who would be fruitful (life-givers) and multiply those who would continue to pass on God’s blessing.
Genesis 27 (selected) 1When Isaac was old and his eyes were dim so that he could not see, he called his elder son Esau and said to him, “My son”; and he answered, “Here I am.” 2He said, “See, I am old; I do not know the day of my death. 3Now then, take your weapons, your quiver and your bow, and go out to the field, and hunt game for me. 4Then prepare for me savory food, such as I like, and bring it to me to eat, so that I may bless you before I die.” (What follows in the chapter is the account of how Jacob, the younger son, tricked his father into giving him, the younger son, the blessing instead, with the help of his mother. Then we pick the story back up.)
30As soon as Isaac had finished blessing Jacob, when Jacob had scarcely gone out from the presence of his father Isaac, his brother Esau came in from his hunting. 31He also prepared savory food, and brought it to his father. And he said to his father, “Let my father sit up and eat of his son’s game, so that you may bless me.” 32His father Isaac said to him, “Who are you?” He answered, “I am your firstborn son, Esau.” 33Then Isaac trembled violently, and said, “Who was it then that hunted game and brought it to me, and I ate it all before you came, and I have blessed him?—yes, and blessed he shall be!” 34When Esau heard his father’s words, he cried out with an exceedingly great and bitter cry, and said to his father, “Bless me, me also, father!” . . . 38Esau said to his father, “Have you only one blessing, father? Bless me, me also, father!”
It is obvious that there was incredible weight and power in the words of the blessing, wasn’t there? Esau was absolutely devastated.
What can we learn here? Well, one thing we can learn is this: children desperately desire the blessing from their parents, and most particularly as seen from the Isaac, Jacob, & Esau account, children long for the blessing of the father.
Unfortunately, throughout all of history, many, many children grow up without parental blessing. Many children grow up with parents who only seem to emphasize what the child can’t do, instead of calling forth the best within them.
In a book I’ve been using in my sermon preparation, I read the following, “In a family in Maryland with three daughters, the oldest describes the immediate impact of receiving their father’s blessing: “He sits us in a circle and puts his hands on ours and prays a blessing individually on each of my sisters, my mother and me. He asks God to give me strength and wisdom because I am a leader; he prays that I will lead my younger siblings in the right direction, along with the children and teenagers in our church. He then prays a blessing on my sister, who is fourteen – that she won’t follow the wrong crowd and that she would always have a sweet spirit. He prays that my eleven-year-old sister will follow the right crowd and that she will have a servant’s spirit, willing to help out in any area of the home and the church. Every time my father gets through blessing us, the most amazing thing happens. My sisters and I don’t quarrel! My eleven-year-old sister will hug me and tell me that she loves me. I do the same to her. Before being blessed, we would never do that! My sisters and I are getting closer and closer, and our family devotions have more meaning.”
Parents who walk consistently with the Lord (not just coming to church on Sundays, but who follow Jesus every day), and who verbally bless their children from a sincere spirit of love often see an immediate impact. And this is not just for parents of young children and youth – this is for parents with children of all ages – and this is for all of us who are part of the family of God – because we have children as part of our family, don’t we? Why else do we remember the teacher, or the coach, or the pastor, or the aunt or uncle who said something to us as kids that brought forth hopes and dreams and the very best in us? We remember those people, we remember those moments. Here’s another story about the author of the book, The Power of Spoken Blessings,” that I think will help us understand. “When I was about 10 years old, I was rowing on a lake one day with a neighbor boy. He wasn’t a believer, and there in the boat I began telling him how to become a Christian. He didn’t seem at all interested. My effort seemed futile. A few days later however, my father told me, “Billy, I hear that you witnessed to your friend at the lake.” I wondered how he knew, since I hadn’t mentioned it to anyone. Apparently the boy informed his mother, who must have told my parents. “Yes,” I answered my father. Then he said, “You are a real little soul-winner!” I knew that my father’s greatest love was leading people to Christ, so his description honored me from my head down to my shoes. I also knew I was unworthy of it, since I didn’t actually lead the boy to salvation. I remember clearly thinking, I’m not worthy of this title, but if I keep growing in the Lord, maybe one day I will be. My father’s words that day represented such a decisive moment for me that I vividly recall the details of when he uttered them. We were in our green Chrysler, going west on Hillgrove Avenue, with only the two of us in the car. I was in the backseat, and I can still see the slight turn of his head as he spoke over his shoulder to me. Empowered by his statement, I began looking for opportunities to bring my friends to gospel meetings. Later, in high school, I made it my goal to explain the gospel to every student. After graduation I began door-to-door witnessing in a small town, and then God used me to lead young Chicago gang members to Christ. I can trace everything that has flowed from my ministry through the years back to that simple word of blessing from my father.”
Here’s what I want you to remember from today:
God blessed humanity – that includes you and me. God has blessed us from the beginning of time by creating us with a capacity to partner with him in calling forth abundant LIFE from the people he places in our lives (be fruitful and multiply…);
Some of us grew up with parents who understood their humanity, but never possessed the awareness of God’s blessing in their lives. Some of us grew up with parents who only knew the short-bed way of living, and so they were incapable of calling forth long-bed living from their children. A lack of parental blessing however, DOES NOT LIMIT the son or daughter to short-bed living. Deep inside, we think it does. Deep down, when we miss the blessing from our father or our mother, we feel unworthy, unloved, unappreciated, dissatisfied, sort-of irritated by life, lonely, and lost. No amount or type of success fixes that for us. The devil wants those who have never received the blessing from their parents to continue that lack-luster legacy. But you can break out! You CAN begin to realize a greater capacity for love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control than you think is possible! I AM LIVING PROOF! I did not receive the blessing from my father. Ever. I know he loved me, but he didn’t show it very well – and he surely didn’t have a clue how to pass on a father’s blessing. I know he never received it from his father. I know that I never received the blessing from my mom until the day I was ordained as a minister. That was only 10 years ago when I was in my early 40’s. But I was passing on the blessing way before that! YOU can live a full capacity life even if you missed the parental blessing!
We must start TODAY helping people around us become aware of God’s blessing in their lives. We do that by the words we choose to say. Proverbs 16:24, “Pleasant words are like a honeycomb, sweetness to the soul and health to the body.”
Listen to the following scriptures with me, please:
James wrote in 3:5b-12 the following, “How great a forest is set ablaze by a small fire! 6And the tongue is a fire. The tongue is placed among our members as a world of iniquity; it stains the whole body, sets on fire the cycle of nature, and is itself set on fire by hell. 7For every species of beast and bird, of reptile and sea creature, can be tamed and has been tamed by the human species, 8but no one can tame the tongue—a restless evil, full of deadly poison. 9With it we bless the Lord and Father, and with it we curse those who are made in the likeness of God. 10From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers and sisters, this ought not to be so. 11Does a spring pour forth from the same opening both fresh and brackish water? 12Can a fig tree, my brothers and sisters, yield olives, or a grapevine figs? No more can salt water yield fresh.”
Jesus said, as recorded in Luke 6:45, “The good person out of the good treasure of the heart produces good, and the evil person out of evil treasure produces evil; for it is out of the abundance of the heart that the mouth speaks.”
So here’s the thing: It all comes back to our own hearts. It all comes back to whether we have chosen to receive, or should I say received and possessed for ourselves the reality of the blessing from God. It is when we have truly gotten that, that blessings begin to flow from our softened hearts into the lives of others. It’s the short-bed to the long-bed transition!
Parents who have children & youth still living in your household, may I plead with you today? Bless your children, bless and do not curse. Call forth the best in them, and the result will be that the best in you emerges as well.
Let us pray: O God, gracious & merciful God, thank you for blessing us in spoken word, and in the word made flesh, Jesus Christ. Nothing compares with that! Nothing can cancel our blessing in Christ! Thank you. Heavenly Father, for those who have never received the parental blessing, I pray that you would help them find freedom from their disappointment. I pray that you would fill them with an overwhelming assurance of your approval, of your love, of your power that lives within them. I pray that those who need to forgive, would forgive completely. I pray that you would help us bless those who have hurt us, neglected us, persecuted us, and even cursed us. Let us not be those who, out of the same mouth, speak blessings over one, and curses over another. May we be life-givers by our words and our deeds – calling forth the greatest capacity and eternal results. In Jesus’ name we pray, Amen.
