Numbers chapter 6 verses 24 through 26. Some
of you may have heard this passage before. It's
a pretty popular passage. It's a passage that
I read at just about every wedding I do. It's
a good closing passage. It's a good blessing.
That's what this passage is. It was a part of
God's command to the priest in the Old Testament
that this is how the priest were to bless God's
people. And what a beautiful... few verses I
think this is for us to look at today. So we'll
read through it and then we'll pray and then
we'll talk. Numbers chapter 6 verse 24. May the
Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord cause
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. God we thank
you for being good to us. We thank you for the
freedom we have today to be in this place. I
thank you for the people who are here today,
dear Lord. We come today and we seek you because
we need you, God. We praise you because you're
good. We seek you because life is hard. And so,
God, I pray that your Holy Spirit would just
be among us this morning. I pray that you free
us from the distractions and the worries and
the things of this world, but that in these...
few minutes, God, that we would just feel your
presence in a mighty way, that we would be encouraged
by that, God, that we would feel your blessings
today, that we would recognize the many blessings
that you give us in our life. So I pray, God,
that every word that comes from my mouth will
be for your glory. Take away any pride or fear
that's within me and let the Holy Spirit take
control of us this morning. And I ask these things
in Jesus' name. Amen. What a beautiful blessing
that God's priests were to speak unto God's people.
And in some way, we make it loosely say that
a blessing is kind of like a prayer in a sense,
and praying for the goodness and the protection
and the grace to be bestowed on someone. And
so, in that sense, the priests were kind of praying
for these people that God would bless them. But
what does it mean to experience the blessing
of God? I think sometimes when we think of being
blessed, we may tend to think of materialistic
things. And that's not a mistake, by the way.
The things that we have are blessings from God.
If we've got a little money, a little food to
eat, some clothes to wear, those things are certainly
blessings from God. But God's blessings are far
greater than the things that we wear. God's blessing
is far greater than the money that's in our bank
account. God's blessing is far greater than the
material things that we see. If we really are
blessed by God, then we experience the peace
of God and the grace of God in ways that really
begins to transform our lives and work in our
lives and brings us a certain joy that the things
of the world can never bring us. blessed by god
and to be living in that blessing well i think
jesus gives us a good example of that in matthew
chapter 5 if you want to turn there this little
section we're going to look at today is often
referred to as the beatitudes jesus gives us
this beautiful list of of The blessed and really
what it means for them. What does it mean to
be blessed? If you've never read through the
Sermon on the Mount, that's Matthew 5 through
7. That's some good homework for you this week.
But in Matthew chapter 5, starting in verse 3,
listen to what Jesus says. Blessed are the poor
in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are those who mourn. Blessed are those
who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for
they shall be filled. Blessed are the merciful,
for they shall obtain mercy. Blessed are the
pure in heart, for they shall see God. Blessed
are the peacemakers, for they shall be called
sons of God. Blessed are those who are persecuted
for righteousness' sake. for theirs is the kingdom
of heaven. Blessed are you when they revile and
persecute you and say all kinds of evil things
against you falsely for my name's sake. Rejoice
and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward
in heaven. For so they persecuted the prophets
who were before you. What are the things that
Jesus said accompany those who are blessed? It's
comfort. It's peace. It's mercy. It's these types
of things. It's a filling with righteousness.
It's not a materialistic gain that Jesus is speaking
of here. In fact, Jesus is not speaking of all
good in our life through blessing. He even closes
this section by saying, even in the worst of
days, if you are living for me and people are
attacking you because of that, Jesus says you
are still great. Blessed are you and your reward
in heaven for those who would seek me. Blessed
are those who are poor in spirit, for theirs
will be the kingdom of God. And these are the
kind of things that accompany blessing. So many
times in our world, we get so caught up in seeking
the material and the worldly. And we think that
that's where our joy is going to come from. But
oftentimes, the things that we may consider as
blessings may very well be a curse. Some of you
have probably heard this. In Liberty last week,
we had somebody that won the lottery. That's
pretty incredible. Some of you are probably saying,
I wish I could win the lottery. They won a million
dollars, as best I can understand, and that's
pretty incredible. And some may say, what a blessing.
And in some way, it is a blessing. But perhaps
in another way, it's a curse. I was reading about
lottery winners this week. I was curious. I know
that lottery winners usually don't hold the money
for very long. Within five years, 70 % of people
who win the lottery have lost everything. 70%.
People that's won hundreds of millions of dollars,
70 % of them within five years have lost everything.
I was reading one story of a gentleman who won
$325 million. Can you imagine what that would
be like to go from just your normal wages to
having $325 million? We think, man, I wish I
could do that. What a blessing that would be.
But you know what he said? He said, I wish I'd
never cashed that ticket in. He said, it ruined
my life. He said, I wish I were to tore it up.
Since he had won the lottery, things had gone
downhill. He had lost a child and another family
member to drugs that occurred through all the
excess money that they had living a wild life.
And it had cost him greatly. And so sometimes
the things that we may consider to be blessings
are actually curses. Perhaps some of the situations
that we go through in life, things that are hardships
that we don't understand. And some of you have
stories like this. You go through life and something
bad happens and you lose a job and you say, man,
God, things are tough. What am I going to do?
I lost my job. And in the moment, we don't consider
things like that a blessing. And then lo and
behold, what happens? You get a better job. There
are so many things in our life that in the moment
we don't realize that God is blessing us, but
we have to realize that wherever we are today,
God is good. And we may not always see the blessing
of God, but you need to know today that God loves
you. And that God never promises us that life
is going to be easy. He never promises us...
health and wealth that everything is going to
be great and our pocketbooks will be full and
i know that there are a lot of people that preach
that message today but i just don't think that
that is the message that jesus christ preaches
And there's so many today that teach that the
blessings of God are the things of this world.
And if you don't have the things of this world,
you don't have the blessings of God because you're
not seeking Him. And I can tell you the secret
to getting all the things of God if you would
just buy my book, Hope, Faith, and Wealth, The
Secret to Success, for $29 .95. That's often
the message you hear. People that say, I want
to tell you of the blessings of God. I want to
tell you of the goodness of God. And I'm going
to tell you in this book. And once you get through
with this, I'm going to want you to buy my other
book. And the blessings of God are not for sale.
The blessings of God are free. And the blessings
of God don't just come in the material things,
but the true blessings of God come through the
comfort and the peace and the joy and knowing
that we are forgiven and loved by God and have
a place with Him for all of eternity in heaven.
Those are the blessings of God. And those are
not secret and those are not for sale. They have
been paid for by Jesus Christ. And what a beautiful,
beautiful prayer blessing that we see in Numbers
chapter 6, verses 24 through 26. May the Lord
bless you and keep you. Some of your translations
may say something like protect you. That's what
it means there. May the Lord watch over you and
take care of you. Is that not what we desire
in our life? In this hectic world that we live
in and our stress and our pain and our losing
our job and our health problems and our money
problems and our marital problems and all of
our problems and the chaos and the wickedness
in the world. Don't we desire? protection? Don't
we desire some comfort? Don't we desire some
shelter and to feel safe? And that's what this
is. God, bless us and protect us. Take care of
us, dear Lord. May the Lord cause his face to
shine upon you and be gracious to you. Boy, the
grace of God is a powerful thing. There are so
many times in our life that we blow it. And by
blow it, that's a Kind of a nice way to say we
sin greatly. We do some really wicked stuff.
There are times in our life that we... feel like
such failures, and we are such failures in some
sense. We have done some evil and wicked things,
and we have sinned against God, and we have hurt
people that we love, our spouses, our children,
our friends. We have just done evil things that
we, even now as they come into our mind, we cringe
to think that we ever did and do some of the
things that we do. And that is a horrible place
to be, is drowning. in the midst of all of that
sinfulness it is a painful and scary place to
be it's like jonah when he was in the whale in
the darkness and and it was dark and and he was
overcome by seaweeds and wrapped up and he and
he thought his life was coming to an end but
yet once more he said i'm going to call to the
lord in my distress So many times our sin, as
we talked about a few weeks ago, it just entangles
in us and it's got us wrapped up and it's dragging
us down. And so many times we feel like we're
in a place where we're too far gone and we even
come to church and we sit on a pew and we know
God's word is good, but we just feel like I'm
just too far gone. But the solution to that problem
is the grace of God. That God has looked at you.
And God knows that you are a hot mess. He knows
that your life is full of sin. He knows that
you have done some things that you don't even
want to think about. But even still, God's grace
is good. What a beautiful blessing of God's graciousness.
God, let your face shine down upon me. God, don't
turn your face from me and my wickedness as David
says in the song. God, please look upon me and
have mercy on me. God, let me experience your
grace. And there is no greater feeling in this
life, not a greater feeling in this life, than
the moment you pray to God and seek him. And
through Jesus Christ, you can know that your
sins are forgiven and that you have received
the grace of God, that your sin is not held against
you anymore. That your sin has been taken care
of. Yeah, you still hurt people in the past.
Well, go make up those relationships. Go apologize
to those people. Go ask those people to forgive
you. Go show people the love that God has shown
you. Go say, look, I'm a new man. I'm a new woman.
That God has changed my heart and changed my
life. And I've experienced the grace of God.
And I was a horrible, wicked man. I was a horrible,
wicked woman. But God has touched me. And I've
experienced the joy of God. And I live in the
comfort of God. and I'm blessed by God. I can
guarantee you that that feeling of grace and
joy and comfort that comes from the Lord will
far surpass any material blessings you can ever
gain. It's a beautiful thing to live in the grace
of God. When we live in the grace of God and
are content with God, then everything else kind
of falls by the wayside. Even the greatest things
that we are up against in this world seem like
nothing to us. In 2 Corinthians chapter 4, Paul
talks about his momentary light afflictions.
And then when you flip to 2 Corinthians chapter
12, he goes through and he lists some of his
momentary light afflictions. It's beatings, it's
imprisonments, it's stonings. And yet Paul calls
these things momentary light afflictions. How
can he do that? Because he's living in the grace
of God. He's living in the comfort of God. He's
living in the joy of God. And so Paul says these
momentary light afflictions, they pale in comparison
to the glory that I will one day experience in
the presence of God. That is the blessing of
God. Verse 26. May the Lord lift up his countenance
toward you. And give you peace. God, would you
just look upon me? Would you smile down upon
me, dear Lord? And would you give me peace? I've
said this many times. But that's what we really
desire in life. We just desire peace. We desire
peace. And it is peace that the Lord gives us
and the Lord alone. That's what our world needs
today. Our world is in so much chaos. There are
so many people that are living in so much wickedness
and doing so much and battling so much. And some
of us here today, we can relate to that in our
own lives. But what we really desire is just
peace. But so many times we look for peace in
the wrong places. We're looking for peace in
the chaos. We're going out into all of the world
and all of the things the world offers, and it's
just chaos and evil and wickedness, and we're
trying to find peace there. And we're trying
everything the world tells us to try, and there's
no peace. And we're looking everywhere the world
says, and there's no peace. And that's because
peace comes through Jesus Christ alone. Maybe
you're looking for peace in your life today.
Maybe you've tried the ways of the world. You
have not found peace. Maybe for a moment. Maybe
a momentary something that seems like peace but
it's always fleeting. It doesn't last. It's because
you're looking in the wrong place. But if we
would come to Jesus, all of us who are weary
and burdened, Jesus will give us rest. The blessing
of God is... It's His protection. It's His grace.
It's His peace. When we're living in the blessing
of God, everything else falls by the wayside.
What about you today? Are you seeking protection
and grace and peace in your life? Are you longing
for something better than what the world has
to offer? I will tell you today, it's only found
in Jesus Christ. That God so loved the world,
He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever
believeth in Him shall not perish, but have eternal
life, but have eternal peace. Let's pray. God,
I thank You today for being good to us. I thank
You for the goodness of Your Word, dear Lord.
So oftentimes we are... led astray by the ways
of the world. So oftentimes, dear Lord, we're
deceived on what your blessing is, dear Lord,
maybe, but God, let us not seek material gain
as blessing from you, dear Lord. That shouldn't
be our only motivation, dear Lord. Maybe you
bless us in those ways, but God, let us be blessed
by knowing who you are, by trusting in Jesus
Christ and by living in accordance to your words.
God, I pray that you'd bless the people who are
here today. God, I pray that you would just look
upon them today wherever they are, dear Lord.
I pray that you'd bless the ones who are struggling
with sin. I pray that you'd bless the broken
marriages and the broken relationships with family.
I pray that you'd bless those that just struggle
with work and with school. God, I pray that you'd
bless those who who struggle with anxiety and
fear and worry. God, I pray that you just bless
our nation, that you would help us to be a people
who would seek you. God, I pray that you'd pour
your grace out on us this morning. I pray that
you would help people to be encouraged today,
dear Lord, that maybe they come in here with
a lot on their heart. And I pray, God, that through
Jesus Christ, they would seek you today and that
that burden would be removed. I pray that you
would just encourage them and give them joy today,
God, that you would bless their heart, that they
would seek you, dear Lord, that they would seek
your righteousness today and they would be filled.
God, that if their spirit is broken and poor
today, that they would come to you and that they
would enter into your kingdom, God. God, I pray
for those who know that they have struggled with
sin. God, they would receive your mercy today
and be merciful to others. God, I pray that we
would just know the blessing that is grace and
eternal life and forgiveness of sins. God, I
pray that you just bless each one here today,
that you would give them peace. If just for a
moment, dear Lord, a moment of peace in your
presence is a powerful thing. So I pray in these
few moments, dear Lord, that we would seek you,
each one of us, that we would pray to you, that
we would ask for your forgiveness, that we would
praise you, dear Lord, that we would confess
our sins to you, that we would open our hearts,
God, that we would ask you to forgive our sins,
that you would protect us today. Give us grace
and give us peace. God bless these people. And
I ask these things in Jesus' name. Amen.