Blessings

 April 6, 2023

“God has blessed me so much!” How often I’ve heard these words; how often I’ve spoken them myself. It’s true. I feel at times like I’ve led a charmed life, except for the fact that such a statement borders on the occult. What is interesting to me is how we use those words to describe situations we deem advantageous. We are blessed if windfall money comes our way, if we narrowly escape an accident, recover from serious illness, or enjoy a healthy family life.

I can’t remember anyone saying they felt blessed when their house burned to the ground, they became disabled from an accident, or were robbed and beaten by a thug. I have heard two people describe their serious illness as a blessing. I recently watched a video of David Ring, an evangelist who was born with cerebral palsy and sees it as God’s gift enabling him to reach people “normal” preachers cannot. My son has described his cancer as a blessing, drawing him closer to Christ than ever before.

But most of the time, difficulties are seen as the work of the devil, or at best, roadblocks God puts in our way to correct us. In what we know as the Beatitudes, Jesus redefines “blessing” for us.

“Blessed are you poor… 

Blessed are you who hunger now… 

Blessed are you who weep now…

Blessed are you when men hate you, 

And when they exclude you, 

And revile you, and cast out your name as evil, 

For the Son of Man’s sake.”

—Luke 6:20-22 

When was the last time you considered ridicule, ostracism, criticism, and slander to be a blessing? Jesus’ way of looking at life is quite different from ours. Much of contemporary Christian teaching extols the “blessings” of prosperity, of success and popularity. Being a laughingstock, getting assaulted for standing up for the unborn, or targeted for simply stating biological fact that DNA is what determines one’s sex, while it may be considered a badge of Christian honor, it’s rarely seen as a blessing. 

I am grateful for the blessings that encourage and edify me, but I am also praying to be able to see more clearly as Jesus sees, and to look for the kind of blessings of which he spoke .