Blessed

You will experience all these blessings if you obey the LORD your God:

Your towns and your fields

will be blessed.

Your children and your crops

will be blessed. . . .

Wherever you go and whatever you do,

you will be blessed. Deuteronomy 28:2-4, 6

THE BLESSING OF GOD —that’s what we really want for ourselves, our families, children, businesses, and endeavors. And from the beginning of the Bible, where we read about the Creator blessing all that he had made, we understand that the orientation of God is to bless his people. When God’s people came out of slavery in Egypt, God met them at Sinai and gave them his loving law. Every command came with a blessing that would be theirs if they obeyed that command. And at the end of Deuteronomy, as Moses spoke to the next generation preparing to enter into the land of Canaan, he called on them to obey God’s law, reminding them of God’s promise that if they would obey, they would be blessed. Their children, too, would be blessed. Everything would go well for them as families and as a nation.

But later in this same chapter, Moses warned of what would happen if they didn’t obey God’s law. And it was horrifying. If they refused to obey, they would be cursed, defeated, afflicted, enslaved, exiled.

This passage sends disobedient parents running into the arms of the gospel. We are brought to our knees in gratitude that we live under the new covenant instead of the old covenant. God’s blessing in our lives is not dependent upon our perfect obedience to God’s law, but on Christ’s perfect obedience. We do not live in fear of being cursed for our disobedience, because he bore the curse for us. We receive the blessing of God, not through our obedience, but through faith. We use the freedom we’ve been given to pursue glad obedience, not out of fear of the curse, but out of gratitude for the blessings provided to us in Christ.

Lord, we want every blessing you have to give! Bless our family and make our family a blessing to those around us. Bless us in spite of our failures to fully obey because of the complete obedience of Christ.