Send “Fourth” – Blessings

Recently I had the joy of assisting in a small way with a project at church. One of the stations of the “Prayer Experience” offered participants the opportunity to give and receive blessings, passages from the Bible in which the Master spoke words of love over His people. It was a blessing to me, just to read the many, many instances in which He shared His heart with His beloved children through the words spoken through prophets, apostles, angels, and Jesus Himself. Even the “regular people” of the Bible had some pretty wonderful things to say.

My job was to paraphrase passages from the most beautiful Book in the world, to put into the quotations the words that would bring their intent to the forefront, where we modern readers would see and feel the meaning behind them. And here, may I say, we are not likely to fully understand all that the Bible offers us until we stand in eternity with its Author, but He does give us insights as we look for Him in its pages.

The “assignment” to produce written blessings was so much fun! The more I read, the more I saw the splendor and felt the power. If you ever wish to try this, you may find yourself in a place of peace and joy that will surprise you; writing scripture in your own words will obligate you to think about what was said, to whom it was said, and what it would have been like to be there, hearing it yourself.

Ready for a confession? The BEST blessing, the one that lingered most prominently in our memories was the only really famous one that I didn’t paraphrase at all! In Numbers 6, verses 22-23, Moses charges Aaron to speak the Lord’s blessing over His people. In verses 24-26 of the NIV translation, it reads like this:

“The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make His face shine upon you and be gracious to you; the Lord turn His face toward you and give you peace.”

If you’re as old as dirt, like me, you may have grown up hearing this in the King James translation, which says “…the Lord lift up His countenance upon you…” in verse 26. A sister at church shared that “lifting up the countenance” would be like this: you’re holding your baby, loving the moment, loving the baby, and you lift that baby up, out in front of you, higher than your face, so that you’re looking up at the baby and yes, your face is shining at that little one, love overflowing everywhere. That is the Creator, Almighty God, my Father, seeing me as His beloved child.

It is a moment to be cherished, to be treasured within you – a moment to carry you through sadness or difficulty, to defend your soul against despair and heartache and fear. And we have access to that blessing every day. We need only to open our User’s Guide, turn to a book like Numbers, and immerse ourselves.