5He shall receive the blessing from the LORD, and righteousness from the God of his salvation.
6This is the generation of them that seek him, that seek thy face, O Jacob. Selah.
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5 comments:
Sorry I was so late getting this post up. Honestly, I'm totally stumped by these 2 verses. Verse 5 is a continuation of verses 3-4, still referencing Jesus. But who is "the generation" and who is "Jacob." I mean, I know who Jacob is in the bible, but who is Jacob in this verse? I'll have to think more about this tomorrow.
Verse 5 makes succinctly clear what we can expect by living up to the standards listed in verse 4. The two words here that make an impact on me are "receive" and "blessing."
When it comes to our existences, God is the giver and we are the receivers. Period. But why do we always get these roles mixed up? Why do we keep slipping back into the mindset that everything revolves around us? How do we end up convincing ourselves that we are in charge of the giving when it comes to our relationship with God? Worse, has this misguided mindset become such an acceptable habit that we don't even feel embarrassed any more when it's pointed out to us? We become hurt and indignant when someone refuses to pay us some attention, even when it's only a stranger who won't show us a common courtesy. Our ire and disappointment (thanks to our myopic self-pride) are even stronger when the situation involves someone we expect to be more considerate. "Last week I gave God 3 hours at bible study and 2 hours at Sunday worship, so that's almost an hour a day on average which is not too shabby all things considered." What must God be wondering when we convince ourselves (but not Him) that we don't have 5 minutes for QT but we do have 5 minutes to order coffee at Starbucks.
The word "blessing" is an essay in itself for me. In our secular lives, the word "bless" is employed exclusively in positive contexts - "the boss gave my idea his blessing," "you're blessed to have such well-behaved kids," "God bless America," etc. I'm not too troubled by these usages but what does concern me is when we extend this thinking to describing our interactions with God. Because when good things happen to us, we say that "God has blessed us." But when not so good things happen to us, we don't say that "God has blessed us" but rather we tend to ask "where is God now?" A previous pastor of mine once preached that everything God gives us is a blessing. Think about that: what God gives us are blessings by definition. Does that mean we love everything that happens to us? No, not really. But that's when we are seeing things from our own perspective. God has his plans for us and we must trust in Him even if we cannot fathom or gratify our expectations with what He does. God blesses us every day we live, even if we don't think they taste like the sugar-coated variety we always want or demand. So we should try not to credit God for "blessing" us only when we think we like the gift.
I find verse 6 a little confusing and reading the different translations does not clear things up because though the differences are subtle they do convey distinct meanings, especially regarding the Jacob reference.
I just read SJ's note and see we're both stumped on this issue.
Amen: God blesses us is interesting in our daily lives and sometimes we do not even realize it when it is happening. When we do things unconditionally and we do not expect anything in return meaning we do because we love God and want to serve hime meaning seeing our God smile then unexpectedly he blesses us. God puts us in situations to test us and see how we handle it. Sometimes God blesses you when you least expect it.
Rocky's comment that even when not so good things happen to us, these are also God's blessings - was quite revelatory to me. You're right. How many times have we thought in hindsight that the thing we thought was so terrible was actually a blessing in disguise. If we can just remember that God is always with us, even during the most difficult times, we would be filled with grace and peace - like Jesus, in the boat during the storm.
I keep going back to the Jacob reference. Jacob was renamed Israel. . . - Okay, I just read NIV translation, which says "God of Jacob", which makes so much more sense!
Also, I looked at the notes from my study bible - and it says that verses 3-6 are instructions for those who can enter the sanctuary. Remember priests had to go through all those sacrifices and rituals in order to be pure enough to enter the inner sanctuary of the temple, to be in the presence of God once a year? Well, I'm still convinced these verses are also a premonition of the coming of Jesus. Because as I said, only Jesus can fill these incredibly exacting standards. And when Jesus was crucified, the iron curtain that separated the inner sanctuary from the world was torn. And thus a new generation of people were able to enter the presence of God - because Jesus' sacrifice made this generation pure and guiltless in the eyes of God. Any generation that truly seeks to see the face of the God of Jacob can now do so. Because that generation is now all those things described in verses 3-6 through the grace of Jesus Christ.
As SW and SJ mention, God's blessings are not always obvious to us when they occur. Some become clear in retrospect a few months or a few years later. Others may become clear only once we join Him. "Unconditional trust" is an incredibly calming idea in our eat-or-be-eaten world. It's something we would want our children to have in us as their parents. By the same token, hopefully we ourselves can take advantage of this as children of God.
Thanks, SJ, for those contextual insights. The verses make even more sense now.
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