He Blessed Them

And thus we have come to know and believe the love that God has unveiled within us. God is love. Love is who God is; to live in this place of conscious, constant love, is to live immersed in God and to feel perfectly at home in his indwelling.

— 1 John 4:16 (Mirror Bible)

Blessed. What does it mean to be blessed? We have heard this word all our lives. It is often spoken in routine night time prayers that are prayed. God bless so and so and God bless so and so . . . It is a very casual word with no real meaning in our vocabulary.

However, it is a rich word, full of meaning. Take a look at the first time this word is used found in Genesis 1:28. The first thing God spoke over His creation humankind was “He blessed them”. If you ever wonder what God was thinking when He created us and what His intent was, you can start with what He initially spoke over us. In the Garden of Eden, God shows us the blueprint for life – we are BLESSED!

Blessed has many meanings but two I want to mention are abundance and provision. In the Garden, Adam and Eve had everything. It was not only beautiful but harmonious, no lack, with only abundance, provision and the presence of God. He walked with them in the cool of the day, just to be with them. Genesis 3:8 implies this was a daily routine. The root of the blessedness was God Himself. God is the provision and abundance. 

As we look at this word in the Old Testament, we see “blessing” from beginning to end. The Israelites were a blessed people. The blessings on Abraham and on the Israelites are found in the covenant. God made covenant with them promising that He would be with them.

When a person or people are blessed, that blessing can not be reversed. God had blessed the Israelites and it was so. Remember the story of Balaam in Numbers 22 and 23?  Balaam was offered a lot of money to curse the people of Israel and he was more than willing and ready to do just that. 

However, every time he tried to curse them he was only able to speak blessings over them. 

“Listen, I received a command to bless; God has blessed, and I cannot reverse it!” Numbers 23:20 (NLT). God blesses and nothing, no power of hell, can change the blessing or revoke it. That is the way it is!

God was with the Israelites and to “un”bless them would mean His presence would leave them. He stood by His covenant. He was with them. The Israelites were His chosen people; He blessed them above all peoples of the earth. (Deuteronomy 7:7,14). 

As with Adam and Eve and with the Israelites, the blessing is living in His ever abiding presence. The Lord has set His love on you, and you are blessed. He is with you.

In the Garden, we were created to be blessed, to live in His presence, in union with Him. It is an outlook; it is an attitude of life. I am blessed because God is with me and nothing can change that. To be blessed is a state of being. 

“BLESSED ~ a perpetual state of bliss”