Is a blessed life synonymous with a successful life?
Many Christians believe they are blessed when they have a loving marriage, obedient children, a healthy body, a successful career, trusted friends, or financial abundance. However, if these are the characteristics of a blessed life, then having all of them should translate into an extraordinarily blessed life.
But does it?
If someone had all those things, would they be extraordinarily blessed?
Rather than turning to God, they might feel self-sufficient and proud.
Perhaps a bit smug and self-righteous. After all, their hard work would be yielding good fruit.
Moreover, they wouldn’t need to cry out to God for deliverance; everything would already be perfect. They wouldn’t need to trust God; they could trust in themselves.
They wouldn’t need God to fill them; they would already be satisfied.
So, what is God’s Richest Blessings?
Our desire for God is greatly fueled by Our need. It is in the areas of loss where we feel our need most intensely.
Unmet desires keep us on our knees. Unmet desires deepen our prayer life.
Unmet desires make us search the Bible for God’s promises.
Earthly blessings are temporary; they can all be taken away.
Job’s blessings all disappeared in one fateful day.
We, too, can have a comfortable life stripped away from us.
Our marriage could dissolve.
Our children could rebel.
Our health could spiral downward.
Our family could fall apart.
Our dreams could be shattered.
However, in the midst of these painful events, is where we can experience God’s richest blessings.
This is where we develop a stronger faith than we had experienced before. A deeper love than we have ever known.
A more intimate walk than we could possibly explain.
Our trials ground our faith in ways that prosperity and abundance never could.
While our trials may not be blessings in themselves, they can be channels for blessings.
Many times, the storms we go through, and the hardest nights of our life are actually mercies in disguise?”
This may sound like a revolutionary idea of blessing but it's not.
In fact, these types of blessings are firmlyestablished in Scripture.
The New Testament (ESV) has 112 references with the words bless, blessing, or blessed, none of which connects blessing to material prosperity.
Consider these passages:
“Suffering and trials are not blessings in themselves, but they are channels for God’s grace.”
“Blessed are the poor in spirit. . . . Blessed are those who mourn. . . .
Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake . . .
Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you.” (Matthew 5:3–4, 10–11)
“Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it!” (Luke 11:28)
Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven. (Romans 4:7; quoting Psalm 32:1)
Blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial. (James 1:12)
“Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on. .
Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.” (Revelation 14:13, 19:9)
There isn't even a hint of material prosperity or perfect circumstances in any New Testament reference.
On the contrary, blessing is typically connected with either poverty and trial or the spiritual benefits of being joined by faith to Jesus.
According to the Key-Word Study Bible, “The Greek word translated blessed is makarioi which means to be fully satisfied. It refers to those receiving God’s favor, regardless of the circumstances”
What is a blessing, then?
Scripture shows that blessing is anything God gives that makes us fully satisfied in him. Anything that draws us closer to Jesus.
Anything that helps us relinquish the temporal and hold on more tightly to the eternal.
Often times it is the struggles, trials, the aching disappointments, and the unfulfilled longings that best enable us to do that.
Pain and losstransform us. While they sometimes unravel us, they can also push us to a deeper life with God than we ever thought possible. They make us rest in God alone.
It is not about what we can do or achieve for him. And it's not what he can do or achieve for us.
In pain and loss, we long for his presence.
We long to know that God is for us with us, and in us.
Great families, financial wealth, and good health are all wonderful gifts we can thank God for, but they are not his greatest blessings.
These gifts may make us delight, not in God, but in his gifts.
God’s greatest blessing always rests in God himself.
When we have that, we are trulyblessed.