Weekly Devotional: April 28th, 2002 -- "Blessed Beyond the Beatitudes"
-- Psalm 1:1-3
-- Isaiah 30:18
-- Romans 4:6-8
I am certain that we all have read the portion of Christ's
Sermon on the Mount known as the Beatitudes. We easily recognize those Scriptures
as we hear them read because we have heard them many times before or maybe
because we have a bookmark with the Beatitudes on it. Maybe your grandma was
named Beatitude and you thought it would be cool to memorize them all. Whatever
the case may be, they are distinguishable by the phrase "Blessed are..."
or "Blessed is..." Now, this is a weekly devotional and I know that we could
spend a few months covering the Beatitudes. Lucky for you, we will focus
primarily this week on three other passages within the Word of God that proclaims
blessing on those who act in a certain way in accordance with the will of
God.
The first passage is found in Psalm 1, verses 1 through
3. "Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor
standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. But
his delight is in the law of the LORD; and in his law doth he meditate day
and night. And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that
bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and
whatsoever he doeth shall prosper." Wow! There certainly is an immense amount
of substance found within those verses. All three verses show a picture of
the same individual, focusing on what the blessed person will not do, and
of course, what they will do. The two sides go hand in hand because God never
empties a person out that He does not expect to fill with Himself. On one
side, the blessed individual does not even hang around with people who have
no regard for God or His Word, much less be friends with them. This is tough
for a lot of young people because popularity could be at stake and I, above
all people, feel like I know where they are coming from. During the early
years of my high school experience, it quickly became my goal to become Mr.
Popular. Along the road to popularity, however, this desire caused me to
stray down paths that I knew were wrong. I was hanging out with people who
were bringing me down and I was going places that I knew I had no business
going. My dad has always told me that "Hindsight is 20/20." Since that is
true, I can look back with perfect vision and see how much time I wasted not
being blessed because of my messed up choices. However, at the time, I thought
everything was perfectly fine. Have you ever seen anything work its way out
of a vacuum cleaner? Probably not, because once you get sucked into a situation,
it sure is hard to work your way back out. As a matter of fact, in my case,
there wasn't any way possible that I could work my way out, but God had to
bring me out. Once He did that, I was on the right path to spiritual blessing
because I loved studying God's Word ("His law" - verse 2). Once I found my
way into the Word, the Word found its way into me and my soul took root in
some extremely fertile ground; insomuch that whatever I do in accordance
with the Word of God shall not fail, but prosper (verse 3). That is exciting
and its all because of God and His ability to bless His people!
The second passage comes from Isaiah 30:18: "And therefore
will the LORD wait, that he may be gracious unto you, and therefore will
He be exalted, that he may have mercy upon you: for the LORD is a God of
judgment: blessed are all they that wait for Him." I would venture to say
that everybody that has ever lived, at least one time in their life, has
taken matters into their own hands. It is certainly a matter of instinct
to want things the way that we want them and we want them now!! I crack up
when I think of the Christmas Carol that says "Now bring us some figgy pudding
and bring some right here!" First of all, has anybody ever ate figgy pudding?
What is in it? Anyways, the point is, we all tend to get a little impatient
at times. Just sit in line at the local Dairy Queen or McDonald's for a little
while and you will be able to say "Amen brother!" Or how about those times
that you are running late and that one dude is out driving 35 miles per hour
in a 55 mph zone, looking at every tree branch as he passes them? Doesn't
that make you just a little impatient? Of course it does, as we mash the
gas and pray that nothing meets us in the other lane. This spills over in
our attitude towards God as well. There are probably some days when we think
to ourselves: Where in the world is God? In this passage of Scripture refers
to a time when the Assyrians were on the offensive against Israel and Israel
wanted to seek alliance with Egypt instead of relying on God to take care
of their battles. This was an effort to take one step ahead of God, but we
must realize that anytime we do this, we are actually taking many steps in
the wrong direction. The state of blessing that we can reside in when we
wait upon God results from trusting Him to fight our battles for us. This
brings about a peace that passes all understanding knowing that if God is
for us, then who can be against us? We are blessed we when realize that nothing
that comes upon us is too big for our God to handle and therefore, we don't
have to try to do something we can't, but rather we wait upon the One who
can!
The third and final passage for this week's study comes
from Romans 4:6-8: "Even as David also describeth the blessedness of the
man, unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works, Saying, "Blessed
are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered. Blessed
is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin." There may be some Christians
that read this that do not think that they are blessed in any way, shape,
or form. Some may have fallen upon hard times or facing things that no one
wants to face. Therefore, they feel as though God has abandoned them or has
somehow forgotten to give them a blessing. But Christians lay claim on the
biggest state of blessing to ever exist and that is that they have received
forgiveness for their sins and our counted righteous in the eyesight of God
through Jesus Christ. You cannot get anymore blessed than that!! Everyone
will leave this world at some point in time and after they do so, they will
sit in a judgment seat before a holy and righteous God who cannot tolerate
sin. The only blessing that matters at this point is not material or temporary,
but the one that Paul quotes David as saying in this portion of Scripture.
Only those who have had their sins covered under the blood of Jesus through
their faith in Him will enter into eternal splendor, as opposed to those
who do not have their sins covered, who will enter into an eternal state
of damnation. So, Christians are blessed more than anyone else on the Earth
because they stand right with God!! If that isn't blessed, then I don't know
what is.
That concludes this week's lesson, but if you would like
to continue to read some more places in the Word of God that proclaims who
is "blessed," check out the passages below and we will see you next week!
Ps. 65:4; Eph. 1:3&4
Isa. 51:2; Rev. 19:9
Matt. 16:16&17
Ps. 89:15
Matt. 11:6
Luke 1:45; Gal. 3:9
Job 5:17; Ps. 94:12
Ps. 144:15
Ps. 2:12; 34:8; 40:4; 84:12; Jer. 17:7
Ps. 112:1; 128:1,4
Ps. 119:2; James 1:24; Matt. 13:16
Rev. 22:14
