INHERITING BLESSING
C.R.Byng
The Spirit would give us a fresh sense of the wonder of the sovereign grace of God that we have been called to inherit blessing. The assembly is characteristically a sphere where blessing is experienced and I think our beloved young brother and sister would be conscious that they are surrounded by the brethren today in a spirit of blessing. We can be simple and say that we wish them well. What a wonderful sphere, beloved; we have been called into! A fresh sense of the wonder of the blessing of God would affect our brother and sister today and remain with them and is intended to affect us all, because the word today is for us all.
It has always been God's mind to bless. We prove it in the assembly more than it was experienced in any previous dispensation, but it has always been the mind of God to bless. In Genesis 1, after it says that "male and female created he them", it immediately says, "And God blessed them", as though God's primary thought in creating man was to bless them. Truly the end will be that men bless God, but it begins by God blessing, and it runs through Scripture. We can think of Noah, of Abraham, of Moses and Aaron, of David and of many others. The great underlying thought of God seeking to find ways of blessing men ran through all His ways. But what a wonderful sphere of blessing we are brought into! It was set on as the Lord went up. What an impression was left on the disciples of Jesus as He went up with His hands lifted up in blessing. "As he was blessing them, he... was carried up into heaven", Luke 24: 51. The Spirit, as coming down ten days later, would, I think, have brought an impression to those beloved men and women that Jesus was still in an attitude of blessing. And is that not so today? Are we not proving increasingly the wonderful grace of the Lord Jesus in blessing us? And the blessed Spirit of God is blessing us and leading us into a deeper understanding of all that is related to the assembly of God. What blessings we can trace back to the heart of the Father! How we can truly give thanks for the sphere of blessing we have been brought into - called that we might inherit blessing.
Now as that is experienced in the local assembly, it is intended to flow into every one of our homes, so that each home becomes a recipient of blessing. That is what characterises a Christian home, that it is a recipient of blessing from God. An atmosphere of blessing in that way particularly comes into a marriage day. There is a glory about a marriage in the Lord which has a special blessing related to it. How thankful we can be that there are abundant resources in the Spirit so we do not have to resort to worldly customs and methods to bring happiness into a marriage in the Lord; yea, rather, if those did find a way in, they would but spoil. We draw, perhaps, particularly on the Spirit of God on a marriage day, that nothing that is natural may come in to spoil the blessing from God. As we think of the marriage in Cana of Galilee, things were inferior there until the Lord brought in the good wine, and immediately matters were according to the proper standard.
We are assured that not only will our brother and sister have a sense of blessing from the brethren, and above all of blessing from God, today, but they will continue to prove blessing as they depend upon God for help. This household is intended to be abidingly a sphere in which an atmosphere of blessing pervades. That means that our brother and sister will need help by the Spirit. Scripture makes provision for a husband to praise his wife; it makes no provision, as far as I recall, for a wife to praise her husband. But a husband can praise his wife. One husband in scripture is recorded as calling his wife blessed, and praising her. He says to her "Many daughters have done worthily, but thou excellest them all", Prov 31: 29. I think that would be the language of our brother today. May it remain so, not only today, but throughout their happy life in the Lord. These things are to continue. Our sister is a bride today; she is to continue a bride. Think of the glory of the assembly as coming out after a thousand years still as a bride adorned for her husband. A sister as a wife surely takes on cares and responsibilities, particularly when her husband is not there, but she is a bride always to her husband as a spirit of blessing is preserved in the household. As that is maintained, every Christian household becomes a sphere from which blessing flows out to others. Not, as it says here, "railing for railing; but... blessing others". Because we have received such abundant blessing, there is to be a spirit of blessing emanating out from the hearts and the homes of the beloved brethren. And that is intended not only to strengthen the testimony but to gather moral power and strength in relation to the service of God.
Blessing in scripture is a word that is difficult to define. It is like glory, in a sense; you cannot exactly define glory, you are just conscious it is always the outshining of love. What a wonderful thing blessing is, beloved brethren! As we receive blessing, instinctively our hearts rise in blessing to God. So this occasion (with its atmosphere of spiritual simplicity, of blessing and, I believe, of approval from the blessed God) this home that has been set up, and all our homes are to have their own part in contributing to the enrichment of the service of God. We call down a blessing from heaven. "Jehovah bless thee, and keep thee" (Num 6: 24) - what a blessing that was of old! How much fuller the blessing today! As we are here in a spirit of blessing, surely we can truly say that our hearts rise in adoration and worship to the blessed God who has blessed us for His own sake; and to Him be all the glory, for His Name's sake.