Don't Miss The Blessing Series

Don’t Miss the Blessing

Genesis 2

If I were to ask you a question, “how blessed do you feel right now.” On a scale of 1 to 10 how fortunate or blessed are you at this moment? How would you answer that question? You might say, well about 4, I’m having trouble paying my bills, I want to quit my job and I really need a new car.

For a lot of us in our contemporary modern society, the way we would answer that question would depend on our definition of blessing. For so many of us, when we think of blessings we think in terms of material items like money and houses and cars.

And often we compare our “blessings” to other people’s blessings. For instance, last year I bought a new car. A Saturn Ion. It is a nice car, it runs, I was really happy with it. Until this Saturday. It was my sister’s birthday and her husband bought her a BMW 325I for her birthday. She took me and Dorota for a spin. Leather seating, security system, keyless entry, it even starts without a key. It has a V-6. Suddenly, I start feeling not so blessed. Not so content.

Our modern society tempts us to overlook some of the basic blessings we experience everyday. I would call these the simple blessings of life. God has blessed us in so many ways, but we often don’t stop to appreciate them. There was an old hymn Christians used to sing, “Count you many blessings, name them one by one, and it will surprise you what the Lord has done.”

We come today to the second chapter of Genesis. This is a great chapter, it has naked people and fruit. What I want us to do is read through this chapter and see that there are many blessings from God, inherent in his creation, that often get overlooked in our modern contemporary culture. We take them for granted and fail to enjoy these blessings.

If you have your Bibles open them up to Genesis 2 and we are just going to go right through this passage. If you don’t have your Bibles, the passages will be printed on the screen. Genesis 2.

1 Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array. 2 By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. 3 And God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.

I. BLESSING ONE: REST

The first blessing from God I see in this passage is REST. It says, “On the seventh day God rested.” The seventh day in the Hebrew scriptures was called the Sabbath. The word Sabbath is derived from the Hebrew word shabat meaning “to cease, desist or rest.” In the Old Testament Jews were commanded to observe the Sabbath. It was a mandatory day of rest.

Exodus 31.4

Observe the Sabbath, because it is holy to you. Anyone who desecrates it must be put to death; whoever does any work on that day must be cut off from his people.

God really wants us to rest so much he said, “if you find someone not obeying the Sabbath, put them to death.” I don’t think you’d have to threaten me to get me to take a nap. The Sabbath was one of the ten commandments. God created this universe and he put into its rhythm this thing called rest. All of nature rests. (plants go dormant in the winter, animals hibernate) It’s just part of the natural order of life.

I like rest don’t you? I don’t know if there is anything better in life than an afternoon nap. Rest is a blessing from God. When I have a Saturday afternoon off, there is nothing better than crawling into my bed and sleeping for 3 or 4 hours and when I wake up I don’t know where the heck I am.

When is the last time you thanked God for a good nap? In fact, I think sleeping is one of the most spiritual things you can do! The Bible says that sleeping is a sign that a person trusts God.

Psalm 4:8 says,

I will lie down and sleep in peace for you alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety.

French Poet Charles Peguy wrote:

I don’t like the man who doesn’t sleep, says God.

Sleep is the friend of man, Sleep is the friend of God.

Sleep is perhaps the most beautiful thing I have created.

And I myself rested on the seventh day…

But they tell me that there are men

Who work well and sleep badly.