Why God Bless You?

Why would God bless you? Have you ever ask that question?

• I’ve not, until I was prompted to think about this, while preparing this sermon.

• Well, we can say, God bless me because God loves me. He is a good God.

• Yes, that’s right. So He wants to give us a good life. That’s all?

• God bless us because He wants us to have an abundant life – one that is rich, successful, comfortable, or plain happy?

Is that it? Something seems to be missing. Why should God bless me for?

• Apostle John says in 1 John 2:17 “The world and its desires pass away….”

• At the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says, “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal.”

• No wonder King Solomon, the wisest man on earth, wrote Ecclesiastes. “Vanity of vanities, all is vanity.”

So when we pray, “Lord, bless me! Bless me!” it cannot be just for a good life!

• It makes no sense because everything in this good life will pass away.

• God can give us success, happiness and comfort, and make us really rich (if He wants to – He made Abraham, David, Solomon very rich),

• But this is not the ultimate reason why God blesses us.

Psalm 67 reveals one fundamental reason WHY God blesses you. [Read Psalm 67]

1 May God be gracious to us and bless us and make his face shine upon us, Selah

2 that your ways may be known on earth, your salvation among all nations.

3 May the peoples praise you, O God; may all the peoples praise you.

4 May the nations be glad and sing for joy, for you rule the peoples justly and guide the nations of the earth. Selah

5 May the peoples praise you, O God; may all the peoples praise you.

6 Then the land will yield its harvest, and God, our God, will bless us.

7 God will bless us, and all the ends of the earth will fear him.

This psalm is a prayer. It’s not wrong to ask God to bless your life. We need that.

• This is the prayer of Jabez – “Bless me, Lord!” Jabez, an obscure person who appeared only in one verse – 1 Chron 4:10 “Oh, that you would bless me and enlarge my territory! Let your hand be with me, and keep me from harm so that I will be free from pain.” And God granted his request.

• Bruce Wilkinson wrote the book ‘The Prayer of Jabez’ in 2000 and it became an international bestseller, selling 9 million copies. I believe it was a phenomenon because this is the cry of the human heart.

• The Lunar New Year is coming and we’re going see people flocking into the temples to pray for blessings. Everyone wants BLESSING.

But Psalm 67 goes deeper than the prayer of Jabez. It tells us WHY God blesses his people.

• Verses 2-3 say, “That your ways may be known on earth, your salvation among all nations. 3 May the peoples praise you, O God; may all the peoples praise you.”

The Psalmist asks for blessing so that the world will know His ways and His salvation, so that the nations will praise Him, and be filled with gladness and joy.

• The Psalmist is praying, “Lord, bless me, so that I might glorify you, and testify to a lost world how great, how loving, how good, how generous a God you are! Let the world know you are a gracious God who is willing to bless.

The psalmist did not pray, “Bless me so that I can have a comfortable life.”

• He did not say, “Bless me so that I don’t have to struggle so much to make a living; so that life will be smooth-sailing and I can be successful.”

• There is nothing wrong saying such prayers, but ultimately this is not why God blesses us.

• This is a greater purpose than just making us happy and having a good life. Everyone else is praying for this. We are no different from the rest if the END of God’s blessing us is to be happy, rich and comfortable in life.

• God blesses us, first and foremost, so that we can bring glory to His Name.

When God calls Abraham, this is what He says in Gen 12:1-3

1 The LORD had said to Abram, "Leave your country, your people and your father's household and go to the land I will show you. 2 "I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. 3 I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you."