Sirach 50:22-24 “And now bless the God of all, who everywhere works great wonders, who fosters our growth from birth, and deals with us according to his mercy. May he give us gladness of heart, and may there be peace in our days in Israel, as in the days of old. May he entrust to us his mercy, and may he deliver us in our days!” This episode talks about how God works great works in all or our lives. Also, how God deals with us according to His mercy not His judgement. Music:"Adding the Sun" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
A New Year’s Blessing
Sirach 50:22-24 “And now bless the God of all, who everywhere works great wonders, who fosters our growth from birth, and deals with us according to his mercy. May he give us gladness of heart, and may there be peace in our days in Israel, as in the days of old. May he entrust to us his mercy, and may he deliver us in our days!”
This is another great verse for the beginning of the year as it sounds like great things to ask the Lord for this year. It starts off by blessing God. This is something that I have tried to add to my prayers over the last year or so. Instead of just asking the Lord for I want, I also try to thank Him for all that He has already given us and I praise Him for being so amazing. Most of us are aware of many of the things that God does for us, but did you know that He also does so much for us that we are not aware of. For instance, all the things that he is preventing from happening to us. If we get hurt and then He heals us, we would be aware of that. However, if he delays us from getting out of the house so that we never even get in the accident in the first place, then we probably wouldn’t even be aware of this. I believe the Lord does this type of thing for us often and so I try to remember to thank Him as often as I can.
Next the verse says, “who everywhere works great wonders.” This is something that some of us struggle with. We know that God works great wonders, we just don’t believe that He does it in our lives. This can be for a number of reasons. Maybe we haven’t really seen Him work great wonders in our lives. We might have seen our neighbor get better after being diagnosed with cancer. We might have seen our friends marriage be healed after being close to a divorce. We may have witnessed God doing great works in others lives and but we haven’t seen Him do great wonders in our lives. This may cause some people to feel as though they are not worthy of the Lord working great wonders in their lives. If this is you I urge you to relook at your life. Is it possible that God prevented some things from happening and you just aren’t aware? The verse says everywhere works great wonders, not just some places. Everywhere, so where could God have worked great works in your life? Has someone you loved been sick and then gotten better? Have those in your family been spared from all serious illnesses? Sometimes the lack of bad things in your life is another way that God is working great wonders in your life. God is working great works in your life. If you haven’t been able to see them then maybe think about all the things He has been saving you from, or all the ways He is preparing you for the amazing things that are to come in your future.
Next it says, “who fosters our growth from birth, and deals with us according to his mercy.” God fosters our growth from birth. This is something that shows how much God loves us. He doesn’t just hope that we grow up in the faith. He doesn’t just create us and then move on to the next person. He doesn’t just pay attention to us when we are old enough to praise and worship Him. He fosters our growth from birth. He is always with us! Then it says that the Lord deals with us according to his mercy. This statement is so much more important for us to hear then I think we realize. It doesn’t say that God deals with us according to His judgement. This is often how we can see God. Instead of seeing Him as our loving Father who views our mistakes and mess ups with mercy, we view Him as a judge who is condemning us for our mistakes. This statement says that the Lord deals with us according to his mercy. I think if we could all believe this and remember this when we feel we are letting Him down then we would be more likely to return to him after we mess up. Our forgetting, or not believing that the Lord deals with us according to His mercy could be affecting our relationship with Him. Is this getting in your way of seeing the Father as He truly is? Is it getting in the way of you turning back to Him and accepting that He does love you, flaws in all?
The second half of this verse is why I thought is sounded like a good verse for the new year. “May he give us gladness of heart, and may there be peace in our days in Israel, as in the days of old. May he entrust to us his mercy, and may he deliver us in our days!” It is a blessing that I for one would love to have this year. I hope that the Lord gives us gladness of heart and peace in our days. We just had the holidays and so hopefully we all got to experience some gladness of heart. However, what about the rest of the year? I know people were expecting 2021 to be a much better year than 2020. We were expecting or hoping that things would be back to normal and we could get out and see our loved ones again. We could hold gatherings and get our groups back together in person. And we did have some of that about halfway through the year. However, I am not sure that people got the gladness of heart that they were hoping for. This year may be more of the same, I don’t know. Just when we thought things were getting back to some sort of normal, a new strain comes out and the numbers jump again.
I am claiming this blessing for this year. May God give you and me the gladness of heart and may there be peace in our days. We could all use a little more peace in our days! There is a lot of uncertainty and worry in the world today. How wonderful would it be to have more peace? It says “May he entrust to us His mercy, and may he deliver us in our days.” This is a promise that we need to hold on to. He will entrust us with His mercy and He will deliver us. I think just believing in that promise would bring more peace into our days. The Lord loves us. He gives us so much mercy. Take some time today and think about where in your life God has done great works. Maybe think about the times when He has shown you great mercy. Think about God giving you goodness of heart and peace in your day.
Dear Heavenly Father, I ask that you bless all those listening to this episode today. Lord, we ask that you give us this gladness of hear and peace in our days that the verse mentions. Things seem so chaotic these days and we could all use a little more peace in our lives. Help us to see your mercy and not focus on your judgement. Help us to understand that You are a loving Father not a critical judge. You look upon us with mercy not judgement. Help us to turn back to you when we mess up knowing you will be there with open arms. Lord we are so very grateful for all that you do for us. We love you and we ask all of this in accordance with your will and in Jesus holy name, amen.
Thank you so much for joining me on this journey to walk boldly with Jesus. I look forward to spending time with you tomorrow. Have a blessed day!