Wednesday 8 August 2012

Numbers 6:22-27


  "The LORD make His face shine upon you and be gracious to you..."
{Numbers 6:25}  (NIV1984)

The second blessing spoken to God’s people, once again proceeds from the LORD and involves His ‘face shining’ upon us, which causes acts of grace to flow from Him to us. God is invisible and is a spirit, and therefore we understand that this is figurative language; beautiful figurative language! 

The sun shines, warms our bodies, cheers our hearts and brings life to our planet. God is the source of all light. He alone lives in unapproachable light (1 Tim 6:16), what is being expressed here is the prayer that God’s life giving light would reach us, and that we would dwell in His grace. The people who lived in the time of the book of Numbers, knew that when Moses came from meeting God, his face shone brightly, the light from YHWH. 

Friend, this is a prayer for salvation. More than that, it is a prayer for the grace of God to emanate from Him to us, that we might be changed, that we might be in the place of blessing. Psalm 80 captures the essence of this blessing with this prayer that is repeated three times in the psalm. Restore us, O God Almighty; make your face shine upon us, that we may be saved. (vs 3, 7, 19) 

What a blessed state to be in, living in the grace of the LORD!  Oh friend, we desire this blessing in our lives, do we not? Whom can we bless today by speaking these words to them?


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