The real blessing is God Himself; blessing is not a thing but a Person – God in Christ as the Spirit to be everything to us for our enjoyment. When Jacob blessed his sons, God blessed them.
In Numbers 6:22-27 we see a pattern of blessing – God commanded the priests to bless the people, and in their blessing God Himself will bless them.
The blessing in this portion of the word is neither an Old Testament blessing nor a New Testament blessing but the eternal blessing of the Triune God!
Speak to Aaron and to his sons, saying, Thus you shall bless the children of Israel; you shall say to them, Jehovah bless you and keep you; Jehovah make His face shine upon you and be gracious to you; Jehovah lift up His countenance upon you and give you peace. So shall they put My name upon the children of Israel, that I Myself may bless them. (Num. 6:22-27, Recovery Version Bible)
This is the eternal blessing of the Triune God, which is the Triune God Himself in His Divine Trinity into us for our enjoyment. The priests were commanded to bless the people with the dispensing of the divine Trinity into them for their enjoyment, and in their blessing God put His name upon His people and blessed them.
We need to be one with the Triune God in the principle of incarnation and bless others with the Triune God for their divine and mystical enjoyment.
When we bless others, we should bless them with the Father (the One who keeps us and blesses us), the Son (the One who makes His face shine upon us and is gracious to us), and the Spirit (the One who lifts up His countenance upon us and gives us peace).
The eternal blessing in Num. 6:23-26 is similar to the one of the Apostle Paul in 2 Cor. 13:14, where he says,
The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.
When we meet with one another in the church life and even when we meet unbelievers, we need to bless them with the Triune God by being filled with God and overflowing with God to others. We need to bless others with the Triune God dispensing Himself in His Divine Trinity into them for their enjoyment.
Jehovah Bless You and Keep You – God the Father
“Jehovah bless you and keep you” (Num. 6:24) can be ascribed to the Father, since it is the Father who blesses us and keeps us in every way.
The Father blesses us in every way and in every aspect in His love (Eph. 1:3), and He keeps us in every way and in every aspect in His power (see John 17:11, 15; 1 Pet. 1:5). The Father blesses us in love in Christ as the Spirit, and we are guarded by the power of God through faith unto a salvation ready to be revealed at the last time.
Before the Lord Jesus went to the cross He prayed that the Father would keep us in His name – this is to keep us in the dispensing Triune God! Then, He prayed that we would be kept out of the hands of the evil one (John 17:15).
We should pray both for ourselves and for others to be kept absolutely in the dispensing of the Triune God and altogether outside of the evil one – this is a real blessing!
While the Triune God is dispensing Himself into us, we are kept in the dispensing One and outside of the reach of the evil one. This is how we should bless one another, and this is how we should pray for ourselves and for others – pray to be kept absolutely in the dispensing of the Triune God and out of the evil one!!
Lord Jehovah, bless me and bless all the saints! Keep us enjoying all Your spiritual blessings in Christ Jesus in love. Father, keep us in every way and in every aspect by Your divine power. Keep us in the dispensing of the Triune God and keep us safe and away from the evil one. Father, bless all the saints with the divine dispensing of the Divine Trinity and keep them in the Triune God! Oh, Father, keep the saints out of the hands of the evil one and under Your divine dispensing!
Jehovah Make His Face Shine upon You and be Gracious to You – Christ the Son
“Jehovah make His face shine upon you and be gracious to you” (Num. 6:25) can be ascribed to God the Son, since Christ came as a sun shining in the darkness and He came full of grace and reality.
Before the Lord Jesus was born, Zachariah prophesied concerning Him saying, “the rising sun will visit us from on high” (Luke 1:78). This rising sun is God the Son in the Divine Trinity, and the sun rising implies God’s incarnation to show Himself to us in a shining way.
Christ’s coming was like the shining of a great light over the people dwelling in darkness, and He Himself is the light of the world (Matt. 4:16; John 8:12).
We need to pray for one another that the Lord’s face would shine over us so that His shining presence would be with us.
The Lord’s face signifies His presence; Christ is the presence of the invisible God; no one has seen the Father, but Christ made Him known by His word, life, work, and living, and He did this in a shining way (2 Pet. 1:16-18; Matt. 17:1-2). When God was incarnated, His presence came to be with us in a shining way, and along with this shining, there was grace!
Numbers 6:25 is fulfilled by John 1:14-17, where we see that Christ is the embodiment of God (the shining of His face) and when He came, He was full of grace and reality, and we received grace upon grace (“be gracious to you”).
This grace is the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, and this grace is now with our spirit. Hallelujah, when we have Christ, we have grace!
We need to pray over these things to God and pray these blessings over the brothers and the sisters that Christ would shine over them and bring them into the enjoyment of the Triune God.
Lord Jesus, visit us with God’s shining presence and be gracious to us. Cause Your face to shine upon us and give us more enjoyment of the Triune God. Lord Jesus, bring us and bring all the saints in the enjoyment of Yourself as grace. Make God real to us by shining His presence in us, upon us, and through us, and give us grace upon grace, enjoyment upon enjoyment of God! Lord, keep us enjoying You as grace every day!
Jehovah Lift up His Countenance Upon you and Give you Peace – God the Spirit
“Jehovah lift up His countenance upon you and give you peace” (Num. 6:26) can be ascribed to God the Spirit, since the Spirit is within us as the countenance of God and He gives us everything we need when we make Him happy.
There’s a difference between the face and the countenance – the countenance is the expression of the person, and the face is the presence of the person. When you meet someone you see his face, but if his countenance is down, you realize he’s not happy.
Jesus Christ came to us as the face of God to bring God’s presence to us, and the Holy Spirit comes as the countenance of God, the expression of God’s person.
The Bible tells us not to grieve the Holy Spirit (Eph. 4:30), that is, not to displease the Spirit by not walking according to the spirit all the details of our daily walk. If we grieve the Holy Spirit, His countenance will drop, but if we obey Him, He will be happy with us, He will lift up His countenance to confirm us, assure us, guarantee us, promise us, and give us everything.
If in the things related to our daily life we do not grieve the Spirit but make Him happy by walking according to the spirit, He will give us peace and everything of Himself. However, if we grieve Him, we can turn back to the Lord, repent, turn our heart to Him, and exercise our spirit so that He will be happy with us.
In 1 Thes. 5:19 we are also told not to quench the Spirit; related to our function, we should follow the Spirit’s leading within to speak when He speaks and go where He wants us to go.
Lord Jesus, save us from grieving the Holy Spirit which was given to us. We choose to be those who walk according to the spirit so that the Holy Spirit will lift up His countenance and confirm us, assure us, promise us, and give us everything of Himself for our enjoyment and experience. Oh Spirit, lift up Your countenance upon us and give us peace! Lift up Your countenance upon the saints and give all the saints peace!
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Inspiration: the Word of God, my Christian experience, bro. Ed Marks’ sharing in the message for this week, and portions from, Life-study of Numbers (msg. 11), as quoted in, the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Crystallization-Study of Genesis (3), week 9 / msg 9, Blessing.
- Read more on Luke 1:78 with some quotes on this topic via, Christian Pictures Blog.
- Hymns on this topic:
# The divine dispensing starts with the Father. / He selected us ’ere the world began. / Predestinated to be His sons / Through His rich life dispensing. (Song on the Divine Dispensing)
# Grace in its highest definition is / God in the Son to be enjoyed by us; / It is not only something done or giv’n, / But God Himself, our portion glorious. (Hymns #497)
# Though we have often slighted Thee, / Thy Spirit often grieved, / Yet Thou dost still as Spirit come / As life to be received. (Hymns #12)
# The Triune God’s dispensing / Himself to us as our life, / His grace is love expressed and / Fellowship keeps us together; / We’re mingled now with Him always. (Song on the Divine Dispensing)
