The Key to Blessings
6 min read
58 “May he turn our hearts to him, to walk in obedience to him and keep the commands, decrees and laws he gave our ancestors. 59 And may these words of mine, which I have prayed before the LORD, be near to the LORD our God day and night, that he may uphold the cause of his servant and the cause of his people Israel according to each day’s need, 60 so that all the peoples of the earth may know that the LORD is God and that there is no other.”
— 1 Kings 8:58-60
The world needs Jesus and the world needs Jesus now.
I used to wonder about the point of short-term summer mission trips. There is so much need here right where we live. What about us? What about me?
But the key to the kingdom of God is obedience. The key to experiencing the blessings of the kingdom of God is obedience. And Solomon, at the very peak of his reign understood this truth very well, which is why he prayed this prayer for obedience for the people of God.
Here is the logic of Solomon’s prayer, which was inspired by the Holy Spirit (in other words, his logic is perfect and indisputable): Through our obedience, we will experience the abundant blessings of God, and that will be our witness to the world that Father, Son, and Spirit are the one and only true God. Of course, we see this logic throughout all of Scripture.
Right now, generally speaking, the evangelical population of the US and S. Korea is between 25-30%. And of course, much less of that 25-30% are actually acting in obedience to God at any given time. How much more blessed would we be if the evangelical populations were, says, 50% or more? Look at what God has done to bless these nations with a small minority of evangelicals acting in obedience to Him!
You see, we don’t think like this because our worldviews have been corrupted by the devil’s lies. But the truth is that God is always wanting to bless us for our obedience and that is all—not for our intelligence, our skills, our know-how. But the devil is telling us, “No—The key to your blessings is your intelligence, your skills, and your know-how. YOU (the me, myself, and I) have created our “prosperous” societies.
And the devil also deceives us by saying that you had better get ahead of your neighbors or else you will miss out on your share of the blessings. It’s all hogwash—smoke and mirrors.
When our faith is mature enough to simply obey God—to simply love one another and to simply go and make disciples of all nations—God will pour out His blessings into our lives—true blessings. And we all get to share His blessings with everyone, and we all get to rejoice in His blessings with everyone.
And if that doesn’t seem fair (on whose terms do we make such a judgment), we can take it up with God.
Father, forgive us for not thinking according to Your logic. Turn our hearts to You, to walk in obedience to You, so that we can keep our lives BASIC and simple, so that the world may know that You alone are God, so that we bask in the blessings of Your love for us. In Jesus’s name. Amen.