Multigenerational Blessings

Genesis 7:1 - The Lord then said to Noah, “Go into the ark, you and your whole family, because I have found you righteous in this generation.

God works through families. He blesses through families. In the Old Testament we learn that he even curse through families. This is the covenantal nature of God’s work throughout Scripture.

Noah found favor with God (Gen. 6:8). Noah was found by God to be a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time, and walking with God (Gen. 6:9). Because God saw Noah in such a condition, Noah’s whole family was blessed – his wife, sons, and daughters-in-law.

We find God’s covenantal faithfulness in the New Testament as well.  The Syrophoenician woman’s daughter was possessed by an evil spirit (Mk. 7:25). So her mother went to Jesus and begged him to deliver her from it. After testing her, Jesus rewarded the mother for her persistence and faith by healing the daughter from the spirit (Mk. 7:29). The child was blessed because of the mother’s faith. This is how God works.

Psalm 128:1-4 reminds us of this.

Blessed are all who fear the Lord,
who walk in his ways.
[2] You will eat the fruit of your labor;
blessings and prosperity will be yours.
[3] Your wife will be like a fruitful vine
within your house;
your sons will be like olive shoots
around your table.
[4] Thus is the man blessed
who fears the Lord.

Noah was blessed in such a way. So was Abraham. So was the Syrophoenician woman and Lydia and the Philippian jailer.

If this is how God works, does it not then behoove us to pursue righteousness and blamelessness for all we are worth? Should we not desire to walk with the Lord daily? Wouldn’t fearing the Lord be wise? The personal blessings that would flow from such a life seem reason enough. But the covenantal blessings on your children and your children’s children seem to make this absurdly obvious and compelling. Even in the land of rugged individualism, we can grasp this.

In light of this, let us resolve to give our lives for our spouses, our children, and to all to whom we can minister. Our lives for theirs. It is only in this kind of death that we might find life – for ourselves and for our families.

Grace and Truth,
Dale

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