Your life, says Henry Blackaby, affects those with whom you have contact, whether you intend it or not. It may be a positive experience for them or a negative one – but your life WILL affect others.
Bask in that for a minute. It’s coming after Christmas week in which I suspect many of us found ourselves knee-deep in “gifting”. Some, much more organized than I, planned, collected and prepared gifts months in advance. Others of us? Well, not so much (sigh). But we still had lots of thought and effort put into gifts – and we all certainly received gifts.
But I had not connected that activity with Paul’s statement in Romans 1:11 – “For I want very much to see you, so I may impart to you some spiritual gift to strengthen you.”
What’s going on? Paul had heard of the Christians in Rome and that is to whom he is writing in this scripture. He says he thanks Jesus Christ for all of them because their faith is being reported all over the world. (v. 8).
Not only that, he “constantly” remembers them “in my prayers at all times” and prays “that now at last by God’s will the way may be opened for me to come to you.” (v.9). He even says (NIV version) “I long to see you so that I may impart to you some spiritual gift to make you strong – that is, that you and I may be mutually encouraged by each other’s faith.”
What is interesting to me is, in my understanding, Paul had not been to Rome but had definitely longed to go there. So here he is talking about giving gifts to people he has not met, are not his relatives, but are definitely his Christian family – and all he knows of them is by other people’s news and information about them.
But he is definitely talking about a different “gift” than we considered this past week as we shared Christmas gift-giving (probably at a “max” level if you have young kids in the mix). He called it a “spiritual gift” and firmly described it as one that would “strengthen” them. I’ll vote for receiving that kind of gift!
Blackaby says we should share Paul’s goal of leaving a spiritual blessing with everyone around us. We have opportunities to strengthen our parents, our children, our friends, our coworkers, and our fellow Christians. But there is a caveat – spiritual blessings are not given haphazardly but by choice.
And I will confess falling into his cautionary hole – our self-centeredness may cause us to only seek blessings from others rather than to impart them. Yep, I love to bask in blessings being bestowed upon me! And we had some mighty wonderful ones come our way just before Christmas. Well, Blackaby confronted me on this – “Only when we are determined to focus on giving a blessing rather than receiving a blessing will we have the quality of ministry to others that God gave to Paul.”
Other sources (biblehub.com) helped explain this even more. “Spiritual blessings can be described as the divine benefits that come directly from the gracious hand of God, imparted to those who believe. These extend beyond material or physical gains. Ephesians 1:3 praises the God ‘who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms’. The point? Spiritual blessings are rooted in a relationship with the Creator and manifest as gifts of faith, hope, love, joy, assurance, forgiveness, wisdom and power for godly living.
I love the little “side trail” that was offered. Archaeological discoveries, such as early copies of Pauline epistles in manuscript fragments, demonstrate the consistency of the biblical text over centuries and affirm these teachings of faith and restoration have remained intact and trustworthy.
Yes, as I am preparing to offer the Family History Bootcamp again, I naturally am thinking of why the tools I have chosen are unique and special – one is that they guarantee preservation of legacy materials for 100+ years . I grin as I say this, but the Lord knew about archival preservation long before we arrived on this earth – and I am wondering what preservation methods He will use for the next 2000 years!!
OK, back to the present. The point is that we may not realize it, but our lives have the potential to bless everyone we encounter. And I am particularly working to assist others in preserving their family’s legacy materials – photos, documents, stories, media, along with milestones, lessons and so much more. (I lean on Deuteronomy 6:20-25 for my marching orders.) I do pray these will bless everyone down the family line!
Our question we must answer: Are others strengthened and encouraged in their faith because of their relationship with me? Focusing specifically on those in my family line – am I able to glean from my ancestors and pass along to my descendants the same as Paul described: leaving to them a spiritual gift to make them strong?
