“God be gracious to us and bless us, And cause His face to shine upon us that Your way may be known on the earth, Your salvation among all nations.”
Psalm 67: 1-2
Psalm 67 is one of my favorite Psalms because, unlike so many who cry for blessings today, the Psalmist does not ask to be blessed so he can spend it on himself. Instead, his cry is that God would bless him so that through him, the nations might hear and come to know and worship God! That has always been the motive behind the saint’s desire for blessing. We do not ask God to bless us so we can hoard his blessings. We ask Him to bless that He might use us to bring the blessing of Christ to others through the preaching of the Gospel.
Isn’t that what He said to Abraham when he called him to follow by faith? “I will bless you and you will be a blessing and all nations on earth will be blessed through you!” (Gen 12:3) Think of it! God blesses us so that other nations and people we’ve never met might be blessed through us by hearing and responding to the Gospel of Christ that we send to them around the world!
That’s why I’m always ready to remind you of our Annual Christmas Mission’s Offering. My prayer is that, as God has blessed you, so you will gratefully set aside a generous gift to help “spread the fame of Christ’s Name” to the nations. You can designate your gift to any of the following, knowing that 100% of everything you give will go to that organization. This year we are supporting HeartCry Missionary Society (Paul Washer, the Tomeci & Palada families, Trevor Johnson etc); Psalm 67 Missions (our missions group led by Aaron Sutton and others doing mission in Texas and Mexico); and The Lottie Moon Christmas Offering (Supporting the 5000+ missionaries of the IMB who are taking the Gospel to the whole world). This morning’s focus will be on the work of HeartCry as we begin our worship together.
Proclaiming His Name for the Joy of the Nations!
Pastor Scott Lee