The Levitical blessing of the priests to the children of Israel.
Numbers 6: 24 “The Lord bless you and keep you; 25 The Lord make His face shine upon you and be gracious to you; 26 The Lord lift up His countenance upon you and give you peace.”
27 “So, they shall put My name on the children of Israel, and I will bless them.”
Now, in the middle of that passage, we have the phrase, the Lord be gracious to you. That means the Lord extends His grace toward you, His free, unmerited favor. This is directly connected with the Lord’s face. The Lord make His face shine upon you and be gracious to you. The Lord turns His face toward you.
In other words, the Lord’s favor in some sense is the way He looks at us. Sovereignly, He looks upon us with favor. And when He begins to look upon us with favor, we’re singled out. Our destiny is changed. We become different from the people around us.
A good example is Noah. It says Noah found grace or favor in the eyes of the Lord. And because of the Lord looking upon Noah in that way, Noah’s whole destiny was changed.
It was different from that of all the other men of his generation, because the Lord had looked upon him, the Lord had bestowed his favor, his grace upon him.
And then continuing with that Levitical blessing, after those words, The Lord make His face shine upon you, be gracious to you, turn His face toward you, we have the culmination, Give you peace. Shalom.
So, we understand that peace is always the outcome of grace. And indeed, apart from God’s grace, we can never really know true peace.
But I want you to see now that grace is more than just a mere attitude of God. When God looks upon us with His favor, He transmits something to us. We are surrounded with a different atmosphere. We are protected. It’s not just a kind of legal transaction, but it’s a real impartation.
God’s eyes look upon us and transmit his love, his mercy, and above all his presence.
The grace of God brings the presence of God into our lives in a very real way. There’s something different in the atmosphere around us.
It’s like on a very hot day everybody’s driving around in cars that are not air-conditioned. And we have an air-conditioned car. So, while everybody else is hot and perspiring, we’re cool and restful because we have a different atmosphere. And that’s how God’s grace is. It surrounds us with a different atmosphere.
This explains many phrases that are used in the New Testament, phrases which apart from this we couldn’t fully understand. For instance, grace and peace was the normal greetings that opened a New Testament epistle or letter.
Romans chapter 1 verse 7, the opening, Grace and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
Something comes to us. It comes to us from God the Father through Jesus Christ the Son. It’s His favor and it brings His peace, His wholeness, His completeness, His all-sufficiency.
And then at the end of Romans, Romans chapter 16, verse 20, Paul puts two things together which are very significant. He makes a statement, a bold statement of faith. He says, The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet. And immediately he goes on to say, the grace of our Lord Jesus be with you.
In other words, what’s going to make them victorious over Satan is God’s grace, his favor, his presence with them.
If the grace of God is going to be with you, then you too will be victorious over Satan and over the forces of evil.
And then in another letter, the second epistle of Paul to Timothy, there’s a similar type of beginning and ending. In 2 Timothy chapter 1 verse 2, to Timothy, my dear son, grace, mercy and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord.
Notice Paul there adds one more blessing. It’s not just grace and peace, it’s grace, mercy and peace. But we see again that grace always comes first. Out of grace flow all these other blessings.
And then at the end of that epistle, 2 Timothy 4, verse 22, Paul says, The Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit. Grace, be with you. It’s like the presence of the Lord is His grace with us.
And Paul speaks about grace as something that accompanies us. It’s present with us. Grace, be with you.
And then again, Paul’s own testimony, as he gives it in 1 Corinthians 15, verse 10, about his labors for the Lord. By the grace of God, I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them, yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me.
It’s interesting that the word grace occurs three times in that one verse. By the grace of God, I am what I am. His grace to me was not without effect. And then he says, I worked harder than all of them. And then he kind of corrects himself. No, it wasn’t really I, but the grace of God that was with me.
And so, when Paul is explaining his success in Christian ministry, he doesn’t claim it for himself, but he claims it for the grace of God.
But he says, the grace of God was with me, like a presence, like something that followed me, that overshadowed me. That kept company with me wherever I went and labored for the Lord.
Psalm 5, verse 12. For surely, O Lord, you bless the righteous. You surround them with your favor, or your grace, as with a shield.
See, that brings out so clearly that the grace of God is not just a theological concept, but it’s a real presence that’s with us. It protects us. It enfolds us. It keeps the forces of evil from having a harmful effect upon us. It drives back the evil forces that oppose us. God surrounds the righteous with His favor as with a shield.
When we walk with God we have a shield all around us that protects us from harm and danger, spiritual, emotional, physical, even financial. What are you protected by?
The grace, the favor of God that’s all around you, like an invisible shield, an invisible shield that keeps germs away, that keeps away sickness. There’s no evil force really that can penetrate that shield of the grace of God if you can just receive it by faith, count on it, believe it’s with you.
Proverbs 16: 15In the light of the king’s face is life, and his favor is like a cloud of the latter rain
Now we’re talking about a king. And remember that Jesus is not just a king, he’s the king of all kings. In the light of his face is life. When he lifts up his face upon us and looks upon us with favor, that’s life.
And then it goes on, his favor, the favor of a king, is like a cloud with the spring rain.
We must understand that in the land of Israel, rain is the greatest blessing. It’s not something we don’t want; it’s something we cry out for. And the most blessed rain of all, the one that brings the greatest fruitfulness and the surest prospect of a good harvest, is the spring rain or the latter rain.
So, a cloud that brings the spring rain is something that people long for. It’s the assurance of blessing, of fruitfulness, of God’s abundant provision for his people. And God’s favor is like that cloud.
So, as you begin walk in this Living Word, just envisage yourself surrounded by a cloud that’s like a cloud of spring rain, the cloud of God’s favor overshadowing you and protecting you.