Receiving as Given

Num 24:3-15         12/13/2017

Balak was infuriated because Balaam blessed Israel three times instead of cursing them, as Balak had hoped. In the course of blessing Israel, Balaam recounted part of the blessing that had been given to Abraham, “Blessed are those who bless you, and cursed are those who curse you!”.

Loving what God loves. Caring about those things that God cares about. This is the path to assured blessing.

Balak was not consigned to defeat and destruction. He could have loved what God loves and cared about those things God cared about.

His curse, his frustration, and eventually the destruction of his people was assured by his commitment to work against what God obviously wanted.

Intransigence.

He refused what was given in favor of selfish persistence.

How could he have received it better? How could I receive it better?

Some mornings are like this. Today I feel myself worried. Life is not going the way that I want it to go. I’m tempted to cling, to force my way. It’s a dark morning of the soul.

Yet in an hour the sun will rise; God’s light on the world. Things will look different. Perhaps I’ll remember that, in its fullness, givenness means wanting what God wants.

“it is in giving that we receive, It is in pardoning that we are pardoned, and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life” Francis of Assisi