Be the Blessing

Our whole life is an opportunity. Every morning we wake up due to God’s mercy and each new breath is a fresh opportunity to praise God and see his kingdom grow. A friend told me a story about them visiting an elderly person to say what they expected to be their final goodbye to them. They’d been ill and hadn’t left their bed.  But then a few weeks later they returned to find them up walking about praising God and back to full health. They said “God has told me he has someone I need to share his love with.” Suddenly this sad situation turned into fresh opportunity. This person had a new lease of life, to go and be a blessing to someone else. They saw their purpose and God raised them up. So much of the time I forget that the only reason I’m breathing is because God’s plan is still being worked out in my life.  

In Proverbs, the writer, multiple times follows up future with hope. Chapter 23 Verse 18 says, 

 ‘There is surely a future hope for you, and your hope will not be cut off.’  

And then 24:14, 

 ‘Know also that wisdom is like honey for you: If you find it, there is a future hope for you, and your hope will not be cut off.’  

Our future and hope go hand in hand. If we’ve got a future there’s always hope. For the person mentioned it was an opportunity to evangelise but for many of us we don’t know what that hope looks like. But in my understanding of faith, if we have breath, we have hope. There’s also the ever-present quote, “I don’t know what the future holds but I know who holds the future so I’m good to go”. So, lets combine future and hope. We have no clue where we’re going, but we know who we’re going with. We have such great opportunity to be a blessing to others with the hope and future we hold, and so often we drift through life just expecting it to fall into our hands, saying there is purpose but not walking with it. Imagine if every one of us walked with the purpose of knowing that there is always hope and to go sharing that with others because if hope can get someone up and out of bed it can certainly get us up and speaking about his love. 

If you have breath, you have hope. So, get up, get out and be the blessing. 

Prayer points for the week- 

  • For God to revitalise our sense of hope, purpose and love. 
  • For those around us that really need a sense of hope in their life. 
  • For the evangelistic opportunities that come our way, that we’ll follow God’s spirit through it all. 

Written by Josh Bennett, Intern for Swindon Youth for Christ