I hear from his wife Doris, oh,
just every little bit, get a card or a note from her. And I would
say four out of five times, the scripture text she will leave
at the end of her signature will be found in Numbers chapter six,
verses 22 through 26, or 24 through 26. It speaks of this blessing. that God commanded Moses to give
to Aaron to bestow upon the children of Israel after the fulfilling
of the law of the Nazarite. The Lord said in verse 23, on
this wise shall, excuse me, on this wise shall ye bless. Moses, God's holy law. and Aaron, God's high priest,
were commanded to bless God's covenant people, but the blessing
to be bestowed was only in accordance with the law of the Nazarite
given in this sixth chapter of the book of Numbers. The blessing
to be bestowed was only in connection with the law of the Nazarite
given in this sixth chapter. The Nazarite, of course, speaks
of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Nazarene. He alone fulfilled
the Nazirite law and the Nazirite vow perfectly as a man. We never read of the Nazirites
being taken up again. Read nothing about it until we
come to Judges 13, where another man who is a picture of Christ,
Samson, our mighty deliverer, is given a Nazirite vow. and
He symbolically fulfilled it, but He erred much in the use
of that vow and in breaking that vow, not our Savior. Christ is
the Nazarite described in verses 1 through 12. He is the Nazarite
sacrifice described in verses 13, 14, and 15. Christ is the
Nazarite's sacrificing priest described down to verse 21. Our
Lord Jesus Christ, He is the Nazarite. He's the Nazarite sacrifice
and he's the priest who makes sacrifice for the Nazarite. And
Christ and Christ alone is the one in whom and by whom Jehovah's
name is put upon his people. He and he alone is the one in
and by whom the blessings of God are heaped upon our souls
day after day, year after year, throughout the days of this life
and in the life to come. When God gave his law to Israel
by the hand of Moses, this law of the Nazarites was expanded
more than almost any other law. That makes it significant. Our
Savior, the Lord Jesus, is that one spoken of here as Christ
the Nazarene. The Nazarene spoken of prophesied
in this chapter. Now I want you to see that clearly
because the blessing, the blessing of God only comes through Christ's
obedience. And it only comes through Christ's
obedience by God's command. And it only comes in the experience
of grace by God the Holy Ghost. So when you hear me say, God
bless you, when you hear me say, God bless you, it's not because
you sneezed. When you hear me say, God bless
you, it's not just a word that I use by way of greeting rather
than saying something else. When you hear me say, God bless
you, this is what I'm talking about. I'm praying that God will
grant you all the blessedness of his covenant grace in Jesus
Christ, his darling son, in your day by day life, in his providence,
in your heart, in your soul, and to everlasting. That's the
blessing of the Nazirite. Let's get down to the end of
this chapter. The Nazarite was required to perform his obedience,
and as he did, he was required to separate himself unto the
Lord God, to sanctify himself. As Christ sanctified himself
unto God, our Father, and sanctified himself for our sakes, that we,
by his obedience, might be made holy as he himself is holy. And
if the Nazarite should defile himself by suddenly someone dropping
dead right beside him, He wasn't allowed Jerry to go to his daddy's
funeral. He wasn't allowed to go to his mother's funeral. But
if somebody dropped dead suddenly beside him, then the Nazirite
had to shave his hair, and he had to offer sacrifice. He had
to bring a healed lamb of the first year, a ewe lamb of the
first year, and then a ram, and then he had to bring a wave offering,
and then he took the hair that he shaved off of his head, and
the priest put it in with the sacrifice under the fire, and
everything's consumed. at the altar of God because it's
the Nazirite must be pure. He must be pure. There's here
no transfer of sin. Brother Benzie and I in preaching
through Exodus have talked a good bit about the transfer of sin.
Here there's no transfer. Here it's talking about the Nazirite
himself being made impure because suddenly one dead, dropped dead
beside him and he is unclean. When the Lord Jesus Christ, our
blessed Redeemer, was made sin for us. He stood before God guilty, deserving of wrath, deserving
of judgment, deserving of death, willingly, because he took a
vow to God, a Nazirite vow, and he offers a sacrifice. His hair,
the Nazarite's hair, was his strength and his glory. Our Lord
Jesus, when we were made sin for us, becoming unclean, suffered
the wrath of God, as those hair were shaved off, his glory gone.
The glory of he who sits in heaven. It's as though his glory were
gone, portraying something for us. Jesus Christ, God's Son,
withheld nothing. He withheld nothing. He withheld nothing. Randall,
to save your soul, he didn't hold back a thing. He had nothing
of his own. He had nothing. He said, I won't
let this go. He who thought not robbery to
be equal with God, because he is God, became obedient unto
death, even the death of the cross, and he held back nothing.
He gave up the very glory that he rightly possesses as God when
he was made sin for us, that he might show forth his glory
in the putting away of sin by the sacrifice of himself, making
his church pure before him by the washing of his blood and
the washing of regeneration in his spirit by the word of God.
And now he blesses us. so that it becomes a matter of
righteousness, of justice, of truth, through the sacrifice
of our Lord Jesus Christ, for the Lord God Almighty, the triune
Jehovah, to grant us all blessedness. All blessedness. The priest would
come and he would take the sacrifice. the turtle dove, the old pigeons.
And he would take the heave offering. And he, after the hair had been
consumed, after all the sacrifice of the Savior had been offered,
and he would wave it as an offering before the Lord. And the Nazirite
is accepted. And the Nazirite being accepted,
all his work accepted as a Nazirite because of this sacrifice that
he has made. And the Lord Jesus Our great
sacrifice, our Nazarene, our great high priest, has taken
everything that is his and offers it to God. And with it, even
us who are described in the Song of Solomon as his hair, which
is like a flock of goats, thick, thick hair, that he'll never
lose one. and he offers it before God,
and as he, our Nazarene, is accepted, the perfectly obedient servant
of God, so we are accepted of God in him. Now listen to me,
being accepted of God in him, We are blessed of God in him. With every blessing, God, the
triune Jehovah, heaps upon him for time and for eternity. Oh, my soul, if that doesn't
ring your bell, I don't know what will. Being accepted in
him. We are blessed of God in Him
and with Him. With every blessing God can bestow
upon a people in this world. Let's look at a text. Numbers
chapter six, verse 22. Here's the blessing God commands.
The Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto Aaron, and unto his
son, saying, On this wise, ye shall bless the children of Israel,
saying unto them, the Lord bless thee and keep thee. The Lord
make his face to shine upon thee and be gracious unto thee. The
Lord lift up his countenance upon thee and give thee peace.
And they shall put my name upon the children of Israel and I
will bless them. I don't know that it's the case,
but I rather suspect that when our Lord, in that passage we
read earlier in Luke chapter 1, as he's ascending up into
heaven, stretched out his hands and blessed his people, I can
hear him say, the Lord bless thee and keep thee. The Lord
make his face to shine upon thee and be gracious unto thee. The
Lord lift up his countenance upon thee and give thee peace. And the Lord God says, they shall
put my name upon the children of Israel and I will bless them. I rather suspect that's exactly
what our Savior did as he was ascending up into heaven. Now
be sure you don't miss this. The word translated Lord, Jehovah,
is used three times in this blessing. All three times the same word
is used. But in each case, there's a slightly different accent mark
in the Hebrew text, indicating there's a slightly different
meaning. Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord, we're
told in Deuteronomy. But he who is our one Lord and
our one God is the triune Jehovah, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. So that we're here declared,
in Numbers chapter 6, we're here declared by God himself, that
God the Father and God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, through
Christ the God-man, through his obedience unto death, blesses
his covenant people with all blessings. The benediction was
pronounced upon the children of Israel at the close of this
public tabernacle service. And so the Lord Jesus pronounces
the blessing of God upon his covenant people by the sacrifice
of himself. And the text says, the Lord bless
thee and keep thee. That's the blessing of God the
Father upon us. God the Father who blessed us
with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ,
along with electing, adopting, and justifying grace, pardoning
grace, regenerating grace, calling grace, preserving grace, and
eternal life. And then it says, the Lord make
his face to shine upon thee and be gracious unto thee. That's
talking about the blessing of God the Son. Through the incarnation
and obedience of Christ, through the mediation of Christ, our
Lord God, the triune Jehovah, makes himself known to us and
causes his face to shine upon us. We see the glory of God shining
in the face of Jesus Christ, his Son, and he causes us to
know that he is gracious. He pours out for us all blessings,
pours them out upon our heads, all the blessings of His grace.
God the Father pronounces the blessedness, says this is their
blessedness. God the Father makes us blessed
from everlasting. God the Son comes and says these
blessings I have secured for my people. And then the text
says, the Lord lift up his countenance upon thee and give thee peace.
This is the blessing of God the Holy Ghost. In the sweet experience
of grace, God the Holy Ghost comes to chosen redeemed sinners
and reveals Christ in us. And when he gives us life and
faith in Christ, he causes us to know we're people blessed
of God. God chose you. Christ redeemed
you. The blessing of God's upon you.
All is well for you. God is your father. Christ is
your savior. The spirit of God is your comforter.
All is well for you. All right, now, first we have
the blessing of God, our father, in these words. The Lord bless
thee and keep thee. When we are urged to bless God,
Bless the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Understand
there's nothing we can do to make God more blessed. There's
nothing you and I do to make God better or more than he is
in himself. There's nothing we can do to
make God happier or more delighted. What's it mean then? We don't
wish that he'd be blessed. We don't make him blessed. We
simply acknowledge that he is the blessed God. We simply acknowledge
that blessedness is his. That blessedness is his, this
blessedness, true delight and happiness and bliss. This is
his because he is God. So continually in the scriptures,
we say, bless the Lord, oh my soul. Blessed be the Lord because
he hath heard the voice of my supplications. Blessed be the
Lord God of Israel from everlasting to everlasting. Amen and amen. Blessed be the Lord who daily
loatheth us with benefits, even the God of our salvation. He
who is our God is the blessed one. Turn over to that blessed
familiar text in Ephesians. Ephesians chapter one. Verse 3. Blessed be the God and
Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all
spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ. The word is
eulogized. When we bless God, we simply
eulogize Him. That is, we speak well of Him.
We say something good about God. But God eulogizes us by making
us blessed. He doesn't just say something
good about us, He makes us good. He doesn't just say that we're
righteous, He makes us righteous. He doesn't just say that we're
sanctified, He makes us sanctified. He doesn't just say that we're
holy, He makes us holy. Who hath blessed us, now watch
this, with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ.
God the Father has blessed us, His elect, with all spiritual
blessings. All spiritual blessings. Well, that means there's nothing
He withholds, nothing He doesn't give, nothing He hasn't given. All spiritual blessings given
us in Christ in heavenly places before the foundation of the
world. Verse 4, how is that? According as He hath chosen us
in Him, before the foundation of the world, that we should
be holy and without blame before Him, in love, having predestinated
us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself, according
to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of
His grace, wherein He hath made us accepted in the Beloved. Now how do you do that? Look
at verse 7. In whom, that is in the beloved, in Christ his
son, in Christ the mediator, in whom we were blessed from
everlasting, in whom we have redemption through his blood,
that is the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of his
grace. Bless the Lord, oh my soul, and all that is within
me, bless his holy name. With all my heart, With all the
delight of my soul, I ascribe all blessedness to my God. But I can do no less, and I can
do no more. But when God blesses me, that's
another thing. When God blesses us, he performs
the blessedness. He blesses us in our creation. and much more in the new creation.
It is a blessed thing to be born. Oh my, when a baby is born into
this world, what a blessed thing. But a much more blessed thing
to be born again. He blesses us in our food and
much more in giving us Christ who is the bread of life and
nourishment for our souls. We are blessed in being clothed.
but infinitely more blessed being clothed in his righteousness,
in the garments of salvation. It is a blessing to be a member
of a kind, loving, happy family. But oh, my soul. unspeakable
blessedness to be one in the family of God, the everlasting
family of the eternal God, sons and daughters of the Almighty.
Try, if you can, to calculate the blessedness which is ours
in Christ by the hand of God. Let no man glory in me, and Paul
said, for all things are yours. whether Paul or Apollos, or Cephas
or the world, or life or death, or things present or things to
come, all are yours. Oh, Don Fortner, did you hear
God speak? All are yours, things past, things
present, things to come. Good men, bad men, faithful men,
unfaithful men, all things are yours for ye are Christ and Christ
is God's. What a blessing it is being redeemed
by Christ's precious blood to have sin pardoned. All sin pardoned
forever. What a blessing it is to be made
the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. What a blessing to be
sanctified, made holy by God the Father. What a blessing to
enjoy all the privileges, all the benedictions of the new covenant. How richly, how richly, indescribably
richly our God has blessed us. He's often blessed us when we
didn't know it. Matter of fact, I rather suspect
we know far less of God's blessings than we do, know far less of
them than the things that we actually know. We look at things
and think, oh, that's terrible, wish that hadn't happened, wish
that hadn't happened, wish that hadn't happened. God's blessings
commonly come in our houses by the back door. And we don't recognize
them. We fail to acknowledge them.
Even when we acknowledge them, we fail, or even when we recognize
them, we fail to acknowledge them. But God's blessings upon
his people are constant. Let us not be ungrateful. Let
us not forget his blessing is constant blessing. This will
set my heart at rest. Nothing else will. What my God
appoints is best. Did you get that? This will set
my heart at rest. What my God appoints is best. The future may be marked with
temptations, trials, and troubles. It will be blessed of God, our
Father. He said, I will never leave thee
nor forsake thee. He said, all thy days shall thy
strength be. Thy bread shall be given thee.
Thy water shall be sure. When thou passest through the
waters, I will be with thee. And through the rivers, they
shall not overflow thee. When thou walkest through the
fire, the flame shall not kindle upon thee. This is our blessedness. The Lord blessed thee. As I say
that to every believing sinner here, knowing that the Lord God
will so bless you. May your soul look forward, not
with dread, but with hope to tomorrow. The Lord bless thee. The Lord bless thee. Oh, he has
blessed you, and he will bless you tomorrow, and tomorrow after
that, and tomorrow after that. His work, Lindsay, is blessedness. It's blessedness. When it breaks
your heart, it's blessedness. When it causes you to look to
Him, it's blessedness. When it causes you to know your
own heart and your own corruption, oh, what blessedness. He is that
God who says, the Lord blessed thee and keep thee. Moses, you, my Lord, say to Aaron,
my priest, for my people, the Lord bless thee and keep thee. The Lord keep thee. It's a promise. The Lord will keep you. He is
ill kept who is his own keeper. He is even worse kept who has
his brother for his keeper. But oh, how splendorously kept
are they who have God for their keeper. The Lord bless thee and
keep thee. Temptations will come. The Lord
will deliver you from evil. You will fall. Yes, you will
fall. You will fall. How often we think. I've had conversations this week
that have broken my heart. Situations that I just never
dreamed. Never dreamed would happen. Everybody,
your heart breaks and you weep. And you think, that won't happen
to me. That's not what I'm gonna do. And God will give you to
know your heart like he did Hezekiah. Because you got to know your
heart. You've got to know your heart. Don't forget what you
are. Mark Medley, I caught your eye there, didn't I? Don't forget
what you are. You're just exactly what you
always were. Just exactly what you always were. Just as corrupt
and vile and godly, sinful, evil, wretched as you can possibly
be. Hasn't changed a bit. And God
will, oh, God make you never forget that. And the way he does
that is he will leave Hezekiah to himself, and make him know what's in his
heart. And so he turns from us, and in the matter of temptation
and trial, leaves us to ourselves, and we fall, and fall, and fall. And suddenly we say and do and
think things. You didn't think yesterday it
happened. You didn't imagine it happened yesterday. And here
I am in this pit, in this state of caughtness, wretchedness. And you hate yourself and hate
everything around you. And the Lord comes and he restores
you seven times a day. The righteous fall seven times
a day and the Lord lifts him up seven times a day because
he's promised the Lord bless thee and keep thee. Now look
at the next blessing. This is the blessing of God the
Son, our blessed Savior. The Lord make his face to shine
upon thee and be gracious unto thee. That expression speaks of assured
reconciliation. The Lord make his face to shine
upon them. God was in Christ reconciling
his elect to himself, not imputing our trespasses to us, but charging
his son with our sin when he was made sin for us and forgiving
us of sin so that the Lord God has reconciled us to His Son
before ever we came into this world. But I didn't know anything
about it until God sent His Son, the power of His Spirit, and
caused His face to shine upon me in His Son. And now he makes himself known
as my God and my father through Christ his son, revealing his
son in me, revealing in me his word of grace and salvation in
his son, giving me faith in his son and believing on his son,
trusting Christ. I have assurance. Then God, my
Father, smiles on me. He smiles on me. He smiles on
me as he smiles on his son. The Lord make his face to shine
upon thee. Pastor, how do you know that's
what that means? Let's see if I can demonstrate
it to you. When you pick up that baby, now that won't quite do. It's just not quite the same.
When you pick up that grandbaby, and you hold that grandbaby in
your arms for the first time, and suddenly something comes
across your face that you just can't hide. Your eyes sparkle,
and your mouth turns upward, And you just smile with all the
delight, all the pleasure. Maybe the reason is, with the
grandbaby, I don't have any responsibility. All I gotta do is just be grandpa.
But with the babies, you smile at them and you weep. Well, now
I gotta raise this thing. Now I gotta feed it, take care
of it, provide for it. The grandbaby, all I gotta do
is just smile at it. and you pick that baby up and
there's nothing but approval and delight. Nothing but approval and delight. Hear me children of God, because
of Christ's perfect atonement, because of his shed blood at
Calvary, because of his perfect obedience, because of his perfect
righteousness, Because when he died, we died. When he lived,
we lived. When he arose, we arose. Because
God looks on his son in heaven. What do you see on his face?
What do you see on his face? I don't see anything but a sparkle
of delight in his eye, a smile on his lips, beaming with delight
on his side. This is what I wanted. This is
what I required. This is what I demand. Here,
my son. And it looks on me and says,
this is what I wanted. This is what I required. This
is what I demand. This is what I'm pleased with. Don Fortner, my son, my obedient,
sinless, holy son. All right, here's the third blessing.
Here's the blessing of God, the Holy Ghost. The Lord lift up
his countenance upon thee and give thee peace. The long and
short of that is just this. The Lord give you a conscious,
delightful sense of his gracious favor. Give you peace. Peace. A conscious, delightful sense
of His gracious favor. The Lord give you peace. No wonder
our Savior calls the Spirit of God the Comforter. When the Comforters
come, He'll convince you of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment.
He'll give you peace. I'll give you my peace, the peace
that I have with my father when I leave this body and go to my
father, having fully accomplished the will of my father in the
saving of my people by the sacrifice of myself. My peace, my peace
I give to you. The peace I have at the throne
of God, of acceptance with God, of pleasing God, my peace I give
to you. We are always reconciled to God,
but we don't always know him. I mean by that that we're not
always aware of it. It's not always sunshine in our
souls. Evening and morning were the
first day, and our evenings and mornings come with every day. Every day has its darkness, and
every day its light. Every day its joy, and every
day its sorrow. Every day it's pain and every day it's pleasure.
But God, the Holy Ghost, comes and he causes us to have a conscious,
delightful sense of God's gracious favor in the darkness, in the
pain, and in the sorrow. Oh, what a blessing it is when
the Spirit of God sheds broad the love of Christ in our hearts.
This blessing David craved when he said, restore to me the joy
of thy salvation. And though we transgress, though
we sin, and surely we do, and surely we will, the Lord God
will yet lift up his countenance upon thee, and when he does,
he will give thee peace. Oh God, thank you. Thank you
for the blessedness. There's no peace like the peace
we have with God and no peace with God like that which comes
from a sense of assured love, assured pardon, assured grace,
assured salvation. Therefore being justified by
faith we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ Peace that passeth understanding
peace. No man can explain, and no man
can understand, just peace. Because He who spared not His
own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not
with Him also freely give us all things? Now one last thing. Look at verse 27. Number 6, 27. And they shall put my name upon
the children of Israel, and I will bless them. They shall put my
name upon the children of Israel, and I will bless them. Our great
high priest, our Aaron, says in Revelation 3.12, I will write
upon him my new name. Look at that article in the bulletin
on Revelation 3.12, and you'll see what he's talking about here
in number six. They shall put my name upon the
children of Israel, and I will bless them. Put my name on them,
they're my property. Put my name on them, they're
under my care. put my name on them, they're accepted forever. What name do we have as God's
children? What name of God is there that's
ours? Look through the scriptures,
you'll find just one. You'll only find one. One name of God
that's our name. His name is Jehovah Shekinu,
the Lord our Righteous. and he puts his name on us, Jehovah's
Ekinyu, the Lord, our righteousness. And he says, because Don's name
is Jehovah's Ekinyu, the Lord, our righteousness, I will bless
him. Because your name, children of
Israel, my covenant people, is Jehovah's Ekinyu, I will bless
you. They shall have their troubles,
but I'll bless them through their troubles. They'll have their
heartaches, but I'll bless them in their heartaches. They'll
have their weaknesses, but I'll bless them in spite of their
weaknesses. They'll have their bereavements, but I will bless
them in their bereavements. The world may curse them, but
I'll bless them. And none can curse whom I blessed. They may die, but I'll bless
them in death. And when all is done, that must
be done, I will bless them. Oh, how he will bless us then. This is God's word to you. The Lord bless thee and keep
thee. The Lord make his face to shine
upon thee. and be gracious unto thee. The
Lord lift up his countenance upon thee and give thee peace. Soon he will lift up his countenance
upon us in the glory of heaven and we shall see him face to
face. As for me, I will behold thy
face in righteousness. I shall be satisfied when I awake
in thy likeness. Amen. Amen. God, make this blessedness yours. Give you faith right now in Christ
the Lord, and go home today blessed of God. Blessed of God. Blessed of God. Amen.