One
of my heroes of faith, ministry and life was a man I only met a few times. His name was Dave Ohlerking.
Our paths crossed over 8 years ago when our church was in it’s
infancy. The organization Dave and his
wife Jean led, Children’s Cup, helped to form how our family
functions spiritually and how our church lives in community.
Though Dave passed away about 6 years
ago his words and influence are felt in many, many places and in many, many
lives. I am grateful for how God used
them in my life, family and work.
Yesterday my mind went back to Dave,
and as I was reading I read a blog post that he wrote in September of
2009. Few people have spoken to me as
Dave did and continues to do. I pray the
following will give you much to think about:
The scene is in downtown Brussels,
Belgium. The traffic is scary.
The other car shot our from a small
alley into the side of my Volkswagen van. The police came and took statements
from the other driver and me.
My French was never really great but I
could read the report well enough to know that it asked if I had any blesse’,
the French word for bloody injuries. Happily, nobody had been hurt.
That word blesse’ really intrigued me.
It seemed so close to our English word bless. As I researched the derivations
of bless, I got blessed. French and English come from Latin. Much of the time
the Latin roots of a word are evident in each of the derivative languages. Just
like blesse’ There is a relation between the French bloody injuries and the
English blessing. Old English used the term bledsian to mean covered with
blood. (Bludgeon comes from the same root.) Later English usage had the blessen
mean sanctify.
I knew I had hold of something
wonderful when I found this. To be sanctified or made holy or blessed meant to
be covered by blood–bloodified, if you will. Blessen comes into our usage as
bless.
To be blessed means to be covered by
blood. Yes! Hallelujah! Calvary’s blood, the bleeding wounds of Jesus, is the
source of all blessing in our lives.
When
we say, “God bless you,” we are invoking the blood of Jesus on others’ lives.
“Jesus cover them with your blood,” would mean the same thing. Now when I say,
“God bless you,” it has a new connotation to me.
And I add the following verse as this piece comes to
a close for the day:
God the Father knew you and chose you
long ago, and his Spirit has made you holy. As a result, you have obeyed him
and have been cleansed by the blood of Jesus Christ. May God give you more and
more grace and peace.
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