Every spiritual blessing is ours in Christ Jesus

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us for adoption to sonship through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will— to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves. Ephesians 1: 3 – 6

What a wonderful declaration these verses are. God our Father has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing. Just stop and consider for a moment what that means. Everything that God has can be yours. All the resources of heaven are freely available to the believing Christian through faith and what is more God wants to use us to bless the world.

The way we access these wonderful blessings is by faith. Faith is the hand that reaches into the heavenly realms and lays hold of the blessings of God for ourselves and others. Faith says ‘God is good’ and then acts on it. Faith refuses to believe that God sends bad things.

It can take perseverance to access his provision but sometimes our persistent asking is hiding a lack of faith. We go on asking yet never receive because we do not really believe we can have what we are asking God for.  How sad when Christians doubt if God wants to heal them or provide for them or when past disappointments, apparent lack of answers to their prayers or a sense of unworthiness hinders them. However instead we must let the word of God decide our actions and not our previous experiences which means we must persevere even when there is no evidence, believing our prayers are making a difference.

There must come a time when we unequivocally settle in our hearts that God wants to bless us.  Too often Christians are just not sure of God’s love for them but it is not to do with who we are but who he is. His very nature is to bless and to give freely; that is the God who has called us into his family. We don’t deserve anything but instead his grace which he has freely given us (verse 6) blesses us with all we could ever need or desire. However he also wants to use us to bless others.  If there are those around us who need God’s love, healing, deliverance, protection, peace, provision, guidance or anything else, we can be the ones to open the doors of heaven into their lives so they can know that God really does love them.

It is so good to offer to pray for people and with faith filled prayers, confident in our wonderful Father, we can see him bless the lives of others. Faith opens the doors of heaven so we can reach in and take hold of God’s blessings for ourselves but so much more we can connect others with God’s abundant provision.