When God Gives Us Peas

There is a song that my daughter has heard more often than any other.  I have sung it to her almost every night of her life just before she sleeps.  The song is based on the priestly blessing found in Numbers 6:24-26 (NIV).

Rachel sings "The Lord  Bless You and Keep You"

The Lord bless you
    and keep you;
the Lord make his face shine on you
    and be gracious to you;
the Lord turn his face toward you
    and give you peace.

On a humorous note, a couple times, Rachel showed me that she really didn’t “get it” when I sang this song.  Once, she stopped me just after the first line and said, “Mommy, that just doesn’t make any sense.”

“What doesn’t make sense, sweetie?”

“Well, God doesn’t bless us.”

“What do you mean?  Of course He blesses us.  Every day, in lots of ways.”

Rachel was thoughtful for a minute and finally conceded. “OK, maybe when we sneeze, He says, “God bless you!””  You’ve just got to love the way kids think.

But I must say that I found her second misunderstanding even funnier.  Again, she stopped me mid-song, just after the words and give you peace.  She obviously didn’t understand what peace means, because she asked in all seriousness, “Mommy, why does God want to give us peas?”

I can just imagine the picture in her head of Jesus standing there offering her a bowl of little green veggie balls to eat.  She just couldn’t figure out why in the world that was such an important thing to ask God for every single night before she went to bed.

Silliness aside, even though we hopefully understand more than Rachel did at age four about the meaning of the words bless and peace, I believe we often live as if we are clueless. 

Too often, we go through life grumbling and worrying about the problems we face.  We focus on the things that go wrong and are blind to the many ways God blesses us, even in the middle of the tough times.

Sadly, when we live like that, Jesus may as well be offering us a bowl of peas.  When we focus on the problems instead of the blessings, we miss out on the amazing blessing of peace – the peace that passes all understanding (Phil. 4:7) – that God promises us when we trust in Him, and put all our worries into His hands.

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How has God blessed you lately? Is there anything that keeps you from seeing the little blessings that God gives us each day?  What are you experiencing today?  Is today “a day of peas” or “a day of peace”? 

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