We are blessed by God to be a blessing to others

The word genesis has to do with the beginning. It has to do with origin.

The book of Genesis tells the story of two beginnings.  It tells the story of God’s creation of the world, and it tells the story of the beginning of God’s relationship with people. 

The reason why the book of Genesis includes two distinct beginnings is because of sin.  God made a world that was tremendously good, but sin corrupted the good that God had created.  Nevertheless, God was not to be deterred by sin, so God made a second beginning.  God reached out to a particular person, Abram, and to his descendants, and through them to the whole world.

On New Year’s Day, 1929, the University of California (my alma mater) was playing Georgia Tech in the Rose Bowl.  Shortly before half time, a Cal player named Roy Riegels recovered a Georgia Tech fumble and ran with it 65 yards toward the wrong end zone before his own teammate caught up with him and tackled him just short of the goal line.  Cal was not able to move the ball, and their fourth down punt was blocked in the end zone for a two-point safety (which turned out to be the ultimate margin of victory for Georgia Tech).  Riegels felt horrible about letting his team down.  He did not want to leave the locker room when the teams returned to the field for the third quarter.  When Coach Nibbs Price told Riegels that he would be starting the second half, he said, “Coach, I can’t do it.  I’ve ruined you.  I’ve ruined the University of California.  I’ve ruined myself.  I couldn’t face that crowd in the stadium to save my life.”  Coach Price put his hand on Riegels’ shoulder and said to him, “Roy, get up and go on back; the game is only half over.” 

Haddon Robinson remarks, “When I think of this story, I think ‘What a coach!’  And then I think about all the big mistakes I’ve made in life and how God is willing to forgive me and let me try again.  I take the ball and run in the wrong direction.  I stumble and fall and am so ashamed of myself that I never want to show my face again.  But God comes to me in the person of his son Jesus Christ, and he says, ‘Get up and go on back; the game is only half over.’  That is the gospel of the second chance.  Of the third chance.  Of the hundredth chance.  And when I think of that, I have to say, ‘What a God!’”

Though humanity’s sin had corrupted God’s good creation, God’s goodness was not to be deterred.  God arranged for a new beginning by reaching out to a particular person named Abram, with the expressed purpose of blessing the whole world through Abram and his descendants.  When God reached out to Abram in Genesis 12:1-3, God said to Abram, “I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing… and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” 

As God did with Abram, God’s intent is to pour his goodness into us so that God’s goodness can seep out of us to others.  Therefore, our purpose in life is to take in God’s goodness and share God’s goodness with others.

In Wellsprings of Wisdom, Ralph L. Woods writes, “An ambitious farmer, unhappy about the yield of his crops, heard of a highly recommended new seed corn.  He bought some and produced a crop that was so abundant his astonished neighbors asked him to sell them a portion of the new seed.  But the farmer, afraid that he would lose a profitable competitive advantage, refused.  The second year, the new crop did not produce as good a crop, and when the third-year crop was still worse, it dawned upon the farmer that his prize corn was being pollinated by the inferior grade corn from his neighbors’ fields.”  If he had taken to heart that he had been blessed to be a blessing to others, everyone’s crops would have excelled.  But when he refused to be a blessing to others, everyone’s crops suffered.

As God revealed to Abram, and as God revealed through Abram, we are blessed by God and we are to be a blessing to others.