“God bless.”

One day I realized I was using those words frequently without really thinking about them. It was the way I signed off on most emails. It was something I prayed would happen for people who were struggling. It was something I said every time someone sneezed, which is a weird way to acknowledge someone else’s involuntary bodily action. I noticed I was using “God bless” without a lot of thought.

What about you? Does “God bless” have meaning, or has it become a pleasant platitude that means little?

Proclaiming God’s blessing to people is something he wants us to do. It goes back to the Israelites when they were fresh out of Egypt. God commanded Aaron and his sons to say to the people: “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” (Numbers 6:24-26).

The Hebrew word for bless comes from the same Hebrew word for kneel. The idea is that even though God is infinitely greater than us, he bends to meet us at our level. He brings his powerful strength down to our level for our benefit.

Jesus fulfilled God’s blessing for you and all people. The one called God Among Us brought the power of heaven into a human body so that he could defeat death once and for all.

The next time you give or receive God’s blessing, remember that those words are a celebration of what God did for us through Jesus.