Bring a Gift, Leave with a Blessing

When they saw the star, they rejoiced with exceeding great joy. And when they were come into the house, they saw the young child with Mary his mother, and fell down, and worshipped him: and when they had opened their treasures, they presented unto him gifts; gold, and frankincense, and myrrh (Matthew 2:10–11, KJV).

Bring a Gift and Leave with a Blessing

Scripture tells us the wise men came to see Jesus bearing gifts and left with exceeding great joy. The condition in how they left was a condition in how they came. If we come into God’s presence with joy, we too can leave with gifts. If we expect to receive something from the Lord when we come into His presence, we won’t leave empty-handed.

Psalms 100:1–2 says, “Make a joyful noise unto the LORD, all ye lands. Serve the LORD with gladness: come before his presence with singing” (KJV). There isn’t an exclusion given to those who worship and serve the Lord. All should make a joyful noise and to come into his presence with singing. We shouldn’t wait until we come into God’s house to praise Him. We are to come with our praise—praise to the Lord of Glory should begin before we come into church.

Praise the Lord for His Blessings

Praise is the key to never leaving the presence of the Lord un-impacted and/or unchanged. If we come into His presence empty-handed, we will leave empty-handed. We bring praise unto the Lord because it is respectful to return something to someone who has blessed you with something. God has given us victory (I Corinthians 15:55)—something we could never achieve on our own. Because of this gift, we need to respond. Our praise is our thanks to God!

Too many times we want to complain about what we’ve received from the Lord. We have our arms open wide to receive His blessings, and then we don’t like what we get. We do not have any right to complain about what we receive from the Lord if we don’t bring anything to the house of God!

Blessings in Giving

In Luke 17 we read about 10 men who had leprosy. They cried out to Jesus for mercy, He heard them, and told them to go and show themselves to the priests. When they were obedient to God’s word, they discovered in route to the priest, they were cleansed. When one of the 10 lepers saw that he was cleansed, he turned back to glorify Jesus that he had received his healing.

The one leper didn’t take his blessing and leave! He wanted to give something back to the Lord of Glory. He wanted to give praise to the Lord in receipt of his blessing. We learn that it was in his return that he received something even greater than a cleansing. Because of the praise he gave back to God, he became whole (Luke 17:19).

When we are willing to bless God, and bring praise into His presence, there is another blessing in store for us when we just give to God (Acts 20:35). Each time we come into the house of the Lord, there is something available to us. It’s up to us what we give and it’s up to us to get!