Blessed to be a blessing......

[Rick Bunker]

Genesis 1:28 (NKJV)
28 Then God blessed them, and God said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth."

I think of this as the first commandment and covenant between God and human beings. It is, in the keeping of it, I think, the greatest example that we are created in God’s image. As God creates so do we as we live out his direction to be fruitful, multiply, replenish, subdue, and have dominion here where God has placed us. The ewes require human intervention in order to have successful and healthy births even in the absence of inclement weather and no immediate predator presence – to say nothing of the times when those are or would be right there to destroy new life just as it is being birthed.

My neighbor has goats and sheep and we have had some goats as well. She often sits up nights helping births to take place that would otherwise cause the death of both mother and baby. There are many today who would say that humanity is a scourge on the planet and the life on earth would be better even idyllic without the presence of human beings. Certainly, there are many species, if they could talk who would vociferously disagree with those who espouse such ideas. Even dogs, which are predators that are domesticated, live longer and healthier lives than those who are wild.

God has endowed us with the ability to be a blessing. The ‘first commandment’ in the first chapter of Genesis is not an impossible romanticized demand it is a privilege that we are blessed and enabled to be able to live out.