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A NEW TRADITION

The Christmas Blessing

This year we started a new tradition. One that we pray our children will carry with them into eternity.

We gave our children each a special Christmas Blessing.

My hubby and I both wrote each child a letter. We told them how we remembered the day they were born and about special memories watching them grow through the years. We then wrote out a special page of blessings. We blessed them with the blessings Abraham, David and of Daniel. We blessed them with the blessing of Timothy and Elijah.

We blessed them with blessings over their future and covered them with blessings for any trial they may face. We blessed them with pure heart, sound mind and willing spirit.

Then we prepared for the Blessing ceremony.

We put these prayers on special paper, and created a book (binder) for each of them.

We prayed with each other and then called the kids into the great room… we were nervous.

We explained that we were about to embark on something new, something we prayed would be a new family tradition, at Christmas each year. We explained that our ultimate prayer would be that this would be carried forward to our children’s children and beyond.

We asked our son, almost 21 to sit in a chair we had placed in the middle of the room. We read this Blessing over him together as we laid hands on his shoulders.

May The Lord bless you and keep you.

May the Lord make his face to shine upon you, and be gracious to you.

May the Lord lift up his countenance upon you, and give you peace…

Number 6:24-26

We each read our letter to him one at a time.  It was hard to keep from sobbing through the love we were pouring out to him, his shoulders were trembling, it was such an honest and emotional moment for us all. Telling how much we respect him, how proud we are for the man he is becoming and the decisions he is making. These were words he needed, right now.  When we got to the blessing page, I wasn’t sure we could go on. This is when the Holy Spirit stepped in.  Those blessings were read with an anointing on them it was absolutely amazing!

We hugged and kissed and he sat down next to his fiancé – whole – filled to overflowing…

Next, our daughter -11- she was quiet, unsure what to do, overwhelmed by the whole thing… yet, she was ready… she practically leaped into the chair! 

We began the same way:

May The Lord bless you and keep you.

May the Lord make his face to shine upon you, and be gracious to you.

May the Lord lift up his countenance upon you, and give you peace…

Being able to cover her with these words and to share with her how much she means to us, how proud we are of her and the wonderful blessings we want for her life was timely… sometimes in the day to day, we forget to tell our kids how amazing they are… she needed these words, right here right now.

Her eyes shined with tears of joy and her smile slashed across her face with each blessing we read… her hugs were tight and long before she sat back down…

Then we did something even more unexpected…

We gave a blessing book to our future daughter in law.  

We asked our son to help us read the blessing over her. It was unbelievable the powerful effect it had both of them… I can visualize one day seeing them bless their children this same way…

The idea came from man y sources, mostly from The Blessing by Robert Strand.

Our plan is to continue adding blessings throughout the year to their books. There will be a Wedding Blessing, next summer Birthday Blessings, Graduation Blessings, and one day… Baby Blessings…  our son’s next birthday will be significant – 21 – we will ask other family members and close mentoring friends to bless him with a letter to add to his book…. This will also be a ceremony where their letters will be read to him. When our daughter turns 13 we will have a purity ceremony and ask others to join us in The Blessing…  

I thank God for bringing this into our life… to give to our children.  I can only imagine what would have changed in my own life if I had been given something like the Blessing… to know that others really thought these things about me, to have those letters to read in times of sadness or dismay…

May The Lord bless you and keep you.

May the Lord make his face to shine upon you, and be gracious to you.

May the Lord lift up his countenance upon you, and give you peace…