“The Lord giveth and The Lord taketh.” This famous verse from Job 1:21 is what people use to paint their erroneous picture of God. It is equivalent of bringing back the picture of the law: that God rewards us when we are ‘good’ and punishes us when we have sinned.
Although the book of Job is a real story, The LORD our God today doesn’t operate in the same covenant as He did then. During the time of Job (before the death of Christ), the devil can freely approach God to accuse the people of their sins. With The LORD being a just and righteous God, He HAS to punish our sins. So good o’l Job, no matter how ‘good’ a person he is, he is still a sinner. This gave the devil the license to torment him and this makes The LORD God righteous and just in testing Job.
Poor o’l Job lived before the cross of Jesus Christ
Today, our relationship with God does NOT operate under the covenant of Law but under the covenant of grace through faith in Jesus Christ (Romans 6). We are living in the age after the shed blood of Jesus Christ which means one thing: Sin has already been taken away by The Lamb. Under the new covenant, the devil can no longer accuse us of sin (for it has been paid for) and because of the blood of Jesus Christ, God is just and righteous in showering us with blessings.
Now we are in the new covenant of grace, Job stories are no longer in effect in our lives. In the new covenant of grace, God doesn’t test us anymore and He doesn’t take back His blessings!
Below are some Bible histories which you can check out. You will see that people have been trying to take away God’s blessings from the people of God to no avail. In the first story, you will see Esau convincing his father, Isaac, to withdraw his blessings from Jacob (and of course to give it to him instead). Isaac knew it is impossible to take away the blessings of God:
Isaac trembled violently and said, “Who was it, then, that hunted game and brought it to me? I ate it just before you came and I blessed him—and indeed he will be blessed!”
-Genesis 27:33
Paul confirms what Esau tried to do will not hold up to God’s law of irreversibility of blessings:
Afterward, as you know, when he wanted to inherit this blessing, he was rejected. Even though he sought the blessing with tears, he could not change what he had done.
-Hebrews 12:17
Another interesting story was the failed plan of Balak and Balaam to curse the people of God. Balaam was paid by Balak to curse Israel, but instead, God contorted his mouth and made him bless Israel instead. Here, we can see that not even a powerful prophet or wizard can go against the blessings of God. This is Balaam reporting back to his employer Balak:
How can I curse
those whom God has not cursed?
How can I denounce
those whom the LORD has not denounced?
God is not human, that he should lie,
not a human being, that he should change his mind.
Does he speak and then not act?
Does he promise and not fulfill?
I have received a command to bless;
he has blessed, and I cannot change it.
-Numbers 23:8,19-20
Not even Christians or saints can take away God’s blessings from you. Below is a story within the Acts of the Apostles. The apostles themselves were against Peter in preaching the Gospel to the Gentiles. These were great and holy men of God protesting, but God has blessed the Gentile world; and what He has blessed, no man can curse:
“Do not call something unclean if God has made it clean.” -Acts 10:15
When you have Jesus Christ in your life, you already are tremendously blessed by God (John 14:21). And when you are blessed by The Almighty, then you are helplessly and hopelessly blessed. No one and nothing in the universe can ‘unbless’ you. As potent as the blood of Christ is in wiping our sins away, that’s how much the LORD will bless us. And as the blood of Christ is eternal, so will our blessings be forever.
You cannot unscramble scrambled eggs. Because of what Jesus Christ has done on the cross, you and I are hopelessly, helplessly, irreversibly blessed! Forever.
My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand.
I and the Father are one.
-John 10:27-30
* Image taken from Google Images