God Comes First

Student 1: "achooo"

Me: "God bless you".

Student 2: "you mean bless you?"

Me: "No, I mean God bless you".

Children have a spiritual proclivity greater than adults, says Qesees Melaku. I agree. Their minds seek power, and are as impressionable as drying cement. Stick your words in their heads, and don't be surprised if they are more lasting than bronze. As it is written

Death and life are in the power of the tongue, And those who love it will eat its fruit. (Proverbs 18:21)

Being in the dawn of my twenties, it is not oft that I feel old- interactions with elementary school kids change the story. The generational separation comes alive. I have hosted the above conversation a few times in the past year. Laziness is a demon I pray God will grant me the liberty to slay. Laziness is the root of this preposterous questioning of my blessing. People get accustomed to the hey-how-are-you-good talks so much that it infects talks outside of greetings. If I sneeze someone usually says "bless you" as a guttural impulse. A culture of people half-heartedly blurting the saying, without God's name first, has made it meaningless to the youth. They don't notice the words. They don't notice the word.

What is a blessing? It is an undeserved gift, in other words grace. Saying "bless you" bestows no health upon us. It is an action, or work. The everlasting almighty bestows health upon us. Ye have heard that it was said of them of old time, when we sneeze our hearts miss a pump. This is why we ask the lord to bless one another. We are fearful of death, and we pray that that the lord gives us the undeserved gift of life.

Our words carry power, and the youth live under the weight of this power. I say "God bless you", and never merely "bless you". I pray that you do the same.