582_The blessedness of living in the fear of God (Psalm 128) Psalm 128 Blessed is everyone who fears the Lord, who walks in his ways! 2 You shall eat the fruit of the labor of your hands; you shall be blessed, and it shall be well with you. 3 Your wife will be like a fruitful vine within your house; your children will be like olive shoots around your table. 4 Behold, thus shall the man be blessed who fears the Lord. 5 The Lord bless you from Zion! May you see the prosperity of Jerusalem all the days of your life! 6 May you see your children’s children! Peace be upon Israel! Many years ago, a well-known businessman was asked the secret behind his steady joy and calm despite the pressures and unpredictability of his work. His answer surprised everyone. He said, “Every evening, before anything else, I sit with my family around the dinner table. We talk, we pray, we laugh. Everything else in my life may rise or fall, but if my home is blessed, I am blessed.” His words echo a profound biblical truth—that real blessing is not measured by possessions or achievements, but by a life aligned with God, overflowing into our work, our homes, and even our communities. Psalm 128 takes this truth and paints it with striking beauty. It opens not with a promise limited to a few, nor with a blessing reserved for Israel alone, but with a grand, universal pronouncement: “Blessed is everyone who fears the LORD, who walks in His ways.” This sets the tone for the entire psalm, declaring that God’s favor rests upon all—of every nation, every background, and every generation—who choose to honor Him with reverence and obedience. This universal welcome is not a New Testament idea that suddenly appeared with the early church. It has always been God’s intention. When Peter walked into the house of Cornelius, a Gentile centurion, he was overwhelmed by this very truth: “Truly I understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears Him and does what is right is acceptable to Him.” (Acts 10:34–35). From the beginning, God’s plan of salvation was for all peoples. Israel was chosen not as an exclusive club, but as a light to the nations—a living testimony of the goodness, justice, and mercy of the God who redeemed them. Though Israel often failed in this mission, Scripture highlights many who, despite being outsiders, recognized the God of Israel and entrusted themselves to Him—Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, and later in the New Testament, the Roman centurion, the Syro-Phoenician woman, and others who believed even when many Israelites did not. In Christ, the promise to Abraham—“through you all the nations of the earth shall be blessed”—shines with full brightness. The blessedness of Psalm 128 begins with one posture: the fear of the Lord. This is not a cringing, dreadful fear, like an animal before a predator. It is a reverent, joyful fear—the kind that leads one to bow in awe, to seek God’s will, and to walk in His ways because one understands who
