Numbers 6:24 Meaning and Explanation

This is the first line of the priestly blessing, and it is striking that God puts the words in His people's mouths. He does not leave them guessing how He feels about them. To bless is to speak good and to give good, to wish someone well and to make it so. And to keep is to guard, to watch over, to fence around. The two belong together: God gives good gifts, then guards the ones He has given.

Centuries later, the One who blessed and kept His own took the form of a servant and carried that keeping all the way to a cross. Jesus prayed for His friends, 'keep them from the evil' (John 17:15), and Jude closes with praise to the God who is 'able to keep you from falling' (Jude 1:24). The God who first taught this blessing has come near in Christ to be, Himself, the keeping He once only promised.

Every verb here is singular: "bless thee," "keep thee." Though spoken over a whole congregation, the blessing reaches each person as if he stood alone before God, named and known. And the LORD is the one who acts in both clauses; the priest's lips move, but the giving and the guarding are God's own work. To "keep" (שָׁמַר, shamar) is the same watchfulness Adam was given over the garden and the shepherd over his flock through the night. It carries the sense of a hedge set around something precious. The One who spoke this word later called Himself the good shepherd who lays down His life for the sheep, and no one plucks them out of His hand. The blessing was always a promise leaning toward Him.