What Is a House Blessing—and Why Does the Church Still Do It?

Scripture Reading: Matthew 7

“Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it.”

And when Jesus finished these sayings, the crowds were astonished at his teaching, for he was teaching them as one who had authority, and not as their scribes.

The Service of Blessing a Home

Pastor James Huenink

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God, our Father and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

Tonight, we're taking a look at the service that I printed out for you—the service for blessing a home. What I'd like to do is go through it first quickly. We won't read everything and pray everything, but we are going to go through some of it, and we'll sing the hymns, because I love to sing. The rest of it, we'll just talk about. Then we'll conclude by asking: Why do we do this? What situations call for it, and why is it important enough to bring up in a service like this tonight?

The Service Begins

The service begins by inviting the pastor to your house to get it started. Now I brought some visual aids to show you what that might be like.

The Processional Cross

The first thing you'll notice is that I bring our big old processional cross into your home—the same processional cross that we would use in worship as the entrance of Christ entering our sanctuary. It leads the way into your own home, carrying the same symbolism as you go from room to room blessing the house. We go room to room, following the cross as it enters into each place. It's a beautifully symbolic way of expressing one of the reasons why we do a house blessing.

The Vestments

Another thing that I do is I come all dressed up. I come in my cassock and surplice. The cassock is the black garment underneath; the surplice is the white on the outside with my stole. You'll notice I have our beautiful pink stole, because that's the Sunday that's coming up this weekend. Very exciting!

This isn't a low-key moment. This isn't a downplayed ritual. This is a big deal. The church is coming to you to hold a house blessing, and so I get all dressed up for it, to make it clear that this is significant.

The Incense

The other thing that will happen most of the time, but not every time depending on what you want, is I come with my censer. This is the censer that I use that holds the incense and burns it. I also brought incense if you want to see what it's like. This particular incense was a gift from my parents from Oman, so it's kind of fun, right?

The reason I have the incense is because it goes with us from room to room. Every time we go into a room, we read a passage of scripture, we do a prayer, and then I or the vicar will go and incense every part of the room. We go all the way around the whole thing and make sure it's really, really stinky and smoky and wonderful.

All of these things are designed to serve a couple of purposes. The processional cross is the symbol of Christ coming from the sanctuary into your home. The Word of God is read, we pray, and then we leave behind the smell of incense to remind you that something significant happened here this day. The whole thing envelops all of the senses—you smell, you move, you hear, you see. It's designed to evoke a high sense that something important has happened. And we do that because something important does happen. We go to your home to bring the Word of God and bless the house.

The Service Structure

You'll notice the service begins with us entering and saying, "Peace be to this home and to all who dwell here." Under most circumstances, we'll then read one of the scripture readings that is on your sheet. Typically, I read the reading from Matthew chapter 7 about the wise man who built his house on a rock, pointing us to how your home is built on the words of Christ. The faith that we share is the foundation of everyone's lives, and that is how a wise man built his house on the rock.

There are other options as well, which you can see. Sometimes I will do a mini sermon—and if you're really excited, I can give you a whole hour! You're laughing, because no, I wouldn't do that. It's always very short.

Opening Hymn: "Oh, Bless the House"

Then we transition to actually blessing the house. To do that, we begin with hymn number 862, "Oh, Bless the House."

Oh, bless the house, whate'er befall,
Where Jesus Christ is all in all!
A home that is not wholly His—
How sad and poor and dark it is!

Oh, blest that house where faith is found
And all in hope and love abound;
They trust their God and serve Him still
And do in all His holy will.

Oh, blest the parents who give heed
Unto their children's foremost need
And weary not of care or cost.
May none to them and heaven be lost.

Oh, blest that house; it prospers well.
In peace and joy the parents dwell,
And in their children's lives is shown
How richly God can bless His own.

Then here will I and mine today
A solemn promise make and say:
Though all the world forsake His Word,
I and my house will serve the Lord.

Appropriate for blessing a house, right?

Going Room to Room

From this point on, what we do is go from room to room, and you don't actually follow the order of the service. You follow the order of the house. So you'll start in perhaps the living room, move to a bedroom, kitchen, wherever it is that fits the flow of the house. If you have four bedrooms, we do the bedroom blessing four times. If you have three living rooms, we do the living room blessing three times. It all just depends on the house.

Whatever your house is like, we go from room to room. I have even done it in a trailer that had one bedroom. It was short, but just as blessed. So whatever your house looks like, we can do it.

Example: The Living Room

Each room has a selected reading. The reading for the living room is:

"And to be renewed in the spirit of your minds. Therefore, having put away falsehood, let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another. Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you."

See, a reading that is designed—sometimes wishfully in a big family—to get rid of all clamor and argument! But it calls on us to live peacefully in the house, and then we pray as well at every other part of the house. Each reading is considered for the room and its purpose, with the prayer that fits.

The Final Prayer

You go from room to room until you finally come to the end, when you pray the Lord's Prayer and the final prayer. I want to read this one, because this one is important:

"Lord God Almighty, we implore You to bless and sanctify this home, its occupants and its possessions, enriching them in every way. Drive from here the snares of the evil one, and send Your holy angel to guard, protect, visit and defend all who dwell in this home. Mercifully hear their prayers and when their last hour comes, grant them safe haven in Your heavenly mansions through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen."

This prayer points out two things. One, it asks God to bless the people and the home. Two, it asks God to drive out the evil one and send the angel, the Holy Spirit, to guard and protect all the people who are there. That makes the house blessing more than just a blessing, but also a level of protection from evil spirits.

Closing Hymn: "Now Thank We All Our God"

From there, we move on to the benediction and the blessing at the end, and we close with hymn 895, "Now Thank We All Our God."

Now thank we all our God
With hearts and hands and voices,
Who wondrous things has done,
In whom His world rejoices,
Who from our mother's arms
Has blest us on our way
With countless gifts of love
And still is ours today.

Oh, may this bounteous God
Through all our life be near us,
With ever joyful hearts
And blessed peace to cheer us
And keep us in His grace
And guide us when perplexed
And free us from all ills
In this world and the next.

All praise and thanks to God
The Father now be given,
The Son, and Him who reigns
With them in highest heaven,
The one eternal God,
Whom earth and heav'n adore;
For thus it was, is now,
And shall be evermore.

So that concludes the house blessing service.

Why Do We Do This?

The first reason is simple: people want the blessing of God in their lives, and the pastor comes out as the person who represents this. I get to wear my collar, do my thing, and all of what we do symbolizes the blessing of God coming into the home through the Word and prayer, blessing the people.

This can happen when people move into a new place. It's pretty common when you move into a new home to do this. Or it can happen anytime you want to do it. It is relatively traditional in the church to do it once a year during the Epiphany season. That's just kind of a thing that people do.

Protection from Evil Spirits

But the last reason is one that I wanted to highlight a little bit because it was hidden in the prayer at the end. The last reason is to cast out evil spirits. Because that happens, and I've done it a couple of times.

That final prayer is actually an exorcism prayer, and it brings the power of God into this place. This is why I read the passage earlier from Matthew chapter 8, which talked about when evening came, many who were demon possessed were brought to him, and he drove out the spirits with the word and healed all the sick. Because the power of God still works today to protect us from evil spirits, whether it's demons who are haunting your home or in your body—though that's not going to happen to us Christians, right?

But for many people, these are serious things that require help. I've done house blessings twice where I was pretty sure there were evil spirits in the home.

So I want you to know that if you think your house is haunted, who you gonna call? Because we actually have something for that. The devil is real, and Christ brings His power to your home to do this.

This is why we do house blessings: to be the blessing of Christ coming to your home through His Word and prayer, but especially if you need protection from evil spirits, I can come and help you out.

Now we do change the service a little bit. We change the hymn from "Oh Bless the House" to something like "Oh Little Flock, Fear Not the Foe," which just so happens to be hymn number 666. And we sing about the power of Christ over evil.

Conclusion

This is why we do house blessings, and why I introduce it to you all today. It's an important and interesting piece of bringing the power and Word of God into your home and into your life.

In Jesus' name, Amen.

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