Counting My Blessings, Naming Them One By One

Listen, I get it. The world is screwed up. Everywhere you look there’s bad news, and I’m not minimizing any of it with what follows here. I’m also not one of those who dismisses human suffering with a wave of the hand and cavalier slogans about how a positive attitude is the answer to everything. If your friend loses a child it won’t do to just hand them a book by Zig Zigler or Norman Vincent Peale. Sometimes, the troubles we face in this life are pitched battles that for a season can strip us of hope. Sometimes, the news we are bombarded with about politics and the state of our country and the world is so overwhelmingly bad we are tempted to believe that things will never get better, that our troubles are intractable, permanent. Maybe they are, maybe not. I really don’t know.

However, and life is often found in the however’s, I remember an old hymn that my mother used to sing around the house when I was little. I don’t remember all the words but this phrase stood out…count your many blessings, name them one by one. Mom would be busy scrubbing some pan, hair falling down around her eyes, or mopping the floor and she’d be belting this song out. I can see it as clear as day.

So, for your consideration on this Wednesday, I have decided to take my Mom up on her suggestion. If you are so inclined you can do the same. Let’s see if it makes a difference in how this day goes. I will count my blessings, naming them one by one…

1. I’m healthy

2. I live in a great neighborhood in a nice house with air conditioning, indoor plumbing and electricity.

3. I enjoy the love and devotion of an amazing woman.

4. My two adult children love me and make me proud every day.

5. I have a large and loving extended family who all get along with each other.

6. I work with great people who I trust and respect.

7. I have lived every day of my life in a free country where I have been allowed to make my life decisions free of government coercion.

8. I have made an amazing living doing good and important work.

9. I have never spent a single day of my life hungry, homeless or abandoned.

10. I am a part of a body of believers who for the most part are just like me, flawed but grateful to be a part of a community of faith.

11. I am able to spend 6-8 weeks every year in Maine.

12. I have a Solo Stove.

13. I am alive at a time in history when I have access to all the accumulated knowledge and wisdom of the world in a devise that fits in the palm of my hand.

14. I have had the company of a Golden Retriever for thirty five years now.

15. Every single morning, my car starts.