Counting Blessings

Have you thought today -- or any day recently -- about the blessings in your life? If so, have you ever bothered to count them?

Somehow the stuff that is going wrong tends to hog center stage. I'm guilty of that too. There's a special something about complaining, an inner inclination to hype the negative that can be extremely compelling. Yet blessings, from the Lord's perspective, bring life. In Deuteronomy 30:19 He equates blessing with life, and cursing with death, and calls us to "choose life, that both you and your descendants may live."

As we bless God and think about the blessings He gives us He fills us with life physically, mentally and spiritually. We then can share that life with others through our actions and words. Proverbs 12:18 says that "the tongue of the wise brings healing." Proverbs 15:4 adds that "A gentle tongue [with its healing power] is a tree of life, but willful contrariness in it breaks down the spirit."

There's daily power and life in considering and counting our blessings.