Count Your Blessings!

Remember that old tune, “Count Your Blessings, Name Them One by One”?

Kind of cheesy, but cheese is good in the right place.

I am not too spiritual to admit I sometimes get in the dumps. Even if I don’t know it my darling wife is willing to point it out! (One of so-many reasons that she is #2 on the all time blessing list!)

But yesterday as I walked out of a prison after leading a weekly “Courageous” Bible study I reflected on a lot of the things the Lord has allowed me to be involved in.

I did not exhaust the list…but these were some of the things I marveled at…

• The opportunity to be in vocational ministry for over three decades…and all of that time subsisting on missionary support!
• The chance to go to a now-defunct Bible school that gave me a great education and incredible hands-on opportunities
• The privilege and blessing of meeting, falling in love with, and marrying Jane almost thirty years ago
• The honor of being a dad…to Josiah and Joel the old-fashioned way; and to Janelle and Jacob via adoption
• The privilege and responsibility of preaching thousands of times in all kinds of venues…churches, camps, seminars, retreats, jails, prisons, etc.
• One-on-one prayer times and conversations with teens and adults
• Electronic communication on a daily basis responding to questions, prayer requests, and more from teens and adults from all over the world
• Watching the light go on as Spirit of God does His thing

Of course the biggest blessing is that the Lord called me to Himself before the creation of the world, and brought me to conviction, repentance, and trust in a jail cell in Texas in January of 1974.

Every situation, every “crisis,” every moment gives me two choices…whine or worship.

I choose to worship!