Feeling Blessed!

Feelings often have a way of pushing or even driving my thinking. As the challenges of life press in sometimes my awareness of God’s blessings in my life are hidden in a fog of emotions: frustrations, disappointments, aggravation with the injustices of life. It is almost as though each feeling breeds a rabbit like litter of more feelings that come between me and being able to see the face of God and His faithful, gracious works in my world.
And then, as miraculously as the sun bursting through the dense autumn fog, my eyes see HIM. I am aware of His hand in the orchestrating the moments of my life, the events of my day, and the wake of His influence in and through my life.
Feeling Blessed has little to nothing to do with monetary or material gains. I think for me it has everything to do with the eyes of my heart. Those eyes that finally SEE as the Son break through the fog of emotions in my life.

Yesterday was one of those such moments. I was STRUCK with the overwhelming sense of being BLESSED. The SON penetrated the fog of my world to show me the wonder of His world, creation and the awesome privilege of Him sharing it with me. I became almost fixated on the majesty of Mt. Rainier as it loomed over its subjects, of which I have been one since childhood. I was amazed as I took in the suns reflection off the new snow that seemed to come all the way down to the civilization down below. I found myself searching for a place to take that perfect picture that would capture the essence of my experience. An ideal location where the iridescent yellow and bright red leafed trees would frame the mountain as the masterpiece that it is. But is it really possible to “hold” the blessing(s) of God in ones hand?
I don’t know. It is almost more like a flow of essence…life…love…character. That penetrating light bursting through the fog which changes me, then reflects off and onto the next person to continue its life transforming work.

As a young teen I dreamed of travel, travel throughout Europe: Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, Holland, etc. I had great hopes of seeing and experiencing the castles, cathedrals, monuments, parks and wonders of the Old World. Just recently I realized that those things were the fog. The real essence was found in the simplicity of the culture being manifested in the people of those places and the wonder of God in His unique creation in each of those places.
I consider myself extremely BLESSED to have had the privilege of seeing God’s amazing unique ART in nature. I have seen a river in Sweden that was so pure that it looked like silver. Through the last few years I have been able to call Bern, Switzerland a second home. There the Aare River flows through the city and it is the most unbelievable glacier blue. In the last month or so Jesus has taken me to Ireland and Spain. In Ireland, the Emerald Island, I saw rivers that are the color of Guinness beer (brown). They are as clean as the silver river in Sweden but God blended the elements of the earth there to paint those rivers a very cool brown. Then a few weeks ago while I was in Spain with the other Foursquare missionaries I was looking down on the river that flowed around the great city of Toledo. There in the middle of an arid and brown terrain was a green river.
Each culture, people, land is uniquely blended together to reflect an aspect of our unlimited, creative God, who finds great delight in BLESSING.
Lord Jesus, penetrate my fog. Help me to see your blessings in my life today! I desire to have a heart that is filled with gratefulness & has eyes to SEE those blessings you have sent to surprise me.
Thank you for exceeding my wildest imaginations of what life could be.