Count Your Benefits

Tuesday, July 6th, 2010

Today's Passage: Psalm 68: 19
Memory Verse: Same

With sorrow, poverty and misfortune all around us, it's difficult to really see how extremely blessed we are.  This morning, I woke up in a real bed with a roof over my head.  I went to the sink and out came clean running water.  I turned on a stove and was able to cook breakfast for my family.  Then I washed a load of clothes and spent the rest of the day relaxing and not doing very much.  How is all this interesting, you say?  THERE WAS NO DRAMA TO DEAL WITH.  Everything in my life is not perfect right now, but God is really good.

If you think that what I just described is not worth mentioning as a day loaded with benefits, let me rewind to a typical day in my life about nineteen years ago.  During the heat of the Liberian civil war, with guns firing and sometimes missiles being dropped all around us, we would wake up and have to walk about 30 minutes to get water from a well for drinking, cooking, and bathing.  At any given moment, with dead bodies strewn around us, we were likely to be stopped and searched by rebel soldiers.  Yet and still, the fact that we were still alive and with the majority of our family was the blessing we held on to with all our hearts. 

Today's passage is another of the many precious promises from our Father that every single day, no matter what situation we find ourselves in, we have available to us a load of benefits -- everything we need to let us know that our God loves us.  Need a little more understanding of what "benefits" are?  The 'B'is obviously for blessings in the form of brand new mercies that make any situation liveable.  'E' is God's eternal love for us, no matter how many times we've failed.  'N' is His never-ending grace and mercy towards us.  The other 'E' is for His everlasting goodness that supercedes any man-made or hell-sent tragedy.  'F' is for God's favor which also never runs out in spite of how little we deserve it.  'I' is for His guarantee of intimacy with us -- we have His undivided attention.  'T' is for the trust we can count on in our God: He'll never go back on His Word.  And, last but not least, He promises that He'll be the same yesterday, today, and forever, no matter how drastically things change around us.

Today, take advantage of all the benefits the Father has made available to us.  Rather than focus on your problems, I can bet you'll be so blessed when you start counting your benefits that your attitude will determine how wonderful your day's going to be.  Now what could be better than that?

Prayer: Father, I thank You today for all Your benefits that I've enjoyed over the years, and for those that I haven't even seen yet.  I'm so glad that our relationship has made all these blessings possible.  May I never take them for granted, but do my best to bring You praise in everything I do.  In Jesus' Name, Amen.