Blessings

I just love this picture of this beautiful sweet old lady that we met at a brigade back in April. Her face is glowing and her smile is radiant.  She is actually sitting in a wheelchair, and I can tell you that the village she lives in is not wheelchair friendly.  In fact, pretty much none of Honduras is wheelchair friendly.

I don't know her story, but I imagine that this lady had had some difficult days...be in health troubles, family problems, whatever... yet her eyes are bright and her smile is true.

Similarly, while I was a student at Harding University, there was a young guy in a wheelchair who spoke. I can't say that I remember what his whole talk was about, but one thing he said struck me and I wrote it down inside my Bible...he said, "I don't know why God chose to love me this particular way."

One of my new favorite CDs is Laura Story's Blessings.  I picked it up at Lifeway while we were in the States, and had only heard 2 songs prior to that, but I just love the whole thing!  One of the songs on the CD is called Blessings, and the lyrics are pretty amazing.  It changes the perspective we sometimes have when we don't 'get' what we ask God for, or when we go through hard times.  Hard times definitely tend to scar us, but we can choose to look at that scar negatively, as a wound we will forever have to bear, or positively, as a badge to show what we have come through.

The lyrics to this song have encouraged me in my own personal life to appreciate every single way that God chooses to bless me, even if I don't understand it.  It has also helped me as I look at the people we are ministering to.  There are hard times, but I want to help reach them so that they can learn about just how much their heavenly Father wants them to reach up to Him.

We pray for blessings
We pray for peace
Comfort for family, protection while we sleep
We pray for healing, for prosperity
We pray for Your mighty hand to ease our suffering
All the while, You hear each spoken need
Yet love is way too much to give us lesser things

'Cause what if your blessings come through raindrops
What if Your healing comes through tears
What if a thousand sleepless nights are what it takes to know You're near
What if trials of this life are Your mercies in disguise

We pray for wisdom
Your voice to hear
We cry in anger when we cannot feel You near
We doubt your goodness, we doubt your love
As if every promise from Your Word is not enough
All the while, You hear each desperate plea
And long that we'd have faith to believe

When friends betray us
When darkness seems to win
We know that pain reminds this heart
That this is not our home

What if my greatest disappointments
Or the aching of this life
Is the revealing of a greater thirst this world can't satisfy
What if trials of this life
The rain, the storms, the hardest nights
Are your mercies in disguise