Counting Blessings

There's a TV show I watch called The New Normal. It's a sitcom about a couple and one of them is Catholic. You often see him at confession in his church and his priest is absolutely amazing. He says things that I wouldn't even think to say in response to what the main character is telling him. In a recent episode, the couple's dog dies, and the main character goes to confession to talk to the priest about his grief. The priest asks him what exactly is bothering him about it, and the main character says that he's afraid of losing the other people in his life. Then he goes on to list a whole number of other characters in the series who the main character really cares about. In response, the priest says something that I wasn't expecting. He said, "Wow, just look at the number of people God has blessed you with."

It hit me in that moment that everything we have comes from God. When the main character of The New Normal was listing the number of people in his life, he was counting the blessings that he has received from God. It's often been said to me that everything I have is a gift from God and it all belongs to Him, so I should use it for His glory. I never really quite understood that until just then.

There's a saying which says that if we want to be happy, we should appreciate that which we already have. We don't have to look to other things to make us happy; we don't need to look for blessings from God: we just have to look at that which we already have, and see just how blessed we already are.