Blessed
I am blessed, and so are you.
And I don’t mean “blessed” as in you earned a large Christmas bonus, you and your loved ones are healthy, your table is overflowing with delicious foods, your favorite people are gathering for the holidays, or you received a meaningful gift from a friend. We’re quick to proclaim the goodness of God and thank him for his blessings when things are going well. But what about when things aren’t going well? Are we still #blessed then?
Two weeks ago, I had the opportunity to go to a local recording studio and narrate the audio version of Mourning God. It was a humbling experience. I woke up on day one of recording overwhelmed by a deluge of emotions (grief, anticipation, the fulfillment of a dream, anxiety, heaviness, fear of embarrassing myself and disappointing others, etc.). I cried all morning as I got ready, sobbed during the twenty-minute drive, and then got lost. I arrived confused with tears streaming down my face and in a decidedly uncool move, plopped a large box of lotion tissues on the desk (see above photo) and pulled on my favorite mom-cut sweatshirt in an attempt to soothe myself.
I continued choking back tears for the first ten minutes of recording, so the audio engineer kindly encouraged me to breathe and take a break. It was humiliating, and the more I shamed myself for not showing up as a professional and wasting limited recording time, the more the tears poured forth. I had emergency texted close friends and family to pray that God would grant me the composure to get through the first six hours of recording, but I couldn’t even read the texts coming in because each notification of encouragement and prayer threatened to undue me. Surrounded by platinum albums each screaming success, I struggled simply to read the dedication I had written. To my beloved son…
How do you define blessing? If blessing only occurs in ideal circumstances, then God is withholding good from many, if not most, of us. But if blessing is about the personal presence of God with us, then every believer is truly blessed.
Paul writes in Ephesians 1:3, “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ” (emphasis mine). Friend, if you are in Christ, there is no good thing that God has withheld from you. He has adopted you as his own son, lavished upon you his glorious grace, redeemed you through the blood of Jesus, forgiven your sins, chosen you for his glory, granted you salvation, and sealed you with the Holy Spirit. If he didn’t withhold his own Son from you, but freely gave him for your redemption, will he not also redeem your painful, frustrating, and disappointing circumstances for his glory and your ultimate good (see Rom. 8:32)?
Sitting before a mic, alone, reading my book to a theoretical listener, I lived eight years of my life in just two condensed sittings. And I was wholly unprepared for what happened next.
As I read Mourning God cover-to-cover (for the first time!), I spoke aloud the truth of God’s personal, sustaining presence in my life. He was present in the delivery room, the waiting room, and at the graveside service. He was present when I visited David in the cemetery, preached on the goodness of God in the face of suffering, officiated funerals, and wrestled with said God.
He was present when I said goodbye to my father-in-law, and when we welcomed Emma Ruth home from the NICU. He was present when we moved to Austin, began new careers, and rebuilt community. He was present when all I heard was deafening silence, and he is present now, in the sorrow, joy, and contentment. Through everything, God has not only been present, but he’s also been good.
Friend, you are blessed. You may not be able to see or feel those blessings right now, but thankfully, the truth of who God is, what he has done on your behalf, and who you are in him, isn’t dictated by our feelings, however valid. So whatever your current season, may your Christmas and 2026 be marked by hope and light, not because everything is as it should be, but because it will one day be so.