Unexpectedly Blessed!

Well! After the last few posts, you may be thinking that life is just all rough, tough stuff. There's plenty of that for sure.

However, you should also know that just as it gets very dark, when you think your heart can't take another hurt, He knows just how to send you reminders that He knows, He hears and He cares. Look for them or you'll miss them.

Bitterness can rob you of them also. Bitterness has a way of warping your perspective and robbing you of gratitude so that you become so wrapped up in your own swirl of emotional turmoil, you can't enjoy the blessings that are waiting for you.

One of the things I like to do is to follow my heart when it comes to giving. It's the part of me that sees something and thinks it might be of use to someone, or recalls how much an item might have meant to me once. If I have a little to spare, I like to get those things and look for opportunities to share . . . because you KNOW others are out there struggling too!

I had done this very thing last week, before I knew the heartache this week would bring. I had spied some items and sent them on their way before I had a chance to procrastinate. All week I waited to hear the package had arrived. It did and with it came the welcome report that it had proved as useful as I'd hoped. Sure enough, my heart-friend (one of those 2-way relationships that is spread over too many miles and too few opportunities to talk/converse/communicate) let me know that the items were somehow just the very things she would have selected for herself.

How could I know?

I couldn't have! That's the beauty of it. God knew. He knew that she would be delighted, and He allowed me to have the means to send her that blessing. The same Lord that knew her heart knows mine. Just as He sent her that which delights her heart, He will delight to do the same for me in His time, in His way by His means.

Yes, my heart is still grieving. Yet, in this dark time, there is hope. God can still use me. ME -- a cracked, chipped, worn, old vessel -- the one that others can so easily misjudge and revile -- HE comes to break bread at MY table and I am humbled. I am honored.

I will rejoice. I will praise Him, because HE is the reason to hope.
All that man can do is all that man can do.

I am HIS. I am blessed. The darkness yields to His light!