I am blessed beyond measure
So far beyond what’s gained through earthly treasures
Whatever comes my way, still my soul will say
I am blessed

by Karen Peck and New River

Whatever comes my way…I usually feel a sense of dread when I sing words like that.  I can imagine all sorts of things I fear or dread.  Yet most often, what comes my way isn’t drastic or dramatic, but the subtle things of a day to day life, and I start grumbling and complaining.  The other day at work I was having a pretty rough day – most days at work right now are rough.  I was overworked, exhausted, and people were making demands on me I just didn’t have the time to accomplish.  I found myself doing a self-assessment and asking myself how I was doing.  And I thought, “I’m ok.  Not bad, not great, just ok.”  But immediately I was checked in my spirit and I knew I’d given the wrong answer.  I am blessed, I told myself, and I began to count, to list my blessings, and my heart was lifted.  This counting of my blessings has helped me through many rough moments.  It sets my mind on the true state of things.  My hard day ended at 5 pm, but some hardships last so much longer than that.  Yet it is still true that I am blessed beyond measure.

Some days you may lead me through green pastures
My heart drinks in deep the waters sweet
And some days you may lead me through the desert
Even then you’re still the reason I can say
I am blessed beyond measure

Through the troubled pain and disappointments
When it seems that I have nothing left
You will never leave me or forsake me
I will testify until my dying breath
I am blessed

Sometimes it seems like the desert is years and years long and the green pastures are only moments of rest – an occasional oasis in the desert.  I always hesitate to talk about one such desert because through it I have felt so much pain and disappointment.  It’s my desert of being single.  I’ve never been married and I would say that I haven’t even really dated anyone.  I have felt self-doubt and self-hatred, wondering what’s wrong with me?  I have been angry with God, watching Him bless my single friends time and time and time again with husbands or wives and seemingly leaving me out.  I’ve cried out why, and doubted His goodness and His love for me.  After all, I wasn’t asking for riches or fame, I was asking to be loved.  I was asking to be a part of this great covenant God gave to Adam and Eve in the Garden.  And I wanted to be a mother.  One of the greatest roles a woman can have.  But unlike Hannah, I never received the gift I prayed for.

I’m not sure if God has said “no” to my pray or “not yet”.  But I do think He has asked me in His way what Hannah’s husband asked her, “Am I not more to you than ten sons?”  Or in my case, a husband and sons?  Deep in my heart, since my early teens, I have heard God ask me if I’d be willing to be single.  At first I was angry.  I’d say, “why are you asking ME that?  Why not him or her or anyone else really?”  I’d write it off as my imagination and go on praying and hoping for a husband.  But He’d ask again, deep in my heart, “are you willing to be single for me, Ginger?”  And even though I finally said yes, I still wondered, but for how long?  Forever or just a season?  I wish that by saying yes it became easy to trust God in this area of my life.  But it has been a struggle.  Did He really ask that of me or is it just that no one wants me?

But even in this deep heart struggle that can overwhelm me with grief, I pull out a piece of paper and start listing my blessings.  See, I never get past my first and best blessing.  I always start off with, “I am a redeemed child of God.”  And then I start thinking about all that that means.  Ephesians 2:13, “But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.”  Romans 9:25, “As indeed he says in Hosea, ‘Those who were not my people I will call my people, and her who was not beloved I will call beloved.’”  I am beloved by God Himself.  I am washed in the blood of Jesus, who shed his blood willingly to bring me near.  That’s what I am worth to Him.  I love in Genesis when Abraham says to his son Isaac, “God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering, my son.”  Indeed He has.    So that he could redeem me, and make me his child.  I belong to Him always now and this remains true whether I marry or remain single.  I may never know why He asked this of me, but when I cry out to Him again in my loneliness, His presence is a green pasture and a drink of sweet water and I know I have a love in Him beyond comparison, beyond measure.

You alone are my reward
With you I want for nothing more
And because your goodness follows me all of my days
I am blessed beyond measure