Blessings

This post is based on the song by Laura Story called "Blessings".  It talks about how even the things that are difficult in our lives are God's blessings.  I find this to be one of the hardest things to remember.  Right now things are going really well for us and we can see God's blessings everywhere, but it is not always that way.  Matt and I were just talking about being homesick the other day and how we are not homesick yet.  I told Matt that I feel like God moved us to Alabama before we took this trip so that we would not get homesick here.  When we moved to Alabama, we were both very homesick and missed our friends and family so much.  It was like a trial run for being here.  We figured out that we just had to pick up the iPad and FaceTime someone when we were lonely and that helped so much.  We have called someone just about every night or every other night since we got here.  We have also learned to plan ahead to when we will see our families again so we can look forward to something.  We are looking forward to seeing my dad and brother and then hopefully Matt's dad and brother.  Then we will start planning for my friend from UK to come down with the brigade and then we will be on our way home and look forward to a visit from my mom.  I also feel like having most of our stuff in storage and living in a smaller apartment before we left helped us to be here without most of our things in a small space.  When we first started living in Alabama, we did not see these things as blessings then, but we do now.  Matt was also mentioning to his brother last night that he feels like God is really helping him to give up some control in his life.  Here in a country where we do not speak the language well, we have still managed to meet friends, have great adventures and help people in the process.  It just goes to show you that all it takes is trust in God and to give Him control and later you will see the blessings in these things.  I know many people are going through hard times right now and it may seem hard to see these things as blessings, but I hope they will be able to pray through them and later see the blessings.  God knows what He is doing and it is to prosper us and not to harm us.