Thursday March 28th, 2024 8:56PM

Bless your heart

My two-year-old just started picking up on saying “bless you” after someone sneezes. It’s pretty cute. If she’s the one that sneezes, she says, “Bless you, me.”

“Bless you” is great for sneezing, but we also use it to mean a thousand other things, entirely. Sometimes it’s a gift from my Georgia upbringing to know how to fill the silence of a sad saga with a simple, “Well, bless you.” There are so many occasions when it works when there’s just nothing else to say.

“Blessed.”

In the south, it’s a word we use a lot. We wear it on our shirts, we use it casually and frequently. We can even use it as an insult. “Bless his heart” really just means, “poor thing is stupid.”

Today, someone told me they enjoyed seeing photos of my family, saying “you’re so blessed to have your family love each other.” I know this person’s struggles of having a family who does not treat one another with kindness and love.

I’m grateful that I have my family’s affection, but I’m not sure that’s what makes me blessed. I just lost my sister a few months ago and I know that it does not take much to lose people. Without those family members, would I no longer be blessed?

Someone I know recently had a near-car accident. Everyone on Facebook wrote, “Oh, you’re so blessed you didn’t have an accident!” or “What a blessing!”

I wondered about the people reading that who have been in car accidents or who have lost loved ones in accidents. They didn’t have the same outcome. Are they NOT blessed?

I’m not any more favored than someone else. I don’t wear a shirt that says “blessed” on it because I never want anyone to think that I have more than anyone else. That’s like saying, “I have three kids and a good job and a happy family, so I’m BLESSED.” Oh, so you have not been able to have kids or a successful relationship? What does that make you?  NOT blessed? Maybe that’s not how everyone takes it, but I’m not sure HOW everyone else takes it.

Blessings aren’t things and I think we have forgotten that. Blessings aren’t even people. Those are gifts.  And how quickly we can lose things and people.

A more appropriate shirt would just say, “Thankful.” Because Scripture tells us that we can be THANKFUL in all circumstances, no matter what we have, or don’t have.

I’m not blessed because life took a special turn for me but didn’t for you.

I’ve suffered a traumatic miscarriage. It’s so hard to look at other women who are pregnant and carrying a child when you’ve just lost your own. But, I’m still blessed.

My husband and I have suffered major job losses in past years. In those moments, it’s so hard to see others financially stable, taking dream vacations and owning dream homes. But that does not mean we are not also blessed.

I’m not sure people realize that you can have nothing, live under a rock and eat out of a trash can and be blessed, because a blessing, while it can simply mean “good fortune,” is really more of a sacred word. It’s a sort of holiness freely bestowed upon us that cannot be achieved by the things we see.

We’ve begun to use the word so casually, it almost seems that the person using it is slightly better than those around them. You’ve got the word “blessed” written all over you and all over your social media posts. So what does that make ME if I don’t have those same things?

Sometimes I think we view life based on what we *think* we deserve, and as long as we have those things, then we are o.k. I’m concerned about what happens when we DON’T have those things. Do we just curl up and melt? Or do we still feel “blessed?”

I’m blessed. It has nothing to do with how many kids I have (because for a long time I was childless and couldn’t have kids). It has nothing to do with how much money I have (because my husband started a new business and hasn’t had a consistent paycheck in two years). It has nothing to do with the size of my house (trust me on this one … my middle kid sleeps in the hallway).

I’m not blessed because of what I have or who I am, so I don’t use the term lightly so that those around me don’t think I have something they don’t. The things that make me ACTUALLY blessed cannot be changed by circumstance or finances or a bad doctor’s report.

If you don’t feel “blessed,” and life isn’t going well, let me assure you that the blessings of God are still FOR you, even if it seems the world is against you.

“Blessed” is mercy given freely, grace given abundantly, breath given daily. “Blessed” is a divine promise, that promise fulfilled, a future that is secure. “Blessed” is love given that is not earned, provision where it has not been gained, and faith that never fails, even when I am weak.

I am blessed, but you’ll never see me wear it on my shirt. It’s just a knowing in my heart that has nothing to do with anything you can see.

And as I sign off, the only thing I think left to say is… “Bless you.” And if I could, I would.

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