My family and I just returned from a wonderful vacation in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. We began the trip being blessed by a kind couple in our church who allowed us to stay in their beautiful mountain home for a week. Each day we meet a myriad of blessings, not the least of which were being four feet from a bear (and living to tell about it!), arriving at Old Faithful 20 minutes before it erupted (we had no idea about when to come, and it only erupts about three times a day now), seeing a mother and baby moose, watching bison roll in the mud, and driving by a heard of them, catching a glimpse of a moose and baby, an eagle soaring, and the list could go on and on.

It took a while, but Jacob finally got around to recognizing how truly blessed he was. If you remember, he started out his life of blessings as a thief. He stole the blessing of the firstborn from his older brother Esau, and had to flee for his life. Issac blessed him before he left and told him to find a wife back in Paddan Aram. Jacob was blessed to meet Rachel, the love of his life, upon his arrival in town. He was blessed with wives and children and animals. He was protected from his father-in-law Laban, when he ran away from town, and his favorite wife Rachel was protected from death, even though she had indeed stole Laban’s household idols, she wasn’t found out. He was blessed by being protected from Esau’s anger, and he was blessed to return to his home and raise his family in the land promised to his grandfather Abraham and his father Issac.

Jacob learned not only to count his blessings, but to celebrate them by Genesis 35. “So Jacob said to his household and to all who were with him, ‘Get rid of the foreign gods you have with you, and purify yourselves and change your clothes. Then come, let us go up to Bethel, where I will build an altar to God, who answered me in the day of my distress and who has been with me wherever I have gone.” (v. 2-3)

Notice, Jacob didn’t say, he only had blessings from God. There were more than a few distresses he endured. Yet, over and over again, he could see God at work blessing him. How about you? Where do you see God’s blessings? Do you celebrate them?