What could have been

Psalm 124          What could have been

          I don't know if you know the movie It's a Wonderful Life. It highlights the troubled life of a man named George (Jimmy Stewart) who contemplates suicide as a solution to his problems only to come to realize how blessed his life has truly been and is.

          Usually, I drive on one road going to work and on a different road for the ride home. The first is uncrowded at 5am and the second, while a longer route, actually is faster in the afternoon. I think my family knows this and it is why I received a frantic call the other day from my daughter asking if I had made it home ok.  On this particular day someone suggested a fish market that I might want to stop at on the way home so I didn't go home by my usual route. Unbeknownst to me, there had been a fatal 30 car pile up on the road I usually take home at a place and time that would have put me squarely at the scene if not in the middle of the carnage.  Because I went a different way it seems, I was spared.

         There are so many should have - would have's in life. When we are counting our blessings, perhaps it would not be a bad idea to think of some of the things that could have been or might not have been. I am sure everyone has had some narrow misses. Perhaps an evening or two when you pressed your luck in some manner and wound up at home safe and sound. And then you realize how blessed you are. Let's think about some of those times and give thanks to God.

          Aside from God's undying love for us, there would seem to be some more unopened and perhaps uncounted presents under the tree this year.  These are all the things that might have been. Narrow escapes, people we might not have met and loved, and myriad things we rarely think of, those shoulda-woulda-coulda's.  Take some time today to think about blessing we may have missed and

           Praise God!

A Song of Ascents. Of David.
If it had not been the Lord who was on our side
   —let Israel now say—
if it had not been the Lord who was on our side,
   when our enemies attacked us,
then they would have swallowed us up alive,
   when their anger was kindled against us;
then the flood would have swept us away,
   the torrent would have gone over us;
then over us would have gone
   the raging waters. 

Blessed be the Lord,
   who has not given us
   as prey to their teeth.
We have escaped like a bird
   from the snare of the fowlers;
the snare is broken,
   and we have escaped. 

Our help is in the name of the Lord,
   who made heaven and earth.