#168 – Your lowest can be His highest

Even if you have been banished to the most distant land under the heavens, from there the lord your God will gather you and bring you back. (NIV)
Deuteronomy 30:4

My pastor said the other week “How many of you have ever thought there was no way you were going to get out of a situation? I’m sunk, I’m doomed, there is no way possible this will work out” – Everyone raised their hand.

Is your hand raised now?

These are very challenging times. People who have never been out of a job, are now jobless. People who have always had a home are homeless. People who were healthy are getting sick.

My hand was raised during that sermon – I’m a business owner facing financial challenges. Savings accounts – gone, retirement accounts – vaporized, being able to pay myself – a luxury, not a given.  Yet, it is by His grace that “I can do everything through him who gives me strength.” (Philippians 4:13). He helps me see a situation with His eyes, not my own. If I look down, he tells me to look up. 

Last fall, I laid down any remaining shred of pride as an entrepreneur and said “this isn’t looking good, and I humble myself to shut things down and be content with that choice” – He said to keep moving forward. That gave me a sense of joy and relief – I’m doing His will for my life. Did that mean we got a ton of new sales and everything was restored. Not yet, but that’s irrelevant – I’m doing what He wants me to do.  Each month, he opens enough doors for all bills to be paid. My children eat every day – we have a roof over our heads – and we are healthy.  I am rich in what counts!

I’ve been walking thru this season with His word in my heart that equips me daily for new challenges.

You may be walking thru a similar season on your own. You may not know who the real Jesus Christ is – a redeemer, the one and only Savior of the World. Before I gave my life to Christ, I thought I knew exactly who he was – “a nice man who told good stories.” Wow, I actually said that.

But I was wrong. Jesus Chris is real. With so many “solutions” that prey upon our desparation, is there any real hope in the world? Sure is!

I challenge you try something really radical – “Call upon the name of Jesus”

That’s why I love this scripture passage of Deuteronomy – you are totally alone and backed in the corner. If you call out to Him, He will answer. I’ve personally seen it time and time again – desperate cries to Christ are met with His open arms. 

You may ask “How will God know I am here – I’ve ignored Him for my whole life?” You may have ignored Him, but he hasn’t ignored you – He’ll know when you are desperate enough to touch His cloak, and he will stop everything to meet you at your lowest, to bring you to your highest. (See Luke 8:43)

Don’t be afraid. Instead of raising one hand, put both of ‘em up.. and surrender! It is the best decision you will ever make!

#168 Items

• Ladies Brown T-Shirt 
• Adult Blue Tee Shirt 
• Car Magnets
• Stickers

New – Blessings Counted Ladies Tee Shirts

By popular request, Ladies Shirts from Blessings Counted.  Some of our most popular Blessings on two styles of shirts! Which Blessing speaks to you?

All ladies shirts are only $20.00 each.  

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District Threads Perfect Weight Short Sleeve Tee

District Threads Perfect Weight Ladies T in Dark Fuschia

Fine knit softness, with a slimmer cut through the body and sleeves.Created with a high 40-singles yarn count, this fine knit fabric is ultra-light and unbelievably smooth. Add to that modern styling and a fitted cut, and you get a truly fashionable tee that’s a wonderful canvas for the blessing you select!

Sizes: Medium, Large, and X-Large. 

Color: Dark Fuschia with White Lettering

Click to see more images of the Perfect Weight Tee and purchase a shirt today!

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District Threads Rib Knit Tee with Contrast Stitching

District Threads Rib Knit in Cocoa with Pink Contrast Stiching

Features pink contrast stitching on sleeves, shoulders, neck and hem. Rib knit adds to the tailored silhouette for the perfect fitted look. 

Sizes: Medium, Large, and X-Large.  These shirts run a little small, so check the sizing chart online to ensure a great fit!

Color: Cocoa Brown/Pink Stitching with White Lettering

Click to see more of our new Rib Tee images and purchase a shirt today!

Sale on Select Blue Shirts – Only $10!

We have 5 Blessings available Blue Shirts for a special sale price of $10.00 each ! 

Large and X-Large – VERY LIMITED QUANTITIES!

SHOP THE SALE NOW >>

New Blessings Counted video!

We just created a new video to highlight the first set of 15 blessings available from BlessingsCounted.com. 

The song to this video is “Captured” by Alberto and Kimberly Rivera from their live CD “Captured ~ Songs of Destiny from the Father”. This song was recorded from a set of spontaneous worship music at their home church in Franklin, TN. They are a gifted couple that have an amazing call on their lives for worship!

Learn more about their ministry at www.RainingPresence.com and purchase the Captured CD.

Music used with permission from the artist.

Please enjoy “Blessings Counted 2009″

#6 – God’s word became flesh 2000 years ago

The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth. (NIV)
John 1:14

As I look at blessing #6 – God’s word became flesh 2000 years ago – I am amazed at the mighty gift that we all have the opportunity to receive – the gift of Jesus Christ in our lives. I received that gift 14 years ago, and have never been the same.

This year has been a humbling experience to see people connecting with Blessings Counted. With each order that comes in, it is exciting to know that these blessings are being spread across the country. The potential impact they have to touch people with the word of God in a new and unique way is really, really cool!

Of all the different blessings that were ordered this year, by far the most popular was “#453 – I have a job” and “#21 – I live in the United States of America” – very timely messages this season.

I thank all the customers, friends, and family that have purchased our products and have helped spread the word about this new business!

I am so excited to see what 2009 will bring!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year,

Michael Connelly
Founder
Blessings Counted

Great Worship Artist: Klaus Kuehn

Klaus Keuhn is an amazing worship leader hailing from Christ for the Nations in Dallas, Texas.

I didn’t even know who he was until I went to a Dutch Sheets conference earlier this year. Klaus led worship and I fell in love with his style – he could bash it out, he could soften it up, and his worship just flowed with a pure love for Christ.  His songs truly lifted the place that we were in and welcomed the presence of God with a mighty sound of praise. Klaus never stopped playing and he flowed with the spirit. 

The coolest thing for me was midway during  worship – he picks up a Bible, God leads him to a scripture (cant remember where) and he just starts signing a spontaneous new song to the Lord. That blew me away! 

As a musician and sound-mix fan(my college roomate Benzo was an audio engineerering major and got me hooked on the science of sound), Klaus get an  A+.  His sound mix - crystal clear voice and keys, guitars that gracefully strum and then switched over to chunky rock sounds – dominant bass guitars, and punchy bass drum – a must to get people moving!    His CD mix is pretty much the same – crank it to 11!!

Enjoy this great song called “The Lord Reigns”  and visit his website KlausMusic.com  to purchase his music!

#21 – I live in the United States of America

For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land with streams and pools of water, with springs flowing in the valleys and hills; a land with wheat and barley, vines and fig trees, pomegranates, olive oil and honey; a land where bread will not be scarce and you will lack nothing; a land where the rocks are iron and you can dig copper out of the hills. (NIV)

Deuteronomy 8:7 

The United States of America is a blessed nation.

When I got the download for this blessing, the scripture reference surprised me. It is all about provision, resources, and abundance.

“You will lack nothing;” – think about it – right now, the USA lacks nothing. Even our poor would be considered wealthy in most nations.

Why are we so blessed?

I feel the God has poured out his grace and blessings on our land because of two things: This nation was forged on Christian principles and that remnant remains to this day – a praying people who seek His face.

Time and time again we often here “America was not founded on Christian principles” and that is not true. The founding fathers set forth a framework of prayer and petition to establish the very documents that our nation is based upon.  As I learn more about the men who were responsible for our foundational documents, some of them loved the Lord, some of them did not.

But they were all clearly inspired by one Christian man – William Penn – who planted “the seed of a nation” a generation before George Washington was even born!

William Penn came to this land as an English citizen to establish a government of covenant – He believed that a land and people who dedicated themselves to the Lord would be protected and blessed by the Lord.

In a letter dated August 15th, 1681, William Penn wrote “that an example may be set up to the nations, there may be room there for such a holy experiment”

William Penn knew that in this experiment, God never changes – He is just and true – it is the people that are the variable. If the people humbled themselves and honored the Lord, His blessings would pour out over the nation and nations whose God is the Lord.

William Penn laid a foundation that was inspiration for the founding fathers. His 1701 Charter of Privileges, the constitution of Pennsylvania, became the basis for our US constitution.  In 1751, a bell was cast to honor the 50th anniversary of this charter – it was inscribed with “Proclaim Liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof” from the Book of Leviticus 25:10 – This is now known simply as the Liberty Bell.

William Penn passed away in England in 1718 and never saw the full fruition of the seed he planted. But the seed continued to grow and flourish, even though as a nation we have time and time again turned away from Him.

In 1863, Abraham Lincoln declared a National Day of Prayer and Fasting to the Lord:

We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of Heaven. We have been preserved, these many years, in peace and prosperity. We have grown in numbers, wealth and power, as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us! It behooves us then, to humble ourselves before the offended Power, to confess our national sins, and to pray for clemency and forgiveness.

That prayer applies to 2008 as much as it does 1863.

Are we any different now than we were 145 years ago?   We must pray for our nation and for our leaders. Most importantly, we must intercede for our new President-elect Barack Obama, his wife Michelle, and daughters Malia and Sasha. Lift this family up for His grace and mercy, for wisdom, favor and protection. Regardless if you voted for him our not – he is OUR president, and we must stand behind Him in prayer!

Our country will not fall apart because of the outcome of the recent election went one way or another, it will fall apart if we stop calling on the Name of the Lord.

If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.

2 Chronicles 7:14

I look at what William Penn did for his land and think what kind of seed am I planting in my land? Is it one of hope for our nation or one of despair?

I am choosing hope! Why? Because I only have to look in the mirror to see that Jesus Christ can change the heart of those who completely deny Him.

Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Romans 5:7-8

Pray for the USA!

Purchase a “#21 – I live in the United States of America” Car Magnet

Purchase a “#21 – I live in the United States of America” sticker 

National Day of Prayer and Fasting – 1863

By Abraham Lincoln

Whereas, the Senate of the United States, devoutly recognizing the Supreme Authority and just Government of Almighty God, in all the affairs of men and of nations, has, by a resolution, requested the President to designate and set apart a day for National prayer and humiliation.

And whereas it is the duty of nations as well as of men, to own their dependence upon the overruling power of God, to confess their sins and transgressions, in humble sorrow, yet with assured hope that genuine repentance will lead to mercy and pardon; and to recognize the sublime truth, announced in the Holy Scriptures and proven by all history, that those nations only are blessed whose God is the Lord.

And, insomuch as we know that, by His divine law, nations like individuals are subjected to punishments and chastisements in this world, may we not justly fear that the awful calamity of civil war, which now desolates the land, may be but a punishment, inflicted upon us, for our presumptuous sins, to the needful end of our national reformation as a whole People? We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of Heaven. We have been preserved, these many years, in peace and prosperity. We have grown in numbers, wealth and power, as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God. We have forgotten the gracious hand which preserved us in peace, and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us; and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. Intoxicated with unbroken success, we have become too self-sufficient to feel the necessity of redeeming and preserving grace, too proud to pray to the God that made us!

It behooves us then, to humble ourselves before the offended Power, to confess our national sins, and to pray for clemency and forgiveness.

Now, therefore, in compliance with the request, and fully concurring in the views of the Senate, I do, by this my proclamation, designate and set apart Thursday, the 30th. day of April, 1863, as a day of national humiliation, fasting and prayer. And I do hereby request all the People to abstain, on that day, from their ordinary secular pursuits, and to unite, at their several places of public worship and their respective homes, in keeping the day holy to the Lord, and devoted to the humble discharge of the religious duties proper to that solemn occasion.

All this being done, in sincerity and truth, let us then rest humbly in the hope authorized by the Divine teachings, that the united cry of the Nation will be heard on high, and answered with blessings, no less than the pardon of our national sins, and the restoration of our now divided and suffering Country, to its former happy condition of unity and peace.

In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.

 

Done at the City of Washington, this thirtieth day of March, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and of the Independence of the United States the eighty seventh.

–By the President: Abraham Lincoln

William H. Seward, Secretary of State.

#17 – God has a plan for my life

In him we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will (NIV)

Ephesians 1:11

I find it very appropriate that I felt the first Blessing to post is “God has a plan for my life”.

I dedicated my life to Jesus in 1994. It has been an amazing transformation from top to bottom. I grew up knowing Jesus as a distant figure for most of my life. Well, as we know with distant friends, we lose touch with them. By the time I was in college, I was about as far away from the Lord as possible – It was only years later did He finally get my attention (or should I say I finally paid attention to what He was saying)

Once I started listening to Him, he would change me from the inside out. He would start to reveal his perfect will for my life – He would challenge me, test me, and show me that “I can do everything through Christ who gives me strength” (Philippians 4:13)

Things that were not on my radar would start to fly into view, and sometimes acting timidly or just jumping in head first, I learned to trust Him in everything: Get married? Raise a family? Start a business? Start another business sharing how many blessings we have? Raise my hands during praise and worship!! Read a bible – by choice!!! All seemed impossible back then, but now are part of the man that God wanted me to be.

God has picked us out one by one to do amazing things for His kingdom here on earth. I feel like he has a really big play book for each and every one of us – inside there are pages and pages of excercises, notes, and lists of all of these things He has lined up for us to do!

I have seen His hand move mightily in my life, and He has given me a pretty cool peek at some of things ahead!!

Imagine what your play book looks like? Just ask Him today!

Blessings Counted!

Michael Connelly

Purchase a “#17 – God has a plan for my life” Car Magnet

Purchase a “#17 – God has a plan for my life” sticker 

My Creed – By Dean Alfange – Flying W Ranch

When I was a little kid, my parents took us on a giant trip across the country. All jammed into a giant station wagon for 5 weeks of sightseeing across this great nation!

One place that fascinated me was The Flying W Chuck Wagon Ranch  in Colorado Springs. 

I kept my dinner ticket as a souvenir. Years later I discovered it in my memory box and on the back of the ticket was this creed. What struck me the most was that it spoke so true about Jesus - how He is our provider and gives us strength to do anything that He puts our minds to! 

I put it in my wallet, where I carry it to this day.

As a Christian, a husband, a father, and a small business owner, this message is timeless and timely for our nation in 2008.

God Bless America!

My Creed – By Dean Alfange

” I do not choose to be a common man. It is my right to be uncommon. I seek to develop whatever talents God gave me — not security. I do not wish to be a kept citizen, humbled and dulled by having the state look after me. I want to take the calculated risk; to dream and to build, to fail and to succeed. I refuse to barter incentive for a dole. I prefer the challenges of life to the guaranteed existence; the thrill of fulfillment to the stale calm of utopia. I will not trade freedom for beneficence nor my dignity for a handout. I will never cower before any earthly master nor bend to any threat. It is my heritage to stand erect, proud and unafraid; to think and act myself, enjoy the benefit of my creations and to face the world boldly and say — ‘This, with God’s help, I have done.’ All this is what it means to be an American.”

Original Dinner Ticket - 1975

My Creed - Original Dinner Ticket