Blessings

I have been thinking about blessings lately and how we are blessed and probably expected to bless others because we are so blessed.  I was cleaning out my work e-mail today and came across this e-mail I sent last year to our Life Group during the "Outflow" series we were doing at church.  I guess I am still struggling with these questions.

(6/9/10)

"Although I was not sure about it to start with, I am starting to get into the Outflow series.  It definitely got better after the first week.  I am sorry it does not look like we will be able to get together to discuss this due to everyone’s crazy summer schedules.  Anyway, something has been on my mind that I wanted input on.  The topic of blessings seems to keep coming up throughout the different days.  I know it was in last week’s topics and was again touched on last night.

Here is my question that I am wrestling with.  Right now I am feeling pretty blessed with family, job, church and my overall situation in life these days.  Therefore, it is a pretty joyous time in my life.  I can ‘t  help but be happy when I think about how blessed I feel and all that God is doing in my life.  This carries over into Sunday morning worship where I am overjoyed to be able to praise and worship such a loving and giving God.  Yet, when I look around, there are many who do not appear to be so happy.  I know some of these people may not feel (or for all I know may not have) many of the blessings I feel God has provided me.  This then makes me sad.  It seems from the Outflow readings and the Psalms I have been reading lately that God wants to bless us if we just ask and accept those blessings.  He may even be blessing us and we do not realize it.

So I guess my questions are along this line.   Does God bless us more if we ask and accept his blessings?  Does God bless some people more than others?  Is joy/sorrow tied to blessings in a manner such that when we rejoice in the goodness of God (maybe because of the blessings he has provided or we believe he is capable of providing) we get to share in those blessings and when we choose to mope around because we feel we are not blessed we are actually missing the blessings he is providing or he chooses not to provide us blessings (this one may or may not make sense)?"