Welcome to today's encouragement from Our Daily Bread.

Our reading titled Blessed Routine was written by Leslie Coe.

Watching the morning crowd pour onto the train, I felt the Monday blues kick in.

From the sleepy, grumpy faces of those in the jam-packed cabin, I could tell no one looked

forward to going to work.

Frowns broke out as some jostled for space and more tried to squeeze in.

Here we go again, another mundane day at the office. Then, it struck me that just a year before,

the trains would have been empty because COVID-19 lockdowns had thrown our daily routines into

disarray. We couldn't even go out for a meal, and some actually missed going to the office.

But now we were almost back to normal, and many were

going back to work as usual. Routine, I realized, was good news, and boring was a blessing.

King Solomon came to a similar conclusion after reflecting on the seeming pointlessness of daily toil.

At times it appeared endless, meaningless, and unrewarding, but then he realized that simply

being able to eat, drink, and work each day, was a blessing from God.

When we're deprived of routine, we can see that these simple actions

are a luxury. Let's thank God that we can eat and drink and find satisfaction in all our toil.

For this is his gift.

Today's Our Daily Bread devotional scripture reading is from Ecclesiastes chapter 2 verses 17 through 26.

So I hated life because the work that is done under the sun was grievous to me.

All of it is meaningless, a chasing after the wind.

I hated all the things I had toiled for under the sun because I must leave them to the one who comes after me.

And who knows whether that person will be wise or foolish.

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