Ah-choo!

As I was sitting at a computer in the library, I heard the guy beside me sneeze. This sneeze caused the girl on the other side of him to say "bless you." He liked that and responded saying, "thank-you. Not a lot of people say bless you anymore."
Thats true, there are not many people who give this response to a sneeze anymore.
I once heard, (and it could be completely wrong), that people used to say bless you during the black plague. When someone sneezed they would say this because they thought the sneezer had caught the plague and was therefore going to die. (Please correct me if my story is askew.)

I just looked up the word "bless" in a concordance and these are a couple of verses that came up...
Luke 6:28 NIV "bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you."
Romans 12:14 NIV "Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse."

Maybe, when people were blessing sneezers, it was because they realized that the sneezers could be giving them the virus through the sneeze (if they even knew about germs back then) and therefore were cursing them with the plague.
I recall Hans Peter, the director of Tauernhof telling us not to say bless so much. He had a good point, but I can't remember what it was, (I'll have to look into that). I think he was telling us not to use it so flippently, maybe he was telling us we needed to be more sincere and real when we say it. I think that could be it (I'll still look into it), because we are supposed to use it when someone basically spits in our face. Bless those who curse and persecute you. Wow. Thats serious.
I think "bless" is another word that followers of Jesus need to think more seriously about, and use more correctly.
I would like to thank the sneezer and the blesser beside me for making me think about "blessing", (too bad they are both gone now so I can't give them big thank you hugs).

Please tell me what you think about "blessing". I think this is something to ponder.