Joshua 12:17-24: in context

This passage is a list, the roll of the kings Joshua and Israel defeated in taking the land: the king of Tappuah, one; the king of Hepher, one; the king of Aphek, the king of Madon, the king of Hazor, of Megiddo, of Kedesh, of Dor, and on through the tally, ending: all the kings, thirty-one. It is a bare accounting, name after name, of the victories God gave in bringing his people into the land he had promised.

A list of thirty-one defeated kings may seem like dry record-keeping, but seen rightly it is a monument to God's faithfulness. Each name on the list represents a promise kept, a victory God gave, a step in the fulfilling of what he had sworn to Abraham and to Moses. God had promised to give his people this land, and here is the tally of how he did it, not all at once, but king by king, city by city, victory by victory, until the whole was accomplished. The long list is, in effect, a count of God's faithfulnesses, an accounting of promises kept one after another. There is a practice worth learning from this. God's faithfulness in our own lives often comes not in a single dramatic stroke but in a long series of particular mercies, victories, provisions, and answered prayers, each one a promise kept, that we quickly forget. And it is worth doing what this list does: counting them up, keeping the tally, remembering the specific ways God has been faithful, one after another. When we count only our troubles and forget our mercies, we grow discouraged and doubt God's faithfulness; when we count up the ways he has kept his word, victory by victory, provision by provision, we build a monument to his faithfulness that steadies us for what is ahead. Joshua would later say that not one word had failed of all the good things the LORD had promised; all had come to pass. And the list of thirty-one kings is part of the evidence, the tally of a God who keeps his word. It is worth keeping our own such list, counting the faithfulnesses of God in our lives, so that when we are tempted to doubt, we can look back over the tally and see, name after name, mercy after mercy, that not one of his good promises has failed.

Do I count only my troubles and forget the ways God has been faithful, or can I do what this list of defeated kings does, keeping a tally of God's faithfulnesses, remembering the specific victories, provisions, and answered prayers, one after another, so that when I am tempted to doubt I can look back and see that not one of his good promises has failed?