TO BE THANKLESS IS A CRIME.
WE HAVE NO CREDIT FOR ANY GOOD THING. IF IT IS GOOD, IT IS GOD
THE REASON I AM PURSUING GOD SO HARD IS THAT HE DOESN’T NEED ME FOR ANYTHING.
WE ARE VERY USED TO PRAYER AND FASTING. WE SHOULD START THANKSGIVING AND FASTING
WHAT WE DON’T APPRECIATE WILL KEEP DEPRECIATING NO MATTER HOW HARD WE PRAY.
WE NEED TO GET TO A POINT OF HUMILITY WHERE WE UNDERSTAND THAT THERE IS NOTHING WE HAVE THAT WE GOT BY OURSELVES
– Bishop David Oyedepo on ENGAGING THE WONDERS OF THANKSGIVING at SHILOH 2023 Thanksgiving Sunday Service Faith Tabernacle, Canaanland First Sunday Service 10th December 2023 Part A
???? Unto the Lord be the glory, great things He has done. ????
We have no credit for any good thing. If it is good, it is God. If it is marvellous then it is the Lord’s doing. Every good gift or every good thing, every perfect thing comes from the Father of Light in whom there is no variableness or shadow of turning.
No one has credit for any good thing in his life. You have no credit for any marvellous thing in your life. They are all the Lord’s doing. Our salvation is all the Lord’s doing. Our access to light is all the Lord’s doing. Psalm 118:27. To be thankless is a crime.
Our arrival here on the earth, we didn’t play any part.
Our preservation since we were born, we didn’t play any part. When we didn’t know anywhere He kept us. When we couldn’t define our environment, He kept us. When we were babies left at home and mothers went somewhere, the devil couldn’t smite you there. He was the one at work.
Lift your two hands and on a personal note: “I thank you Jesus”. Don’t toy with that, let it come from your heart.
No one is worthy of all His goodness, He is just being the good God that He is. We are something now because He made us something. He called people that are not, so we were nothing and He made something out of us. We owe him thanks and forever.
When we assume His grace as a right or an achievement, it turns into disgrace. My prayer is that we will come out of here today addicted to thanksgiving as a lifestyle and it won’t stop adding value to your life.
As a Commission, we owe God thanks. We are not where we are because we are smarter or wiser than anybody else. It is grace speaking nothing else. We don’t have the wherewithal, we don’t have the background, grace speaking. I want to wonder what I was doing with the Book of Lamentations as a new believer. It was God showing me light.
Did you put in any effort? I can’t remember. What are you doing with the Book of Lamentations as a new believer?
Do you want to lament? God just showing you light by His grace preparing you for life without you knowing. The same goes for you, You have seen grace over and again in your life. May you not despise it.
Being filled with awe, I told our pastors after Jesus completed this building that if anybody goes around and says we built It, God will kill him.
We had no capacity, we had no resources, we had no speed in our hand, we had no technicality. If you go around and say we built this, God will kill you. We didn’t. We owe God thanks. He won’t stop doing His marvellous deeds until we stop acknowledging Him as the one at work.
He will stop when we stop. We are not worthy of all the goodness that we see as a Commission. It is His grace!
ENGAGING THE WONDERS OF THANKSGIVING
Thanksgiving is the will of God that commits Him to fulfil His Word. When you pray according to His Will, He hears you and thanksgiving is His Will. When you pray according to thanksgiving, He hears you. 1 Thessalonians 5:18. 1 John 5:14-15.
f thanksgiving is His Will, when we pray according to thanksgiving, He hears us. We are very used to prayer and fasting. We should better start thanksgiving and fasting. Amen!
He hears thanksgiving faster than He hears prayers. What we don’t appreciate will keep depreciating no matter how hard we pray. Malachi 2:2-3. Thanksgiving is the way up. We gave God thanks to move from 6 to 10, membership or attendance in Church.
Then 10 to 15. It is a spiritual yeast that keeps enlarging your coast. If you find bread without yeast, it is flat. When you add yeast to it, it gives it shape. Everybody’s destiny will start taking shape now. If you don’t thank God for the light you have seen you won’t see brighter light. Jesus said, “Father, I thank you because you have hidden these things from the wise and revealed them to babes”. We thank God for light.
Light from the Word is the greatest treasure in the Kingdom. It can make a nation out of a nobody. Isaiah 60:22. By access to light. You don’t go to kings, they come to you. Yet we don’t thank God for light, we thank God for lands, thank God for cars, you can lose lands any time. The people who sold to you can say they are not selling to you again and take you to court. The court can be forever.
Thank God for light, it is our greatest asset in the adventure of life. You find Paul saying I thank you God. I am not worthy of this light. I am the least of all saints, this is you. 1 Corinthians 15:9. It is not effort, it is not exertion, it is not the study, it is the Shower of the Light that shows up.
For instance, during this glorious event, we heard that testimonies are not happenstances, they are not things that happen by chance or stories of luck, testimonies are products of applied insights from the Word. Isn’t that enough to be jumping about? That you are not at the mercy of any anointed man to secure a miracle. When you apply the insight gained from the Word of God you have already set the stage for the supernatural. They are not a product of prayers.
Whatever He tells you to do, do it. If you don’t do what He tells you to do, good luck. When you know it and you do it, well done! Isn’t that enough to be jumping? Somebody is now bothered that the business he was thinking would happen during Shiloh has not happened. He didn’t get anything we have been saying.
They went for outreach in Secondary Schools and then a sound came from abroad “Now, you are representing us in 18 nations.” They reject you in one state here and then 18 nations, don’t play with God. Applied revelation! They said let’s carry the gospel to those children.
We want their lives better and God saw the sincerity of their heart. Everybody who has a testimony did something. You sit down there, you sit down there. Everybody who ever had a testimony applied insight gained to have it.
Supernatural manifestations are products of applied revelations. Luke 5:1-7. Applied revelation brings people out of frustration. It is our greatest treasure. Proverbs 3:13-15. His Word is the wisdom bank of heaven in print for those of us to gain access. Luke 11:49. That is the wisdom bank of heaven on a mission to bail everybody out on the earth.
Applied revelation will bail anybody out of frustration. Psalm 92:1-2,10-14. All came out of thanksgiving in verses 1 and 2 of Psalm 92. Instead of thanking God, you are grumbling. “Our time is not hard and I am not flourishing, so what happened?” People just turn their backs as if God needs them.
Can I tell you why I am pursuing God so hard? He doesn’t need me for anything. I don’t know whether He needs you but God doesn’t need me for anything. He said if I call you and you don’t answer, stones will take your place. God doesn’t need you for anything.
So don’t think when you are coming to Church “If I don’t go, how will God feel?” God won’t feel anything. You are the one to feel everything. We need to get to a point of humility where we get to understand that there is nothing in our hands that we got there by ourselves. There is nothing around our lives that we made happen ourselves.
