Halleluyah! It’s the last month of the year and December is our month of Thanksgiving and Praise. Glory to God!

This Sunday, we continued on the subject of “The Past and Your Praise”. Pastor began by refreshing us on the message of last week which focused on the past being inconsequential to the expected end that God has planned for us, she gave a scenario of a gateman and his boss, the boss at any given time can instruct the gateman to open the gate, anything the boss may have done wrong is not the business of the gateman, he is obligated to respond to instructions as long as the boss is in charge; the word of God says we have been placed far above principalities and powers, irrespective of what our past may be, when the devil comes, our response should be to cast him out and he will have to leave, he has no right to remind us of the past, our father can deal with the situation.

Pastor established this truth from the word of God as she took us to James chapter 4,

“Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God…Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” James 4:4-7

The word of God is telling us of christians who had become so used to the world and the things of the world, but he shows us that the moment they decide to submit to God, they can resist the devil and he would have to go, Pastor charged us not to allow the devil to remind us of things God has no record of.

Pastor went on to the second part of the message;

“In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.” 1 Thessalonians 5:18

One thing we can be certain about in the midst of every situation, whether good or bad, is that God’s will is for us to give thanks in the midst of that situation, we can never go wrong when we give thanks; Jesus demonstrated this while he walked on the earth; at the grave of Lazarus, even though the man was dead, he gave thanks.

“And be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess; but be filled with the Spirit; Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord; Giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ;” Ephesians 5: 18-20

We are given the same instruction and this time, he tells us how to do it, we are taught to create a spiritual environment by speaking the word of God to ourselves in psalms, hymns and spiritual songs and we are instructed to give thanks always for all things; God knows that bad things happen, he is the one who instructed us to stand in the evil day, that means inspite of it, he wants us to give thanks even for the seeming bad days, he is our father and he is on our side, he has seen everything that will happen and he wants us to walk by faith by giving thanks knowing he has made a way.

We went on to see how this played out in Abraham’s experience.

“(As it is written, I have made thee a father of many nations,) before him whom he believed, even God, who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which be not as though they were, and being not weak in faith, he considered not his own body now dead, when he was about an hundred years old, neither yet the deadness of Sarah’s womb: He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God;” Romans 4:19-20

In walking with God, we have to learn to call forth the things we desire even when we don’t see anything, that is how God functions and it is the best way for any child of God to function, we are not limited by what we see, we can call things forth, everytime Abraham looked at his body, he saw the deadness but he did not consider it, he was strong in faith and rather than complain, he gave glory to God.

“By him therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name.” Hebrews 13:15

This instruction to offer the sacrifice of praise means that the situation may not warrant giving praises, we may not feel like praising or see anything to thank God about but it’s a sacrifice, meaning that though it is inconvenient, we do it, we give thanks to God anyway because we know that he has worked something out.

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