Almighty Father, we just want to thank You; ancient of days, we bless Your holy name, we have so many reasons to praise You, You have done so much for us. Thank You for our breath, thank You for health, thank You for our mouth, thank You for our eyes, thank You for our ears, thank You for the brain, thank You because we are not insane, thank You because we are not walking naked in the marketplace, thank You today because we are in Your presence, we have come to give You praise, we have come to worship You, only You deserve our glory, only You deserve our worship, accept our thanks Father in the name of Jesus Christ, accept our praises in the mighty name of Jesus.
Father, we have come because we are not among the dead, we are not here to rejoice over the dead but we are here to celebrate the life You have given to us. Thank You for everything that You have done, thank You for the first month of this year, thank You for the fulfillment of Your promises, thank You for bringing us through the first six months, thank You for the testimonies, thank You for the great lessons, thank You for the wonderful encounters and thank You for beautiful outcomes. Glory be to Your name in the name of Jesus Christ.
You are the author and the finisher of our faith, whatever You start, You have what it is to complete, and You have made a commitment to us that He that has begun the good work is more than able to bring it to pass. Lord, You have started the journey of this year with us, Father, in the name of Jesus, perfect it for us.
Today is the fifth day, the seventh month, as we continue in this journey, come along with us in Jesus name. Avail us Your presence, give us glorious rest – rest from trouble, rest from pain, rest from shame, rest from reproach, rest from ridicule, rest from hunger, rest from hardship, in the name of Jesus.
Let this second half be more glorious than the first half in the mighty name of Jesus. Grant us peace, grant us joy. Today we beseech You, Father, stir up the spirit of rejoicing in us in the name of Jesus, and by reason of that, Lord, You will dissolve the spirit of pains and sorrow in the name of Jesus Christ.
We remember Your children who have been faithful in the payments of their tithes and the giving of their offering, Lord Almighty God, let Your promises find fulfillment in their lives in Jesus name. As we have come before Your presence today in the name of Jesus, we ask Lord that we will leave here with freedom in Jesus name; we will leave here with rejoicing in Jesus name. And at the end of everything, all glory, honor and majesty will be Yours and Yours alone, in Jesus mighty name we have prayed. Praise the Lord somebody.
Shake hands with maybe five people and say good morning, happy new month and happy new year; as declared by our father in the Lord, you will have reasons to shout happy new year again, restoration will be your portion and joy eternal will be your testimony in the mighty name of Jesus.
Is with great joy that I welcome every one of you to this glorious service today; we have come as you are all aware to give praise to God, and my prayer is that God will accept us and accept our worship in Jesus name. Let me also welcome all our friends from the National Praise Team, thank you very much for honoring our invitation, the Lord will continue to bless you in Jesus name. The business is clear, the business is praise, and we trust God, as we praise God today, blessings will be released in Jesus name.
[Birthday celebration]
Our declaration for the month of July is our month of Divine Rest; our scripture is taken from the book of Exodus 33: 14, where God told Moses my presence will go with you and will give you rest, and he said, My presence shall go with thee, and I will give thee rest; you will receive rest in the mighty name of Jesus.
And as usual by the grace of God, tomorrow we’ll be having our usual prayer chain, and the topic for tomorrow is Overcoming Self- Sabotage. My prayer for everyone is that you will not be a problem to yourself. You know many people are problems to themselves and that’s why I keep saying, don’t say your enemy should die because if God should answer that prayer, you will be the first to drop dead. Please come by 6:30, it promises to be great and the Lord will bless you in Jesus name.
Very quickly before we join our father in the Lord, can we turn our Bible to the book of 1 Timothy 6: 6 – 8 (I would have loved to take it up to 10 but because of time), it says, but godliness with contentment is great gain. 7For we brought nothing (I want you to take note of this scripture, it’s very thoughtprovoking) into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out. 8And having food and raiment let us be theirwith content.
By the grace of God, this morning I’ll be talking to us very briefly on the topic, The Value of Contentment. Contentment is an inner sufficiency that brings peace, regardless of your circumstances. I need to emphasize the fact that contentment is not the lack or the absence of ambition and certainly not complacency, but the antidote to destructive greed, envy and financial frustration.
That scripture in verse six says, but godliness with contentment is great gain, so contentment is not in having everything you want but appreciating everything you have. It is a quiet inward satisfaction which relies on God’s grace rather than the shifting, the fleeting external human instinnts, but the spiritual muscle or strength that must be intentionally cultivated.
Brethren, true wealth is not measured by the amount of money you have in the bank or the number of real estate you’ve got, contentment teaches us that true riches come from God’s blessing and not just the physical or material possessions. There is this saying in the secular world that health is wealth, and for me, nobody can dispute that, because if you have money and lack good health, you cannot claim to be okay. If you say you are okay you are deceiving yourself, you’ll rather want to pray that the money should even go so that your health can be restored.
So contentment prevents us from running (what I call) an endless race, which we call rat race to match people’s expectations, and this is because human nature naturally gravitates towards comparison. Human nature, our human instincts gravitate towards comparison, greed and (what I call) a restless pursuit of the next milestone; we achieve one, then you want to go again; you achieve this, you want to go again.
I remember those days in school, we were taught that once a need is achieved, it does no longer energize behavior. You cry for a car, the moment you get that car and use it for a while, it does not energize you anymore, it is another one that you’ll be looking. That is the way human nature is wired, and if you are not careful, you run the rest of your life trying to achieve this, achieve that.
And meanwhile, Ecclesiastes 5:10 says, he that loveth silver shall not be satisfied with silver; nor he that loveth abundance with increase: (and he summarized, it says) this is also vanity.
What does contentment do? Number one, contentment fosters a peaceful life, and is closely tied to gratitude. You cannot see a contented man that will not be grateful because contentment is tied to gratitude; being thankful for what you have, opens the doors for God to promote you to your next level in life.
It is extremely difficult if not impossible, like I said, to be contented and not be grateful, ingrates are never satisfied let alone of being grateful. Look, I’ve come to realize that grateful people are generous people, generous people are grateful people, ingrates hardly show gratitude, and the reason why mean people, those who cannot give hardly show gratitude is because they don’t know the value or what it cost for someone to give.
But those who give regularly, you find out that even among men, the givers are the ones that appreciate when they are given because they know the cost of giving. But somebody who never knew the cost of giving, it doesn’t matter what he gives him, he does not value it because he does not practice giving.
Contentment fosters gratitude; you cannot be contented and not be grateful to God. I’ve seen beggars giving fellow beggars money, yet you see those who are very rich, to give is a difficult thing.
We must make effort to avoid comparing because that is another one; we must make effort to avoid comparing ourselves to others which often lead to covetousness, temptation and regret. 1 Timothy 6: 9 & 10, it says, but they that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lust, which drown men in destruction and perdition. 10For the love of money is the rule of all evil: which while some converted after, they have erred from the fame, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.
When kidnappers are caught, they will say it’s the devil; when people get killed, when they fall into ritualist hands, they say it’s the devil, it is because you are being driven by greed, you saw what somebody has got and you want to do it by force, by fire. Brethren, contentment anchors a believer in God’s provision rather than the system of the world. To be honest, contentment is richer than the riches of this world, this is simply because it is something that has to do with your soul, it comes from the heart.
Sometimes rich people are supposed to be pitied; look at the rich men around us, they are rich, but when you look at them closely, you’ll find out that that thing doesn’t make sense to them again.
How do we cultivate the grace of contentment to our everyday life? Number one, we must practice gratitude, that’s what brought us here this morning. Contentment is a master key for thanksgiving, it teaches us that being grateful for our current blessings open doors for greater abundance.
Psalm 67:5 & 6, it says, let the people praise thee, oh God; let all the people praise thee. 6Then shall the earth yield her increase; and God, even our own God, shall bless us. When you give praise to God, then you knock at the treasure gates of heaven; your praise, your gratitude is the key to the divine treasures of God, when you give praise, then you open it, God releases His blessing.
Proverbs 28:20 says, a faithful man shall abound with blessings: but he that maketh haste to be rich shall not be innocent. A faithful man, a grateful man, a contented man, he shall abound in blessings. Brethren, the shortest way to blessing is in gratitude and contentment; shift your daily focus from what you lack to the blessings you already possessed.
Brethren, like we’ve just sang, count your blessings, name them one by one and it will surprise you what the Lord has done. In Philippians 4:6, it says, be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God; in fact, one of the requirements for requests and supplication is thanksgiving, and I tell you today, there are many things you can thank God for in your life.
I told the workers and ministers an experience I had last week about the call for prayer, but look, is because you are alive you are asking for blessing. And by the way what is blessing? You can breathe, you can walk, you can talk, you can see, you can hear, your hands are there, your legs are there, your tongue is there, you can eat your food, you can feel the taste of your food. You don’t know what God has done for us.
So many times we get carried away and somebody say God has not blessed me, may God not slap you. That your dirty mouth that you used to say God has not blessed you, may God not slap you. That’s why that song came to my mind, “I have too many reasons to give You praise, oh Lord, You are good…”
Now you are seated among the people of God, people are not running away from you, you don’t understand. God forbid, let somebody else come in now, even all of you as he enters you’ll be looking at me, looking at the ushers, will you allow this person to come in? And you are not that person, you are not on the treatment table, even when you are being treated, there is hope of recovering.
You are not begging for food, your children are not in the prison yard, you are not in IDPS. A lot is happening in our time, I think we need to be very careful the way we just try to define some of these things; and of course as Christians we need to thank God for salvation. Paul talked about the inheritance of the saints in Colossians. Time will not permit me. We have gotten so many things to bless God for.
Number two, avoid envy. True contentment means not comparing yourself to others, but embracing God’s distinct plans and timing for your life. Those of you that are fond of comparing yourselves, stop comparing yourself to others, no two people are the same.
My God will bless you in Jesus name; God will give ou the spirit of contentment in the mighty name of Jesus.
