Amen! I don’t just want somebody to shout hallelujah, the Bible says the children of God have the right to shout and to sing. That right does not belong to everybody, amen. We must begin to put things in context, so let the children of God in the house shout hallelujah.
It is our right to shout, it is our right to sing; so if you are here you are not ready to shout, you are not ready to sing, something is wrong somewhere; but I trust God that He will put it right today.
Our Father and our God, we want to say thank You this morning; truth be told, we don’t know how to go about it and we don’t know how much of it will be enough, but the fact remains that our hearts are here, and Lord Almighty God, we have made up our minds to thank You today. We are here to shout, we are here to sing, we are here Lord Almighty God to register our appreciation unto You because all of these are within the confines of our right, and Lord Almighty God, the same we have come to do today.
Father thank You for the privilege to be here; thank You for the privilege to be able to do what we are going to do today; glory be to Your name in the mighty name of Jesus. And we ask Lord with every sense of humility that the blessings that follow obedience, Lord let it be our portion today in Jesus name.
Thank You for all that You have done for us; thank You for fighting our battles; thank You for healing our sicknesses; thank You for Your divine intervention in our lives; thank You for taking us through the first five months of this year; thank You Father for the peace in our land.
During the countdown to the election, the tension was palpable, it was like there will be no tomorrow, but we thank You because the elections have come and gone.
When we were counting down to the inauguration, it was another moment of tension, but we want to thank You Lord Almighty God because that is already settled.
Thank You for the first one week of the new government; thank You because we know everything by Your grace will turn out fine. Accept our thanks in the mighty name of Jesus Christ.
Lord Almighty God, You are the one that shinneth in the darkness and darkness disappears; we pray in the name of Jesus that You will shine Your light into the darkness of our lives, and to the darkness of our nation, and You will cause Your light to prevail in Jesus name.
These are not the best of time in our country, politically, economically, even security wise amongst others, but Lord Almighty God, the Bible says the Lord is our Shepherd and because You are our Shepherd Lord Almighty God, we shall not lack anything; You will take care of us; You will treat us nicely; You will make us happy; You will shield and defend us from every form of evil and You will grant us peace and rest.
Thank you Father because you have answered; Lord I pray for all Your children who have been faithful in the payments of their tithes and in the giving of their offering, Lord Almighty in blessing, bless them all in Jesus name; in multiplying, multiply them in Jesus name. Make each and every one of them a delightsome land in Jesus name; and for those who have not been doing it for reasons best known to them, my Lord and my Father, we pray Lord that You will express Yourself in their lives in a wonderful way, such that they will have the vision, they will be able to get that conviction and do it so that the blessings will not be lost on them in Jesus name.
Lord, this is our month of divine blessings, I pray God that You will bless every one of us and the families that we represent so much that the magnitude of our blessings will confound our enemies in Jesus name. As we go into Your word very briefly before we hook up to our father in the Lord, Father almighty God speak to us like never before; give us the heart to receive Your word, and give us the grace to apply Your word so that we’ll be able to give value for our time, value for coming, and Lord Almighty God, at the end of everything, the blessing should be ours, the glory will be returned to You and the shame will be unto the devil in Jesus name. Blessed be Your name forever, in Jesus wonderful name we have prayed.
And the people will say a better amen! Remember it is your right to shout and sing, nobody can prosecute you for that, amen. It’s our inalienable right and you must freely exercise it and the Lord will bless you in Jesus name.
1st Thessalonians 5:16-18; I want to give a brief teaching by the special grace of God before we hook up to the National to hear from our esteemed father in the Lord; “Rejoice evermore. Pray without ceasing. In everything give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you”.
By the way, before I go into the exhortation, we have declared this month as our month of divine blessing and whether you like it or not, it doesn’t matter the kind of head you carry, blessings will overwhelm you this month. It doesn’t matter where you are coming from, that you carry an anti-blessing spirit, but this month, by reason of what God will do, that spirit of medicine will be overwhelmed in Jesus name. There will be overflow in every areas of our life in the mighty name of Jesus.
The text is taken from 2nd Chronicles 20: 25 & 26, and by the grace of, tomorrow we’ll be having a prayer chain and the theme is “Power as of Old”, and the text is taken from Hebrews 13: 8; “Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today and forever”, what He has done before, He is capable of doing again, and I can assure you that in this month of June, God will exceed expectations in your life.
Remember it is your right to shout and sing, that is one takeaway from our hymnal today; it’s our right, don’t economize it, it has been paid for, amen! And the Lord will bless you in Jesus name; goodness and mercy will be your portion this month and beyond in the name of Jesus.
Brethren, it gives me great joy to stand before you today as we celebrate and thank our Father in heaven for showing us mercy and of course for sparing our lives to witness the dawn of a new month. A lot has happened within the last five months, even a lot has happened within the last few days, but it has pleased the Almighty God to keep us standing, I have no doubt whatsoever in my mind that He that is faithful enough to bring us to this glorious month will surely preserve us, guide and direct our steps as we continue our journey into our glorious future.
Today, I would like to share with you briefly on the topic that I called the “Cornerstone of Happiness”; I will try as much as possible to wrap it up before our father in the Lord comes on board.
A cornerstone is a stone that forms the base of a corner of a building. Suffice to say that every building, or in every building, there are cornerstones. The cornerstone joins two walls around which all other stones are laid; the cornerstone actually and Biblically symbolizes the integrity of the structure. The integrity of every structure is the function of the cornerstone.
Secondly, a cornerstone can be defined as an important quality or fiction of which a particular thing depends or is based. In other words, it can be a premise upon which a fact or a concept is based. While happiness, by simple definition is a state of being happy. I pray today in the name of Jesus Christ that God will make you happy; every root of unhappiness in your life, God will take care of in the mighty name of Jesus.
So happiness is an emotional state characterized by feelings of joy, satisfaction, contentment and fulfillment. Four key ingredients, and I want us to take notes of them; number one, happiness is an emotional state characterized by feelings of joy. You cannot be happy without being joyful; you cannot be happy if you are not satisfied; you cannot be happy if you are not contented; you cannot be happy if there is no sense of fulfillment, and I pray in the mighty name of Jesus that today, God will trigger all these elements and ingredients in your life so that your joy will be full and you will be happy in the name of Jesus Christ.
So in a nutshell, happiness involves positive emotions and life satisfaction. There are many factors responsible for happiness; I think I’ve said this times and times in the past that one of the major triggers of happiness is when you do what you like; that is when you do things that gives you pleasure, so long as it is not illegitimate, so long as it is not immoral and sinful, whatever makes you happy can be a trigger for happiness; but today, we are not looking at that because of our time, today we shall be considering principal among them which is gratitude.
The cornerstone of a happy life is a heart that is full of gratitude. When you look for reasons for gratitude, you learn that life is not so bad after all, praise the Lord! When you look for reasons for gratitude, you will just realize that life is not as off, life is not as hard, and life is not as bad as people may want to present it to us.
In Psalms 103: 1-4; David said “Bless the Lord, O my soul: and all that is within me, bless His holy name. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits: (he said) who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases; (he said) who redeemeth thy life from destruction; who crowneth thee with lovingkindness and tender mercies;”
When you look for reasons for gratitude, you will discover that life is not as bad as you think. David made a conscious effort in the showing of gratitude to God by checking a peep at the past; he took a peep to the past, the present, and of course the future. He recalled what God has done in the past, and of course he brought to behold the things that God is doing now and of course the things that God will continue to do.
If you want to look for reasons to bless God, then you’ll remember things like every day is a bonus. I’ve shared that here before; every day is a bonus. The Bible tells us in Lamentations 3: 22, it says “It is of the Lord’s mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions faileth not”. If you look at that expression there, you will find out that everything is put in present tense, it did not say ‘we were not’, it says it is of the Lord mercies that ‘we are not consumed because his compassion faileth not’; and verse 23 adds an interesting flavor to it, it says they are new every morning; it’s a continuous thing, it’s a daily occurrence; it says it’s by that mercies that we are not consumed and guess what, they are daily renewed, they are renewed on daily basis.
So if you have no reason in your own thinking, if you think you have no reason to thank God, at least think about the fact that God has given you another day. If you think oh, I’m of age and yet I’m not married, thank God for the fact that you are alive, it takes a living fellow to get married and the fact that you are old does not mean that you cannot get married anymore.
I read the testimony of a woman recently; she got married at the age of 60. That may not be the best of things, but the fact remains that God knows how to do His things and if we are believers and we say well, God’s time is the best. Whenever you think or look for reasons to show gratitude to God, think about the past; what God has done for you in the past, how God has rescued you in the past, how God has rescued your spouse in the past, what God has done for your children in the past. When you seem to have no reason to bless God, think about the present, that you still have the breath of life.
Some people are carrying oxygen as we speak in the hospital, but here you are breathing freely. The Bible says it’s of the Lord’s mercies that we are not consumed because his compassion faileth not; and guess what, he said they are new every morning, that means that the grace of yesterday is not sufficient for today, so God is renewing His grace, He’s renewing His glory, He’s renewing His power so that we can continue to fire on. I pray today in the name of Jesus that every killer of happiness in your life will be doomed forever in Jesus name.
And I need to say these brethren, that gratitude adds to faith; gratitude adds to your faith; gratitude adds to my faith and expectation that you will have a great life. In Jeremiah 29: 11, it says “For I know the thoughts that I have towards you, the thoughts of peace, and not of evil, but to give you an expected end”. Brethren let me tell you, your best is yet to come; things may look dry, things may look very dull, but I can assure you your celebration cometh.
Isaiah 3: 10 says say ye to the righteous, it shall be well with him. I stand on the authority of the word of God this morning and by the apostolic authority (because I did not make myself a pastor, I never set out to become a pastor but God’s grace reached out to me and today I’m a pastor), and by that divine authority, I decree today it shall be well with you; in every area of your life, you will experience wellness in Jesus name.
You need to keep a positive mind; the hymnal we sung this morning was very instructive, and I like a particular line there, it says ‘our way is growing bright and our souls are on the wings’; when they were singing it I picked that word, it says our way is growing bright.
Brethren, forget about the rate of inflation, forget about what dollars is saying in the market, our way is growing bright, your way is growing bright, our way as a nation is growing bright, and our souls are on the wings – on the eagle’s wings.
When you are carried, no one can touch you; when you’re on the back of the eagle, you soar like eagle. I’ve never heard that an eagle had an accident in the sky; in the mighty name of Jesus, in every area of your life, there shall be no accident.
The greater your sense of gratitude, the more you will find reasons to be grateful. I want to say that gratitude is strongly and consistently associated with greater happiness; if you cannot show gratitude, you cannot be happy. Gratitude helps people to feel more positive emotions, release good experiences, improve their health, help in dealing with adversity and brings strong relationships.
No wonder the Bible tells us in Proverbs 17: 22 that “A merry heart doeth good like a medicine: but a broken spirit drieth the bones”. Psalm 37:3 & 4 say “Trust in the Lord, and do good; so that thou dwell in the land, and verily shall be fed. (Verse 4) Delight thyself also in the Lord; (is that one in your Bible?) he will grant the desired of your heart”.
John 15: 11, so that you will understand what we are saying; it says “These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full”.
Brethren I shared these scriptures with you so that you will know that it is God’s plans for us to be happy, and from today, whether the devil likes it or not, you will be happy in Jesus name.
Do you know what? You can always spread happiness. How do you spread happiness? You spread happiness by showing gratitude, amen. I told you my story in 1990 when I attended a wedding, I went with a package for the for the new couple, and after wasting so much time, the food was flying across my head, they didn’t give me food; it goes to another time, drinks were flying over my head, I had no opportunity to grab it and I was very hungry; when it was 3⁰’clock I decided to go, and my sister said what about the gift? I said let whoever like come and collect my gift. Whoever your father is, come and collect this gift.
You spread happiness by gratitude; I decided to go, I will not do that these days but those days, I don’t suffer food lightly, you can’t invite me to your wedding you will not give me food, and I left very early in the morning, I didn’t eat, and in this case you are even for adding salt to injury, the food I was seeing it but I never touched it. Every spirit of seeing and not touching, God will destroy in Jesus name.
Giving thanks can literally makes you feel much better. If you are sick, let me tell you, one of the antidotes for healing is happiness. That’s why when you are sick, you go to the hospital, the doctors – experienced doctors try to speak, manage your mood, make you to come up, because once your mood is right, it doesn’t matter the level of ailment, the chances that you will survive is very high.
The secret of happiness is as simple as thanking people. I’ve shared it here again and again, we must learn to thank people, learn to appreciate every act of kindness and throw away every sense of entitlement. As we thank God, we must thank our spouses; my wife is here today, the day she gave me a very good food, I’d say this one is lovely, I love this food; and if it’s not good, by my nature I’m going to complain, so it’s a matter of debit and credit, and I said you have to open your account; the day you have a credit, you credit it; the day there is a debit, you have to accept it.
We must learn to thank people. I’ve discovered one thing, one of the major challenges we are having in this part of the world is that we have very few people that are very thankful. I have one of my distant relations, whenever he calls me, I know he has a need, and the moment I send money to his account, that is the end of the day, he will not call until there is need for another one, and when he called me last time I said sir, be careful, you have to behave properly, how can I be giving you money all the time you will not even acknowledge receipt? He asked me not to be annoyed, I said I’m annoyed.
You must make conscious effort to appreciate everyone who has made positive impact on you one way or the other. Do you know what it does? It helps in promoting peace, love and good laborliness. Gratitude is humbling and shows appreciation; true and genuine gratitude can bring you joy and make you happy that you have been blessed with whatever you are grateful for.
John 3: 27, “John answered and said, a man can receive nothing, except it be given from heaven”. You cannot receive anything except you are given, either from heaven or by somebody. Husbands must appreciate their wives; wives must appreciate their husbands; this idea of ‘it’s my right’, who told you that it’s your right? Even within the confines of obligation, appreciation is required.
I’ve said it times and times again, children must learn to appreciate their parents; if you say it’s your right to train me, go to Ajah, see so many of them under the bridge there, some people fathered them; we need to do away with this sense of entitlement, there is nothing a man has that is not given. You have a good husband, you better thank God for it; the mistake we make oftentimes is that we think the grass is greener on the other side until you get there before you know that it’s worse than what you have.
Brethren, ingratitude is a sign of discontentment which is a sin and a great loss in the sight of God. 1st Timothy 6: 6 says “But godliness with contentment is great gain”. Anything that is not a gain is a loss as far as God is concerned; and where there is discontentment, there will surely be (what I call) corrupt practices such as bribery, forgery, embezzlement, and all the rest.
The reason why we have all kinds of corruption in Nigeria today is because of discontentment, and discontentment of course is a product of ingratitude. Discontentment also brings envy and this leads to (what I call) anti-social behaviors such as arm robbery, kidnapping, assassination, etc in the society.
So in general, discontentment can make you bitter. If you are not a contented person, you will be bitter; if you are not a contented person, in other words you are an ingrate, you will be resentful; it doesn’t matter how much they give you it won’t please you, you will not be satisfied.
In my village, they said if you take a flower or all these children’s toys and you shake it beside a toddler (maybe a two or three years old) and he’s not stretching towards you to grab that thing, that baby will grow up to be a bad person.
You can’t shake something or shake a flower beside a three year old boy or a girl and he’s not struggling to come and collect it, mark that person.
Ingratitude promotes envy. I told you I was going to teach you and it’s going to help us, we cannot come to church every day God is going to perform miracle, but it is in knowing the word of God that miracles will come. It brings depression, especially when you see no way out of it, you become depressed, your life becomes meaningless, but I pray today in the name of Jesus, as many of you that are going through situation, God will deliver you in Jesus name.
Ingratitude has the capacity to destroy marriage. The truth is that it has destroyed marriages, friendship and working relationship if you allow it to eat you up. I listened to a lady about two weeks ago online, she was cautioning people; never you make the mistake of leaving your husband, (she said) I made that mistake two years ago and I regretted it; she said now, I caution everybody, it doesn’t matter how tough, once violence is not involved, keep your hope, do everything to improve your relationship at home; she said because she has tasted the other side, it’s not working, now I tried to come back, the man said no; as a matter of fact, the man has grabbed another woman.
That is what ingratitude can cause; you will have lost out before you discover the treasure that you have lost.
To this end, I want to encourage you all this morning to develop the attitude of gratitude if you want to have and enjoy peace in your world. As I was preparing last night, this line, (I wanted to go and sleep but I came back) that you need the sense of gratitude if you want to have peace and live in a peaceful world.
In conclusion, you need to know that there is a limitation in every obligation; therefore, even within the confines of every obligation, appreciation is required. No wonder Jesus, notwithstanding the purpose for which He was sent, according to Acts 3: 38. You know it says for how God anointed Jesus Christ of Nazareth with Holy Ghost and power, and He was going about doing good and healing all that were oppressed of the devil, for the power of God was with Him.
But do you know that the same Jesus in Luke 17: 11: 19, when He encountered ten lepers and one came, He asked, were there not ten that were healed, where are the other nine?
So brethren, within the confine of obligation, appreciation is required. And those who make gratitude their watchword will never lack help whenever and wherever.
However, the first step towards gratitude is by surrendering your life to Jesus if you have not done so. In John 1: 12, the Bible says He came to a soul but the soul received Him not; but as many that received Him, to them gave power to become sons of God.
When you embrace Him, He will also promptly embrace you and give you more than enough reasons to be confident, happy and of course expectant. So I pray that God Himself will touch every heart today and strongly apply His words our hearts and bless the same and give us that ‘doing heart’ so that we can (for the rest of our lives) walk in the realm of gratitude.
With these few words of mine, I hope I’ve been able to convince you that gratitude is the cornerstone of happiness. Shall we rise on our feet; as we continue to thank God, let’s continue to be deliberate in our appreciating all our benefactors – your brothers, your sisters, the people in the church who have been of support to you, it is not for lack of responsibilities or obligation, but they come out of their way to just make that sacrifice and some of you will take it for granted, so I want us to close our eyes and go before the Lord and tell God; Father, give me a high sense of gratitude, the highest sense of appreciation, so that in all things (according to our scripture today, 1st Thessalonians 5: 16-18) we’ll give thanks; when it’s small, when it’s big, even when there is not at all, that we’ll be able to appreciate You.
But like I said earlier, the first way to show gratitude to God is by accepting Him as our Lord and Savior, therefore if you are here, you have not at any point in time surrendered your life to Christ, you have not at any point in time received Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, I want to appeal to you as all heads bow and all eyes close, praying to God, I want you to raise up your hand very quickly because that is the only thing that will make God to receive you.
Today is your day of salvation, tomorrow may be too late. Come and meet the God of grace, the God of gratitude; look, gratitude makes what is not enough to become more than enough; the Bible says if you hear His voice today, don’t delay, you may not have a second chance, God is saying come. And He said come unto me all you that labor and are heavy laden, (He said) I will give you rest. Ultimate rest belongs to God and God will only give you rest if you are in one accord with Him.
Father in Jesus name; Almighty God we just want to say thank You; thank You for Your words this morning; thank You for the impact of Your word; thank You for the great insights that Your word has given to us and thank You Father Almighty God for the challenge that the word has actually pushed; we pray God that You will give us the grace to respond accordingly in Jesus name.
I pray today that every root of sorrow in the life of Your children, You will take away in Jesus name. Everything that they have been rubbed off by reason of ingratitude, Father I pray as they make up their mind Lord today to live a life of thankfulness, You will restore back to them in Jesus name.
For those of them who have lost what they call lifetime opportunities, I pray oh God that You will give them a second chance. And as all of us Lord have come today to appreciate You and to sing Your praise, we ask oh God, Father that You will cause our praise worship, our thanksgiving, our gratitude to come unto You as a sweet smelling savor in Jesus name.
And Lord Almighty God, let it be a key to the door of our treasures in Jesus name.
As we thank You today, Lord Almighty God, You will reign Your shower of blessings upon us all in Jesus name. And we pray oh God that from the service of this morning, that there shall be testimonies in Jesus name.
Blessed be Your name forever. I pray for all Your children who have come out voluntarily to surrender to You, receive them in Jesus name. Let Your mercy overwhelm them in Jesus name, and let the door of blessings be opened unto them all in Jesus name. Glory be to Your name forever, in Jesus wonderful name we have prayed.
And the people will say a better amen.
God bless you!
