Father in heaven, the ever gracious, ever loving, ever generous, the most benevolent God, the God of all ages, we bow before You this morning, we confess that You are Lord, and beside You, there is no other one; we recognize the fact that is by Your grace that we are where we are, we recognize the fact that is of Your mercy that we are not consumed, because of Your compassion that faileth not.
Who are we? Ordinary people, stubborn, uncompromising, but we thank You, Father Almighty God that even in our state of uncompromising and our state of unrighteousness, Your mercy prevails and we are what we are today. Thank You for preservation, thank You for salvation, thank You for Your leading, thank You for Your grace and favor. Thank You, Father, for taking us through the journey of the first eight months, and thank You for bringing us to the ninth month; thank You because You that has begun the good work, You are more than able to complete it, so we have no any doubt that the remaining four months shall be glorious, accept our thanks in the name of Jesus Christ, accept our praises in the name of Jesus.
We want to thank You for a new day, we want to thank You for a new week, we want to thank You for a new month, and we want to thank You for the remaining part of year 2024, Lord, accept our praises in the name of Jesus Christ.
It is unto You we have come today, and we have come to give You praise, Lord Almighty, we ask that today You will possess us, and Lord Almighty God, You will turn the total of our being to a praising machine in Jesus name, and as we praise You today, we pray You open the heaven and You will release Your blessing in the mighty name of Jesus.
As we praise You Lord today, we pray that those who are sorrowful, those who are in grief, Father Almighty God, shall be relieved in Jesus name. As we praise You today, we pray in the name of Jesus for those who are under one burden or the other, Father, let there be a divine intervention in Jesus name. As we praise You, Lord today, Almighty God, for those who are under the oppression of evil one, Father, we pray deliverance will come their way in Jesus name, and as we praise You, God of heaven, today, we pray that there will be open heaven in Jesus name. Thank You for everything.
We pray for all Your children who have been faithful in the giving of their tithes and the payments of their offering, my Lord and my Father, I pray that all the promises You have made concerning tithing and giving shall find expression in their lives in Jesus name. Unto them You will open the windows of heaven and You will make them a delightsome land.
As we go into this service, Father, please come along with us in Jesus name, manifest Your presence and release Your glory. At the end of everything today, let Your name be glorified, let Your people be blessed, and let the shame be unto the devil. Thank You Almighty God, in Jesus wonderful name we have prayed.
If you’re excited to see a new day, say a better amen. If you are happy and feel privileged to be part of this new month, say a better Amen. And believe me, if you know and you believe in your spirit, (remember the Bible says the just shall live by faith), that this year will end in praise for you and your loved one, let your amen shake the whole building. God bless you. Happy new day, happy new Sunday and happy new month!
We bless the Almighty God once again for the gift of life, we are here just because it has pleased God to give us life. If we had gone, there is no way we will be here today; we bless God for counting us among the living, and may His name be glorified forever and ever in Jesus name.
So I wish you a very wonderful month, we’ve declared it as a month of fruitfulness, and guess what, fruitfulness is part of God’s divine wishes for our lives, and my prayer for everyone of you is that this month will be a month of uncommon results and extraordinary glorious outcomes in Jesus name. Everything you do, the Lord will prosper; everywhere you go, you will meet with favor, and every prayer the Lord will answer, and for every door that you knock, it shall be open, and God will make a way in your desert, in the mighty name of Jesus. And when next you come, you will come back with joy, and of course, with testimonies in the name of Jesus.
By the grace of God, tomorrow we will have our prayer chain as usual, and the theme for tomorrow is ‘The Unchangeable God’. Our text is taken from the Book of Malachi 3: 6, and time is 6:30pm, so I look forward to seeing everyone of you tomorrow, come, let’s lift up our voices unto God, the God that hears and answers prayers; He has done it before, and He will do it again for us in Jesus name.
By the grace of God, this month marks the end of the third quarter of the year, and as usual, God helping us, we will be reaching out to the needy. You know it’s something we started sometimes in June, I think we had in the first quarter, second quarter, so this month’s own will be the third edition of it, we want to give food to the needy among us, therefore, I would want to humbly request for as many of you that would like to be part of the glorious exercise to please reach out to us via the church account.
We have a dedicated church account for that; CSR Account Details: A/C Name: RCCG CTL CSR, A/C No: 1022224065, Bank Name: UBA; we will need about 15 – 16 million. Last edition, I think we spent about 14.5 million, you know what it is, and to the glory of God, I think we have a balance of about 6.5million in that same account, which means that we still need 10million there to go. So if God places it in your heart to be part of it, please feel free to be involved; the Bible says he that giveth to the poor, giveth to the Lord, and you know God owes no man anything, so I trust God will minister to you and will be part of it, the Lord will bless you mightily as you do so in Jesus name.
From today, there shall be plenteous of good harvest in your life in the name of Jesus. Acts of Apostles 16: 25 & 26, “And at midnight Paul and Silas prayed, and sang praises unto God: and the prisoners heard them. And suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken: and immediately, all the doors were opened, and every one’s bands were loosed”. I pray in the mighty name of Jesus that as together we praise our God this morning, there will be a great earthquake in the foundations of our prisons, and of course, doors shall be opened unto us and every one of you shall be free in the name of Jesus.
As usual, I would like to give you this first course before our esteemed father in the Lord, Pastor Enoch Adejare Adeboye, General Overseer of the Redeemed Christian Church of God will come on board to serve us the main course. But we need to refresh you and, of course, prepare you for the main course. So within the intervening period, I’ll be speaking to us on the topic, ‘Provoking Divine Attention Through Praise’.
I told the workers and ministers this morning that we have come just to do one thing today, and the one thing we have come to do today is simply to praise our God – Provoking Divine Attention through Praise.
Now for better understanding and try to give a simple definition of the relevant words in our topics of today; to provoke simply means to stimulate, to provoke means to evolve, to arouse or produce; while the word divine, as we all know is associated with the supernatural. Anytime you hear the word divine, is a suggestion of the supernatural, and it simply talks about God.
Now for the word attention, attention denotes taking notice of someone or something. You know there are many of you in the house, you know how to attract attention, apologies to our mommies and our sisters. You’ll get to a place and they start checking out themselves, sometimes you think if they don’t have a mirror at home; even in church this morning, I was standing here and saw somebody checking out herself – attention seekers, notice me. So attention simply means to create awareness, praise the Lord.
My prayer for everyone of us is that your presence and my presence here today will attract divine attention in the name of Jesus. That’s why you have to be very careful of what you do, because God is looking, is checking, and don’t forget what you do is a product of what is in your mind. I pray once again that today, God will not pass you by.
There are several keys to provoking divine attention:
Number one, is having a childlike heart as against the natural one (heart). A childlike heart, you ask him to sit down, he sits down; you ask him to jump up, he jumps up. But a natural heart, you ask him to sit down, he asks you, why should I sit down? You ask him to stand up, he’ll say, sir, what have I done now that you are asking me to stand up? That’s a natural heart. But for a childlike heart, whatever you ask him to do is what he or she does without any question.
See a man or a woman with such a heart, perpetually, he attracts God’s attention.
Number two, paying attention to little things. The story in Exodus 3: 1 – 5 is very relevant to this point; the Bible says “Now Moses kept the flock of Jericho his father in law, the priest of Midian: and he led the flock to the backside of the desert, and came to the mountain of God, even to Horeb. 2And the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed.
3And Moses said, I will now turn aside, and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt. 4And when the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses. And he said, here am I. 5And he said, draw not nigh hither: put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground”.
Moses saw fire and he discovered that the fire was raging, but the subject of it was not burning, and the Bible says he turned aside, purposely to find out – paying attention to little things.
Number three, honoring His presence. Moses demonstrated what I call the highest level of honor unto God; immediately he saw what he saw, he saw the sacred fire and he knew that this is a manifestation of the awesome presence of God, he pulled off his sandals, he clearly said God, I am not worthy to stand before You with my shoes on.
Number four, developing friendship with God. How do you develop friendship with God? You take time and spend time with Him, study His words, meditate on it and apply it. You turn aside like Moses did, in order to have an uninterrupted relationship and communion with God.
Number five is commitment to righteousness. Commitment to righteousness is another key to attracting or provoking divine attention. Psalms 5: 12, it says, “For thou, Lord, wilt bless the righteous; with favor wilt thou compass him as with a shield”. When you are a righteous man, the Lord will bless you, and He blesses you with favor, and will thou compass him as with a shield.
However, our focus today, like I said, will be of praise as an important tool of provoking divine attention. Genuine and quality praise is a special aroma that draws God’s attention and presence to every situation. And brethren, without any fear or contradiction, I can tell you that when God’s attention is gained, problems are solved, and unpleasant situations are turned around for good, and this is more so because God dwells in the presence of His people, and guess what, He will not share his presence with strangers.
Psalm 22: 3, it says, “But thou art holy, O thou that inhabitest the praises of Israel”. Praising God’s name ushers God’s presence into even the darkest of moments; when you praise God, God comes in, and when God comes in, He turns around your darkest situation into light. And wherever God’s presence is, (His) God’s characters follows, therefore, as you praise Him today, every darkness in your life, every darkness in your business, every darkness all around you will give way in the name of Jesus Christ.
How do I know? John 1: 5, it says “And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not”. As we praise Him today in the name of Jesus, every darkness of sorrow, every darkness of failure, every darkness of disappointment, every darkness of shortage, will disappear in the name of Jesus Christ.
There are many glorious occasions of praise, bringing down the glory and awesome presence of God that turn around horrible situations around to wonderful testimonies in the past. Paul and Silas in our text, not withstanding their ordeals, they intentionally set up an altar, and the Bible says in the midnight, Paul and Silas prayed, and sang praises unto God, and they did not do it secretly, the prisoners heard them, the foundation of the whole place shook, and of course, there was a divine intervention. I pray today, God will intervene in our lives in the name of Jesus.
