I WANT TO SPECIALLY CONGRATULATE OUR MOTHER, ARCHBISHOP MARGARET BENSON IDAHOSA TODAY ON THIS AWESOME GIFT OF LIFE.
LIFE IS NOT A RIGHT, LIFE IS A GIFT.
THAT IS THE ROOT OF A THANKFUL LIFE. WHEN YOU KNOW IT IS ALL THE GIFT OF GOD.
WE OWE GOD THANKS. IT IS A DEBT WE OWE AND A DEBT WE MUST PAY.
IN THE KINGDOM OF GOD, SUCCESS AND EXPLOITS ARE NOT ACHIEVEMENTS, THEY ARE MERE ENGRACEMENTS.
BEHIND ANY GREAT HAPPENINGS IN ANY LIFE IS THE GRACE OF GOD. NO ONE CAN BE ANY MORE THAN THE GRACE OF GOD MAKES HIM.
– Bishop David Oyedepo on WE OWE GOD THANKS AT CGMI MEGACON 2023 Day 6, Morning Session / Celebration Service of Archbishop Margaret Benson Idahosa’s 80th Birthday 29th July 2023 || Part A
Father, we give you thanks for the opportunity we have to be part of the celebration today. May celebration never cease in everyone’s household. I pray that the goodwill of everyone today will be speaking in their families forever. Thank you Jesus for a very successful MEGACON. Receive our thanks in the name of Jesus.
Today is your precious daughter’s birthday. Jesus thank you for the gift of life. Thank you for the grace you have granted her. Thank you for the good hand upon her life. Thank you for everything that speaks of your glory. Take all the praise in Jesus name. Speak to us this morning Jesus, in Jesus’ precious name.
I want to specially congratulate our mother today on this awesome gift of life. Life is not a right, life is a gift. No one did anything to appear here. We landed here all by grace. We came to life all by grace. Nobody played a part to be born. Life is not a right, life is a gift. That is the root of a thankful life. When you know it is all the gift of God. Jeremiah 1:5. It is all a gift.
Before the two were born, God made His choice, Jacob I loved, Esau I hated. They haven’t done anything. Life is a gift. That is where the journey begins. Recognizing that we are just an embodiment of God’s grace.
I speak on the subject WE OWE GOD THANKS.
It is a debt we owe and a debt we must pay. We owe God thanks. The celebrant of today owes God thanks. All well-wishers who have come to celebrate with us, we owe God thanks.
In the Kingdom of God, success and exploits are not achievements, they are mere engracements. Paul said I am what I am by the grace of God. Behind any great happenings in any life is the grace of God. No one can be any more than the grace of God makes him. We owe God thanks.
We owe God thanks and we are here to give God thanks for the life of our mother, Archbishop Margaret Benson-Idahosa who turns eighty today.
What is in thanksgiving? People get weary about thanksgiving because they don’t know what virtues are in it. What virtues are in thanksgiving?
Preservation of God’s blessings.
If you want His blessings preserved, give Him thanks. Malachi 2:1-3. Thankless people hardly sustain God’s blessings. It is not a thing you will have to feel like, it is a thing you must do. It is a thing we must do.
Blessings are cheaply reversible when you don’t know how to preserve them. You may have three baskets of tomatoes today, but by next tomorrow you won’t have anything again. It is gone because it was not preserved. Many have seen blessings before but they can’t see it anymore because they are thankless. If you don’t thank God for small, you won’t see big.
You don’t thank Him for big, you won’t see bigger. You don’t thank Him for bigger, you won’t see the biggest. It is thanksgiving that multiplies things. Jeremiah 13:16.-17. Behind thanklessness is pride. You see something and you say it is nothing. I shared with you yesterday that I have given testimony of 200 naira in my life. See how God is blessing me. I have given testimony of 500 naira but that is not where I am. We are not here by right, we owe God thanks.
Thanksgiving is a mystery that multiplies God’s blessings in our lives. We saw that in John 6 when Jesus gave thanks for two fishes and five loaves of bread and it multiplied supernaturally. Thanksgivers never go down. They keep enjoying the grace of multiplication in their lives. You know why food finishes in our stores, we are thankless. What about fish? Finished. Water? Finished.
You finished it yourself. A family years ago testified about blessing water to eat with thanksgiving for dinner. Parents and children drank water to bed. The following day two bags of rice arrives at their door. Nobody knew how. Thanksgivers never get stranded. Thanksgivers multiply God’s hand in our lives. May we all become addicted to a life of thanksgiving from today.
One of my sons was reminding me that in 1989, I was giving testimonies in our pastor’s meeting that can’t they see the way God is blessing me? I get blessings of a thousand naira every week. Isn’t that wonderful and amazing?
I wasn’t nagging or flattering God, I was celebrating Him. Is that where I am today? If you don’t want to stay there for too long give God thanks for where you are. Give God thanks intentionally, it is a vital mystery of the Kingdom.
Thanksgiving brings perfection of God’s blessings.
That leper returned and Jesus said “Were there not ten cleansed?” God is counting those who return. When you don’t return with thanks for what He does. You have asked Him to stay His hand. The one that returned was made whole.
In thanksgiving lies the perfection of God’s blessings for our lives. The Lord wants to perfect all things that concern us. How will He perfect them? Through the mystery of thanksgiving as a way of life.
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