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When I was in Egypt I saw God move in a mighty manner. Tens of thousands of people prayed to receive Christ into their lives. Hundreds of churches were touched by a spirit of revival that was the result of 800 pastors and leaders who gathered for a conference on spiritual awakening. The Holy Spirit fell on that group of leaders in a wonderful way. There was brokenness and repentance.
I returned to the United States
with a spirit of thanksgiving and a heart full of gratitude for all God has
done. My heart continues to cry out, "Great is thy faithfulness! Great is
Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me. All I have needed, Thy hand has provided. Great
is Thy faithfulness!"
As I returned to my own
country and began to praise God for all He has done in these past few weeks,
God began to speak to my heart. "My son," He seemed to say, "you
have a grateful heart now because of the great things I have done. But I want
you to have a grateful heart all the time." I realized that I don't need
to wait for something extraordinary to happen in order to praise Him and give
Him thanks. I need to praise Him all the time.
Paul, the great apostle,
wrote, "give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you
in Christ Jesus" (1 Thes. 5:18 NIV). Our prayers of thanksgiving aren't
just to be when He has done great things. They're to be at all times, in all
situations. We thank Him when the sun is shining and when the dark clouds seem
to overwhelm us. We thank Him when things are going well and when it's
difficult. We praise Him for who He is and thank Him for His goodness in all
things.
The psalmist said,
"Enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise; give thanks
to Him and praise His name. For the LORD is good and His love endures forever;
His faithfulness continues through all generations" (Psalms 100:4, 5 NIV).
There's something very special when we come into the presence of God with a
heart of praise and thanksgiving. He inhabits our praises. He fills a grateful
heart with His love and goodness.
A grateful heart is one
that recognizes who God is and what He has done. A grateful heart is one
exercising faith. It's looking to God as the Source and Sustainer of everything
in our lives. It's seeing Him for who He is and believing He rewards those who
diligently seek Him (Heb. 11:6).
The bottom line of a
grateful heart is that it recognizes that the very nature of God is one of goodness. He's perfect in His goodness. Even when "bad things" seem
to be happening to us, He remains faithful and His goodness isn't hidden. He's
still there. And He loves us. When we understand that, we will humbly bow
before Him and worship Him. Worship flows from a grateful heart.
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