THE WONDERS OF THANKSGIVING

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 8TH, 2023.

DIVINE CONNECTION DAILY DEVOTIONAL BY OLADELE T•E

THEME: THE WONDERS OF THANKSGIVING!

TEXT: [NKJV] JOHN 11:41

Then they took away the stone from the place where the dead man was lying. And Jesus lifted up His eyes and said, "Father, I thank You that You have heard Me.

Giving thanks to God is an act of showing appreciation to Him for what He has done, for what He is doing and for what He is yet to do. Giving thanks is an act of applying for more of what you have received from God. Giving thanks is also an act of telling God that you would love to see what He had done in the past again and again. There are wonders that only giving thanks to God can make happen and those kinds of wonders are very spectacular and one in a million. God loves to be appreciated and if He is not well appreciated, there is no amount of prayer and faith that can make Him to perform more of His wonderful deeds in your life. Giving thanks to God is an act of magnifying Him above yourself and above every other thing around your life. No matter what you are going through, once you know how to magnify God through thanks, He will definitely make a way for you where there seems to be no way.

According to the focal scripture for today's devotional message, the Bible elucidates how Jesus provoked a wonder to happen just by giving thanks to God. What was the wonder that was provoked? The wonder provoked by the thanksgiving of Jesus was that after He had given thanks, He called forth the man that was already dead and buried for four days and the dead man came back to life. By the gratitude that Jesus showed to God, a life that was lost was restored. The life lost was not only lost but also had no hope of being restored again but by giving thanks to God, the hope for the dead man to come back to life was not only restored, the life of the dead man was also restored. Rather than complain about it, why can't you just give thanks to God about it? Jesus wept and from mourning, He switched to giving thanks to God and a wonder that had never happened before happened afterwards.

One of the wonders of thanksgiving is restoration. After Lazarus had died for four days and his body had already been stinking, only the thanksgiving of Jesus restored life back to His rotten body. Another wonder of thanksgiving is multiplication. After Lazarus came back to life, he didn't die immediately but rather lived some more years after he was restored back to life. The thanksgiving of Jesus didn't just raise Lazarus back to life but also added more years to him so as to live much longer. By giving thanks to God, the wonder of restoration can happen and the wonder of multiplication can also happen. Once God can restore it, He can also multiply it. I don't know what you might have lost in the past. I want you to know today that it can be restored if only you can give quality thanks to God. Not only will God restore what was lost but He will also multiply it. That's a wonder and it can happen when you drop ingratitude and take up gratitude.

PRAYER: Father, I thank You for the revelation of Your Word. Now that I know that by giving thanks to You, the wonder of restoration can happen and the wonder of multiplication can also happen. Please Lord, help me to give quality thanks to You in and out of season so that I can experience the wonders of restoration and of multiplication in Jesus Christ name.