The Power of Praise: Breaking Barriers and Walking in Victory

• Be joyful always. Pray continually. Give thanks in all circumstances. Does anybody else get hang hung up on that one? I mean, give thanks in all circumstances. Come on. In awe. I mean, it’s so easy to give God thanks when you’re on the mountaintop. But man, when Satan is just sabotaging you and something you didn’t even see came out of left field, God says, “Give thanks.
• ” And we’ve had a lot of left field curveballs lately. It just has been kind of I’m like I’m watching it as your pastor. I’m watching. I’m going, “Okay, okay. Okay. This is good. All right, God. I know God well enough to know this is positioning. This is all positioning. It’s all positioning.” [music] I think you’ll hear some of that today.
• Give thanks in all circumstances for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus. You know, I’ve got to stop right here and say something. Derek, I’ve known you for years. I’ve watched you in Shay. You’re a faithful tither. You’re a praiser. You sacrifice. I’ve watched you. You conduct with integrity. You’re a man of God.
• But I’m going tell you, it was when I visited you in the hospital that I was most impressed with you. It was when you were on a bed in such excruciating pain that I couldn’t even imagine. It was that was when I went, “Whoa, this man’s weighty.” Because it was at that moment that they came to give you something and before they even put it in, you started thanking God and giving him praise and you prayed over the machine before anything would even enter your body.
• I’m like, this man is one step away from death right now. Literally, I mean, his whole like he was cut from here to here, all open, hanging out, intestine, everything there. And where most people would have been complaining, God, why me? Why? I’m watching you go barely have strength in your body praising God [music] and praying before anything entered in that nothing could even get in your body if it did [music] not go through the hands of a sovereign God.