A Thankful Heart is a Happy Heart (Part 3 )

Hello everyone,

This week we have been exploring the wonderful attitude of thankfulness.  There are so many benefits to having a thankful heart!

Today, I'd like to show you how this winning attitude, has far more going for it than we imagined!     What if I told you a thankful heart can open the door for the supernatural power of God to be manifest in our lives?  Well it can, and it will, if you and I just open our hearts to embrace it!

THE SUPERNATURAL POWER OF THANKFULNESS

The Word THANKFUL in the Greek is made up of two words:

• EU meaning good or well; and 
• CHARIS meaning grace.

"Now, the Word  eu, denotes a good inner disposition or a good feeling about someone or something. ....it paints a picture of someone who is so grateful that he has an outpouring of overwhelmingly good feelings about everything" (Renner, Sparkling Gems 2). This means,  regardless of what is happening, or not happening, this person has made up His mind to be grateful!  Imagine waking up in the morning and simply deciding,  "No matter what - today I'm  going to be thankful!"

Now, I did some more digging on this word thankful, and found that the second part of the Greek compound word, CHARIS, meaning GRACE, is packed with POWER!

Do you find that when You are thankful, your gratitude overflows into SPONTANEOUS  PRAISE ?  Well, many things happen when we praise God from our hearts.  I'm going to speak about two of them here. Firstly, we have a CHANGE OF FOCUS!  Our focus is no longer on our problems, but it's on the ability and nature of our God, which immediately fuels our faith with expectancy and diminishes fear.    So GRACE becomes the VOICE OF FAITH that thanks God for the answer before it comes.

Secondly, since the Word of God teaches us that God, Himself, inhabits the praises of His people, our spontaneous praise, from grateful hearts, draws or attracts the presence and power of God into all that concerns us.  Our praise brings the SUPERNATURAL PRESENCE OF GOD RIGHT INTO OUR CIRCUMSTANCES.   No trouble or challenge can stand against the presence of God.  So praising Him, takes our own limitations out the way and causes our giants to face our God, not us.

Now that's enough to get your feet "a dancing and your heart rejoicing", isn't it?  Even though this aspect of thankfulness is a powerful encouragement....there is more to come!

In the next letter, I'm going to tell you more about the SUPERNATURAL power of thankfulness, you don't want to miss it!

Love Jenny