Prophetic Word – Tap into Gratitude, Tap into Overflow

Thanksgiving weekend is here!  And even if you don’t celebrate thanksgiving in your own country it is always good to be thankful and have a heart of gratitude.

I could’ve sent this post on Wednesday or even on Thanksgiving day but the Lord wanted me to wait until after to send it because He doesn’t want it confined to one day.  He doesn’t want this to be something that you just do on Thanksgiving day but He wants you to adopt it as a lifestyle.

This word is to highlight the importance of being thankful and having a heart of gratitude which puts you in a position to tap into the overflow, the abundance of God.

1 Thessalonians 5:18 KJV “In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.“

It doesn’t say FOR everything because some things are really bad and we can’t really give thanks for them but it says IN everything.  That means regardless of what you are going through you need to find the time to say Thank you to God.  Be grateful for what you do have.  Be grateful for salvation if you have nothing else, that is the most important thing.

God has just been impressing upon my heart how it pleases Him, makes Him so happy when we are thankful.  We spur Him on to bless us even more!  Did you know that?  He LOVES it when we are grateful.

Thanksgiving actually releases such a joy in the Lord that He turns around and blesses YOU for doing it!

First of all, you should never ask God for anything without giving thanks to Him during that time of prayer.  That’s biblical!

Philippians 4:6 “Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God.”

It’s good to thank Him in advance but what about all the other things He has done for you already?  Remember those when you go to Him in prayer.

When you lack gratitude you could be missing out on the BEST part, leaving blessings on the table that you don’t even know are available to you.  I want to outline for you all the things that God showed me about being grateful and what it unlocks.

I pray that this ministers to you as it did to me when He was outlining this to me…

Gratitude & Thanksgiving comes from a Heart and Mindset of abundance, not poverty and lack

Luke 6:45 “A good person produces good out of the good stored up in his heart….for his mouth speaks from the overflow of the heart.“

Gratitude can only exist in a heart that operates from a place of abundance.  You can only give what you have. You can open your mouth and say THANK YOU because you are speaking from a heart of abundance and overflow.  You are unable to be thankful if you have a heart or mindset of lack and poverty.  Because then you see yourself as being deficient and having nothing to be thankful for. SELAH

When you are a saved, born again believer in Jesus Christ and filled with the Holy Spirit, you have MORE than enough.  You are wealthy.  You have abundance because you have Christ.  The SOURCE of abundance lives within you.  Therefore from that place of abundance you should be quick to say thank you, to be grateful and express thanksgiving to everyone that you come in contact with.  You are never poor with Jesus.  You have no lack or poverty in your heart.

Therefore, gratitude and thanksgiving to God and to others is a reflection of our own hearts.

One of my favorite stories in he bible is Genesis 13 The Living Bible

13 ^1-2 So they left Egypt and traveled north into the Negeb—Abram with his wife, and Lot, and all that they owned, for Abram was very rich in livestock, silver, and gold. ^3-4 Then they continued northward toward Bethel where he had camped before, between Bethel and Ai—to the place where he had built the altar. And there he again worshiped the Lord.

⁵ Lot too was very wealthy, with sheep and cattle and many servants.  ⁶ But the land could not support both Abram and Lot with all their flocks and herds. There were too many animals for the available pasture. ⁷ So fights broke out between the herdsmen of Abram and Lot, despite the danger they all faced from the tribes of Canaanites and Perizzites present in the land. ⁸ Then Abram talked it over with Lot. “This fighting between our men has got to stop,” he said. “We can’t afford to let a rift develop between our clans. Close relatives such as we are must present a united front! ⁹ I’ll tell you what we’ll do. Take your choice of any section of the land you want, and we will separate. If you want that part over there to the east, then I’ll stay here in the western section. Or, if you want the west, then I’ll go over there to the east.”

¹⁰ Lot took a long look at the fertile plains of the Jordan River, well watered everywhere (this was before Jehovah destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah); the whole section was like the Garden of Eden, or like the beautiful countryside around Zoar in Egypt. ¹¹ So that is what Lot chose—the Jordan Valley to the east of them. He went there with his flocks and servants, and thus he and Abram parted company. ¹² For Abram stayed in the land of Canaan, while Lot lived among the cities of the plain, settling at a place near the city of Sodom. ¹³ The men of this area were unusually wicked, and sinned greatly against Jehovah.

¹⁴ After Lot was gone, the Lord said to Abram, “Look as far as you can see in every direction, ¹⁵ for I am going to give it all to you and your descendants. ¹⁶ And I am going to give you so many descendants that, like dust, they can’t be counted! ¹⁷ Hike in all directions and explore the new possessions I am giving you.” ¹⁸ Then Abram moved his tent to the oaks of Mamre, near Hebron, and built an altar to Jehovah there.

I’m going to point out the parts that speak so deeply to me.

1  Abram as we all know carried the SOURCE of abundance within him.  This manifested in what was around him to the point where whomever came in contact with him, his nephew Lot, also started to manifest the same abundance.

2.  The two of them became so wealthy and had so much possession they had to part ways.  Pay attention to how Abram did it, (1) he did not choose the best land for himself. (2) he made Lot choose and Lot chose what he thought was the best based on appearance.  You know why Abram was able to say to Lot that he can choose?  Because Abram knew it didn’t matter what he gave, he has the SOURCE of the abundance.

3  Look at what happens after Lot chose the best part and they parted ways(v. 14), God says now look again!!!! In all directions.  Prior to that Abram only saw east and west, now God says not 2 ways but east, west, north and south!!  Come on!  That means Lot thought he got the best 1/2 the land but in fact he got 1/4 instead.  There was a portion that was concealed until the separation. <—don’t miss this sentence. (phew!)

Some of you may even feel like you got cheated out of something.  You had the best taken away from you.  No!  AFTER the separation God can show you what He really has for you.  The BEST is yet to come.  What you lost was nothing. 

You carry the SOURCE!

There was a multiplication that took place after the separation.  Because the SOURCE of the abundance was with Abram.  He doesn’t need to be stingy.  He doesn’t need to keep the best because he understands that even if he gives up the best what comes after that is even more.  Why?  Because Abram has the SOURCE.  God says in verse 17, now go explore the “New possessions” I am giving you!  He never saw that land until he gave away what was considered the best to Lot.

4  Abram doesn’t operate from a place of lack and poverty.  His heart operates from a place of abundance.  He can give away what appears to be the best because he has the SOURCE.  He doesn’t lack anything!!!

5  Pay attention that the story starts (v. 4) with him worshiping God and it ends after he took possession of the land, he built an altar there…aka  he gave thanks to God (v. 18).  He lived a lifestyle of thanking God.

Therefore, gratitude and thanksgiving to God and to others is a reflection of our own hearts.

Thanksgiving  activates supernatural multiplication

Matthew 14:19 “And he directed the people to sit down on the grass. Taking the five loaves and the two fish and looking up to heaven, he gave thanks and broke the loaves. Then he gave them to the disciples, and the disciples gave them to the people.“

You all know the story of the feeding of the 5,000 how the Lord fed them all with only five loaves and two fishes (Matthew 14:17-21).  This was all made possible because Jesus gave thanks to the Father for the little, it multiplied into much.  For some of you this may seem like it can only happen for Jesus.  Well, I’m here to tell you it can happen for all of us.  I wrote this prayer based on the same principle because this is something I’ve done personally over and over again.  It Works!  The key…thanksgiving!  Thank God for the little and He will supernaturally multiply it to do more than it was expected to do.  Here’s the prayer for Multiplication.

Thanksgiving gives you access to the Presence of God

Psalm 100:4 “Enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise; give thanks to Him and praise His name.”

The easiest and quickest way to enter the presence of God is to praise Him.  It grants you instant access.  As you begin to worship Him, thanking Him for all He has done and praise His name you will begin to feel your atmosphere change as it opens access to the Lord right there in your home, in your car, on the street, in your office. Wherever you are, He will show up as you begin to give thanks and praise His name.

Giving thanks to God and to others will release additional blessings upon you

Luke 17:11-19 “Now it happened as He went to Jerusalem that He passed through the midst of Samaria and Galilee.  Then as He entered a certain village, there met Him ten men who were lepers, who stood afar off. And they lifted up their voices and said, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!”

So when He saw them, He said to them, “Go, show yourselves to the priests.” And so it was that as they went, they were cleansed.

And one of them, when he saw that he was healed, returned, and with a loud voice glorified God, and fell down on his face at His feet, giving Him thanks. And he was a Samaritan.

So Jesus answered and said, “Were there not ten cleansed? But where are the nine? Were there not any found who returned to give glory to God except this foreigner?” ¹⁹ And He said to him, “Arise, go your way. Your faith has made you well.”

So in this story we see that Jesus is walking through Samaria, not Israelites, and He comes across ten lepers.  They know who He is and they ask Him to heal them.  He grants them this prayer and they get healed.  But out of the ten, only one came back to say THANK YOU.

Wow!  Just think of the ratio.  You see the one had to go back, return what does that mean?  Generally, lepers couldn’t stay with the population they lived on the outskirts so I guess now that they were all clean they could go back and mix with everyone else. So it had to take some effort, some going out of their way to go back to where Jesus was to say thank you.

This story gets me every time.  They all got something.  They had abundance.  They were given their life back and they couldn’t even say thank you?!  Now to them this was the best gift to have a healed whole body but the one that went back got something even more.  What’s better than having a whole body?  Salvation.  You see at the end when Jesus said to him “your faith has made you well” what that means is that now he would be considered a part of the family of God.  Because he said thank you, he actually got the best part of the whole deal.  You can have a nice whole body and still go to hell, did you know that?  You can have all the riches in the world and still go to hell.  The best part was given to him when he returned to say thank you.

The principle God is sharing in this story is that in saying thank you we unlock additional blessings that we didn’t know we needed.  Things we didn’t even know was available to us becomes available when we have a heart of gratitude.  We tap into overflow.

Nobody likes an entitled person, not even God.  Always be grateful for what you have, thank God and thank others for what they are doing for you.  In doing so you will enter God’s presence, show that you operate from a place of abundance and overflow, activate supernatural multiplication, and tap into God’s overflow to receive blessings that will be available to you all because you said thanks!

Blessings