"The God Who Blesses Our Future"- The Apostolic Connection
by Kenneth Carpenter
First Apostolic Church of Maryville (Maryville, TN)
Kind: sermon
Scripture: Genesis 48:13-19

Source: https://acts238.life/repository/sermons/kenneth-carpenter--the-god-who-blesses-our-future-the-apostolic-connection
Published by Acts 2:38 Life from the sermon transcript on that page.
Free to copy and share with attribution.

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for just a few moments I'd like to draw your attention to the Book of Genesis chapter 48 and verse number 13. and Joseph took them both Ephraim in his right hand toward Israel's left hand and Manasseh in his left hand toward Israel's right hand and brought them near unto him and Israel stretched out his right hand and laid it upon the head of Ephraim who was the younger and his left hand upon manasseh's head guiding his hands wittingly for Manasseh was the firstborn go down to verse 17. and when Joseph saw that his father laid his right hand upon the head of Ephraim it displeased him and he held up his father's hand to remove it from ephraim's head unto manasseh's head and Joseph said unto his father not so my father for this is the firstborn put thy right hand upon his head and his father refused and said I know it my son I know it now anytime your your father your parent tells you something twice they mean business I know it my son I know it he shall also become a people and he shall be great but truly his younger brother shall be greater than he and his seed shall become a multitude of Nations for just a few moments the god who blesses our future the god who blesses our future one of the awesome things about God is that he is the only one that's able to make all things new many places in the scripture the scriptures tell us of a god of new beginnings or a god of a second chance we know that in the book of Lamentations God declares and says my mercies are fresh and new every day great is God's faithfulness so we understand that he is a God who is concerned with blessing our future he is not a god that is concerned with our past because he's already shed his blood to take care of our past he is a God who is concerned with our future today now I may need to use you brother Erickson for a moment to illustrate what was going on here Joseph had been sold into slavery Joseph had been sold into bondage Joseph had a hard and a pitiful life of being lied on and mistreated but God had given Joseph a dream and at the end of the day Joseph remained true to God and because of that Joseph was elevated to great power while in Egypt he was given a wife after the days of prison he was given a wife and he had his firstborn son while in Egypt his firstborn son that special son the firstborn that receives the right hand of the blessing of the father that son when he was born Joseph called him Manasseh he said your name is Manasseh why call you Manasseh for he said God has made me to forget all of the toil of my father's house God has made me to forget being hated by my brothers God has made me to forget being lied upon being cheated being forgotten being used up by people God made me forget all of that so I call his name Manasseh because God has made me to forget so Manasseh was that son that represented Joseph's past life but the scripture says that his second born when he was born Joseph looked at this his second son and Joseph said I'm going to call your name Ephraim ephraim's going to be your name for God said he hath made me to become fruitful in the land of my afflictions I have become fruitful down here where I was afflicted I have become a leader down here where I have been Afflicted I have become fruitful in this land of Affliction so Ephraim represented Joseph's past life but Manasseh or Manasseh excuse me Manasseh represented Joseph's past life in the world while Ephraim represented the blessings of fruitfulness of Joseph's future years later Joseph's father Jacob Israel comes down to Egypt and Israel Jacob made this statement he said oh how good God has been to me for I didn't even think I was going to see your face again Joseph and not only is God allowed me to see your face Joseph but I'm allowed to see your children which would have been Jacob or Israel's grandchildren and the day came that Jacob was dying and they all know that just before the death of the Father the father transfers the family blessings of the right hand upon the firstborn and so Joseph goes down to see his dying father and he takes his two small boys with him Manasseh the past and Ephraim the future Manasseh the firstborn Manasseh the one that will be blessed he goes down and as he's standing there and brother Aaron said I'm going to need you to help me if you would stand and come here for just a moment and you will be J you will be Jacob you will be the one that is going to bless now I'm standing here and I realize that right right now that this my right hand that's your left hand and this my left hand that's your right hand so if I'm going to place Manasseh if I'm going to place him close to your right hand I have to put him in my left hand and so I get Manasseh because after all he's the firstborn so I take Manasseh in my left hand because he's the one that I want under your right hand and so I push him toward your right hand I reach and get Ephraim which is on my right hand but ephraim's not going to have the right hand the blessings placed upon him he's going to have the left hand placed upon him so here is I move my two sons Manasseh going to your right hand and Ephraim to your left hand something interesting began to happen Israel crossed over and he laid his hand upon Ephraim and the other hand he laid upon Manasseh and then he began to pray the blessings of God I don't know if you can see this or not but what he did he crossed he crossed he crossed his hands he crossed his arms and he began to pray the blessings looking down on crossed arms he began to pray the blessings but as he began to pray the blessings Joseph looks up and sees this is wrong this is wrong no no no no Daddy your right hand should be up on the head of this one and he tried to get his father's hand but his father stopped him and he said I know it my son I know it my son but he said Ephraim is going to be blessed Ephraim is going to have the blessings can I come and preach to you for a few moments to day that God is not interested in your past because he's got the blood to cover your past he's interested in your future today he's a God that wants to help your future I'm sorry today if you want to go back and revisit your future you don't need an Apostolic preacher but if you want your past to be different you've come to the right place because he's able today He's Able today you can you can live in your past if you want to you can relive it you can redream it you can alter your words you can alter you can alter your lifestyle by your past you can always build monuments listen God is never going to bless your past that's not God and when God looked down and God saw Manasseh Manasseh represented lying Brothers Manasseh representing forgotten in the prison Manasseh represented being lied on by Potiphar's wife Manasseh represented every bad thing that people had done and God is not out to bless your past he's out to bless your fruitfulness he's out to bless your today and he's out to bless your tomorrow I hope there's somebody interested in this building on this Sunday morning January 31st you say you know what I had things happen to me it's under the blood I had things happen to me it can't go back and correct them one scripture one scripture says this because David had a son by the name of Absalom and Absalom had had his brother amnon killed now Absalom Absalom had had amnon killed amnon was dead there's nothing you can do about it but David allows Absalom to come back to Jerusalem but he won't talk to him he allows Absalom to come back but he won't go he won't go down to his house and visit him he allows him to come back but under certain stipulations because after all Absalom my son your father is treating you in light of some of the things you've done in your past oh I'm going to let you come to church oh I'm going to let you be around here but don't expect me to come by your Pew and touch you oh I'm going to let you come and visit the church I'm going to let you come and be a part of the redeemed but don't ever get to thinking that you're something special I got some news to tell somebody today that's not the son of David that I'm preaching about today I'm not talking about an Earthly King that'll let you come in Jerusalem but won't have anything to do with you well the Bible says that A very wise woman went down to see David and a very wise woman told a story about two sons that strove together and and one son took the other's life and and now they've come to take her last son and David became a hypocrite of his own counsel he became a hypocrite of his own Council he said oh what's been done is has been done he said your boy ought to live and then she said yes and the stories about you you see you've already got one boy dead why are you going to let one son be here in Jerusalem and not go down and talk to him for the wise woman said we are all as water that is spilled on the ground that cannot be gathered up again I'm going to tell you something and sister Carpenter don't don't don't don't don't get too upset today all right don't first lady of the church I don't want your blood pressure going up today but you see there see that water I just poured out the best I can do I'll never get all of that water back in that glass there I can take therapy for it I can get on medications for it I can get me a counselor for it I can try my very best to scoop up all the water but what was just done 20 seconds ago can never be undone and the woman said we all have had things to happen and we all are as water spilled upon the ground yet doth God devise means that his banished be not expelled from him in other words God had to banish some but he doesn't expel them he may put you on the back seat of silence for a few days but he's not going to put you completely out of his presence because he's not interested in blessing your past he's interested in blessing your future you may be watching me from one of our prisons today sir ma'am God's able to bless your future and not your past he's going to do a cross blessing through the cross of Calvary all things have been made new you see today can I fervently tell you to get over and start living life can I tell you to let go of your blanket and get your thumb out of your mouth and stop nursing your past and stop letting your stress or stop letting your bad news be your therapy you somehow release chemicals in your body when you when you begin to talk about your problems it makes you feel good I can't relate to that today because God that I preach about is not interested in your past his blood has taken care of your past he looks down this place today and he's scouring the aisles of this place and he's saying would you let me step into your future now let me step out here today do you know the Bible said it was a man that somehow got his self-demon possessed he somehow got himself demon possessed wanted to collect tear his clothes off wanted to hurt himself mutilate himself and he finds himself in a graveyard howling at the moon cutting himself and well they came down I don't know if his wife the children had anything to do with this but they came down and the Bible said the Bible said they tried to tame him tame him it went down like a horse or a dog you're trying to teach new tricks here keep your shirt on and here sit down in the seat right here and and they tried to tame him but he couldn't be tamed you couldn't tame him into good behavior are you hearing me today you couldn't tame him into Goodbye Oh you could get a suit on him for just a little bit but it didn't take long he'd tear it off and start it started howling at the moon and cutting himself and yelling at people and then they said well we can't tame him we can't educate him into good behavior said let's go down and bind him let's handcuff him let's chain him up and see if we can get him to act right when we chain him up but the Bible said the chains and the Fetters couldn't couldn't keep him and so finally they put him on the no hope list they put him on the no help list they put him if they had a police department in that day they put him on the do not respond to this address call he's crazy nobody can help him they put him out there just leave him alone because his past is always going to be his future but all one day out over the Sea of Galilee came a man riding in a boat and when that man named Jesus stepped out on that on that Shore that man came to him and did something that he had never done before he began to worship God he must have had some knowledge of God because he came and he began to worship God but when he came and started worshiping God the Devils took over there were two worlds that had hold of this one man's life a knowledge of a holy God caused him to run to Jesus but the power of the Demonic World caused him to say get away from us leave us for we are Legions Two Worlds had a hold of that one man I've come to preach today to people that Two Worlds have got a hold of you one world says you need to be a church on Sunday morning that another world says you'll never amount to anything because your pastor you're dirty you're low down you're a liar you're a cheat you're all these things but all Jesus has come down this morning just say hey don't you tell me where to put my hand don't you tell me who ought to be blessed I know you think I'm going to lay my hand on brother Carpenter but I'm not going to bless you mother Carpenter today I'm going to lay my hands on the vilest center in the house don't you tell me who to lay my hands on don't you tell me who to save don't you tell me who to save red yellow black and white they're all precious in my side don't you tell me who I ought to be saving women Jesus speaks the word demons flee the man is clothed in his right mind and at the feet of Jesus but here's what I want to preach and I ask for you to give me a little lenience here in the word Jesus got ready to get back on that boat and go preach somewhere else and that man clothed in his right man and at the feet of Jesus got in that boat with him and Jesus said no sir you need to go home and you need to tell how great God has been to you now notice what he didn't say he said you need to go display your scars you need to go tell how many days you were naked in the cemetery you need to go tell how many Cuts you got on your body you need to go tell how many lonely nights you howled at the Moon you need to go tell no no he didn't say that because that's the part God never wants to bless that's the part he would like for you to forget about because he's forgotten about it that's the part he would like for you to stop talking about because he's already put it under the blood he said no what I want you to go tell is how good I've been to you I want you to tell how good how much I blessed you I brought your wife back I brought your children back I brought your sanity back don't tell that part that I don't want to bless thank you