Holiness - Part II | Senior Pastor Kenneth Carpenter

have your bibles and would be so kind to stand if you're not already standing you're physically able to stand in honor of the reading of god's word hebrews chapter 12 and verse number 14. hebrews chapter 12 and verse number 14. maybe it'd be good if we read it all together i begin the series of holiness holiness and i'm i'm doing this for my precious valuable strong tower students that are worth all the spiritual investing that we can give to them they're worth it they're worth it and um i'm teaching on holiness i got one bible study out and then we had the sweeping of covet through our community and i did one bible study online and i decided that there are some things i believe you need to be in the building i really do there's a spirit that goes with and so i decided just to uh the kind of go a different direction but we're going to go we're going we're going to be teaching for the next several weeks the lord willing on the subject of holiness would you say that with me holiness hebrews 12 14. follow peace with all men and holiness without which no man shall see the lord father i love you tonight thank you for the call to the ministry preaching and teaching you said if i loved you i'd feed these people god i'm here tonight to try to show you that i love you by feeding these wonderful people god may our ears and our eyes be open tonight that we would understand spiritual principles and understand how everything works together father if you'll anoint me i'll give you the praise and the honor for for you and your glory in jesus name we pray amen you may be seated holiness holiness i had a list of a very serious prayer request listed and then for whatever reason i put down this announcement and maybe if it is connected to the serious prayer request it might be on sister castile's part but tomorrow tomorrow and i need you to help me make some noise right now tomorrow brother and sister cast steel will be celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary tomorrow happy anniversary brothers sister castillo 50 years jubilee amen but it's the only jubilee none of you go free thank god happy anniversary holiness living a life of holiness is a process it is a process please please please don't misunderstand holiness in reference to the holy ghost because you do receive the baptism of the holy ghost in a moment you do receive it it's an experience you receive it in a moment but holiness holiness is a process and when we can really understand holiness is a process it is a process that starts the moment you are born again the moment you are born again there is a process that starts of holiness this process will continue to mature you it will continue working in you until the day god either calls you home or god sounds the trumpet and raptures the church it will be a process it is a process that is actually in three parts so that you know it's a process holy holiness is not something you take off and holiness is not something you put on holiness is a process it's a three-part process there's three parts to holiness holiness must be important for the bible records that without holiness we will not see the lord the very first part of holiness that begins the very moment you are born again is justification justification write that word down you've heard it for years the word justification well it's a very important word because justification deals with the penalty of sin the penalty of sin now we understand in romans 6 and verse 23 what the penalty of sin is the penalty of sin the wages of sin is death now please don't misunderstand that death there with physical death it's far far worse than physical death it's the second death it's the eternal death and the eternal separation without ever having an opportunity to be saved it's the second death don't misunderstand it well the wages of sin or death that means we die one day no no no no that's not the death you should fear the death we should fear is the second death but see that's why we have the the new birth message because if you're only born once you die twice you die physical and you die the second eternal death of never having an opportunity to be saved but if you're born twice you may only die once so i i'm here to tell you that if you're not born again of the water and the spirit you need to be like the young lady i believe we have a young lady here tonight and when pastor gets done with her bible his bible lesson she's going to be baptized that's not to join this church that's not to show she's following christ that's for the purpose of the remission of sin that ties into john 3 that you must be born again of the water and the spirit so justification deals with the penalty of sin now what is the penalty of sin number one all have sinned all have sinned and come short of the glory of god so all have sinned all of us were under the penalty and if you're not born again you're still under the penalty of sin you owe god something you can't pay you're under the penalty of sin now many of us understand the word penalty sometimes if we'll pay a bill if we'll pay a bill by a certain date it's one amount but if we're late there is something called a late penalty and you have to pay a little more because that's the penalty and god forbid that any of us would get sideways with the i r s penalties penalties you see there's a greater penalty than a late bill a late penalty and there's a greater penalty than 25 interest on money that you have to pay and it keeps growing there is the penalty of sin when adam and eve sinned they placed all of us all of us under the penalty the penalty of death but when we are born again in the courtroom of god that's where penalties are dealt in god's courtroom we are justified we are justified because of what jesus did for you and i at the cross and because we believe that message with all of our hearts we stand broken and repented in the courtroom of heaven of which the heavenly judge the one that's been offended at the sin steps up and says i remove the penalty i remove the penalty of death we enter into what is called justification justification is positional my position in christ is one of justification i am no longer under the penalty of sin now you don't have to raise your hand you don't have to raise your hand i'd rather you not it'd be so many and how many of you have been pulled over for speeding and you knew you were speeding come on now you knew you were speaking and you knew the officer knew you were speeding because it starts out something like this well i caught you at 82 with your brakes on all right and the speed limit and i think i think that some folks can relate to what i'm saying tonight the other folks can ask god to forgive them for their pride all right and he steps up and you know you're gonna get it but all of a sudden he or she says you know would you just slow down would you just slow down i'm not going to write you a ticket how many could raise your hand don't i'm not going to write you a ticket but would you just slow down and what did you say oh yes i slow down thank you and when you drive off what kind of spirit are you driving off in thank you thank you jesus thank you god well i use that analogy to say this we're all caught sinning we're all sinners you were born in sin i was born in sin we were born guilty we were born under the death penalty but the heavenly judge steps up and says i'll take that fine i'll take your sin i'll take what you deserve is death but you can't handle death but i can handle death because i will suffer death just like you should have suffered death but i want to give you a position in the courtroom one of justification it is positional it is your position and you know what our attitude should be thank you jesus thank you jesus thank you god thank you god now the wonderful thing about justification is that you could be a hideous sinner i mean you've done some of the most vile things imaginable but you can come to jesus christ with your life and if you'll believe the gospel and become born again of the water in the spirit he takes you and puts you in a position with him and that position is no longer guilty no longer guilty of the sin that they committed i took their penalty and you are justified or you could be a six-year-old child whose mom and daddy brought them up in church and what you're guilty of is you lied a couple times to your mama and you did take that cookie out of that jar and you're not sharing your toys but that same loving god that can move upon the vilest center sweeps down and moves upon that six-year-old child and that six-year-old child is just as hell-bound is that violent sinner on skid row but when god swoops down and touches that six-year-old child's heart and that six-year-old child lifts their hands and begins to say jesus jesus forgive me jesus jesus i love you jesus and that six-year-old child is baptized and filled with the holy ghost that six-year-old child is put at a position of justification and it doesn't matter the vileness of your sin we're all born in sin and shaping in iniquity and we've all been given a position of justification we're justified you see i thought you was going to talk about holiness tonight there's no way to understand holiness if we don't understand positional justification now can i tell you you could be in the church 50 years living for god or you could have come in the church last sunday night by being born again and the person that's been in 50 years and the person that got in last sunday are on the equal ground of justification that wonderful the man and woman been in church 75 years let's take brother sister casebolt been in church for years but let's take somebody got the holy ghost sunday night got baptized justification and positional wise they're on the same ground god takes the penalty of sin i don't know about you but i'm glad god takes our penalty of sin so i'm still going through the consequences of some that's right but your really problem is not the consequences it would been the penalty because the penalty is hell the penalty is eternal separation from god so i'm going to tell you i think we ought to endure a little consequence to know that ultimately he's taken he's taken the penalty away i'm no longer under that penalty justification deals with the penalty of sin i could read you several verses of scripture romans 4 25 speaking about jesus christ who was delivered for our offenses and was raised again romans 4 25 what was he raised again for he rose again so he could justify us he took the penalty of sin he took what i should have gotten he went to hell for me so that he could come back three days later and say now i have risen from the dead so i can be your justification i'm taking your penalty romans 5 16 romans 5 16 and not as it was by one that sinned so is the gift for the judgment was by one to condemnation that's what adam and eve did one brought condemnation but the free gift is of many offenses under justification adam and eve did one act and brought condemnation there were many offenses but it led to justification verse 18. therefore as by the offense of one adam and eve judgment came upon all men to condemnation even so by the righteousness of one that's jesus christ the free gift came unto all men here's that word again unto justification of life aren't you thankful for your position tonight aren't you thankful for that position this evening now the process begins with justification justification takes away the penalty of sin but justification leads us to the next step in this process and that's sanctification sanctification is not justification justification has to do with penalty sanctification has to do with the power of sin it's very important that you you grasp this principle i am justified because i was under the penalty of sin i am in the process of sanctification that's a separation from and a drawing toward sanctification is a separation from and a drawing toward sanctification deals with the power of sin because just because you got the holy ghost don't be deceived you're going to get tempted again and just because you have the holy ghost doesn't mean sin doesn't have power but if we will enter the process of sanctification we begin to draw away from the power of sin it's not overnight don't give up don't give up if you've stumbled and failed a little bit keep getting up and keep getting as far away from sin as you can keep things in your life that sin hates keep things in your life that your flesh doesn't want to do church bible reading prayer praise worship because the more you cater to your flesh the more sin draws you back and you can lose your position because he didn't put you there just to put you there he puts you there to start a growth process he puts you there so that you can begin to come away but if you cater to your flesh and you let your flesh do reasoning you let your flesh start figuring out what's of god and what's not of god you let your flesh start determining what you ought to do you're going to eventually lose your position but if you can put things in your life come on somebody if you can put things in your life that your flesh doesn't like your flesh doesn't like being told what to do you need to put somebody in your life with authority that can tell you what you don't want to do but they can show you to you in the bible you need to put some things in your life that your flesh doesn't want to do and the mind wants to reason it out i can praise the lord some other time well why not right now what's not what's wrong with right now well i can praise god on sunday night it's not that i don't love jesus i'm i'm just i can just praise him on sunday night why don't you praise him right now because the truth of the matter is the more i can put my flesh in subjection the more i'm walking away from the power of sin but as i'm walking away from the power of sin i'm walking toward the one that gives the power over sin and i become stronger now if i keep things in my life doesn't matter doesn't matter if i've been born again baptized feel the holy ghost it doesn't matter none of that matters if i keep music in my life that doesn't glorify god if i keep entertainment in my life with this and glorify god if i keep more things in my life that cater to my flesh and very small amounts of things that minister to my spirit you're going to be sucked right back and lose your position sanctification deals with the power of sin romans 10 and 10 by the which we are sanctified through the offering of the body of jesus christ once for all you know a good standard and we start talking about holiness holiness and standards kind of start kind of getting this but you know a good standard whenever you start thinking about what we're asked to do from the bible what we're asked to do even from our spiritual leader or even from our parents and you start thinking that's a little bit much don't he know this is 21st century that's that's a little bit much for me to go through do a good in-depth study on the cross and then tell me it's a little bit too much watch what you know wwjd what would jesus do you know when we really begin to look at what he did for us i don't know about you but you and i got the deal of a lifetime you hear me we we got the deal of a lifetime you're not going to hear me bellyaching about coming to church i'm telling you coming to church is a whole lot better than going to jail come on uh you're not going to hear me talking about you you mean y'all got to go too tight you do got you got to do this you got to do that i'm going to tell you something coming to the house of god and singing is better than the psychiatrist it's better than the hospital it's better than all the things man you ought to know we're getting a deal don't ever don't ever complain about anything god asked us to do first thessalonians 4 4 that every one of you should know listen watch watch this now that every one of you should know how to possess his vessel at your body that's your body i'm going to nail this doctrine before it's over with oh it just matters what's in your heart oh yeah it's a starting place but that's just where i got my position i did get my position inside my heart he shed abroad the holy ghost in my heart my position started in my heart but that position didn't stop in my heart it made its way to the outside and the bible says that every one of you should know how to possess his vessel control your vessel control your body in sanctification and honor isn't an honorable thing to serve god you know i've never had to hang my head for serving god but i sure have had to hang my head for serving flesh i never had to hang my head because i walked out of the prayer room but i've had to hang it when i didn't walk out of the prayer room i never i don't have to hang my head i'm talking to you too i'm talking i say i all of us right i've never had to get a hold of god god's word prayer and worship praise never had to hang my head about that boy sure had to hang my head for getting with the wrong crowd everyone should know how to possess his vessel in sanctification that's that's that second step that sanctification is separating listen to jesus how does this sanctification take place jesus in the garden in john chapter 17 verse number 16 listen to jesus praying for the disciples who would preach the gospel and the church would be born from them listen to jesus in john 17 16. he's talking about the disciples the apostles they are not of the world even as i am not of the world sanctify them through thy truth thy word is truth that's why do everything you can when the word's going forth from the pulpit do everything you can to pay attention bring a bible to church bring a pencil pen paper write it down because our drawing away from the world and our drawing to him happens with the preaching of the word of god the only thing that can separate us from the power of sin is the preached word and the taught word of god look at this analogy look at this analogy ephesians chapter 5 and verse number 25 look at this analogy husbands love your wives even as christ also loved the church and gave himself for it that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by what by the word does this make sense to us tonight why we battle reading our bible flesh flesh why do we battle and please do you know originally why we put scriptures on the screen was for people with poor eyesight to be able to see the scripture that's at least that's what i was sold on years ago brother namey that's what they showed me that's why i got a projector and i said yeah let's put the scriptures we got some we got some older people can't see that to read their bibles but you know what i think's happened i think we've allowed that to be our bible i think that we've allowed that to become our bible listen there's nothing like having a bible that you write in it there's nothing like reading your bible on your own personal time and letting god just let a light shine over a scripture and strength begins to come to you and you know what that strength is not that strength is you know what that strength is being drawn away from the power of sin and being drawn to the one that has power over it you know i've been reading two scriptures lately because i do feel like i do feel like our world as a whole is underneath the grip of fear i do believe that the the if the enemy's got one fog over the world today it is the fog of fear but you know what i've been quoting scripture for god hath not given us the spirit of fear but a power and a sound mind but if i stay over here in the flesh and i can drop 30 minutes on cnn or fox or whatever i can drop a half hour an hour on the news and i'm going to tell you something that's not going to tell us nothing but fear fear fear fear fear that's all that's going to breed in us but if i can get a hold of some scripture for god hath not given us the spirit of fear but a power and of a sound mind and you have not received again the spirit of fear but you have received the spirit of adoption whereby we cry abba father the more of the word of god that i can get in my heart the more that i can get away from that get a bible own a bible write in a bible keep a bible the pastor's washing you tonight with the word of god now let's let's write this down now we enter sanctification he steps out and says i free you from the penalty of sin justification excuse me we enter justification it releases us from the penalty of sin if i'm willing to walk in sanctification all right sanctification that delivers me from the power of sin and if i will walk in sanctification see a lot of can can i just tell you this tonight stop here long enough just to say this to you is a lot of people if you stay at that justification you will never mature you'll never mature a mark of an immature christian is they want to ask questions like this you mean to tell me i'll go to hell if i do that uh uh are you telling me i'm gonna go to hell if i do this and they wanna they wanna bring a certain act and they they wanna say so if i do that i'm gonna go to hell no you will be lost from disobedience it's not the act it's the spirit that you had toward the act because we're trying to get as far away from the world as we can so it is very possible that if you're always asking that question you're always asking that question you mean if i do that i'm going to be lost you just just for example you hear this you know brother carpenter you say that you you got to be born again of the water and the spirit to be saved no no no time out champ i didn't say it the word says it the word says it well i just can't understand it if it's the way you say it there's a is a lot of people ain't gonna make it i just can't see all these folks first off you need to stop for a moment we're not gonna stand before god on judgment day as a group it's not the united states are going to stand there we're all going to be grouped together we're going to stand there as individuals and it's not going to be what us all knew or didn't know it's going to be what did i know and what did i do matter of fact when you start talking about everybody that don't know it it makes me realize that us that do know it need to get busy and tell it to everybody that don't know it because after all he left us here to be a witness but we can't be a witness if we're not maturing in sanctification we got to be coming away from the world i submit to you right now that there's a lot of things i did that i didn't understand i did because they showed it to me in the bible the night they leaned down to me and said you need to be baptized in jesus name that's all i knew i didn't know acts 2 38 acts 8 acts 10 acts 19 i knew none of those but the man showed me in the bible where you'd be baptized in jesus name i said that's it let's go i didn't understand it i didn't even understand all the remission of sins business i had enough to know that if i got in the water and they called the name of jesus out over me it washed all my line my stealing my cussing and all the rest of stuff away it would be years later that i would come to understanding of things in scripture so don't ever use as an excuse i'm gonna wait till i understand it if they can show it to you in the bible exercise the greatest gift of obedience if you will exercise obedience when you see it in the scripture i promise you the understanding will follow if god sees that you are obedient justification takes away the penalty sanctification deals with the power sin has over us and that third final act that third final act is called glorification glorification deals with being freed from the presence of sin glorification happens the moment the trumpet sounds and i am changed and you are changed this mortal body puts on immortality and we're changed and thank god sin has no more power over us not only that we are freed from the presence of sin what a wonderful thing about holiness now this is the roots of holiness justification sanctification and glorification the bible says in romans 8 17 and if children then heirs heirs of god join heirs with christ if so be that we suffer with him that we may be also glorified together in the sanctification there's nothing that you can do to merit your justification you just obeyed the gospel but in order to be sanctified you must be willing i want to read you something from unger's bible dictionary from unger's bible dictionary page 582. listen to this holiness so far as it appears in man is an outcome of god's gracious work in salvation and yet not without the proper exertion of one's own free will and the putting forth of strenuous in other words if sanctification's going to take place it's not christ alone it's christ alone that merited my justification it's the death on the cross and my obedience to god's word but when it comes to when it comes to sanctification god must have your willingness no one becomes sanctified no one becomes sanctified no one becomes sanctified without your input no one i can't i can't pray i can't pray you through i can't i can't i can't pray enough to sanctify you you have got to want to be saved you have got to desire inside of your heart if there's no desire there you will go back lose your position and go back to the world but if god sees a hand reaching out that's all god needs to see is a hand reaching out then god can begin to pull you toward him i want to read my last text i want to read my last text for the night it's found in hebrews chapter 6 verse number one he says in hebrews chapter 6 and verse number 1 therefore leaving the principles of the doctrine of christ let us go on into perfection not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward god of the doctrine of baptisms and of the laying on of hands in the resurrection of the dead and of eternal judgment this we will do if god permit and i'm gonna show you what paul is dealing with here he's dealing with immature christians that are content to dwell at their positional of justification they always talk about the blood they're always talking about the forgiveness of the blood they're always talking about he died on the cross he's always talking about my baptism do you follow that they're always talking about my water baptism my spirit baptism and laying on their hands and are always talking about that but paul was concerned because they were not maturing they were not maturing and he comes along and he says therefore leaving the principles of the doctrine of christ he said now it's time to leave them not forsake them but it's time to leave them and it's time to go on into perfection that word is maturity that word is maturity he said it's time to go on into maturity go past repentance go past doctrine of baptisms go past laying on of hands go past the resurrection of the dead and then he says in verse 3 and this will we do if god permit for it is impossible for those who have once been once enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift and were made partakers of the holy ghost and have tasted the good word of god and the powers of the world to come if they shall fall away to renew them again unto repentance seeing they crucified to themselves the son of god afresh and put them and put him to an open shame for the earth which drinketh in the rain that cometh off upon it and bringeth forth herbs meat for them by whom it is dressed receiveth the blessings from god but that which beareth thorns and briars is rejected and is nigh into cursing whose end is destruction but beloved we are persuaded better things of you and things that accompany salvation and things that accompany salvation though we thus speak i'd like for you to leave verse 9 on the screen paul is dealing with immature christians always talking about baptism always talking about the blood always talking about when i got in church and this and they're not maturing and he's saying hey you need to start maturing you need to start maturing in your holiness you need to start growing there needs to be some changes taking place in your life and then it uses the analogy he uses the analogy of those that have fallen away to renew them to repentance seeing that they have crucified the son of god afresh in other words because they have stayed at that immature space a place they've lost their they've lost their position but then he turns and he starts talking about rain he said the rain that comes down and he said when the rain falls upon a field that's been planted it brings whatever was planted whatever is planted is what it brings up if they planted corn the rain will cause corn to come up but if they planted nothing they didn't they didn't go on in sanctification they didn't they didn't read their bible to find out what god was expecting of them they they didn't they didn't really fall under some kind of of what does the bible say oh the bible's the greatest book in the world but they never spent time to find out that's the mind of god that's how god's going to direct you that's how god's going to mature you it's through the bible but they never spend any time in the bible so when the rain fell on their field it brought forth thorns and thistles which are products of the curse of the sin but the man over here that planted corn when the rain came it caused what had been planted to grow up when we plant the good word of god in the days to come the word that's going to tell us on wednesday night what kind of attitude we ought to have regardless of what somebody has done to us how we ought to love one another and pray for those that despitefully use us and how we ought to read the god bible that says if they smite you on one side of your face turn to the other and if they sue you for your shirt give them your coat and and all of these things if we can get the god bible in our lives then when the rain comes and i begin to mature what's going to come out of my life is not the thorns and the cursing but what's going to come out of my life is a beautiful life that god can draw away from the power of sin and you know i i i'll ask them to leave verse 9 on the screen for a reason because i believe verse 9 applies to this congregation tonight he talked about those that wouldn't mature he talked about those that just wanted to stay around well i got baptized and i got the holy ghost listen to me talk in tongues and he says but beloved we are persuaded better things of you and things that accompany salvation he says i know some better things i'm going to tell you i'm going to tell you beloved strong tower i am persuaded to better things for you young lady in the days to come when this bible's opened up on the midweek service and we begin to talk about what kind of spirit god wants you to have as a young lady i'm persuaded that some of you are going to reach out and receive that and say i got overcome with the world i thought the world told me how a young lady was to act and you're going to start acting like what the bible tells you young man i'm persuaded better things of you i'm persuaded in the wednesday nights to come you're going to hear things that's going to get inside of your spirit in your life that's going to change the way you deal with anger it's going to change the way you view authority it's going to change things around why i'm persuaded tonight by those that are sitting here that knew know very little about the apostolic faith and the apostolic doctrine and the doctrines of holiness both inward and outward i'm just persuaded that you've got a good on a sincere heart that says i never did that because i never knew that but now that you've showed it to me in the bible i'm going to walk into sanctification and i'm going to let that begin to grow in my life i want to read that before i close tonight but beloved we are persuaded better things of you and things that accompany salvation though we thus speak he said brother penton he said i had to deal with thorns and thistles and i had to deal with immaturity he said sorry about that he said we're persuaded better things of you although we had to say this all right so let's mature what do you say why do you say we stand right now hallelujah what do you say that we just take a few moments before this young lady's baptized tonight musicians would come and just give us some music tonight father we love you oh god we love you come on come on just lift up your hands right now god wants you to lift up your hands god's word says to lift up your hands come on just lift up your voice right now god's word says to lift up your voice right now oh god's word says to lift up your voice right now come on let's just create an atmosphere in this room right now oh glory to god glory to god glory to god glory to god glory to god lord i love you tonight god i love you tonight lord oh god your word is so true god oh god your word is so true tonight lord oh god your word is so true tonight god lord help us god to walk in sanctification lord help us oh god to walk in sanctification lord with our spirit lord i pray over this young lady tonight god lord it's about to be baptized god i pray over her right now lord in the name of jesus if she has not already received the holy ghost god fill her with the holy ghost tonight when she comes up out of that water for her obedience lord to be baptized god will give you praise and honor and glory jesus name we pray amen