The Nature of the Father | Senior Pastor Kenneth Carpenter

have your bibles and for a few moments let's go to the first book of corinthians chapter 4 and verse number 14. again i'm so excited to see everybody that's come in today to worship the lord and come in for father's day and come in for the graduations this morning and tonight we must needs hear from the word of the lord we must need here from the word of the lord i'm so thankful that in the midst of this chaotic world that we live in this chaotic world crazy they they did it they sang it right today it's a crazy world i'm thankful that the bible addresses this crazy world because if the bible didn't address this crazy world the world would convince us that we're crazy but i'm thankful today that we're in our right mind and i'm thankful today that the bible addresses certain things first corinthians 4 and 14. i write not these things to shame you but as my beloved sons i warn you for though you have ten thousand instructors in christ yet ye yet ye not have not many fathers for in christ jesus have i begotten you through the gospel wherefore i beseech you be your followers of me for this cause have i sent unto you to motheus who is my beloved son and faithful in the lord who shall bring you into remembrance of my ways which be in christ as i teach everywhere in every church one more verse of scripture john chapter 14 and verse number eight you still happiest amen john 14 verse 8 philip saith unto him lord show us the father and it or satisfies us jesus saith unto him have i been so long time with you and yet hast thou not known me philip he that hath seen me he that has seen me has seen the father how sayest thou then show us the father just for a few moments today i want to minister on the nature of the father the nature of the father i believe a lot of people struggle with a god issue because they don't know his nature they don't truly know what the father what the father is like so for a few moments i want to try to build your faith up and cause you to see the father's true nature because if you could ever see his true nature no one will ever have to cheerlead you to worship no one will ever have to intimidate you or try to intimidate you to do anything once you understand his true nature you just want to do it let's pray father i love you thank you for this tremendous crowd of people that are here this morning thank you lord for your spirit that's already been moving today i pray god as we break the chains and unlock god locks that have been upon people's hearts the lord you would use me today and after you use me i'm going to give you the praise and the honor and the glory touch every soul here this morning in jesus name amen amen you may be seated the nature the nature of the father seems that paul had a moment with the one of the churches the corinthian church seems that they had forgotten to give paul the honor that he should have the corinthian church was a very large church it was situated in a very populous and prosperous place in the earth at that time and the city the corinth was flourishing and so was the church but somewhere another the church kind of got sideways and they needed a lot of correction there was a lot of things going on in the corinthian church and they needed a lot of correction and it would appear that when paul began to write his letters of correction that there was a little bit of friction there was a little bit of push back from him and he had to remind them that you have had a lot of instructors you have had a lot of people come along and instruct you in the ways of jesus christ you've had a lot of instructors but he said i want you to know that you've only got one father now you must realize i am very thankful for the apostle paul very thankful for the apostle paul because he is writer of over half of the new testament bible and the way he allowed the holy ghost to use his mind the way he allowed the holy ghost to use his mind is so comforting in the 21st century because paul addresses things if we'll just read what paul writes through the holy ghost he addresses several things and he kind of gave the uh i've heard the statement used i've heard people say me and this individual is going to have a come to jesus meeting all right so paul's going down to corinth and he is saying what you're going to corinth for paul he said men in that church they're going to have a come to jesus meeting because i'm going to remind them that they've got a lot of instructors that's come by but i'm the one that came and preached the gospel to them i'm the one that came and found them they were in their bars and in their idle temples and i was the one that came and found them when their marriages were separated i was the one that came and found them when they had children that they hadn't heard from him yeah i was the one that came and began to preach the gospel and those so therefore he refers to people as his sons in the gospel he said i'm gonna let timotheus be with you he is my he is my son in the gospel so paul is uh he's talking about what a father image that he is to the corinthian to the corinthian church jesus came along and this is interesting i'd like for you to really give this some thought you see a man turn water into wine i don't think i'd have any more questions for him you see him walk on the water i don't know that i'd have any more questions you see him raise a man dead four days i don't think i'd have one question in all the world but you see the image of a father is so needful miracles can never take the place of the image of the father a chill bump an emotional spiritual high will never take the place of you having a perfect image of the nature of the father because jesus to reveal himself no man comes to the father but by me i am the way the truth and the life you got to come no man comes to the father but by me and all of a sudden i've seen you turn water into wine i've watched you walk on water i've watched you unstop deaf ears i've seen you open the blinded eyes but this question comes from philip show us the father and we will be satisfied brothers and sisters today there's a lot of things god can do for us but one of the greatest things god could give us today is for you and i to understand the nature of the father because it may not always be his will to turn my water into wine but it's always his will to let me know i have a father it may not always be his will to come walking on the water to me but i need to know in my storm on the sea that i have a father that loves me it may not be that he's going to bring my lazarus out of the tomb but i need to go to the tomb and understand we have a father would you just praise him for a moment we have a father i'm so thankful today paul i found myself in my prayer you're saying i'm so thankful paul for the writings that you gave because i'm going to read to you from the book of philemon from the book of philemon philemon's just one chapter philemon's right before the book of hebrews the book of hebrews philemon's just one chapter 25 verses philemon was written in the year of 80 1860 and it was written by the hand of a jail mate of paul's paul had a certain jail mate and after he converted that jail mate matter of fact some traditions tell us that paul was such a powerful witness for jesus christ that the romans figured out brother corey that they had to keep changing the guards every four to eight hours because he was converting them left and right they would change the guards they would check them out at the end of the day and ask them some questions and something would go some and go something like this he's not getting to you is he because many of the guards as a matter of fact paul even greeted in one of paul's greetings he even named a person and said they live they live in caesar's house they live in caesar's house this jail made of paul is the whole reason for the letter because when paul converted onesimus which the name omnissimus means profitable servant no onesimus was living was in jail because he didn't live up to his name he was not a profitable servant the best of research that i found on onesimus onesimus was philemon's bookkeeper he was the bookkeeper for philemon philemon was an apostolic brother who had an apostolic family who had a house so big that the church met in philemon's house onesimus cooked the books onesimus he defrauded philemon and when he defrauded philemon he ran to rome because if a slave had any chance of being free they would run to the most liberal city of that day which was rome slaves slaves ran to rome because they could find a very liberal open mind toward those that would plead their case but when onesimus ends up in rome evidently does something again wrong and he ends up in jail he ends up in paul's jail sail paul converts him onesimus repents is water baptized in jesus name filled with the holy ghost and then he begins to tell about wise in jail he mentions the name of philemon and paul his head turns he says do you know philemon do i know philemon why i preached the gospel to philemon i found philemon when he was just a rich landowner he was so miserable and i brought him the gospel and philemon's been converted and that's where i'd like to begin because there's a letter that i think will help us in this crazy hour that we find ourselves sandwiched in paul a prisoner of jesus christ and timothy our beloved unto philemon our dearly beloved and fellow laborer to our beloved amphibia and our chippas our fellow soldier this is possibly the wife and the son of philemon and to the church in thy house he has a church there grace to you and peace from god our father and the lord jesus christ i thank my god making mention of thee always in my prayers hearing of thy love and faith which thou hast toward the lord jesus and toward all saints that the communication of thy faith may become effectual by the acknowledging of every good thing which is in you in christ jesus now he opens this up by greeting philemon his wife his son and all the church that meets there now just an interesting thing i wanna i wanna i wanna inject right here onesimus served in a house that had a church in it but he was not converted he he served in a house that had a church in it but he was not converted isn't it amazing that onesimus conversion took place in a jail i don't know about you but i want to tell everyone in this room today it is the will of god for you to be converted and it is god's plan a to convert you in the church but if you do not heed god's plan a god can convert you in other places i don't know about you but i don't want to only look up to him when i'm laying flat on my back i don't know about you but i don't want to think about him when i've got some issue in my life i just kind of believe that if we'll think about him when we're standing on our feet with good health i don't want him to put me on my back for me to look up i don't i don't want i don't want him to have to put me in a situation are you getting what i'm saying today he says you're communicating of your faith verse 7 for we have great joy and consolation and thy love because the bowels of the saints are refreshed by the brother in other words you're such a you're such a wonderful person and you refresh the people people are glad the entire church across the landscape just joys every time they hear the name philemon every time they hear the name philemon they know it was philemon that sent us an offering and helped us buy a piece of property for our church it was philemon when famine came and we didn't have any food it was philemon that sent the wagons of food down here you see philemon has got this name because he's always communicating his faith as a matter of fact if you're not communicating your faith communicating means two ways if your faith is not leaving you going to someone else then you really don't have faith none of this i have him hidden in my heart and he knows what's in my heart that's very foolish to think that because if you ever get real faith in your heart you begin to communicate that faith it begins to leave you and it begins to come back and so philemon just had this name you mentioned philemon you just mentioned philemon in the first century apostolic church and everybody just had a great oh philemon he brought food he did this he did that and then paul gets to the issue paul is very wise because he's going to address a subject with philemon in verse number 8 he says wherefore though i might be much bold in christ to enjoin thee that which is convenient now here's what this means he says i could use my authority i could use who i am and i could get this done with just my authority i could just use my authority i'm an apostle i could just flex my muscles and tell you this is the way it's going to be done but yet for love's sake would you put verse 9 on the screen yet for love's sake would you would you just all say that it'll sound so good in this room yet for love's sake can i tell you today does god have the authority absolutely could god make things happen absolutely but can i tell you that god does his finest work on you and i for love's sake he holds our next breath in his hand he holds our world in his hands but he don't want to have to flex his muscles every time to get us to do something paul says yet for love's sake i rather beseech thee being such a one as paul the age watch watch him now he brings his age into it now yeah you got to look at this you really got to stay with this he said i could flex my muscles or he said i'm an old man talking to you i'm an old man talking to you i've seen my wife on one or two occasions get frustrated with our children on one or two occasions and i have heard her say don't you forget what i've done you forget what i've done because sometimes the younger needs to understand we live in a culture that's trying to tell you that older folks don't have it together you may be seated we live in a culture that is deifying youth recapturing youth and although i may not be against all of that i gotta let you know that we don't need to fall prey to wall street and all the other people that's gonna tell us what being old ought to feel like and ought to look like because you couldn't you couldn't grow old in any better place than to grow old in the house of god or grow old in the pathway of god he said i could just flex my muscles right now or i could appeal to you as one paul the age and now also a prisoner of jesus christ i beseech thee for my son my son onesimus whom i have begotten in my bonds now wait a minute wait a minute now we've got philemon he owns a he owns a servant we've got the servant running away from philemon we got the servant running away from him we got paul converting him in prison and philemon's got wanted pictures up on the on the signs around town wanted onesimus he's a wanted man reward for him but we got paul saying he's my son now i have begotten him in my bonds which in time past was to be unprofitable but now profitable unto thee and me whom i have sinned again therefore receive him that is my own bowels whom i would have retained with me i would have used my authority that in thy stead he might have ministered unto me in the bonds of the gospel but without thy mind would i do nothing that thy benefit should not be as it were of necessity but of willing watch what paul says i'm not going to use my authority i'm not going to use the fact that i'm old and i know way more and been through way more than you have been through i'm not going to use any kind of false sympathy and tell you that i'm in jail he says i could have used all that and i could have kept him here and he would minister to me matter of fact he's writing the book of philemon except for one sentence and we'll get to it in a moment he's writing it for paul but paul mentions a word that i believe could be the first step in solving all conflict i believe the first step in solving all conflict between man and god i believe the first step of solving all conflict in miracle issues i believe the first step in solving all conflict in church matters i believe the first step in changing all conflict that we see in our city streets today is a word called respect if we could get back to have a revival of a word called respect he said i should use my authority he said i could use the fact that i'm old he said i could use the fact that i'm in jail he said i could have just told onesimus you're staying here that does it tough philemon he said but i wanted it to be your decision oh i'm telling you today we could change our personal personal lives for god we start giving god some respect he's not the man upstairs he's jesus he's jesus he's not the boss he's jesus this is not an ordinary house this is the father's house this is not ordinary place it's a holy ground this is not an ordinary posture this is giving praise to god oh how we could alter our lives today if we could learn how to give respect oh how marriages could be instantly healed and save someone hours of counseling with you if we could if husbands could just learn how to respect their wives we've got another be seated i know they're going to be standing in line to get this dvd today and think about it if all nationalities just respected each other if we would all shut our i mean if we would all be quiet long enough to listen and that's not listening waiting for you to be quiet so i can tell you what i think but if we could just try to get into somebody's skin and feel what they feel should make it better you know it may not make it better but the first step would be at least you were willing to listen at least he said i respect you philemon i respect you philemon i wouldn't keep him i'm sending him back i respect you but without thy mind would i do nothing that thy benefit should not be as it were of necessity but willingly for perhaps he therefore departed for a season that thou shouldst receive him forever now not as a servant but above a servant a brother beloved especially especially for me but how much more unto thee both in the flesh and in the lord if thou count me therefore a partner receive him as myself if he hath wronged thee or oweth the ought put that on my account i paul have written it with my own hand here's where paul told paul told uh onesimus he said wait a minute wait a minute you've been writing this whole thing he said now give me the quill give me the quill i will repay it how be it i do not say to thee how much thou owest unto me even thy own self aside you see whenever we want revenge we better be careful in how we write it out whenever we want somebody to write how we've been wronged we better be careful what we want because we better consider that we've all done wrong and we've all sinned and come short of the glory of god so when somebody wrongs you and you've got this long list of things they've got to do to get back in your house you've got this long list of things they've got to do for you to speak to them again you better just stand off for a moment and realize you've wronged and blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy it was two brothers talking one time and one of the brothers his son had got put in jail and the brother said oh my brother said my sons got put in jail and his brother said to him said if that was my son i'd leave him in jail and he replied and said if that was your son i would leave him in jail too you see we're gonna have to understand some things paul is saying now i'll repay whatever whatever he embezzled from you whatever money he took from you i'll personally repay it back to you because that's only right for him to do that but i want you to figure in when you're figuring on how much you lost i want you to figure that you owe me your soul because i was the one that preached to you you know i'm going to read i'm just going to read the rest of this just just a few more verses he says yea brother let me have joy of thee and the lord refresh my bowels in the lord having confidence and thy obedience i wrote unto thee knowing that thou will also do more than i say but with all prepare me also a lodging for i trust that through your prayers i shall be given unto you and then the next three verses he just tells people that's with him that they're they're saluting they're saying praise the lord you know i want to address this before we end today there's tremendous strife in our world no one has the answer yet because they have not addressed the only answer and the only answer to what's going on in our world today is salvation not reform we will never reform a world to love one another will never reform a world there's there can't be enough reforms to change men what we have to do is we have to preach this glorious born-again salvation message and the more people we can get born again the more we're going to change our families our communities our state and ultimately our world the more people we can get born again musicians would you come right now john macarthur is a tremendous scholar of the scriptures although he and i differ greatly we differ tremendously on the godhead and the plan of salvation i don't want to take away from john mcarthur's study of the word because there are some things he is he's spot on he writes and i'd like to read it to you today he writes something about philemon he says the book of philemon provides valuable historical insights into the early church's relationship to the institution of slavery slavery was widespread in the roman empire according to some estimates slaves constituted one-third perhaps more of the population and an accepted part of life in paul's day slavery had virtually eclipsed free labor slaves could be doctors musicians teachers artists librarians or accountants in short almost all jobs could be and were filled by slaves slaves were not legally considered persons but were tools of their masters as such they could be bought sold inherited exchanged seized to pay for their master's debt their masters had virtually unlimited power to punish them and sometimes did so severely for the slightest infractions by the time of the new testament the first century apostolic church however slavery was beginning to change realizing that contented slaves were more productive masters tended to treat them with more respect it was not uncommon for a master to teach a slave his own trade and some masters and slaves become close friends while still not recognizing them as persons under the law the roman senate senate in a.d 20 granted slaves accused of crimes the right to a trial it also became more common for slaves to be granted or to be purchased or to purchase their own freedom some slaves enjoyed very favorable and profitable service under their masters and were better off than many freemen because they were assured of care and provision many free men struggled with poverty the new testament nowhere directly attacks slavery and i i'm doing this today because if you've ever bought you a bible and you might you might laugh at me boy he's as crazy as i've ever heard but you better buy your bible because when these liberal minded people that are pulling down all these statues you're not going to erase ignorance that way you're not going to erase it you can't pull enough statues down to erase hurt and when this liberal movement finds out what how this bible addressed slavery they'll want to burn every bible there is they'll want to burn every anything gets in their way anything this book says they shouldn't do that they want to do they'll burn these books one day now i hope to god we're in heaven i hope the rapture comes and i hope to god we're in heaven but if we're not just like some of us i'll put us in there that are fearful one day they're going to take away our right to have guns and we're going to hide guns everywhere i understand that you better get you a bible because there could very well be the day let me finish reading this the new testament nowhere directly directly attacked slavery had it done so the resulting slave insurrections would have been brutally suppressed and the message of the gospel hopelessly confused with that of social reform we are not trying to socially reform man we're preaching today that man must be born again what you don't need is a class of better behavior you need an altar to change your life you need to have a personal encounter with the lord jesus christ you need to call his name out and watch him come inside of you and watch your life become changed listen to this now instead of christianity undermining the evils of slavery by changing the hearts by changing the hearts of slaves and masters by stressing the spiritual equality of the master and slave listen to this galatians 3 27 for as many of you as been baptized into christ have put on christ so we've been baptized what does that do there is neither jew nor greek neither bond nor free neither male nor female for you're all one in christ jesus what was paul saying he's saying if i can get you born again that'll take care of the slavery issue if i can get you born again that'll take care of the equal rights movement if i can get you born again it'll take care of all of that y'all understand where i'm coming from today or do you understand where the book's coming from today what we need today is not reform we don't need protests we need a pentecostal revival of fire upon our cities that's what we need we need and i'm doing my best how many could somebody help me real quick how many children we have graduate this morning how many 13. did you see those 13 evangelists that was up here this morning did you see the 13 world changers this morning they didn't know what i was going to preach today you're exactly right 13 children dream big dreams of a world that is changed dream dream how many we got to graduate tonight we got five i want you to come tonight and see five more evangelists you may be seated for a moment ephesians 6 verse 5 slaves ephesians 6 verse 5 starts out servants but it's slaves slaves be obedient to them that are your masters according to the flesh with fear and trembling and singleness of your heart as unto christ what'd he say he didn't say protest he didn't say rebel he didn't say you've been done an injustice he said look at the one you're under and said serve them just like you would jesus not with eye service as men's pleasers but as the servants of christ doing the will of god from the heart with good will doing service as unto the lord and not unto man knowing that whatsoever good whatsoever good thing any man doeth the same shall receive of the lord whether it whether he be bond or free and you masters do the same things unto them forbear threatening knowing that your master also which is in heaven need whether neither is their respective person look look what paul's doing paul thank you thank you under the inspiration of the holy ghost he gets on both sides he gets on the slave and he gets on the slave owner and he begins to preach the only thing that can abolish it and the only thing that can bring it down jesus christ and him crucified you see if the slave gets born again and the master gets born again that all just simply goes away i got so many more scriptures i could read just stand with me right now i've got so many more scriptures i could read but could i tell you today men and women's hearts are filled with anger men and women's hearts are filled with frustration men and women's hearts are filled with confusion men and women's hearts are filled with violence there is a new epidemic that's not been addressed it's the epidemic of wounded hearts there's an epidemic of wounded hearts stephen solomon uh he um was a talk show host and one time he went to washington and he got right out oh stephen brother lee got right out in the middle of the street with them with protesters and i mean they're throwing flames and all and stephen got right out there interviewing one and some man or woman was yelling to the top of their voice and profanity and throwing things and stephen finally got him calmed down and said what's your protest what's your cause he or she couldn't tell the cause he said wait a minute what are you doing this for and they they gave stephen no answer back you know why there's hurting people in this world today and they don't even know why they're hurt you say ignore them then oh no no no oh a thousand times no anytime any man or woman that's angry frustrated violent or wounded deserves an apostolic church to step in and i want to close with this today before we gather in the altar i want to close with this today please don't be insensitive and make statements like this when somebody says black lives matter and you say well all lives matter that's a very insensitive statement to make whether you agree with their cause or not you will never win a world remember what's the first step in getting everything better respect you'll never win a world doing that why don't we listen for a while why don't we try to feel for a while i won't try to reach out for a while because that's how we first begin to come together and and to balance it out to balance it out oh how it hits me in the gut how it hits me in the gut it's sickening it hurts when a man stands up behind a pulpit preaches the gospel and leads people and later you find out he was morally corrupt he was cheating on his wife he was stealing money from the church but can i tell you something for every one man that's not being what he should in this pulpit there's ten thousand bishop billy mccools so okay you lost me on your analogy well for every policeman that has abused somebody there's thousands of men and women in blue that want to serve our communities god knows they're not doing it for the money they want to serve our communities they want to make sure we got safe streets they want to make sure that we as the citizens are taken care of so please the world don't have the answer although you may not think it but what you just heard for the last 50 minutes one soul at a time one change at a time