The Power of God’s Love | Senior Pastor Kenneth Carpenter

open with me to john chapter 3 and verse number 16. john chapter 3 and verse number 16. for god so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have every lasting life i think i think somehow it would be pleasing to god and somehow get it into our soul if we'd all read that verse all together can we do it one more time for god so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life for a few moments today i want to preach on the power of god's love the power of god's love father i indeed love you i thank you lord for anointing i thank you god for your presence that's here thank you lord for our good chilean brothers and sisters that's with us today in the auditorium and watching online i thank you god for the revival and harvest you're going to bring to chile thank you for the revival and harvest you're going to bring to maryville lord god i ask you to anoint your servant i'll be ever so mindful to give you praise honor and glory in jesus name we pray amen amen you may be seated i stumbled across this the other day it breaks john 3 16 down simply says god the greatest lover so loved the greatest degree the world the greatest company that he gave the greatest act his only begotten son the greatest gift that whosoever that whoever so ever believes the greatest simplicity in him the greatest person should not perish the greatest promise but the greatest difference have the greatest certainty everlasting life the greatest possession amen amen the greatest the greatest god gave us something we could believe in when god became a man and robed himself in flesh he gave us something we could put our faith in something that we could believe in how many of you today though it may be simplistic but i think sometimes we we we miss it how many are glad today that you can believe in the lord jesus christ let me thank well you can put your faith you can put your faith in him the man jesus christ is the greatest visible expression that god ever made the greatest visible expression that god ever made was the man jesus christ some people who in awe at creation some people are taken back at the beauty of the mountains or the beauty of the ocean coast and all of these in and of themselves have a certain awe about them there's nothing that can compare that when god wanted to express his love he expressed it in the man jesus christ the greatest expression hebrews chapter 1 and verse number 3 simply says it this way about jesus being that expression jesus who being in the brightness of his glory and the express or the expression of his image of his person jesus is the expression you want to know if god loves you don't go to don't go to the smoky mountains and look out over the the the beautiful surroundings of the smoky mountains you want to know that god loves you don't don't travel to some seven wonder of the world and look out over some kind of grand canyon or seacoast do you want to see the true expression of god the greatest expression that he could give to us that simply says these three words i love you the greatest thing he could say i love you it's an expression you realize that we're in a weekend of expressions men and women are expressing their love one to another the last week the last few nights you realize there are 250 million roses grown for this day you have any roses according to stats were grown just for this weekend 250 million 250 million roses expressions of a man handing that to his wife or a man handing that to his girlfriend if he doesn't have a wife right you want to know what it cost those 250 million roses was at a budget of 20 billion dollars 20 billion dollars was spent so that we could have a way of giving an expression hey like this one 2.4 billion dollars has been made the last while on candy candy 2.4 billion which i'd like to add the national association of dentists thank you for their job security expression but all of that pales in comparison to the cost of the great expression that god made to tell a world i love you to tell a world now he didn't say for god so loved the church because we could start understanding a little bit comprehending that he would so love a church but he didn't say god so loved the church that he gave says for god's soul love the world to the deepest rejection god so loved go ahead brother let the lord bless you right there go ahead evidently i said something just touched him today evidently he said so you brothers pray for him right now he just got caught up in the love of god this morning in the name of jesus father we love you father we praise you father we thank you today i love you are you with me this morning i love you you know what calvary's all about this morning calvary is all about god saying i love you why don't we just lift our hands right now let's lift just lift our hands right now let's just lift our hands father i love you this morning father i thank you this morning father i magnify you this morning lord i love you lord i love you father i thank you today come on let's just pray for a moment father i thank you right now lord father i praise you right now god father i thank you right now oh father i magnify you right now lord lord i thank you today god lord you are great and you are greatly to be praised let's pray for our brother right now let's let's pray for our brother father i love you this morning god i worship you lord lord touch our precious brother right now god move upon our precious brother today god you are great and you are greatly to be praised mighty god we love you mighty god we thank you today mighty god we love you let's just stand for a moment let's just stand for just a moment i love you lord i love you lord i love you lord mighty god i thank you god i thank you god i thank you lord lord i magnify you today i'd like to ask you just continue to pray with me for them me to pray for brother clarence today what i thought was him praising god he has had a seizure this morning let's pray for clarence right now thank the lord oh god touch him right now god you are great and you are greatly to be praised lord touch our brother right now touch our brother right now lord lord you are great and you are greatly to be praised lord in the name of jesus today in the name of jesus today god touch him lord from that seizure lord touch him on from that seizure today mighty god mighty god you may be seated this morning thank you church he stood and started waving his hands and i thought he was caught up in the moment of praising god but god's love is something that we can get caught up in right when you truly love when you truly understand when you truly understand that jesus christ is the greatest card and bouquet of roses and box of chocolates that you could get on this sunday morning of him just simply saying to you i love you too many people put too much confidence in their love for god they stop serving god when their love for god begins to wane they stop serving god when they don't see their standard of the love coming and they just quit because they measure god's love based on their love you've made a terrible mathematical mistake there when you begin to measure your love compared to his love because let me tell you what the bible says we love him because he first loved us we didn't build a huge bonfire on the earth trying to get god to come down here we didn't offer up pounds of sacrifices and all kinds of things and count the stars and try to beg god to come down here in that while we were yet sinners christ came and christ died for the ungodly when adam and eve broke the commandment god had a plan when cain murdered abel god had a plan when everybody when adultery and fornication and homosexuality and all kinds of grotesque sin began to rape the landscape of humanity god stood as a flag flying high above the battle and god said i will love a world you see the bible simply tells us in first john 4 and verse number 12 no man has seen god at any time if we love one another god dwelleth in us and his love is perfected in us john 1 4 john chapter first john chapter 4 verse 16 and we have known and believed the love that god hath to us oh i hope you're looking at this god is love and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in him you see the bible says that we dwell in christ but the apostle john says we dwell in him and we dwell in his love for to dwell in christ is to dwell in his love i love you so what does it look like well i believe that we have one of the most beautiful pictures of the love of god in luke chapter 10. verse 25. luke chapter 10 verse 25 follow along and behold a certain lawyer stood up tempted and tempted him saying master what shall i do to inherit eternal life now i want to go ahead and tell you i want to preface the whole reading of this to tell you that the lawyer was not sincere he was not sincerely wanting to know what it would what he needed to do to inherit eternal life so he asked the question jesus answers in verse 26 and he said unto him what is written in the law how do you read it he simply said back to the lawyer what's written in the law and how do you how do you interpret it and he answered and said thou shalt love the lord thy god look it look at the word how the word eternal life is connected to love and thou shalt love the lord thy god with all thine heart and with all thy soul and with all thy strength and with all thy mind and thy neighbor as thyself and he said unto him the lawyer did or jesus said to him thou has answered right this do and thou shalt live but listen to the lawyer but he willing to justify justify himself said unto jesus and who is my neighbor there's a translation of the bible the message bible that says and the lawyer attempting to find a loophole the lawyer wanted to find a loophole and just who is my neighbor just who is my neighbor jesus answering said a certain man went down from jerusalem to jericho fell among thieves we stripped him of his raiment and wounded him and departed leaving him half dead and by chance there came down a certain priest that way and when he saw him he passed by on the other side so now let's get the story jericho is somewhere in that in the neighborhood of 17 to 19 miles away from jerusalem jericho is 17 miles of a road that is winding and is a very steep road some of the roads that they would have traveled would have been um hanging over a cliff area some were filled with rocks some were steep some had what's called hairpin turns on it any of y'all ever been on the dragon you'll know what i'm talking about you can about see yourself coming all right and on these hairpin turns and rocks in steep decline in the 17-mile journey it was notorious for a hideout for thieves historians tell us that there were so many people murdered on this stretch of road it's not found in the bible but historians say that that stretch of road is called the way of blood the way of blood several years ago the highway 11w had so many accidents on it they began to call it bloody 11w bloody 11w well this road from jerusalem to jericho had so many reports of robbers killing those traveling that it became known as the bloody way the bible simply in telling us a story there was a man that went down from jerusalem to jericho and somewhere along that 17-mile journey he turned a corner and was face to face with a band of robbers they were not content just to take his garment from him they weren't content to take his coat they weren't content to take his clothing they weren't content to take whatever undisclosed amount of money he had but they had to start beating him they had to start stabbing him and cutting him and beating on him until they left his condition half dead bleeding bruised and waiting for death but about that time a priest who had just served his eight days of continuous service in the tabernacle he had just served eight days of getting up before congregations and telling them the thou shalt nots of the bible he had just served eight days of telling people how moral they ought to be he had just served eight days of trimming the wicks on the lamps he had served eight days of replenishing the oil he had served eight days of walking around in front of the people teaching them this is god's way and as he's probably humming a psalm as he's probably thinking about getting home and relaxing after eight days of service he rounds the corner and his psalms hemming and humming is stopped because he begins to hear the guttural sounds of a dying man moaning and groaning well he looks at it and he begins to ponder i know the bible says if you find your brother's donkey or if you find your brother's ox in a ditch help him but it doesn't say anything about a man does it say anything about a man or perhaps it went something like this well that man's about to die if i go over and touch that man i will be rendered ceremonially unclean for eight days i'll have to go through all kinds of ceremonial cleansings and i'll have to do and after all camp meeting starts in a couple of days and i'm the speaker well after all i've got some things to do and the bible said he walked by on the other side of the road we went too long until a subordinate levite came by now the levite is nowhere holds the qualities of a of a high priest or a priest but he's like a young man that's climbing the ladder of success he's like a young man he's a levite he's looking for any opportunity to advance his cause he's he's ambitious he's young he's looking for any opportunities that can add to his success in life well the bible says that the levite came by and he looked on him but and i'm adding y'all know i'm adding a lot to this story did he look on him and think um hmm um i'm really in a hurry i'm really in a hurry if i stop here it's going to take some time and not only is it going to take some time he doesn't have any money just having clothes it might be contagious he's not even wearing a mask oh my goodness not even wearing a mask and if i stop it's going to delay me from getting home and he went on by but then the bible says in this parable verse 33 but a certain samaritan samaritan now you've got to understand them jews hated them samaritans they hate you know you you know how you don't you know how you could you could push their buttons so quick it's just mention the samaritans see they viewed samaritans underneath the gentiles because gentiles were just full blood heathen people but them samaritans they have the first five books of the old testament them samaritans now they don't have any of the prophets because them samaritans don't want to hear on how to live they just want the foundation and them samaritans we we made a law but then samaritans couldn't come into our temple you know what them dirty dogs did they went right over there on a mountain and built their own temple and they try to worship like us do you know what them samaritans did they claim they serve the same god of abraham oh we hate i mean jesus one time was preaching to him to the jews and they weren't accepting him and he said well he said i'll i'll just go down he said you know it happened in the old testament said there was only there was only one leper healed in the old testament and he was a he was a gentile there's only one woman that had a miracle mill barrel in her kitchen and she was a gentile you know how mad they got at him they picked him up and was gonna throw him off a cliff so to mention the word samaritan see they even talk you can find this out they even talked that if you allowed a samaritan to come into your house that you brought generational curses into your home that the samaritans left a dirty residue in your walls of your home and your children would grow up and for god's sake become samaritans so can't you see the crowd when jesus is saying a priest and he went on by and a levite he went on by but now he says a samaritan i guarantee you anyone that was on their cell phone or their stone tablet i guarantee if there was anybody dozing when he said samaritan like a bird dog what did he just say samaritan but a certain samaritan as he journeyed came where he was and when he saw him he had compassion on him and went to him bound up his wounds pouring in oil and wine set him on his own beast and brought him to an end and took care of him and on the morrow when he departed he took out two pence and gave to the host and said unto him take care of him whatsoever thou spend us more when i come again i will repay thee which now now listen to jesus which now of these three thinketh thou was neighbor unto him that fell among thieves watch this lawyer he can't even stand to form the word in his mouth verse 37 doesn't even say that he said a samaritan he's not even going to put that dirty word in his mouth he's a lawyer he knows how to word it he said he that showed mercy on him look at that he that showed not a samaritan but he that showed mercy look at what a samaritan did look at what a samaritan did when the religion of priests won't help you and the religion of levites won't help you there is a samaritan that'll come to where you're at you know what samaritan is and please excuse me i know this is not probably politically correct because you know there's a lot of things in my vocabulary that i don't mean to say you know but they slip out i don't mean it i i think they're the most wonderful people but i've had to learn not to say jew them down or indian giver i'm sorry i'm sorry but a samaritan hold on okay was a half breed he was half jew and half assyrian he had a syrian blood in him but he had jewish covenant wrapped up in him so the samaritan was a happier and the samaritan was the one that helped him do you know i think jesus identifies with the samaritan because he's all man and he's all god he's so much man as if he wasn't god but he's so much god as if he wasn't man at man he can cry tear as god he can raise the dead at man he can look out and have compassion but as god he can reach down and heal the leper i don't know about you but on this valentine day i want my great samaritan jesus christ to walk in here and simply say those words to us again i love you oh let all hell beat you up let all condemnation want to rob you down but there's a god that wants to walk by here and simply say the words i love you oh hallelujah jesus you just made the samaritan the hero you just showed that the samaritan would come to where you're at and pour oil and wine into your wounds you know what oil and wine did wine cleanse the wound and oil soothe the pain but not only that watch this where's the man found laying on the ground bleeding what does samaritan do lifts him up and puts him on his own beast can i tell you any time you begin to embrace the love of god that you start becoming elevated people have all kinds of destructive behavior all because of one thing they don't believe they are loved by anyone and a lot of destructive behavior they have is simply the fact that nobody cares about me but oh if a pentecostal preacher on a sunday morning could somehow invade the minds of young people invade the minds of middle-aged people and not only that do you know there's elderly people suffering from great depression because they don't work jobs anymore and they don't have strength enough to go anymore and somebody has to watch out over them and old slew foot would like to slither into their homes and tell them nobody loves you you're not worth saving can i tell you i hope by way of internet today that this message goes into the home of an elderly person you can't run the aisles you can't come to church you can't even cook your own food but you listen to me on this valentine's sunday god says i love you i love you hallelujah oh friend i believe that's what my mama saw about a month ago when she fixed her eyes on the ceiling at fort sanders hospital and they took that breathing apparatus off of her i believe when my when i said mama let's just talk to sweet jesus and i said it that way let's just talk to sweet jesus for a moment as her shoulders just just a little bit just kind of twisted like she was wanting to get her breath she fixed her eyes on the ceiling and the most calm piece came over her you know what i believe my mother saw i believe my mother saw a jesus that's walking the floors of every icu unit in the world and saying you're here to take your last breath and i'm here to help you take your first step i love you i love you you can't even begin to love yourself until you comprehend the love that god loves you with you can't even begin to understand am i doing all right this morning jesus you just made a hero out of the samaritan now watch me i'm going somewhere with this i promise you there is a there is a method to this madness here i'm going somewhere jesus you put him on your own beast which meant you had to walk and he gets to ride jesus you walk to calvary i ride to calvary jesus you walk the death i get to ride the death jesus you did all of these things i get to believe in it knowing that it takes him to an end and stays the night with him can i tell you the darkest night you'll ever have jesus is as close as the mention of his name is it do i have anybody do i have anybody in the house tonight that knows what it's like to face a situation where your knees begin to buckle do i have anybody here with me that would be that would be transparent enough to say i have been through some things pastor that i had to stop where i'm at and say oh god help me this morning any of you ever got up and put your shoes on of the morning and you knew where those shoes were going to take you to in about two hours what meeting you were gonna go to and as you sat there at the end of your bed you just simply had to say oh god help me today but can i tell you that i've never asked god to take me somewhere to what god didn't stay with me through the entirety of the night whether it was a funeral home or a hospital or a courtroom or wherever it was at i'm glad that he will stay with you through the darkest hours of your night because he's here to tell us this morning i love you can i get a witness today keep listening to what i'm saying about brother erickson keep listening to what i'm saying about you made a hero out of the samaritan and when i come again i will repay jesus you made a hero out of samaritans jesus what chapter are we reading from right now somebody help me what chapter are we reading from luke chapter what is that right jesus do you know you just made a samaritan the hero would you turn back with me one chapter before chapter nine chapter nine now this is deep 9 comes from 4 10. so in chapter 9 in verse number 51 and it came to pass when the time was come that he should be received up he steadfastly set his face to go to jerusalem let me tell you the interpretation of that brother larry simply meant anywhere he was at he was headed to jerusalem when anyone asked where you going jerusalem i'm going to jerusalem because he was going to suffer die in jerusalem so now i want you to get i'm going to get get to know where are you going i'm i'm going jerusalem came to pass when the time was come that he should be received up received up he steadfastly set his face to go to jerusalem and sent messengers before his face and they went and entered into a certain village of the samaritans to make a radio for him he's on his way to samaria excuse me he's on his way to jerusalem but he's got to stay the night somewhere so he tells his disciples he said run on up ahead there's a village up ahead running up ahead to this village up ahead and get me a place to stay for the night and so they ran up ahead and just so happened it was a village of the samaritans verse 53 and they did not receive him because his face was as though he would go to jerusalem now watch this this is just gonna listen to this if this is ever a message for the hour of the great turmoil that's in our world today about race because being prejudiced can go both ways being it can go we always we sometimes we just think about it from white to black but it can go from black to white and it can go from white to hispanic and hispanic to black and can we the church and i'm so thankful for this we're not getting caught in the crosshairs of this hatred because when you dwell in jesus you dwell in love and when you dwell in love there is no white black hispanic there isn't any kind of all these different you don't look at a person and say i hate them because they don't dress like me i hate them because they're culturally different from me the love of god does not dwell in your heart but if you have the love of god now watch this now the samaritans are just as bad as the jews these disciples come walking into the village say hey our master is on his way to jerusalem and just like the jews drink their teeth when they hear samaritans the samaritan's grit did he say jerusalem did he say was jerusalem and the bible says yeah we said jerusalem our masters are on his way to jerusalem verse 53 and they did not receive him because his face was was as though he would go to jerusalem and when he's just that means that they wouldn't rent him a room they wouldn't give him any water and when his disciples james and john saw this they said lord will thou that we command fire to come down from heaven and consume them as elias did let's roast them god let's just roast them can you believe they you would immediately wouldn't even give you a place a drink of water they wouldn't give us a drink of water no bread no no place to lay roast them god burn them go ahead burn them god go ahead now these people somehow they think he's going to do it but what does he say but he turned and rebuked them wait a minute i get rebuked what about these stinking samaritans that won't give you a holiday in the end express the land what about these stinking samaritans who won't give you some water to drink you ought to get to rebuking them he rebuked them and said ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of for the son of man is not come to destroy me oh please look at this for the son of man has not come to destroy men's lives but to save them and they went to another village look at this when the disciples said toast them burn them up light the city up he said you are rebuked you are wrong he said i didn't come to destroy men's lives but i came to save men's lives i didn't come to damn you i came to save you i didn't come to condemn you i came to give you the greatest expression of my love that you could ever have and that is i love you let's go to another village i'm on my way to jerusalem they're going to nail me to a cross my tongue is going to swell three times it's normal size they're going to strip me naked about six feet above the earth and underneath heaven they're going to put a sword in my side they're going to shame me of all humiliation but 2 000 years later a group of people can gather in a room and hear the message preach and you hear me today god loves you god loves you but preacher you don't know me i don't have to know you sir i just have to know god and when i know god i can say god loves would you stand with me right now hallelujah come on i love you god i love you god i love you god i love you god come on just pray with me for a moment i love you god man my eyes are roaming through here today just simply i'd like to lock eyes with somebody in this room and tell you god loves you i'd like to lock eyes with someone that is trying to go to a doctor to get enough medication to make it through your day i'd like to lock eyes with you and tell you that god loves you this morning i'd like to lock eyes with somebody today and tell you that god cares about you i'd like to stand here on behalf of the lord jesus christ and tell every teenager in this place god has an incredible plan for you but until that plan comes to fruition i want you to know that god loves you if you don't remember a thing i say if you don't remember one thing i say today i want you to go home and say god loves me that preacher told me god loves me the next time you feel the ugly vines of depression grow up on you and you begin to entertain and demons hold their breath as you begin to entertain life is not worth living my family would be better off without me here i can't take it anymore somebody pray with me right now yeah yeah yeah oh he just walked in this room in this walk he just walked into this room jesus how can you make a hero out of those that reject you i don't know of her granddaughter is going to sing this morning or not i'm not clear on how many years ago this happened but i do know we were at the old building on the corner of monroe and mcginley street in alcoa i do know that there was a little boy coming to our church the cousin of sister carpenter his name was chad they had a sunday school contest chad was an only child we had a sunday school contest we was giving away a bicycle or something whoever brought the most chad was being raised by a single parent his mother's name was freda this is carpenter's aunt she made a great living a good living she'd poured her life into that boy there was nothing that he wanted that he didn't get she had an above average job at levi strauss over here on macarthur drive but freda's world come crashing down when they begin to shut the factory down was no way that she could ever begin to make the money that she made there and life closed in on her chad gets off a school bus one day and it just dawned on him that he forgot to invite his mama to sunday school all day long at school chad thought about when i get home the first thing i'm going to do is invite mom to come to sunday school brother perry little did chad know that for the bigger part of the day frida had stood in the bathroom of her home with a loaded pistol because life wasn't worth living anymore and she thought i would rather end my life my family will come in and give chad much better than i could have and she'd almost got her nerve up when the door of the home opened and she heard the faint voice of her son chad mama mama mama what is it chad you're going to promise me you'll come to church with me this sunday you're going to promise me i can count you as one of my guests mama you got to promise me she looks at the pistol and she makes a decision at least i could give him she holds that pistol close at least i could give him the last thing he asked i'll do this next week but little did freda know that at the end of that sunday morning service god would move on pastor with prophecy and i said thus saith the lord someone has held a gun to their head this very week someone has decided that life is not worth living but god has brought you here this sunday morning to tell you that he is the one that can give you life and about that time it was almost like clarence over here earlier this morning about that time in that little building with just a handful of people free to make congress screamed out to god god filled freedom with the holy ghost freda was baptized in jesus name free to live many many many many many many many years living for god and serving god you know why somebody told her about a god that said i love you could we this morning i know we got a baby dedication and i know it's 10 minutes to 12. but there would be nothing as important today if someone would just like to come and bask in the father's love for a few moments is there anyone that would just like to come up around the altar today you would just like to come up around the altar and bask in the love of god for a few moments thank you lord thank you lord thank you lord thank you lord thank you lord father i love you this morning oh father i thank you today god oh god you're so good to me lord oh god you're so good to me oh god you're so good to us today god oh god i love you god i thank you for saving us today god god i thank you for your love and for your mercy today god go ahead go ahead there's nothing as important as praying right now