Cheese and the trap -Pastor Hope Carpenter

Oh, God, we love you today. We love you. We give you praise. We give you glory. We give you honor. That does not matter. What's going on in the world around us doesn't matter. Lord, what what our situation or our circumstance. Lord, you are worthy to be praised. We give you glory. We pray God that. That our worship be like a sweet smelling savor in your ear today. God and I pray, Jesus, that you take this word. That you let it go through the airwaves. God, that you let it touch people's homes. Let it find its way in nursing homes and in homes and in broken homes and in prison cells. God. People in their lowest form, God, where they can reach up and grab ahold of this word, this life changing word, God, this word that sets the captives free. Do it today. Do it all over the earth. In Jes. Name we pray. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Whoo. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. I got a powerful word for you today, but it is a tough word. It is a tough word. Say it's a tough word. It's a tough word. We're going to talk about forgiveness. Ooh, forgiveness. Forgiveness. Forgiveness. It's one of the most. To me, it is the most important principle of Christian living, but it is one of the most hardest to grasp. Not only is it hard to grasp, but it is hard to do. It is so hard so many times for us to actually humble ourselves to forgive. But you know what? Forgiveness is the actual foundation of Christian living. Have you ever thought about that? That forgiveness, you say, well, Jesus is the foundation or the cross is the foundation. Well, why did Jesus have to come in the first place? Why did Jesus have to come? He came because we had a debt that we could not pay. Jesus came because here we are miserable sinners. We had a debt that we could not pay. So he had to come and die. He had to become less than so that we could be raised up out of our sins. Sin to sit in heavenly places with him. It is the foundation of Christian living. That is forgiveness. Shout forgiveness. And see, once we understand and once we comprehend that forgiveness is the foundation of Christian living, that should be the life flow out of our life. Whatever we've been given freely. The Bible says whatever we've been given freely, that is what we are commanded to turn around and give freely. Okay, we didn't have to pay for our debt, did we? No, we did not have to pay for our debt. It was given to us freely. So Jesus said, what I've given you Freely. But we want to turn around and make other people pay. We want to make people pay. And the Bible says the world only will know that you really are who you say you are by what, how you treat people. For God so loved the world that he. What he gave. That should be. That should be the whole testimony of our life as Christians, that we're givers. Not just givers financially, but givers in every aspect of our life. I'm going to give you forgiveness. I'm going to give you mercy. I'm going to give you love. I'm going to give you grace. I'm going to give you patience. For God so loved you so much that he gave his very best. Then he said, what I've given you, you must turn around and give it to other people. All right, well, I'm done, right? Basically, this is the truth. Biblically, you have to forgive. You don't have an option. You have to forgive. You say, no, I don't. Yes, you do. Or it is sin. When you don't forgive, it is sin. Have you ever been hurt? Have you been hurt? Have you been hurt? Have you been hurt? All of us have been hurt. Right? I'm not the only one. And I'm not trying to minimize it. I'm not trying to take your pain that you're seeing, sitting there feeling, and you're grabbing a hold of your pain and you're saying, I'm not going to forgive. Because they do. And yes, all the things they did, a lot of it is so bad it should have never happened. Nobody has a right to abuse you. Nobody has a right to molest you. Nobody has a right to rape you. All of those things are wrong. But listen, it is not your right to hold on to bitterness. It is also not your right to not forgive as a Christian, Forgiveness should be at the heart of our Christian walk daily. When I came to Jesus, I don't know about you, but I was pretty messed up. So when I came to Jesus, I begged him. I was like, oh, God, I can still remember the crying, the scream. Lord, please, please. You know, we feel like we have to beg and scream and plead for God to forgive us. God, please forgive me. I was so horrible. Did Jesus withhold from us? No. Did we even have to beg him? No. I mean, we don't have to beg. We don't have to plead. We don't have to grovel before the Lord. We just come to him with a broken and a contrite heart. The Bible says that's what he loves and we come to him, we say, we are so sorry. And freely he gives. The Bible says not only does he freely give that the forgiveness to us, The Bible says, what does he do then? He takes robes of righteousness and he wraps them around us. Not only are we forgiven, but we're put back immediately into right standing. Right standing. And see, we love that. We like to shout about that when it comes to us and God, right? But when it comes to us and our neighbor, when it comes to us and our parents, when it comes to us and our husband and our wife. Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. It's going to take a minute before you get back into right standing. Hmm. You're going to have to prove yourself. You're going to have to do this about 10, 12 times, right? In a right. No, no, no, no, no. Freely, you are to give. Hmm. It's so quiet in this room today. We want to find ways to stab and find ways to pay people back. But listen, forgiveness is an act of faith, just like salvation. You don't wait on your feelings to change before you forgive. You forgive, then your feelings change. It's an act of faith. We're all imperfect people, right? We're all imperfect and we hurt people. And especially if we're hurt. I always love this little saying that says, hurt people, hurt people. Yes, because you can't give what you don't have. And if you're full of bitterness, you're full of anxiety, you're full of unforgiveness. That's what your response is going to be. Luke 17:1 says this. It is impossible for offenses not to come. Listen, say this one thing you can count on. Say there's one thing you can count on. People are going to offend you. People are going to get on your nerves, right? You're never going to be so holy that you don't have to walk in a level of grace toward people. People are going to get on your nerves. But listen, that word. Let me break the scripture down. That word, offense, that word means skandalon. That's the original word for offense. It's skandalon. This is what it means. It is the bait that sets the trap. It is impossible for baits that set the trap not to come. Offenses hurt, pain. It's just the cheese on the trap that's begging you to come. Get it? It's just begging you to come. Take that bait. Take that bait waiting for you to grab it. Why? So that you can be trapped. You've been baited. You've been trapped by bitterness, hurt, pain and unforgiveness. That's why the word says this. It says, don't let the sun go down on your wrath. You have to deal with it right there. Say, deal with it right here. Say, I'm going to deal with it right here. Deal with it immediately so that there is no time for the bait to become a trap. Deal with it immediately so that there is no time for that. Time passes and that bait is sitting there and it traps you. You got to deal with that is so good. Whether you think it's good or not. The Holy Ghost is shouting, hope. That's so good. That's so good. Teach the word. Teach the word forgiveness. This is what it means to grant free pardon. To grant free pardon or remission of sin, of a debt. And to give up all claim. To give up all claim. Matthew 6, 14, 15 says this. It says, as you've been forgiven, you are to forgive others. How? To the same degree giving up all claim. See, this is what unforgiveness does. I know because I've been there. Unforgiveness holds you captive. It holds you in bondage. It holds you in that trap. You're trapped. When you take the bait of offense, you are trapped in bondage. See, this is how we are. We want full remission. We want full pardon. We want full forgiveness, Right? But we don't want to give it. We want grace and mercy, but we want you to pay. Whoo. Matthew 18. I'm not going to read it all today, but there is a parable there of the unmerciful. So servant, and he wouldn't forgive. Go read that mark it and go read it tonight. And this is what happens when we don't forgive. The Bible says this is how your heavenly Father will treat you. This scripture says he will deliver you over to tormenting spirit. Not Jesus. Not 6 pound 8 ounce baby Jesus wrapped in swaddling clothes. No, no, no. The Bible says when you don't forgive, he will allow you to be turned over to tormenting spirits. I researched that. Tormenting spirits, meaning nightmares, sickness, mental illness. How many of you struggle with nightmares? Maybe you're struggling with unforgiveness. How many of you are struggling with sickness in your body. Maybe you might need to examine your heart. Maybe you're struggling with bitterness and unforgiveness. And the pain in your body is just a fruit hanging on the tree of bitterness and unforgiveness. Studies have proven that sickness comes to bitter people. The Bible says That unforgiveness dries up your bones. It makes your bones brittle. Many years ago, we had a gentleman on our staff. His name was Dr. Paul. And he was over all of our worldwide missions. And one year he went to Brazil and he was ministering. And this guy was in the service who had been struggling for many, many years with Parkinson's disease. And he said that he had just struggled for, I think it was seven years. It had been documented. But in that service, he said he realized that he had been struggling also with bitterness and unforgiveness in his heart. And that night he came down to the altar and he said, God, I surrender. I give up my right to hold a grudge. I give up my right lor and I ask you to help me. Give me the grace to forgive. He got up from that service and all the shaking stopped in his body. Everything stopped in his body. And he left that service that night totally healed and set free from Parkinson's disease. All because he came to an altar and he surrendered his heart. And he said, God, help me to forgive. I wonder how many healings could take place all over the Internet tonight. I wonder how many healings could take place in hospitals tonight. I wonder how many healings could take place all over the world. People hearing my voice tonight, when you release your bitterness, when you release your unforgiveness, you have no idea how many medications you could put down and the that you could get tonight if you would only forgive the people who have hurt you so bad. I just decree and declare tonight that tormenting spirits are going to leave the room that you're in as you surrender your heart to be able to forgive in Jesus name. Also, when you have unforgiveness, studies have proven that your body chemistry actually changes. Your blood levels change. When you have bitterness in your heart. It's a poison that literally, physically makes you sick. And the Bible says this. He says, before you get down to pray, before you say the blessing, before you even touch your child at night to say, let's have our nighttime prayer. He says, you gotta forgive. He says, if you've got alt in your heart, get up and deal with it. And then come back pray. It's time to do a heart inventory. It's time to do a heart inventory. See, we get up every day, we do our day, we pay our bills, we go to the mall, we cook our dinner, we go to work. But we never deal with our heart. I wonder why we're not walking in the great blessing of God. So many Times. But our hearts are just messed up. They're. They're. They're clouded with so much bitterness and anger and resentment and unforgiveness. And then we have the reasons why we're so entitled. We love our bitterness. We love our anger. We love it because you don't know why I feel I have a right to feel this way because they did this, this, this and this. I have a right to feel like this toward my daddy. You don't know what my daddy did to me when I was 12 years old. I have a right to feel this on the inside of me. No. Matthew 5 says this. If you've been offended, if someone's hurt you, the Bible says you still gotta get up. It's still your responsibility to go to them and get it right. They may never come to you. They may never come to you and ask for forgiveness. But I want to live free. How about you? My feelings. Say this. Say my feelings are my responsibility. My feelings are not your responsibility. If you've been hurt by others or if you've hurt others, it's still your responsibility to get up and go fix it. And see, this is what we do. We want to judge everybody else by their actions, but we want them to judge us by our intentions. We want to judge them by the raw facts, but we want you to have to figure out our intention. We never want to give the benefit of the doubt, but we want others to always give us a pass. Whoa, it's quiet in here. Terrence ain't even on the organ today. Oh. We automatically assign assume the worst about other people's motives, but we want everybody to assume the best about ours. We want judgment for others, but we want mercy for us. Jesus said this. He said the same degree that you dish it out is the same degree that you're going to get it. That's right. If you dish out judgment, the Bible says you're going to reach reap judgment. If you dish out mercy, the Bible says that you're going to reap mercy. The same measure, with the same measure, say with the same measure, with the same measuring stick that you give it, you are going to get it. Whoa. This is hard. I know. Why is this so hard? Because I know so many people have been hurt so bad. There's been violent hurts, there's been violations, pain, abuse, treated terribly. But the treatment is not the prerequisite for forgiveness. The repentance of my spouse is not necessary for me to forgive. The repentance of the person who raped me is not a prerequisite for me to forgive. Romans 2:5 says this. It says it's the kindness of God that draws people to repent. It's kindness first, then repentance comes. See? But we want to beat you. We want to make you pay. We want to tell you how sorry you are. We want to tell you how horrible you are. And I'm never going to be in your life again because you were so horrible as I was growing up. I'm never going to love you. I'm never coming to see you at Christmas. I'm never going to do these good things to you like I know the Bible's commanded me to do because you were so horrible to me. No, the Bible says you want them to repent. You want them to get their life right. The Bible says it's the kindness of God that causes people to repent. Nagging, pouting, revenge, withholding. That only fuels the toxins. It doesn't solve anything. Paying you back, making you pay. That is not what God's called us to do. As Christians, not as people who bear the name Jesus. Jesus gave us the greatest example on how to live, and he also gave us the greatest example on how to forgive. Listen, Jesus was Jesus on the cross. He looked over at the people on the cross beside him and he said, father, forgive him. He gave them the benefit of the doubt. See, we don't want to give people the benefit of the doubt. He looked over and he looked up and he said, father, forgive them. They don't know what they're doing. And even Stephen, you know the story. Stephen. Stephen being stoned, he looked up into heaven and he said, father, the people actually throwing the stones at him. I mean, wailing, wailing stones at Stephen. He looked up into heaven and he said, father, forgive them. They don't know while it was happening, saying, I forgive. And when Stephen was being stoned in Acts 9, he looks up and he says, jesus, forgive him. Do you know what happened in that story? Jesus got up off of his throne. He stood up. You want me to tell you how to get Jesus to give you a standing ovation? It's while you're taking the blows. It's while you're taking the blows. And the whole time you're showing love, the whole time you're showing grace, the whole time you're showing mercy. The whole time you're just loving like Jesus wants you to love. That's how you get Jesus to stand up off of his throne and give you a standing ovation. That's how you please The Lord, you say, well, hope. How many times. How many times have I got to forgive them? I've had enough of their mess. This is the last time, sucker. You better do that this year. It's the last time. You're coming in late. How many times? The Bible says 70 times 7. And I believe that means per incident, per day. Whoo. Love keeps no record of wrong. Love keeps no record of wrong. And just like the thousands of times Jesus has taken your sin and my sin and he's forgiven it immediately. And then he's clothed you with robes of righteousness, and he's taken your sin and he's thrown it into the sea of forgetfulness. That means he can't bring it up to you anymore. He's forgot it. He can't bring it up just as many times as he's done that for you and for me. He wants us to turn around and do that for others. See, our hearts. Our hearts are just. Just take your hand and do like this. I just say, bless my heart. Really, That's a Southern little colloquialism. But I'm not saying it about somebody. I'm saying it about my little heart. Bless my heart, Jesus, because this is what happens. All of these violations, all of this pain, it just makes your heart harder. It just puts a stone after stone after stone after stone all around your heart. And you get hard and you get cold and you can't feel and you can't love and you can't give love and you can't receive. Receive love. And the longer that you go undealt with your. Your. Your heart just gets so entitled and more angry and meaner. No meaningful relationships. You're isolated, you're cold. And until we deal with each one of those hurts and pains individually and we take it to the cross of Jesus and we say, God, I take your blood. Your blood is enough. I take your blood as payment for this sin. They owe me nothing. One sin, one hurt, one pain at a time. And I release my right to hold on to this offense. I release my right. I give up my right to be right. I might be right in this situation, but today, God, I give up my right to be right. Why don't you just say that wherever you are? God, today I give up my right to be right and I just accept the blood of Jesus. Say it out loud. Say, I accept the blood of Jesus. You may not want to say it. Come on, say it. Say it in faith. I accept the blood of Jesus as payment in full for every hurt, for Every pain, you may have to call their name out. You may have to write a letter. You may need to get on your face right now and say, God, you gotta help me. You gotta give me the grace. You gotta give me the grace to forgive. God, help me, help me. I want to be free because I know that you have freely forgiven me, Lord, I want to turn around and be a desperate dispenser of forgiveness to everybody who I come in contact with. God, help us today. Help us, Jesus, to love people like you love people. Help us to go the extra mile, God, to give people the benefit of the doubt, the same benefit of the doubt that we want, God, when we're in the wrong. God, help us to go the extra mile, to give grace and love and mercy and today especially forgiveness. I thank you, God, today that we're going to be quick to see the bait. We're going to be quick to recognize the bait that Satan is laying before us, that Skandalon, that bait set in the trap. God, help us to be wise and to see the trap before us. And God, I pray that you would give us the grace to walk in forgiveness, to deal with our issues and our hurts and our pains every single day before the sun goes down so that we can live free, so that we can live happy, so that we can have meaningful relationships and that we're not hard. God, I want our hearts to feel. Lord, you promised us in scripture that you would take our heart of stone and give us a heart of flesh, a heart that could feel and love and care for people. Do it today all across the world, across all these airwaves that are listening to this message today. And I believe it to be done. I believe we're going to have testimony. I believe we're going to have people sleeping all night long tonight. I believe we're going to have people healed of cirrhosis, of the liver, of brain disease, of Parkinson's disease, diabetes. I thank you today. I decree and declare it, God, as we forgive, as we obey God, that you're freely going to give it back to us. And I thank you for it. In Jesus name. In Jesus name. I love you. I know it's a tough word. I know it's a tough word. I know it's hard. But God's going to give you the grace to deal with these hurts, these pains, these bitterness, this unforgiveness. I want to see you live your best life. I want to see you live free. I want to see you live as an overcomer, not somebody who's underneath all their pain and underneath all their trouble, but somebody who stands on top of it and who has overcome and who can turn around and say, I got a testimony. I can pull you out of this darkness and you can live in glorious light. I believe it to be done today in Jesus name. God bless you. God bless you and we will see you next time. Wow.

I love how Pastor Hope breaks down the Word. I also love following her on social media because she always drops truth bombs and motivates me to get through my week. So make sure to follow her on Facebook @pastorhope c and on Instagram pastorhope carpenter and we'll see you next week.