Win Within 212 Conference -Pastor Hope Carpenter

Come on, let me hear some people. God got you through some stuff. God got me through some stuff. Come on. Has God got you through some stuff? You're here. You're here. You got your sane mind. You got your health back. You got your family back. You got your ministry back. God just gets you through stuff. Hallelujah. Sit down. I love y'. All. What a powerful, powerful 212 conference. I mean, just so. Some of the most amazing words from God, Some of the most powerful times in worship. Questions and answers. Very practical. And as pastor Tavener was preaching, I was just sitting there and I thought, you know, I've been there. I've been that person who just wigged out and freaked out and lived in fear. And I just sat there and thought, you know, God, how have you changed me in this? God, what have you shown me? What practical thing have you done in me to where I do love the process. Now it was so easy for me to say, I love the process. Because until God has put you through a process and you've come out on the other side and you look back and say, I do it all over again. I do it all over again, God, whatever it takes to make me like you, whatever it takes to give me this peace and this joy and this great hope, God, how did you do that in me? God, what could I say about that? That. And immediately he took me to the scripture in Philippians 4:12, where it says, I know what it is to be in need, right? I know what it is to be in need. And I know what it is to have plenty in that life. We have good days. We have bad days. We have good jobs. We have bad jobs. We have a good Sunday. The next Sunday is a day on Sunday. We have times in our marriage that are great, and we have times in our marriage that you just want to take that pill and strangle them in the night. I mean, I'm talking about suffocate them to their feet flopping. And then the. I mean, it ain't all good, is it? Somebody. Somebody said, you know, because our kids were all gone and they were going to college, and they were like, oh, I'm just so sad. My kids left and I cried. I said, girl, I didn't cry. Lick. I threw a party. I said, thank God. Get out. You need me to help you pack something Quick. What you need? You got it. Go, go. They said, you didn't cry? I said, I cried more while they was at home. Life's hard sometime, right? So I'm sitting there thinking, of his message. And I'm thinking of Philippians 4:12. I know what it is to be in need. I know what it is to have plenty. But I've learned the secret. So that tells me that not everybody gets it. It's a secret. I've learned the secret to be content in every situation. And this is the secret. It is trusting that God's got me through the good times, through the bad times, and that God is using this process success called life. He's using it like the potter and the clay. He knows what I'm supposed to look like and he knows what it's going to take to make me look like it. And if I would stop kicking and screaming on the wheel of life and just submit myself to the potter, knowing that he's got my best interest at heart, that I can learn this secret and I can be content in any situation that I'm in. It's a secret. I've had things and I've had things taken away. And when God put me through the process, when he slapped my tail back on that wheel and he completely took it and slammed it off and he said, I'm starting completely over. I have learned that the process is one of the most precious things in my life because I tried it up till 45, 44. I tried it up to then my own, because I knew what I wanted to look like, what I was going to be like, what it's going to sound like, blah, blah, blah, blah. It just didn't work out. There was no peace. There was no joy, there was no contentment. There was always striving. There was absolutely no contentment in my life. But I can promise you today I've been through some of the worst things probably anybody could be, situations anybody could be in. But today I am so content. I am so happy. I am at such peace. And it all came because of the process. Look at somebody and say, you got to learn to trust the process. Process. You got to learn to trust the potter and be a submissive clay vessel. Jesus, I thank you for today and I thank you for this time. I thank you, God, that you love me and that you chose me and that you use me. I ask you to help me today to help these people in Jesus name. Amen. As I was thinking about the title of our whole conference, when within, you know, I'm very black and white, kind of real simple girl. And I didn't go to Bible school like the rest of these wonderful preachers. I didn't take homiletics, hominudics all these other things that they took. I did go through the school of hard knocks and I did get the privilege of sitting under one of the greatest Bible teachers in the world all of my life. But I'm a real practical kind of person. So when I see the theme Win Within, I'm like, what are we trying to win? What do I get? You know, if I'm gonna win something, what am I gonna get right? I mean, my husband and I don't judge us, but this is one television show that we do watch. We hardly ever turn on a television, but years ago, we discovered the show Naked and Afraid. They don't show it. They bloop it out. They don't show any of that, thank God, because the people I've seen on it really ain't nothing to look at. But we discovered this show Naked and Afraid. I'm talking about dropping you off in a jungle. Alligators everywhere. You butt naked, dropped off with another person you've never met and you walk up, hey, okay, so they drop you off with a stranger and you're both butt naked in this place. And you only get this little bag and you get to put a couple of things in it and to take with you. So you have to be very strategic on your Naked and Afraid venture. And so they drop them off and they show awful things. How many of you ever seen it? The rest of you gotta watch one episode. I mean, it is insane. And I'm talking about mosquito bites. Thousands, thousands all over their body having to lay down at night. Listen, naked on the ground, I'm thinking, where are those bugs gonna go? Rats and animals and bears and bugs and scorpions and. And all of this stuff. And you know what they get? Nothing. Ain't no way in hell would I ever be on Naked and Afraid and get eat alive for any less than about 150,000. I said these folk crazy. Every one of them crazy, Crazy. Paper crazy. You know, already got paper saying I'm crazy. Certified crazy to go through all that and get nothing. So when I see a title that says Win Within, I'm thinking, okay, what do I get? What am I fighting for? What is the prize? What am I trying to win? And this, this truly, I mean, you're not fighting for a big church. You're not fighting for reaching a thousand barrier. You're not fighting to get to drive the car that you think you're supposed to get to drive once you get to a certain level. And you're not fighting to get to carry that purse that you think you're supposed to carry if you're this, that and the other. We're not fighting for those things. This is really, truly the goal. The goal is we're fighting for Jesus. Our goal is Jesus. Our goal is eternal life. And we're down here running a race. The Bible says it's a relay race. We're down here running a race. Why? To try to finish well. We're trying to finish our lap. We're trying to finish our course in finish well. And we will not finish well. Pastor Denise going to run around the dome if we're not whole, if we're not healthy, free from bitterness, old hurts, strife, jealousy, unforgiveness, the divorce that set us back, we. The abuse, the rape, all these things that have happened to us in our process. You will not finish well. It causes you to stumble on this race of life. It causes us to stumble on the tracks that we're running to try to get to the finish line. We all hit trials, right? How many of you ever had a trial? How many of you had a wonderful life with no trials? Exactly. We all hit trials. We all have trouble. We have trouble. That hit our home. There's no perfect family. There's. We're all dysfunctional in some shape, form or fashion. Nobody had perfect parents. We all got let down. We all been hurt. We all have pain. But if our hearts aren't strong enough to go through the trial, that's when we derail. That's when we fall down. That's when we fall apart. That's when we stumble. That's when we get sidetracked. That's when we lose our mind for a minute and have a little midlife crisis. That's when we forget. Forget why we're running. And we start focusing on us. And we start saying, what about me? What about me? I thought I was supposed to be happy. Oh, life's got to be more than this. See, we forget about the prize set before us and we stumble on the track. So first of all, we have to deal with all our junk and get our hearts clean so that we'll be strong enough to run this race and go through this process. And when the cloud sets in, we don't pack up and go back. And if your heart is not strong enough to handle it, it's inevitable you're gonna lose it. You're gonna fall apart, you're gonna derail. You're gonna go off to the other side. That's the ones who go out to take the trash out and End up in Florida. Right? Doctors will even tell you. Listen. Doctors will even tell you not to exert yourself too much if you have a heart condition. Why? If you exert yourself too much, you could collapse. You could have a heart attack. You might have to stop and have some surgery if you exert yourself too much. And we are running a race. This is a race. This ain't no trot life. No, this is a relay race. This is a sprint to the finish line. And doctors will tell you, don't exert yourself too much if you got heart problems. That's what happened to me. We were going 560 miles an hour, and I had heart problems, had issues that I'd never dealt with, that I never talked about. I had pain and bitterness and unforgiveness. And we were going too fast. That's all that's wrong with you. You've been going so fast, and you never took the time to worry about you never took the time to deal with you. This is what Jesus said. He said, what does it profit a man? What does it put in your bank account? What does it profit you to gain all this stuff and have a great church and to help everybody else have a good pocketbook, get to go on great vacations, but you lose your mind. So what? Your soul is. Soul is your mind. What does it profit you if you gain the whole world and you lose your soul, you lose your mind. You're emotionally a basket case. You can't function without Lexapro, Xanax, Klonopins. What does it profit you to work yourself in the mud and your emotional man in your mind. Mind. And you make poor choices and you keep stumbling on this trail, in this race of life, what does it profit you? Nothing. Philippians 1:6 says this. Paul says, I'm confident in one thing. In one thing. He who began a good work in you, he will be faithful to finish the work in you. Look at somebody and say, God's got me. God's got me. He said, he will complete it until what? Till the end of your race? Until the day of Jesus Christ. So number one, I get from this, I have a. Not just a work going on on the inside of me. The Bible says I have a good work. He said this good work going on on the inside of me. He's going to be faithful to finish this thing that he started in me. First of all, what's going on inside of us is internal. It's internal. The work is internal. We focus so much on the external. But how much do we focus on the internal us? Our heart, our mind, our thinking, our thoughts, our emotions, our feelings, our attitudes, our judgments. It's internal. The most important thing. It's not our outward appearance. It's not our fake smiles. Ah, yes, I'm great. I'm blessed and highly favored. You're crazier than a bedbug. Fake it till you make it. I will never say that again. I used to say it. Fake it till you make it. Please don't. It's miserable. Who wants to live like that? Who wants to merely exist and walk around in a life that's not real? And fake it till you make it. Say it's internal. The work is internal. There's a work going on in our hearts. Creating, developing, training, pruning, purging, tearing down, building up, deleting, retraining. It's a lot of work. And the Bible says this, it says it's a good work. See, we look at that and we think, oh, Jesus. Whoo. This is going to be a lot. This is going to be hard. It's a good work. It's a good work. It's good for the soul. Listen to this. To be brought from life to death because your soul was fully alive in its fleshly ways. It's good for the soul to be brought from life to death, then death to life. Right? The word work literally translates in the Greek. I love this. This is what it says, the good work in you. It means toil as an effort or occupation. That's not our job description. That's his job description. God is working. He is toiling. And it is his full time occupation to make you, to mold you, to bend you, to break you, to press you, to pull you until you become his image. A full time occupation. And he don't care. He's not upset about it. Why? Because he reaps the benefits of his job. He gets you. He gets me. So full time occupation on his part, you think God's going to fall asleep on your life? Come on. Do you think God's going to neglect or not put the work in. God's putting the work in. In your life. He reaps the benefit. And this is the key here. This work is a lifelong process. There is not a place Pastor Tavener called there that we get to after six months or six years or once our church gets a certain number. There is not a spiritual place called there that you get to and you're done and you're finished. I think we think that. I think we somehow we've been trained to think that. That if we read enough or we study enough or we cry enough or we pray enough, we gonna get this stuff cleaned up and we gonna be good. It is a lifelong process. A perfect Christian is the result of years, years of training until your race is complete and they put your cold tail in the ground. That's when your race is finished. That's when you are done. That's when you are complete. That's when it's over. That's when you get to rest. That's when you get to sit down. That's when you get to stop fighting, when you get to stop believing, when you get to stop pressing years. And it starts at new birth. What does a new birth produce? It produces a baby. The new birth produces a little baby who is helpless, who don't know anything, who don't know the language, who don't even know how to feed itself, who poops on itself and stinks and. And messes up and has to have somebody else come and help it get fixed and clean. Can't even clean itself. And here we are in church. Mmm. Did you see what they did? And it's our job to go and help clean them, help pick them up, help change them and feed their belly and take care of them and put them on some new shoes and some new clothes. Much spiritual nourishment and education and training and falling down and getting up is required until we become a full grown man or woman. We don't get saved and know this immediately. We don't. We don't walk with God two to four to six, even ten years. We don't. It's a lifelong journey of being sanctified and looking like our daddy and acting like our daddy and talking like our daddy. And you know, we gotta. We gotta take these masks off. We gotta stop walking around like we got it all together, and we gotta stop faking people out and acting like we ain't got no problems. And because you've been pastoring six years and you've got it all together now, and you don't need to come to the altar and you don't need to sow a seed and you don't need to sit down and take a training and listen to somebody who's done it a little bit better than. We gotta take these masks off our face and admit, yeah, I got some junk and I just pooped on myself. I just crapped my pants. Guess it's running down my leg, even. It was a big one. It was a wet one. It stank. You know, them wet ones stank. Days and days stank. I mean, stank up your whole room. Even when you take it out, it still stink. That's y' all look at somebody say, you stink sometime. You blow it. We all blow it. So, number one, the work starts with God. He begins the work, okay? He begins the work. Only God can create, okay? Only God can create. So he begun the work. So great a change is required from turning from a life of selfish sin to a life of self sacrificing on the altar. Holiness. That's a big jump from over here of selfish sin to a life over here of self sacrificing, putting yourself on an altar. And it can only be influenced by divinity. We didn't find Jesus. He chose me. You weren't even in your right mind enough to say, oh, I think I've screwed up so much, I think I'm gonna find Jesus. No, even if you said that, he still found you. He chose you. It started with Jesus, though. The work is conditioned by our faith. Not of ourself, though, remember what? Not of ourself. Still the gift of God. I don't get any credit in this. We don't get any credit in this. And those of us who like credit. Those of us who like to win, we don't get any credit in this. I am who I am by the grace of God only. Solamente only. I am who I am only by the grace of God. I can't do it without Jesus. And the fact that God is the one who started the work in you. God started it. Look at somebody say God started all this. God started it is proof that he will complete. The character of God implies this. God don't lie. He's not fickle. He don't change. He's not weak that he should fail. He can't lie. The fact that he started in you is proof that he's going to finish it in you. God's the master puppeteer of your life. He's working in you. And he uses everything that touches your life, everything on the outside, to make sure that the inside lines up with his plan and his purpose. Remember, it's an internal work. It's an internal work. But God don't come in here and split us open and do open heart surgery right here. He uses the situations and the circumstances of our life to mold us and make us and train us and knock us down and start us over. Life is scaffolding. You seen a building being built? You ever built a building built A house where you had to put a scaffolding thing up on the side of it. Your life is a construction site. And what is it doing? It's building me into the image of Christ. He's our daddy. How many of you are daddies in here or mamas in here? He's our daddy. Don't you know a good daddy will make you learn a lesson? Don't you know a good daddy don't give you everything you want, but a good grandma does. Just saying. That ain't my job to parent them. It's my job to give them everything they want. And all the grandmamas and granddaddies said, but a good daddy will make you learn a lesson. A good daddy will allow you to feel pain. A good daddy will bust you in the rear end. A good daddy will put you in timeout. He'll sit your tail down. Because he's a good daddy doing a good work. He's a good daddy doing a good work in you. And what is the object of the race? The object is that you will be ready for the day of Christ. It's not that you can build a bigger church. It's not that you can go to another level in your bank account. Remember the first scripture I read? I've had stuff and I've lived having nothing. I've had them both. But now I can say I've learned to be content in all of it. In every bit of it. It's not about those things. Those are just extras. But the goal to win in your life is so that you can be ready for the day of Jesus. It's her goal. He's coming for a bride. He's coming for a bride. And he said, it's not just any bride. He said, it's a bride without spot or wrinkle. Look at somebody and say, you God's girl. Say it to a man. Say, you God's girl. He's coming for a bride. Listen. And the good work will only be begun. It's begun by God, but it will only be continued. God started it right? He's gonna finish it. But it will only be continued when we learn to cooperate. Somebody say cooperate. Work together with the good work continues when we learn to cooperate with God. God and me are operating this good work of transformation together. It's not just God. And I'm sitting back doing what I want to, when I want to, how I want to. Y' all can kiss my butt if you don't like it. This is my life. I'm a grown woman. And y' all can't tell me what to do. And you worry about you, and I worry about me. God gonna do it. God got me. Only God can judge me, right? He started it. But we are in cooperation with him to work this transformation so that we can be ready for him. It's important. You gotta get this. We gotta exercise our faith in him and our obedience. Say, faith and obedience. Faith and obedience. Say it again. Faith and obedience in the strength of God. Faith and obedience in the strength of God and for the reception of God's work in me. Faith and obedience in the strength of God so that God can do his work in me. If you don't fight, you don't win. You don't run the race by sitting on the sideline. And you don't win the race by being the slowest one on the field. And you can't run at all. If you got heart problems, you ain't gonna make it. You gonna fall down, you're gonna lose it all. Everything you work for, you're gonna. We have an adversary, the Devil. In churches like ours, we, you know, the Devil is just a lion with lips. He ain't got tongue. You know, we talk. He ain't got no power. Blah, blah, blah. We know he don't, but he's still our adversary. He has a job description as well. Jesus is building us. He's our builder. The Devil is our adversary. He's throwing life at you. He comes to steal from you. He wants to kill you. He wants to destroy you. And how does he do it? He does it through life. He does it through our situations, our circumstances. Our husbands, our wives, our children, our job, our ministry. Church people. I've heard people say I'd be a great Christian if it wasn't for church people. Well, you know what that says. That says a lot about you, not them. You have an adversary, the Devil. He's throwing life at you. Divorce, midlife crisis, rape, children going crazy, Taxes, abuse, burnout. Why? To try to get you to quit. To try to get you to stumble and derail on this race called life. Because he don't want you to win. It's the Devil's tactics. Listen, those are the devil's tactics. But on this side, it's God's standard operating procedure. They use the same thing, but they have different goals. The enemy wants to make you quit. By throwing life at you. God wants to make you something. By throwing life at you. God wants to make you something. He's trying to build you, not break you. So what he uses is his construction material to make you and mold you into everything he wants you to be. Stop resisting it. Stop hating it. Stop hating to say process. Say process with smile on your face. Process. God uses all these things to strengthen you and promote you, not kill you. If you didn't have an adversary, you'd never have a battle. If you didn't have a battle, you'd never have a victory. If you don't fight, you don't fight the good fight. Fight of our faith, of this, of this run. You got to fight the good fight of faith. It's the same word good where it says he began a It's a good work and it's a good fight. All good. Look at somebody and say it's all good. No, look at them and say it's all good. You need to know it's all good what you're going through. It's all good. It's all going to work out. For your the most beautiful thing that ever happened to me is when I went. When I decided, did nobody make me? I had a choice. It's when I decided to cooperate with God. That's the most beautiful thing that ever happened in my life. Ron didn't make me cooperate. He told me to get out quick, like, girl, you know, I took all my expensive purses, all my expensive shoes. I said, he ain't taking my stuff. Ain't no other woman getting my stuff. All the women said I left all my panties, I left my tennis shoes. I got my Louis Vuitton, I got my Gucci, I got all that. I said, I don't know what I'm gonna need later on. I wasn't stupid. I might have lost my mind, but I still had some sense, still have some good common sense. But the most beautiful thing, thing truly, that ever happened to me is when I decided I'm going to cooperate with God. I mean, fighting against it hasn't got me anywhere good. And I'm going to cooperate with God in my obedience and my submission. To lay on an altar along with God, using life to tear me down to nothing, put me back on the track again. I had bloody knees. I was tired. I had heart problems. But my decision to cooperate with God bandaged my knees. It healed my heart and it put me back on the track of life better than I've ever been. More content, more joy, more peace, more patience, more love, more passion than I've ever had so that I could run the race set before me. I'm determined to win, but I know in Winning that I'm determined to fight. See, some of you ain't willing to fight. Some of you got heart problems, some of you tired, some of you, life's just been too hard and you hadn't taken the time to deal with you. And you think that you're just sick of ministry. You really just got heart problems. You think you don't love your wife. You just got so much hurt and pain you've never dealt with and you gotta blame somebody. Don't quit. Please don't quit. And don't force God to crush you like he crushed me. It was worth it. But my God, it was so unnecessary. It was so unnecessary. If I just had somebody who loved me enough and who could have seen that she's just broken, she needs some help. She needs to take some time to go into a little open heart surgery, get into little intensive care unit. Not intensive, critical unit, not intensive. Let's talk about her unit and let's talk about all the things we see we don't like and don't look like Jesus. Why wouldn't somebody help me become more like Jesus? Don't quit. You don't have to quit. You can just stop a little bit and get what you need. Because this race, this race takes strength. This race takes endurance. This race takes patience. Don't quit. You can't quit. You're destined to win. God's waiting for you to cooperate with him. He's waiting for you to say, God, help me, fix me so I can be strong enough to work with you while you work this thing out in me, while you deal with me and while life happens and I can take it and I can jump over this hurdle and I can be stronger and better. Doesn't matter matter if you gain. The whole world doesn't matter. But you lose your mind and you're miserable going through it. I don't want to live like that. Do you want to live like that? I really truly want to be happy. I really truly want to lay down at night and say, God, it's so good to serve you, God. I'm employed by the best employer I could ever have. What a privilege and an honor to share Jesus with people. What a privilege and an honor to make Jesus famous. What a privilege and an honor to testify of the goodness of God in show. I was a mess, but he brought me from death to life.