Clash of The Kingdoms (The Helmet of Salvation and The Sword of The Spirit)

M h. You're listening to the Cross Kingdom Sermon of the Week. We

hope you enjoy this message from Justin Carpenter. We want to we want to

be a community that that has deep roots and foundation in Christ. Now,

so you'all remember, yeah, I got tons of time left. Okay,

So y'all remember I started a series called Clash of the Kingdom's Last Fall.

I do not recall the last piece of armor I did. Uh. Now

I've done two pieces in first service, and now somehow I have to try

to merge everything to get back on tracks so I can have the same theme

both services. We'll see how long that takes. So the piece that I'm

on, I laughed because last week Monty was uh kind of made a joke

about the the Armor of God being for Sunday School or whatever. I said,

Well, you know, many, I just taught on the homet of

Salvation at nine. For those of you that were in here last Sunday.

If you're wondering what I'm thinking of, I'm just trying to get a feel

for direction. It says in the last days that deception will be so great

that if it was possible, even the elect would be deceived. So here

we are twenty twenty four years later. Can we all agree, whether you're

pre mid post pan pre Wrath, pre millennial'm millennial, post millennial, or

pan millennial, that we are in the last days? Or can we say

all? Can we all say yes, okay, see we're in unity.

This is good. Can we all say that Jesus is gonna return in physical

form one day, even though we could probably argue twenty five different ways in

this room right now of when we think that's gonna happen. I have news

for you. Are you all ready for this? Regardless of your theological stance

right now, whether you're pre millennial, a'm millennial, or post millennial,

or whatever flavor you want, we're all gonna be wrong when he shows up.

He's gonna show up in a way that we go huh. I didn't

see that coming. Kind of like the confusion the Disciples were in when all

of a sudden, the Disciples are here and they're like, Lord, when

a're you gonna come and stop a mud hole in the Roman Empire. All

they cared about was seeing their enemy destroyed. When you come in and all

of a sudden, Jesus unpacks this kingdom in a completely different way than what

they thought. We're in a election year, right, don't get caught up

in a political spirit. Yeah, don't bash your opponents. Some of them

might have a spirit of stupid. I get it, but you let the

Holy spirit handle that. Ye love everyone around you, and I don't mean

with a greasy goofy love. I'm talking about Jesus's love, which is supernatural,

which you do not have the capacity in your soul to love that way,

So get over it. But the time for us to actually walk in

spirit and love with his love, you have to recognize it cannot be done

in your soul. If you're trying to will yourself to deal with people,

you're gonna fail miserably. Because people are gonna fail you. They're gonna tick

you off. They're gonna find ways to tick you off in your sleep,

So get over it. The sad thing is we're so busy shooting arrows at

each other, we forgot who the enemy was. We're so busy jockeying for

platforms and titles. We forgot the direction we're supposed to be going. I

have a thirty seven page outline on the Armor of God and every time I

finish, I'm like, why do I have all these pages? You feel

the last two pieces is the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit.

If you don't understand the Gospel of the Kingdom, you cannot advance the

kingdom. If the Gospel of the Kingdom is not at the very center,

the very center of it all, you're in trouble. Because it's only when

Jesus is lifted up that all men are drawn unto him. And it's only

when the Gospel of the Kingdom is presented that we can put a demand on

Heaven that those signs and wonders will actually follow after us. We don't have

to chase them. Paul said that the Kingdom is in power, not just

in word. Now. I know there's a whole bunch of intellectual wordsmiths out

there, and we see them all through social media, but the reality is

in real life. You know, I have Facebook friends, lots of them.

I don't know if they could pick me out in a lineup, but

they're my friends on social media. And from time to time people will come

up to me and tell me, oh, hey, I'm friends with you

on social media. I go, well, hey, finally, you know,

it's good to finally get to meet you for real. In case you

didn't figure it out. We can always present our very best out there right

on these platforms, but your life is exposed fully. What you do in

secret will be shouted from the mountaintops. Everybody's got an opinion right now.

But I'll tell you prophetically, one thing that's happening. Judgment starts first in

the House of God. And if you want to know what's happening, we

are seeing the judgments of God coming to the House of God, and it

starts with the elders. So I've said this for years that exposure, exposure,

exposure was coming. If you think these issues with Robbi, Zachariah,

Mike Bickle and these different people, if you think this is it, you're

wrong. This is the tip of the iceberg. And this is not a

season for you to play games with sin because what you've been stiff arming in

private's going to be shouted from the mountaintops if you keep resisting the whole Holy

Spirit, and it's not his heart to expose you publicly, but he loves

you too much to not expose you publicly. If you keep resisting him.

His judgment is not as wrath. There's no condemnation in Christ. But what

you what you get away with in the outer courts, will kill you in

the holy holies. Y'all, peep, all this greasy grace crap acts is

very clear. Anonyas and Sapphire knew the Lord, and the greater the glory,

the swifter the judgment. And I don't care if it hairlips the Pope

for saying that. Somebody used to that say, are you serious? I

was like, does the Pope ride in a glass car? Okay, I'll

stop my dad jokes, no jokes. Moving on. But y'all, there's

one thing about the sword of the spirit, and I said this this morning.

The sord of the spirit is the word of God. In Ephesian six

seventeen, the sword of the spirit is rama. It means to the utterance

the spoken word. It says it's a two edged sword. What does that

mean? You might want to say that it's logos and rama. That's the

two edges. Jesus is literally brought onto the scene as the logos. In

John one, in the beginning was the word, the word was God,

the word was with God, and the word became flesh and dwelt among us,

So you have the word who became flesh. Jesus shows up in the

wilderness, and guess what happens. He does not beat the enemy with any

other tools but word and revelation. He's coming with a sword coming out of

his mouth. Why because this war is about words more than it is physical.

That says we don't wrestle against flesh and blood. I pulled Anthony up

on the stage first service, and because too many times we read that scripture

and I don't know about y'all, but like, okay, well, we

don't wrestle against flesh and blood. And then there's this big argument when people

get entangled with spiritual influences. You know that word that nobody likes to talk

about, demons because we are so intellectually smart in the body of Christ.

Now we can take our souls and intellectually fix everything. How's that working out?

What's happening right now in our culture? We're in a war and the

enemy is trying to read define everything. The enemy is trying to tell you

that there's no such thing of a male or female. Hello, people,

do I need to tell you if you're a male or female. I would

do the illustration Becky does, but I get kicked off the stage, so

I'll leave that alone. But like, hello, but the deception is getting

so intense. It's getting so intense. There are like thirty eight thousand denominations.

You know that, literally, there's like thirty some thousand denominations. You

don't believe me, go check it out. Last week I had lunch with

a Lutheran pastor. Then I had lunch with a charismatic Catholic and we didn't

come together breaking bread and talking about are what separated us? We talked about

Jesus, because both of those people love Jesus. Do I agree with them

theologically? No, they don't agree with me. Theol Unity is not agreement.

And if you think unity is agreement, you got a huge problem.

If they believe in the Gospel, the true undefiled Gospel. They might have

minor stuff screwed up, but they don't have that screwed up. So guess

what your happy hind end is gonna be with them in heaven. I don't

know if I'm gonna get through these pieces of armor or not, but I'm

having fun. So when we dwell in unity, it commands a blessing.

If you come to someone to begin to build relationship with them with the pre

conceived idea of the moment. They don't agree with you on a theological stance,

you're out. That is not the heart of Jesus. You with me?

Do you think the disciples had perfect theology? Jesus shows up on the

scene and he's literally fulfilling the law and jacking with everybody's understanding in the process.

In fact, I might say that Jesus lived under more freedom fulfilling the

law than most of you today. What's that repeat that I said? I

might say that he probably lived under more freedom fulfilling the law than what we

do today. The Disciples are in the upper room waiting John twenty. They're

sealed with the Holy Spirit, so that's not an issue. The Holy Spirit's

already inside of them. Jesus and John twenty goes and he said, he

breathed on them, and he said, receive the Holy Spirit. So they're

sealed with the Holy Spirit in John twenty, but he said, wait until

the Spirit comes upon you. For the empowerment of ministry. We can lie

to the Holy Spirit, we can grieve the Holy Spirit and we can quench

the Holy Spirit. And one of the biggest issues right now in the church

is that we are quenching him. How do we quench him? We literally

grab the power of God and we squeeze it off. The Pharisees and the

Sadducees squeezed it off by the traditions of men that crept in during Babylonian captivity.

And they begin to take their traditions and put it above the Word,

and then then it got mixed. And then Jesus dealt with them because of

their religiosity, because they took it, and it says they made the Word

of God noen void. There's a reason why we have a theme this year

making war. Are declaring war in twenty four on doubt and unbelief because I'm

absolutely convinced our biggest issue is not another country. Our biggest issue is the

doubt and unbelief that we have in our heart. And we have spiritualized our

unbelief to look spiritual to others. How do you think Cessatianism came about?

You had people not seeing the works of Jesus, and rather than looking in

the mirror and saying, God fix me, You're not the problem. They

created a doctrine that makes them look good and the real guy's bad. You're

welcome. We are in a time right now where it's got to be a

clear display of the Kingdom, a clear display, and I want you to

know. Some come and some go. What's interesting is when Jesus preached to

the masses, he didn't chase people. He didn't he loved them, he

didn't condemn them. He said he came to seek and to save that which

was lost, y'all in case you hadn't figured it out, true Biblical Christianity

is not super hip today. When you sit and say there's absolute truth and

you live your life with kingdom convictions, guess what happens. People don't want

to And the danger is if you don't have that helmet on and you don't

know how to wield your sword, you're gonna end up cutting them instead of

wrestling with the true enemy. It says, we don't wrestle against flesh and

blood. So you have these principalities over these nations, literally governing the collective

thought process of a nation. That's the difference between a demon and a principality.

A demon might get next to you and give you thoughts and hope that

you think those thoughts are yours. So you start partnering with them and build

a stronghold, so then they have an extra room. It's like you just

expanded your house, but not a good addition. Are you with me?

But a principality is up there, not down here, and they're affecting the

way the culture thinks, so they can try to drive it towards their direction.

And then we've been in a holy huddle not understanding how to advance the

kingdom and power and how to wield our sword and how to get into these

places of influence. Then we're not seeing the culture changed because we're too busy

arguing and fighting with each other over stuff. Meanwhile we forget who the real

enemy is. Your kids are being discipled right now, whether you're doing it

or not. And every everybody's you know, everybody's afraid of how to touch

certain subjects and topics and all this stuff. And the Body of Christ.

I got news for you. Your kids were exposed to the enemy's plans way

before you had the hutzvah to start talking to them about some of this stuff.

That's Hebrew for nerve, don't I only I only know a couple of

Hebrew words, So have mercy. The helmet of salvation is for your protection

and your identification. Are you with me? It identifies you? When the

soldiers would have a helmet on and you know, like the Roman soldiers they

have the red horsehair on there that identified them on the battlefield, so they

didn't take their sword and stab the people on the same side. What do

we do though, like, oh, hey, oh sorry, he got

in the way one down. Oh they didn't agree with me. Oh they

didn't give me what I wanted. Oh they didn't see me. Oh they

didn't give me a title. Oh they don't know what I've got. Oh

they don't understand the favor of God on my life. The list goes on

and on and on, and all he's asking is for us to take up

our cross daily and follow them. Do you think if he could take Moses

thousands of years ago and get him where he needed to go? You don't

think he knows where you're at? Says he even knows that how many hairs

are on your head. The reason why I'm going bald is it's easier to

keep track of me, Like that you don't. Every once in a while,

I ask all. My dad jokes every once in a while, it's

funny. Listen, we've committed from day one. I said, Lord,

there's a hundred churches in Kerville. I'm like, if you really really really

want us to plan a church, then there's got to be something different that's

not being displayed in Kerk County that you've called us to. And I don't

feel qualified, nor do I have a passion for it, but I will

do it. I wrestled with him for six years over it. Six years.

I'd get prophetic words and I'm like, I love you, You're wrong.

Even Rich my mentor said, don't be surprised when the Lord caused you

to plan a church. Rich, I love you, but that'll never happen.

Do you want to be? Do you want to walk? Let's say

you left Kerbill for five or six years and you came back, and you

came back into your community and no one was different. Do you think something

would be wrong with that? All? Right? How about this? All

of a sudden, your son just stops growing, he's five. Ten years

later, he's five. You would say something's wrong, But we have been

stunted from the maturation process of actually growing up, putting childish ways behind us,

growing up in Him, and getting into a place where we have enough

character that we can actually carry something bigger than us. When things don't work

out the way you think they should, God's not against you. When things

don't work out when you think you should have more favor with people than what

you do, God's not against you. Favor with God and favor with man.

If you'll wait for God to move on you and give you more favor

with men, then the timing of the Lord will be accurate, and you

will not be holding on to Ishmael. You will have Isaac. But the

problem is we live in a culture that is polar opposite of that. We

want everything right now. We sit in front of a microwave, we pop

popcorn for three minutes, and we're impatient about it. I can't wait for

that new microwave with five thousand watts and thirty seconds the whole bag's done,

y'all. Anybody been in front of a microwave and like you're literally you can

feel I'm not kidding, like you're impatient, y'all realize, one hundred years

ago you got to go chop a tree down and start a fire, and

you know, three and a half hours later, you got a flame to

do something. I know that's spiritual. The Lord will never violate his word,

but he'll violate your understanding of it. If you preach the truth to

somebody, you give them the gospel and they get offended, don't worry about

it. God he's big, he can handle it. You don't need to

stick up for him. You ever notice he's not nearly as worried about his

reputation as you are of yours. I know the love that's gonna actually be

an evangelistic tool is when the world sees you get persecuted, get mocked,

get made fun of, and yet you still love these people and they're like,

what is they're weird? I know how that person just treated them,

and look they're still they're loving on them. Well, as long as you

understand Paul said, I know no one by the flesh. What's he saying.

He's saying that when somebody gets in your face and acts like an idiot,

he's able to bypass that and go, oh, I'm not dealing with

flesh and blood right now, And you can separate the person from the influence,

realize who the real enemy is, and keep loving the person, and

then declare war on the enemy. Because you were given gifts, and every

one of your gifts destroy the works of the evil one. But the moment

you slip back into your soul and you want to take vengeance, and you

lose sight of what's influencing a person in that moment, whether it's their flesh

or even spiritual influence. You've lost because when evil comes and you repay evil

with evil, evil advances Roman six pot nineteen. I speak in human terms

because of the weakness of your flesh. For just as you presented your members

as slaves of uncleanness and of lawlessness, leading to more lawlessness, so now

present your members as slaves of righteousness. For holiness a life laid down with

the pursuit of His kingdom and his righteousness. You have a byproduct of holiness.

As a result, it turns into legalism when you think you can do

outward expressions to cause a manifestation of holiness, when it has everything to do

with intimacy and Him transforming you from the inside out. And holiness is a

byproduct of a life abandoned none to righteousness. If you counsel your soul and

that's all you counsel, then you're gonna get earthly results. We need our

soul. God's got a soul and actually talks about his soul in the Bible.

Should check it out. It's interesting. Jesus comes back in Revelation and

he's got a two edged sword coming out of his mouth. If you look

at these scriptures, I'm so lost. I'm outline. I don't know where

I'm at. But somewhere in this outline on page ninety eight, right here,

well, Revelation nineteen thirteen. He's clothed in a robe dipped in blood.

In the name by which he is called is the Word of God.

Wo there it is Revelation one sixteen. In his right hand he held seven

stars. From his mouth came a sharp two huedged sword, and his face

was like the sun shining in full strength. And to the Angel of the

Church in Pergama right the words of him who has the sharp two huedged sword,

and faith comes by hearing and hearing through the word of Christ Romans ten

seventeen. The word raima is used three hundred and thirty one times in the

New Covenant. You ever notice, like if you're in your reading time and

all of a sudden, words begin to just come off the page. And

my old Baptist days, I would highlight yellow, and then when I got

really good with highlighting, I broke out the multicolor highlights and then begin to

categorize my highlights. But you have to understand that his logoss word in that

moment just became rama for you. Are you with me? And here's the

invitation. When something jumps off the page like that, Not only does it

go from written to rama for you, it's an invitation for you to actually

engage and encounter the Lord through his word. Stop reading for knowledge and read

for intimacy. Understand that his word is alive and active and sharper than any

two edged sword piercing between soul and spirit and joint and borrow, and is

the very what he discerns, the very intense of our hearts. I could

do acts of righteousness in front of you, I could say exactly the way

it should be said, and my motive could be horrible, And guess what.

One day every one of us are going to give an account for our

life between the Jesus, that's it. Your Dad's not gonna have to give

an account for your life, your mom, your brother, your sister,

every one of us, from big to small, will stand before the Lord.

And it's only what passes the motive. It's only the pure motives of

our heart that is going to go into eternity. All the other works that

were done for selfish, ambition, jealousy, envy, all of those other

things are going to be burned up. That should cause the fear of the

Lord in our lives, because we're going to stand before him. We're going

to give an accoun out for our life, and you're gonna go, Lord,

but look, I did this for them. Yeah, but why Well,

I actually feared punishment. I actually feared if I didn't do it,

I was get in really bad trouble, and fear motivated me to go do

that, not your love. In Isaiah eleven four, the only Weapon in

the War's words, Isaiah confirms this way of framing the conflict as the expected

Davidic ruler will strike the earth with the rod of his mouth and will vanquish

the wicked with the breath of his lips. So you might say it's a

war of words. It said, we'll give an account forever every idle word

that we've spoken. It says, life and death is in the power of

the tongue. Do you understand the sword that you carry? Do you understand

the sword when you pull it out of the sheath, that you better be

paying attention and identifying who is foe and who is friend. When you pull

that sword out. When you go to curse your brother, who's made in

God's image, remember your maker. It says, out of our mouth comes

blessing and cursings. This should not be make it all good or make it

all bad. But this back and forth. Corinthians, they're literally communing at

the table of the Lord and the table of demons. Hello, this was

written for the church people. That's not unbelievers. I'm going to land it.

And unlike the video we posted on Facebook, when I say land,

it's not going to be ten minutes. You want to know my dream,

My dream isn't about numbers. My dream is to see David's mighty men and

women. My dream is to see an army that rises up and advances the

kingdom and does it in a way that said that they look at them and

go, oh, my goodness, those are the greater works. That's my

dream. Whether we got five hundred or one thousand, it's not about that.

Numbers don't guarantee success, that's right. But healthy communities multiply because,

make no mistake about it, and acts. They went from addition to multiplication.

But why did they go to multiplication Because there was a clear presentation of

the Gospel of the Kingdom and it was done in power. Yeah, everybody's

like, well, don't pay any attention to signs and wonders. Really,

Jesus said, if you don't believe me, at least believe on the works

that I did. So, Hey, Einstein, how'd that leg just grow

out? Hey? How'd that person just rise from the dead. Hey they

had cancer, Now they don't. Hey they had a limb that was missing,

and now it's there. And to the degree that your mind just offended

you when that was said, just exposed your own belief. There is no

plan be in the Kingdom. There's one plan. Every one of us takes

the Gospel of the Kingdom and we make disciples and we see nations transformed,

and that takes all of us. It takes the body of Christ. It

takes the fullness of the fivefold ministry, and it takes Joel's army. Joel's

army is not shooting each other. Joel's army is not stabbing each other.

Go read Joel and read Joel's Army. It's a clear presentation of understanding authority,

understanding their metron, their sphere of influence, and not stepping into somebody

else's lane and getting upset with them, but putting spiritual blinders on and headed

straightforward to what the Lord has called you to. And at the end of

the day, the clash of the kingdoms, make no mistake about it.

It's not much of a clash. He said it's finished twenty twenty four years

ago. God is not up there biting his fingernails wondering what's going on.

Jesus is not up there going can I have an anxiety pill? Oh,

my goodness, justin just said that. Hello, he knows my filter.

It's getting better. He's not taken by surprise. Whether I've heard it said

many times. God has factored in our stupidity into our destiny. So it's

all good and the only one that can stop you from fulfilling the very purpose

for why God puts you on this earth, is you you look in the

mirror. I don't care what happens to your life, how ugly it gets.

Your life is a vapor. This is for a moment, but everything

that you do of eternal substance goes out for eternity. Everything you do that's

eternal will never die. I just visited with Denise Senlow. He used to

be the principal Covenant. And for those of you that knew Jackson her Son,

you know he passed away a few years ago, and they're still getting

testimonies of how Jackson touched other people's lives for Jesus. Some people may have

saw a handicap, a mental disability nineteen years on earth, and I'd venture

to say that he had more of effect for the Kingdom and for Jesus than

many of us have in forty or fifty years, y'all. I I've played

my life now for him and for what He's called me to. And I'm

going, and with or without people, I'm going. If there's a wall

in front of me, I'm putting a crash helmet on and I'm gonna run

through it. But I'm going. And if I got to put people on

my back along the way. We'll see how many I can carry if I

can have the prayer team come up. Thank you for listening. For more

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