Kenneth Copeland - Faith Does
Hello everybody. I'm Kenneth Copeland. This is the Believer's Voice of Victory broadcast, and this is Kenneth Copeland Bible College right here. Praise the Lord. So let's give the Lord a praise and we'll welcome the world into our classroom today. Praise God. So, literally this, of course on the Victory Channel, just literally goes out to the world. Isn't that amazing? Praise God.
Father, we thank You. It's beyond our imagination now. And we praise You and honor You for faith, for the directions of faith, and what it is, and how to use it, and how to feed it. And we've learned that it is a powerful, invisible force. We have found that it comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God. We found out how it works. It works by love. We found out how it is released. It is released out of the human heart, through the mouth and actions. And we praise You for that, Sir. And we worship You today in the name of Jesus. Amen. Hallelujah.
Wow. This has been a great week in talking about faith and we talked about faith comes, faith works, faith is, and faith does. Well, we're going to talk about today, faith does. Faith acts. So let's turn to the book of James in chapter two and look at the 14th verse. What does it profit my brethren though, a man say he have faith and have not works. Can faith save him? All right. Let's look at this then from the Classic Amplified once again, and it's also excellent and Weymouth translation.
Now, we don't have that where we can get to it yet. We're still working on it here at KCM because we put that New Testament back into print. It was out of print for a long time. It's also called the New Testament in Modern English. And in this passage right here, it says, "What does it profit my brethren though, a man say he have faith and have not works. Can faith save him"? Faith without corresponding action is dead. Now look at it. If a brother or sister, or is poorly clad and lacks food for each day, and one of you says to him, "Goodbye, keep yourself warm and well feed," without giving him the necessities for the body, what does that do? So also faith, if it does not have work, deeds and actions of obedience to back it up by itself is destitute of power, inoperative and dead. Someone will say to you, then you say you have faith and I, and have good works. Now you show me your alleged faith apart from any good works if you can. And I, by good works of obedience, will show you my faith or corresponding action. To me, corresponding action really says it. Without corresponding action, faith is dead.
Now let's take, turn over to Mark five while we're talking about this. Let's take the woman with the issue of blood. She heard. She heard of Jesus. So somebody is relaying messages to her. She's a shut in. She's been locked up for 12 long years with this issue of blood. So, you know she's skin and bones. Many physicians spent all that she had. But she kept saying it, "If I, but touch his garment, his clothes," one said the hem of his garment. What's she talking about? She's talking about... Jesus is a rabbi. He dressed as a rabbi all the time. He wore the rabbi's robe. He wore the rabbi's clothes, and his prayer shawl was lengthy and came out from under his clothing. And she was after that prayer shawl. She had been taught that that's where the anointing is. And she said, "If I'm to touch that, I'll be made whole". I will, I will be made whole. She believed it. And she said it.
What was the corresponding action? She got out in that crowd knowing full well she was breaking the law, because for her... Read it in the fifth chapter of Leviticus. It'll, explain it all there. She was unclean because of that issue of blood. It was a stoning offense to break that law. But she had such faith in that power, such faith in Jesus because she heard it. And faith came, and she kept saying it. She kept saying that. Just kept saying it. She said it, and then she did it. The corresponding action to her faith was to crawl out there. She fully intended... We know from what it says, that she fully intended to crawl out there and get back and get herself together and then come out in public. Because she believed that this bleeding going to stop when I touch him. For she said, "If I may touch, but his clothes, I shall behold. Straightway the fountain of her blood was dried up".
Immediately the fountain of her blood was dried up. Then she felt it. She believed it before she ever went out in the street. She said it before she ever went out in the street. And what did Jesus say? Jesus stopped and said, "Who touched my clothes"? Jesus, knowing in himself, King James says virtue, Jesus knowing in himself that dunamis, power, had gone out of himself. He turned about and said, "Who touched me"? Faith. He was headed to Jairus' house to raise his little daughter up by faith, because Jairus said, he said... He besought him greatly saying, "My little daughter lies at the point of death. I pray thee come and lay thy hands on her that she may be healed and she shall live". And that's the last thing he said. He stayed with it. And so Jesus didn't he even answer him. He just headed to his house. And the woman with the issue of blood stopped him. Faith put him on the move and faith stopped him in the middle of the street. He was aware of her. He was aware of the power that went out of him. She was aware that she was healed and made whole. Faith. And he said, "Daughter, your faith made you whole". Her faith. What happened?
Now, listen to me. Listen to me. You there at home, listen to me now. Faith, a powerful and visible spiritual force. Faith in her heart took title deed to that healing. She came to a place where she wasn't believing it. She knew it. I had Brother Roberts say this to me. I heard him say it to people over and over and over again. Faith connects with God and connects with God. And you come to the place that you just know in your knower, you know that you know that you know that you know that you just know that you know you know that you know that you know you know you know that you know you know you're healed. Then he said go into action. Glory to God. And one way he expressed this, he said, "Kenneth, if God tells you to build a building, dig a hole". But he said, "Always sow a seed first".
Sow the seed and dig the hole. When it came time, the Lord had said this to him the day he was healed from stuttering and healed from tuberculosis. The Lord said to him that day you will build me a university. I mean, and it was years before it came time. But when the Lord said, it's time is now. It's now. He and Miss Evelyn took all of their savings and they liquidated property, and they brought all that they owned before the board of trustees of the Abundant Life Ministries of Oral Roberts Evangelistic Association and put it on the table. And they said, "This is Oral Roberts University. We're sowing our lives into it. And the Lord will build it". Amen. So, that's what you do. Corresponding action to that faith.
Now, then back up over here to Mark 5:15. Now, you know what happened here. They came over to the other side of the sea, the country of the Gadarenes, and came out of the other side. The ship immediately met him out of the tombs, a man with an unclean spirit. Now we've talked about this before and we find this in the sixth chapter of the book of Ephesians, the holy spirit through the apostle Paul gives us the rank and file of Satan's organization from the ground up. Principalities. He said, "We wrestle not with flesh and blood, but with principalities, and powers, and rulers of the darkness of this world, and wicked spirits in the heavenlies".
And we've looked into that some in times past, we don't have time to go into that here. But we see it manifest here in this chapter. When he was come out of the ship immediately there met him of the tombs, a man with an unclean spirit, a ruler of the darkness of this world. One spirit, the boss spirit, who had his dwelling among the tombs. No man could bind him. No, not with change. Because that he had been often bound with fetters, or shackles, and the chains had been plucked asunder by him and the fetters broke into pieces. Neither could any man tame him. Now that Sampson in reverse. Sampson wasn't an unusually large man, but when the power of God came on him, the strength of God was where his strength was.
Well, this is just in reverse. This man's skin and bones naked, but the power of this demon, and all the other demons that were working through him, all the other devils would empower him, and he'd just tear those shackles and chains up. Always night and day he was in the mountains and in the tombs crying and cutting himself with stones. So he was a cutter. But when he saw Jesus afar off, he ran and worshiped him and cried with a loud voice and said, "What have I"... Now, the ones that I have faced sounded something like this. What have I to do with thee Jesus, Son of the Most High God. I adjure thee my God, you torment me not. It's a sickening kind of a sound that just irritating, and raspy, ugly, nasty thing. I've heard it more than once. And there was a man that had gangrene in his legs and I stood at the foot of his bed and laid my hand. And he looked up at me and started growling at me. And that thing left and he was healed. Glory to God. But see that wasn't the man. He wasn't growling like a dog.
So, for he had said unto him come out of the man, you unclean spirit. He asked him, "What is thy name"? And he answered saying, "My name is Legions for we are many". And he besought him much that he would not send them away out of that country. That is a huge revelation. The devil had assigned him there. And it's obvious what his job was, to fight Jesus every step of the way. Now, there was now under the mountains, a great herd of swine feeding. Now, all the devils besought him.
Now, the people heard that conversation between Jesus and that devil. They didn't know he's a devil. They thought it was the man. And they were afraid of him anyway because he never slept. They thought he must be some kind of a God. He never sleeps. He just was around naked all the time. They were afraid of him. But then, that devil's power had been broken. So he was gone. Now Jesus had to deal with the legion, three to six thousand of them, that one unclean spirit, a ruler of the darkness of this world. So now we're dealing with principalities and powers. These are lower level devils than that one boss devil. So now there was there nigh unto the mountains a great herd of swine feeding. All the devils besought him saying, "Send us into the swine that we may enter into them".
This herd of pigs, roughly two thousand of them, this was also extremely frightening because that was... Those hogs were food for the Roman garrison that was stationed there. That could bring a lot of trouble. All of a sudden somebody calls two thousand hogs to run off out in the road, screaming and hollering, two thousand demon possessed hogs. Oh my goodness. My grandpa had a few of them, and they was nasty sounding things. Anyway, and forth with Jesus gave them leave, and the unclean spirits went out and entered the swine and the herd run violently down a steep place into the sea.
There were about two thousand, and they drowned in the sea. And they that fed the swine fled and told it in the city and in the country. And they went out to see what it was that was done. And they come to Jesus and they see him that was possessed with the devil and had the legion sitting and clothed and in his right mind. And they were afraid. And they that saw it told them how it befell to him that was possessed with the devil and also concerning the swine. And they began to pray him to depart out of their coast. And when he was come into the ship, he that had been possessed with the devil, prayed him, that he might be with him, but Jesus suffered him not but sayeth unto him, "Go home to your friends. Go home to your friends".
So he wasn't home. He lived somewhere else. And now we're going to see where. Go home to your friends and tell them how great things the Lord have done for thee, and hath had compassion on thee, and he departed and began to publish in Decapolis or the 10 surrounding cities, how great things Jesus had done for him and all men did marvel. Now we're talking about faith acts, faith plans, faith gets ready. Amen. I've mentioned this to you before, but keep this very alive in your teaching and preaching. They came to Jesus and see him that was possessed with the devil and had the Legion sitting and clothed and in his right mind. So where did those clothes come from?
Now, Jesus had to have prepared for that before they ever went over there. I mean this just, oh, and can't you just see him, and he gathers everybody together and he says, "Now here's what's going to happen. We're going over there. And there's a man over there that you've heard about. He's in terrible shape, but I'm going over there and the father's going to set him free". Now I'm going to call him to preach. And I can't send him home naked. So let's get him some really nice clothes. When he goes home, he needs to tell people what great compassion the Lord has had for him. But what good is he going to do if he goes home and tells that, and he's naked and nasty and all dirty and ugly and comes dragging home and said, "Look what Jesus did for me". No, I want him going home looking good. I want him to look good because he's going to start filling out again. He's going to... So we need to take a little time here. We're right here by the water lets just get him there in the water and clean him up and put these new suits on him. Glory. I got so excited when I saw that. I thought that's him.
Now listen, I remember I bought a fairly nice looking trench coat that came down to about here. It was white, but I got it at Railroad Salvage and it had big old black blotches on it. And I was preaching in Shawnee, Oklahoma and for Opal and Roy Sprague, in their church. And so, Opal washed that coat and washed it. She liked to got it all out. It looked good enough. I wore it. And back during that time, I had my britches split while I was preaching and I'm preaching prosperity. I didn't have a suit like this back there then. My britches split while I was preaching. So I just didn't turn around. I just kept backing up and walking sideways and kept preaching faith and prosperity. Got back to the hotel and sewed my britches up. Well, I've been in the army. I learned a little bit about sewing your clothes. I sewed them up and kept preaching. And then we're out of time and faith works, glory to God. Come on, give the Lord another praise for this whole week.