Kenneth Copeland - When Your Faith Isn't Working
Hello, everybody. Friday is here and so are we. This is The Believer's Voice of Victory broadcast. This is Kenneth Copeland Bible College. This is the student body, and today is a day of faith. Hallelujah. So give the Lord praise. All last week we had a faith review. For the benefit of the radio and television audience, when we talk about faith, we're talking about the Word of Faith. We're talking about the spiritual force of faith, which I will go to Hebrews chapter 1 in the Classic Amplified, and we will see or Hebrews chapter 11 verse 1. Now here is a working definition. In fact, Hebrews chapter 11 is the faith hall of fame. By faith, by faith, by faith, by faith.
Now, what do we mean by faith? Now faith is the assurance, the confirmation, the titled deed of the things we hope for, being the proof of things we do not see and the conviction of their reality, faith perceiving as real fact what's not revealed to the senses. You could have someone call you and say, well, I had Carolyn Savelle's dad call me one day, and he said, "Kenneth, Mary and I have been praying for you and your ministry. And the Lord said something to us about an airplane. You believing for an airplane"? I said, "Yes, sir. I am". Well he said, "I'm sending you money for an airplane". I said, "Olin, how much is it"? And he told me. Now, the airplane was $9,000, little red single engine Cessna Skylane, $9,000. I already had $5,000, and I had just come from the airport and Pappy Spinks who owned the airport and the airplane, I used to work for him. And the Lord dropped that into my spirit, and so I went out there and handed him that $5,000. I'd been believing for that for days and weeks. And I said, "I'm not going to fly that airplane until, I don't borrow money". Okay. But, I said, "I'll get the rest of it. The Lord will get it for me".
So I walked out the door, started out the door, and I turned around. I said, "Pappy". Now see, I'm saying it. He didn't know it. I said, "The Lord will get me the rest of that money". "Well, do you have any idea when"? I said, "No, sir, but I'll let you know". I drove home, which is 15 minutes. A note, Gloria said, "Call Olin Creech". I called him. The airplane was $9,000. I gave Pappy $5,000. Olin said, "I put a check in the mail yesterday". I said, "How much for"? He said, "$3,500". So add that together, 5000 and 3500. I just happened to have $500. That airplane was mine. That airplane was mine. I didn't even have the title yet. And it was mine.
Did you see title deed? Faith is the title deed. Somebody could call you and tell you, the Lord has instructed me to give you our car. Gloria, we have a new car. Really? Yes, we have it. It's ours. I don't have the title yet, but I believe the person said it. And I have, I own that car. I have title deed to it before I ever have the title, in my hand. That's faith. That's faith. I have the title deed to my healing before anybody ever pronounces me well. I told you already about being healed of that little skin cancer on my hand, I had that before Pastor George ever anointed me with oil. Amen. I knew it. They didn't have to tell me that. And the moment he touched my hand with that, oh, it was a shock. Electricity went through me and then I laughed I got it, praise God, it's mine. And sure enough, there was no cancer in there. They just sewed it up. Praise God.
Now then, let's go back where we were, in first John. Whosoever meanth me, whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God. And everyone that loveth him that begot, loveth him also that is begotten by him. By this we know we love the children of God when we love God and keep his commandments for this is the love of God. One translation says for this is loving God that we keep his commandments. Well, let's go to John 14. Now we're back at the covenant meal. We'll go to John 14. This is one of my, this is right in the 13th chapter we get the new commandment of love, 34th and 35th verses. Then you come across to the 14th chapter, the 21st verse, are you there? "He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and I will manifest myself to him".
There's no one in this room that does not want Jesus to manifest himself to us. Amen. I'm more interested in what he has to say than what he looks like. But if you tell someone I had a vision I saw Jesus, 9 out of 10 are going to say, what does he look like? No. What did he say? Then we can talk about what he looks like. Did you ever think about what it means that I like you? That literally means I want to be like you. I like you. I want to be like you. I don't like you. I don't want to be like you. I like Jesus. And he likes me. He told me one time. He said, I love you, Ken. I don't like you very much. I said, Lord, why? You know, here in my spirit. He said, you're too high tempered. He said, I can't enlarge your ministry in a photo mirror. I said, Lord, I don't understand. He said, well you're too high tempered. He said, somebody criticizes you and it makes you mad.
Well, it hadn't been but a little while before that, some man walked up to me with a big smile on his face. And he said, I've never seen, I've never heard, seen or heard anybody rape the scriptures like you did tonight. And he turned around and walked off. With a smile on his face he said that. Well he probably forgot that, but I didn't. Now first I wanted to hit him. And then I wanted to cry, you know what I mean, and it just go over and over and over in my thinking, then I, all the things I wish I'd have said, I'll tell you what, I'll give you a piece of my mind. Now wait a minute. You may not have many pieces left. He said, if you want my will for you, don't ever read about yourself in print again. Not ever again, ever. Tell your staff to never bring you anything in print about you. Good or bad. He said the bad stuff is too hard to get rid of. Don't read books, anybody writes about you good or bad. Don't do it.
And he said, you don't even try to get rid of the good stuff and sometimes that's more dangerous than the other. It changed my entire life. There's been all kinds of things, all kinds of silly little books. And if you want some nasty books written about you, I can tell you how to do it. Prosper financially and get you an airplane. Here it comes, I mean. And then you get the second airplane and they come out of the woodwork. Then you get a fleet of airplanes. But there are things that have happened that would not have happened, had we not had the aircraft to take care of the job? I mean, powerful things. Praise God.
I won't take time to go into that. But he that has my commandments and keeps them he it is that loves me. Well I love you Jesus. Well, did you do what I told you to do? No I just couldn't work it out. Well no, you don't love him enough to go ahead and do what he told you to do. And if things are not working in your life quite right, and your faith's not working like you think it should, go back to the last thing he told you to do and meditate on that and take care of that. In other words clean up. Go take a spiritual bath and then come back. Did you know the name was so important to the scribes that every time they wrote that name that they would not pronounce, they would go bathe before they wrote it. If they wrote it five times, they bathed five times before they would write that name. Now, when his name becomes that precious to you and me, his name is the name of every name that's named in heaven, earth and in hell. Hallelujah, and every knee bow and every tongue confess that he is Lord He is Lord. Thank You, Jesus.
So, and this I'm a whosoever, who is he? Verse four, whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world. Now found out I'm a whosoever. Now I'm a whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world. And this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith. That powerful force, it will overcome the whole world in your life. All that's around you, everything that happens, glory to God, you go to sleep at night with praising God. Don't just flop over there and start sleeping. Every night. Now, Brother Hagin before he would go to sleep, he would read something about healing. He had to have healing to live. I didn't, I've been healthy all my life.
Now the devil's tried to kill me. I got snake bit when I was just a little boy, just not quite obedient to my mother. We were in Oklahoma, up in the cooks and hills. My dad gone up there, gone fishing and I've told you this before. And I was a little boy. I mean, if there was water, I wanted to jump in it and we'd just drive down the road. And the bar ditch be full of water. I'd say, daddy stop I want to jump in that ditch. Well, don't you go diving in there. You don't know what's under the water. And he just stopped. And let me swim in the mud hole. Well the water very clear up around the edge of the river. And there's shale bed there I had on my bathing suit. And obeyed, I didn't get out in that river cause the river was running pretty fast.
So I went out there just to play in that water. And I felt something and that rolled over and there was a snake went out like that. Well, I did what you should never do. I ran to the back door of that cabin and I hollered it mother and she came there and that's all I remember. I just passed out in her arms. Then my dad got in. And so I was just in the bed, just sweat pouring out of me, fever high. My dad ran up to the desk and asked if there was a doctor. And he said, "Copeland the nearest doctor is miles away". But he said, "There's an Indian doctor that lives right up the road here". and he said, he's a good doctor. He said, he takes care of all of the people that work in the power plant and all that. He said he is good doctor.
So dad said, call him. He came in. When he walked in the door, he said that boy snake bit. He could smell it. I remember just little things I had to wake up and go out. And he said well, all you can do is just keep him cool. Because it's gone so far now that he said, there's really not anything I can do. Well, of course, you know what my mother did. I mean, she just like she would say, just hit it in prayer. This was back before she and my dad had received the baptism of the spirit. But that didn't mean anything. She prayed night and day. And so she just went to praying. And I remember waking up and she would take the sheets. She took the sheets off the bed and put the shower curtain out of the bathroom, underneath the sheet to protect the mattress. But I mean, couple of three days I was all right. So the devil tried his best, but his best wasn't good enough. Hallelujah. Why? Because of faith in God, starting with my mother. She just wouldn't quit. Glory to God.
Now, this is the victory that overcomes the world. Even our faith. Now first Corinthians. Glory to God. Chapter 15, oh the victory chapter, my, my, my. Verse 39 of 14, where for brethren covet to prophesy and forbid not to speak with tongues, that all things be done decently and in all order more over brethren I declare under you the gospel which I preached under you which also you have received and where in you stand, do you stand in that gospel? Yes we do. By which all soul you saved if you keep in memory, what I preached under you unless you have believed in vain. For I delivered under you first of all, that which I also received how Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures. And that he was buried and that he arose again the third day, according to the scriptures that he was seen of Cephas then of the 12, after that he was seen of above 500 brethren at once of whom the greater part remain under this present. But some have fallen asleep.
After that he was seen of James, then all of the apostles and the last of all he was seen of me also as one born out of due time for, I am the least of the apostles that am not meant to be called an apostle because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God, I am what I am. And his grace was bestowed upon me. He was not in vain, but I labored more abundantly than they all. Yet not I but the grace of God, which was with me. Therefore, whether it were I or they, so we preach, and so we believed. Now if Christ be preached that he arose from the dead, how say many, some among you, that there is no resurrection of the dead, but if there be no resurrection of the dead, then Christ is not risen. But if Christ be not risen, then our preaching is in vain. And your faith is also in vain. Yea we all and we are found false witnesses of God because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ, whom he raised not up.
If so be that if the dead rise not then is Christ raised, is not Christ raised. If Christ be not raised, your faith is in vain. You are yet in your sins. They also, which are falling asleep in Christ are perished. If, in this life only we have of hope in Christ we are of all men most miserable. But now as Christ risen from the dead and become the first fruits of them that slept for since by a man came death by man also came the resurrection of the dead for his Adam and Adam all die, even so in Christ, shall they be made alive. Every man in his own order Christ the first fruits afterward, they that are in Christ at his coming, then cometh the end. When he shall have delivered up the Kingdom to God, even the Father when he shall have put away all rule and all authority and power. For he must reign till he hath put all enemies under his feet. The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death, but he hath the last one.
Death, we're talking about life and death. For he has put all things under his feet, but when he sayeth all things are put under him, it is manifest that he has expected which did put all things under him. And when all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall a son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be all in all. Now we could keep on reading and you need to read all of that. Go to the 33. Be not deceived, evil communications corrupt good manner. Awake under righteousness and sin not.
For some have not the knowledge of God. I speak this to your shame, but some man will say, how are the dead raised up with what body do they come. Thou fool, that which thou sowest is not quickened unless it die and that which thou sowest is not the body that shall be but bare grain, by chance of wheat or of some other grain. But God giveth it a body that has pleased him. Verse 42, so is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption and raised in incorruption. Sown in dishonor, it's raised in glory. It's sown in weakness, raised in power. It is sown a natural body. It is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body and there's a spiritual body. And so it has written the first man Adam was made a living soul the last Adam was made a quickening spirit or a live giving spirit. However, that was not first which was spiritual, but that which is natural. And after that which is spiritual, the first man is of the earth and earth of the second man is the Lord from heaven.
And as the earth of which there and so forth and so on and come on down, come on down. For this corruptible must put on incorruption. This mortal must put on immortality. And though this corruptible shall have put on incorruptible and this mortal shall have put on immortality then shall be brought to pass. The saying that is written. Death is swallowed up in victory. My God, the sting of death is sin. The strength of sin is the law. Thanks, be the God, which has given us the victory over death through our Lord Jesus Christ. We have victory over life. We have victory over death. We have victory over sin. We have the victory over sickness and disease. We have victory. We have victory. We're here for a reason, glory to God. This is called the Victory Channel. That's the reason it's the victory. That's the reason it's a Bible college that majors in victory, glory. We are not the victims, we are the victor. Glory be to God forever more. Give him praise and honor we're out of time, but praise God. Praise him and praise him and worship him and praise him and praise him.