Kenneth Copeland - Enter Into God's Rest by Faith
— Hello everybody. I'm Kenneth Copeland. Let's have a word of prayer. We'll get right into today's Bible lesson. Father, we thank You today. We give You praise about this time, this special time, into which we have entered and we step into it by faith in God. And I'm asking You for insight, ideas, and concepts from heaven. We would like very much to have Your insights on what we're talking about and we pray it and ask it in the name of Jesus. Therefore, we consider it done. Amen. Praise God. Hallelujah. And this is professor Greg Stephens, our illustrious teacher and Bible scholar at Kenneth Copeland Bible College. Kenneth Copeland Bible, that still is...
— I like it.
— I do too. Well...
— Amen.
— My goodness. No, God's goodness. Now, take us back into last week and let's recap what we were talking about, especially concerning a Shmita year on the Jewish calendar. Now, we know that as born again believers, we have been grafted in, according to the Word and I'm totally convinced and have been for a long, long time, Greg, that the ministry stand since the very beginning concerning our support for the Jewish nation, the Jewish people, and the times that I've been there. The last time I was there was with Harry Jackson. God bless him, he's in heaven now, but, and I was standing up on top of a recording studio there and I was part of his broadcast and looking out and he pointed out certain things. I hadn't seen it from that perspective before. And I fell in love with that city again and our support of Aliyah.
— Which is bringing Jews back to their homeland.
— And in a lot of cases, supporting them for a year, financially, till they get on their feet.
— That's right.
— And more than one time. And that's brought the blessing of God on this ministry and it just, it's amazing.
— The Word said it would.
— Yes, it does.
— And so that's why you've done it. You didn't do it out of any other reason than that's what the Word said. And you've always based this ministry on, well, if it's in the Bible, that's what we do.
— That's what we do.
— And so that's why we do that. So I'm not trying to give a new doctrine or new something. I went off of this, your word from the Lord for 2022, the year of correction, direction, protection and perfection in the spirit, soul, and body, finances, churches and the government. I started looking at it and then started looking at this year. And I didn't look at 2022. I went to the Jewish year, 5782, and then began to look at it, and realized it's a Shmita year. A lot of people don't even know what that is. It's a Sabbath year. It literally means this: to release. Something is released in a Shmita year. It was a year of the Lord. The instructions were given to Moses, every Sabbath, seven days, there's a day of rest. And then every seven years, there's a year of rest in Israel where they don't plant the crops. Whatever grows naturally, grows naturally. They give the year a chance to rest. When they didn't do that, they got in trouble with the Lord. But as they did that, they were blessed. And so it's a Sabbath rest year. And so I began to look at that. What does that look like for us? And I broke down, you have to go back and look at it. I won't take the time here, broke down the numbers of the years and what they mean and all that, and shown how God has spoken through His Word concerning year. This is not something new. When the Lord gives you direction about something for the year, that's nothing new. That goes all the way back... early with the rabbis. So literally, it's a sabbatical rest for God's people this year.
— And we have to always...
— And they fail to do it. -... have to always, always, constantly remind yourself that all of this, this is a book of covenants. It's not a book of testaments. It's a book of covenants. And then the word covenant is used all the way throughout. For instance, you go to the last and most important, Seder meal between heaven and earth. It changed everything. What did Jesus say? He shocked that group of Orthodox Jews when he picked up Messiah's cup...
— And made it his own.
— Yes. He picked us up.
— This is my blood.
— He said, "This is the new covenant".
— That's right.
— And my blood.
— And he's making it right then. There were Four Cups at the Seder meal and he picked that one up, a Cup of Redemption and offered it as himself. Same thing he did with the matzo, with the bread. There's three pieces in there and they represent The Patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. You always take Jacob, break Jacob, hide Jacob. Well, Jacob, I'm sorry. Not Jacob. Let me get that right. Isaac.
— Isaac.
— Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. You break Isaac. Thank you for correcting me, Laura. And Isaac was broken on the altar with Abraham as a type and a shadow what was...
— Well, sure he was because the Lord... Now here, and listen, this is important. Knowing what was coming, because this was a plan before the foundation of the world, knowing what was coming. He asked his covenant partner, Abraham, to offer up his only begotten son on the altar.
— That's right. The son who you love is what the scripture said.
— Yeah. He so trusted his father, Abraham. And finally he said, "Father, where is the sacrifice"? Well, he fully, you go again to the book of Hebrews and it said, "He received him raised from the dead, in a figure. He had a vision of it and saw it". He raised that knife. He fully intended for God to raise him up out of those ashes because he was totally and completely persuaded that God could not lie. And he had a blood covenant.
— An Angel had to stop his arm...
— Angel had to stop it.
— Because he was on his way to do it. Isaac...
— Now that's a type of Jesus. We know that.
— Absolutely right.
— So now once, once God's covenant partner was willing to do that, then the day would come when Jesus would cry out, "If it be possible, take this cup for me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours be done". He could do no less because he was in covenant with that man and he offered his son. He had to go through with it.
— Now, Abraham had other children. He had one before, he had other after. But Isaac is his covenant son. That's the promised one, that's the covenant of him and Sarah. That's the child from her. And so now all the others have been blessed because of faithful Abraham, to this day. But that was the one. And that's the one that Jesus comes through. And so God's only begotten love beloved of the Father. Then he gave his life. He is the...
— So there's no way God could back out of that. Neither could Jesus.
— And here's the point. Once God said something, you told a story a few weeks back of your father. As soon as Mr. Copeland said something, he had to do it. If he said he was going to spank you, then he was true to his Word to do it. Once God commits himself to something, like if your blesses are I'll bless you. If you bless the Jewish people, I'll bless you. Then he's committed to do that. Even if they don't obey him with a Shmita year, then he's committed to do what he said he is going to do. Well, okay. I'm going to let these things happen to you in that regard. So now in Christ, Jesus though, things have been fulfilled. And so we know that this is a natural Shmita year, which is a release year. It's a sabbatical year. It's a year where there's a hedge of protection around God's people, even though craziness will be happening in the world, we'll be all right if we'll enter into that rest, now it takes faith to do that, because the children of Israel with Moses never could enter into that rest. You find it over in the book of Hebrews, but we're not going to be like them this year.
— No.
— Or any year. We're in Christ. He's the Lord of the harvest. And so every year in a way is a Shmita year for us. Every year is a Jubilee year for us. It just happens to fall on the calendar this year.
— And Jesus is our Jubilee.
— Oh, absolutely.
— Now, explain the Jubilee year because we have people that don't know what that is.
— After seven cycles of seven years of Shmita years, there's a year of Jubilee and the year of Jubilee, well, Jesus proclaimed it that day in the synagogue and Nazareth as his custom was on the Sabbath, they went and read. He took the book of Isaiah, "Spirit of the Lord is upon me, he has anointed me". Well he's declaring a year of Jubilee right there that he...
— The acceptable year of the Lord.
— The acceptable year of the Lord. All debts are released. If you're a slave, you're freed. And it's the 50th year. All of it's done. Well, he did that. He released us of our debt. We were married to a system that was against us. There was no way we could be righteous in ourselves. We needed a savior. And so he did that. We're now married to him. We've been divorced from that old system.
— That's right. You can find that in a Book of Colossians, the first two chapters, especially.
— Right. So we're dead. That's why I have an arrow in my Bible. I've spent so much time studying that first part. I point that arrow to remind me that I live on this side of what he's already done for us. But he's released the debt. I'm no longer a slave to sin. I've been set free. He dealt with sin.
— I am so convinced that the United States is a type of Israel. Here was a people that wanted to worship God. And they were under a terrible government that didn't want to let them go.
— That's right.
— And they left.
— They saw it as an Exodus and a New Jerusalem.
— Yes they did. And they began to name their cities and so forth after that and made the Exodus to the new land and they covenanted with God. At the very beginning, the Mayflower covenant. And then the great covenant there, where Virginia Beach is now, in Virginia. And they erected a cross, knowing that they would never get back to England again and gave themselves totally. And they dedicated this land to the Lord, Jesus Christ and the preaching of his Gospel.
— And they didn't steal land in Plymouth. They bought it.
— They bought it.
— From the Indians. They respected them. It's not like what's being taught nowadays, because they were trying to rewrite our covenant history. This is why you have to put yourself in remembrance of these things. That's what Abraham did. It's what Sarah did. Sarah herself received strength to conceived. She judged him faithful in the promise. She went back and put herself in remembrance.
— Well they haven't studied the Native American and the different tribes had different ideas.
— Yes they did.
— I'll point out that Sitting Bull would go up on top of a hill and he would pray to the Forever Spirit. He didn't know his name, but he prayed to the Forever Spirit. And he said, "Because of you and because of your protection, no enemy can kill me".
— Praise God.
— And there's one...
— Well that's on Paul on Mars Hill, isn't it?
— It's the same thing.
— It's exactly the same.
— There was a time when there was some soldiers that had him pinned down and then they were shooting at him. He walked out from behind the cover and sat down out there on a stump or a rock. I don't remember which one. And loaded his pipe and smoked it. And the bullets just going in every direction and he got up and walked away, because of his faith in the Forever Spirit.
— There you go.
— Now, an enemy didn't kill him. It was a member of his own tribe. But I just want to point out, the people that talk about the Native Americans, they don't know their history.
— Probably never met one in their lives.
— No.
— Anyway, I shouldn't have said that, but the cities that they named, the mountains that they named, all had biblical names and it wasn't just on the East Coast. As they came West, they did the same thing. They continued to name everything. One of the founding fathers, matter of fact, they wanted to make a homeland for the Jews in America.
— You know the mountains named Sangre de Cristo Mountains? Blood of Jesus Mountains.
— There you go.
— They're strong.
— There you go. Well, California, the mission.
— Yes.
— They set missions one day's walk apart from each other.
— Yes.
— All the way up there. One of the founding fathers said, "No, we can't build a homeland in America for the Jews. It has to be in Judea". And I believe it was Adams who said that, but that was a strong movement, "Well, let's bring the Jews here and give them a homeland. Let's get them out of Europe and bring them". And they said, "No, it's got to be..". They knew enough of the Bible to know, "No. Jerusalem is the capital, it has to be there. We can't make Jerusalem here". And so that's what the Shmita was all about. When they didn't honor the land and the city and their covenant with God, they got in trouble for it. But we're not going to be that. They couldn't do it because, Brother Copeland, they didn't do it by faith.
— Well, that's the key to everything.
— They didn't enter in the land...
— Two things. You always start with love because God is love. And right there in the Book of Galatians, "Faith works by love". How much time do we have, Carol?
— Nine minutes.
— Okay, I'll introduce this. Let's go to the Book of Hebrews. Now, let's go here. We start out here in the third and the fourth chapters. And you have to go back to the bottom here of the third. "But with whom was he grieved for 40 years? Was it not with them that had sinned whose carcasses fell in the wilderness? And to whom swear he, that they should not enter into his rest, but to them that believed not? So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief. Let us therefore fear, lest a promise being left us of entering into his rest any of you should seem to come short of it for unto us was the gospel preached as well as unto them. But the Word preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith with them and then that heard it". Now, this is a letter and as you move, it has divisions. As you move through the fifth chapter and you'll find in the fifth chapter, the mission statement of Kenneth Copeland Ministries. Now, you come down into the sixth, our mission statement is right here in the 12th and 13th and 14th verses of the fifth chapter, to bring believers from milk to meat.
— Yes, sir.
— Being strong meat belongs to them of full age, even who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil to come to maturity in the word of righteousness... Now, it divides right here. "Then, therefore leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on to maturity". And here's the principle doctrines of Christ. And the laying on of hands is right in the middle of it. So these are sacred, very sacred things. These are the principle teachings of Jesus.
— This is the doctrines of the New Testament Church.
— Yes, it is.
— This is what we're supposed to be built on right there.
— And that's what we're supposed to be doing.
— Right there. Yes, sir.
— That's borne out what Jesus said in the last chapter of the Book of Mark. So now as you flow through here, then you begin to learn the difference between the blood of animals and the precious blood of Jesus, where the covenants are ratified. Then as you flow on through, oh, verse 14 of the ninth chapter, "How much more shall the blood of Christ who through the eternal spirit offered himself without spot purge your conscience from dead works, serve the living God". So you should not have anymore sin in consciousness.
— That's right.
— Okay. Now, you just keep going and you come into this 10th chapter in verse 38. "Now the just shall live by faith. But if any man draw back, my soul will have no pleasure in him, but we are not of them who draw back under perdition, but of them that believe in the saving of the soul. Now," makes a break right there. A big now. "Now faith".
— Yes. Yeah.
— So let's get this in the Classic Amplified Translation. Now, you'll see it on the screen. If you don't have a copy of that, get it some way. "Now, faith is the confirmation, title deed of the things we hope for. Hope is future". Hope is powerful thing, but faith is now. You have to get in the Word, you have to study, you have to hear people preach and teach faith. And I've had people say, "Why do you just teach faith all the time"? That's what I'm called to do. And I heard the Lord say this to me, "You are a faith specialist". Oral Roberts was a healing and miracle specialist. That's what God called him to do. Kenneth Hagin was a faith specialist. He heard the audible voice of God say, "I have taught you faith through experience and man the word. Now, you go teach my people faith".
— Others are worship specialists.
— That's right. Oh.
— And that's just as much a calling as...
— Absolutely there are people that are called to bring the glory of God down. I'm thinking about Michael Koulianos.
— Absolutely.
— And that entire group. And I've sat with him and talked to him and he's just hungry to know more about faith so he can enter it into what he's called to do in the glory of God. But here it is, just spelled out. "Now faith is the assurance, the confirmation, the title 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". "Faith perceiving as real fact. What is not revealed to the senses by faith, trust and holy fervor, born of faith, the men of old had divine testimony. Borne to them and obtained a good report. By faith, we understand the worlds during successive ages were framed, fashioned, put in order and equipped for their intended purpose by the Word of God because He spoke it".
— Yes he did.
— It was not made out of nothing. It was made out of faith. Amen. "Prompted, actuated by faith, Able brought God a more, better, acceptable sacrifice than Cain because of which it was testified of him, that he was righteous, that he was upright and in right standing with God and God bore witness by accepting and acknowledging his gifts. And though he died, yet through the incident, he is still speaking". And then there's, "Because of faith, Enoch was caught up and transferred to heaven even that he did not have a glimpse of death. He was not found because God translated him. For even before he was taken to heaven, he received testimony still on the record that he had pleased and been satisfactory to God. But without faith, it is impossible to please Him and be satisfactory to Him. For whoever would come near to God must necessarily believe that God exists. And that He is the rewarder of those who earnestly and diligently seek him out. Prompted by faith Noah".
— Enoch was the first rapture.
— Yes, it was.
— That's the first rapture.
— That's right. It's right before Noah. Now he introduced it. The gospel preached, the promises preached, not mixed with faith don't work.
— That's right.
— You have to mix it. And then the apostle Paul also wrote in the 10th chapter of Romans. "So now, faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God".
— In the Greek, it says, "Hearing by the word of Christos".
— Yes. Christ
— Well, the Word made flesh.
— Yes.
— Who framed the world.
— Yes.
— Now faith is, I like that. Now, God is always in the now.
— Yes he is.
— Even if he went to the future, it's now. Even he goes to the past, he's now. It's now. It's in the present. He is El Emunah in the Hebrew. He is the faithful God.
— Praise God.
— It's how you would say it.
— And we're out of time. Praise God.
— How did you do that?
— We'll be back in just a few moments. Give the Lord a praise. Glory to God.