Kenneth Copeland - Faith-Filled Prayers Change Everything
— Hello, everybody. We're Kenneth and Gloria Copeland. And as of this taping, today is the 14th of April. Yesterday, the 13th of April, was Gloria and my 60th wedding anniversary. Praise the Lord.
— Congratulations.
— Yeah, thank you very much.
— We made it, we made it.
— Made it. Glory to God. And it's amazing what the Lord has done in all these years. We went together for six months, and then six months later both of us were born again, and then three months after that, both of us filled with the Holy Spirit. And as they say, the rest is history. Glory to God.
— That was a good thing.
— We're going to be talking about prayer. And we will get involved with what Jesus said during the last Passover meal, what's been termed as the Last Supper. It really wasn't the last supper, it was just the last of its kind, and it changed heaven and earth forever. Because only hours after, Jesus went to the cross. Now it was a high Sabbath, so it began on Wednesday and not on Friday. You remember Jesus said, "As Jonah was in the belly of the whale three days and three nights, so shall the Son of man be in the heart of the earth three days and three nights". Now John makes note of this and that it was a high day. So, first of all, I want to read this right here from the book of Numbers. Now listen to this. God is not a man that he should lie. Neither the Son of man that he should repent. Listen to this. Hath he said, and shall he not do it? Or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good? I say it over and over and over and over and over again, this is a book of covenants. It's not just the Old Testament and the New Testament. And like somebody said, "Well, it's just a bunch of old white men". No. No, that's not true.
— We're not so old, are we?
— We're not talking about us. Anyway. Well, we're started on that. We started being old, anyway. Anyway, this is a book of covenants. It's called God's Word because it is His bond. This is the Word of God. It does not contain the truth, it is truth. Because God is not a man that he should lie. Jesus, a man in the image of God, and he could not lie. Jesus could have. It's impossible for God to lie as a spirit, but Jesus could have, but he didn't. And let me remind you of something else. The first covenant is called the law and the prophets. There had to be a law. When Cain killed Abel, his brother, there was no law against it. So, there had to be a law. And this established the law right and wrong. And it's right. What God says is right. And people try to twist it around to meet their ideas and so forth. But Gloria and I made the decision that Kenneth E. Hagin in one of his seminars made this statement, "All of you who would like to make the Word of God final authority in their life, please stand". Gloria and I jumped to our feet. And we realized the problem that most Christians have is not making this final authority in their lives.
— Because that's the answer to everything's answer. It's in there. The answer is in that book.
— It is. That's what it is, a book of answers. It's a book of corrections and directions and protections and perfections.
— Worked for us for a lot of years.
— Oh my, yes. When we found out that this book can be trusted, it can be trusted as a very highly trusted friend, as a highly trusted attorney or doctor. The Bible says there is a Friend that sticks...
— I just thought of something. You have to trust that friend. You have to know him.
— Yes, you do, Gloria.
— And that's why most people fail. They don't know the truth. They don't know what God said. They don't know about Him. They don't spend time with Him. How are you going to know Him?
— They don't have a personal relationship with Him. That's true. It's true. And by not realizing that God had this book written for all people of all time of all languages.
— That's right.
— And it is amazing. You hear testimonies in all different tribes and tongues. But it all always does the same thing. If people will allow it to enter into the heart, and then renew the mind, and then fill your mouth, things change. Faith in God changes things. So, now let's go over here in the gospel of John. The 13th, 14th, 15th, 16th, 17th chapters of John all take place in the middle of the night. The last Passover meal, the last Seder meal before Jesus would go to the cross. And in this, in the 13th chapter of John. Now before the feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that his hour was come, that he should depart out of this world unto the Father. Having loved his own which were in the world, he loved them until the end. And supper being ended, the devil having now put into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon's son, to betray him. Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he was come from God and went to God. He riseth from supper, laid aside his garments, took a towel and girded himself. After that, he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples' feet and to wipe them with the towel wherein it was girded. He washed Judas' feet. He gave Judas every opportunity to repent, but he didn't. Now I want you to notice. The covenant word friend. We talk about friends. We talk about a best friend and so forth. But the Bible said there is a Friend, with a capital F, that sticks closer than a brother. That's a covenant friend. That's someone that between two persons there is blood. And a blood covenant is the most powerful agreement known to the human race. For instance, and the first covenant in the 15th chapter of Genesis, a covenant was made with God and Abram in the blood of animals. And he walked in the blood in the night. Ain't that amazing? God walked in the blood and said, "So shall thy seed be". Then in the 17th chapter of Genesis, God appeared to Abram when Abram was... he was 99. He was about a hundred years old. And he said, "My covenant is between me and thee. As for Me". So, Abram did not... he was not pressed to agree to the contract of this covenant. But God said, "As for Me". And then he laid the covenant down, and he changed his name. A covenant had been entered. He said, "Your name will no longer be Abram, but Abraham". The H in the middle of Abram's name in Hebrew is Hashem, which is the name. So, now the first recorded name change based on a covenant. And we still do it today. A marriage is a covenant. And at that marriage, there's a name change. On about 8:00 in the evening in Friday the 13th of April, Joe Stewart changed your name. You walked in there Gloria Jean Neece.
— Yeah, that's right.
— You walked out on our way to Hot Springs that night, you walked out Gloria Jean Copeland.
— Now you had to pay my bills.
— Yeah, that's right. Gladly, girl. And it took a while before I had money enough to pay them.
— I noticed that.
— I told Gloria when the Lord led us to go to Oral Roberts University, I said, "Gloria, we got these two little children. We get up there, we'll starve out". She said, "Kenneth, we're starving now. We might as well starve in the will of God". Praise God. But this book and the prosperity covenanted in this book changed that.
— It sure worked.
— It sure did work, glory to God.
— Still working.
— It changed that, and it's still changing it. The finances of this ministry are still growing and growing and growing. Glory to God. 2020 was a record year financially. Well, actually 2019, 2020, and then 2021 broke all the records, and 2022's ahead of that. Glory to God. And it's all cause of this book and what we learned from Kenneth Hagin and Oral Roberts and T.L. Osborn and TL Lowery and Rex Humbard.
— You could tell we listened to everybody.
— We did. Glory to God.
— And it worked.
— Oh, absolutely. And it has worked. And those great men of faith now are among the great cloud of witnesses. Glory to God. Now I want us to pay very, very careful attention to the words of Jesus particularly in this. Now Jesus made a point of seeing to it that Judas got out of that room. That spirit of the devil entered into him, and Jesus knew it, and he had to get him out of there. And Jesus in the 26 verse of 13 chapter, then John said, "Who is it, Lord"? Jesus answered, "He it is to whom I shall give a sop, when I have dipped it". And when he had dipped the sop, he gave it to Judas Iscariot, son of Simon. After the sop, Satan entered into him. Then said Jesus under him, "What you do, do quickly". In other words, get out of here. Now no man at the table knew from what intent he spoke this unto him. For some of them thought, because Judas had the bag, that Jesus had said to him, "Buy those things that we have need against the feast," or that he should give something to the poor. Gloria, you would have to have an outstanding reputation for giving to the poor. Amen. If you woke Judas up in the middle of the night and had a poor widow over there, Simon said, "I want you to go over there and give her a certain amount of money". Now that totally belays the idea that Jesus and all of his disciples were poor. Poor people don't need a treasure in the first place. And to have that kind of reputation meant, and if you read the eighth chapter of the book of Luke, he had very wealthy women that were following him and many others.
— Oh, that's like me... Following you.
— That ministered substance to him. They were his partners. They traveled with him. Praise God. But now here we are. So, Judas is gone. When he was gone out... Now listen to how Jesus put this.
— Tell us where you are.
— I'm in the 13th chapter of John at the 31st verse.
— John.
— Therefore, when he was gone out, Jesus said, "Now the Son of man is glorified, and God is glorified in him. If he be glorified in him, God shall also glorify Himself, and shall straightway glorify him immediately. Little children, yet a little while I'm with you. You shall seek me, and as I said to the Jews, 'Where I go, you cannot come,' so now I say to you. A new commandment I give you, that you love one another, as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this shall all men know that you're my disciples, if you have love for one another". Now that's our commandment. That is our commandment. Well, yeah, but...
— And it's supposed to be our reputation.
— Yes, it is. And, well, Brother Copeland, what about thou shall not steal? If you love, you don't steal what somebody has.
— No.
— If you love, you don't kill. It covers all of the commandments. And the Apostle Paul said, "If there be any other commandment, it is covered by love your neighbor as yourself". There was a man came to him tempting him. He said, "What is the greatest commandment"? Jesus said, "Love the Lord thy God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, all your strength. Love your neighbor as yourself, fulfilling all the law and the prophets". That fulfills it all. So, that's a great teaching right there. Simon Peter said, "Lord, where are you going"? Jesus answered, "Where I go, you can't follow me now, but you shall follow me afterwards". Peter said, "Lord, why can't I follow you now"? I mean, Peter wanted to know. He wants to know everything. Good for him. And I want to get down. I want to go on down. Well, Jesus said, "Will you lay down your life for my sake? Verily, verily, I say unto you, the cock shall not crow until you've denied me thrice," or three times. Now look at, look at the beginning of the 14th chapter now. All of this is all right there together. It's just right in that precious moment. Let not your heart be troubled. You... Every human being has command and control over your inner being. Most people, now I'm talking to the church right now, to born again people, don't realize that. It was a long time before I began to realize that I have authority over my own heart. He said don't let it be troubled. Well, that's a command from Jesus. Don't do that. Don't allow trouble to stir you up. Don't allow worry and concern and all. Just say, no, no, I'm not touching that. I don't let my heart be troubled. Neither do I let it be afraid. Why? You believe in God, believe also in me. That's the answer to that. You believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father's house or many mansions, many dwelling places. If it were not so, I would've told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go to prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you under myself that where I am, you may be also. I will come again, so he is coming again. And this is the season of the resurrection. Glory to God. To me, it's not Easter. It's resurrection day.
— Amen.
— Actually, the egg being involved in resurrection comes from the Seder meal where an egg is used anyway. Now in the sixth verse, Jesus said... Now you remember God said, "I am"? Jesus said, "I am. I am the way". He is the way. "I am the truth". He is the truth. "I am the life. And no man or no person comes to the Father but by me". Now I got us into a really bad deal. Well, the deal wasn't all that bad, but it just didn't work out. It was an insulation business that was... it was really good. But the product, the railroad car full of product, just kept going through Little Rock. And by the time we got the product in, Gloria and I didn't have any money.
— We didn't have any money when we started.
— Well, and you quit your job cause of this big... The reason Harvey invited me in on it because of my sales experience, and I had sold a lot of it.
— Yeah, you did.
— But the product wasn't there. So, I'm out looking for a new job. Gloria is at home in this three bedroom home that we bought on a lease purchase deal because of this product that I had sold, and it didn't happen. And so, we had a rented rollaway bed. I was hunting a job, and Gloria was at home. And my mother and dad, now we ever told them anything. Gloria and I agreed together when we got married, we're not going to our parents or anybody else. We're in this thing together. Glory to God. And they sent us a 25-pound sack of potatoes. I know it was the Lord. We wouldn't have anything to eat if it hadn't been for that. Gloria was boiling potatoes in the coffee pot. Anyway. While I was out hunting a job, she picked up a Bible my mother had sent me. And there was an inscription in there that said seek ye first the kingdom of God and all these things. And Gloria said, "I certainly do need things".
— I did.
— And she just said, "Lord, take my life and do something with it," and He did.
— He won't turn you down.
— No, no, no, no.
— Hallelujah.
— And the Lord blessed me with a new job, and I'll tell you about it tomorrow. We're out of time, so praise God. Don't go away. We'll be right back.