Kenneth Copeland - How To Receive Eternal Life
Open your Bibles with me, please to the 10th chapter of the book of Mark. Mark, chapter ten. And we'll come down to verse 17. "And when he was gone forth into the way, there came one running," running up here, "running and kneeled to him, and asked him, Good Master, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life"? Now there's the question, so repeat that. What shall I do to inherit eternal life? That was his question. All right. "Jesus said unto him, 'Why callest thou me good? there is none good but one, that is, God. Thou knowest the commandments, Do not commit adultery, Do not kill, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Defraud not, Honour your father and your mother.' And he answered and said unto him, 'Master, all these have I observed from my youth.' Jesus beholding him loved him, and said unto him, 'One thing you lack.'"
One thing. I mean, that's pretty good. I never have come to him. And he said, "Kenneth, there is only one thing you lack". I've heard him say, "Now Kenneth you need to do this. You need to do this". One thing, "Go your way, sell whatsoever you have, and give to the poor, and you shall have treasure in heaven: come, take up the cross, and follow me". Now, let's look at this for a minute. One thing you like. One thing. Go your way, or you go do this now. Sell whatever you have and give to the poor. Thou shalt have treasure in heaven. Come take up the cross and follow me. Hmm. Mm hmm. And he was sad at that saying, and he went away, grieved for he had great possessions. Jesus looked around about and said to his disciples, How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the kingdom of God! And the disciples were astonished at his words.
Now poor people wouldn't have been astonished at that and said, "Well, you know, that's the way them rich cats are. And, you know, they need to just dump everything like we have and go along and be poor with Jesus". That's what the general Christian public thinks. That couldn't be... That is so far from the truth. Now watch this. And he said how hard it is... Now listen for them that trust... Trust in it. So now we see this young man's problem. "Trust in riches to enter into the Kingdom of God. It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man who trusts in riches to enter into the Kingdom of God. They were astonished out of mesure saying among themselves, who then can be saved? Jesus, looking up on them, says with men it is impossible, but not with God. For with God, all things are possible".
Now, then the conversation started. "Peter began to say unto him, Lo we have left all and followed you". In other words, he said, "We did that and followed you". "Jesus answered him and said, Verily, I say unto you, there is no man or nobody that has left house or brethren or sisters or father or mother or wife or children or lands for my sake and the gospel's". So what he said here, for my sake and for what I preach that have invested in this ministry, taking everything they had and invested in this ministry. But he shall receive a hundredfold now. Now, it's coming now. "'In this time, houses, brethren, sisters, mothers, children and lands with persecution and in the world to come Eternal life.' He answered the man". Amen. So that's all the man asked.
Now then, praise God. I want you to turn with me over in the Book of Acts. And look in the fourth chapter, verse 33, "With great power, gave the Apostles witness of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all. Neither was there any among them that lacked for as many were possessors of lands or houses, sold them, brought the pieces of things that were sold, laid them down at the apostles feet and distribution was made to every man, according as he had need. And Joses, who by the apostles was surnamed Barnabas, which is, being interpreted, The son of consolation, a Levite of the country of Cyprus, having land, sold it, and brought the money, and laid it at the apostles' feet". That was the young man. That's him.
Now history bears it out. But now think about this now, all of those apostles were there when that man came up there, they saw it all. They knew him by sight. And they got over there with him and they said... Now, I'll tell you something. You blew it. You could have been one of us, but we're changing your name. You're now Barnabas. Well, he started selling land. Yes, boy man, I mean, I really fouled this up before, but there he is. He missed an opportunity to be an apostle of the lamb because he was a good replacement for Judas. And I seemed to have that in my spirit that Jesus is looking at him because Jesus already knew Judas. He knew who he was.
The Scripture says he knew him when he called him. And he's looking at this young man and he said, "Well, yeah, there's my replacement right there. Come on, boy. Come, come". But no no he backed away. But then, now he's the Levite, he's of the priesthood. So he's highly educated in the things of the Word. And the Levites were very wealthy. And God planned it that way. So now follow his track. He's the one. He's the one that went after Saul of Tarsus. And over there in the 13th chapter of the Book of Acts. Let's turn there, please, because something very, very important here and people skim over it. Well, I'm not in a habit of doing that. Now there were in the church that was at Antioch certain prophets and teachers; as Barnabas I mean, he's the number one name now, Barnabas Simeon that was called Niger. They pointed out the fact that he's black. This is very important here.
The Bible makes a point of this. "and Lucius of Cyrene, and Manaen, which had been brought up with Herod the tetrarch, and Saul". He's still Saul, "They ministered to the Lord and fasted, the Holy Ghost said, Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have called them. And when they had fasted and prayed, and laid their hands on them, they sent them away. So they, being sent forth by the Holy Ghost, departed unto Seleucia; and from thence they sailed to Cyprus". Now come down to verse nine. "Then Saul, who is also called Paul, filled with the Holy Ghost, set his eyes...", glory to God. Does these things excite you? Yes. I mean, do your homework. And pray and seek the Lord and say, Lord, open my eyes here, let me see what's going on here. That's what I call going widescreen.
So go back to the scriptures. And everywhere you see Capernaum write home now beside it. That's where Jesus lived. Well, one night it was... Oh, I mean, he had been going and they'd been there, you know, and all that. And so I mean, and they saw him walking on the water. Well, it scared everybody but Peter. He said, "That's you, Lord, bid me come," what's the Lord going to say? It's not me. So he said, "Come on". Well, anyway, Jesus got in the boat and immediately it was in Capernaum. Well, I'd read that over and over and over again, and I stopped over now, said "Lord, now let me look at that. What did you do there? What did you do there"? And I started praying in the spirit and on the inside of me he said, "Kenneth, my men were tired". He said, "Now you're a traveling preacher. You know what it's like to get home and sleep in your own bed". And he said, "Enough of this rowing and let's get back". Amen, well he hadn't changed.
Now let's go back over there now where we were in Mark 10, cause I want us to look at that. Put our eyes on it one more time. But he shall receive a hundredfold. Read it out loud with me. But I shall receive a hundredfold now in this time. Houses, brethren, sisters, mothers, children. Lands, with persecutions. And in the world to come eternal life. Well, the persecution is coming because he already warned us of that. Satan comes immediately to try to steal it but he's been defeated. He can't get it done if you won't let him. He can't get it done if you don't let him. Amen. And Jesus just said, you have a hundredfold coming. You better claim it. Somebody got in my face and said, "Yeah, name it claim it, blab it, grab it bunch". I said, "Yes bless God we are".
Yeah. We named it, claimed it, grabbed it, blabbed it and we got it, Hallelujah. And it's still coming in. And it's still being blessed. And we're still moving on with God. I'll tell you, the devil is a nightmare, but I'll tell you the worst thing he can think of is Christian people with money enough to do what God tells them to do, especially preachers. Yes amen, hallelujahю
Now, they called me one day out there at the airport and they said there's a guy out here that's landed out here and we don't know him, but he's having a little problem with his airplane, maybe you need to come down, he's flying a single engine airplane. Got down there and he said, "Brother Copeland, this engine, it really needs overhauling, now ain't no trouble, but he said, I'm in the mission field. This thing is giving me trouble and he said, I just landed here. But he said, I didn't know this was your place".
So we sat down and a mechanic came out there and looked at what he had. We went back inside and we got acquainted and got his name and address and everything. Praise God. So the ministry just overhauled that engine for him. Don't give him new spark plugs, overhaul his engine. Now, here's one of the main things. Name the seed. Name it. Amen. Write it down. Write these things down. If you're going on a different food plan and under God's direction, write it down.
The devil starts coming at you and take the scriptures and write in there and keep it in your notebook and keep it in your Bible. That devil starts after you and you say, "Devil, it is written. And I wrote this down. And such and such date. And here's the scripture I'm standing on. And I said, right here, this is what I eat and I don't eat anything else. Now get behind me, Satan. It is written. I said it's written".
Well, there's nothing in the book says you can't write it. You take what is written, Jesus said, "Heaven and earth will pass away. My words will never pass away". Everything he says, said is written down in heaven archive. And when there is a new heaven and a new earth, this law book will still be there. It is still there. And any angel in the future that has any idea of doing, there'll be a hook put in his jaw. Why? Because the law has been fulfilled. The covenants have been fulfilled. The blood has been spilled. There will never be any more glorified ones, we're it. I mean, when that trumpet blows, that's it, glory to God.