Kenneth Copeland - Be Set Free From Worry and Cares
— Well, here we are Thursday. Praise the Lord. And we're talking about the truth. And Jesus is the truth. He said, "I am the way, the truth and the life. And no man comes to the Father except by me". Now, let's go to in the eighth chapter of John, our golden text here. "As he spoke these words, many believed on him, then said Jesus to those Jews, which believed on him, If you continue in my Word, then are you my disciples indeed. And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free". It is much like this. You could put a mule in a stable with thoroughbred racehorses, get some kind of plastic surgeon to trim his ears down, but he'll never be a racehorse. Amen.
— And you'll always be disappointed.
— Always be disappointed. That's a long expectation...
— That's right. Always be disappointed in him. But why? He was made a mule to start with. It's very difficult to turn a Volkswagen into a Mercedes. Why? It was made that way. But when the God of heaven, who is the truth and has the authority of authorities, if he walked in and said, "Isn't this a beautiful Monday"?
— Oh, no, Lord, this is Thursday. Have you checked the calendar? If he said it, I'm telling you, if the sun has to back up, he created the sun. And this is truth. And it'll recreate you or anyone else that accepts Jesus as Lord of your life. He made you.
— When you minister and Billy Burke ministers in healing you know or this has happened to me some too where people come up and tell them their pain goes well now, and they'll say, well, where's your pain?
— Oh, I have pain like everywhere. And he says, "Now, where is it now"? And they're like, well, that's what that was... they don't... Because the truth is they were healed.
— Yeah, the Lord made it right.
— He made it right.
— Now let's go over here, I quoted this last week and this week, let's go to second Corinthians chapter five. Oh I'll tell you, I have it's so marked up underlined it in red and yellow and everything else in this fifth chapter. And let's go to the sixth verse. "Therefore, we are always confident knowing that while we're at home in the body, we're absent from the Lord. For we walk by faith and not by sight". Remember what we found out yesterday and the full armor of God? Above all, taking the shield of faith. Well, above all. Now the Apostle Paul is referring to a Roman armor. There was among Roman infantry called the Turtle Move, large shields that could hook to the shield next to you. Now, the weapon of the day was the bow and arrow. Those were devastating weapons. So you had to have some kind of armor to defeat that, particularly if you were coming up to a place and the enemy had the high ground. They're shooting down on you. So you hook those shields together. They did what was called the turtle move. Now the shields are above all. And they would walk under those shields, just arrows, just bouncing off the fiery darts of the wicked. Do you see it? You see it. You see it. That's what he was referring to. The Shield of Faith. And then just stay under there in the fiery darts of the wicked bounced off of that shield. And they just kept on going until they got up close enough, hand to hand combat. You couldn't fight Roman soldiers hand to hand. That's the way they won the wars. Above all, taking the shield of faith and quench the fiery darts, the fiery arrows of the wicked.
— And even in a faith fight, you can keep moving forward.
— Yes, you can.
— And that's why we need the shoes of peace as we move forward. We're moving forward in his Word. We're moving forward by faith. But it's not random out there faith. It's faith in God. But it's faith in what he said. He moved forward in what he said. That's a picture.
— Exceeding and precious blood back promises. Those are truth. They're unbreakable truths. I was thinking about during the break, I was thinking about in a court of law, you swear to tell the truth, nothing but the truth, so help you God. I do. Well, you are a witness, and the court wants to know. Now I've been told that when Jesus said, "Verily, verily," I tell you the truth. Nothing but the truth. The truth. I got that from Brother Hagin, you see two verily-s, you better listen up, because he's bearing down on it. He's actually saying, "You listen to me I'm telling you, this is true. This is truth, and it'll make you free". Because back there then, they didn't have the Gospel of John to read. Amen. But they had the law and the prophets. And so he stayed over in the prophets. They stayed in the law, and they tried to hang him up with the law. But he said when he said, "I only do those things that please him". I mean, there were many Jews that said, "He knows what he's talking about". Now he said, "You'll know the truth, and the truth will make you free".
It'll make you free from sickness and disease. It'll make you free from poverty. It'll make you free from family troubles. It will make you free if you will continue there in. So you continue here in. So we walk by faith and not by sight. We're not moved by what we see. We're not moved by what we feel. But we're moved only by what we believe. We believe this. I'm gonna go back to this again, I use this illustration many times because seems like there's been so much talk about the flu over the last couple of years and God be the glory in our traveling where we'd leave and go somewhere and we'd have to be tested for COVID and we go out tested when we go in and then tested when we come back again. And then, you know, all of that just continual testing like that all the time. And it was not just me. It was our team. And we were tested negative five different times. Why? We had our armor on. We knew how to walk by faith. We knew what it took to do that. And it's not only... when I've heard Gloria say it so many times, if you know what to do in the natural and you know what to do in the supernatural, you can walk in divine health.
And that's what we're talking about. So I believe it. And I walk my faith. Therefore, I will never have COVID of any kind. Amen. And anyone can do this, this is a whosoever thing, with the shield of faith, then the truth. So we're reading truth... "We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body to be present with the Lord". Oh, there's a truth. Absent from the body and be present with the Lord. Oh, what a truth is that. Brings you to that place where you have absolutely no fear of death, amen. And the older I get, the stronger I get in that. Hallelujah. I'm on a mission, and I don't have time to die. Amen. But I have to do those things. I have to eat right, think right, talk right, and exercise right in order to continue in this tent, in this body. So let's go on down verse 14, "For the love of Christ, constraineth us; because we thus judge, that if one died for all, then were all dead: And that he died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them, and rose again. Wherefore henceforth know we no man after the flesh: yea, though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we him no more. Therefore..."
Now Brother Hagin always said if you find a therefore, stop and see what it's there for. Because this... We're coming to the bottom line of this, this chapter. "Therefore, if any man," any human. Now people get in the fuss say, well now, this is men, what about women? Come on, we're talking about the human... Human, not huwoman race. The man was created first. So it's called human kind. "If any man, any person be in Christ, he is a new creature," a new creation. One translation says a new species of being. Old things are passed away. What old things? That old, sinful nature. It's gone, Glory to God, Hallelujah. "Behold all things are become new and all things are of God". So this inner man is suddenly, suddenly brand new... "Who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation to know that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them, and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation. Now then we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us. We pray you in Christ's stead, be ye reconciled to God".
Now class, the moment Jesus was raised from the dead, you and I were reconciled. Even though we accepted him some 2000 years later. It's right here in the truth. And the moment we accepted him. Oh, November the second, 1962. Oh, Gloria and I got married in April that year, and we were so in love with one another. And I had just flown a trip. A man by the name of Wheer, an executive with the Arkansas Louisiana Gas Company. I had flown him to Shreveport and back and I got back... we had a new furnished apartment and Gloria was waiting supper on me. And so we got back. I went in the bedroom and changed, took my suit off and all that and came back in the kitchen and I stopped and I had one shoe on and had the other one in my hand. And all of a sudden I was face to face with the Almighty God, and I heard it on the inside of me, "Kenneth, if you don't get right with me you headed to a devil's hell, son". I said, "I know it, I know it. But what do I do now"?
Class, I heard my Sunday school teacher, in a Southern Baptist Sunday school in Abilene, Texas. Her name was Taggert. She was a widow woman, and she was very old. And, you know, the Baptist Sunday schools are just like regular school. And you keep getting promoted and change in teachers and so all of us boys just told us, Sunday school superintendent, if we don't get Mrs. Taggert, we're not coming back. So she just promoted with us and I heard her voice, "You have to ask Jesus to come into your heart". I thought, that's old lady Taggart. She's been in heaven for years and years and years. She called herself old lady Taggert, I can just see her in my mind. And she said, "Boys, you have to ask Jesus to come into your heart". And I thought, that sounds just as dumb to me as it did the first time, but I don't know anything else to do but I'm gonna do it, Jesus, come into my heart... Now I had this speech problem and it was very profane. Gloria said, "I'm not going out in public with you anymore". I won't go into that. Why? For a few seconds I could physically feel this square block in my mouth. I couldn't close my mouth for a few seconds. I mean, physically. And the profanity was gone... Till this day, gone.
And then I thought, now I've got to tell Gloria, What am I going to do? Well, she was raised in the Church of Christ, I was raised in a Southern Baptist church. So we just decided, you know, we just don't talk about that, what's the use in it, you know, just let our folks deal with that. I said, "Gloria", she was at the stove. I said, "Come here" and she walked over there and just stood there right here next to me. Now, in her book, God's Will For You... In fact, just last night I was breezing through there and read that account of that. And I said, what if I were to, you know, maybe speak for God and give my testimony and she thought, what testimony? And she said, "Hallelujah". I said, "What"? Then she told me the story. While I was out looking for a job, she was there in that three bedroom empty house, in this business that we were going to get into that flopped. And I was out looking for a job. She began to pray because my mother sent me a Bible and it was there in the coffee table that I made in high school, wasn't all as bad as she acts like it was.
But anyway, there was that little Bible "Kenneth, precious, seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all of these things will be added to you". And she said, "Well, I certainly do need things..." I guess so she was sitting on a rented roll away bed and a Panasonic television sitting on the table thing and then picture gone down to about that size. Take my life and do something with it. Then she told me that story, and the rest is history, as they say. But that new creature right then, that right then. No, we're not doing that anymore. No more. It happened. Now and it came down and... "For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him". Let's unravel that. He who'd oh, get this class, get this... He who knew no sin was made to be sin that we may be made the righteous... made, you get it? Made, the truth will make you free that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.
I believe I made my case. When I knew that truth. I heard that truth from Mrs. Taggart. So she been in heaven a long time and she got the credit for winning me the Lord. She's going to get it... and my mother. Kellie, I found out about a week before that, my mother was in her kitchen. She threw her Bible down on the table and said, "I have prayed for him the last time. If he goes to hell, it's your fault". Gloria got saved the next week. I got saved the week after that. It worked. It worked. So now tell me how much time do I have? Good. Now let's find out the truth about that. Turn to I Peter, chapter five. Now, the truth about healing is in the second chapter. "Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed. For ye were as sheep going astray; but are now returned unto the Shepherd and Bishop of your souls". You need to read the whole second chapter. Read it. There is not but five chapters in here.
Now you come down to this fifth chapter. "The elders which are among you I exhort, who am also an elder, and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, and also a partaker of the glory that shall be revealed: Feed the flock of God which is among you, taking the oversight thereof, not by constraint, but willingly; not for filthy lucre," not for money... "but of a ready mind; Neither as being lords over God's heritage, but being examples to the flock. And when the chief Shepherd shall appear, ye shall receive a crown of glory..." Oh, glory to God, a crown of glory... "that fadeth not away. Likewise, ye younger, submit yourselves unto the elder. Yea, all of you be subject one to another, and be clothed with humility:" Humble yourselves. "for God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble. Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time: Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you".
That word translated care is anxiety and worry. All of your inflation cares, all of the worries, anxieties, that's a command, that's not a good suggestion. "Humble yourselves therefore, humble yourself under the mighty hand of God that he may exalt you in due time". Now, listen, it became... it was a shock to me when I found out that God wants to exalt us, but he does not want us to attempt to exalt ourselves. One woman said, "Well, if he just have half these worries, I'd be happy". He don't want half of it he wants all of them... casting the whole of your care upon him.
— If you just give him half, you'll find a way to fill that half back up with something else.
— Oh, yeah. And in the rest of the story is right here.
— Yes. He wants them all.
— Here it is... "Casting all of your care upon him, for he cares for you. Be sober, be vigilant because your adversary, the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour:" Well I'm a whom he cannot... "Resist steadfast in the faith, knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren that are in the world, but the God of all grace, who hath called us under his eternal glory, by Christ Jesus, after that ye have suffered, resisted a while, make you perfect, mature, establish, strengthen, settle you. To him be glory and dominion for ever and ever". Oh, glory to God. Settle it once and for all. I've known a lot of particularly young people. Well, I really don't know whether I'm called to preach or not. Well, find out. Don't preach any more than you do. Spend some time. You're asking that question, most likely you are. But once I found that out, it never occurred to me again to ever question it. And we're out of time. Amen. Goodbye. No, no, no. We'll be back in just a moment, Kellie and I.