Kenneth Copeland - Faith Responds To The WORD of God
Hello, everybody. I'm Kenneth Copeland. We're here on the shores of Eagle Mountain Lake and we didn't go to our prayer cabin this year. We planned to, but we had another situation that came up, so we did it here, this time instead. And right now, there's just a light breeze blowing across the lake. And it's just delightful, beautiful. And people say, "You mean there's a mountain out there"? Yes, there is. That's where it got its name. Now, particularly back before they dammed up this lake I believe it's the Trinity River, came down through here and back towards the dam. And still many times we get in our boat here and go all the way around.
And as we turn the corner down there and where you can see it, you can see it sticking up right there, and there's a mountain sticking up there and there's an alkali spot on the side of that mountain. And it looks just like the wings of an eagle. And he has his head turned like this. It's Eagle Mountain Lake. It's Eagle Mountain International Church. Thought you needed to know that. Inquiring minds need to know. So and it's a little breezy today and it's cool and it's nice. We need to save it all up because summer in Texas is coming. Amen, that's good too.
Father, we thank You again today for the power of Your written Word and the power of Your name. Cause Your name is good and Your name is behind all of this. And we pray in Your name and in Your name these signs, these signatures will follow and we lay hands on the second they shall recover. That's Jesus' signature. He commanded it and we do it. Thank You, Jesus. Amen.
Now, here in the book of James, once more. Now you have to remember James is Jesus' half brother? How would you like to have had Jesus as your older brother? He never did anything wrong. And why can't you be like Jesus, anyway, but glory to God. So let's take a look at this. "James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad, greeting. My brethren, count it all joy", ha ha ha, "When ye fall into temptations; tests and trials, Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing". Wanting nothing. Healing? Finances? Wanting nothing. "If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. But let him ask in faith..."
Let him get in the Word and stay there till he has title deed to it. "...nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed. For let not that man think that he shall receive any thing of the Lord. A double-minded man is unstable in all his ways". What is a double-minded man? Well, Jesus said, "Let's go to the other side. He went to sleep, planning on them taking the other side. Well, there was a thunderstorm came up out there on the Galilee. They woke him up and said, 'Master'", they called him Master. "'Don't you care that we're about to die?'" That's a double-minded man and that's unstable. What should have been said? What did he say? Oh, you of little faith. In some places he said, "You of no faith", complete unbelief.
Everybody's believing something all the time. You can't turn your believer off unless you're sleep. No, you believe something. It's like, well I think I'll fast a few days. No, you're about to eat three or four of the biggest meals you've ever eaten in your life. But when you get on the Word and you say, "I am going to fast for three full days with nothing but water and the Word. I have a situation that I'm putting before the Lord and I believe I receive the answer to it according to this and I receive it".
You don't even get hungry. I know. I've done it time and time and time and time again. So now here's something I want you to see. I want you to come over here. "Do not err, my beloved brethren. Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning. Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures. Wherefore, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath: For the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God. Wherefore lay apart all filthiness and superfluity or abundance of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engrafted Word..."
Humble yourself. That's what he said over here. That's what Peter said, humble yourself. Humble yourself about it. Listen now... "Be ye" what? Doers, act on it. "Be ye doers of the Word and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. For if any be a hearer of the Word, and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass: For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was. But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty," Oh, dear Lord, I love it. The perfect law of liberty. Jesus said it like this. "Continue ye in my Word, and you'll know the truth. And the truth will make you free". Well, it'll set you free. Well, there are newspapers that have used that verse and said the truth will set you free. No, but what? They're newspaper. You don't know whether it's true or not. This is truth. This is authority.
God said, "I have made you the father of many nations. Now, if you'll do what I say, you will be. But I'm gonna change your name. So everybody knows," that's truth. And it's amazing to me how many people have never studied and found out, particularly United States citizens have never studied about George Washington, the first president of this nation, about his inauguration. He went to the 17th chapter of Genesis in his own Bible and prayed and entered a covenant with the Almighty God of Israel. However, let's go back here, be a doer of the Word, act on it.
Now, this is the Weymouth's New Testament. It went out of print. So our ministry, Kenneth Copeland Publications now have all the rights to this, and you can order it and it comes in different sizes. It's a taller one and skinnier one and David Weeter, bless his heart, took this one and had it rebound and leathered. And so this is the one I enjoy using. I want you to listen to this. Let's read right here in the second chapter, first verse. "What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and have not works? Can faith save him? If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of daily food, And one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things... Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone".
Oh, I like this, in the second chapter. And Francis Weymouth, a Bible scholar, read his history. It's wonderful, but especially his New Testament. Now, right here. That was in the second chapter. Let's start there in the second chapter and the 14th verse... chapter two, verse 14. "What good is it, my brethren, if a man professes to have faith, and yet his actions do not correspond"? The King James says "works". And people say, "Well, I didn't think we're supposed to do it, but works, we're supposed to do it by faith". This straightens it out.
"What good is it, my brethren, if a man professes to have faith, and yet his actions do not correspond? Can such faith save him? Suppose a brother or sister is poorly clad or lacks daily food, and one of you says, 'I wish you well; keep yourselves warm and well fed, do not supply them what they need' what is the use of that? So also faith, if it is unaccompanied by obedience, is dead in itself. Nay, some one will say, 'You have faith, I have actions: prove to me your faith apart from corresponding actions and I will prove mine to you by my actions. You believe that God is one, and you are quite right'", and so forth.
Now corresponding actions, say that: my faith must have corresponding action, or it's dead. If I don't act on the Word and what I believe there is no expression of my faith, nor is there any release of it. Now, take that to heart. That's powerful. But you're believing... Well, let me just give you an example. I went to preach for Hilton Sutton's dad, Dad Sutton in Beaumont, Texas, and a flu broke out all over the country. There were football teams that didn't have enough players and so when I got there, he said, "Brother Copeland, I couldn't guarantee you $50 if you stayed a month". I said, "Did I ask"? No, but he said, "We've got the flu. People in my church have the flu and oh"... I said, "Well, you know what to do. Let's get you an oil bottle. And we'll just get over there on James five and we'll go to work".
And there were a number of them and I would read the healing scriptures to them and say, "Now what are you going to do? You're going to just lay there and be sick. Or are you going to put corresponding action to your faith"? It just take the cover and I've done it myself and just put it back. Oh. "Brother Copeland, yes, I'm healed in the name of Jesus" and start walking around the room and all the symptoms leave. All but one... How can I say this sweetly, knothead. No. He wasn't any sicker than anyone else. He didn't have any more symptoms then anyone else. He said, "No, sir, I'm not going to do it". I said, "Why? This is what the Word..." "I know the Bible says that", looking at me because he's older than me, you know, like you young... "I know the Bible says that, but I'm not going to say something that I can't feel or see. I'm sick".
Well, he was. When he said I'm sick, he became very sick. He almost died. No corresponding action. All of them but one. I was preaching in Oklahoma City and Brother Hartsfield Church and I woke up one morning. We were staying in the home of Lavinia James. Now, Lavinia James, bless her heart. She went to Oral Roberts' tent meeting and got healed of cancer. And after that, I mean, she took people to the meetings. She took people everywhere to the meetings. And she lived there in Oklahoma City. So we were staying with her.
I woke up one morning, I went to bed feeling good. I didn't feel great. I woke up the next morning. Oh, I had the flu. Oh, I said, "Gloria, you're going to have to help dress me". "You mean you're going to go over there and preach"? "No, I'm healed". "How can you say that? By faith". I read the Book, "By his stripes you were healed", if you were heal, I am now. I've been redeemed from the curse of the flu. You can find it right there in Deuteronomy 28. Under the curse, you'll be smitten with pestilence until you've consumed thee from off the land and smite thee with a consumption with fever, inflammation, extreme burning with blasting and mildew and pursue you until you perish. But I've been redeemed from that, blessed God forevermore.
So I said, "You're going to have to shave me". Well, no, no, no, wait a minute. I don't think I'm not going to trust you with the blade. I said, "Lavinia, do you happen to have an electric shaver"? "Oh, yes", she said. Okay, use that. She had to hold my head up and shave my face. No way I'm going to stay in the bed. No. So I sit there in the car all the way to the church. So I got to the church. I can just see it in my mind. And Gloria and I came in through a side door over there and I went up on the platform. She and Lavinia sat down front and morning service, but it was pretty well packed out. And I went up to the pulpit and the room went... so, okay, I said, "I'll be back in just a moment".
Well, the choir practice room was right behind the platform. I just went out the side of the platform there and back in that choir room, I said, "Satan, in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whose I am and whom I serve, you take your hands off my body. I rebuke you, I resist you in the name of Jesus. I mean it right now". I prayed in the Spirit back there. I don't know how long... That's much better. So I walked out there and put my Bible and everything up and my notebook on the podium and the room went... So I said, "Okay, turn in your Bibles to First Peter to 24". And we started there. I preached healing for 2 hours and 15 minutes, walked out of there completely well, healed, corresponding action.
Now how much time I have, Tim? Five. We can do this. Okay. Let's go back over here to the book of Mark, chapter five They came over... verse 40. "And he said unto them, Why are ye so fearful? How is it that ye have no faith"? That's when you rebuke... you have no faith. "And they feared exceedingly, and said one to another, What manner of man is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him"? I put right down, he's a faith man. "And they came over unto the other side of the sea, into the country of the Gadarenes".
Well, Gadara is over one part around the Sea of Galilee. That big lake there, it is big. You can see why they called it a sea. "Came out of the tombs a man with an unclean spirit, Who had his dwelling among the tombs; and no man could bind him, no, not with chains: Because that he had been often bound with fetters and shackles or chains, and the chains had been plucked asunder by him, and the shackles broken in pieces: neither could any man tame him. And always, night and day, he was in the mountains, and in the tombs, crying, and cutting himself with stones. But when he saw Jesus afar off, he ran and worshipped him, And cried with a loud voice, and said, What have I to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of the most high God? I adjure thee by God, that thou torment me not".
That's that devil talking. "For he said unto him, Come out of the man, thou unclean spirit. And he asked him, What is thy name? And he answered, saying, My name is Legion: for we are many". 3 to 6000 devils. So you have one. You go over the six chapter of Ephesians and the Holy Spirit will show you through the Apostle Paul the devil's operation from the ground up: principalities, powers, rulers of the darkness of this world. This was a ruler of the darkness of this world and wicked spirits in the heavenly places. This was a ruler of the darkness of this world. And he had ruled over 3 to 6000 other devils that were coming and going through him. And they were all of them were controlling that whole area around there.
"Now there was there nigh unto the mountains a great herd of swine feeding. And all the devils besought him, saying, Send us into the swine, that we may enter into them. And forthwith Jesus gave them leave. And the unclean spirits went out, and entered into the swine: and the herd ran violently down a steep place into the sea, they were about two thousand; and drowned in the sea. And they that fed the swine fled, and told it in the city, and in the country. And they went out to see what it was that was done. And they come to Jesus, and see him that was possessed with the devil, and had the legion, sitting, and clothed, and in his right mind: and they were afraid".
Now, listen what he said. "And when he was come into the ship, he that had been possessed with the devil prayed him that he might be with him. Jesus suffered him not, but saith unto him, Go home to thy friends," If you look that up in the BLT, the Blue Letter Bible, if you don't have it, get it, it is supported by donations. You need to get it and support it. You can look all these words up and tell what they mean in Greek or in Hebrew and friends, all of yours: friends, family, "Tell them how great things the Lord hath done for thee, and hath had compassion on thee. Clothed and in his right mind".
Tim, where did he get the clothes? You think Jesus said, "Boys, take off your clothes," no, that's not going to work. No. There's corresponding action before you do what the Lord has led you to do. There was a time that, well, in fact, it was in that meeting in Beaumont. I heard it in my spirit. This was going to be the best meeting financially you've ever, you've ever had. So Gloria and I got together and we said, "We need this and we need this. So we're going to tithe ahead of time".
So obviously, Jesus had commanded Judas, who was the treasurer. Now, listen, there's a man over there on the other side of the Galilee. I'm going to deliver him. I'm going to call him to preach and send him home. He needs some clothes. He's over there nacked and I'm not going to send him home embarrassed. And they provided the clothes before they went. Corresponding action before you do it. This is the way it works. I'll be back in just a moment.