Kenneth Copeland - Prayer That Agrees With God's WORD Brings God Results
The book of Joshua. "Now after the death of Moses the servant of the Lord it came to pass, that the Lord spake unto Joshua the son of Nun, Moses' minister, saying, Moses my servant is dead; now therefore arise, go over this Jordan, thou, and all this people, unto the land which I do give to them, even to the children of Israel. Every place that the sole of your foot shall tread upon, that have I given unto you, as I said unto Moses". Now come down here to the 8th verse. "This book of the law", the Word of God, "This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth;" Don't say anything else, "but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe, you may see, to do according to all that is written therein: for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success".
That scripture over there says, "You will deal wisely in all of the affairs of life", that was in the first covenant. Okay, what about the second? So we have the book of James. We have, wisdom is the principal thing. Meditate in it. You will have wisdom you'll observe to do. First Corinthians Chapter 1 verse 30. "But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption: That, according as it is written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord".
So there's another wisdom scripture. Amen. And you could just go through the book of Proverbs and take those things. Trust in the Lord with all your heart. Listen, and lean not to your own understanding. Forget about what you're thinking about and meditate the Book. Meditate the Book. Now, I'll give you another example. This also was a woman concerning her sister. And so we had in a meeting and she wanted prayer for her sister. And I said, "Well, you do understand that you have a blood covenant with Jesus". "Yes, I do. Yes, I do". I said, "We'll base this prayer over her and her healing on that".
So what were we doing? We were using the prayer of agreement and we were making a petition on the scripture. So we went to the book. We went... just healing all over it. Amen. In both covenants. Exodus 23:25. Oh, no, you don't start there. You start with Exodus 23:20 because you can't foul it up if you don't. "I'll send my angel with you and you will serve the Lord your God with gladness of heart. And he, your angel will bless your bread and water. I will take sickness from the midst of you and you will have no miscarriages in your land".
So what do we do when we go to a restaurant? Ministering spirits, watch over this stuff. I'm going to have to eat it here in a little bit. Don't let them drop any of it on the floor and put it back on my plate. Amen... Don't take just little dabs of scripture. It's also on your Partner Letter and in a book of Colossians. Well, let's turn over there. Chapter 1 verse 9. "For this cause we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to declare or to desire that ye might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding".
Now we have a basis for the wisdom of God. And I was in a place one time and it looked like... I don't know what all the devil... I got an infection in my right big toe. And just hurt. And I was there alone. Gloria wasn't there. I was in the hotel room, and I had all the symptoms of the flu, and I said, "You can't put that on me. I will not take it. I will not take it. I will not take it. I will not take it". And I just got up out of bed and I'm limping on the right foot. And I just said, "No, I'm not taking that. No, I'm not taking that. I'm not taking this. I won't take the symptoms of the flu. I'm not having that. I'm not having that. In the name of Jesus, it's not mine. It belongs to the devil. I'm not having it. Jesus bore mine in the name of Jesus. That's not my flu. I'll not have it".
Jesus took it to hell. That's where it belongs. "I'll not have it. I'll not have it". So I just started counting them. I don't remember now. It's not how many times you do it. I just wanted to see how long the devil's going to last. I don't know, up into the hundreds of times. And I've thought about it a lot of times. What if I had stop one time and going back to bed, all of a sudden the power of God, I don't know why it happened this way and I don't care. But it hit me right at the bottom of my feet. Yes, I do, because my toe was healed. And came right up my back like that. And that's what I was doing, came right up like that and it was gone. I went to bed and went to sleep. Based on the book, Amen.
Like Brother Hagin said, "I have inside information from inside that Book". And he would say that, I have this Book in my possession that has all the answers, but they're not any good if you don't know them. Attend to my Word. Don't let them depart from your eyes. Keep them in the midst of your heart. For they are life to those that find them and medicine to all their flesh and protect your heart with all diligence for out of your heart are the issues, the forces. There was a woman with an issue of blood. The issue. The issue. The forces is coming out of your spirit. Well, issue forth even when you don't know it. Hallelujah, glory to God. So now here we are. His Word is his will.
Now, we talked about James chapter 1:1 through 7. For let not this man think that he's going to receive anything... anything. For he that wavereth is like what? "For being as he is a man of two minds hesitating, dubious, irresolute, he is unstable and uncertain about everything he thinks, feels, decides". The man of two minds. The double-minded man. I had been developing and working on messages that I was to preach and I was still there at ORU. And I thought, that's it. A double-minded man. And I said, Lord, I asked the Lord. I said, What is a double-minded man? He said, "Look at Peter".
So I turned to where he said to turn. And he said, when the storm hit, "Master", he called him Master. Master, do you not care that we're dying here? He called him Master, but he accused him of not caring. He's a double-minded man. Calling him Master but he's afraid. Praise God. So, this clock must be running fast or something. So let's go back over here now to the 11th chapter of Mark and let's look at this. Right there in the book of James. We won't take time to look at it. Well, yes, I will too.
Look at the 4th chapter. "What leads to strife (discord and feuds) and how do conflicts (quarrels and fightings) originate among you? Do they not arise from your sensual desires that are ever warring in your bodily members? You are jealous and covet what others have and your desires go unfulfilled; so you become murderers. To hate is to murder as far as your hearts are concerned. You burn with envy and anger" and so forth... "You do not have, because you do not ask. Or you do ask [God for them] and yet fail to receive, because you ask with wrong purpose and evil, selfish motives. Your intention is when you get what you desire..."
You have not because you ask not, you ask wrong. I have had this happened. Someone called me, "Well Brother Copeland you know the Bible says you have not cause you ask not". And I thought, here it comes... and laugh about it knowing it's out of line and use that to manipulate me and laugh about it. There was one man... The Lord started talking to me. He said, "Christian people lie. You're right in the middle of them". What? Then somebody will call you and say, "You're going to the meeting tonight"? "No". "Why not"? "Well, you know... and if you don't, just tell them I don't want to go. I'm tired and I'm going to bed and watch TV. Come up with some lame excuse and they knew that when you're lying, when you said it". He said, "Stop that". "Yes, sir".
Well, it wasn't, of course he knew what was coming. And this man called me. He said, "Brother Copeland, I would like for you to come preach for me". I said, "Why"? Well, he said, "I would like you to come preach faith". And I said, "Well, I'll pray about it". So he hung up. I prayed about it. The Lord said, "No, I don't want you to go over there". I said, "Well, is there something"? No, he said, "It's none of your business. I just don't want you to go over there. I have different plans for him". I said, "Yes, sir". So he called me back. He said, "You're coming, aren't you"? And I said, "Nope". "Why"? I said, "Does it matter to you why. I'm not coming". He said, "Why"? I said, "I don't want to". Kind of made him mad. "Did you pray about it"? I said, "Yes, I did. And I'm not coming".
Oh, he's used to the excuse. Why are you not coming. Two reasons, I don't want to and I prayed about it and the Lord said no. So after the word kind of gets out, you know, But I cannot continue to do that. I was in a small church, Stroud, Oklahoma, and I went back there. I was in their home first, Roy and Opal Sprague. And this was where... now the Lord had begun to take the weight off of me. But I was there preaching, I dropped a note or something, and I bent over, Oh, and it got very breezy right here. And I said... Oh man, they split brother. I mean, those things, they were just the old cheap, wore out stuff in the first place. And I went back to my room and I sewed those up, you did it yourself?
I was certainly not going to ask Opal to do it. I don't want them to know I split my britches while I was preaching, but I learned that in the army. So I sewed them back up and that's the last ones that split, anyway. While I was there, I was sitting up. The first time I stayed in their home but this time I had a hotel room and I was sitting there in that hotel. I was up in the bed and had kind of like this, had everything. And all of a sudden I had a vision and I saw it. I mean, it was so real. There was a pipe right here above me and up at the top there was this flow of water that was gushing down. And it was so real I could feel it. There's just a little spue in my face and I did this and it went away.
I said, "Father, what is that"? He said, "That is your spirit. And that was my glory and my power. Your spirit is clogged full of unrepentant unforgiveness," a lot of little stuff over the years. And then I remembered, Oh, no, the little house, the first house we had here on Florentine Street. Gloria came in. There was a man out at the corner selling cantaloupes. Boy look good. Whole sack full of them. She came in and I said, "Oh, those really look good". The only two good ones were on top. The rest of them were bad. I said, "Give me that..." I said, "I'm going down there and I feel like spanking him".
But see I was just a little baby Christian. I thought I was more than that because I had spent time at ORU. She said, "Give me that. You're not going to do that". And I said, "I forgive that man. I don't know who he is or where he is. But now that is his problem and not mine". So we'll close up here on Mark 11. It's a mile and a half from Bethany to Jerusalem. "And on the morrow, when they were come from Bethany, he was hungry..."
I'm going to read this from the Classic Amplified, right there in that place. "And seeing a fig tree afar off", so it's afar off, "having leaves, he came, if haply he might find any thing thereon: and when he came to it, he found nothing but leaves; for the time of figs was not yet. And Jesus answered and said unto it, No man eat fruit of thee hereafter for ever. And his disciples heard it". I'll tell you, I mean, he laid that tree low. "And seeing in the distance a fig tree [covered] with leaves, He went to see if He could find any [fruit] on it [for in the fig tree the fruit appears at the same time as the leaves].
But when He came up to it, He found nothing but leaves, for the fig season had not yet come". "And in the morning, as they passed by, they saw the fig tree dried up from the roots. And Peter calling to remembrance saith unto him, Master, look at that fig tree which thou cursedst is withered away. And Jesus answering saith unto them, Have faith in God. or have the faith of God. For verily I say unto you, whosoever shall say", there it is, "Whosoever shall say unto this mountain..."
So there was a mountain there, "unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that those things which he saith shall come to pass; he shall have whatsoever he saith. Therefore I say unto you", so he put it into motion, "What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them. And when ye stand praying, forgive, if ye have ought against any: that your Father also which is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses".
Now that next verse, if you do not forgive, neither will your Heavenly Father forgive you your trespasses. Most in the Classic Amplified that is in italics and there are many translations that do not have that one in there. But it is still true, the same time, because Jesus prayed it. "Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us". Thank You, Lord. So there you have it. Unforgiveness. So I began to forgive people before I'd walk into a restaurant. I forgive the waiters. I forgive the waitresses. I forgive everybody in there. So I get up in the morning forgiving, and then somebody says something. They're already forgiven. I just smile and walk on the road, go some other way. Amen, Hallelujah.