Kenneth Copeland - God Gave Command Authority to the Church
— Hello, everybody. I'm Kenneth Copeland, and this is the Believer's Voice of Victory broadcast, and this is Gregory Stephens. Well, Thanksgiving is in the rearview mirror, and 2025, 2025, begin to make decisions now, not New Year's resolutions, book decisions. What am I going to do in 2025? What are my decisions to serve God? What are my decisions concerning His Word? Am I going to spend more time reading the Word and listening to CDs that build faith? Am I going to remain in a church, like Gloria says, that's hazardous to your health because everything's passed away? Well, let me tell you what you do. Pass away out of that church. Just move out. Like someone said, Grandma taught it, and we bought it. This is life to those that find it, Proverbs 4, and health to their flesh. It says medicine to their flesh. My Word, the Word of the living God, it is His bond. It is His bond. That's the reason it's Holy Bible. Blood covenants from Genesis 1, and you get to Malachi, and it says, end of the prophets. Matthew, chapter 1. Glory to God. That's the way the book is built. Father, we thank You, and we praise You. Thank You for the things that You did for me in 2024, and I praise You and worship You for it. Oh, glory to God. Hallelujah. And we thank You for 2025 because it's right here. Hallelujah. In Christ mass, the celebration of the anointed One and His anointing. And we're so blessed in Jesus' name. I strongly suggest that you don't run up a big credit card bill buying Christmas presents. Well, what about my children? Well, we were $24,000... I was $24,000 in bad debt. So we called the children in, and we told them, this is what we're doing, so don't expect all that much for Christmas because by the end of the year, we're going to be debt free. We said it. So John got a little can of firecrackers about that big, and Kellie got a little doll, and that was it. But November of that year, we were debt free. By faith, and God told us. And so we built then our lives on that, and that's a testimony within itself. But now, let's go to Ephesians once more. Verse 16, first chapter. "I cease not to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers. Well, I know, Brother Paul, what's it's like because I write a Partner Letter every 30 days, and I make mention of my partners in my prayers. But I have an advantage, sir, that you didn't have. I have their pictures in my study floating through my study. Glory to God. I can stand there and look. I want to see what's on the bookcases behind them, you know. Their pictures are about this big, and I can just stand there and pray and worship and follow their faces through there. Now, if you think that's not a blessing of the Lord, glory to God. Amen. But now, the exceeding greatness of his power to us were to believe according to the working of his mighty power, the dunamis, which he wrought in Christ when he raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principality and power and might and dominion and every name that is named, not only in this world, but that which is to come, and hath put all names under his feet, and all things and names under his feet, and gave him to be the head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him that fills all and all". There's the authority delegation right there.
— There's your orders.
— Yes, sir. You put it under our feet. Now, it doesn't... This is a letter. It doesn't take long to read a letter, so just read the letter over and over and over. Read 1 John over and over and over. If you really want to have a good time, read the book of Revelation over and over. Well, let's see. Does that... Hey, forget it. Except to remember one thing. There was a red horse and a black horse and a pale horse. No, it was a green horse, and that's the colors of Hamas...
— That's right.
— ...prophesied right there.
— Yeah. Glory to God. I told you this was in the book. Then it says, "The end". Yeah. New heaven, new earth, the end.
— That's Iran's colors, that's Hezbollah's color, and that's all of them.
— Yeah. Green.
— Red and black.
— Let's go back to this. Chapter 3. Well, you can't just start, for this cause. Let's back up in chapter 2. "Strangers from the covenants of promise having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus, you who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ. For he is our peace". He is our peace. He is. He is our peace. He is our shalom. Nothing missing, nothing broken. He is that peace. "He is our peace who hath made both one and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us. Having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments, command authority of a follower of Jesus Christ. Abolished in his flesh the enmity and the law of commandments contained in ordinances to make in himself of two one new man, so making peace that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby and came and preached peace". Ooh. He preached it, "came and preached peace to you which were far off and to them that were nigh. Through him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father. Now therefore you are no more strangers and foreigners. Now, Jesus Christ, being the chief cornerstone in whom all the building fitly joined together grows unto a holy temple of the Lord, in whom you also are built together for inhabitation of God through the Holy Spirit. For this cause, I, the prisoner of Jesus Christ, for you Gentiles, have you heard of the dispensation of grace given to me to you, if you have heard... How that by revelation he made known unto me the mystery as I wrote afore in few words. Whereby when you read, you may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ, which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit, that the Gentiles should be fellowheirs, and of the same body, partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel". Glory to God. "The good news, whereof I was made a minister according to the gift of the grace of God given unto me by effectual working of his power". Remember, he persecuted the body of Christ. He was on his way to Damascus to get letters to persecute. He thought this is a cult and God literally, literally knocked him off his horse to the ground. And he was blind by the glory. And he looked up and said, "Who are You, Lord"? That's the shortest salvation prayer on record. Who are You, Lord? I am Jesus who you persecuted. And in a vision, a man called Ananias. Then the Lord said, I'm paraphrasing, "You go minister to him". He said, "I don't know whether I want to do that or not". No, he said, I will show him all the things he must suffer for my namesake. Now, what was the reason for that? The first covenant was proven over centuries of time. This new one had to be, had to be proven in the field. He was shipwrecked. He was beat. He fought wild beasts at Ephesus. He was whipped over and over again, put in jail. He proved it out. And we have his writings, his letters to the church.
— It's a simplistic way to say this, but I tell the Bible college students that Paul is your Moses.
— Yes, he is. Yes, he is.
— He's going now, God arrested Moses by a burning bush. He did this... And now he's going to be your deliver to bring you into this covenant. And that's what all of this is about. Ephesians 1, 2, and 3. It's vital. I don't know how to get this across to you. It's so vital that your identity and your faith be in your position, your present position. It's vital. You won't be able to operate in the blessing. You won't be able to operate in it anyway.
— And let me tell you, radio and television audience, listen to something else. The moment, the moment that Ananias laid his hands on him and he began to speak with other tongues, the scales fell off of his eyes. This great apostle would later say, "Do not, do not forbid to speak with tongues. Don't do it". Thank You, Jesus. Oh, listen, that says, that just speaks volumes to me. The moment he spoke with other tongues, the scales and blindness fell from his eyes and he could see. Well, the moment that that happened to me... The moment that that happened to me, and I was headed back to Little Rock and I said, "Lord, I'm going to say some of those words again". You can tell I wasn't old-time Pentecostal. And I don't know what all I know about this, but there's anything to it, anoint it. oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh. Lord, You know, I'm going to have to talk to these people here in a minute. I can see the lights. Little Rock. You're going to have to do something to me or their ears. And I said, "Little Rock, approach control". And I thought, well, that worked. Think of that. Got on the ground. I mean, I blessed the airplane. I blessed that thing. I mean, I laid hands on it. I didn't know what I'd done. But it sure was good. And all of a sudden, the Bible just did this. I thought, that's what they've been talking about. Glory to God.
— See, Paul thought he would, Saul, he was Saul. Saul of Tarsus thought he was doing God's work.
— Yes, he did.
— Because he knew this. Every time we go chasing after other gods, Brother Copeland, we go into captivity. And if we allow these Christians, these people in the way, if we follow, if we allow that to happen in Israel, we'll go into captivity again. We'll lose our temple. And so he thinks he's doing that work. But what he doesn't realize is he's fighting against the very God he claims to be serving. And so he has that moment. God took one of the best of the best when he chose Saul of Tarsus. And he's righteously, just like Moses. Moses, he's a deliverer. And what did he do? He slays the Egyptian. He's delivering an Israelite. Doing it by the flesh. And Paul asked for orders. He asked for letters to be given to him to go to Damascus. You received orders. You received a piece of paper and a folder or whatever it was. That was your orders in the military. All of these letters and these epistles back here, that's our orders. We've been given letters like our orders and we've been commissioned. And you were showing me a verse over in Timothy that describes Jesus, every bit of his, what he came to earth to do. And that's what Paul's talking about in these prayers in Ephesians chapter one, Ephesians chapter three. And it's vital that we keep our faith in our letters, in our covenant.
— Now, Greg looked there, chapter three, verse five, "which in other ages was not made unto the sons of men..." Come on down. "Wherefore, I was made a minister according to the gift of the grace of God given to me by the effectual working of his power. Unto me, who am less than the least of the saints is his grace, given that I should preach among the Gentiles and the unsearchable riches of Christ. And to make all men see what is the fellowship of the ministry, or their part of the mystery, which from the beginning..." Let me read it, "to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ". Now, get this. "To the intent that now unto the principalities and power in heavenly places might be made known by the church the manifold wisdom of God". Hallelujah. Glory to God. The manifold wisdom of God. "According to the eternal purpose, which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord, in whom we have boldness and access with confidence by the faith of him. Wherefore, I desire that you faint not at my tribulations. For this cause I bow my knees under the Father of the Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named that he would grant you according to the riches of his glory to be strengthened with might, to be strengthened with dunamis by his Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your heart by faith, that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth, the length, the depth, and the height, and to know, to have intimate relationship with the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that you might be filled with all the fullness of God. Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we can ask or think, according to the dunamis that works in us, unto him be glory in the church by Jesus Christ throughout all ages, world without end". Amen. Amen. My God. I'm in that prayer.
— Yeah. Well, we believed on Jesus through their words.
— Yes.
— So he is praying for us.
— Glory to God.
— Be renewed by the Spirit of your mind, he will say in chapter four of that, and put on the new man. That's something we have to put on.
— "And without controversy, great is the mystery of godliness. God was manifest in the flesh, that's Jesus, justified in the Spirit, that's when he was raised from the dead, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory".
— That's first Timothy chapter three.
— There it is. Verse 16. That's the entirety of Jesus right there.
— That's it right there. Then you go to the book of Hebrews and it's sealed. Glory to God. Did we leave anything out?
— Well, Peter will say in second Peter one, "Be established in this present truth". That's what you're talking about.
— Oh.
— Thank You, Jesus. Oh, Jesus. Oh, we give You thanks. We worship You. Thank You, Lord. Thank You, Lord Jesus. We worship You. We bless and praise You with all of our heart. We magnify You. We're seated in heavenly places with You. And the scripture says, "Here men that die, receive tithes. But there he receives them of whom it is a witnessed that he lives forever". You know that I'm a joyous tither and thrilled to give. Thank You, Jesus, for receiving our tithe and setting it before the Father and worshiping him with it and our givings of offerings. And Gloria and I began, as You know, with literally nothing.