Kenneth Copeland - The Ten Commandments Reveal the Faithfulness of God
— Hello, everybody. I'm Kenneth Copeland. This is Greg Stephens. Ambassador Huckabee, well, he wasn't an ambassador then. He was interviewing a man that said most Christians cannot quote over five of the 10 commandments, and most of them three. I thought, huh, let's see here. So that's the reason. Now, Ambassador Huckabee, and so anyway, that's where it came from. So I began to study them again, and he was right. I know I missed two.
— Anyway, to your point, I did a little news research for us here with my Victory News card. I found the polls, YouGov poll, Pew poll, Barna Research, 60% cannot name five of the 10. 90% of Americans believe certain commandments are relevant, murder, stealing, and lying, the others are not. 90%. Many believe the golden rule is one of the 10 commandments. Fewer than half of all adults can name all the four gospels.
— Oh, come on.
— No, I'm serious. Fewer than half of all adults can name the four gospels. Now, it's changing. Louisiana became the first state with Governor Landry, requires the display of the 10 commandments in all schools, and they be taught from kindergarten all the way up through high school. Now, officially displaying these other states have come on board, Georgia, Texas, Oklahoma, North and South Dakota, Indiana, Tennessee, and Mississippi. So it's going to change.
— Thank you, Jesus.
— You know, I do this, Brother Copeland, at the Bible School, I hate to say this, and there's some former students in here. I do this with them in their first year when they first get there. And when we get to Exodus 20, an Old Testament survey, I ask them about the 10 commandments. I said, "What's your favorite one"? Do you remember, any of you remember this? What's your favorite one? What about number four? Do you like four? Do you like seven? What's number six? I do that with you. Did I not do that? And many of them can't do it. They'll know by the time they come to Bible School.
— Well, let me tell you this. And that's the way I did it. Well, I put it up there on my mirror. Well, I went through it this morning. But it's just the way I used to do in the old days when there was no simulator to flying. So I did it the same way I did back there then. And I'd read them. Number one, I'll have no other God before me. Number two, I'll make no graven image. Number three, I do not take his name in vain. And it brings me to tears. I honored my father and my mother all the days of my life. Yes.
— Remember the Sabbath. Keep it holy.
— Yes. And let's put this on.
— We're going right now. So do you want to pick it up?
— No, no, no, no. Wait, wait, wait. And I tell people, I had a drug problem when I was about six or eight years old. What? My mama drug me to church. I'm so glad she did. And I have a memory of this in my mind. We left, we left the first, when we left the University of Baptist Church and went downtown to the first church, First Baptist Church in Abilene, Texas. They had a balcony. And my mother noticed one morning that, wait till he gets home. I was laying down the balcony. But I absolutely honored my father and my mother because she honored me when we got home. And somebody said, you know, most homes now have switches, except the children. Come on. My mother was a switcher. My little legs just, no, no, no, no.
— My grandfather was the pastor, a preacher, and he'd be right in the, he just, he wouldn't even look up. He'd just be reading this deal. He'd go, "Gregory". And that was it. I'm like, how did he know? I don't know how he knew. He would always say, well, the Holy ghost tells me. That's what he'd always say. John said, "Daddy, how do you always know what I'm thinking"? I said, "John, that's easy. I thought it before you". And let's get down to business.
— We covered commandment one fairly well yesterday. If you missed it, go back and watch it. I am the Lord, your God brought you out of Egypt. Have no other gods before me. And then the second one is likened to it. Now thou shall not make unto thee any graven image or any likeness of anything in heaven above or in the earth beneath nor in the water of the earth. Thou shall not bow thyself down to them, nor serve them for I, the Lord, thy God is jealous. God visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, upon the third, the fourth generation of them that hate me and showing mercy unto thousands of them that love me and keep my commandments. There are four prohibitions listed in that verse. We don't make any three dimensional graven images because we are created in his image. He's three parts. Father, Son, the Holy Spirit. We're three parts. I'm a spirit. I have a soul. I live in a body. It's three dimensional. I can't be worshiping a statue that somebody made. Three dimensional statue.
— Gordon Robertson was, he really did not want to go to the mission field and so forth. But he was in India and he saw this woman praying to a rock. That's all she knew. He said, well, that did it for me.
— Nor are we to worship anything that he created, the rock or a bird or a fish or the sun or the moon or anything like that. That's what Abraham was when he was Abram.
— Now you really hit it when you talked about the moon. The half moon.
— Absolutely.
— Islam. It's on the flag. On everything they do. Here's the point of this. That was a betrothal. Judaism was born on that first Pentecost when they received these 10 commandments. And here's the thing, because they were already breaking them, we'll talk about that later. Because they were already breaking them, 3,000 died that day. Ground swallowed them up. On the second Pentecost, fulfillment of Pentecost, not the second Pentecost, there was one the next year. But when Pentecost was fulfilled in Acts chapter 2, 3,000 were born again that day. For a reason. Because here's the point. God is completely committed to us in our relationship with him. He'll never be unfaithful to you. He'll never be unfaithful to me. See, this is the blessing side of the commandment. You can look at it as God's trying to restrict you. No, he's trying to save you. He's trying to protect you. He's trying to protect your family. He's trying to protect... They thought they knew everything coming out of Egypt. They didn't know anything.
— Well, and think about what happened at Babel. The languages were confused. Now, that didn't mean immediately somebody was speaking French. No, no, no. Had that been the case, they could have learned the difference in a year. They just couldn't understand, anything they could imagine they could accomplish.
— Because they were unity.
— And so the Lord dispersed them around the different parts of the world. And when the explorers got over here, the Native Americans, Columbus thought he was in India. That's the reason they're called Indians. Anyway, the American Indian. And they got over here, they had their own language.
— Some of them could write even.
— Well, the Cherokee developed an alphabet.
— Looks very much like ancient Hebrew.
— Yeah.
— Well, looks very much like it.
— When they excavated the burial mounds in Cherokee, North Carolina, they found Middle Eastern alloy. And these markings on there, and they took it to a language expert. He said, "No, that's paleo in Hebrew".
— How'd they get that? Let me show you this real quick, because many people get this wrong in verse five. Thou shalt not bow thyself down to them, nor serve them. For I am your Lord, your God, and jealous God. Now, this part right here, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generations of them that hate me. Pay attention to that. You got to pay attention to the words. And showing mercy, chesed unto thousands of them that love me and keep commandments. So here's the point. So many think when he states he visits the sins of the fathers upon the children, they think the wrong way when they see that. God's memory is perfect. Absolutely perfect. Lucifer's is not, but God's memory is perfect. He allows his children time to repent. He waits until the iniquity rises to a certain level. He's a long suffering. What he's saying here is, my mercy will extend to several generations. I'll remember this so that they can get right. Verse four proves it. The word "thousands" there in Hebrew, alafim, is a double plural indicating 2,000 generations. So if his memory of all those that hate him is only three to four generations, his chesed memory is 2,000 generations.
— Glory to God.
— So he only remembers a very short time those that hate him. But those that love him, it's a double. It's 2,000 generations that he'll remember that.
— And you go back to what is it, Isaiah 43? I, even I,
— Blot out your transgression.
— Blot out your transgression for my own sake.
— For his own sake. The reason he doesn't remember my sin any longer, thanks to Jesus, is because of his sake. He can bless me in that. See, everything changed at the cross. You're in a new covenant now. So when we look at these commandments, don't let yourself be condemned by the commandments if you're in Christ Jesus. They have been fulfilled. Now, I align my will toward this. Some people say, well, Paul teaches totally against the Ten Commandments. Yes, he does, no, he doesn't. If you're looking at the Ten Commandments for your righteousness to make you right with God, they won't.
— They won't do it.
— So here's the thing. What does he remember? He remembers what Jesus did. I should keep my faith in what Jesus did. And because I keep my faith in what Jesus did and love him, these all hang on love. All ten of them hang on love. And I love him, then I won't steal, I won't kill, I won't do these things. I'll keep God first. I'll remember the Sabbath. Now then, class, Genesis one, And Elohim blessed them, saying, Be fruitful and multiply till the water's in the sea. This is page two...
— Very beginning of it.
— Do you see that? In my Bible, I turn this over here and it says, page two. In page two, the first thing any human ear heard was to be blessed. And I read that, and I read that, and I read it, and I read it, and read it, and read it, and I wrote it in red up here at the top over and over and over and over and over and over again. The blessing.
— That's it. That's it.
— Hence came the book. The blessing of the Lord, it maketh rich, and he adds no sorrow to it. So if that's what he started here, if Elohim blessed, it's Elohim blessing all the way through.
— Absolutely true.
— And when you get over to here and right, nine, five, And to them was given that they should not kill them, but that they... whoa.
— Revelation.
— And there was a war in heaven. Michael and his angels prevailed not. Oh, Jesus Christ, Nazareth, the same yesterday, today, and forever. The temple was filled. Oh, glory to God. Thank You, Jesus. Oh, what do we, what do we? Overcome them and all things. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. Amen. The end.
— All the way through. It's all the way through. Now, if I was created in his image, why do I need another image?
— And in this case, in this case, it's wonderful to read the back of the book first.
— Yes, sir. Yes, sir. You know, I've had people come up to me and, and I'm not, I'm not condemning you. I'm not saying you're in sin. I'm not saying you're not going to go to heaven. Didn't God doesn't love you and hadn't blessed you. But somebody asked me about a tattoo. And I said, "Well, you know, you do what you do". And then said, "Well, I was thinking about getting one of a family member that had died... their face". And I said, "Don't do that. No, they're with Him. You're making a graven image of a person". Now, I'm not going to get in whether you shouldn't get tattooed or not get tattooed. I know that Jesus, when he returns, will have something written on his leg. I don't know if that's a tattoo or not, but he's got something, you know what I'm saying? So I'm not, and I know what Leviticus says, and I know that, you're under grace.
— And I don't know what it was not too long ago. I said, "Did that hurt"? He said, "Well, yeah".
— Yeah, but my name has been written. I was created in his image. I told my daughter, she was talking to me about it. I said, "Well, you're beautiful like you are. You don't need paint on you to, to make you beautiful". And I don't know why I got off on that, but I just, I just feel the need to say, don't have any graven images.
— And in that case, that's exactly what that would be.
— Well, they're getting grief because they're still,
— That's what I'm saying. You're putting your grief on your body permanently.
— So I advise them, don't do that. If you're going to do a Bible verse or something like that, that's between you and God. I'm not going to tell you what to do, but I'm cautious about graven images like you were with flying that had become that with you. And it can be anything, guys in our lives. And this is why you live a fasted life. If you, if you feel something controlling, you get rid of it.
— I hadn't thought of this in years and years and years. Uh, when I was a little boy, you know, the war was going on and you could do these tattoos. They just stick on your arm...
— Take them off.
— That's my dream. So I'm glad I didn't have any money for tattoo going on me,
— Before they get on you, they have to be in you. Go ahead, sir.
— Well, we have five minutes here. Why don't you wrap it up?
— So when you begin to look at these things, remember this is God's betrothal. First one, He introduces himself to them. The second one, he says, because you and I are one, we're betrothed now, you're going to be a special people to me. He says, "You're not going to have any graven images. You're not going to cheat on me". So here's the point. He won't cheat on you. So because here's what I want to get you to understand all 10 of these and there were the others. They all hang on love. They all hang on the blessing. He's committing himself the way he's committing us. He won't break these. He won't break a single one of them where you're concerned. So he's going to be faithful to you. And he's going to remember because you love him and keep his commandments. He's going to remember to a 2000 generations, your children and your children's children. That's your inheritance of the Lord. And it's all because of the 10 commandments.
— Glory to God.
— And we would teach people this. If we would teach the nation this, we wouldn't have the problems we have, but praise God, there's a revival coming.
— We've got a preaching president.
— He's got an office of faith in the white house itself.
— And whether you like it or not in Air Force One... He flew over the Gulf of Mexico and changed it with news media in there to the Gulf of America. With news media there, it is that forever until somebody else changed. So all of the maps, all of the globes of the world has to be changed because of our presence.
— How did it become Gulf of Mexico?
— The Spaniards did it thousands of years ago. Nobody really knew
— Because they were explorers, they named it that.
— They named it that well, our explorer was exploring right over the top of it and named it that with news media there to...
— ...to record it.
— It is done forever
— With the stroke of pen, with just one word, with one vow. We'll start with a commandment number three, and this is a big one tomorrow with that. Thou shall not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain for the Lord will not hold him guiltless to take his name.
— It actually says he will not carry...
— That's it.
— ...the name, right?
— That's exactly right. That's what it says in the Hebrew. Very good. We'll be back in just a moment.