Kenneth Copeland - High-Octane Faith Runs on Love
Hello, everybody, and welcome to the Believer's Voice of Victory broadcast. And merry Christmas, everybody. Praise God. And here on the Believer's Voice of Victory, we're celebrating Christmas from now through December the 25th, Christmas Day, glory to God, by giving you a special gift every day. It's part of our "25 days of Christmas". Just go to kcm.org/25days, and get all the information there. Hey, we get excited about this. I'm a Christmas kind of a guy. Amen.
When I was a little boy, my birthday was on the 6th of December, so mother would always get the Christmas tree up by my birthday. Oh, I just had to have it. But then, boy, the 6th through the 24th, oh, oh, it was agony. You would, oh, you know, watch the presents stack up. And my mother loved Christmas. Well, so did my dad. But we're just a Christmas family, and we always enjoyed it, and we still do. And so we're all in it with you. Praise God.
Father, we thank You today. We receive Your presence on this broadcast, and we thank You and worship You. We open our hearts, we open our minds to receive revelation from heaven. And we thank You in Jesus' name. Amen.
Hallelujah. We're talking about words, the most important things in this earth. Let me say it again. Words are the most important things in this planet. Praise God. Now let's go to Matthew 4:4, "But Jesus answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God". Now, since words are the most important things in this planet, that makes the Word of God the most precious thing in this planet. Praise God. Oh, thank You, Father. Oh, Lord, give us deeper insight and revelation of this.
Now, you remember John 1, "In the beginning was the Word, the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same in the beginning with God". Hallelujah. The Father, the Son, who is the Word, and the Holy Spirit. Now, this, then, the Word of God, the covenants of God, His very bond is just as much a revelation of God in the earth as He is. Oh, this is just as much God as He is. Mm. Oh, my goodness. My, my, my. Hallelujah. Now then, we talked about the fact that this is a Word-created universe, Genesis, Chapter 1; 1, 2, and 3. Then Hebrews, Chapter 1, we found out that it is a Word-upheld universe. He is upholding all things by the Word of His power. Amen. Now let's go back to Mark 11:23 once again because it is not a good thing to talk about all of these things, you can't separate them from faith because faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God.
"Brother Copeland, why do you preach so much about faith? I mean, why do you talk about faith so much"? Well, for one thing, that's what I'm called to do. But now think about this. You can't get born again without it. We are born again by faith. The just shall live by faith. You can't walk the Christian walk without it because we walk by faith and not by sight. It is by faith so that it might be by grace. The gift of righteousness is by the faith of Jesus Christ. Oh, you could just go on and on and on and on and on and on. God is a faith God. He is love. He is a faith God. Faith worketh by love. Oh, yeah. Let me tell you something. I can't impress this on you enough. The Lord has been impressing me with this now for months.
We must renew our minds that when we say, "love," we said, "God". And when we say, "God," we've said, "love". "love" has become a slang word. "I love my car. I love pizza. I love this, I love that". And you can have very little respect for the love of God when you don't respect the word "love". So what does the Word say? To love my new shirt? No, no, no. The Scripture says He gives us all things richly to enjoy. He wants you to have a new shirt. He wants you to have these things. These things are good, and He knows you have need of all of these things. But we must develop a greater and higher respect for God Himself. When you say, "love," you've said, "God".
And you ask any Christian, "You believe God loves you"? "Oh, yes, Brother Copeland". Then why, when the going gets tough, "I just don't understand why don't You care? How could You let this come on me"? See, you don't believe He loves you. You understand that He does, but you don't trust the love. "I know you didn't do this to me, and I know with all my heart the reason you told me to do this is because You love me. Now, it doesn't make sense right now, but I believe it. I believe the love, and I trust You with all my heart. And I don't lean to my own understanding". That is so vital. That is faith in love. Faith in God, faith in love, same thing. But the renewing of your mind to love, all of these words and all of this has to do with His love. Praise God.
Now, Mark 11, Verse 20, "In the morning, as they passed by, they saw the fig tree dried up from the roots. Peter calling to remembrance saith unto him, Master, behold, the fig tree which you cursed is withered away. Jesus answering said, Have faith in God," or "Have the faith of God". "For verily I say", well, "Have faith in love". Huh? Oh, oh, yeah. Glory to God. "For verily I say unto you, Whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, be thou cast into the sea; and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that those things which he saith.."., what are things that you say? Words. So let's read it that way: "...believe that those words which he saith shall come to pass; he shall have whatsoever he saith".
Now then, let's go to the 12th chapter of Matthew. Matthew, Chapter 12, and look at the 36th, "I say unto you, That every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment". You tell me words are not important? "For by your words you shall be justified, by your words you shall be condemned". This is serious business. Now, let's look at this from the 6th chapter of Luke because Luke adds something to it in his writing that Jesus said. 6:45, "A good man out of the good treasure of his heart," or the deposit of his heart, "bringeth forth that which is good". Verse 44, "Every tree is known by his own fruit. For of thorns men do not gather figs, nor of a bramble bush do they gather grapes".
See? "A good man out of the good treasure," good deposit, what you've put in there. What you have put in there is what comes out. Huh? "...bringeth forth that which is good; an evil man out of the evil deposit of his heart," or a heart full of fear and unbelief, "bringeth forth that which is evil". Why? How? How, Jesus? How does He do it? "For of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks". That's what causes it to come to pass. You have, today in your life, I have, today in my life, what I said yesterday. Amen. Now, this is spiritual law. You can't change it. You can change the words. Hallelujah. Oh, yeah, I just preached myself happy on that one right there.
So now stop and think about it. We live in a Word-created, Word-upheld, Word-dominated environment. Amen. All right. Now, let's go back over our... we won't take time to look all these up. We looked them up last week. We've got so much to do today. And if you've downloaded your notes from last week, you've got them. Now then, download them for this week, and you'll have them, have all the scriptures and everything there. So now, Genesis 1:1-3, "God said, Light be: light was". Hebrews 1:3, He's "upholding all things by the word of his power". Psalm 19:14, "Make my words acceptable to you, O Lord". Psalm 91:2. Oh, oh, this one just does me that way. Hallelujah. Think about it. Let's turn over there. I can't bypass this one. Glory to God. Nope, no, no, no. "He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty".
Now, how do I get in there? "Hey, that's where I want to abide. I want to be there in the shadow of the Almighty. I don't want to be outside that. How do I get in there? Oh, God, let me in there. You just..". That won't do it. That will not do it. "I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge and my fortress: my God; in him will I trust. Surely he will deliver me". Glory be to God. Hallelujah. I'm telling you, well, if that don't set you on fire, your wood's wet, brother. Praise God. I'm telling you, that's dancing time in the household of faith. Praise God.
That's the reason David would dance before the Lord with all of his might because these psalms worked for him in combat. Hallelujah. That's the soldier's psalm. I've met a few. I know of hundreds and hundreds under the command of personal friends of mine that caused their... Keith Kurber, colonel retired, pastoring church up in Alaska now, Special Forces. He said, "I want you to lay hands on me". And Gloria and I did. He was about to deploy. And he said, "I'm taking over a high-casualty unit".
Well, we went over the 91st Psalm, and I told him about what I had read of a World War I commander that commanded all of the troops under his command to memorize the 91st Psalm. And you had to be standing ready, you know. I mean, you walk up in front of them and say, "Verse 5"! "Thou shalt not be afraid of terror by night; nor for the arrow that flies by day, sir"! I don't care, just like we had to do when we was in the service learning the orders of the day, if they called out number 3, I mean, brother, you had to come up with number 3. And they did it with that whole 91st Psalm so that they had it. They said it every day. They said it in formation every day. And in combat, that man did not lose a man under his command.
So Colonel Kurber and Gloria and me and we believed God, stood on the Word. I said, "Keith, let me know". So the four of us were standing there praising God and worshiping God. And then, he went on, you know, two-year deployment. Well, you know, I pray in the Spirit over my partners and, you know, all that, but I wasn't thinking about Keith every day. But, now, that's the reason you need to be praying in tongues and take care of your prayer life every day. You turn that over to the Holy Spirit, and it would come up. But my partners, I prayed for my partners every day, every day, every day, every day, every day, every day, every day, every day.
Well, I got a call, and it was about 2:00 in the morning. Gloria and I were in the bed, and that phone rang. And I answered it, and it was Keith. "Brother Copeland, I'm home"! I said, "Hey, Keith"! He said, "I'm so excited! I want to tell you, I didn't lose a man! Praise God"! He said, "We were protected through this whole thing"! Ha, why? He was in the secret place, and he knew how to control his tongue. And like David said, "Don't let me sin with my tongue, put a watch over my mouth". Amen. Hallelujah. All right.
So, words, that's the way you get in there is words, words spoken in faith. Hallelujah. Well, okay, I've got so much to do this week. Okay. Psalm 103, Verse 5, and Verse 20. Verse 5, "Who satisfies thy mouth with good things; so that thy youth is renewed like the eagle's". Now, the words "things" in the King James translation is italicized, so it just simply tells you that it was put in there by the translator. "Satisfies thy mouth with good; thy youth is renewed like the eagle's".
Now, is he talking about food? I've heard people translate that way. But actually, it simply says, "Who satisfies thy mouth with good; thy youth is renewed like the eagle's". So now, let's take the way this was translated. That's fine. The Hebrew root to "things," material things, anything that can be touched and so forth, is "word". That's good, isn't it, because all things are created by words. So, "He fills my mouth with good words; that my youth is renewed like the eagle's". Now, if that was just one little spot, we couldn't do that. But we know because of the flowing principal.
So what do we know from the book of Isaiah? "I wait upon the Lord". Huh? What am I doing waiting upon the Lord? I'm praising Him. I'm standing before Him. I'm worshiping Him. Words. Amen. "And he renews my strength like the eagle's". Praise God. Words. How does He do that? "I believe I receive it". Isn't that what Jesus said in Mark 11:24, talking about Mark 11:23? "I believe I receive the strength". Words, words. Now, there's just scripture after scripture. I carry a whole list of them in my little book here. I go from strength to strength as my days are, so shall my strength be. He is my strength. He upholds me. Praise God. Saying it, saying it, making confession of these things before God, may come to pass.
All right. Now, that was the 5th verse. Let's go to the 20th verse of the 103rd Psalm. "Bless the Lord, O you angels, that excel in strength, that do his commandments, hearkening unto the voice of his word". They're not listening for what God is saying in the earth. They already know what God is saying. It's when we say it that activates it, otherwise they don't have anything to work with. Amen. Hebrews 1:14, "To which of the angels said he at any time, Sit on my right hand... are they not all ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for those that shall be heirs of salvation"? "Well, what are they waiting for"? They're waiting to hear what's coming out of your mouth. You and I are the deciding witness. "Out of the mouth of two witnesses let every word be established". Amen. So what you're saying is what licenses the angels or the devils to work. Hallelujah.