Kenneth Copeland - Healing Is a Process
KENNETH: Hello, everybody. We're Kenneth and Gloria Copeland, and welcome to the Believer's Voice of Victory broadcast.
GLORIA: Amen.
KENNETH: And welcome to Southwest Arkansas. Praise God.
GLORIA: On a chilly spring morning.
KENNETH: Yeah, it is. Whoo! I'm telling you. It's just plum got cold over the last two or three days. Of course, by the time you see this, it'll be all warmed up. But, I mean, it, oh, yeah. And everything, springtime...
GLORIA: And I didn't even bring my skis or anything.
KENNETH: Our spring time in this part of the country is so beautiful.
GLORIA: It is.
KENNETH: It's just wonderful.
GLORIA: It's pretty.
KENNETH: Everything comes alive. We've got a family of geese that have moved in, and they just hatched out two or three days ago. And the little old yellow, fuzzy goslings...
GLORIA: You may hear them, too.
KENNETH: ...and, you know, they're teaching them how to swim, and they paddling around the pond. It's just wonderful. And we want to share this place with you. We enjoy this with you every year. It's been such a blessing to our family. Gloria was born just, what, two miles up the road here? And...
GLORIA: I always was a city girl.
KENNETH: Yeah, uh-huh. The town is the same, what is it, 102 people? And they never changed the sign. I guess the equal amount move in and move...
GLORIA: Well, that's right, yeah.
KENNETH: ...out over the years.
Father, we thank You today. We give You praise, and we honor You today. We honor Your Word. We honor Your name. We honor the blood of Jesus, and we thank You. The windows of heaven are open, and we open our hearts and minds to receive, to receive revelation from heaven, to receive insight and ideas and concepts about living this life of faith in Jesus and to know more about You, Lord Jesus. Oh, my, my, my. We love You, and we thank You. We honor You, and we ascribe all of the glory, all of the honor for every word that's said and every deed that's done to Your matchless name. Thank You. Amen.
Glory to God. We are going to be talking about healing. Isn't that good?
GLORIA: Oh, I like healing.
KENNETH: And Gloria's done Healing School for almost 40 years, and I'll tell you what, there ain't nobody, I don't care who it is. There ain't nobody knows any more about ministering healing than Gloria Jean Copeland.
GLORIA: Well, I appreciate that.
KENNETH: I can tell you that. Praise God. I've sat there in Healing School and just got healed, and received. Amen. It's just wonderful.
GLORIA: Praise the Lord.
KENNETH: Now, let's open our Bible's first to the book of Proverbs. All healing, all of it, is from God. People say, "Well, I don't believe in that healing". What's the matter with you? There's healing in your body. "Well, I know, but that's natural". Well, who do you think put it there? You didn't.
GLORIA: That's right.
KENNETH: God built that in there. He is the healer. Amen. Come on. Amen?
GLORIA: That's right.
KENNETH: All right, you're going to learn a lot of things. I want to show you this, though. Healing of the physical body is a process. Now, healing natural, you know, there's divine healing, and there's natural healing.
GLORIA: Yeah.
KENNETH: Help me, Lord, to make this clear, please. Let's take the healing of a broken bone. And you know, they set the bone and put it in a cast. And it takes several weeks for that bone to heal. That's a process, right?
GLORIA: Yes, that's right.
KENNETH: Now, that healing process is over a period of time. Now, divine healing is when the anointing, the power of God, is released, and say it mends over a period of a week instead of four to six. Well, you know something's happened.
GLORIA: Speed it up.
KENNETH: But it's the same process is what I'm trying to get over to you. Now, let's say you just received a miracle, just an instantaneous, miraculous healing, which is going to happen a lot all this week. Praise God.
GLORIA: Yes, amen.
KENNETH: It's the same process. It just got sped up to instantaneous, but the healing is the same process. Amen.
GLORIA: Yes, that's right.
KENNETH: Now, this is the prescription in the 4th chapter of the book of Proverbs, beginning with Verse 20. "My son, attend to my words". Now, we're going to see that words play a vital part in this all the way through in healing. Remember Psalm 107:20, Gloria, where He said, "He sent his word..".
GLORIA: Yes, that's right.
KENNETH: "...and healed them, and delivered them from their destructions". Well, Jesus is the Word. He's called the Word. He is that Word that...
GLORIA: Think how blessed we are to have the Word.
KENNETH: Oh, glory. Yeah, and you know what? And there's something I want to mention about this as we go. "Attend to my words," words came first; "incline thine ear to my sayings". Well, words don't do you any good if you don't have an ear to hear.
GLORIA: That's right.
KENNETH: And what is that, let's take, quickly, Mark 4:23. Hold your place there in Proverbs and go over to the New Testament to the book of Mark 4 and look at the 23rd verse. "If any man". Now, do you realize that when the Bible, which is a spiritual book, refers to "man," it's not talking about gender? It's talking about mankind.
GLORIA: Mm-hmm.
KENNETH: You know, there's been a lot of wrong ideas and bad doctrine that came out of that, and it's ignorance that caused it. "Well, see, this is only for men". Well, you know, pssh, I'm not even going to honor that...
GLORIA: Don't even go there.
KENNETH: ...with much comment, but it's talking about mankind. Now, any person, "If any man," any person, "have ears to hear, let him hear". So that's not God's choice.
GLORIA: No.
KENNETH: That's our choice. "And he said unto them, Take heed what you hear". Now, we're about to read in Proverbs 4, "Incline thine ear unto my sayings". You don't just open your ear up like a garbage pail and just listen to gossip and all of that. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. "You take heed what you hear: with what measure you", "M-E-T-E," is old English for "measure. "What measure you measure, it shall be measured to you". The way you hear it is the way it's going to come back to you.
GLORIA: That's right.
KENNETH: "And unto you that hear shall more be given. For he that hath, to him shall be given: he that hath not, from him shall be taken even that which he hath". Now, it's not God that's taking it. He just got through teaching that it's Satan comes immediately to, what? Steal the Word. My brother and sister, the Word of God is the most precious thing on this earth. It's the most powerful thing on this earth. This is a Word-created universe, created by the Word of God. It is upheld...
GLORIA: That's right.
KENNETH: According to Hebrews 1, it is upheld by the word of His power.
GLORIA: It never loses its power...
KENNETH: No.
GLORIA: ...because of that.
KENNETH: Because of that. Now, notice that the Scripture says, "The power of death and life are in the power of the tongue," or in the power of words. You can't change that. That's a spiritual law. However, you can change the words under which you live. And they come out of your own mouth and out of the Bible, the written Word of the living God.
GLORIA: Mm-hmm.
KENNETH: It's so vitally important. Now, notice, "Unto you that hear shall more be given. For he that hath". Has what?
GLORIA: Has...
KENNETH: Ears to hear.
GLORIA: ...ears. These things.
KENNETH: "He that hath". he's talking about ears, wasn't He, when He was talking about, "Any man have ears to hear, let him hear". "Unto you that hear shall more be given. For he that hath," ears to hear, "to him shall be given: and he that hath not," ears to hear, "from him shall be taken even that which he hath". And He just got through going through all of these verses here, telling us, from the 14th to the 20th verses, that the sower sows the Word, and Satan comes immediately to steal it. Now, when we don't let him steal it, praise God, it's because we have ears to hear, "shall more be given".
GLORIA: I have on my, you know, I've got this margin on here just filled up. "The law of receiving is the law of attention".
KENNETH: Oh, that's good, Gloria. Yeah. Well, hey, let's go back over there to 4:20.
GLORIA: That's what it says. It says, "Attend to my words".
KENNETH: That's what He said. That's what He said. That is so good. Listen to this, go back to that 20th verse, the 4th chapter of Proverbs. "My son, attend," pay attention...
GLORIA: Yeah.
KENNETH: "...to my words; incline thine ear unto my sayings". Now, don't forget what Romans 10:17 says. "So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God". Now, I made note of these scriptures, Gloria, in Luke 5:15 and 6:17. They came to hear and be healed. Now, you know, Gloria, most people have the idea that Jesus just came to town, and He just went to healing and He just healed everybody, and He just healed everybody. No, He didn't. He didn't heal everybody. "Why, Brother Copeland", Put your gun up. He didn't heal everybody. There were those in His hometown that "There He could do no mighty works because of their unbelief". Now, wait a minute. We're onto something here. What did they not believe? The Word. He preached. He took a text in the 61st chapter of Isaiah, and He preached, "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, for He has anointed me to preach the Gospel to the poor". So what happened? He preached, and they didn't believe it. They said, "Who does He think He is? I mean, we know Him. That's Mary and Joseph's boy coming in here, telling us that all this and"...
GLORIA: What didn't they do?
KENNETH: Got furious at Him.
GLORIA: They didn't pay attention.
KENNETH: They didn't pay attention.
GLORIA: That's right.
KENNETH: No, they didn't. So now what did He do? What did He do after that? The Scripture said, "He went throughout the whole area, went through their villages teaching".
GLORIA: Oh.
KENNETH: That's the cure for unbelief because faith cometh by hearing...
GLORIA: That's right.
KENNETH: ...and hearing by the Word of God. Now, "Attend to my words; incline thine ear unto my sayings. Let them not depart from thine eyes". Keep them before your eyes. Now, back in these days, they only had the written Word. But think about what you and I have. Oh, my goodness. You know what I enjoy doing? It's so wonderful now. You know, I've got all these translations in my phone, and now, not all of them are audio, but there's a number of them that are in different translations that someone is reading it. Well, turn on the audio and follow it and read with whomever is reading on the audio in that particular translation. And, of course, I use the King James translation from which to preach, and so that's what I listen to. I use other translations to study, but it's so good. You know what? This guy don't daydream. He just keeps on reading, and you go, "Whoa, whoa, wait a minute. Where is he now"?
GLORIA: He can't stop. He can't stop.
KENNETH: No, man. Now, there are times you stop and you make notes and so forth, but there are times you need to just go on and read and listen carefully and read and look. So, amen. Now then, "Keep them", don't let them depart from your eyes. When you're reading and meditating and confessing the Word of God, keep them, you ought to go through the healing scriptures every day. And as you do, you begin to see yourself, you meditate on that, "By his stripes you were healed". "Okay, what does that mean now that I'm healed, and I know I'm healed now? Well, you know, healed people ought to be up out of bed this time of day. Well, what am I staying in bed for"?
GLORIA: Yeah.
KENNETH: "Yeah, but you've got the flu". That's not what this says. This says, "By His stripes you were healed". "I know, but you're hurting". "Yeah, but that don't matter". Now, here's the difference, Gloria, and this is where it seems to be difficult. People make it difficult. But when you "attend to My word, you put My word first place," when that's final authority in your life, and you read I Peter 2:24, and, for instance, I enjoy doing this first thing out of bed in the morning. I look in the mirror. I go in there in the bathroom, and I look in the mirror, and I look myself right in the eye. "Surely Jesus bore my griefs, my sicknesses, my sorrows, and my pains". Look at myself right in the eye, and I finish quoting that. "We did esteem him stricken and smitten of God and afflicted. But he was wounded for my transgressions, he was bruised for my iniquities: and the chastisement of my peace was upon him; and with his stripes I am healed". Then I go over to Matthew 8:17...
GLORIA: Yeah.
KENNETH: ...which was in quoting that scripture. "Himself took my infirmities, and bore my sicknesses". Then I go to I Peter 2:24. "Jesus bore my sins". I'm looking myself right in the eyes, and I'm saying this. "Jesus Himself bore my sins in his own body on the tree, that I, being dead to sin, should live unto righteousness, by whose stripes I was healed. If I was healed, I am healed now".
GLORIA: That's right.
KENNETH: Now, that's what God said about it. Now, faith is believing that instead of believing physical symptoms or anything else. I heard Creflo Dollar say it like this. In fact, I was watching Creflo yesterday. And, oh, my goodness. So plain. He said, "Now, grace", You know, the Scripture says, "We are saved by grace through faith". It put the grace first and then the faith next. Then we see over in Romans 4:16, "It is by faith, so that it might be by grace". Now, get this. Creflo said this, and, oh, my, my, it just blessed me so. He said, "Jesus... Grace..". Jesus, full of grace and truth.
GLORIA: Mm-hmm.
KENNETH: "Grace provided my healing 2,000 years ago. Grace provided that". Now, I have to appropriate it by faith.
GLORIA: "Grace" meaning you didn't do anything to deserve it.
KENNETH: It has nothing to do with...
GLORIA: That's right.
KENNETH: ...anything I did or didn't do.
GLORIA: It was grace.
KENNETH: It's just pure grace.
GLORIA: Mm-hmm.
KENNETH: So what I must do, I must appropriate it by faith and say, "That's mine. I take it now. And from this moment, I am healed". And don't get off of it. Don't turn that loose.
GLORIA: That's right.
KENNETH: Don't get over into the, "Yeah, but's". "Yeah, but I hurt. What if"... No. No, no, no, no. All that's a badge of unbelief. Just get over here and stay here. "Yeah, but I'm healed. Yeah, but I'm well". Yeah. Yeah, yeah.
GLORIA: And, you know, we ought to start doing that when we feel good, not wait until we get sick.
KENNETH: All the time. That's the reason I'm saying...
GLORIA: That's right.
KENNETH: ...do it every morning looking in the mirror.
GLORIA: Yeah.
KENNETH: "Every morning, I'm healed".
GLORIA: Yes, amen.
KENNETH: I don't care what your body feels like. And you just keep laying hold of that. As your faith grows, your faith appropriates it, and it comes from the power of God within. It comes from a power of the Holy Ghost upon you, and it doesn't come down on you here. It comes from in here, out like that.