Kenneth Copeland - Speak Your Faith Into Motion
Jesus said, "Man doesn't live by bread alone," natural food alone, "but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God". "Faith cometh by hearing, hearing by the Word of God". Amen. So get into this.
Thank You, Lord, I'm coming before You today. I'm in Your Word. I'm listening to CDs. I'm watching the DVDs today, but I'm feeding my spirit. I'm taking faith food. I'm receiving faith food. I'm renewing my mind, but I'm feeding my spirit, and my faith is coming.
Talk to your faith, see? You believe in your heart, you say it in your mouth. "I believe in my heart, I believe my faith is growing". I say it, "Come on, faith. I'm speaking to you like I speak to the mountain. Come on, grow up. Come on, get strong. Come on, strength". "Well, how do I get strength"? Well, the joy of the Lord is your strength. "Huh"? That's what Nehemiah said, "The joy of the Lord is your strength". "Uh, if it's going to take joy, I ain't never gonna make it. Ugh". You got born again. Look at Galatians 5. Well, let's go over there and look at it. I don't trust you. I tell you to go look at it, you might not do it. Glory to God. Let's go over there and take a look at this. Galatians 5, and let's look at the 22nd verse. "But the fruit of the Spirit", well, let's back up here a minute.
You notice the word "Spirit" here is capitalized. Now, in the Greek text, there are no capital letters and there are no punctuation marks, not like English marks. So the translators just had to do the best they could with it. But if you'll study this a minute, it's very clear. Back up here, the 16th verse, where the Word says, "This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and you will not fulfill the lust of the flesh". It's not talking about walking in the Holy Spirit. It's talking about spirit, soul, and body. It's talking about walking in your born-again spirit man. And we can look at it, we can prove it right here.
Now listen to me carefully. "For the flesh lusteth," or puts pressure, "against the Spirit". Your flesh don't put pressure against the Holy Spirit. Your flesh puts pressure on your born-again spirit. Amen. And your born-again spirit puts pressure against the flesh. It's trying to get you to stop doing that and quit walking by sight and start walking by faith. Amen. So now notice this. Let's go back over there again. "The fruit of the Spirit is love". Well, that's God. Well, yeah, all of these things, all of these nine fruits here, they're all God. Amen.
When you were recreated in Christ Jesus, all of these were deposited in you because the Spirit of God came inside to live inside you. All of these are in your spirit. They are available to you. They were put there the moment you got born again. This is different from the gifts of the Spirit in I Corinthians 12, 13, and 14. This is the fruit of the Spirit. So by faith I need to develop "the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering," or patience, endurance, "gentleness, goodness, faith," or faithfulness, someone who can be depended upon, "meekness". Meekness is not weakness. It's not being weak. Being meek is humility. Humility is not self-debasement. Humility is when you bow your knee before God.
See, joy of the Lord makes me strong. "Well, how can the meekness make me weak"? Now, that's just borderline stupid right there, but... Forgive me. You forgive me too, Lord, amen, because I've been just as stupid as that myself, or worse. But meekness, true humility, Bible humility, is to humble yourself to God and His Word, put His Word first place, not what you and I think about it, but what it says. Be New Testament taught instead of religiously brainwashed. Just believe anything that comes passing by. No, hey, this as much a manifestation of God in the earth as the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. In the beginning was the Word. The Word was with God. The Word was God. Amen?
Now, thank You, Lord. "Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law". Developing or growing, it's diet and exercise. Oh, glory to God. Thank You, Lord Jesus. Being a doer of the Word, not just a hearer only. "Well, faith cometh by hearing". Oh, yeah, and we need to hear. And there are people that, you know, listen to two or three, four CDs a week and maybe two or three of them a day, and I mean, they are in every meeting they can get in. They come to the Believers' conventions. They go to Brother Moore's. They go, you know, every time Creflo has a meeting then they go to that one. And every time Jerry Savelle has a meeting, they go to that one. Glory to God.
"Yes, amen. Oh, I'm there brother". You're enjoying good health aren't you? "Nah. I just don't know how come God don't heal me". You haven't acted on the Word. You're just a big, spiritually fat believer. But you're fat on faith, but unless you put it into action, it hasn't been released. "Well, brother, I just don't understand this. I just got all kinds of faith. I just". Well, release it! It must get out of your spirit, into your mouth, and out your mouth, and hold on to the Word of the living God. If you're having trouble in that area, if you're not developing properly, walk right up to that mirror in the morning.
Listen to me now, I mean this. I do it. I do it everyday. I look myself right in the mirror, and I look right in my eyes and I say, "I believe this. But more than believing this, I know this is true: Surely He hath borne my griefs, carried my sorrows (weaknesses, diseases, sicknesses) and pains. We did esteem Him stricken of God, and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for my iniquities; chastisement of my peace was upon Him, and with His stripes we are healed. Jesus cast out the spirits with His word, fulfilling that which was spoken by the prophet Isaiah that He took our infirmities and bore our sicknesses. Himself bore our sins on His own body on the tree.
I know this. I don't just believe this, I know this. I know it so. I know it. Glory to God. Whether I feel like it or not, I believe it. Whether I see it or not, I believe it because I know it. I believe every word of it. That we, being dead to sin... now listen to me carefully because I am going to add a little something to this: That we being dead to sin, sickness, and disease, that we live under righteousness, delivered from the curse and set free, by Whose stripes I was healed. If I was healed, I am healed now. And Mark 11:23, Jesus said, "whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and cast into the sea; and shall not doubt in his heart". I do not doubt in my heart. Sin, sickness, disease, get out of me! Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea. I take it! It's mine! I believe it, receive it! It's mine.
Then don't change that all day long. I don't care, oh, thank God, I don't believe this, I believe that. I don't believe that, what that bank account says, I believe that! The blessing of the Lord, it maketh rich, and He adds no sorrow with it! All of my needs are supplied by His riches in glory. I have a full supply, thank you very much. And then just start praising God, worshiping Him. Put your eyes on those verses. Look them up. If you don't know where they are, I'm not going to do all your homework for you. Get you a good concordance and dig in there. I mean, get one online. You make sure you don't get off on some other wild tangent by doing that. Amen.
Get a good Strong's Concordance. Get a Young's Concordance. Get something that you can trust and depend on and look all, "I don't know how to do that"? Well, learn how! Amen. Dig in, sister. Dig in, brother. Hallelujah. Because you've got to feed on these things. "Well, I just don't have time". Well, you got time enough to sit there and watch that television half of the day. Cut that stuff out. I walked into something. Oh, dear Lord Jesus. Oh, help me Lord. "Hep me, hep me"! Oh, dear Jesus. Someone had asked me to come down there, and pray for so-and-so in the hospital, and I did, I went down there. And, you know, these are good people, they're born-again people, laying up there sick in the hospital with the TV on, watching General Hospital.
One of those... I don't know what's on there now because I don't watch that stuff. But back there then, it was the big serial, everyday, General Hospital, all these sick people. They're laying there thinking, "Oh, yeah, look at that. Oh, yeah, that's neat". Man! Forgive me. "A thought unspoken dies unborn". Amen. Thank You, Jesus. Oh, glory to God! Speak to the fruit of the Spirit. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. Amen. Listening to your spirit man, and practice and practice and practice. "Lord, I'm listening for you today. I need to know. I need to know what to do about this". Sit down and pray in the Spirit. "I believe I'll receive your direction". Those that are led to the Spirit of God are called to the sons of God. And there's that voice, right in here, but you're going to have to shut up and be quiet long enough to hear it. It will grow. It will become stronger.
Now look with me in the... thank You, Lord. Thank You, Lord Jesus. Oh, praise God. Help me, Lord. Let's go with the 4th chapter of Ephesians, the 14th verse, "That we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the slight of men, cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive; but speaking the truth in love, may grow up into him in all things", growing up into him. Growing up into him. When you come, don't be gossiping and talking. I mean being tenderhearted, forgiving one another even as God for Christ's sake has forgiven us, amen, forgiven you. Develop the love, developing the fruit of the Spirit and you get... no, no, no, no. Put it back down. Put it back down. Put it back down. Temperance, which means self control.
"Oh, Brother Copeland, how am I going to do that"? Yield to the Spirit of God. Say, "Lord, help me. Lord, help me here. I'm growing. The fruit is growing. I got to speak in love. I will speak in love. I believe God. I believe what the Word says". You can't if you don't put it in your eyes, your ears, in your heart, come out your mouth. Hallelujah. It's medicine to all your flesh. But faith cometh, faith cometh. Don't, "Well, I don't feel anything". Forget the feelings all right. Forget, just forget them. "Well, you don't know how bad I feel". Well, I've felt just as bad as you. Well, now maybe not. There's some really bad things that I've never experienced. But, hey, His name is Jesus and He loves you and He cares for you. I don't care what ugly, nasty thing you've done. He's already been to hell with it. He's already forgiven you. Now what you need to do is confess that sin and receive His forgiveness.
Now if you've never made Jesus Christ the Lord of your life, don't go back trying to confess all those sins. Confess Him as Lord and just wipe the slate clean! Amen. Now the joy of the Lord is your strength. We're back to that. "Oh! Oh, Lord, Brother Copeland, oh". No. Now, wait a minute. No, no, no, no, no. I want you to listen to me now. Medical science has proven that a put-on laugh has the same effect on the brain and the body as a real, sure enough, good old belly laugh where you just get so tickled your side hurts, you know. Now, you say, "Well, Brother Copeland, how could that be"? Well, I'm about to tell you. Do it by faith. The Scripture says, "The joy of the Lord is our strength", and joy is living in you, and I'm developing the fruit of the Spirit.
Now, I did that by faith. There's not a thing in this room that's funny, unless maybe it's Tim. He's holding the cards up there funny. No. Nah, I'm just picking on him. Anyway, yeah, that worked, didn't it? Hey, you got tickled too, didn't you? Well, hey, pick it up! Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha, Satan! Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! "What are you laughing at me about"? "Because you're a liar and the father of it! And you told me I'm sick and I'm not. Jesus told me I'm healed and I am! Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha," and don't quit. Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! It'll eventually come up in there. The joy of the Lord will come. It's in there. Prime the pump. Get it on up in there. Nothing happens without faith! And that thought flashes across your mind of what old Sister Bucketmouth said about you. "Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! I've forgiven her. Ha-ha-ha, I love that girl"! Whoa! "Really"?
Yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. I tell you, you can laugh yourself well. People have done it that are not even born again! The Scripture says, "a merry heart," not a merry pump, a merry spirit "does good like a medicine". And there are people that have... one man that I'm thinking about now, that just went out and bought all kinds of old slapstick comedy movies. I mean old stuff, brother. Some of it's silent. Now, you wouldn't think after all of these super movies that we've got and everything, if you've never taken the time to get into some of those old slapstick comedy silent movies, those guys had to be good because you couldn't hear nothing that they were saying. But funny! Buster Keaton, I'm telling you, you can't watch that very long without cracking up.
I started to say, I don't care how bad your body's hurting you. But when you're laughing, it releases endorphins, which is stronger than morphine. That'll give you something to laugh about. And this man that wrote this article had cancer, was dying. And he went out and he got Laurel and Hardy movies. He got, you know, all them old slapstick comedians back there. Comedies now ain't even funny. But back there then, man, I mean, it's just gut-wrenching funny. And he laid there and watched that and just "ha-ha-ha, ha-ha-ha, ha-ha-ha-ha-ha, ha-ha-ha. Ha-ha-ha-ha, ha-ha-ha". Prime the pump by faith. "I'm laughing by faith. I'm laughing at you, devil, by faith. I'm laughing at the pain. I'm laughing at this flu. I'm laughing at you! Ha-ha-ha-ha! You thought you could put the flu on me. You can't because Jesus is living in me"!
I'm going to give part of Creflo Dollars' testimony. Tried to put cancer on Creflo. He said, "You can't do that, Satan. I've got a man living on the inside of me". His next doctor appointment, went in there and they looked at the screen. And Creflo looked at his son. They both looked at the doctor. And Creflo said, "Are you guys seeing this"? He said, "Yeah". There was a picture of Jesus right on that screen.