Kenneth Copeland - God's Covenant With You Is His Offer Of Friendship
Hello everybody, I'm Kenneth Copeland. Welcome to the Believer's Voice of Victory broadcast, and welcome to Kenneth Copeland Bible college this morning. Praise God, hallelujah. Praise the Lord God, forever more. We had a good time last week. Did we not? I tell you what, Oh Lord. I'll tell you what, I have more fun than anybody on the planet. I've been doing this for 53 years and it's like, I just got started, amen. Glory to God. Ain't got time to die. Well, who wants die when you're having this kind of fun, brother. Amen.
Open your Bibles with me and our first scripture this morning will be in the 24th chapter of the book of Isaiah, please. We're talking about covenant faith. We're talking about faith that grows and becomes extremely strong when a believer becomes covenant minded. You are a covenant soldier.
Stop and think about what happens when a person enlists in military service. He has a contract with the United States government. He has AI he has a covenant with the government. And he has a purpose and that's to protect and stand up for the constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic. He has a covenant. Amen. And he has entered into a covenant into which he is willing and able to offer his life for that covenant in return, the government of the United States.
Let's draw it down to cases. The government of the United States and then that branch of service. I was in the United States army. There's the air force, Marines, Navy. That service provides everything for that soldier. The scripture said, no man goes to war at his own expense. Well, the man of God is thoroughly furnished. How? By covenant, you have entered into a covenant with the government of heaven and you have offered your life and everything it does everything it has and always will have. And God offered his life and gave it for you and gave you everything He has everything He knows everything He's offering you full supply. No way He intended for you to go to war at your own expense. You should prosper to the outermost, not for prosperity sake, but for the sake of the people. Meet the needs of the people. Amen. Hallelujah. Glory be to God.
Isaiah 24, you there? Verse four, the earth mourneth and fadeth the way, the world languishes and fadeth away, the haughty people of the earth do languish. The earth also is defiled under the inhabitants there of because they have transgressed the laws change the ordinance broken the everlasting covenant. Therefore, hath the curse devoured the earth. I mean, that's as simple, you'd have to have help to misunderstand that, but people just read by that and say, well, yeah, you know they broke the covenant. Yeah. That's huge, but you have to be covenant minded. After a while, you get to where you see anything that says Testament covenant boy, I mean your, your, your flag goes straight up.
I want to know what this means. I want to dig into this more. I'm a covenant man. I'm a covenant woman. My family's covenant. Hallelujah. Thank you Lord Jesus. Now then, let's, let's go back to Galatians three where we began last week. And read our, what I call the golden text. In Galatians 3:7-11, Know ye therefore that they which are of faith, or the faith, the same are the children of Abraham. The scripture foreseeing that God would justify the heathen through faith preached before the gospel unto Abraham saying in these shall all nations be blessed. So then they, which be of faith are blessed with faithful Abraham for as many as under the works of the law are under the curse. For an it's written, cursed is everyone that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them, but that no man is justified by the law in the sight of God, it evident for the just shall live by faith.
There it is. The blessing and the curse. It is the Bible. It is the Bible. Now our English translators did their best to get over to us the will of God by calling it Testament. For some reason a Testament means covenant. What is the last will and Testament? It's the covenant that a man makes with his family over what he does with his, with his earthly goods. It's a covenant made with the family. So instead of reading the will, you read the covenant. This is the covenant with the family, but people and with Western minds don't think covenant, particularly English speaking people. They've, they think Testament.
Well this is the will. Well, we just don't know what the will of God. You got his will and Testament. That's what you do in church, you read the will, it is the will of God. Duh! And they were doing their best to get that over to English speaking people. However they got that over and lost the whole covenant idea. But praise God, we've got it back. Hallelujah. Somebody ought to give the Lord a praise.
So now let's go to the book of James please. And we'll read the, in the 2nd chapter 23rd verse. The scripture was fulfilled which saith, Abraham believed God and it was imputed unto him for righteousness. And he was called the Friend of God. You notice it's capitalized. Now that's huge. That is covenant correct. He's a Friend. There is a friend that sticks closer than a brother. It's a covenant friend. In our case, our father, El Shaddai himself is our friend. He's my father, but he's my covenant friend. He's not this, no he's my friend. Jesus Christ of Nazareth, son of the living God, Lord advocate general of the church. Hallelujah. Is my blood brother.
Now I'm native American that's big to me. I mean, when I was a little boy, I always wanted to have a blood brother and um, some of you are so young, you don't remember who Ben Crosby was, but some of you do. And when I was, when I was a little boy, I mean he was, he was the biggest singer in town, brother. I mean he was, he was the Elvis of the day. And we drove right by MacMurry college. It's MacMurry university now, but back then they were the MacMurray Indians. And there was a, they had a sign out there by MacMurray, said MacMurray college and they had this Indian, you know, feathers and all, and I'd say, mama, when I grow up l will be an Indian and sing like Ben Crosby. Amen.
And I had, you know, I knew that that on my mother's side that we're Cherokee and I got thinking about that. I thought, I wonder how much of that I just made up. I'm not going to mention that anymore until I find out for sure. There is no use lying at the pulpit. So, and then ran my DNA on ancestry.com and it just wasn't there. So I didn't mention anymore. And my granddaughter, Rachel, said, Papa, I found out what the truth is about this. She said, ancestry.com doesn't have any native American markers. Native American people wouldn't give it to them. Ooh, they're still a little touchy. Amen, I said we still a little touchy. And she said, but I have found a specialty lab they specialize in that.
I said, okay, let's get, let's get my DNA ran there. And sure enough, it's Cherokee, glory to God. And a couple of tribes up in Minnesota I'd never heard of before. So now I've got a little dab of stuff there I didn't know I had. Amen. And I'm, but covenant meant something to me when I was a little boy and, and I loved it. It, it was all part of my life and part of my DNA. Amen. I didn't realize then that God was preparing me for what I'm doing this morning, covenant of blood, hallelujah, and the way it works.
So now we talked about these different areas of the basic fundamentals of faith and so forth. But now this is just so important. The scripture was fulfilled when saith Abraham believed. But what did Abraham believe? He believed what he said. What did he say? He swore, he swore an oath to him. He made covenant promises. Unbreakable promises. Did you hear me? Unbreakable promises. That book is unbreakable. Now you know what truth is. Truth is an unbreakable blood sworn oath of covenant. It is absolute truth. It cannot be broken. God is truth. And we worship him in truth.
What does that mean? In spirit and in truth, we worship him around the truth of his covenant. Hallelujah in the name of Jesus. The Spirit of the Lord has come upon you, has come upon you in times past, time, and time, and time again. But those moments as precious as they were are only the beginning saith the Lord, for the best is yet to come. So rejoice and be glad for my will is being carried out in your life and in your family. And there's a couple of family problems that are going to get worked completely out and it'd be sooner than you think, saith the Lord. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Glory to God.
Did that witness to your spirit? I'm glad. Thank you Lord Jesus, the friend of God, God's friend. So when God saw what had to be done at Sodom and Gomorrah, he went to talk with his friend about it. He couldn't do anything else because his friend owned the earth. God owned heaven. He didn't own the earth. Never has owned the earth. He created it, but he gave it to men. Never has owned it, by right of creation he does. But there's no way he could go in there and destroy that whole race of people. Do you remember he had to come down and see what was happening there. He wouldn't butt in on that, but report of that sin got through to him.
So he came down to check it out and sure enough, it had to be destroyed, but he didn't destroy. He didn't own that place. Well, I've got some more news for you, neither does the devil. He had to go talk to the owner and that owner's name was Abraham. He's now gonna button on your church. He's not gonna butt in on your ministry. If he has a plan to happen in your ministry, he'll come talk to you about it and you can do what you want to do about. You cannot do it at all, but don't lie about it. And when he comes to you and says, Kenneth, what are you going to do about this? I said, nothing. Why? Did you realize all the praying you ever did never informed God of anything? It did more to inform you. Amen.
Oh, well, he's talking to me about what, what the ministry that, that just happened there just a moment ago with this young man and boy I didn't want to do that. Oh no. And um, he talked to me about it. And so then he came, he said, what are you going to do about this? I said, nothing. Don't you plan to do that? I said, no, I do not. Why? I said, because sir, I'm liable to make a mistake and I don't want to do that then and make a mistake and, and affect somebody's life. He said, Kenneth, you're making the mistake now. He said, by not being willing to move on this, you're already making the mistake that will hurt people's lives.
I said, sir, I see it. Yes sir. I am yours to command. I'll do it. But now I could have whined around about that and kind of dodged it and all that and maybe not even gotten there yet and just be floundering around somewhere. God, but God get it done, but he will just have to use somebody else to do it. So does that help? All right now, the friend of God. Now, then, Oh Lord Jesus, look with me in John 15, gospel of John 15 chapter. Now always remember, keep this in the forefront of your thinking when you're studying, reading. How much time do I have, Tim? In the gospel of John 13, 14, 15, 16, 17 was all spoken in the covenant meal. All of that is in that last supper, that last Passover meal where he said this is my body broken for you. This is my blood of the new covenant. All of you drink of it.
Now was Judas there? Did he drink of it? Yes, he did. Big, this is huge. And you'll see it here in a minute. All right, verse 13, 15:13, greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friend. Capitalize that F, you are my friends if you do whatsoever I command you. And look up there, we don't have time to do it this morning, but go ahead and look up the other places where he called them no longer servants but friends and so forth.
Now then Matthew 26, Oh dear Jesus. Verse 47, and while he had spake, lo Judas, one of the 12 came with him, a great multitude swords and staves from the chief priests and elders of the people. Now he that betrayed him, gave him, now what did he do? It said he covenanted with them for 30 pieces of silver. Whomsoever I kiss, that same is he, hold him fast. Forthwith, he came to Jesus and said, hail master and kissed him. And Jesus said unto him, friend, capitalized, Friend, wherefore art thou come? Judas broke the covenant. Jesus did not. He did not. And we're out of time.