Kenneth Copeland - We Are Messengers Of Our Healing Covenant
Kenneth Copeland: Hello, everybody, I'm Kenneth Copeland, and this is the Believer's Voice of Victory broadcast.
Father, thank you so much today. Yesterday, we came to that wonderful place, again in Your books, that we have an everlasting covenant with You. You are a covenant-making, covenant-keeping God. You're honest, and Your Word is good, and we thank You. And we are rapidly becoming like Abraham where we are fully persuaded because of Your blood, fully persuaded, and we don't back down from the devil or any of his works. In Jesus' Name, amen.
Kenneth Copeland: Join me again in welcoming professor Stephens to this broadcast.
Greg Stephens: Thank you, it's an honor.
Kenneth Copeland: Thank you Lord Jesus, hallelujah.
Greg Stephens: Amen.
Kenneth Copeland: Let's read Ephesians once again here. Chapter two, "wherefore remember you being in time past Gentiles in the flesh, who are called uncircumcision by that which is called the circumcision in the flesh made by hand, at that time, you were without Christ". You were without the Anointed One, you were without His anointing. You were an alien from the common wealth of Israel and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world, covenants of promise have become religions. True covenant is hope, which is coming from religion to reality, glory to God.
Greg Stephens: Amen, I just noticed something. How many times, how many programs have we read that verse right there? You were without Christ being aliens from the common wealth of Israel. You were without the Messiah.
Kenneth Copeland: Yeah.
Greg Stephens: You didn't have a covenant with the Messiah like we do, but there were people that were allowed to live in the common wealth of Israel that weren't Jewish.
Kenneth Copeland: That's right.
Greg Stephens: And they got overflow blessing because of where they were. But you, you didn't even have that, he says. You weren't even part of the common wealth of Israel and strangers from all the covenants, didn't even have a clue that they existed.
Kenneth Copeland: Syrophoenician woman.
Greg Stephens: Absolutely right.
Kenneth Copeland: And Jesus, but she said covenant words.
Greg Stephens: Yes she did.
Kenneth Copeland: That got His attention. She called Him son of David. She called Him Messiah. And she said, "Have hesed own me". Which is the covenant of God's ever lasting mercy. David was so big on the hesed and his covenant.
Greg Stephens: Oh, he understood maybe better than anybody ever did.
Kenneth Copeland: Better than anybody I think.
Greg Stephens: He did things that should have got him killed.
Kenneth Copeland: Yeah.
Greg Stephens: But he was quick to repent and quick to call upon that mercy. And he would not, he honored, that's the thing about David. He would not touch Saul.
Kenneth Copeland: No he wouldn't.
Greg Stephens: Even though he's anointed king and Saul had been replaced, Saul has been replaced. He wouldn't do it.
Kenneth Copeland: He just would not do it.
Greg Stephens: No, not at all.
Kenneth Copeland: And he's a man after God's own heart. And the thing that goes after God's heart is covenant reality. You, when you know that you know, that you know, you have that covenant, glory to God. Flip over there to the book of Romans right quick. And let's look at something about Abraham in that fourth chapter of Romans, verse 19. "Being not weak in faith, he considered not his own body now dead. When he was about a 100 years old, neither yet the deadness of Sarah's womb. He staggered not at the promise".
Greg Stephens: There it is.
Kenneth Copeland: He staggered not at that covenant. It was as a covenant in his own blood. Well, in any way, he's gonna stare at it "through unbelief but was strong in faith, giving glory to God being fully persuaded". That's what happens when a person becomes blood covenant-minded and hearted, where you can, you can sit down with Jesus. You can sit down with your Heavenly Father and you can say now look, there's a lot I don't know about this. You know everything about this, but I have access to it because you and I are in covenant together. He started bringing up that 120 years lifespan in Genesis 6:3 and that, and then, through Keith Moore's teachings and so forth, and through the footnotes of the Classic Amplified that three score and 10, four score by strength never was His promise. That was a curse, it was a curse, God said 120.
Greg Stephens: That's right.
Kenneth Copeland: So I really didn't wanna do that, at first.
Greg Stephens: Sure.
Kenneth Copeland: But He just a little bit at a time, kept talking to me about it, kept talking to Him about it. And I kept studying it. I kept looking at it. And then He said, "You don't have to do this". I don't mean to heard an audible voice, but in here when you develop that...
Greg Stephens: Yes, sir.
Kenneth Copeland: When, over, if you listen, you can develop it and trust it. As long as it lines up with the Word. He said, "Will you do that for Me"? Of course I will. At the time He said that my body was so full of pain because of what had happened to me back then in 2004, when that disc ruptured in my back I had a muscle spasm in my back that was horrible. And I won't go into all that, but, and that pain just stayed in there, just stayed and stayed and stayed. But over a period of time, it, just believing God and so forth, a whole lot less than what happened, but it was there. And I said, well, then we, you've heard me talk about it. We went through that, I said, "Yes Sir, I'll do it". That's I enter covenant with You. So I consider not my own body now, 83 years old.
Greg Stephens: Amen.
Kenneth Copeland: But I only consider what He promised me and He promised me 120.
Greg Stephens: Amen.
Kenneth Copeland: And now I'm totally compared pain free. And I work out hard and it changed my entire life. That one covenant move, just simply Greg because I'm very covenant aware Even when medical science is involved, and it is. Because of there was some things that brought about a major change and it was wonderful, but all of that, I mix it with faith, whatever it is. And I asked the Lord, I said, "Shall I not go do that, and just stand on your covenant? It's fine with me cause I'll get there". "No", He said, "No don't do that". He said, "I provided this, I provided that man in there, you didn't know him until a few weeks ago". And he said, "I provided him, I set him up for you, go on".
Greg Stephens: There you go.
Kenneth Copeland: There you are.
Greg Stephens: I thought about what you said yesterday at the end. You were talking about knowing this in your head versus being fully persuaded...
Greg Stephens: Yeah.
Kenneth Copeland: Of this, now here, Abraham is righteous cause God said he was righteous. The Bible also tells us that Lot, his relative was righteous too. Lot is 24 hours away from his city being destroyed. Totally oblivious to it. Yet the Bible calls him righteous. He doesn't know, he hadn't gotten to the place Abraham did, that he was fully persuaded. He's still largely sins ruled. And God, because of the covenant will go there and say, "Well, you know, we can't do that. We're gonna need to talk to our friend, Abraham". And Abraham begins to negotiate with God. If there's 50, if there's 40, if there's 30 righteous, will you spare it? That's what He did with you, He negotiated with you...
Greg Stephens: Yeah, He did. Over time
Kenneth Copeland: He, you don't have to do this. He said, you know, I already knew I'd lived to be 92.
Greg Stephens: Right.
Kenneth Copeland: Of course when experience that I'd had with Him and I just settled that and was happy with that. And He said, "No, you don't have to do this". He said, "You can just go on at 92 if you want to". And He said everything would be all right.
Greg Stephens: That's what He was doing with you. Like He did with Abraham.
Kenneth Copeland: Yeah.
Greg Stephens: Cause you're his friend...
Kenneth Copeland: That's right.
Greg Stephens: Capital F. And so as a result of that, He's negotiating with you. There if you wanna do this.
Kenneth Copeland: No.
Greg Stephens: I'm with you.
Kenneth Copeland: Think about it like this. I'm His son but I grew up and now I'm in business with Him. I got born again I didn't know what I want.
Greg Stephens: Yeah, well.
Kenneth Copeland: I was still flying airplanes and tried to get away with that and did for a while. That's all I had, but that commercial ticket got me into the right seat of Oral Roberts' airplane and created a sweet place with him that lasted until he went home to be with the Lord at over 90. And I just, but as it began to grow and develop and you come to that place where Kenneth Hagin was just talk to God all the time. You talk to Him about where you're going this morning and about going this way or that direction being sensitive to listen to Him.
Greg Stephens: He did that all the time.
Kenneth Copeland: All the time.
Greg Stephens: If you remember Brother Hagin, he did that all the time
Kenneth Copeland: All the time.
Greg Stephens: I was thinking about this. Jesus established that covenant with us. We know it is communion. We talked about that on previous broadcast, but it really started with Abraham that started Genesis 14, verse 18, the first mention of bread and wine, where Melchizedek, here we come out of the covenant of Noah.
Kenneth Copeland: Yes.
Greg Stephens: He's one of the survivors that Shem.
Kenneth Copeland: Yeah.
Greg Stephens: He comes out of there and he meets him in Jerusalem, which was called Salem at the time. In Christian theology teaches that that man is a type of Christ and some think it was Christ. Well I believe it was Shem. That line of that covenant.
Kenneth Copeland: Greg.
Greg Stephens: Yes, sir.
Kenneth Copeland: The Jews had it on record.
Greg Stephens: Yes, sir.
Kenneth Copeland: Cause I got it out of the Chumash. -Greg Stephens: And that's why I believe what I believe, sorry
Kenneth Copeland: Yeah, cause you're mostly Jew that's right.
Greg Stephens: Yeah, but both are correct. He is a type,
Kenneth Copeland: Yeah he is.
Greg Stephens: But he is Shem of Noah. So that event, the moment that bread, here's the thing that you need to tie it together. The pieces together, the moment that bread and wine happened, the Jews and the bread with Melchizedek, that marked Jerusalem as a covenant spot.
Kenneth Copeland: It did, it absolutely did.
Greg Stephens: That the city, now David is gonna step into that. Now Jesus is gonna step into that and establish this covenant with His disciples.
Kenneth Copeland: And the, one of the clues to it, one of the keys to it is Melchizedek.
Greg Stephens: Yes.
Kenneth Copeland: Which means lord mayor of Salem or to become Jerusalem.
Greg Stephens: Malki Tzedek
Kenneth Copeland: And he wore, the mantle, or it wasn't actually a mantle, but it was a necklace form of thing that said who he was, it was his badge of authority. And he said, blessed be Abraham.
Greg Stephens: Yes he did.
Kenneth Copeland: Of the most high God, possessor of heaven and earth.
Greg Stephens: Yes he did.
Kenneth Copeland: He called him possessor of heaven and earth because he's in covenant.
Greg Stephens: That's right.
Kenneth Copeland: And Abraham said to the king, he said, "I have lifted my hand to God. Never let it be said that any man made Abraham rich but Almighty God". I edited that completely.
Greg Stephens: Yeah.
Kenneth Copeland: They said, cause he's in covenant with him. He knew he was rich before he ever got rich. This is what this covenant is all about, man. And every time you take communion, there it is. Every time you take communion and say, never let any man say that he made Kenneth Copeland rich, but Almighty God, cause I was so broke. I couldn't pay attention.
Greg Stephens: That's right, when I partake of communion, you do that this Sunday, you can do it in your house today.
Kenneth Copeland: Yeah.
Greg Stephens: As a matter of fact, you should.
Kenneth Copeland: Yes, you should.
Greg Stephens: When you partake of communion, everything Jesus was you're partaking of who He is and what he became. The great exchange happened. He took all of my sickness and my junk on Himself became that, God judged Him and He's not mad at me anymore. I live in peace with the Father because of the blood of Jesus. And there's a future element to it when He said I will no I won't partake of this again, till I do it with you in my kingdom.
Kenneth Copeland: Peace on earth, goodwill toward men, the sacrifice's in the earth, it's over, the war's over between heaven and earth. And God can say all right, glory to God it's done.
Greg Stephens: And so now we are messengers of that, covenant.
Kenneth Copeland: Yes we are.
Greg Stephens: Not in our own authority, there was one messenger of the covenant that's Jesus. But we now have his, the same anointing.
Kenneth Copeland: Get into there Greg I wanna hear more about Jesus.
Greg Stephens: Okay the same Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead now dwells in me. Okay, so we are living in a time of fulfillment of the previous covenants, not total fulfillment. There's some things that were spoken of in the first covenant that are yet to be done that will involve Israel. They'll involve Daniel. Some of the things that we'll see the antichrist those things, so it's not totally fulfilled, but it's...
Kenneth Copeland: And all of that is still old covenant.
Greg Stephens: Absolutely.
Kenneth Copeland: All of that, the old tribulation thing that is all still in the covenant.
Greg Stephens: Yes, sir. And so a lot of what Jesus was preaching like on the Mount of Beatitudes, He's talking to them about a future time during the Messianic reign. A lot of people don't realize that when He said "Thy kingdom come, thy will be done". That prayer? That prayer has been answered.
Kenneth Copeland: Yes it has.
Greg Stephens: It's done.
Kenneth Copeland: Completely.
Greg Stephens: Total, so He's fulfilling and the start and abolishing temporal elements of the covenant and establishing an everlasting covenant. So what do I mean by that? Certain things in the old covenant were temporary. For example, our exclusion, because we're not Jewish, the natural sin enveloped Abraham. Well, that's been done away with now because we're in Christ, there's neither Jew nor Greek bond nor free male nor female. There's no more. He doesn't have distinction. He doesn't have distinction in races or groups of people, the ministry of the Holy Spirit and the angels now is an everlasting one in the earth. They're back in the earth that wasn't available in the first covenant, the Holy Spirit could come on someone, a priest or a King, but not in dwelling. That changed everything for Lucifer on the day of Pentecost, all of the sudden there's 120 and then 3000, by the end of the day...
Kenneth Copeland: They're all just like Jesus.
Greg Stephens: And they're all just like Jesus.
Kenneth Copeland: And just tore everything He'd done for thousands of years just handed it to him on a plate, man. I mean just tore Him up.
Greg Stephens: He didn't know what happened at all.
Kenneth Copeland: No.
Greg Stephens: At all.
Kenneth Copeland: It was hidden from Him.
Greg Stephens: Exactly, it was hidden from Him. So there were some smaller covenants in that first covenant that were only for Israel example, being the land covenant that is tied to that's your land. That's not my land, that's their land. And they should never give an inch of it away. So here's the thing born of a virgin seed of a woman, promised seed of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the seed of the house of David, the son of David, that's all the messenger of this covenant. Those things have all been fulfilled. Malachi chapter three, let me show you something. Malachi chapter three.
Kenneth Copeland: Go to Matthew and turn to the left.
Greg Stephens: Yeah. Absolutely, "behold I will, now look at this, behold I will send my messenger and he shall prepare the way before me and the Lord whom you seek". So there's the messenger that will come before Jesus. But listen to this, "the Lord whom you seek shall suddenly come to his temple. Even the messenger of the covenant". That's Jesus, "whom you delight in behold, he shall come sayeth the Lord of Hosts". Now, if you go over Romans chapter 15, verse four "for whatsoever things were written a four time were written for our learning that we through patience and comfort of the scriptures might have hope". Now what things were written afore time? The first Testament...
Kenneth Copeland: Yes.
Greg Stephens: Jesus never preached a message out of second Corinthians wasn't there. So when He opened the scriptures and talked about Himself, it was the first covenant first Testament. When Paul opened the scriptures, when Peter opened the scriptures where are they coming from? Cause they all talk about, and some of them allude to our day, listen let me go on down here, look at verse eight. "Now I say that Jesus Christ was a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God, to confirm the promises made unto the fathers and that the Gentiles might glorify God for His hesed, His mercy, as it is written for this cause I will confess to thee, among the Gentiles and sing unto thy name" and then verse 10 tells us. "And again, he says, rejoice, you Gentiles with his people". We've been grafted in to this covenant by the messenger of the covenant Jesus. And when He came into the earth, I mean the whole planet rejoiced the angels rejoiced, people came to see Him and called Him King. So this new covenant for Jew and Gentile alike is one person. And His name is Jesus. That's my access point. That's the fulfillment of all of these other covenants. It's all done in Him. Now, some of them haven't been fulfilled yet. He will return and set up His kingdom and they tried and tried Brother Copeland to get Him to do that the entire time He was in the earth and His ministry and He wouldn't do it. They tried to force Him to do it one time and He would always withdraw because He knew something that everybody else didn't know. There had to come a time when these people that didn't have a covenant and straight, He wouldn't have been gone cause He came to the whole earth for God so loved the world. We were, the people of the world He had to find a way to bring them in.
Kenneth Copeland: I wanna inject something right here. The wisdom of God, into our, into the hearts and minds of our forefathers are the ones who set this nation they wrote the Constitution and the Bill of Rights in such a way that with a heart that it would do away with slavery.
Greg Stephens: That's right...
Kenneth Copeland: That all men are created equal. They really believed that would do that. Well, it eventually it did, but they, the thing that had to happen, that hadn't happened until Rosa Parks. God bless her heart, had been free since Abraham Lincoln, the first Republican wrote the Emancipation Proclamation, but nothing happened until action was taken...
Greg Stephens: That's right.
Kenneth Copeland: And then it started unraveling right. It started unraveling, amen.
Greg Stephens: They tried our founding fathers. You mentioned them, they tried to get rid of slavery before we were a nation, Pennsylvania...
Kenneth Copeland: Absolutely.
Greg Stephens: New York voted on it and the King of England vetoed it he said, you cannot do that.
Kenneth Copeland: And we're out of time.
Greg Stephens: And we're out of time.