Kenneth Copeland - Trusting In the Promise
— Welcome everybody to Friday's edition of the "Believer's Voice of Victory" broadcast. I got so excited yesterday I forgot what day it was. Had to go in and, anyway.
— It's Friday.
— This is covenant time. I do wanna read this Greg, before we can get into this we're right there in the book of Ephesians.
— Yes sir.
— And we've read this over and over again, in all of our covenant studies. That this is huge, right there in
— Chapter two.
— Chapter two, verse 11, "remember that you being in past times in past Gentiles in the flesh". Now, Gentile in the flesh what is Gentile? That's somebody who doesn't know God.
— Yeah.
— It's not a Jewish term. It came out of there because, and particularly at the beginning, they really didn't know that a Gentile could actually be born again. This was 10 years after the day of Pentecost.
— That's right, Acts chapter 2.
— And then Peter had that enormous vision that changed his whole life.
— Yes sir.
— And he went to Cornelius's house. Anyway, "at that time, you are Gentiles in the flesh called uncircumcision but that which is called circumcision in the flesh made by hands". "At that time, you were without the anointed one," you were without that anointing.
— That's right.
— "You were without Christ being aliens from the common wealth of Israel and stranger, strangers from the covenants, both of them of promise, having no hope and being without God in the world". Christian people, born again, filled with the Spirit, but instead to them it's a Testament. The New Testament, the Old Testament, even though the word covenant is used interchangeably there, in and out, particularly in the standard version. But Testament, they were trying to tell us something this is the will and Testament of God, that means it's His will to do all these things. And it just went like this. But if you're a stranger from that, and you don't realize that when it says God's Word, it's not talking about a book when it says, God word is talking about his bond.
— That's right. Now, if somebody talked about A.W. Copeland's bond my dad, I don't think about a book.
— No.
— I think about the fact that my dad was brutally honest. I mean, he, I saw him cost himself millions of dollars just by the word, yes he did. And walked, all he did was to keep hisjob. I said, daddy, "How'd you do that"? He just looked at me and said it's a lie. It's his bond. This is His Word, it's in blood, it's His bond. He will do everything he said he'd do and he is everything He said, He is.
— It's not a lie.
— It's not a lie.
— That very next verse says, "but now in Christ, Jesus you're made nigh by the blood".
— By the blood, there you are.
— So that's what it's signed in, "for He is our peace Who's made both one". He's made both one, what is he talking about both one? Well, he makes analogies to husbands and wives. He makes analogies to the Gentile and Jew. We're now one in Him. And it's a beautiful typology that the Hebrew scriptures the alphabet itself, all of it speaks of... There's just so much meaning, the rabbis say it this way, that even the spaces between the letters speak of Him. I mean, they just have such a reverence for it. I love it, so Brother Copeland the more I started to study, why did you start to study it? Well, I tried to convert for one thing because trying to find myself but I wanted, if I'm gonna be a disciple of Jesus I wanna know what it'd been like to sit there and so we we've talked about this word, "Chesed" so many times and you know, mercy, loving kindness. Some people can say grace, if I could, I'll show you something.
— please.
— This is the, the letter for, that starts it. This is Hey, this is where "Chesed" comes from this first letter. This is the modern version of it. The modern printing of what the letter looks like. It's two lines there joined together. Now, the picture symbol for this is a door. It's a doorway, all right. So, now let me show you what it looks like. There are eight Hebrew letters that are what they call crowned letters. This is what it looks like if you were to see this letter in the Torah scroll. And you can see that, now that looks a little different than the other one, but it's two letters.
— The other one looks like this.
— It's solid across there but this one has the crown on it. It's a crowned letter. There are eight letters that are crowned letters in Hebrew. And it has this funny little peak right here. Actually this is two other letters that have been joined together. It's vav and zayin.
— Well, like in English have a double L or double p,
— So they've been joined together and it becomes, Hey, okay. This is where we get the word, life, Chayim This is where you get the word, Chuppa in a marriage, the covering of the marriage. So all of those words are doing this. So vav is a nail we talked about that before when Yod Heh Vav Heh and Zayin is a sword we talk about the sword of the Spirit. So the nail and the sword joined together had been joined together and crowned. So it's one man, joining to the crown man that has the sword of the Spirit that has the Spirit. So this little bridge right here is the yoke or they've been yoked together. And this is where, part of the word for marriage. They have been yoked together. See, I've been, I was one time a stranger without a covenant but now I have been yoked to the covenant, my God. Jesus will say, take my yoke upon you.
— It's light. This is the first word.
— It's easy.
— This is the letter for "Chesed" from the word for "Chesed", mercy.
— My mercy is so easy. My loving kindness is so easy, yoke this to you. This is who I am, this is THE BLESSING. It's not hard, it's not grievous. There's no toil, we talked about it earlier in the week. There's no toil to this. This is who we are now.
— You know what I just had this mental picture. When I was a little boy I wanted a Shetland pony because they were small.
— Yes sir.
— I was little and I wanted one, really bad I wanted one. I can see myself at a little pony and there's Jesus, a Clydesdale, biggest horse in existence. And I'm yoked with him, He's pulling the load and now my feet are not even touching the ground. I'm just doing this and I'm getting all the credit for doing it. And he's saying, "Come on, son, yoke up with me. I'll just carry you".
— That's right.
— I can just see it.
— Now, in the scriptures that are very strong laws about yoking, two animals that are not alike together because one will do more of the work than the other. So now, if this is talking about,
— An unbeliever with a believer.
— There it is if this is talking about that word for the Chuppah for marriage, if this is talking about this, we're equal. You don't, yoke up two that are not equal together. And this is why it says don't be unequally, what? With an unbeliever, that's light and darkness. And so this little thing we're yoked together to the crowned one where the Spirit is, and it's a beautiful picture, but remember it's a door. So in the rabbis, they'll teach it this way. Sometimes, you're ready for this, look at this. Putting the blood upon the doorpost of your heart. And this is the mercy of God, do you remember the angel? The death angel passed over them by mercy when you were inside? Once I enter that 'cause marriage is covenant. Once I enter into that covenant relationship the blood of the doorpost is on my life. When I yoked myself to Jesus, the King, the death angel passes over me. I walk in THE BLESSING of the Lord.
— Right there. Ephesians chapter five.
— Ephesians chapter five.
— And of course I've used this every time in a wedding that I perform and, you know, husbands love your wives and so forth. But look what he said in the, of the 20th verse. "So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies. He, that loves his wife, loves himself for no man ever yet hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, even as the Lord, the church for we are members of his body, of his flesh and of his bones". That's the same thing that God and Adam said.
— That's exactly right, yes sir.
— So, and we, we're yoked together with Him and when Gloria and I were married on the 13th day of April, 1962, and we came together, I just fell just helplessly love with her the first day I saw her and just changed my entire life the day I met her. And that came to pass with me I would just try to figure out some way to do, just do something for her all the time. And then, then when I got into this then I saw what God was doing that I didn't even know about at that time, that we we didn't get born again or six months later. Well, we were just inseparable even before that, which is 58 years ago, soon to be 59 years. Well, in just a few days, 59 years. And, but then both of us realized that this came to pass with both of us. We supernaturally became one flesh and were supernaturally joined with Jesus. And as he is so are we.
— Yes sir.
— In this world, the spirit realm recognizes this and I'm a classic example is Job. Job had instruct... Lucifer had instructions when he went to the Father about Job. And Abba said to him, you can't kill him.
— Don't you touch, is why
— You can't kill him, you can't take his life. Now, everything else was fair game. He got his kids,
— Well his wife was the reason for that.
— But his exactly, but she didn't die. And I always wondered, she was seemed to be the problem. Why didn't she die, because they're one.
— They're one. But see, people don't understand that book. You have to read that book very carefully. You can't read the book of Job with a Christian mindset. There wasn't but one sin mentioned in that book and it was cursing God. That's the only, all the rest of the stuff he did there'd be messed up and fouled up, but there was only one sin in that book. He will curse you to His face. You've blessed him but he'll curse you to your face. And he wouldn't do it, he refused to do it. Now, in order for the devil to do anything he's gotta get it on your mind. You can't think of it and you've no way you're gonna do it. So that got on His mind, He was afraid his children were gonna curse God. His wife said why don't you just curse God and die? He wouldn't do it, she's the one that committed the sin and opened the door for the devil to kill those children.
— That's right.
— It took me a long time to see that she did it. What the devil said, Job would do, Job wouldn't do it. She did it. And she said it
— Because they're one and she has the authority to do it.
— She had the authority to do it.
— Oh goodness.
— That's a revelation.
— And it was on his mind. In other words he said, I was worried and all and trouble came anyway. Why? He kept making the same sacrifice over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over. And instead of making one sacrifice that's the end that. You said it. And that's it, I'm not going any further, but he was, he had a worried mind, but he refused to curse God.
— Amen.
— Glory to God, that's what made him an example of faith.
— Right, but even Lucifer recognized they're one and that's what's happened. We are, you've been married to Christ Jesus. You're one with him. And you start looking at this thing. The old covenant required a person to love God.
— I mean it required it in the,
— With all your heart, all your soul.
— In the new covenant the focus is on God's love for you.
— Yes Sir.
— That he's loving me even when I don't love him. Even when I don't act like I love him he still loves me. I can't ever be separated from that. And in the old Testament, I was required. It demanded obedience and this new covenant, I have faith. Abraham operated by faith rather than obedience Now, he obeyed because of his faith. Your faith will cause you to obey. It's a higher standard. When we operate by faith, we're operating by our higher standards.
— Let's use the word trust.
— Yes sir, I like that.
— It's the same thing.
— Same word.
— It's a trust him. I trust him with Him with my life, I trust him with my children. How did Jesus start that in the book of Mark in 22nd verse? They said that fig tree you cursed is dried up. Look at that thing in less than 24 hours. That thing dried up to nothing, he didn't even refer to the tree. He said "have faith in God," trust him. That's the way Solomon put it, "Trust God with all your heart. Lean, not to your own understanding". Trust him. Well, what am I gonna do about my children? Trust God, have faith in God. What am I gonna do about my finances? Have faith in God. Gloria and I learned that when we didn't have any finances just have faith in God. And little miracles began to happen. I wasn't in the army all that long but I was in there when it wasn't any war it kind of irritated me, but you got to go to war, I didn't. But anyway, I was between wars. No GI Bill back then, none. Greg, right before I went to Oral Roberts university, did they reinstated the GI bill and I had enough to buy groceries.
— There you go, praise God. There wasn't but $35-$40 but in 1967, that was money enough. And anyway, there's little miracles, Why? We were trusting God, we were believing God, We had faith in God. I've always been a person that questions. I question everything, that's good,
— I noticed that about you.
— No, it's true, Brother Copeland, it's true. But I had the Lord get onto me now one time because I guess my questioning had moved over into unbelief. Well it can do that, it can do that if you're not careful, He didn't mind you asking questions. But when it got over into unbelief and I mean, I can see it. As clear as day, we were young pastors my kids were out in the backyard playing on the swing set. It was my fault, I had made a mistake in our finances and I didn't know what we were gonna do. And Brother Copeland I went in, I was laying on the floor, praying in tongues and crying and shut everybody, don't bother me. I'm gonna stay here, I'm doing a Brother Hagin, I'm gonna stay here till I get the answer.
— Yeah.
— And if I have to stay here for a week, I'm gonna stay on this floor. And the whole time I'm thinking, we gotta feed these kids. What'll will feed these kids? They're out playing in the yard. And I heard this, "Greg, do you trust me"? Yes, Lord, I trust you. Now, I gotta pray in the Spirit, yeah. I heard it again. Do you trust me? Yeah, Lord, I trust you now and you need to pray further about this See, I wasn't in faith at all. I heard it third time. He finally, my mind finally clicked in, Hey dummy, listen up, yes Lord, I trust you. Obviously I don't, because you've asked me the third time. He said, trust requires unanswered questions.
— That's good man. Because if you know the answer, you won't trust me. And so I've got this.
— You wanted to walk by sight.
— I wanted to walk by sight, I thought I was walking by faith, but I wasn't Brother Copeland. I was not walking by faith. I was walking by sight. I was worried about what those kids are going... they didn't care if they came in and had hot dogs and macaroni cheese or folded over cheese sandwich, but they didn't care. They knew I was mad at them for having a good time. When I'm in here I'm in here praying down heaven to provide for them. And they're out there having fun.
— They trusted you.
— That's what I got, they were trust in me. They had a care in the world of what they were gonna eat and didn't even care what we were gonna have. They knew that mom and dad would have food in there. In just a minute, when they're hungry.
— One of the greatest Christmases we ever had we had Chef boyardee, some of you don't even know. yeah not for Christmas, but please, we had more fun. We still have a lot of fun. Even though we have every thing
— Amen.
— That we desire more than enough. But before we open those presents, we pray, now listen, You children know that Jesus is the reason.
— Yes.
— We're here, he's the reason we have we even have any presents. He's the reason we have a tree. Well, it's a pagan holiday, not anymore. We took it away from you, you understand?
— Amen, amen.
— Who are they anyway? And so there's people need Jesus, right? It would change the reason for their tree and but it's the same celebration, because he's the one. And now we have more than Chef Boyardee.
— Amen. Praise God for that, Amen. Or Spaghettio's whatever it is. So, in that situation with those kids that day and this'll bless somebody right here at Christmas time this month, that day I heard in my spirit if you would act more like them, where I'm concerned
— Oh Greg, that's good.
— You'd get what you want, you can get everything you desire.
— You bringing back things and I remember that much time ago would just have a minute. The first new airplane was just little twin engine Cessna. And I ordered it and you know, by this time, man, with no such thing as debt in this ministry or in our family and I was short I had believed it all in there, but suddenly like, Oh $20,000 or whatever, no cell phones on those days So I got out in the middle of the lake. I'm just praying as hard and fast as I can. I got to have this money, I gotta... And he said, will you shut up? Yes, sir, the same thing. He says, you prayed the whole thing in here, but that, can't you trust me for that little bit. I wanted to jump overboard but I didn't, but we're out of time, glory to God.