Kenneth Copeland - The Spirit of Faith Wins the War of Words
— Hello, everybody. I'm Jeremy Pearsons. This week on The Believer's Voice of Victory, we are sharing a teaching that Brother Copeland did on Mark and Trina Hankins' TV program. And as they taught on how faith speaks and how faith works and understanding faith's purpose, we knew that this was a word we wanted to also share with you, our partners and friends on The Believer's Voice of Victory. So, let's get started today by joining in and learning about activating the spirit of faith.
— We're talking about II Corinthians 4:13.
— Oh, yes. Praise God.
— Where the Apostle Paul said, "We having the same spirit of faith according as it is written, I believe, and therefore have I spoken".
— According to what?
— According as it is written.
— As to what?
— I believe and I have spoken, of course written.
— It is written.
— Yeah, that's good.
— It is written.
— How did Jesus defeat the devil?
— It is written.
— It is written. And again, it is written.
— It is written.
— And they left him for a better time.
— Oh, yeah. We got to get away from...
— We got to get out of here, brother.
— Get the devil out.
— Yeah. And they will run. The devil will run in fear.
— Because of the fundamentals of faith, you have to get rid of phrases like I just used. You cannot, you must not, you must not mix your language. Why do you need the acts of God's enemy with which to express yourself? You do not. Well, I'm afraid not. You're going to the meeting tonight? No, and I'm afraid not.
— Yeah. Yeah. My feet are just killing it.
— Yeah.
— Well, I'll see you all later if the train don't hit me. Ah ah! Listen, that's deadly stuff.
— Soon or later the language of faith, which is the spirit of faith, certain words.
— Yeah.
— Brother Hagin said this, and it was proven out in my life. If you say something long enough for it to get down in your spirit, it'll control your life.
— Yeah. You know he said that, Brother Hagin said that, in Mark 11:22-23, which was revolutionary revelation for me, when he said the Lord told him, "Did you ever notice Mark 11:22, have faith in God, verse 23, that whosoever shall say unto this mountain be removed and be cast into the sea shall not doubt in his heart. Believe those things which he saith shall come to pass. whatsoever he saith"? And so, that was revolutionary to him. He said the Lord pointed that out to him.
— He only used believe one time.
— Yeah. He said say three times.
— But he said three times.
— So, dad Hagin said this one time, he said, "That means you can actually school yourself into faith with your own words".
— But you're going to have to get the death words out.
— Yeah, that's right.
— The fear words out. You have to get the sick words out. I'm just sick of that. I'm just sick of hearing that. I don't use the word sick. That's not part of my vocabulary unless I need it specifically. I don't use it to express myself. I don't use death to express myself. Now, after a while, when you just stand on the Word, it goes away. Think about the fundamentals. We talked about that.
— The language of faith.
— The very fundamentals. Of course, Vincent Lombardi, I guess arguably the greatest football coach, had a terrible losing season.
— Oh, okay.
— Green Bay Packers. He brought those guys back in spring training. He said, "Gentlemen, this is a football".
— Okay. This is a football.
— Basics.
— Basics.
— That's the way he started, and everybody gone... This is a football. Now, a 747, a Boeing 747 would have flown in the Garden of Eden just the same as it'd fly in the 20th and 21st century. Why? Nobody knew the fundamentals. That had never been revealed. They were there. In fact, it would have flown better because the air was a whole lot better than it is.
— Yeah, I imagine.
— But the fundamentals were not known. And in World War II... I keep going back to the war because the United States was so ill-prepared for this thing, and I mean they took kids in there that had never seen an airplane. And they had them out there. They started with the very basic fundamentals, and you have to start at the beginning everywhere on that little airplane. And it sounds like that is stupid. The instructor's standing out there. Now, one thing he's doing, he is gaining command and authority because they don't know any... He has to think about, "I don't care if some of them knew how to fly. Nope. Nope. No, you start over. We're going to the fundamentals". And he's got this Piper, little Piper Cub, little single engine airplane, little yellow airplane sitting there. He said, "All right, what you have before you is an airplane. And what you have on the front end of this here airplane as a propeller". Come on, everybody out there knew that. And he started... "And behind that there propeller is an engine". Everybody knew that. and coming around, "And this here's the leading edge of the wing". Ho-hum. But then he comes around and said, "This is an aileron". "What? An aileron? What is an aileron"? "Well, you'll find out later". Then he comes around, "This is the fuselage". "Well, that looks like the body of it to me". "No, it's a fuselage". And you come back, "This is the leading edge of the horizontal stabilizer". Boy, he's just got them out in left field now. And he comes around, "This is the rudder. This is the elevator". "The thing got an elevator in it"? "It better have or you ain't going up and down". The basic fundamental of that little airplane is basic the same on the Citation X that I fly today. That little airplane did 80 miles an hour, and the Citation X will do 600, but it was the same basic fundamental. It didn't have a propeller, but, oh wait a minute, yes, it does. It has a fan in front of that jet engine doing the same thing that little propeller did.
— So, the fundamentals...
— The fundamentals are the same.
— Yeah. They're the same. And the spirit of faith, Paul says, we have the same. It also means the spirit of faith works the same in every situation.
— It works exactly the same.
— Exactly the same.
— Now, here's the point that the Lord energized in my spirit. I have to have, not the spirit of that instructor, I have to believe since that instructor knows how to fly and I don't, I have to depend on every word he says. Because if I learn what he knows, then it'll keep me from sticking that thing up like a dart somewhere, banging it into the side of a mountain, and I'm going to have to follow those same rules as long as I fly. I can't decide that I know more. I never will forget it. I mean... When we began to fly that four engine JetStar and we're in... And I thought, "A four engine jet, what am I going to do with this thing"? Man. And he stood up there and he held the flight safety manual here, and he put this down and he picked up the AFM, the manufacturer's manual. He said, "If anything in flight safety's training manual disagrees with the manufacturer's manual, then this one has prejudice". I thought, "I wish preachers knew that".
— That's the truth.
— You don't argue with this one. I don't care who you are. I don't care what you are. Don't argue with this book.
— Yeah, it's forever settled in Heaven.
— You don't want to argue with this. You question and you ask, but this is right. This is right. Every time, all the time, and we'll be reading this 1,000 years from now and it'll still have great revelations. Great. And it'll just go on and on. The last thing I want to say about this, why didn't God execute Cain? Murder was not against the law. That's what this is.
— He had mercy on him, basically.
— He couldn't do anything else. It was not against the law to do it. It was wrong, but it wasn't against the law. So, then he had to form this law book and write it down that it's against the law. What Satan did wasn't against the law, but it is now. We have the law, and then we have the greatest document ever formed in the language of a man, the new covenant.
— The new covenant.
— I'll tell you, we were doing with Greg Stephens... He's a professor of old covenant survey, and when he opened up his Bible, and right here, when you turn from Malachi over to here, he got this great big arrow that he... Just great, big arrow, thick. And I said, "I got to get me one". I thought it was...
— We're going this way.
— Yeah. We're going this way. Come on. Come on over here. This is in the blood of God. This is in the blood of God. This is in the blood of animals, then the blood of a man, then circumcision. Circumcision, one of the biggest words in the Bible. One of the biggest words in the Bible. But over here, the blood of God.
— The blood covenant through the blood of Jesus.
— That word circumcision is the key to David's success.
— So, when he faced Goliath, I Samuel 17... Now we're still talking about the spirit of faith.
— Yes, sir.
— Now here's something that dad Hagin said about the spirit of faith, and he said about faith, because when he had seven incurable diseases laying on that bed and he said, "Lord, I do believe". He said, "I believe, and if you stood in front of me and said the promise I don't believe I'd say, 'Dear Lord, Jesus, that's not the truth,' because I do believe". And Jesus said to him, "You do believe as far as you know". In other words, the spirit of faith feeds off of the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of God.
— Oh, that's good.
— The knowledge.
— Yes, it does.
— And so, every breakthrough in faith comes from a breakthrough in revelation knowledge. And so, when you...
— That knowledge that is revealed, it's...
— Revelation.
— A different kind of knowledge.
— Yeah. Sense knowledge, to me, is... Well, hand me your book. now, of course, this agrees with the Bible, but now, say this was, oh, a textbook...
— Somebody else's book, not mine.
— Somebody else's book, and you're reading, and a teacher is standing before the class and teaching from a math book or something. Now you've got a problem. You've got a problem with who wrote the book, and you have a problem with that teacher's revelation of the book. And they're hearing it... You don't think in words, you think in pictures.
— Yes, sir. Yeah.
— So, what do you think if I say, "D-O-G"?
— Yeah.
— What?
— Dog.
— Dog.
— It could have been depend on God.
— Oh, okay.
— But you don't know that, and we have to get on the same page here. But if the spirit of God is the teacher...
— I now hear. Yeah. Now, David, David knew something about Goliath, ah ah ah! that the other guys didn't know. They were better soldier, but David's 17, and that's where the spirit of faith comes from. That quote in David' said, "I killed a lion. I killed a bear. I'm going to kill this uncircumcised Philistine".
— Revelation had come to him out there, early in the morning, late at night. "The Lord is my shepherd".
— And meditating.
— "And meditating on that". What you have? This is the Word of God. And faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God. And he begins to realize, "Hey, we've got an edge here".
— Yeah. Yeah. And so, even Psalms 119 is where there's a constant application of, "I will meditate in your Word. I'll meditate. The entrance of your Word gives light". He has to understand... Dad Hagin said the moment the light comes, the faith is there.
— It's there.
— And so...
— So, the Word and the Holy Spirit were so together. It was just one.
— Yeah. Yeah. They are the same.
— So, when the Word is spoken to you, it's alive, and it's powerful and it's operative. And David stepped out in that spirit of faith...
— And he's spending all... He's in totally immersion. He's praising and he's worshiping.
— he never thought he could not whip Goliath.
— No, he didn't. Doesn't ever enter his mind.
— That never entered his mind.
— Know he had complete dominion because he was meditating on this Word.
— Now, Greg Stephens, he is a bonafide scholar of the first covenant. Now, he asked me, we just were taping here just a few days ago, he said, "Brother Copeland, what's the difference... How do you quote the 23rd Psalm"? I said, "The Lord is my shepherd".
— Yeah. I shall not want.
— No. He said, "The rabbi says a Psalm of David, the Lord is my shepherd".
— Oh, okay. I do not lack. I shall not want.
— Now, why do they say that differently, Mark? They've been studying it for 5,000 years.
— And they speak it in their meditation process, so faith works by speaking. So when David faced Goliath, he had to win the war of words before he could win the fight of faith. Because Goliath is telling the whole army that, "You're worthless and I'll defeat you," and David's the only one to talk back to Goliath.
— Now, you remember when Samuel came in to anoint the king, David wasn't in there. Well, Eliab's the oldest and the largest, so he's firstborn. Remember what the Lord said?
— Yeah.
— I look on the heart.
— Oh, that's right.
— And then Eliab showed his heart through his mouth when David embarrassed him.
— And when David showed up, I mean, you got words flying. You got his older brother telling him, "What are you doing here"? And then he's got King Saul saying, "You're just a kid. You can't face this". And in every case, David talks back and he says, "My God is able to deliver this giant into my hand". Matter of fact, David spoke back to Goliath, and so in those words, he's speaking covenant words, he's speaking words of faith, and he's speaking words that when God says something, David talked back to him.
— If you can't find Mark 11:23 and 24 in David's life, then it's not faith, because that's what Jesus said it was. Let's go over there a moment.
— Yeah. Let's go there. Mark 11:22 and 23.
— No, over here in I Samuel.
— Oh, you're going to I Samuel 17.
— Yeah. I want to point out some things here.
— All right. Show me.
— Let's go back because we brought up Eliab, let's talk some things about him. In verse 12, and it points out the fact that Jesse had eight sons. And 13the verse, "The three eldest sons of Jesse went and followed Saul to the battle, and the names of his three sons, Eliab the firstborn, Abinadab, and the third Shammah". David was the youngest, so he has to be under 20 or he would have been in the army. Now, the Philistines drew near morning and evening, twice a day for six weeks. Twice a day for six weeks. I want to point that out again. Twice a day for six weeks. You've been listening to COVID-19 twice and three or four a time a day six weeks it'll kill you.
— It's a narrative to kill you.
— Yes.
— Those words.
— Eyes, mouth, and ears.
— Yeah.
— Yeah.
— And David was the youngest. So, in the 18th verse, "Carry these and receive their report". Find out what they're saying. Verse 20, "David rose up early in the morning and left his sheep with a keeper". There's no way he's going to leave that flock of sheep untended. Pastor, don't you leave that flock unattended.
— Oh, that's good.
— Don't you dare do it. Don't you do it. You better preach faith to that flock, and you better do it out in the open. Don't you put it in the back room.
— Yeah. That's right. That's good.
— Now, there's going to be some tough stuff you're going to have to preach, and some of them may leave. Well, bless them. Pray for them.
— Yeah.
— Preach the whole counsel.
— But preach it all. Now, come on down. Verse 24, "All the men of Israel when they saw the man, fled. They fled from him and were afraid. And the men of Israel said, 'Have you seen this man that's come up? Surely to defy Israel, he's come up. And it shall be that the man who kills him, the king will enrich him with great riches, give him his daughter, and his father's house, it'll be tax-free from then on". David said, "What? Let me hear this again".
— There's a reward.
— Yeah.
— Now, verse 28, "Eliab his eldest brother heard when he spoke to men, and Eliab's anger was kindled against"... He embarrassed him. He got embarrassed. He's a coward.
— Yeah. He's afraid.
— He's afraid of it. So, verse 26, "David spoke to the men that stood by him saying, 'What shall be done to the man that kills this Philistine and takes away the reproach from Israel? For who is this on circumcised... He doesn't have a covenant, and I do".
— That's right.
— How'd he find that out singing out there?
— Yeah, he learned the covenant.
— He learned it. He learned it.
— He learned the God of the covenant. He was intimate with the Lord. He worshiped him.
— He had no fear in him.
— Now, here's something about the spirit of faith, that whoever kills his giant is going to take away the reproach, and he defies the armies of God. So, David said, "Is there not a cause"? So, the spirit of faith must have a cause or a purpose. So, the Lord said to me, "With a spirit of faith, your cause must be greater than your comfort. And your purpose must be greater than your pleasure". In other words, the spirit of faith makes you leave your comfort zone, and David left his comfort zone to face the giant.
— And to just kept working in him.
— It's the spirit of faith.
— The more he rehearsed it, the bolder he got. So, what happened? He gets over there in front of the king, so he comes and tells here. "These words would you..". "Now, he and turned from them and spoke the same manner, and the people heard it". Hey, the king needs to find out about this because look what happened. Here's a little boy that had entrance into the king, the most powerful man, at that time, in the world. His faith put him before the king.
— Wow. That's very powerful.
— Got the attention of the king, and what did he say? Verse 32. "David said to Saul, 'Let no more man's heart fail because of him. Your servant will go and fight this Philistine.'" And then in the 34th verse, he told about, "I took my sheep out of that lion's mouth, and I killed him with my bare hands. And I killed a bear with my bear hands. And they didn't have any covenant, and neither does that giant, and I'll kill him".
— He knew his covenant. And I'm telling you, we're running out of time, but the Lord said to me, "Never run into a giant with your mouth shut and the spirit of faith".