Kenneth Copeland - Jesus' Life of Uncompromising Faith
This is actually an adventure, a day in the life of Jesus. And you can see for yourself who He really is, in this chapter. It's amazing to me. Verse one, "They came over unto the other side of the sea, into the country of the Gadarenes. And when He was come out of the ship, immediately there met Him out of the tombs a man with an unclean spirit". Now, this is amazing information. A man, one man, with an unclean spirit. Now, the apostle Paul is the man to whom God, Jesus Himself taught this man and trained him. He was a highly educated man, and Jesus personally trained him. And in the sixth chapter of Ephesians, he said there what Jesus is facing here. And the apostle Paul by revelation from God opened the door to Satan's rank and file. Amen.
In the sixth chapter of Ephesians, starting from the bottom up principalities, powers, listen, rulers of the darkness of this world. Those are the ones that possess people. Now there are people, particularly in this country, we don't see many demon-possessed people. But now, as you minister in other places, you come across them, a lot of them. Now, I've faced a few here in this country, but not all that many. And the ones that usually are out of sight, they've been incarcerated some way. I won't go into all that. I could, it's really interesting stuff. But I've come across them in other countries. So this was an unclean spirit. This is a ruler of the darkness. This man was completely demon-possessed. That means he was taken over by the devil; spirit, soul and body. Spirit, the real man, the eternal man. The soul made up of your will, your mind, and your emotions and your physical body. One, one unclean spirit, Jesus dealt with one. He dealt with the boss first.
Now watch this, "Immediately there met Him out of the tombs a man with an unclean spirit who had his dwelling among the tombs; and no man could bind him, no, not with chains". Now they give you insight into this situation. Everybody in this house knows the story of Samson. Samson obviously was not a great big man because they couldn't figure out what made him so strong. He was not a physically strong man because the Spirit of God came on him. Now this is Samson in the negative because this man is skin and bones. He doesn't sleep. He doesn't eat. Doesn't even know where he is, but you couldn't bind him. That devil that possessed him, not Satan. Now Satan's behind it, but not Satan. One unclean Spirit.
Notice now, follow it carefully. I want to remind you again, immediately he met Him. He had his dwelling among the tombs, he's unclean. You see, the unclean spirit manifests himself in unclean ways. A spirit. We are spirit beings. God is a spirit. They that worship Him, worship Him in spirit and in truth. We are spirit beings. Once a spirit is released into the earth, that spirit can never ever for eternity cease to exist. You're going to exist somewhere. You are in eternal life right now. Not after you die. Because you don't die, it's just your body that quits. If you really learn that, if you really become aware of that, oh, life just changes. It removes fear. Dear Lord. I mean, we're eternal spirits and we've been given everlasting life. We've been given Zoe. Zoe, it is the life of God.
The scholars that I have met, the best way they could explain it was, it is the life that makes God, God. And He's in here. Whoa, glory to God. It doesn't take you long to preach yourself happy when you get over into that. Now, because he'd been often bound with fetters. What are fetters? Shackles and chains. He'd been shackled and chain. And the chains had been plucked asunder by him, and the shackles broken in pieces. While Samson was energized by the Spirit of God, this broken little skinny man was energized by that demon. Just tear those chains and shackles, all to pieces. Not telling what that did to his flesh, but he couldn't feel it, because he's a cutter anyway.
Now, when he saw Jesus, afar off... I heard the pastor of the great Gateway Church, Robert Morris, what a man of God. Robert is a wonderful friend. And I heard him say this, I've never figured out any way to improve it. He said, if there was anybody that the devil could have stopped from worshiping Jesus, it would have been him. Not only was he possessed by an unclean spirit, but there were three to 6,000 devils working for the main devil. And he couldn't stop him. Immediately at afar off, he ran and worshiped Him. And you know how long it took Jesus to deliver him, just about that long. And that's all the time it takes to deliver you, just about like that. Glory to God. Thank You Jesus. It's shouting time.
Now, as I said before, I've been in the presence of devils. I've had them speak to me. You don't put up with that. And there are people that try to get them to talk that's, hey, you don't be messing with this. And if you keep playing games, you're going to get into stuff you don't need to be getting into. The voice that are used by demons. I started to say this a moment ago, and I got sidetracked. A spirit without a body, you have to have a physical body in this earth, Charles Capps called it your earth suit. When you go to space, you have to have a space suit in that environment to live. And when a physical body, I mean a spirit to be alive in this initial environment, you have to have an earth suit. And this is it. And you get out of your earth suit, you're gone. Can't stay here. And your dear departed grandma that was born again and filled with the Holy Ghost is not hovering around your house. And anybody that says she is, is a liar from hell.
Some reason the Lord brought that up. This devil said, he worshiped Him and cried with a loud voice and said, "What have I to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of the most high God? I adjure you by God, that you torment me not". He's using that man's voice for Jesus had already said to the man, but to that devil, "Come out of the man, you unclean spirit". And then that devil retaliated, "I adjure you by God". Because he knew who Jesus was ...That you torment me not. Everybody there heard that conversation, everybody. And Jesus said, "What is your name"? And he answered saying, "My name is legion: for we, we are many". Famous last words. "And he besought him much. He besought him much". Are you listening to me? "He besought Him much that He would not send him away from that country". There was a lot in that, that I'm not at liberty to get into tonight. "Now there was there nigh unto the mountains a great herd of swine feeding".
You notice Jesus didn't say anything about not leaving that country. All the devils besought Him. Now that one devil, his position had been broken. He didn't have another word to say. All he got out was, "I don't want to leave here". When he had reason to be there. Anyway. Then all the devils besought it. Now the people didn't hear this conversation. They heard that other one, but Jesus heard the devils and they heard Him. Now the devils are crying the same requests. Now notice this, "And all the devils besought Him, saying, 'Send us into the swine, that we may enter them.'" Obviously we're not going to leave here. But without a body of some kind we cannot express ourselves. Without a human body God cannot fully express Himself in the earth. Just as a spirit, of course He expresses Himself, but He cannot fully express Himself until He has a person. A person that will listen and obey. Amen. Amen, glory to God.
"All the devils forthwith Jesus gave them leave. And the unclean spirits went out and entered into the swine: and the herd ran violate down a steep place into the sea, about 2,000 and were drowned in the sea". I'll tell you 2,000 of those things, I can't imagine what that sounded like. 2,000 head of hogs, I have no concept of what that sound like. Frightening thing. And it scared everybody there because that 2,000 herd of pigs, that was Roman army property, these hogs were food for the Roman army. And you know what Jesus being a Jew felt about those hogs. So he just let the hogs go to the devil. In that case, really good idea. Now it scared everybody terribly. "They that fed the swine fled, and told it in the city, and in the country. And they went out to see what had been done. They come to Jesus and see him that was possessed with the devil, and had the legion, sitting, and clothed, and in his right mind and they were afraid".
Now we understand by the laws of faith, the word corresponding action. In the Book of James, particularly in Weymouth translation of the New Testament. It's also called the New Testament in Modern Speech. Now it went out of print, so Kenneth Copeland Publications, put it back into print. That one is the one you've heard me, you've heard Brother Hagin use the word faith, in the King James, faith without works is dead being alone. Wayman said faith without corresponding action is dead. That's where that came from. Corresponding action. That really said it to me. Corresponding action. The woman with the issue of blood said, "If I ever touch the hem of his garment, I'll be made whole". Well, she could have said that though she bled to death. But corresponding action she got in the street. She got in the street and did what she said in her. That was corresponding action.
Well, corresponding action can be before, not just after you have believed it in your heart and said it with your mouth. Faith, real Bible faith always prepares and praises for what it expects. What it believes will happen ahead of time. That happened in this incident here, "They come to Jesus and see him that was possessed with the devil, and had the legion, sitting, and clothed, and in his right mind". Brother Kraus. Where did they get the clothes? He certainly didn't tell one of your boys, take your clothes off, give it to this man. Now that's not going to work. They were prepared. Jesus already knew where He was going. He already knew He was going to deliver this man and call him to preach. Because look at the rest of it. This is the key to what I'm about to tell you. "When he was come into the ship, he that had been possessed with the devil prayed Him that he might be with Him".
Lord, let me go with You. Please let me go with You. Now Jesus said, 'No, no, no. "Go home to your friends. Tell them how great things the Lord has done for thee and have had compassion on thee.' And he departed, and began to publish in Decapolis how great things Jesus had done for him and all men did marvel". So obviously Jesus had said, all right, we're not going to go home yet. I know you guys have been up all night and all that, but we've got a job to do before we go home. We're going by the Gadarenes. And there's a dear man over there that doesn't know where he is. Doesn't remember where he's from, but we're going to set him free. And he's naked. He's cut and scarred, but I'm going to heal him and I'm going to call him to preach. And he's going to go preach compassion.
So get him some clothes. Oh, come on Judas, give me some money. No more than that. Come on, come on. Come on here. We're going to suit him up good. Because he's going to go home and he's going to be talking about me, and he's going to be talking about all of you, and he's going to be telling this story, and he's going to be talking about the Father, and he needs to look good when he gets home. And they're going to say, "Where have you been? My goodness, you look so good. You look so prosperous". And he's going to say, "Let me tell you about a man that set me free. I don't even remember how I got into this mess. I don't know what happened to my mind, but this man brought back all of my memory of the past and I'm home. I'm home. Let me tell you about him".
All of his friends. Ain't that amazing. And he came home looking good because he met a man named Jesus. Give the Lord a praise. Hallelujah. He met a faith God. He met a man that not only set him free from that demon, He put clothes on him. He gave him a calling. He told him exactly what to preach. You go preach love and perfected love cast without fear. And this whole area is in great fear because they thought this man was some kind of god, because he never slept, and he howled all night long. Study it. He preached in the 10 city area surrounding that place. And when Jesus came back, they rushed to Him. This man changed that whole area with his testimony.