Kenneth Copeland - God Is Good to All
— Hello everybody, I'm Kenneth Copeland. This is the Believer's Voice of Victory broadcast. Father, we thank you so much. You are so good to us and you've opened the eyes of our understanding. You have shown yourself to us in your Word, and we just praise you and thank you for it. We thank you for words that move heaven on the earth. And we're more involved in these covenants than ever in our lives because of your goodness and your grace and your mercy. In Jesus' name we pray it and to that name we ascribe all of the glory. Amen.
— Amen.
— The 145th Psalm in the Classic Amplified, verse three, "Great is the Lord and highly to be praised and his greatness is so vast and deep as to be unsearchable. One generation shall laud your works to another, and shall declare your mighty acts. Of the glorious splendor of your majesty and own your wondrous works I will meditate. Men shall speak of the might of your tremendous and terrible or your awesome acts of power. And I will declare your greatness. They shall pour forth like a fountain the fame of your great and abundant goodness, and shall sing aloud of your rightness and justice. And the Lord is gracious and full of compassion, slow to anger, abounding in mercy and loving kindness. The Lord is good to all. And his tender mercies are over all his work. The entirety of things created".
— Amen. Some people think God's only good to people that are good to him. That's not true.
— He's good to anybody that will receive it.
— Yes, yes.
— Hey, when I was lost and undone and a sinner and I lied for fun, man. I envisioned myself as this great actor and just go to a restaurant and just, this one girl that I knew. And this was when I was out on the west coast trying to get discovered, you know? And so we would go into a restaurant and we would be very British, you know? And we would order our meals and it was wonderful. Just lie like a dog, but then it got over on me and I just lied all the time. Well, hey, he died for the ungodly and I qualified. And then I found out his mercy endures forever. That's the greatest verse I've found in the Bible. That thrilled me beyond measure. But he's good to all, his loving kindness, he's good to all. Then his tender mercies to make known to the sons of men God's mighty deeds in the glorious majesty of his kingdom.
— He'll never be less good.
— No.
— It doesn't diminish.
— And then he will fulfill the desires of those who reverently and worshipfully fear him. He will also hear the cry and he will save them. Well, no, wait a minute. That's first covenant. What about second covenant? Well, okay, I will do this. Open your iPads, that's still strange. I'm opening my Bible. I like paper. But this is handy. So I come down to the book of Ephesians and I go to the fifth chapter. Now the King James, we will read it from the King James. And it just simply says, "Be followers, Be ye therefore followers of God as dear children and walk in love as Christ also has loved us". But now wait a minute, that's kind of blind. The Greek word there is M-I-M-E-T-E-S, mimic. "Be ye therefore imitators of God, copy him and follow his example as well beloved children imitate their father and walk in love". He is love.
— Yes.
— You're going to be like him. You're going to have to walk in love and you can. You can be like him.
— Sure. Sure. Expected that's expected. "Greater works will you do".
— Yes.
— That's his expectation of you.
— And I'll show you this. Now their greatness, the greater works? In Ephesians chapter three, "For this reason, seeing the greatness of his plan by which you are built together in Christ, I bow my knees before the father". "I bow my knees before the father". "Before the father of the Lord, Jesus Christ". Now look, "For whom every family in heaven and earth is named". We're named after our Father, that Father of whom all fatherhood takes its title and derives its name. "May he grant you out of the rich treasury of his glory to be strengthened and reinforced with mighty power in the inner man by the Holy Spirit himself, dwelling in your innermost being and personality. May Christ through your faith, actually dwells settle down abide, make his permanent home in your heart. May you be rooted deep in love and founded securely in love". Glory to God. "That you may have the power and be strong to apprehend and grasp with all the saints God's devoted people. The experience of that love what is the breadth, the length, height, and the depth of it". Hey, that's all of it.
— Filled with the fullness of God.
— Yeah. Now look, "That you may have the power", be strong to apprehend and grasp with all the saints, "That you may really come to know practically through the experience for yourself, the love of Christ, which far surpasses mere knowledge without experience that you may be filled through all your being unto all the fullness of God. That you may have the richest measure of the divine Presence and become a body wholly filled and flooded with God himself. Now, to him who, in consequence of the action of his power that is at work within us, able to carry out his purpose and do superabundantly, far over and above all that we dare ask or think". That's the greater works.
— Yes.
— Beyond what you can ask or think according to what?
— The power.
— According to the power that works in us.
— Not out here, in us.
— In us. Oh my. In Detroit, the word of knowledge has always functioned at even back before I knew what it was, it was there. I just didn't understand it much until I began to learn from Brother Hagin, the fruit of the Spirit, the gifts of the Spirit and so forth and the difference. And so anyway. But the word of knowledge and in a deeper and higher revelation, the Spirit of God said through Brother Hagin, "Standing right in the pulpit, you will see it like you saw it run off on a television screen and you'll be able to minister to the people". That's happened some and I talked about it in Detroit. I was there in that church and I saw a pair of lungs just... This was years ago, but I just saw them, just this beautiful pair of pink lungs, just hanging over the congregation. And I saw them. I mean, I saw it as real as I'm looking at that camera right there. I saw those lungs and they just hung up there, just pink and pretty, just as nice. So I just got a call out, "Anything wrong with your lungs"? And it just started working all over the room. It came back when I was in Detroit this time.
— Praise God.
— And I began to see things, literally see them. And so, I'd been standing up, ministering and so forth. And just before I sat down, this pain hit me. Now, I used to suffer terribly with hemorrhoids and that's what it felt like. But, when I sat down, it went away and I thought that's... But then I just didn't pay any attention to it. And then people were giving their testimony and so forth, I was sitting there and the Word of the Lord came to me. He said, "Intercession". I was interceding for someone that had terrible hemorrhoids. And I picked up the pain. And while I was sitting there, I began to tap my teeth and my teeth, I felt that well, now, then I recognized where I was in the Spirit. So I just began call out all kinds of teeth. And then all of a sudden right here. And I began to feel that, I put my hand up here, pain right in here, pain right here. And it just went all over the place. Now that's the word of knowledge.
— Right.
— And it's the Word being manifest. It's the goodness of God. He loves you. He loves me. And he hates pain. He bore our sicknesses.
— And our pain.
— Now, here in the book of Isaiah and we'll go back here, Greg. Do you want to read from the fifth chapter? Then I want to go to 53.
— Sure. Yeah, absolutely.
— In the King James version, verse three, "He's despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief". And so on. "Surely he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows". Well, he did do that. He did do that. But now, in the Hebrew language, grief and sorrow is not even mentioned there. He bore our sicknesses and carried our pains, just go to Strong's concordance and look at it. "And he bore our sicknesses and carried our pains". He carried our pains, he carried our pains. He carried our sickness and our pain. And then that was fulfilled in the book of Matthew, the eighth chapter. And it says that. At Peter's house when he healed Peter's mother-in-law and then many followed him that were possessed of devils. This was on the Sabbath. And at sundown, then they followed him out of the Sabbath where he had healed people. They followed him to Peter's house. He healed Peter's mother-in-law of a great fever, Luke said. So this was something like typhoid or something. She was...
— Really sick.
— Really, really sick. And he touched her hand and rebuked that fever and it left. She got up and fixed supper. And he said, and they brought many possessed with the devils and he cast out the spirits with his Word and many that were sick and he healed them all. He hates sickness. He hates pain. He is love and love, just doesn't want pain on a child.
— No. Is moved with compassion concerning that. Because when the creation we talked about last week, heaven and earth, they're supposed to come together and man is the one that's supposed to do that.
— Yes.
— That's why he didn't say it was good on the second day.
— Now read from that fifth chapter.
— Because man is made of the earth.
— Yes.
— And Jesus became made of the earth.
— Now that makes this fifth chapter of Isaiah, that really says something here.
— Well, in Isaiah chapter five, I need find where I was going to... Look at Isaiah chapter five and verse number 20, "Woe unto them that call evil good and good evil, that put darkness for light and light for darkness, that put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter woe unto them, they're wise in their own eyes and prudent in their own sight". That's exactly what that rich young ruler did, "I've done all of this" he's wise in his own eyes.
— That's right.
— And he's trying to grab him out of that. Don't call good, evil and evil, good. The thing that Jesus got the maddest about with the Pharisees is when they came up and he said, well, he's casting out devils by the Devil.
— Yes.
— They're calling... Oh, that's danger. But he started then talking about blaspheming the Holy Spirit. It's a bad place. Now, let me show you another verse. Psalm 34. Let's tie this together here real quick. Psalm 34. Oh, there's so much good in here. Well, look at verse eight. "O taste and see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man that trusteth in him. O fear the Lord, you saints, for there's no want to them that fear him. The young lions do lack and suffer hunger, but they seek the Lord shall not want any good thing. Come you little children and hearken unto me. I'll teach you the fear of the Lord". Verse 12, "For what man is at the desire of life and love many days that he may see good". Now, look at the key to seeing good, many days.
— Keep your tongue.
— "Keep your tongue from evil and thy lips from speaking guile".
— Now, guile is deceit. Don't be deceptive about your speech.
— Verse 14.
— And boy, isn't that a bad looking car?
— Yeah.
— Well, no, I thought it was a good looking car. God is good. That's a good looking car. It's not a bad looking car. And I know. Well, we're just kidding around. Listen, the devil doesn't kid around about your words.
— Ministering spirits, that's what he originally was.
— Yes.
— Don't provoke the angel, the Lord said. I had my son one day said he goes, "Dad, that's sick". I'm like, "Stop saying that".
— You can't say that.
— Don't say that.
— You can't say that.
— No, that means it's good. Don't do that.
— No.
— Look at the very...
— Here's the thing. If that's your car and you say, "Boy, that is a sick car isn't it"? You have cursed your car.
— Yes.
— And the devil will see to it that it's a sick car. That thing won't run right, it will always have something wrong with it. Because he will whip you with a dictionary. He is a legalist and he knows that words are the most powerful things on this earth. Words got him into trouble.
— When Adam, the thing that God loved, and it was all good when he saw Adam now calling her good. When he saw Adam starting to say things, that was his job in the garden was to replenish the earth, to speak things into existence.
— That's right, that's what he was supposed to do.
— There's there's a very interesting thing in Hebrew, ish is man isha, woman. Then there's another word has the same spelling in it. It's Esh. Esh means fire. Very close to ish and isha. It depends on where you put the yod and the hey, which is part of yod hey vav hey.
— That's right.
— If the yod and the hey aren't there, it's fire.
— Well, we know what that can turn into.
— Yes sir. But if ish and isha have the yod and the hey in it, they have a perfect marriage. Is that there's the fire is not in there. God's in it, then it's good.
— Yes.
— And so, this next verse, "Keep your tongue from evil and your lips speaking guile". Verse 14, "Depart from evil and do good".
— Oh man, do good.
— That's not a suggestion. "Seek peace". Look at this, "and pursue it".
— There you are again, go after it.
— Hunt it down. Like we've talked about last weekend and Thessalonians. We're on a hunt.
— You know, I've been flying for so many years that that things have crossed my mind. The greatest, the greatest fighter plane in World War II was the P51.
— Yeah, Mustang.
— What does the P stand for? Pursuit.
— Pursuit.
— That thing gets after you, it was the fastest in the business. It had the longest range. It had the most firepower.
— It changed the air war in Europe.
— Yes it did.
— With the bombers, the long range bombers now had... They called them the little buddies, I think is what they said.
— Yeah, the little friends.
— Little friends with it. And most of those were the Tuskegee Airmen.
— I was about to say it. You stole my thunder.
— I'm sorry.
— They were the only group for those that are not... The Tuskegee was the Tuskegee University in Alabama. And it was the first opportunity that the black man had an opportunity to fly. He'd been lied about and there was an officer that falsified a report. He later got into a really deep, deep trouble because of it, that the black man was not mentally capable of operating that kind of machinery, which ludicrous. And so it started at Muskogee. And anyway, they were the only group, they went from to P40s to P51s. They were the only group when it came time to go to Berlin. And the young man that was the flight commander, he was lead, lead bomber commander. And he held up his hand. He said, "I have the right, do I not? To pick my escort. I'm going to Berlin. And I have a right to pick my escort". They said, "Well, yes you do". He said, "I want the Red Tails".
— Red Tails.
— The Tuskegee Airmen, because they don't leave the bombers. They don't run off and chase enemy airplanes. They stick with the bombers. The Tuskegee Airman never lost a bomber.
— My God. That's like the goodness of God where he's, "I'm with you in the valley of the shadow of death". I am with you.
— So many of those young men were Christians. So many of them. Benjamin O. Davis was there and he was a West Point graduate. And he knew he was called to do it. And he stayed in West Point. Even though no one there would speak to him and have anything to do with him, he just stayed anyway, because God had called him to do it. And he said, "You're going to be trained. You're going to be trained so good". And I remember I was in a meeting, this was in the days of the Full Gospel Businessmen's Fellowship. And a young man was giving his testimony. And he said, "You know that I have to be overqualified. I have to be more well-trained than anybody to have an equal chance at a job". And the Lord said, "What does that hurt"? I thought, "Yeah, yeah. You just smarter than anybody here. And you just better than anybody here and that's all right, buddy. Just get smarter than anybody here". Glory to God. And you say we're out of time?
— Stay with it.
— How did we get to be out of time? But we are.
— We are.
— Has this been good? Two weeks of the goodness of God. Give the Lord a praise, come on Jeremy, help us son. Thank you, papa. You know, God is good to all. His goodness is chasing after everybody. And we know that Jesus went about doing good and he healed them all and we should be following him and healing and doing good as well.