Kenneth Copeland - Single-Minded Faith
Now let's go to James chapter one, the oldest book in the New Testament written by the half brother of Jesus. Now notice something here. "James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ to the 12 tribes, which are scattered abroad greeting. My brethren count it all joy when you fall into divers temptations or different temptations tests and trials. Knowing this, that the trying of your faith". It didn't take him three verses to get to faith. The trying, not the trying of you. Tests, temptations and trials are not trying you. They're trying your faith. They didn't come to teach you something. They came because of the devil. The scripture is good for teaching. The Word is good for teaching. Now don't get the idea that the Spirit of God won't take an opportunity to teach you something out of something stupid that I did. I didn't say you. I said me. Amen.
Now there was a lot of things I learned that if I had just waited a little while and just looked at the book, I wouldn't have done it in the first place. Because I'm a committed man to what the Lord says in His book in both covenants. So knowing this that the trying of your faith works patience. That is a Fruit of the Spirit. Read the nine Fruit of the Spirit in the Amplified Translation and instead of long suffering, it is patience. And patience doesn't mean what the meaning that we put onto it. No, the Bible meaning of patience is not to put up with. The Bible meaning of patience is endurance. In some ways, the King James Translation of that is good, long suffering. Now that's the Fruit of the Spirit. Not you. What do you have when you walk and live by faith and you believe what the Fruit of the Spirit is? One of them is goodness. Hee-haw. What do you have when you put together love, joy, peace, goodness, long suffering, faithfulness. When you cultivate that fruit and you live by faith, the Fruit of the Spirit will bring holiness to the flesh. The Fruit of the Spirit, this inward fruit coming out brings holiness to the flesh.
Now notice what he said. "You have to let patience do this by faith. Let patience have her perfect work that you may be perfect and entire wanting nothing. If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God that giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth not". To upbraid simply means to find fault. And he shall... The word will or the word shall is one of the strongest affirmations in the English language. God said I will, not I might. I shall. I will. I will hear from heaven. I will heal your land if you do certain things. So now here we are. "And what that wisdom shall be given him or her". That wisdom will, it will be given, but it's conditional. "Let him ask in faith nothing wavering for he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed. Let not that man think that he shall receive healing. Let not that man think he shall receive money. Let not that man think he shall receive anything of the Lord. A double-minded man is unstable in all of his ways".
Well, that means a single-minded man is stable in all of his ways. What is a single-minded man or a woman? A single minded person is a person to whom the Word of God is final authority. "Yeah, but I thought it wasn't... Yeah and I did too, but I found out it wasn't". I had to believe that. Folks, this is not hard. Let me demonstrate. "Now, Brother Copeland, it could not be that simple". Yes it can and it is. Dwayne, I think I'm going to go to the store. I need to go to the store. I know the way to the store. I think I'm going to go. I really need to. If the weather's good. I don't know. Maybe I don't need it as bad... That's double-minded.
Dwayne Munoz, I am going to the store and I'm going at three o'clock. Do you understand me? And if you have any reason why I shouldn't go the story, you better get out of my way because I'm going to the store. That's single-minded. That's faith. I believe I'm going to the store and I'm going. Amen. Now let me give you another illustration. The storm is on. Jesus is asleep in the back of the boat. They woke Him up and said, "Master, we're dying here". Well, now wait a minute. You're calling Him master, but you believe you're dying. He had to get up, "Hush. Be still", then what did He say? "Where was your faith"? Now He had said just before that, "We are going to the other side". Okay. Now Jesus didn't mix up a bunch of words. He intended to go to the other side. He had given the command, He's captain of the ship, He went to sleep. "Yeah, but He's Jesus". Well, that's His name. That's His name. Yes, that's His name. Well, kind of. That's the Englishized name of Him. His name was Joshua, Yeshua. And He was tired and He went to sleep. He intended for them to take care of things. So what did He say? "Where's your faith? Why were you not single-minded on what I told you to do. You just roll us out here and then we die"?
Now, Peter is the big spokesman. In fact, he was the one that said, "Don't you care"? When I was a spiritual infant, I said stupid stuff like that. Don't you care? And then I realized I needed my spiritual jaw slapped and I got to where I'd slap it myself and not easy. Just slapped the... and don't you ever say that again. The one who cares. Cast the whole of your care over on Him because He cares for you. Now that's a command. That's not a suggestion. So, Peter could have had he been more spiritually aware and adult or we could say this, put it in today's spiritual atmosphere, what should he have done?
Now I'm going to put a little something in here and you're sharp enough to catch it. Stood up there in the front of that boat and just hung on to it and said, "Jesus said we're going to the other side. And by the eternal Almighty God, we're going if I have to walk". But he was the one that was bold enough to just crawl out of that boat. And for a moment, he was single-minded, he had his eyes on Jesus, but he let his occupation get in the way. He's a fisherman. He's raised on that lake. It's a big lake. He was raised on that lake, made his living on that lake and it was a good living. He was wealthy man. Amen.
Now single-mindedness is no good without faith because just being single-minded doesn't mean anything until you exercise your faith along with your mind. Peter could have been that single-minded and stood up there and just shouted and shouted and shouted and shouted and shouted. But it would have done no good unless he believed that storm would settle. When he said it, not when Jesus said it. Then later in his life, he became that bold man of God, raised the dead. Glory to God. That same Jesus operating and functioning as a man. Now understand this. This is something that must be not only understood, but you and I need to be so excited about this. I mean, this needs to be more prevalent on our thinking and in our minds. There is a born again, Holy Spirit baptized, resurrected man in the Godhead. And it's important that He is the center of the Godhead, the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit. Now why is that so important? Because all these covenants and everything God has done, He has done in behalf of man, mankind.
So Man is in the middle of everything and particularly on this Earth. God created all of this whole thing before He created His man. In all of the creation, He saw that it was good and that it was very good. But wait a minute, something wasn't good. The man needed a woman. Yes. And so He took a bone out of Adam and created a woman. Don't you know she was something to look at. And Adam said, "This is good". She was so beautiful and he was so head over heels in love with her. And he had the honor and privilege of naming her. And she was so wonderful and so beautiful. And so everything he could imagine in his whole being that he chose her over the Word of God.
Two things that you want to really watch out for and be cautious about. The information that you read on Wikipedia and don't Google my name. So far it's 100% wrong. They got my net worth more than the whole ministry, all the buildings, all the gas wells which I of course I agreed with, but at same time it's a lie. No, just for the record, I am paid a salary. You don't need to believe what you see on Wikipedia. I question the biblical insight to an artist that paints Adam and Eve with a belly button. Cain, yes. Abel, yes, but not those two. It's slick, Adam, yes. A scar. Some of you didn't get it yet. All right. Okay. Let's go. Why is it impossible to please God without faith? What is His primary focus? You have to go back to the Book of Genesis to find the primary focus of God, the blessing. Well, Adam messed it up, but that didn't mean he didn't continue to be blessed because he did. But then you come down through the years and you come to a man by the name of Abram.
What was Abram? His name was covenant changed to Abraham. The H in the middle of his name is Hashem, God in the middle of Abram. You'll no longer be called Abram, but Abraham. No longer a father, but the father of many nations. And what was Abraham's qualification? He would teach his children. And what was outstanding about him? He did everything by faith. He believed God and it was accounted under him for righteousness.
Now that turned, that accounting went over into the positive side of the ledger. It is no longer accounted to us for righteousness. Turn to 2 Corinthians 5. Oh, this great chapter. Verse six, "Therefore, we are always confident knowing that whilst we are at home in the body, we're absent from the Lord". Now, here it is. Listen. This is one of the reasons that's impossible to please Him without faith. "For we walk by faith and not by sight". If you don't know anything else, you're on your way where faith is concerned. We don't walk by what we see or what we feel or what we hear or what other people say, we walk by faith. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God. We walk by faith. We walk by faith and not by sight.