(Singing) I know my God
has made the way for me. I know my God
has made the way for me. ANNOUNCER: What exactly is a
Word of knowledge? Learn from Kenneth Copeland today what the
Bible says about operating in this gift. Grow in your walk
with God and know that every step begins with faith, next, on
the Believer's Voice of Victory. KENNETH: Let's go back up
there now to Chapter 12, I Corinthians. Take a look at
this again, and begin reading in the 8th verse, "For
to one is given by the Spirit the word of wisdom; to another
the word of knowledge by the same Spirit; To
another faith by the same Spirit; to another the gifts of
healings." In the Greek text, healing is plural here. And you
notice it's translated that way in the--later on the in the
chapel in--chapter in Verse 30, "Have all the gifts of healing?"
Well, no, it is singular there. But in the Greek, it's, "gifts,"
plural, "of healings," plural, plural. Now, let's talk about
what is called here "the gift of plural. Now, let's talk about
what is called here "the gift of faith." This--the Amplified
translates it as "special faith." This is different from
your saving faith. This is different from the faith that
you exercised when you accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior
and the faith that you exercised or received the baptism of the
Holy Spirit, the faith you exercise to receive healing, to
receive anything that belongs to you in Christ Jesus. No, this is
a--this is manifestation of the faith of God being added to your
faith. Now, let me--let me show faith of God being added to your
faith. Now, let me--let me show you something right here. Thank
You, Lord, for bringing that up to me. I appreciate that. Look
at the 31st verse of that 12th chapter. "Covet earnestly the
best gifts: yet I show you a more excellent way." And then He
goes into talking about love. Well, people get sidetracked in
thinking, "Well, it's love I need to go after. It's love."
Well, that's absolutely true, but He's not saying here, "one
or the other." He said, "Earnestly covet these gifts,"
earnestly. I mean, go after them. Study them. Talk about
them. Learn them. Hallelujah. Amen. So--and when you move over
into what He called the more excellent way, you are earnestly
coveting those gifts, but you're walking and manifesting in the
compassion of God. And inside the compassion of God is where
these manifestations flow. Hallelujah. Now, earnestly. Why
do I want to earnestly spend Hallelujah. Now, earnestly. Why
do I want to earnestly spend time praying about these things?
How do I pray about--I do most of my praying about this in
tongues. Well, how do you learn anything praying in tongues? I'm
so glad you asked. (Laughter) Let's look now in the 14th
chapter. See, these chapters and numbers and stuff were all put
in there after--this--this was a letter. Now, notice what he said
here in this 14th chapter. He said, Verse 12, "Even so you,
forasmuch as you are zealous of spiritual gifts, seek that you
may excel to the edifying of the church." Now, "the edifying of
the church," he's not talking about the--just the church
congregation, he's talking about the Body of Christ. (Audience
Agrees) Now, that's the reason he's talking about love. He just
got through talking about it in the 13th chapter. I'm not--I'm
not seeking to just excel in these gifts, I am seeking to
walk in a way that builds up the Body of Christ. That's what this
is equipment--this equipment is all about, is edifying, building
up the Body of Jesus. AUDIENCE: Hallelujah. KENNETH: It's
ministering to the Lord. Now, I'm pressing in. I want you to
see this now. Look at this. We're going to use our personal
equipment to learn and walk in this equipment that God has
given us to minister to the Church. Now, I'm going to use my
own faith to believe God for the gift of faith. I'm going to use
my prayer tongue to believe God, to learn about the other
manifestations of the Spirit. Now notice what He said. Verse
13, "Wherefore--" You don't ever start a sentence with
"wherefore." So it must be tying something together. So back up.
"Even so you, forasmuch as you are zealous of spiritual gifts,
seek that you may excel to the edifying of the church.
Wherefore let him that speaketh in an unknown tongue, pray that
he may interpret. For if I pray in an unknown tongue, my spirit
prays but my understanding is unfruitful." That takes me back
to Mark 11:24, "Whatsoever thing you desire, when you pray,
believe you receive it." I have a Holy Spirit demand here on me
to pray that I interpret. That means I have a demand on the
Holy Spirit to see to it that I do and that I don't make some
fool mistake while I'm doing it. (Audience Agrees) I don't know.
Lord, I wouldn't do that for anything in the world.
(Laughter) Now, see, you--you've let fear interrupt the
whole--the whole process. Right in the very early days when the
word of knowledge started working in me, I don't know, it
just was there. And it was there from the time I--and like I told
you earlier, I've never known anything in my Christian life
accept being born again and baptized in the Holy Ghost and
the word of faith. That's all I've ever known. Like T.L.
Osborn said, "I was born free." I was born free of religion. I
wasn't brainwashed. Everything I knew, I knew was wrong.
(Laughter) Amen. Hallelujah. Somebody asked me one time. We
got in an elevator and they came and said, "Brother Copeland!" I
said, "Yeah?" They said, "What is your background?" I said,
"Sin." (Laughter) That's all I knew was just sin till I got
into this. Hallelujah. Ha-ha-ha-ha. Hallelujah. Glory
to God. Now, let him pray and interpret. Why? So your mind can
be fruitful. Now, let me talk about interpreting. You're
not--you're not becoming a public interpreter. (Audience
Agrees) No, that's not what this is about. AUDIENCE: That's
right. KENNETH: I'm praying--I--and before I ever
start. I said, "Lord, I'm going to pray about this. I'm going to
pray about this situation. And what--I'm praying about
something specifically here that--and--and now--and as You
said in Your Word, I pray also that I interpret and I release
my faith for that right now in the name of Jesus. And I believe
I receive while it's still a mystery. (Audience Agrees) I
believe I receive while it's still a mystery, before I know
anything more than I know right now. I believe I got this thing
and I'm going to stay with it. I'm going to stay with it." What
am I doing? I'm exercising my--I'm exercising my saving
faith. That's my saving faith, and it's my prayer tongue that
I'm using here. Now, I pray that I interpret. Now, Brother
Roberts told me this. He said--he said, "Everything that
I have ever done," he said, "in building the City of Faith and
building Oral Roberts University," he said, "I didn't
know how to build either one of them." He said, "The only way I
knew how to do it--" he said, "--I knew was first sow my
seed." He said, "You can't do anything, you can't harvest
anything if you don't sow on the front end." (Audience Agrees)
And then he said, "Start praying in tongues and--and pray that
you interpret and you believe for it." Now, he said, "Now,
it'll--you'll--you're expecting it. You're looking for it." He
said, "It--it may come as a verse of scripture. And it just
seems like it just kind of starts floating up in there."
I've had that happen to me. I'm praying over something.
(Mumbling) And here it just came, and I was, "What was that,
huh?" (Mumbling) You know? (Laughter) And I don't know,
I think maybe last week I might have told you about this or
something, but anyway, I--I ran out of--I ran out of messages.
(Laughter) I got invited down to Houston to Brother Sutton's
church, invited down there for three days, and the meeting went
for three weeks, and I ran out of stuff to preach. And--ha-ha!
I'm praying before the Lord, and I said, "You know, yeah, oh,
Lord, help me here. Oh, God." And I just--boy, I mean, I cut
down on--I said, "I--you know, I guess I'll just preach the same
thing over and over again. It seems like it comes out
different every time anyway." See, I know I'm going to wind up
preaching faith. I got to preach Mark 11:23 because that's about
the only thing I know. I still don't know much more than that.
No, no, don't know much about that yet, but I'm learning.
AUDIENCE: Amen. KENNETH: (Praying in the Spirit) "Go look
in the back seat of the car." (Praying in the Spirit) "Go look
in the back seat." There ain't nothing in the back seat of my
car. There's not anything in the back seat of my car. Oh, I
don't--I don't need to be doing that. I'm praying over--(Praying
in the Spirit) "Go look in the back seat of the car." See, I
got the interpretation of it. And I finally--just to get rid
of it--(Laughter) There's not anything in the back seat of my
car, but I'm going down there just to stop this. It's
irritating me while I'm praying. I don't like to be interrupted
while I'm praying. (Laughter) I went down there, and I had
forgotten about it. Here was a whole sack full of books a fella
had given me. And he--I was leaving this church. I had just
spoken there that--that morning. And he-- "Brother Copeland,
Brother Copeland, Brother Copeland!" And he said, "I
just--" he said, "I just appreciate your ministry." So
what he said is, "I've just got some books here I'd like to sow
into your life." I said, "Thank you, sir. Thank you. And
I'm--I'm headed out of town, brother. I'm going" wherever it
was I was going. And I just--I just laid those back there in
the back seat of the car. I totally forgot about it. So I
pulled them out of there. (Laughter) Oh, man. Glory to
God. I started at--it was a--it was--I've forgotten now, 12, 13
books of E.W. Kenyon's. Man, I just--I just started on the,
"Father & His Family." I read a chapter and preached a chapter,
read a chapter and preached a chapter. (Applause) (Laughter)
Amen. AUDIENCE: Amen. KENNETH: But, see, the interpretation was
there. AUDIENCE: Right. KENNETH: But, I--it wasn't spectacular
enough for me to take hold of it. (Laughter) And when the
Spirit of God is moving, don't be always looking for
spectacular. (Audience Agrees) Some of the most supernatural
things are not spectacular at all, but they are supernatural.
Hallelujah. AUDIENCE: Glory! KENNETH: Amen. AUDIENCE: Amen.
KENNETH: And Brother Roberts said, "It may come as a
conviction." All of a sudden you think, "Whew, I need--I need to
fix that. Yeah, Lord, I need to fix that. Glory to God. Amen. I
just repent of that, Lord, and get that out of my way." And
just--just deal with it in the Spirit and go right on. It may
come as a note of victory. When you get that victory, you know
what that means? Jesus is saying, "I got this, little
brother." AUDIENCE: Right. KENNETH: "Just relax and praise,
because I got it." That means you've pressed through to the
victory. AUDIENCE: Yes. KENNETH: Hallelujah. AUDIENCE: Glory.
KENNETH: It may come out of your mouth in your known language.
Amen. And as you're doing that, you're hearing direction come
out of your own mouth. Now, that's where most people get
over into fear. "Oh, I wouldn't want to do that." Well, back
there in the very early days, like I said, this--particularly
the word of knowledge, just--it just was there a lot. I'm--a
long time before I ever knew what it was. And I would
just--we would go to somebody's prayer group and they
would--they--if any of you guys were in any of those prayer
groups back there 40 or 50 years ago, you--oh, man, that's some
of the post powerful things you ever got into. And they'd have a
hot seat, and you'd put that hot seat in the middle of the room.
And people would sit down in that hot seat and everybody'd
start praying for them. Man, I mean you never heard such
praying in all your life. And it was being--it was--I'd just lay
hands on people and then start praying. But then that person'd
say, "How'd you know that what I was wanting to pray about?" I
don't know. I just knew. I mean, back--back in those very, very
early days. See, that's what that was, is word of knowledge.
But I didn't--I didn't know. I sure did like it. But it--it
functioned back there even in those early times. Well, a lot
of you that works and functions in your life, you'd never
recognize it. So, anyway, I--there was two or three things
that happened, two or three different situations. And I--I
saw it and--and acted on it maybe about half what I got. And
sometimes I didn't do anything about it at all. And--and one
day, in preparing for service one day, and the Lord started
talking to me about it. He said, "What are you going to do about
this?" I said, "Nothing." There ain't no use you conning Him and
lying to Him. Just tell Him the truth. (Laughter) He already
knows anyhow. There's no use dragging this conversation out
because it's going to end the same way. He's going to end up
on top. Do you understand? (Laughter) He said, "What are
you going to do about that?" I said, "Nothing. I don't intend
to do anything about it." He said, "Why not?" I said,
"Because I don't want to make a mistake and cause trouble in
somebody's life. I just--I just--Lord, I just--the bottom
line is I'm afraid I'll make a mistake." He said, "Knowing you,
Kenneth, you probably will." (Laughter) "But," He said,
"you're already making the biggest mistake you could make.
By not trusting Me, you're making a mistake that's
hindering your life because I'm going to hold you responsible
for what you didn't say." And He said, "You're--you're walking in
fear instead of faith." Well, I--of course, you know,
once--once He corrected me, I could easily--I could easily see
that. I could see where the problem was, but I still didn't
want to do it. And I don't know, I think I told you about this.
But anyway, I was preaching in a little town in Oklahoma, and
this--I just walked up to the pulpit, and I hadn't even
started preaching yet. I really hadn't said hardly just, "Hello,
how are you?" And I saw the usher bring in this couple
through the back doors of the church there. And I heard the
Lord say, "That man and woman that just came in have just come
from visiting their son in jail in Tulsa. I want you to tell
them that everything's going to be all right." So, the first
thing that cross my mind, "What if he's not in jail?" (Laughter)
Now, stop and think about it a little bit here. What do I
really need at this moment? (Ticking Noises) I hear you
thinking. (Laughter) Special faith to move right up under the
word of knowledge and support it. See, the only reason they're
divided up singular is where we can analyze them and look at
them, but they work together, (Audience Agrees), all these
selfsame things working together as the Spirit wills. I said,
"The--the man and woman that just came in, the Lord wanted
me to tell you that your son is going to be all right." She
squealed, "Aah!" You know, "Oh, glory to God! Glory to God! We
just came back from Tulsa! Our son's in jail, and we just
got--oh!" I said, "You!" (Laughter) Now, think about
how--as powerful as that was, think about what a mark that
would have had, had I done what I was supposed to do. AUDIENCE:
Right. KENNETH: Now, I got in trouble because of trying to
protect me. So what--I did what the Lord said. I made the--the
worst mistake I made was not doing what He said do. So this
is where faith always comes in. Always need faith. Call things
that be not as though they were. Now, what if I had said, "You
know, your son's in jail," and she said, "Well, our boy's not
in jail. He's just down the street there, but he's sick
and--" Well, you know, I can miss it. I'm not infallible. I
can miss it. I would have just simply said, "Well, thank God.
Glory to God. At least I got half of it right. Glory to the
Lord." (Laughter) Amen. AUDIENCE: Amen. KENNETH: And
the worst thing that could have happened was me mess it up and
she not believe it at all, but at least I did what I was
supposed to do. AUDIENCE: That's right. KENNETH: But the devil
will do his best to worm in there and try to make
you--think--you think make me look bad. You and I look bad
enough already. (Laughter) Just forget that. Get completely out
of that frame of mind. Amen? AUDIENCE: Amen. KENNETH: These
are gifts of the spirit. And they are for all of us to be
profiting by. Hallelujah. AUDIENCE: Hallelujah. KENNETH:
This area of the word of knowledge and diversities of
tongues, I'm going to talk to you about that next week,
particularly in the word of knowledge and a deeper
manifestation of it, and diversities of tongues in a
higher manifestation. On the day of Pentecost, they heard them
speaking in their language. But now, wait a minute. It said,
"They heard them speaking in their language." That doesn't
necessarily mean they spoke in all those languages. (Audience
Agrees) Come on, folks, give the Lord a chance here. Amen. Now,
both things were happening, supernatural speaking and
supernatural hearing. (Audience Agrees) Now, they went--on that
day, they went--obviously some of them, anyway, went directly
into diversities of tongues. They immediately started moving
in the gift of the Spirit of diversities of tongues. That's
different from your prayer language. AUDIENCE: Right.
KENNETH: Your prayer language--it says, "They speak
to God. Howbeit no man understands him." Now, that's
happened recently. In fact, tomorrow night I'll show you a
video about that, that happened to our--the kids from our church
down in-- AUDIENCE: Glory. KENNETH: --Honduras where a
woman received the Holy Ghost and began to speak in fluent
English. So she went from her--she just jumped from
that--her personal prayer language into the diversities of
tongues. And I am certain by now that--I've had some time to
listen to it, that that was for the benefit of our young men and
women that were on that team. AUDIENCE: Amen. KENNETH: Amen.
And for this church. AUDIENCE: Amen. KENNETH: She was
actually ministering to this church. Amen. AUDIENCE:
Amen. KENNETH: Hallelujah.
