(Singing) I know my God has made the way for
me. I know my God has made the way for me.
ANNOUNCER: Today on the Believer's Voice of Victory,
Gloria and Kellie Copeland show how the Word is the foundation
for change. Allow the Word to bring change into
your life that will last for eternity. Now, here's Gloria.
GLORIA: Hello, everybody. Welcome to the Believer's
Voice of Victory. Kellie's with us again today,
and we're going to hear some good Word. Hallelujah. Kellie,
what do you got? Something good? KELLIE: Something good. GLORIA:
All right. KELLIE: You know, we've been talking about just
knowing Jesus, knowing Jesus in His Word. Next week, we're going
to talk about knowing Jesus in worship. GLORIA: Good. KELLIE:
But it really took us awhile to just talk about and discuss how
you guys met Jesus in His Word. You met Jesus through His Word.
Literally, some people somebody tells them about Jesus and leads
them in prayer. You literally were introduced to Jesus through
His Word. A scripture you read sparked your heart, and you
said-- GLORIA: That's right. KELLIE: --"Take my life--"
GLORIA: That's right. KELLIE: And, you know, we really
overcomplicate things. And we went--we mess it up when we do
it. GLORIA: Well, in those days, there weren't a lot of churches
that preached the Gospel. KELLIE: No. GLORIA: Most of them
preached, but they'd be traditions or, you know, "This
is what we believe," or whatever. So we went--we
didn't--we weren't really good churchgoers, but we were good
Bible readers. And we got in the Word, and we found out that
there was a way to start over again, to be born over again.
KELLIE: Into something different. GLORIA: And we liked
that. Glory to God. It was a good decision. KELLIE: You met
Jesus in His Word. GLORIA: Mm-hmm. KELLIE: And ever since
then, you've just grown and you've grown. And not--I want to
separate growing in knowledge, because you've done that, but it
wasn't just growing in knowledge of stuff, growing in facts, you
grew in your knowledge of Him. You grew in relationship with
Jesus, and He taught you and lead you into the place that you
are right here. And we read in your book, "Walk With God," the
other day--we read it said, "God didn't expect you to start
anywhere else but right here where you are at today." GLORIA:
That's right. KELLIE: And isn't that easy? All these things of
God are so easy because He's done all the work, and all we
have to do is believe and yield to what He says and even obey in
His Word. You know, people think that to do the things the way
God says to do them that it's hard. It's not. It's easy. But
it's only hard if you're trying to also do your own thing.
GLORIA: Yeah. KELLIE: Ha-ha-ha. It's like, you know, when you've
got--I've got a six-year-old, and she likes things to go her
way, and she likes to make the decisions. GLORIA: Mm-hmm.
KELLIE: But I finally--I think I've about got across to her to
the fact that if she gets to make the decision, and it goes
her way, it's not going to be good. But if it goes--but if I
get to make the decisions and tell her what we're doing, then
she gets to do all the things that she ends up wanting to do.
You know, we get to play, we get to have fun, we get to--but her
decisions don't always lead to-- GLORIA: Fun. KELLIE: --for fun
for her. GLORIA: (Laughs) KELLIE: And I think that's the
same way with the Father. He has a way of life-- GLORIA: He
knows. KELLIE: --that works-- GLORIA: Mm-hmm. KELLIE: And He's
not hammering us to get us to just be good. He wants us to
be--walk in His ways so we can walk in His blessing. GLORIA:
The truth makes you free. KELLIE: It does. GLORIA: That's
why He wants us to do it. KELLIE: And it's not about being
performance-based acceptance. He loves us. He accepts us. It's
not about that. But He--if we don't do what He says works--if
we do what He says doesn't work, the reason He tells us-- GLORIA:
It doesn't work. KELLIE: --it doesn't work is because, as the
wise woman, Gloria Copeland said, "It doesn't work." GLORIA:
That's right. KELLIE: It's that simple. It's literally that
simple. So we've just been looking at how we--how you guys
and how we and even how Jesus knew the Father through the
Scripture. He knew Himself through the Scripture. And what
we--Jesus is the doorway to the Father. You can't come to Him,
and it's illegal for God to bless you, even, without Jesus
in there, because Jesus is our doorway to the Father. He's the
way-- GLORIA: He's the Savior. KELLIE: --the truth, and the
life. And He's the Savior. And I'm so grateful. So I was just
thinking about this topic and how I wanted to present it to
you. And then I was finally like, "Lord, just let us flow in
this--with all this," because I wasn't quite sure how to--how to
bring the topic to bear about knowing Jesus through His Word.
So we started with talking about how you knew that. And then, you
know, you can look at--we won't turn there, but you know the
story of the temptation of Jesus. He went out into the
wilderness, and He was tempted by Satan. And He had found
Himself and His answers and His life in the Word. He found life
in the Word. There's a really--there's a place in your
book here, I wanted to read it. I wasn't sure when I wanted to
read it, but I'm going to read it now. You talk about, in this
"Walk with God" book, which we're giving away this week,
newness of life. This says, "alive unto God." You read,
"Proverbs 4:20-22 says, 'The Word of God is life and health
to our flesh. So the Spirit of God will make alive our
bodies.'" It says that the key--that "the issues or forces
of life come out of our heart. Keep and guard your heart with
all vigilance and above all that you guard, for out of it flow
the springs of life." King James says, "My son, attend to my
words--" GLORIA: Give attention to the Word of God. KELLIE:
"--incline your ear to my sayings. Let them not depart
from your eyes; keep them in the midst of your heart. For they
are life to those that find them, and health to all their
flesh." This is life. GLORIA: That's right. KELLIE: When you
found this, you found life. GLORIA: That's right. KELLIE:
And then you passed it along to me. And then I had to know more
than just that it was life for you. I had to come into it--
GLORIA: You had to receive it. Yeah. KELLIE: --and receive life
from these words myself. "Keep your heart with all diligence;
for out of it are the issues," or the force of life, the force
of my life. GLORIA: The victory-- KELLIE: You know, when
we've-- GLORIA: --or the defeat comes out of your heart. KELLIE:
When we've been sick-- GLORIA: Victory comes out of your heart,
or defeat comes out of your heart. KELLIE: "Out of the
abundance of the heart," comes out, and it comes out here. The
fruit of it will be out here with what's inside your heart. I
mean, when we've been sick in our bodies, the life force on
the inside of us, connected with the Word, the promise that we
were putting in, and it healed our bodies. GLORIA: And that's
what happened with us on our finances. KELLIE: Everything.
GLORIA: Our finances got healed-- KELLIE: This word here
says, in your book-- GLORIA: --as well. KELLIE: --"The word
'temptation' means solicitation to evil. There will be
temptations, but those temptations will not get your
attention when you're dead to sin. We are dead to sin because
we're alive to Him." GLORIA: That's right. KELLIE: It doesn't
work the other way around. You can't be dead to sin and then
get alive to Him. When you become alive to Him, you become
dead to sin. And I wanted to read that first. I thought it
was really good because it's the life of God coming out of us
that can walk us through things. It's Jesus walking--I mean, many
of us would say, "Well, if Jesus were walking with me, I could do
it. Like the disciples, they had Jesus." They had less of Jesus
than you and I do. GLORIA: He is walking with you. KELLIE: He's
on the inside of us. They had Him in their face, in their
presence, physical presence. We have Him on the inside, talking
to us. With them, He was walking on the earth as a man teaching
these people how to follow Him. I'm so grateful because His walk
with them gave us these words to read because He walked in the
natural with them, and He was training them. And He was--He
was introducing them to the Word of the Father. And, of course,
all those words that He spoke became the Word of God to us.
And so as they were growing-- GLORIA: He wrote letters,
Ephesians, Corinthians, all the letters to tell the churches the
will of God. KELLIE: And really-- GLORIA: And we've got
those. KELLIE: And He expected us to take the Word the same way
He did. Think about when He was led into the wilderness, Mom.
Satan came at Him with a temptation. But He was God. The
life of God was in Him. And so what happened? The Word of God
came out with power. "It is written," He said. "It is
written," He said. GLORIA: That's right. He had it inside
of Him. KELLIE: "It is written," He said. He knew who He was.
GLORIA: That's right. KELLIE: Why? Because He had a connection
to the life of the Father that was on the inside of Him, and it
came out as His Word. GLORIA: That's the way we're supposed to
live. KELLIE: And that's the way we're supposed to live. GLORIA:
That's why we are supposed to put the Word of God first place,
meditate in it day and night, get it in your eyes and your
ears, down in your heart, let it come out your mouth, and that's
the way you live free. That's the way you live blessed.
KELLIE: And that's why He came. GLORIA: Amen. KELLIE: That's why
He came-- GLORIA: That was the point of the whole situation.
KELLIE: Right. GLORIA: Yep. KELLIE: I mean, God made Adam
and Eve because He wanted this family. Well, that fell through.
Sounds like it fell through pretty quickly. GLORIA: He told
them what to do to live in victory. KELLIE: They didn't do
it. GLORIA: They just didn't do it. KELLIE: They made choices--
GLORIA: Mm-hmm. Wrong choices. KELLIE: --that were not the God
choices, and they chose to try to meet their needs some other
way besides God. But He already-- GLORIA: And as
somebody might say, "Well, it's too late for me. I've already
made bad choices." You have another opportunity. KELLIE:
That's right, always. GLORIA: You can repent of your sin and
give your life to the Lord. He'll take it. He'll cleanse you
from all unrighteousness, the Scripture says. He won't turn
you down if you come to Him in faith and ask for forgiveness.
He'll forgive you. And then if you say, "Lord, show me what to
do," He'll show you what to do. Glory to God. KELLIE: And all
you have to do is yield to Him. GLORIA: And it's so much better
than living life by yourself. KELLIE: I want to not be without
Him. GLORIA: Hmm-mm. KELLIE: And He--but the Bible says that
before the foundation of the world, before the world was ever
created, they already knew--He already knew He was a lamb
slain. He was the sacrifice. He was going to be the one to pay
the price for Adam and Eve and for every human being after
that. And He was the one that was going to come--I mean,
really and truly, He was the light of heaven before He came.
If He didn't love us, if He didn't love His Father, how
would He have even found the desire or the joy enough to come
to this earth and be a human. What a step down. But His step
down became our step up-- GLORIA: That's right. KELLIE:
--because He enabled us to come up with Him, to come-- GLORIA:
Praise God. KELLIE: --to be like Him. That's some--that's--that's
some amazing. This is God Himself-- GLORIA: New creation
in Christ Jesus. KELLIE: --sending Himself to earth to
bring us back, and I just can't tell you-- GLORIA: He sent His
Son for us to bear the penalty of sin. Then when we receive His
Son, we become cleansed and free and get born over again. KELLIE:
Isn't that awesome? GLORIA: Think about the awesomeness of
that plan. We are born from an old, sinful creature. It doesn't
matter--I mean, I've known people that were on death row
that killed--that murdered multiple people. And then they
found God while they were in prison. They got born again. Now
all of that's cleansed away; the power of the Gospel to make new.
KELLIE: And we get so caught up on our humanity when it's
actually our humanity that we want to-- GLORIA: Was the reason
He came. KELLIE: --pretend we're not--you know, like we're not
supposed to mess up or something. That's why He came.
GLORIA: That's right. KELLIE: And the longer you walk with
Him, the less you mess up. But He--God doesn't expect you to do
all of that perfectly even today. We mess up still. GLORIA:
But we can repent if we do mess up. KELLIE: We mess up, but big
deal. We've got a Savior. GLORIA: We do our very best--
KELLIE: We do our best. GLORIA: --not to mess up. KELLIE: Right.
But, our salvation is not in our doing good or not good, or
messing up or not messing up. It's in Him. His glory can only
shine through our humanity. I think Todd White said this:
"Your weakness is a magnet for His strength." GLORIA: That's
good. KELLIE: And He's just not bothered by our weakness. Why?
Because He came to make us strong. That's what--that's His
purpose. GLORIA: He's got the answers. KELLIE: That's His
cause. He has all the answers. So I wanted to read this, Mom,
in John because, you know, He is the Word. GLORIA: Is that The
Passion, in John? KELLIE: Yes, the Passion Translation. It's
the one right here. We have so many books back here. I wish you
could see. GLORIA: Where are you, page what? KELLIE: I'm in
Chapter 1. And we're used to hearing this: "In the beginning
the Word was with God, and the Word was God." And we know that
Jesus is the Word in the very beginning of time. He was, and
He was the Word. He was, and He is, and He is to come. He's so
big. He's so magnificent that in our minds we think, "I can't
fathom the bigness of Jesus." But it's funny, Mom, the more
you put the Word in your heart, the more you understand how big
He is and how small He is; how big He is, and yet how
intimately connected to you and the details of your life He is.
The more you worship Him, the more you understand how big He
is and how small you are. GLORIA: That's true. KELLIE:
And, you know, it's when we get those out of order that we can
only think that things aren't going to work out. GLORIA:
Mm-hmm. KELLIE: Think about that. When we get that out of
order, "God is small and we are big," in our heart, we say, "I
don't know how this could work out." But when you get that in
right order, "God is big, and I am small, and I worship Him,"
you just know this is going to work out. And you put His Word
in your heart, and though you are small, you are big because
you have defeated the enemy. I, Kellie, Copeland, defeated the
enemy on the cross with Jesus. I was part of that. And so,
because of that, He's a part of my life, defeating the enemy
today in my life, because I was part of defeating the enemy.
GLORIA: You were born over again. KELLIE: I was born over
into Him with His action on the cross and my receiving it. And
He--it's just become so real to me, Mom, that He is the exact
expression from the Father. Like how I express Jesus to someone
else and tell them how much He loves them, Jesus came to
express the Father to people, to me. GLORIA: Praise God. KELLIE:
And so when we're in the Word, we begin to know Jesus. And
Jesus said, "If you've seen the Father--if you've seen Me,
you've seen the Father." So we begin to know Jesus. We begin to
see the Father in His Word. GLORIA: Amen. KELLIE: So I want
to read this because I just thought it was really good. You
have to follow along here with me. GLORIA: Where are you, page
what? KELLIE: Right here, page one. Page, I don't know, seven,
chapter one. "In the very beginning, God was already
there, and before His face, was his Living Expression." What
does that mean? In His presence--this says that there's
no Hebrew word for "presence" as in "presence of God" only the
word "face." So it says, "In God the Father's presence, Jesus was
right there." He is the living expression of God, living in the
earth. He was living in the earth. The Word became flesh and
began living in the earth. GLORIA: Mm-hmm. KELLIE: And it
was God the Father's Word--God the Father's message to you and
I came in the form of Jesus. And this living expression, or this
Jesus, "was with God and yet fully God. So He was with God,
He was separate from God, but yet He was completely filled
with all of the manifestation of God. He is the message of God,
he is the blueprint of God, he is the eternal Word, the
creative Word, and He is the Word made visible. He's the
living expression of all that God is, all that He contains,
and all that He reveals. Just as we express ourselves in words,
God has perfectly expressed Himself in Jesus." GLORIA:
Praise God. KELLIE: That's why it says He's the Word. He is the
way-- GLORIA: He's the light. KELLIE: --the Father expressed
Himself into this planet. "They were together--face to face, in
the very beginning. And through his creative inspiration this
Living Expression made all things, for nothing has
existence apart from him! Life came into being because of him."
Everything that happened in the--on this planet, from Adam
and Eve, everything that was created came out of Jesus
Himself as He was the expression of the Father to this earth.
"For His light is light for all humanity. And this Living
Expression is the Light that bursts through the gloom--that
Light that darkness could not diminish!" This light of Jesus,
darkness can't diminish that. It says, "Then suddenly a man
appeared who was sent out from God's presence, a messenger
named John. For he came to be a witness, to point the way to
the Light of Life, and to help everyone believe. John was not
that light but he came to show who is the light. For he was
merely a messenger to speak the truth about the Light. For the
Light of Truth was about to come into the world and shine upon
everyone. The Creator entered into the very world he created,
and the world was unaware. He came to the very people He
created, to those who should have recognized Him, but they
did not receive Him." Then listen to this: "Those who
embraced Him--" Now, to embrace Jesus, you're going to have to
embrace His Word-- GLORIA: Believed Him, took Him, yeah.
KELLIE: --because His Word is Him. "To those who embraced Him
and took hold of his name, were given the authority to become
who they really are, the sons of God!" And it goes on. It's
really good. I won't--I won't take the--take the time to read
all of that, but here's something it says in Verse 15.
Well, let's look at Verse 14. "And so the Living Expression
became a man and lived among us! And we gazed upon the splendor
of his glory, the glory of the One and Only who came from the
Father overflowing with tender mercy and truth! John taught the
truth about him when he announced to the people, 'He's
the One! Set your hearts on Him!'" And, of course, it goes
on, and it's so good. But Jesus--we have to set--we set
our heart on Him. When you set your heart in the Word, and you
set your heart on the Word, as you guys did years ago, you
begin to meet Jesus in the depths-- GLORIA: And we began to
see into the-- KELLIE: You began to see-- GLORIA: --Scripture.
KELLIE: --into who He is, into what He's promised you. And then
He--so He continues--so He came--He came as the expression
of the Father. And He began to do what He was called to do. He
started His first preaching. You know, He'd preach the sermon on
the Mount was one of the first recorded messages in here. And
He began to say, "This is what you heard, but this is what I'm
telling you." He began to give them light on what the Scripture
said about the Father-- GLORIA: Praise God. KELLIE: --and about
who they were. And then tomorrow, I want to talk about,
Mom, in John 6 where people were trying to see the benefit of
Jesus without laying hold of Jesus. They wanted His benefits
separate from Himself. GLORIA: That can't be done.
KELLIE: That doesn't work. (Both Laugh) GLORIA: Can't.
Kellie and I will be back soon. Thank you.
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