BVOV Magazine 2013 - present

To know the strength of God’s WORD is to know His integrity, His ability and His faith. God releases His faith with His words. He is a faith being. He does everything by faith. Hebrews 11:6 says, “But without faith it is impossible to please him….” That is the way you and I are to operate—by faith. We are to take The WORD of God and stand against Satan by speaking it out our mouths in faith. Ephesians 6:17 says, “And take...the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.” The WORD is our sword, our weapon in the world of the spirit; but it is of no use until it comes out our mouths. We have to speak The WORD for it to be effective in our lives. Jesus considered only The WORD of God in His earthly ministry. When Satan came to tempt Him, Jesus answered with The WORD. He said, “Satan, it is written…it is written…it is written.” Satan has no defense against The WORD of God when it is spoken in faith. Romans 10:17 tells where faith comes from: “So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.” First John 5:4, “…and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.” We are dealing with a living God, a living Jesus, a living WORD. His faith and our faith come together by The WORD. God’s faith is active in His WORD today! His WORD and His faith prevail on the lips of a believer. When we go in His Name and speak His living WORD, the Holy Spirit carries those same faith-filled words from our lips and causes them to produce just as abundantly as when God speaks them. As we confess with our mouths that Jesus is LORD, we give Him the opportunity to work in our lives. As we confess The WORD, we allow the Holy Spirit the freedom to bring complete and total deliverance. Put into action the rights Jesus purchased for you by confessing the power of God’s living WORD in you. Be like our father Abraham. Refuse to stagger at The WORD of God through unbelief, but stand strong in faith, giving glory to God, being fully persuaded that what God has promised, He is able also to perform. Praise God! V ********************************************************************************* Victorious Christian Living by Gloria Copeland A Loving Heart and an Open Hand “Turn unto the Lord your God: for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness….” Joel 2:13 Over and over again, the Scriptures tell us that God is gracious, but too often we miss the fullness of what that really means. A person who is gracious is someone who is inclined to do what you want them to do. They’re disposed to show favors to those who ask them. They are, as James 3:17 says, “easy to be intreated.” My grandfather was like that. All the children in my family called him “Pop,” and we dearly loved him because he so enjoyed being good to us. If we asked him for money, he’d dig into his pockets and give us whatever he had. He taught us all how to drive, and then let us take his pickup to town (even before we had our driver’s licenses). As long as he knew it wouldn’t hurt us, he let us do whatever we wanted to do. My grandmother wasn’t as much that way, so she often tried to stop him, but she didn’t have much success. Despite her protests, he usually ended up giving us whatever we asked for because he couldn’t help it. That was just his nature. God is much the same way. It’s not difficult to get Him to do what we want. On the contrary, He likes to say yes to us. He is disposed to show us favor! You know how some people have hobbies like fishing or golf, and they’re always looking for opportunities to do those things? You might say that God’s hobby is doing good things for His children. He is continually watching for opportunities to BLESS us and give us what we want. Ecclesiastes 3:12-13 says, “…for a man to rejoice, and to do good in his life. And also that every man should eat and drink, and enjoy the good of all his labour, it is the gift of God.” God wants to give good gifts to people. It’s what He loves and enjoys, so much so, that one of the Hebrew titles for God in the Old Testament is “Jehovah the Good!” That’s why we can go boldly before His throne of grace to receive what we need from Him. That’s why we can go in faith, and not in fear. We don’t have a heavenly Father who’s hardhearted and tightfisted. We have a Father who is easily entreated, who greets us with a loving heart and an open hand. We have a Father who loves to be good to us. V BVOV : 21

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