BVOV Magazine 2013 - present

More often than not, I felt as clueless immediately after I prayed as I did before. But I didn’t let my feelings move me. God said He’d give me His wisdom liberally, and as far as I was concerned it was mine the moment I asked Him for it. So I just thanked Him, praised Him and spent time in the Scriptures, fully expecting to hear the Holy Spirit speak to me through them and give me the answer I needed. A number of times over the years, when Gloria and I have needed wisdom about something particularly significant, we’ve taken several days to just seek The LORD about it. We’ve pulled aside from everything else to pray, search The WORD and listen to the Holy Spirit. Without fail, within three days we’ve always gotten The LORD’s direction. That’s how we ended up with the beautiful home we’re living in now. We didn’t just decide on our own one day to build it. Gloria started standing in faith for it back in 1967, after she read Oral Roberts’ book, "Don't Let Anybody Steal Your Dreams." She meditated dream-house scriptures, made plans and clipped house pictures out of magazines for years. One day, when her faith reached the point of culmination, she came to me and said, “Kenneth, I’m either going to have to build this house or quit messing with it. I’ve told The LORD that I’ll be happy, either way. If He doesn’t want us to build it, I’ll give it up with no regrets. But we need to find out for sure what He wants us to do.” So we set aside a week to pray about it. One day as we were sitting on the couch together praying in the spirit, The LORD said to me, 'I want you to turn to Isaiah 54.' He pointed out several scriptures there and told me to read them to her. He said, 'Read these verses to Gloria and minister this house to her.' When I read her those verses, she could hardly contain herself. She started crying and rejoicing at the same time. She then told me that those were the very scriptures The LORD had given her when she first began believing Him for a house in 1967. Talk about confirmation! That was powerful. We knew we’d heard from heaven. Of course, one reason we hear so clearly is because we don’t just listen for the voice of The LORD on special occasions. We seek Him continually. We read The WORD and pray every day, according to Colossians 1:9-10, that we’ll be “filled with the knowledge of [God’s] will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding; that [we] might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God.” If you want to hear more clearly and consistently from The LORD, I recommend you pray the same scripture. Ask God daily for His wisdom and then, instead of just rushing out the door to go to work, read a chapter or two in The WORD, believing to receive the revelation The LORD has for you. Tune in on purpose to the Holy Spirit on the inside of you and pay attention to what He’s saying. Slow down! Listen! After you read The WORD, pray for a while in the spirit and with your understanding also (1 Corinthians 14:15). Pray in other tongues and ask God to give you the interpretation. He’ll do it if you ask Him in faith. You might not always get the interpretation immediately, but if you’ll keep expecting, it will eventually come. It might hit you later in the day, like a bolt of lightning, as you’re driving across town. Or it might dawn on your spirit gradually over a matter of weeks, until one day you realize you know the answer to the situation you’ve been praying about. “But Brother Copeland, you don’t understand how busy I am. I don’t have time to read the Bible and pray every day.” Really? How much TV do you watch at night? “Maybe an hour or two.” Then take one of those hours and give it to God. If you’re too busy or too sleepy at night, get up a little earlier in the morning. Do whatever it takes to make time in your schedule to seek The LORD. I guarantee, He’ll make it worth your while. He’ll turn your life into the most thrilling adventure you ever imagined. As you hear His words and speak them, He’ll do the works of Jesus through you. He’ll make you more than a conqueror in every situation, and there won’t be anything the devil can do about it—because the dominating power of God’s WORD coming out of the mouth of a believer is the greatest force on earth! V 8 : BVOV

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