Living at the End of Time—A Time of Supernatural Increase

Contents

1 Time Has Culminated in Jesus

2 Sowing and Reaping an End-Time Harvest

3 Signs and Wonders ... Without the Wonder

Prayer for Salvation and Baptism in the Holy Spirit

About the Author

Chapter 1

Time Has Culminated in Jesus

All my adult life my mama used to tell me,

"Kenneth, Jesus is coming this year."

I would say, "Is that right, Mama?"

"Yeah," she'd say, "He's coming this year. And you had better get yourself straightened out!"

Well, the year would go by, and no Jesus. But each new year, here she'd go again...

"Kenneth, Jesus is coming this year. You'd better straighten up!"

"Yes, Mama, I know...."

Occasionally, when she started in on me I would say, "Mama, you said Jesus was coming last year.

What happened?"

She'd say, "I know I did—He's coming this year!"

I'm telling you nothing could change her, nothing could influence her. I would even get real spiritual on her and say, "Mama, you're not supposed to set dates on Jesus' return."

"The year don't count," she'd say.

So 'round and 'round we'd go every year. From the time I was a teenager in school, I was so tired of hearing my mama tell me, "Kenneth, Jesus is coming this year!"

Well, she did that until the day she went home to be with the Lord in 1988. Then, as far as she was concerned, it happened—Jesus came. He came, and off they went together to heaven. The only difference was, she left her body here instead of taking it with her.

Now, I tell you all of that to say this: JESUS IS COMING!

I don't know if it's this year. I don't know if it's next year. I don't know if it's next week. But I do know He's coming and it's a whole lot sooner than most of us think.

"Well, Brother Copeland, how can you be so sure?"

Read the Word. Then just take a good look around you.

It doesn't matter where on this planet you live—there is more Glory, more outpouring, more preaching, more Word, more believers, and even more hell on this earth than there has ever been before. It's nothing like mankind has ever seen.

Time as we have known it is over. These are different times we're living in now. And what I'm about to tell you is almost unthinkable, not from a bad standpoint, but from a good one.

You and I have entered into a space of time, a little, narrow band of time, which, in the scheme of all mankind, is the biggest and perhaps the most important block of time since the creation of Adam.

We have stepped over—in the spirit realm and the natural realm—into exceeding abundantly above all that we can ask or think (Ephesians 3:20).

How do I know?

Let me answer that by taking you back to where all this began.

Overtaking the Sower

To better understand this narrow band of time in which we now live, let's look at John 6:5-13: When Jesus then lifted up his eyes, and saw a great company come unto him, he saith unto Philip, Whence shall we buy bread, that these may eat? And this he said to prove him: for he himself knew what he would do. Philip answered him, Two hundred pennyworth of bread is not sufficient for them, that every one of them may take a little. One of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, saith unto him, There is a lad here, which hath five barley loaves, and two small fishes: but what are they among so many? And Jesus said, Make the men sit down. Now there was much grass in the place. So the men sat down, in number about five thousand. And Jesus took the loaves; and when he had given thanks, he distributed to the disciples, and the disciples to them that were set down; and likewise of the fishes as much as they would. When they were filled, he said unto his disciples, Gather up the fragments that remain, that nothing be lost. Therefore they gathered them together, and filled twelve baskets with the fragments of the five barley loaves, which remained over and above unto them that had eaten.

Now if there was ever a picture of exceeding abundantly above all that we can ask or think, this is it.

Thousands of people eating bread and fish until they were full, and 12 baskets filled with the leftovers.

People today, like people back then, would say, "My, my, what a wonderful miracle of God!"

And they're right, it was a miracle of God. But this was more than a miracle. On that day, culminated in Jesus. It was compressed, or tightly compacted, within a short space. The growing time for the seed the little boy planted in Jesus' ministry was instant.

Let me show you what I mean. Go back again and examine what happened on that grassy mountain near the Sea of Galilee. But instead of reading about it in John 6, look at the same event recorded in Matthew 14:19-21:

And he commanded the multitude to sit down on the grass, and took the five loaves, and the two fishes, and looking up to heaven, he blessed, and brake, and gave the loaves to his disciples, and the disciples to the multitude. And they did all eat, and were filled: and they took up of the fragments that remained twelve baskets full. And they that had eaten were about five thousand men, beside women and children.

Now, notice what happened: The disciples told Jesus, "There's a boy here with some bread and a couple fish." Jesus asked for the food, and they got it for Him. He took it, looked toward heaven, gave thanks for it, blessed it, broke it and distributed it among His disciples. They, in turn, took the food and distributed it among the people...and they distributed it...and distributed it—to approximately 20,000 people. Then, they went back and picked up all the leftovers. Twelve baskets full!

What I want you to see is that this whole process of Jesus taking the loaves and fish into His hands, blessing them, breaking them and distributing them, is the whole sowing and reaping process condensed into a matter of moments.

That lad sowed his five barley loaves and two small fish into the ministry of Jesus. Jesus received the boy's seed—planting it in fertile soil. He watered it, then immediately there was a harvest. Not only was there enough to feed everyone until they were full, there was also plenty left over for the storehouse.

Whose storehouse? That little boy's storehouse! He was the one who planted, wasn't he?

So what happened? What are we seeing take place before our very eyes?

The reaper caught up with the sower.

"What?! How can that be, Brother Copeland?"

Simple. Look at Amos 9:13: "Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that the plowman shall overtake the reaper, and the treader of grapes him that soweth seed; and the mountains shall drop sweet wine, and all the hills shall melt."

The Word prophesies that there is a time coming when seedtime and harvest time will run together.

That young fellow sowed his bread and fish into Jesus' ministry that morning, and went home later that afternoon with 12 baskets full—all because time culminated in Jesus. And that, my brother and sister, is the kind of time we're living in today.

Christmas in September?

You and I are now living and operating on a whole new time frame. When we made Jesus the Lord of our lives, we got over into His time schedule and He got into ours. But what I really want you to grasp is that Jesus' time frame and the world's time frame do not function the same. Oh, we're in the same space as the rest of the world, but we're not functioning on the same schedule—and I'm talking literally.

What do I mean?

Well, among other sources, the study notes in the Bulinger Bible explain how the current gentile- ized calendar you and I use is inaccurate and way off-schedule. These sources explain how dates such as Jesus' birthday are incorrect, and have been for centuries.

Now this may come as a shock to you, but Jesus was not born on December 25. In fact, He wasn't even born in December, Jesus' birthday is actually sometime at the end of September.

Of course I realize that might upset your Christmas this year, but I don't think Jesus will mind it too much if you continue to celebrate His birthday three months late. But this does have very significant bearing in our immediate lives. Let me explain.

From the very beginning, God has given us the time frame in which He will work with mankind. It is a seven-day time frame. We see in Genesis that God created the earth in six days, and rested on the seventh. Then He gave mankind dominion. He gave him a lease on the earth. How long was that lease?

Second Peter 3:8 gives us a key. Speaking of the return of the Lord, Peter tells us, "Beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years...." In light of that, and a mountain of other biblical evidence, we know that mankind was given a 6,000-year lease on the earth.

At the end of that time, God would take over and close out the Age with a 1,000-year (seventh-day) reign.

Now we know that Jesus was born 4,000 years into that time frame—or on the fourth day Even with the mess that the gentile calendar created, it is not very difficult to figure out the correct date of Jesus'

birthday, because we know the actual dates of other major events such as Herod's birth and death. Besides that, the Hebrew people have been keeping their calendar for a long, long time.

For all practical purposes, 2,000 years have come and gone since Jesus' birth and ministry. Six thousand years since Adam was created.

Where does that put us on our spiritual clock?

We have entered that little sliver of time between Adam's lease on earth—and consequently, Satan's dominion in this earth due to Adam's Fall—and the period of time we read about in Acts 2:19-20: "And I will show wonders in heaven above, and signs in the earth beneath; blood, and fire, and vapour of smoke: The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before that great and notable day of the Lord come."

The Millennial Reign

You and I are being squeezed between 6,000 years of time behind us and another 1,000 years ahead of us. The 1,000 years facing us is the millennial reign of Jesus of Nazareth, which is the first time in human existence since the Fall of Adam that humanity will be totally and completely out of contact with Satan.

I'm telling you, Jesus is coming. He's about to rise off His heavenly throne and return to earth. He may not have stood up yet, but I guarantee you He is out on the edge of His seat!

Although we are the ones who are wedged into this narrow band of time, really, it is God Who's being pressed and pushed. And by pushed I mean everything God promised would come to pass during the past 6,000 years must come to pass before the beginning of Jesus' millennial reign. Everything He ever said is coming to pass—and only God could accomplish that.

This sliver of time we're living in is the moment just before the catching away of the Church, and the final outpouring when God can do whatever He wants to do, which includes angels becoming more involved in the natural realm.

You and I are in a moment of grace which, for us, means we are reaping a harvest of 2,000 years worth of gospel seed. For 2,000 years seeds have been sown, and now the Body of Christ—you and I—

are reaping that harvest. Think about it!

In addition to that, time has culminated in Jesus.

As believers living at the end of time, time for us has been compressed, compacted. Seedtime, growing time, harvest time—it has all been compressed into a sliver of time, just as it was for that lad with the five loaves and two small fish.

We are living in the exceeding-abundantly-beyond-all-we-can- ask-or-think time. Hallelujah!

Great Responsibility

Now that we have some understanding of these days in which we live, it is vitally important for us to also understand how we are to respond to "such a time as this." Doesn't it sound to you like the Body of Christ is about to have its hands full of harvest?

Sure, God is pouring out His Spirit like never before. But with all that anointing He's placed in and on us, He's also given us great responsibility as the end-time Church.

So, to catch hold of what God is telling His people today, let's look at Psalm 2:2-4: "The kings of the earth set themselves, and the riders take counsel together, against the LORD, and against his anointed, saying, Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us. He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh...."

In Psalm 37:12-13, we read: "The wicked plotteth against the just, and gnasheth upon him with his teeth. The Lord shall laugh at him: for he seeth that his day is coming."

As this Age draws to a close, I'm hearing the Lord say, Hey! Give Me a couple of days here. There are a lot of things I've been wanting to do, but My hands have been tied. But now that they're untied, let's have some fun. Let's have a good time—and win billions of souls before we go!

What do you think all this laughing in the Spirit is about, anyway?

Well, we just read it in the Psalms.

Satan's time is up, and God is laughing at him!

God is having one BIG time of it. He is laughing at the devil all over the world. He's laughing at him in churches. He's laughing at him in meetings. He even has preachers going around preaching and teaching laughing.

The bottom line is, you can go ahead and laugh at the devil, too. He's through! He's finished!

In Hebrews 10:12-13, the Bible tells us that Jesus, "After he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever, sat down on the right hand of God; From henceforth expecting till his enemies be made his footstool."

Notice that Jesus didn't sit down to do nothing.

No, He sat down expecting till His enemies be made His footstool. He sat down, or He entered into God's rest.

Would you please tell me how in the world will Jesus defeat His enemies with Him sitting down? It's simple: He has already defeated the enemy. What's more, He gave you and me authority over the enemy, with the command to go into all the world and preach the gospel and tread on His enemy.

Ephesians 2:6 says God has "raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus." And in Hebrews 3 and 4, we are commanded to enter God's rest. Paul says in Hebrews 4:1: "Let us therefore fear, lest, a promise being left us of entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of it."

The Word is actually saying we ought to be afraid of getting out of God's rest.

Afraid of it? We haven't even heard of it!

Religious doctrine has told us to get agitated, sorry, bawl, squall or beat the altar with our fist. Yet all the while, God's Word is commanding us to enter into His rest...and then stay there.

Now I'll be the first to admit that entering God's rest has been the hardest thing for me to get hold of since I've been in the ministry, though I have done it more on a personal level. I have taken the Word, stood on it, believed God and entered into His rest when I've been faced with an attack of the devil, or the like.

But I'm seeing that God intends for us to rest over the whole thing, over every situation—particularly with all that we have facing us in this sliver of time.

When those hungry folks came up to Jesus, He didn't fall on His face and start sobbing and kicking the dirt, saying, "Oh, God! Oh, God! I just don't know what I'm going to do. There's 5,000 of them—and that's just the men. We don't have enough money.

Besides, we're out here in the middle of nowhere.

And that idiot I've got for a treasurer...."

No, Jesus just rested in God. He trusted and rested in His Father.

Today, as men and women of faith, our goal is to walk in the promises of God with such faith that, no matter what challenge or need comes our way, we do just like Jesus did when that multitude came to Him: We just smile and say, "Bring the loaves and fish here to me."

Then we take our seed, look to God, give thanks for it, bless it, break it and expect the abundance.

Then we just rest.

We are living in the last little sliver of time, a time of great harvest, a time when we can laugh, and a time when we can rest.

So go ahead, laugh. God is. Go ahead and rest, too. Jesus is. But do it expecting. Do it expecting, until your financial enemies, until your physical enemies, until your family's enemies—or whatever enemies—be made your footstool.

Chapter 2

Sowing and Reaping an End-Time Harvest

For centuries the Church has been absolutely riddled with ungodly ideas concerning prosperity Financially, the Church has been dominated by the world's system and the world's way of doing business—so much so, in fact, that we actually started preaching it as "God's economics" when God didn't have anything to do with it in the first place.

We brought the world's ways over into the Body of Christ instead of taking the things of God over into the world. But all that has begun to change—and it is going to change some more. Big time!

Sowing and Reaping ... It's as Old as Dirt It must change because we've come to the end of 2,000 years since Jesus' birth into this earth. Two thousand years of gospel have been sown into this world, and now it's harvest time. You and I are the ones who will reap this harvest—a harvest like never seen before.

But to bring it in, we need to set our thinking straight. We must dig into God's principles of economics and begin applying them. And the most fundamental principle of God's economics is the principle of sowing and reaping.

To begin our study of sowing and reaping, let's read an early Old Testament account of it in Genesis 8:20-22:

And Noah builded an altar unto the Lord; and took of every clean beast, and of every clean fowl, and offered burnt offerings on the altar. And the Lord smelled a sweet savour; and the Lord said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for man's sake; for the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth; neither will I again smite any more every thing living, as I have done. While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease.

First, I want to point out that what we just read happened only two verses after Noah got off the ark.

When Noah and his family left the ark, they were it.

There wasn't anyone else. Everything "in whose nostrils was the breath of life" had been wiped out by the Flood (Genesis 7:22).

But God preserved for Himself a seed—Noah and his family, all the fowl, beasts and creeping things—and He planted that seed in the earth and declared, "While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest...shall not cease."

So life on earth began once again from the seed of one man.

The second point I want to make concerning this passage is in verse 22: "While the earth remaineth, seedtime and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease."

Here, the word seedtime is a compound word. It is defined as the season for planting seeds. But if you analyze this word, particularly in the context of this passage of scripture, I believe you can conclude that this verse is saying, "As long as there is an earth, there will always be a time of planting—and a time of growing—and a time of harvesting."

That makes sense, doesn't it? From the time you plant a crop until the time you harvest it, there's the growing time. Right?

We could also say it this way: Seedtime plus growing time equals harvest time.

In the New Testament, Jesus followed through with this concept of seedtime and growing time when the apostles approached Him about increasing their faith. We read about it in Luke 17:5-6. "And the apostles said unto the Lord, Increase our faith. And the Lord said, If ye had faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye might say unto this sycamine tree, Be thou plucked up by the root, and be thou planted in the sea; and it should obey you."

The apostles came to Jesus wanting Him to increase their faith, or to make it grow. But He told them that their faith was like a seed. If they would plant it, it would grow. Why? Because faith follows the law of seedtime, growing time and harvest time.

Now I'm purposely introducing this matter of "growing time" because that's what I want us to focus on in just a moment. For now, though, I want to establish in our minds that the primary principle or law of economics in the kingdom of God is this law of sowing and reaping.

Let's look at a very familiar verse of scripture, Galatians 6:7: "Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap."

Based on the context of this passage, we know that the Apostle Paul is primarily talking about money. But when you examine "...whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap," you realize that this is not just about money, it's a general revelation of the earth's entire operation. In fact, it's the way heaven operates. It's the way the kingdom of God operates.

How do we know that?

Well, back there in Genesis 8:22, God declared it as so. Then Jesus said the same thing in Mark 4:30-32.

In Galatians 6, Paul is very aware of this basic law of sowing and reaping and he goes on to apply it to spiritual matters in verse 8: "For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting."

So we see that the law of sowing and reaping is a kingdom law which, consequently, governs the earth and all natural or material matter.

Now, take this basic, yet all-encompassing law of kingdom economics and apply it to this compressed, narrow band of time in which we now live as people of the end times—a time when 6,000 years' worth of God's promises are about to explode all over this earth—and that's when things really start to get interesting.

Pressed for Time

Have you ever noticed how we seem to be a generation of people who are always in a hurry and forever running out of time?

Here we are with all the technology to do anything and everything faster than the speed of light, but we're always out of time. And I can tell you why.

It's because... We're out of time!

Remember Amos 9:13? "Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that the plowman shall overtake the reaper, and the treader of grapes him that soweth seed...."

My friend, this is a picture and prophecy of that end-time harvest we've all been praying and looking for. But watch carefully what is really happening in this verse. (Again, the key is growing time.) How much growing time do you think is involved when the farmer is out in the field, walking a couple feet behind the guy driving the plow, poking grape seeds in the ground, and then just a few steps behind him is the fellow who's pulling ripe grapes off a mature vine?

I would say the growing time—the span of time from seed to ripe fruit—is only a matter of seconds.

But then, that's not even what this scripture is saying.

This verse is actually saying, the plowman, the planter, the reaper and the winemaker are all catching up to one another and passing each other, to the point that you cannot tell which one is which.

Is it beginning to look just a little impossible to you?

Well, in the natural it is. But let's find out more about this principle of growing time, and how supernatural growing time relates to our end-time harvest. Let's focus our study on John 6:5-13, and start by reading verses 5-9:

When Jesus then lifted up his eyes, and saw a great company come unto him, he saith unto Philip, Whence shall we buy bread, that these may eat? And this he said to prove him: for he himself knew what he would do. Philip answered him, Two hundred pennyworth of bread is not sufficient for them, that every one of them may take a little. One of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, saith unto him, There is a lad here, which hath five barley loaves, and two small fishes: but what are they among so many?

Before we read the rest of the passage, I want to stop here and examine these verses so we can get a good idea of what's really happening—what Jesus is saying and how His disciples are responding.

When Jesus looked up and saw the multitude coming, He knew good and well what He was about to do. He also knew class was now in session.

Jesus asked Philip, "Where are we going to buy bread for all these folks?"

The Bible is clear: Jesus already knew the answer, but He asked anyway, because—as The Amplified Bible says—He wanted to "test" Philip. In other words, Jesus was wanting to get Philip's attention. He wanted to make him think.

Well, how did Philip do?

His response to Jesus was, "Two hundred pennyworth of bread is not sufficient for them, that every one of them may take a little."

I am satisfied that Philip's answer is the very reason Jesus did what He did.

You see, Jesus was—and is—aware of the fact that the way you and I learn is through communication. That's to say, we never really know what we believe until we start hearing our own mouths say it. We may think we have a pretty good handle on some things. But until the pressure gets turned up to the point where words and thoughts start jumping out of our mouths, we never really know what's deep down inside.

How many times have you suddenly found yourself in the middle of a heated argument, saying some things that even shocked you?

Dear God, why did I say that? Where did it come from?

Well, out of the abundance of your heart your mouth spoke—just like Jesus said it would.

So this tells us there is no question as to what Philip had on his mind (and in his heart) that day.

Little. He had little on his mind.

In fact, faced with all those hungry people, little was the biggest thing in Philip's eyes. And by that I mean, all he could see at that moment was the problem— How are we going to feed these folks? Just getting a few crumbs into these people's hands was far bigger than any answer he could imagine.

Well, along came Andrew and he got in on the test, too. Let's see if he does any better (verses 8-9):

"One of the disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, saith unto him, There is a lad here, which hath five barley loaves, and two small fishes...."

At the start, Andrew did pretty good. He'd been taking notes in class, and up to this point he had heard the Spirit of God enough to realize the answer.

Andrew's problem, however, came when he allowed his own reasoning to talk him out of the answer. He started out in the right direction, but look where he ended up: "There is a lad here, which hath five barley loaves, and two small fishes: but what are they among so many?" His image of the supply turned into crumbs, just like Philip's.

Truthfully, I suspect Andrew never realized that he had tapped into the answer to Jesus' question. Yet, I believe he picked up on it from the Spirit of God.

Why else would he bring that little boy with a basket of lunch to Jesus?

In the end, both Philip and Andrew allowed the size of the problem and their own reasoning to block their view of the answer, though it was standing beside them the whole time, staring them in the face.

Twice-Sown Seed

Up to now, we've seen how most folks would think in their natural minds about feeding 20,000 hungry people with five loaves of bread and two fish.

Now let's watch carefully how Jesus handles this situation. Let's pick up with the rest of that passage of Scripture (John 6:10-13):

And Jesus said, Make the men sit down. Now there was much grass in the place. So the men sat down, in number about five thousand. And Jesus took the loaves; and when he had given thanks, he distributed to the disciples, and the disciples to them that were set down; and likewise of the fishes as much as they would. When they were filled, he said unto his disciples, Gather up the fragments that remain, that nothing be lost. Therefore they gathered them together, and filled twelve baskets with the fragments of the five barley loaves, which remained over and above unto them that had eaten.

On that day, heaven has it recorded that a little boy fed 5,000 men and all their families with two small fishes and five loaves of bread.

"Wait, now, Brother Copeland. We just read that Jesus took the bread and fish and distributed it. Didn't Jesus feed those people?"

Oh, Jesus did the miracle and distributed the food, all right. But it wasn't his seed to sow until that lad walked up and handed Him his lunch.

If we will follow closely what happens to that seed, we will be able to understand the significance of this whole event, and the effect of it on our sowing and reaping today.

Matthew 14 records the same event, and in verse 19 we read how Jesus took the seed—the bread and fish—gave thanks for it, blessed it, broke it and gave it to His disciples. Before Jesus did all this, however, He told the disciples, "Bring them hither to me" (verse 18).

Why do you suppose Jesus told the disciples to give Him the bread and fish?

Couldn't He just as easily have said, "Hold them up and let Me bless them?"

Why did Jesus want to handle that seed? The reason was the anointing of increase.

The anointing of increase is literally and figuratively in the hands of the minister, just as it was present in Jesus' hands that day.

Throughout the Bible we see the anointing of increase in the hands of God's ministry. That's why God instructed Israel in the Old Testament, and Christians in the New Testament, to bring all their tithes, offerings and goods into the ministry.

God's way is for goods to come into the ministry—for the ministry to receive it, handle it, bless it and distribute it, or sow it—then for it to go out, multiplied in greater number than when it came in.

That's the anointing of increase.

The Bible says, "Now he that ministereth seed to the sower both minister bread for your food, and multiply your seed sown..." (2 Corinthians 9:10).

When that boy sowed seed into Jesus' ministry, Jesus received it, applied His anointing of increase to it, then turned around and sowed it into His disciples and the multitude. But as the anointing of increase in and on Jesus hit that boy's seed, not only did it cause the seed to multiply, it also did something supernatural to the growing time of that seed.

The "plowman overtook the reaper, and the treader of grapes him that soweth seed." We could say, time culminated in Jesus. Optimum results were Time Has Culminated in Jesus 31

produced in minimal time. The seed's growing time was compressed to the point that the seed multiplied, grew and produced fruit as fast as the people could eat it. Harvest was produced within moments.

That's not where the story ends, though. We haven't seen the real harvest yet!

God could not fulfill His Word—the law of sowing and reaping—to that young fellow until all 20,000 people had eaten and were full. The reason He couldn't was because the boy's seed was sown a second time by Jesus. And when Jesus sowed it, the boy's seed began multiplying, and multiplying and multiplying.

Everything those people ate that day came from that boy's seed. Then after everyone was full, Jesus told His disciples to "Gather up the fragments that remain, that nothing be lost."

Was Jesus being tight or stingy?

No. Those 12 baskets of leftovers belonged to that boy. They didn't belong to Jesus. Jesus was just making sure He didn't lose any of the boy's harvest.

Notice, however, those baskets of leftovers were only the boy's immediate harvest from having sown directly into Jesus' ministry. The fulfillment of his harvest, the fulfillment of God's obligation to him, was the fruit from seeds multiplied and sown into the lives of 20,000 people.

He fed the multitudes for Jesus and had enough seed to last a lifetime. That's twice-sown seed.

My friend, the twice-sown seed is where you and I need to learn to exercise our faith and keep our expectancy.

Remember how Philip could only see little, and how Andrew started off right, but talked himself out of it?

That kind of thinking will not bring in this end-time harvest we have facing us.

We need to line up our thinking with God's anointing. We need to expect His anointing in every situation. After all, God's style is "pressed down, shaken together, and running over." That's the way He does things.

God didn't create a corncob with a kernel of corn on it. He created a corncob with an abundance of kernels on it, and all creation is designed the same way.

We have moved into an era of exceeding, abundantly beyond what we could ask or think, a time when God now has the opportunity for His people to have more than enough to do all that He wants us to do, instead of the devil stealing everything as fast as it grows in the field.

Think of all the missionaries that have gone to China, Africa, South America and all those places.

They preached, shed their tears and gave their lives, and it looked like the devil had the upper hand.

Well, I have news for you. Every seed sown for the last 2,000 years—every word preached, every tear and drop of blood shed—is coming up...Now!

All 2,000 years' worth of gospel seed planted is coming up a hundredfold, and we're the ones to bring it in.

It's loaves and fishes time. It's multiply-the-seed time. The plowman and reaper are passing each other until you cannot tell which is which.

Let's get in on God's system of economics and get a net-breaking, boat-sinking load of souls before we leave this place!

Chapter 3

Signs and Wonders ... Without the Wonder

In January 1983, I found myself disturbed in my spirit. The Spirit of God had been stirring deep inside me, and it got to the point where I was so moved by the Spirit that I canceled all my appointments for the month—I had to.

I knew I had to get before God. I had to get still...and listen.

So that's what I did. I pulled aside from the busyness of life, went to our prayer cabin in Arkansas and fasted and prayed for a month.

During that time, I didn't eat any solid food, and on any given day, I drank up to six ounces of fruit juice. That's all.

Now I'm not telling you this to bring attention to my fasting. I'm simply showing you how hungry I was for God. And I knew the only thing that would satisfy my hunger was to hear from God Himself.

So I just stayed before Him.

Finally, by the end of that month, I got what I was after. I heard from God, and I'll never forget what He told me.

The Glory is coming, the Spirit of God said, and when it comes, it will fill the whole earth.

I want you to know, that one word from God was what I needed. It filled my entire being, satisfying the hunger of my spirit, soul and body.

I later came across Numbers 14:21 and found more revelation on what the Spirit had told me.

"But as truly as I live, all the earth shall be filled with the Glory of the Lord." In other words, "You can count on it, Brother. This thing is coming to pass.

God's Glory will fill the earth. It's a done deal."

Well, I'm here to tell you, my brother and sister, the deal is done. God's Glory isn't coming—it's here, and it's filling the earth right now!

Get Ready—God Is Crossing the Line!

You and I are in the most unusual spot of time since the beginning of all creation.

With 6,000 years of human history behind us since the Garden of Eden, we now live in a sliver of time just prior to the next 1,000 years—the millennial reign of the Champion of our salvation, our Lord Jesus. Think about it. It will be the first time human beings have ever been in this earth without contact with Satan.

But the Bible clearly tells us that before that grand and glorious reign of Jesus in the earth, there will be seven years of tribulation.

Jesus Himself said there has never been a time like the tribulation, and there never will be again.

Now, when people think of the tribulation, they often think of Acts 2:17-19:

And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh: and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams: And on my servants and on my handmaidens I will pour out in those days of my Spirit; and they shall prophesy: And I will show wonders in heaven above, and signs in the earth beneath; blood, and fire, and vapour of smoke...

"Oh, no! Brother Copeland, you mean we're about to see blood, and fire, and vapor of smoke?"

That's right—we are. Actually, we are already seeing it.

But let's get this straight: The blood, fire and vapor of smoke in Acts 2 (and Joel 2) is not a reference to the wrath of God, as some have often mistaken it to be. No, this is not at all about the tribulation. This is referring to the end-time outpouring of God's Glory.

God spoke through the prophet and said, "I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh." He didn't say, I will pour out of my wrath upon all flesh.

God is not talking about destruction here. He is talking about the revelation of the blood of Jesus.

He's talking about the fire of the Holy Spirit. He's talking about the smoke of His Glory, or the physical manifestation of the very presence of God among us!

Granted, up to now there have been many, many manifestations of God's presence in the earth, even way back in the Old Testament.

But God was limited in the manifestation of Himself in the earth because of Adam's disobedience, thereby handing over his God-given authority to Satan. From the time of Adam's sin, the devil has stood in God's face over this whole matter. But 2,000 years ago Jesus restored our authority, and now 2,000 years of gospel seed sown in the earth is about to explode with harvest in a most glorious way.

My friend, you and I have the privilege of being on this earth in a time when God is no longer limited.

He will do whatever signs and wonders He wants to do, just as Joel prophesied and the Apostle Peter echoed.

These are the days of blood, fire and vapor of smoke—the time of intense outpouring of God's Glory. It's an exciting time for believers, certainly, but it is also a time in which we must know how to conduct our lives at every moment and in every situation.

Staying Anchored in a Flood of Glory

Imagine going to church some morning, getting in the building and then at some point during the time when everyone is singing and worshiping God, a cloud of God's Glory begins to fill the room, and it gets so thick that you cannot see anyone around you.

"Oh, come on, Brother Copeland, that's just too far-fetched."

Let me tell you, it's already happening.

I know of a church in Africa that had a great outpouring of the Holy Spirit, and the daughter of a witch doctor was born again and baptized in the Spirit. Her daddy didn't like that one bit, so he went to that church during a service and planned to curse them—and I don't mean just say ugly things to them.

When he got there, there had been manifestations of God's Glory in that service and he said, "I don't care what kind of miracle you do. I'll match it!"

Well, he actually pulled off a couple of things, but the devil's been doing that since Pharaoh's days.

Then all of a sudden, everyone in that church building started rising off the floor and got about four feet in the air where they were suspended—that is, everyone except that witch doctor, who just kept running across the front of the room, jumping as high as he could. But God's presence was so strong that no one paid any attention to that old boy.

Finally, all this got to him and he fell on his face and gave his heart to the Lord. Sure enough, everybody just floated right back down.

This went on all night, and by morning the man was baptized in the Holy Spirit and free from a whole bunch of devils.

So what do you do in the middle of an outpouring like that? What do you do when the Glory of God, the signs and wonders of God, start spilling over into your everyday life, and not just down at the church building on Sunday nights?

Well, Jesus is our standard of living, so let's take a look at what He would do in a signs-and-wonders-type situation, and let's start by going back to a portion of the foundational scripture we have been using as we have examined living in the end times—John 6:5-6: "When Jesus then lifted up his eyes, and saw a great company come unto him, he saith unto Philip, Whence shall we buy bread, that these may eat? And this he said to prove him: for he himself knew what he would do."

Now, have you ever noticed that to those who believe, signs and wonders are a sign, but to those who don't believe, it makes them wonder?

We see particularly in the book of Acts that people were always marveling or being filled with wonder and amazement over the miracles, signs and wonders manifesting in the lives of the apostles and believers.

We can take that a step further, however, and say that signs and wonders have never produced any faith. If they had, the nation of Israel would be a faith giant today, just from all those miracles recorded in the Old Testament.

But even as we get into the New Testament, it's obvious that signs and wonders produced no faith, because if they had, Jesus could have simply walked the streets of Jerusalem with His arms raised after He was resurrected so people could see the holes in His hands, and everyone would have followed Him.

I'm sure if He had done that, tens of thousands of people would have followed Him. Yet, there still wouldn't have been an ounce of faith in all of them put together, and not one of them would have been born again. They would have been a bunch of people full of wonder, following a man with holes in his hands, and even the excitement—or wonder— of that would have worn off in time.

I realize you may think I'm being pretty hard on these folks, but if you've studied the ministry of Jesus any, you know that even His disciples were not much different than all the other people in the crowds that followed Him.

Jesus' disciples were continually walking alongside Him, watching Him work miracles and manifest the Glory of God, and all the while just as full of wonder as everyone else.

We know from the Scriptures that they spent plenty of time asking themselves, I wonder why He did that...I wonder why He didn't do that...I wonder what He'll do now...?

The reason we know they were thinking those thoughts—and even asking each other—is because Jesus asked them over and over, "Where's your faith...? Where's your faith?"

So here in John 6, when Jesus asked Philip,

"What do you think we should do?" His purpose in asking the question was to get Philip to think. He was working on changing the way they all thought.

Besides, Jesus knew good and well, what He was going to do with all those hungry people. He was going to feed them. He may or may not have known all the details of how it would happen, but He did know what to do. And that's what I want us to examine.

I want to show you three aspects of Jesus that will help anchor us and keep us steady in the ways of God and the plans of God, especially when we begin stepping out more and more into these great end-time manifestations of God's Glory in our lives.

Let the Word Settle It

If there's one thing we will never have to guess about Jesus doing in any situation, it is that He will always be found doing what the Word says. He will always follow the Word. After all, He is the Word.

The first chapter of John tells us Jesus is the Word that became flesh and dwelt among men. He is the Word of God manifest and He always lines up with that Word. If He didn't, He would be violating Himself and His Father.

So whatever God's Word says, that's what Jesus will do, whether you or I go along with it or not, because the Word has settled every matter in heaven and earth once and for all.

In Acts 2, "when the day of Pentecost was fully come," signs and wonders began exploding on Jerusalem. Some amazing things started coming out of the mouths of that band of believers, and it quickly drew a large crowd.

Now all those folks standing around, listening to people speak in other tongues for the first time—and many hearing their own languages being spoken—marveled. They were filled with wonder.

But then what did Peter do?

He stood up and spoke. He preached in that anointing-charged atmosphere.

What did he preach?

The Word!

"This is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel" (Acts 2:16). And then he went on to quote and preach that prophecy. By the time he finished, 3,000 souls were saved.

What happened?

The Word produced salvation in an atmosphere filled with God's Glory.

The Bible says heaven and earth will pass away but God's Word will not. If it were to pass away, Jesus would have to go with it, which is what the devil has been hoping and trying to make happen for the past 6,000 years. But you can forget that. It's not going to happen.

The Word always remains.

Faith and Wonder Don't Mix

A second aspect about Jesus upon which you can depend is that He will always and forever act by faith.

Jesus did not get a free ride in this earth because He was, and is, the Son of God. How do we know this?

The Bible says it is impossible to please God without faith. It also tells us that Jesus perfectly pleased His Father. So He had to have lived and walked and talked and thought by faith.

Really, if you think about it, it is impossible to please anyone without faith. Your spouse, your parents, your children, your employer—every relationship requires faith. You simply cannot please anyone without it.

How pleasing do you think it would be if your spouse or closest friend came up to you and said, "I love you and I care about you, but I just don't believe a word you say"?

When you put it in that light, you begin to realize that any meaningful relationship demands faith and confidence.

So, we will never have to guess what Jesus will do in a situation.

He will always act by faith. He will always please His Father.

Besides that, could you ever imagine hearing Jesus say, "Well, I wonder what I'm supposed to do now? I've got a whole mountainside covered with tired, hungry people and a handful of unbelieving staff members. I just don't know what I'm going to do."

No, you'll never hear Him say anything like that.

That's not the way faith talks, and it's not the way Jesus talks either, because wonder and faith don't mix. But the Word and faith do.

Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God, not hearing by signs and wonders (Romans 10:17).

Burdens Removed, Yokes Destroyed

The third factor we see about Jesus that never leaves us guessing is that He never does anything apart from the Anointing.

He tells us Himself in Luke 4:18, "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach... to heal...to set at liberty...."

Jesus did—and does—everything by the Anointing. He cannot function any other way.

Why is that? Because it is the Anointing—the very essence and presence of God, His abilities, His power—that removes burdens and destroys yokes (Isaiah 10:27). That's God's way of doing things.

It takes God's Anointing to preach good news to the poor. It takes God's Anointing to heal the brokenhearted. It takes God's Anointing to preach deliverance to captives and recovering of sight to blind people, to set free those who are broken down by calamity. And of course, it will take God's Anointing to accomplish this end-time outpouring of signs and wonders in the earth.

I would also add, anything that opposes God's Anointing is anti- Anointing, which is why the devil is called the anti- Christ.

Jesus always functions, always shows Himself, by removing burdens and destroying yokes. Satan, on the other hand, always functions through piling on burdens and yokes.

Also, notice that Hebrews 13:8 does not say, "Jesus—the same yesterday, and today, and for ever."

It says, "Jesus Christ—Jesus, the Anointed One and His Anointing—the same yesterday, and today, and forever."

Not only is Jesus the same yesterday, today and forever, but His Anointing is the same as well. God's Anointing has never changed. Why? Because God does not change.

All that is to say, if you are ever in a situation and wonder if a particular supernatural manifestation is of God or not, I can tell you for certain, it's God if burdens are removed and yokes are destroyed—natural, as well as spiritual ones. (Remember the witch doctor who finally broke in the overpowering presence of God's Glory?)

So Jesus never does anything apart from the Word. He never does anything apart from faith. He never does anything apart from the Anointing.

That's why in John 6, when the hungry multitude came to Jesus, He knew exactly what to do. He simply acted on the Word, on faith and on the Anointing.

In the end, Philip's answer to the question Jesus asked was, "Two hundred pennyworth of bread is not sufficient for them, that every one of them may take a little."

Likewise, in John 6:9, Andrew caught a glimpse of the miracle answer and then talked himself out of it. He said, "There is a lad here, which hath five barley loaves, and two small fishes: but what are they among so many?"

In other words, both men had spent a lot of time around Jesus—they had heard the Word, and they had seen faith and the Anointing in action. Nevertheless, they let the size of the problem and their own reasoning talk them out of the answer.

Both men let go of the Word. They let go of faith. They let go of the Anointing. Of course it became a different story after these men were born again and filled with the Holy Spirit.

But thank God, Jesus didn't let go of the Word—ever. He held on. And because He did, everyone ate their fill that day with plenty left over.

So regardless of what you are facing today, lay hold of the Word. Lay hold of faith. Lay hold of the Anointing. The Word will cause faith to rise up within you, and that faith will hook up to the Anointing to meet any situation.

If you will lay hold of these and not let go—the glorious end-time, miracle-working, signs-and-wonders-producing power of God will flow through your life. And as it begins to reach flood stage, you won't be swept away by wonder. You'll know that it's a sign...our time is up. We're Glory-bound!

Prayer for Salvation and Baptism in the Holy Spirit

Heavenly Father, I come to You in the Name of Jesus. Your Word says, "Whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved" (Acts 2:21). I am calling on You. I pray and ask Jesus to come into my heart and be Lord over my life according to Romans 10:9-10. "If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved." I do that now. I confess that Jesus is Lord, and I believe in my heart that God raised Him from the dead.

I am now reborn! I am a Christian—a child of Almighty God! I am saved! You also said in Your Word, "If ye then, being evil know how to give good gifts unto your children: HOW MUCH MORE shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?" (Luke 11:13). I'm also asking You to fill me with the Holy Spirit. Holy Spirit, rise up within me as I praise God. I fully expect to speak with other tongues as You give me the utterance (Acts 2:4).

Begin to praise God for filling you with the Holy Spirit. Speak those words and syllables you receive—not in your own language, but the language given to you by the Holy Spirit. You have to use your own voice. God will not force you to speak. Worship and praise Him in your heavenly language—in other tongues.

Continue with the blessing God has given you and pray in tongues each day.

You are a born-again, Spirit-filled believer.

You'll never be the same!

Find a good Word of God preaching church, and become a part of a church family who will love and care for you as you love and care for them.

We need to be hooked up to each other. It increases our strength in God. It's God's plan for us.

Table of Contents

Time Has Culminated in Jesus.

Sowing and Reaping an End-Time Harvest.

Signs and Wonders ... Without the Wonder.

Prayer for Salvation and Baptism in the Holy Spirit.

About the Author.

Table of Contents

Time Has Culminated in Jesus.

Sowing and Reaping an End-Time Harvest.

Signs and Wonders ... Without the Wonder.

Prayer for Salvation and Baptism in the Holy Spirit.

About the Author.

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