Christ Revealed In His Word #06
Life: Its Characteristics and Manifestations#2686
Shall we pray.
Heavenly Father, again we want to consider You at this moment Lord, and trying to give You preeminence, trying to give You honor Lord, knowing that You will get honor and glory unto Yourself, for You said there’s coming a time when every knee shall bow and every tongue shall confess that Thou art Christ, to the glory of God the Father. There’ll come a day, Lord, when people understand that You were not just a man. You were God in human flesh, and we appreciate that so much, Lord.
May we have an understanding today that leaves us deeper with Yourself and with each other, Lord, that we might all be one with You and one with each other, and that great love, the Holy Spirit Himself in our hearts, shedding abroad Himself and His ways, not our ways, but His ways. Lord, grant our fellowship may be in You this morning as we try to walk in the Light with the blood of Jesus Christ cleansing us. Give us understanding, Lord. We know that all of us do not have the same understanding, Father, but we know there is a place where we can have that which casts out all other thoughts but Your thoughts, Lord, and then one day we’ll come to that complete understanding and perfection. In the meantime, Lord, help us with what we have that we may utilize it fully and live thereby. In Jesus’ Name, we pray. Amen.
You may be seated.
Now this, I think, is the sixth message we’re taking in the series of the sermon Brother Branham preached on “Christ Revealed in His Own Word”, and by now we have seen that this message is like many others in that it does not altogether consistently reveal Christ in the Scripture, or bring Him out of the Scripture, by carefully pointing out the various places in the Word where that would be most appropriate.
But extensively, this message Brother Branham preached deals with how He is to be revealed, and once we know God’s way of showing Him sitting in the Scriptures, we can then see Him.
So, that’s what this Scripture, this sermon, is mainly about; not that it does not cover doctrine in certain areas, but it does show you how that Christ is revealed in the Word, that this Bible is completely and a complete revelation of Jesus Christ, so that everything in it is either concerning Him as to a direct revelation from God about Himself, or it has to do with people reacting, and the course that history has taken so that you understand, then, it is really a complete revelation of Him.
So far in this message the highlight of the doctrine is found in paragraphs 52 and 53 and 74. And unless one fails to see this, you cannot actually have a true revelation of Jesus Christ. Now, I’m going to quote what Brother Branham says. Unless one sees this, the revelation of Jesus Christ fails.
[Christ Is Revealed In His Own Word, 08/22/65M]
[52] So, the Bible is a revelation of Jesus Christ, God Himself revealed, from Word to flesh.
In other words, God Himself actually coming into manifestation, wherein God was previously a Spirit (and He still is, of course), but not able to be seen, man could not then have any concept of what God truly was like, and what God truly did, His motivations and those things also which are with Him.
So, it says here that “Jesus Christ is God revealed from Word to flesh.” In other words, the Word became flesh. Brother Branham says:
[52] God is Word, or God is the Word, rather, and Jesus is the flesh. It is a revelation, of how God, the Word, was manifested in human flesh and revealed to us. That’s why He becomes a Son of God.
Now, right there, of course, it sounds a little ambiguous as to whether you’re deciding whether God is becoming His Own Son, or God in the office of Sonship, or whether this one he’s speaking of, it’s the flesh body, becomes the Son of God. Well, actually he’s talking about the one in flesh.
[53] He is… a part of God. The body is a part of God, so much that it’s a Son.
Now, we showed you that the other day. I don’t know if I put it on the board or not, (It’s not really necessary.) how that, if you were to take the life that lies in the sperm and the egg, you could put it under a microscope and you’d never see that life. You could see the egg, and you could see the sperm, and you could no doubt tell whether that egg was able to be fertilized, because it was not a rotten egg; it wasn’t, you know… well, that’s what it really comes to.
It would just not be able to take the life. And you could also see by the movement of the sperm that there was a life there. But you could never get a microscope that would ever show the life itself. There is no way to visualize it, or to ever apprehend it by the senses, because life itself is invisible.
However, you must understand this, that when you come to the formation of those cells and those two cells going to form a child, that those cells have to be a part of that actual life because that actual life is in there, and you’re seeing a chemistry or a manifestation; you’re seeing the chemicals, which will manifest.
So therefore, the body is literally a part of that life. And you cannot get away from it because, if the life weren’t there, there would not be a body. So, it’s a part of it.
So, when you’re dealing with God, Brother Branham could categorically say that, “That body is so much God that it’s a part of God. It is so much God that it is a Son.” Now, you could use the word ‘child’. Dealing with human beings, they could be male or female. You know, there’s no problem there. But of course, in this particular instance, it is the Son: it is designated in the male gender.
I know there’s a vast woman’s lib movement on now to feminize God, take away all the masculinity out of the Bible. Well, that’s all right. You can emasculate God here in your thinking, but you wait till judgment day. That’s all right.
I mean its fine by me; women can do what they want, and men can do what they want. And God’s going to do what He wants. Let’s find out. I’m going to throw my lot on God’s lot. You do what you want. Go anyway you want to go. It’s no problem of mine. I’ve got my problems.
One by one there’s a confrontation. Doesn’t say we’re going to come en masse; mass judgment is always down here in the world. God judges en masse. But up there at the White Throne, it’s one, one, one. Sheep come in, one by one. Do what you like. I mean I’m not hard and not tough up here.
The thing is, look; I cannot control your lives. I’m not expected to control your lives. I preach a Word. And if you’ve got something in your heart to listen, to take that, we’re on the same level then. We’ve got a rapport with each other, and by the grace of God, a rapport with God.
But you can see where the body is so much a part of God it is a Son. And your children are so much a part of you that they are children. See, they are a part of you. What else are they if they’re not a part of you? You tell me. See, the origin is there. That’s a part. So it is with Almighty God in the production of this Son.
He also says in paragraph 74:
[74] To misinterpret Jesus…
That’s the man Christ Jesus now, we’re talking not about the… You know, the Father and Son have the same Name.
So, you say, “Well, I’m going to talk about Jesus.”
I say, “Which Jesus? Father or Son?”
What are you going to tell me? See? You know how it is that almost everybody likes the name… Well, I suppose it was a tradition. I don’t say we have that same tradition where the fathers always wanted to have the son named just like he was; then, you bring it down to John 1, John 2, John 3, John 4, and John 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10; there’s a long, long list of Johns going way, way back.
That’s fine… or Georges or Jims or anything like that. Now they kind of hide it in the second name, you know. They’re a little bit different. But we say, “Which one? Which Jesus?” Well, the man Christ Jesus.
Now he said:
[74] To misinterpret Jesus, in the form of God in a man, would make Him [Jesus] one god out of three.
And that’s really true there, if you were to misinterpret Him and say, “All right now, this One here is God, and there’s two more just like Him. But this one here is called Son, and he’s manifest in human flesh, and now these two over here were not.”
Now, I can understand where you might get two gods out of Scripture, but to have three is insanity. It’s literally insanity because Jesus said God was his Father, and he said the Holy Ghost was his Father. The Scripture tells us that. Which One is his Father? Now, there’s certainly the truth that a man could have, you know… In nature here, how in the world could a woman have two men as the father of one child?
Now, she can have two children by two men, and she can be carrying them at the same time, and they could actually come out as they did in Sweden; in America the same way, one black and one white, which proves that we have…
The genes are marvelous, and the chromosomes, but they’re not that marvelous. They came from two separate inseminations; let’s face it. She had one in the morning and one in the afternoon, and that’s a literal fact.
And if anybody thinks, “Well, hey, you’re quoting from a foreign land.” Well, I can’t quote as to black and white, but I can tell you the truth, there is a lady living right down in Beaumont, Texas, and we could find her name out. And her pregnancies occurred actually six weeks apart by her husband.
And the twins, in being born, almost died, and she almost died because the one had, you know, the gestation, the period was through, the period of gestation, so the one was about to be born. It was about six weeks in my understanding. My memory isn’t that fast on it anymore, because that’s about twenty some years ago.
So, you can understand these things. But you come down to this point here: you talk about Christ Jesus our Lord having two Father’s, that’s ridiculous. He had one Father by two appellations: (That’s what it was.) one called the Holy Spirit, and just one, the cognomen of God.
Now, the next thing he says here is:
[74] To misinterpret Jesus… [in being the Word,] you’d make Him one God out of three.
And that’s true again. Once more you have to realize John said, “In the beginning was the Word, the Word was with God and the Word was God.”
Now, “in the beginning with God” is what throws everybody. But It tells you frankly, “The Word was God.”
They say, “Well, there it is; proves there’s two of them.”
No way. No way. Because he said, “I and my Father are one.”
Now, let’s remember this: we get it back to the human aspect: Adam’s body didn’t make him any more Adam than he was in the spirit. He was Adam. And if he’d never had a body, he would have still been Adam. Now, remember; the law of multiplication was given to Adam and Eve when they were one person in spirit form. But it was only in physical form there could be manifestation.
So therefore; what we’re looking at is this: you do not see life; there’s no way you can produce it by test tube or discover it by a microscope, only insofar that you could understand it could be there. But you cannot see it. And so therefore, whether it’s manifestation or not, it doesn’t make any difference. You can’t deny it. It is still life.
All right. We have, then, God… We have in our human lives here, manifestation comes by giving a body to it. And that body comes according to the attributes and the characteristics, which lie in that life. It doesn’t lie in the elements. No way, shape and form, although the elements do have a certain amount to do with it. That’s true, we understand that. But the life itself is back there in a spirit form.
Well, you look at the same thing with what we see in our time, looking back to the birth of the Lord Jesus Christ. What did God do? God reduced Himself, (That’s Holy Spirit.) compacted it with all of the attributes, what you call them, minuscule form, whatever you want to put it, just down to the very minutest, where you could never even figure it, because when you look and understand in the human egg and the human sperm, there’s the twenty-three chromosomes, twelve hundred and fifty genes of chromosomes come together what?
So many trillion times, seventy trillion times, I think it is, the way you can come together, and then you get to put them altogether, the chromosomes and genes, that’s one with nine thousand and thirty-one zeroes behind it, that’s the way they can come together. And that’s all compacted, although you don’t get all of it in one child; it shows how they can blend in there and what lies there.
Then what does lie in God? When God decided to reduce Himself and put His life in the form of an egg and a sperm? Just simple as A-B-C. What came forth? A body, a part of God. And the life of God was there. Not your life and my life. That’s a different thing entirely.
This was not a created life that God made, when He said, “I’m going to create animal life and floral life and this kind of life, the botany life and, you know, the animal life.” And these… That’s a different thing entirely. God reduced it. And I can see by looking at what’s in nature and in man, you can take it right back to God, and it’s not such a terribly hard picture to see… not so terribly hard to solve.
And so now we see God in manifested form, because that body was a part of Him and what does He do? He comes into that body, because that’s His Own home-made body as it were. Mary didn’t supply anything but the chemical facility. That’s all. In other words, you want to put it down: she was an incubator or sort of a factory makes no difference.
We’re seeing the same thing right today. What you have, what do you call? A fertilization, in vitro. And you can have where they take the sperm and the egg and put it in the test tube, and they say, “Hey, this is taking; this is fine,” then put it in the womb. And then you can have a borrowed womb, like Christ did; he had a borrowed womb and a borrowed tomb.
Some women cannot carry children so they pay a woman ten thousand dollars, twenty thousand dollars to go through that for them. And it boggles my mind, and I think it’s ridiculous, and I think it’s kind of crude. But science once more proves God.
God doesn’t make scientific statements per se; He makes the spiritual. But if a scientific statement is there, you better believe it’s right. Like you know, like the four corners of the earth: nobody thought that was right. The astronauts got up there and proved it right.
All right. Now, last Wednesday, we were impressed by Brother Branham’s message as to the sovereignty of God. This is the same message now, “Christ Revealed in His Own Word”, as the sovereignty of God, in that, number one: it was exclusively God’s Book, not man’s.
We saw that. Number two: it was exclusively determined by God how it was written. Number three: it was exclusively determined who should receive this revelation, which is Jesus Christ. Number four: it was exclusively determined how that revelation was to be given.
So, we see, not a lot of doctrine, but we see this One, God, wishing to communicate Himself to mankind. And the communication would have to lie in something physical, because we are in the physical, if you want a real communication. Now, way back in the old days of the prophets, God could appear in a Pillar of Fire, which He has in this age. And He could appear in various ways, like in a cloud, you know, things like that. He speaks out of a whirlwind and does amazing things, and lives in a prophet, temporarily very temporarily.
You know, you can find that in people who are in spiritism. You go to the islands, especially Haiti, one of your toughest spots for spiritism, and I guess it’s recognized as the world’s toughest spot, and you know the people love to be inhabited by those spooks, and they think it’s a great thing. They’re spirits.
And they think it’s a great thing, you know, to be inhabited by them. And somebody may wander into your house, and he’s got a glazed look in his eyes; now, he’s not on drugs, because drugs didn’t obtain down there till just recently. This is a book I read many years ago, and it’s written by Seabrook many, many years ago, when he traveled the world. He’s a very brilliant author and a great traveler.
And he mentions how they, living down there, they sacrificed butter roosters and they went through all their voodoo and magic, and how the Catholic Church was deeply involved in it, which it always has been. It takes this way and that way, what it wants to do, because it’s always in a state of flux; no stability you see, like the bottomless pit no foundation. All churches are the same way; all churches. Just Word has that foundation. See? It’s got to.
And so anyway, these people then, because this spirit’s upon them and they’re not under drugs. It’s not necessarily self-induced, though many times it is self-induced, not a hypnotic trance, but it’s like a spirit trance. And they come in your home, they touch the food or something, that food is especially blessed. And they’re into a spiritism. See, it’s a…
Now, we’re looking at this here, God having brought Himself to a place of manifestation, some way that He can be revealed. And in this Book here we find the mechanical story or the mechanical draft of what comes into a living reality: in other words the blueprint to the building, the plan to the production of that plan. And so in here we see, then, that this God that was very vague to man, God has made it so that God is not vague to man any longer.
All he’s got to do is follow this blueprint here, if it is properly understood, and in the understanding to reveal Jesus the Christ; to reveal God Himself, Who took on that human form. You’ll notice It was exclusively God’s Own Book, not man’s. It was exclusively determined by God how It was written exclusively determined who should receive Its revelation, which we found here is about Jesus Christ. And it was exclusively determined how that revelation was to be given. In other words, man did not have one thing to do with it.
So, we examine these four thoughts under two headings particularly: ‘Exclusively God’s Book’, and ‘Exclusively Determined Who Wrote It’. Now, that is right. Now, God Himself could have done it. The Scripture tells us how that Jesus wrote in the sand. Scripture tells us how God wrote on tables of stone and gave them to Moses, which Moses came down and in anger destroyed.
It tells us how a hand appeared and wrote in the temple way back there, in the days of Babylon, in the time of Belshazzar. It isn’t that God couldn’t write. And it’s not that God doesn’t speak, because God did speak. And Israel was so terrified, they said, “Don’t talk to us anymore. We don’t want to hear Your Voice and see the manifestation. We would sooner have a go-between. We would sooner have Moses do it.”
And so God said, “Very, very fine. This is exactly how it is all going to be done. I’m going to have a prophet I will deal with.”
Now, there’s various kinds of prophets, but God only gives His Word to prophets. And people say, “Well, I heard the voice of the Lord.” You didn’t hear the Voice of God, even though your auditory nerve was touched, and somebody in the room would not hear it. That wasn’t God. That was your auditory nerve being touched.
God only speaks audibly to a prophet. That’s mouth to ear. I know many people are pulled aside on this, and they say, “Well, I ought to know.” Well, listen, please, be my guest. You know what you know, and do what you want to do. This is my apple box. This is the one I paid for. See?
It is no way. There’s no way. Search the Scripture. You say, “Well look; the thing is this: I don’t use that Scripture.” Fine, then why do you talk about God? Why do you mention Jesus Christ? You want to talk about God and pantheism, that there’s a universal spirit there, that’s fine by me.
You may even go with Mrs. Baker Eddy and say, “God is universal mind.” That is still fine by me. No problem. No problem. But when she said there’s no more efficacy in the blood of Jesus Christ than the blood of a rooster, there’s something wrong with her. She was not… and I do not pan her epilepsy, but epilepsy is also a spirit in many, many cases. Sometimes it’s by injury.
But in many cases people are simply with that spirit; spirit gets cast out, that person is perfectly fine from that time on. But she was a very sordid individual; tried to commit murder, everything else. How much she heard from God, I wouldn’t give her a nickel’s worth of my time. There’s no way.
They can believe what they want to believe out there, that’s fine by me. But the Bible here, which we go by, declares distinctly this is the Word of Almighty God, and the prophets absolutely were the only ones to whom God communicated His Word, and we’ll see more about that as time goes on.
In other words, this is God’s Word exclusively; It does not contain the word of man, which we’ll see that later on also. God determined who would write it. And it is not a man coming and saying, “Now look, Lord, I’m here as your amanuensis, or your secretary, your private stenographer, or secretary. I’m not here as one to copy down, so you talk to me.” It’s not that at all. God picks that man. We’ll see that too, also, as we go along.
Number two: the exclusivity determined, exclusively determined, who and how the revelation, to whom and how the revelation was to be given. Now, there again we see the sovereignty of God. He picked the prophet to give it, and only certain people can receive it. And we’ll see more of that as we go along.
So here we see this is like an exclusive club. And you know something? That is exactly what Paul calls it: the initiated. He said, “This Word cannot be given to anybody but to the perfect.” And that is a word that is actually “cultish”. That’s to the exclusive. And what it is, you’re perfect in the mysteries.
In other words, you have an understanding which is spiritually given. But it does not make you a Gnostic and belong to the Gnosis. The Gnosis read in between the lines, and they say, “Look, we heard something from God, and it’s different from this here. It gives us more of a revelation.”
No, that’s not it. They had those in the first Church Age. They’ve got them today. They’re all over the place. See?
But it is really an exclusive club. That’s why the Bible said only the very Elect are not deceived. Not just Elect now, very Elect. And the very Elect only appear at this end time as they appeared at the beginning. Now, we’re not preaching an exclusive club membership. Far be it. We don’t talk of membership here, as though this church could do one thing for you. Not on your life; not at all. We don’t say that.
We’re talking of God’s exclusive club, the Bride, (See?) which were foreknown before the foundation of the world. And if your name wasn’t on the membership of that Book, the Lamb’s Book of Life, no matter how you would like to come to the exclusive club, you cannot get in it. Not one of us today has gotten this exclusive club because we got into it.
We’re already a part of Him before the foundation of the world. That spirit life form, you see, that had to have a manifestation. You already were.
If you tell me you weren’t, you’re ridiculous. Where did you come from? Your grandfather? Your great-grandfather? You’re great-great? Your great-great-great? I’ll put it back to what, a hundred zeroes? I don’t know. I don’t know how far six thousand years go back. And then you’ll see. You were there. Then, where were you before then? See, where were you?
And you had to have representation back there, or you don’t have one now. Oh, it’s just a very exclusive club. Ah, yes. Yet it had a Foundation Stone and a Headstone. And it’s all of one all of one Source. Absolutely. Don’t make any mistake about it. Very exclusive club. See?
So, God has determined exclusively by Himself how the revelation was to be given, to whom it was to be given, and then passed on, and who would receive it. And as many as were ordained to eternal life believed. As many as were ordained believed; those who were not ordained could not believe. And Paul says, “As many as are perfect…”
I wonder if I can find it over here. Just not too good a memory, you know, so you know you can’t trust me too good when it comes to my memory. Now, in verse 6 of chapter 2:
(06) Howbeit we speak wisdom among them that are perfect: yet not the wisdom of this world, nor of the princes of this world, that come to nothing:
(07) But we speak the wisdom of God [to the perfect] in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world unto our glory:
(08) Which none of the princes of this world knew: for had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.
Now, you tell me this, at the end time they’re supposed to crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh. Now, if it wasn’t an exclusive club, so to speak… (And pardon me for using the terminology. It’s a bad terminology.)… if it weren’t an exclusive Bride with an exclusive revelation, do you believe they would crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh? No way, shape and form! Any more than they did it back there two thousand years ago.
Now, that makes us nobody. I know people think that. Farthest thing in our minds. You talk to a Christian, he thinks he’s the lowest form of humanity in the world. He thinks he’s the most degraded, worthless, no-good piece of junk except Almighty God looked down and said, “Hey.” But the Bible said He takes the beggars off the dung heap and makes them princes. So, if you weren’t on a dung heap, then you never can be a prince.
This is something like the old fable, you know, kissing the frog, turns into a prince. Uh-huh. God kissed the frogs. You’d bet He did. And He got a bunch of princes out of the deal. Oh I don’t care; we can use a fable if you want. They used fables back there in the time of Peter; they thought the Phoenix bird was a legitimate story. It wasn’t, but it did illustrate the Resurrection. See?
Now, this exclusive club is the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, we’re going to start reading back here on page 27, on the bottom paragraph there.
[111] [The] prophets did not always understand what they were writing or what they were saying,…
Now, you see, he’s telling about the prophets, and we’ll get a little more into this as time goes on. But now just take the word ‘prophets’. That’s all you need to do. It’s a seer: a one that can look down the road. All right.
[111] Prophets [and they wrote the Bible] did not always understand what they were writing or what they were saying,… they would in no wise have said it, if they could have understood It. See?
Well, you say, “How would that be?”
It shows you that this is God’s writing, not man’s; that they were merely automatons or robots, secretaries, forced to do what God told them to do, and it had nothing to do with them. In other words, the secretary doesn’t own the corporation! And she doesn’t tell the boss what to do and what to say. And she better get down exactly what the boss said, or she’s fired! So, so the prophet.
Of course, the prophet has something built in which the secretary doesn’t have. Even though she might have a stenotype machine and all little things, she can work it out so fast, and even have… Ah, she could have a dictaphone, that would be wonderful. And secretaries do have dictaphones, so they can know exactly what the boss said. I’m going to tell you something: those prophets were like those dictaphones. We’ll tell you why as time goes on.
Now, listen; Brother Branham said:
[111] “…they were moved by the Holy Ghost.” Moved! When the Holy Ghost moves you, you move.
Now, there’s something about a prophet most people don’t know. They think, “Well, maybe that prophet, he’s a prophet, but you know, he sort of sits around in a half a daydream, and when he gets to a certain stage then, and in a sort of a little day dreamy way, he gets himself sort of comatosed, in a little bit of a hypnotic trance or something, works himself into it, then God speaks.”
That’s a lot of hogwash. That’s not how God does it.
Let’s find what Amos says over here. It says in Amos 3:6,
(06) Shall a trumpet be blown in the city, and the people not be afraid? shall there be evil in [the] city, and the LORD hath not done it?
In other words, It says, and the Lord shall not do something about it, if there’s evil in the city. In other words, doesn’t God have His hand on it, His eye on it, know about it?
(07) Surely the Lord will do nothing, but he revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets. [Now, It tells you right there… Now, watch the prophet.]
(08) The lion hath roared, who will not fear? the Lord hath spoken, who can but prophesy?
Now, there he tells you, categorically. A prophet is at the complete will and dictates of his Owner, which is Almighty God. Now, you know, the secretary can fail and get mad and quit, but not a prophet. And I’ll prove it. Jonah got mad and he quit, but he couldn’t. See? He can’t do it. See, Bible lines up. He couldn’t get away.
Oh, you say, “Well, I think that’s just a fable.”
Well, that’s fine by me, fable’s fable, that’s okay. I don’t believe it’s a fable. I believe it’s true because we’ve seen vindicated that something is true about this Book. No other book has what this Book has into manifestation; in other words, as evidence presented in a categorical manner, showing that it lines with this.
Not something obtuse and way out there in the foreign fields, my brother/sister. Not just pertinent and relative, but It! It. Not pertinent and relative to it, but It! A lot of people can say a lot of things pertinent to and relative to. But It is a different thing. See. Certainly.
Now, listen.
[111] When the Holy Ghost moves you, you move. [Just like Jonah.] “God, in sundry times and divers manners spake to the prophets that were moved by the Holy Ghost.” [Now, that’s an actual quote there.] Now, that’s why, in all ages, the people who were spiritual consulted the prophets about the times that were to happen. And the prophet-writer must be in constant fellowship with the Author.
Now, let’s just take a little look over here past Amos, and I had a little note marked down on Numbers, so we’ll go to Numbers 23, and this is about old Balaam back there. And I want to see what he said about a prophet because this king came to give him money to prophesy bad against Israel, and he took the money and went down to prophesy bad and ended up prophesying good. And he did it two times in a row. And, of course, king Balak got very angry. Well, no doubt, you could understand he would get very angry. You know.
Here’s what he said in verse 12:
(12) And [Balaam] answered and said, Must I not take heed to speak that which the LORD hath put in my mouth?
Now, he didn’t say put in his mind, because he went down there with his mind and his heart full of poison to destroy Israel, to curse them. And he couldn’t do it. Now, watch verse 26:
(26) But Balaam answered and said unto Balak, Told not I thee, saying, All that the LORD speaketh, that must I do?
Why? Why? He’s his own free boss. “I come down here, Lord, and I’ll tell You one thing. You want me to bless this bunch of birds; I’ve been paid to curse them. Now, evidently You will not let me curse them, so I ain’t going to say nothing. I’m walking off the scene.” He couldn’t walk off the scene.
Now, come on. Read It the way It is. Don’t just gloss over It. Read It the way it is. He said, “I can’t do a thing about it. I’ve got to do what He said.”
And you say, “Well, was the Bible written by that kind of an influence?” Absolutely true. See? No problem there.
Now, I read in Jeremiah, the whole chapter. I’m not going to read It this time, but let’s go to Jeremiah anyway, and that’s Jeremiah 1:9,
(09) Then the LORD put forth his hand, and touched my mouth. [Didn’t touch his heart; didn’t touch his mind.] And the LORD said… Behold, I have put my words in thy mouth.
“I have made your tongue my pen. I have made your tongue, my tongue.” See? “Your mouth is my mouth.”
Now, let’s go to 5:14 of the same book.
(14) …thus saith the LORD God of hosts, Because ye speak this word, behold, I will make my words in thy mouth fire, and this people wood, and it shall devour them.
Now, what does that mean? It tells you that when that man has to get up and pronounce a curse of God upon the nation, that nation’s gone. Now, what about America?
They say, “Well, I don’t choose to have Brother Branham as a prophet and said the things that he said, and so therefore, I just turn it aside, and I just say God’s a good God.”
That’s what Eve said too, but she died.
Now, either you got to come to the place where knowing you’re living in expectancy that this nation has the atomic bomb with its name on it, and Russia’s going to hit it. It’s going to hit the Vatican also. You got to realize absolutely that what follows this Message, whatever date comes, which I don’t know and you don’t know.
It simply says this type of people shall not pass away. And so the doctors can try all they want and the psychologists and the sexologists, and try all they want you’re going to have your homos with their AIDS and their filth and their rot till Christ burns them all up. So, put it down, and put it down and leave it down.
You say, “I don’t believe that.”
You don’t have to believe anything. You don’t have to believe anything. But you’re going to be forced to one of these days, to find out, whether you believed or not, because every generation does eventually.
I know they say, “Well, this was way back in those days.”
Sure it was, right back in Sodom. Do you realize how filthy homosexuality got? They were stricken blind!
You say, “Well, I believe they had their eyes opened.”
How come they couldn’t see a door? Let’s just say their eyes were really closed, and they were so wrought up in their lustful sins, they tried to find the door to beat the door down. In other words they were completely oblivious to what God had hit them with already to get their lusts satisfied.
That’s… Read Rock Hudson’s story. They took the wraps off. I read the first issue. That’s enough for me. I don’t need anymore. He couldn’t be satisfied. Talk to these perverts. Now, some I don’t condemn; they were born that way. God have pity on them. I’m sorry for them. When they were born that way, there’s hope for them because Paul says, “Such were some of you.”
But when they deliberately go into it, as these people have, and try to destroy the rest with their filth and their corruption, saying, “You will find the third sex will predominate,” I’m not interested. I will predominate, because I’m getting out of here and coming back with the One Who’s going to wreak the judgment, Who said the words are going to be fire.
Well, you say, “I don’t think I like the sound of that.”
Well, nobody likes the sound of those things, but you’d better listen to them, because it’s the truth.
Now, he said:
[111] The prophet-writer must be in constant fellowship with the Author.
Let’s just take a look at that constant fellowship with the Author. What kind of man is he, this prophet? Now, Balaam was not a true prophet. He had a gift of prophecy, and he was a prophet out there in the world. And he was under an influence, the same as those prophets under Ahab were. An evil spirit got a hold of them. Now, this was not an evil spirit with Balaam. Don’t think for one minute that was. It’s not so. But you’ve got a different story.
Now, let’s go back to see John here; let’s see what John said here. Brother Branham spoke of fellowship. 1 John 1:7,
(07) …if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin [walking in the presence of God].
Now, that’s yours and mine here in verse 7. John was passing it on. But when you talk about the presence of Almighty God and a prophet, you are talking about the literal presence of God and not the baptism with the Holy Ghost. You are not talking merely about some little wave, some little emotion, something in the spiritual realm, but this is God Himself. He’s talking about being in the presence of God.
[111] He must live in presence of the Author to know what the Book is going to be.
In other words, he must be in the living contact with Almighty God, that that is his life, that the prophet does not have a gift of prophecy, but the prophet has a complete ministry, a complete life. He’s born a certain way.
God said to Jeremiah, “I knew thee before thou wast formed in the womb.” They are made a certain way. Their conscious mind and subconscious mind are so close together, they can blip out one into the other. They can go into a trance and a vision. It’s been going on in the writing of this Book.
Remember; the apostle Paul had a visitation from God and received by revelation the epistles he wrote, and identical to what Peter, James and John, and the other apostles had received by way of mouth from the Lord Jesus Christ here on earth. It was no different. Fourteen years he went back and checked up; it was word by word and point by point.
In fact, where they had laid down some of their understanding, he had not laid down any of his and rebuked them and made them ashamed. See? Then what kind of Presence did he have? He called the Pillar of Fire, Jesus, which He was; He’d gone back to the form of the Pillar of Fire. See? That’s why the body, the man Christ Jesus, if you make that God, you have done despite to the Word of God. You’ve got two gods right there. Forget it.
The body is a part of, it had the life of, the attributes of, but the body was a man. The federal Headship of Christ in contradistinction to the federal headship of Adam, see? That federal headship is really kind of a silly word, because the federal headship of Adam went down the drain a long time ago when the serpent moved in. See?
[111] [Now]… See? The prophet-writer, had the pen and was ready at any time, and in constant fellowship with the Author, which was God, to put down whatever He said put down. See? Showed what kind of a life he must have… a separated life from all the brethren.
And that’s exactly true. That’s why we talk here of the sovereignty of God in choosing the men that He wants. And they have a special capacity; they’re born a certain way, for a certain hour, for a certain Word, for a certain everything in the sovereignty of Almighty God.
And all of those men over sixteen hundred years dovetailed in exactly what they said, so He could bring a prophet on the scene today and show it all come together. And people didn’t want it! And we’ll see more of that as we go along.
[112] Now, that’s why the prophet had his mind set constantly on what God said, not on what man thought…
Now, that’s his own thinking! See? A prophet’s mind has to be amenable to change. You say, “Just a minute.” No, don’t just a minute.
Let’s take Moses. Moses sees a fire burning in a bush. He said, “Hey,” he said. “What is that? The reflection of the sun?” He said, “What’s going on?” He said, “That’s funny, I’ve never known anything like this down in Egypt, and I had a pretty good education.” But he said, “There’s a fire in that bush, that thing is not burning.”
Now, that was in Moses’ mind. There was no thought of God in that thing at all. He came over and a Voice from the bush said, He said, “Take your shoes off, because you’re on holy ground.”
He said, “What in the world’s going on here?”
He had his own thoughts about taking over Egypt. When God said, “Moses, I’m going to send you down there, and Pharaoh will not let you go with a high hand, no way, no sir, and you’re going to have all these signs and wonders, and he’s going to get madder and madder, angrier and angrier, and he’s going to get tougher and tougher, and he’s going to get rougher and rougher.”
And Moses went down there and turned the water into blood, and the shepherd’s crook turned into a serpent. I don’t think it really turned into a serpent so much, as they thought it was that way; not that it couldn’t turn into one. Perhaps it would be possible.
Aaron’s rod budded. But I think Brother Branham one place did mention that that was an influence that God had set there. But there was one thing about it for sure, that absolutely the waters flowed blood and different things like that took place.
Now, what happened? Now, when Moses showed the sign, of particularly that time, of the hand and the crook on the ground, Pharaoh hardened his heart, got real angry, and sent him away, and he said, “Look,” he said, “you guys are going to make brick without straw because you’re a bunch of lazy people. I’ve just been too good to you.”
And you know what Moses did? Now, there’s no more on Moses’ mind, that Word, than nothing at that time! Because Moses and the elders went back saying, “Well, God, You didn’t only not deliver people, but they’re in worse shape than ever!”
And God had to say, “Didn’t I tell you that?”
So, the Word of God has nothing to do with the human mind! And the human mind in gear can misappropriate and misinterpret the Word of God, which it certainly does. Or how do you get three gods out of one God? How do you get three gods out of the Old Testament? You can’t do it.
You talk about the Elohim of God, then you might as well have a whole plethora. Then next thing, we’re all God. Ha! And then God’s in the church. Hogwash. God’s in God. And this is the blueprint right here. Then you’ll see God, Logos, manifested, when He goes into action. Now we get somewhere.
Now, he said:
[111] …separated life from all his brethren. [Certainly, like Joseph. Very peculiar to his own people.]
[112] Now, that’s why the prophet had his mind set constantly on what God said; not what man thought, what the age thought, what the church thought, what the kingdom thought. What God thought! See?
Now, when there came a time for a decision or a judgment, he couldn’t say, “Well, let me look this case over, and I’ll see what I come up with.”
Now, Moses had been given the Word of the Lord about “Don’t you work on the Sabbath day.” And a man went out and gathered some sticks on the Sabbath day to cook his food, and they brought him in and said, “Now Moses, we got a little, touchy question here. The man shouldn’t be gathering sticks as far as we know, certainly not to be cooking his food, because the food should have been cooked the day before, so he got complete rest. What are you going to do?”
Now, Moses had been given the Word of God, but being in a human mind, it was pretty tough to go through that Word because the Word was given; so therefore, the Word of God had departed, in that particular sense. So, he said, “All right.” He said, “Put the man into custody, into isolation,” and he said, “then we’ll go ahead and find out from God tomorrow.”
So, Moses went before the Lord on the next day, and the Lord said, “Moses,” He said, “according to the Word which you have written down there, the man must be destroyed. He’s got to be stoned.”
Now, that was the punishment. You say, “Well, I don’t think that’s very nice of God.” Well, what we think of God isn’t the point; it’s what God said.
[112] He only expressed God’s thoughts to Word…
In other words what it was, God had thoughts and the prophet put them in words to the people. Not that God didn’t give His Own Word. He said, “I’ll put My Word in your mouth.” But it was through the prophet that people got the knowledge; no other way. See?
[112] …because a word is a thought that is expressed. You got it now? The Word is a thought expressed, so the prophet was waiting for God’s thoughts. [See?]
Now, when you talk of thinking, you always think in terms of say, not trying to get something original that you may expound upon it, but really when you talk about thinking, what you’re doing is accumulating the data which you may have available, and then making a judgment! See?
Well, that’s why man can’t enter the picture at all, because the Word plainly lets you know what the data is. Some people call it data, or the facts. Call it facts. Then God makes a decision. It’s all laid out before us. Now, that’s what we understand.
[112] The Word is the thought expressed, and the prophet waiting for God’s thoughts. And then when God revealed His thoughts to him, he expressed it in Word, “THUS SAITH THE LORD.” not “Thus saith I, the prophet,” “THUS SAITH THE LORD!”
And that’s exactly true, and that’s what you find in Deuteronomy, when the prophet comes in the name of the Lord, he’ll say, “In the name of the Lord this such and such a thing must take place. And when it takes place… Now, remember; God’s a God of integrity.”
Someone says, “Well, just a minute, God might let something slip in there.”
Oh, come on now. If I had to deal with a slippery God and a slippery devil and a slippery bunch of people, I’ve done slipped out of control already, forget it. I don’t have any time for God, and He didn’t have any time for me because He lied to me. How can you impugn the integrity of God?
If a man came and said, ‘THUS SAITH THE LORD’ and the thing came to pass, when you yourself would not allow anybody to speak in your name? And how high up are we on the scale? Above the ants, well, or orangutan or something, I don’t even know if we got that far. They’re at least innocent, because they can’t be immoral. See, we’re in the low scale.
[113] [Now,] that’s why they defied kingdoms and churches, which to do so in their days was a death penalty. Who would walk up into a king’s face and say, “THUS SAITH THE LORD, such-and-such is going to happen,”
Like Elijah, when he said, “‘THUS SAITH THE LORD’” to old Ahab, “the dogs are going to lick up Jezebel’s blood and going to lick up your blood, too. Dogs will eat Jezebel and lick up your blood;” that’s what he said. Jezebel got so mad, she chased Elijah all around the country. But you know what? They threw her down. The dogs ate her up. That’s the record. And the record of her demise was there before her demise. Oh yeah, sure… such and such.
[113] You’d have your head chopped off. The church would put you to death right now for doing it. But these prophets were bold.
You say the church wouldn’t? Ha! I can tell you one thing: If the Protestant groups had not gotten to the state they were in and to the places they’re at, don’t tell me the Roman Catholic Church would not have beheaded pretty well all of them by now, because that was in their blood and never got out of it. And now the Protestants are right back with the Catholics, and you watch what will happen when the Great Tribulation takes place. Because the pressures on now already.
The church right today can control any place it wants to in the world. It’s got that power. See? Especially where you got your democracies, because your democracies have vested in authority that’s going down the drain, all and all along.
[113] …you’d have your head chopped off… and so on…. Why? Why were these prophets so bold? They were moved by the Holy Ghost; that’s why they became bold. They wrote the infallible Word of God. [See?]
Now, notice; these prophets wrote the infallible Word of God based on the predestinated office and ministry, otherwise they couldn’t have done it couldn’t have done it. They’re a special people for a special work. Now, keep remembering here the title is “Christ Revealed in His Own Word”. And here we see Christ in the prophets.
In other words, Christ was willing to give his life and stand with that Word. Paul was a prophet, gave his life for that Word. Peter gave his life for the Word. There wasn’t one prophet but died for the Word if he died. And then John was not able to be destroyed by the people, and he died, not for the Word; he lived for the Word, and he died with the Word, the same as the others did: called off the scene by God.
[113] ...they wrote the infallible Word of God.
Why infallible? Because ‘THUS SAITH THE LORD’ showed that they were able to be the mouthpiece of God. God’s credibility lies at stake.
[114] There are many who tried to impersonate these prophets, such as priests, and so forth. [That’s right, back in the days of Korah, Dathan and Abiram.] What did they do? Just messed up, that’s all. They couldn’t do it, [That is, they could not be prophets.] because God had selected the man for the age, and selected the Message, and even the nature of the man… what would go over in that age–what He could put over, and how He could do it [Now, that’s something right there that shows you predestination.] with the nature of that certain man. [Now, watch.] He could blind the eyes of others. The words that that man would say, the way he acted, would blind others, and open other people’s eyes.
Now, that’s true. If William Branham was a prophet, and I certainly believe that he was, how come my eyes are open to him and other people’s eyes are blind, and your eyes are open and other people’s eyes are blinded?
Well, you say, “I don’t believe your eyes are open.”
Well, I believe they are. And we’ll just have to wait and see. The evidence I’ve seen lines up with the Bible. I don’t know what else I could believe.
Now, they think I’m stupid to believe and say, “This is my last resort, and my resources are completely gone now, because this is that prophet. I have what he said, therefore I abide by it. This is my faith. My faith comes from this. This is, therefore, my life.”
And they said, “Why don’t you just stand back now? Because you see, something else could come along.”
Then I say, “If it does, I don’t want it. I’m not interested.”
Well, they say, “That’s kind of foolish.”
Well, that’s fine. The apostles were just as stupid. Jesus said, “Why don’t you boys go someplace else?”
They said, “Oh-ho, ho-ho-ho-ho, no way! We believe that you have the Words of eternal life.”
You say, “Well, that was Jesus.”
Well, do you think he’s dead? The same One proved His resurrection, a man named William Branham who said, “I stand here tonight and I challenge you. Bring me twenty-four of your worst cases, I guarantee healing for every single one.”
When did Christ even do that in his own flesh? But the same Christ through another man’s flesh, a prophet, did that thing. When they wouldn’t take up his offer, he went down to the Mexican border and found a little Spanish girl, all crippled; the best report I can get of her, she looked like a dish of cold, cooked spaghetti, limbs, everything all twisted in. He said, “Bring me your worst case.”
They brought her: a little, twelve-year-old kid, nothing but skin and bones and a mass, a mess at that. He held her on his knee, I think. How long, I don’t remember, maybe close to two hours, said, “Just keep singing, praying.” Suddenly, she screamed; jumped off his lap, flesh on her body. Many, many people saw it. That’s not something I’m dreaming up, brother/sister. That was seen and understood! See? The dead were raised, doctor’s certificate proving it.
You say, “Well, I never heard of it!”
Well, you better hear of it now. And I’ll tell you why you didn’t hear it, because your preachers wouldn’t tell. They were afraid of their pensions, and little scrawny things, like the prophets of Baal, too fat a living. They’ll get rid of their fat one of these days.
You won’t need to worry about a diet, brother/sister, too long. You’ll find out. You’ll find out. You can tow the line. You’ll get mighty thin. The fat ones will tow the line. You know, America’s inundated by the black birds, and I think we got the same thing right today in the spiritual world.
[114] See? He dressed the man in the type of dress that he was; the nature, the ambition,… everything just the way he had to be, just perfectly selected for that certain people that He’d call for that certain age.
Yeah. People would get stumbled over Brother Branham’s language. I sort of dress it up as I go by, and I don’t dress it up too much… not that smart anyway. I make the verbs agree with the nouns, a few things like that tenses and so on. Doesn’t make any difference, really.
They say, “Well, if he was God’s prophet, why didn’t he speak the King’s English?”
Well, I don’t necessarily know God speaks English. I thought more like Hebrew. He’s not confined to the English language. It’s ridiculous. Try to put it down to education. What about old Amos, the herdsman? You don’t have to have a prophet that speaks perfect English no way, shape and form as long as he tells you what’s right and proves it.
Personally, I would put it this way: as long as he proves what he’s going to tell you is right, who cares how he tells it? That’s the big thing. If he ever proves, he’s the one to do it.
You know, like I tell you about our neighbor, who I mentioned him in this series already, our friend John Timinov, next door to us. He never had much education. Oh, the big shots would come down from the factory, you know, and well, the big boys that had all the big degrees which is fine, you know. That’s good to have those degrees, if you can really make them work. They had the degrees. They’d come down, and they couldn’t make the factory go. They call old Johnny, who’d go over and look at it, tinker a bit, tinker a little here and there, and the thing would go. How come the big shots couldn’t do it?
Now, John wasn’t educated. So, we asked him about our Bendix. He said, “Mrs. Vayle,” he said, “I’ve never tried a Bendix,” he said, “but I think if any man can make it, I can fix it.”
And he fixed it! The experts couldn’t fix it! Oh, best machine we ever had, those old front loaders. Man, I tell you, you can’t beat them. I don’t care what anybody says. Old Westinghouse, the slant front, you know, they lasted and lasted and did the most fantastic washes. You get these top… Oh, they can’t even dry the clothes, spin anymore; that’s the kind of guys you got inventing things.
Then you think education’s going to do something for God and with the people of God? Forget it. This man had to be a Kentucky hillbilly in the vernacular to show up the world. Get away from that stuff that you’re putting your faith and your trust in. That’s the thing right there. This Laodicean age, so rich, so erudite. Oh my, so wonderful in their own eyes. “We’ve got the education, our seminaries.”
They mean cemeteries, what they really mean spiritually dead and corrupt. See, Laodicea, rich, increased in goods; naked, wretched, and blind and don’t even know it. This man come on the scene like that, vast knowledge, uneducated, seventh grade education, but as he said, he sure knew what was in the books. “Don’t try to sell me short.” But the elect could not be deceived. They couldn’t do it. Something greater than just healing revivals was in the air. People didn’t understand it.
[114] …they said, “Well… I can’t see.” They were blinded. [That’s why. That’s Revelation 3.]
[115] Jesus came the same way,… immortal God dressed in human flesh.
Now, Jesus is that body we’re talking about. And God came that way, as He had a body to work in as a prophet to give the Word, so He now has a body to die in to give Blood. I know people don’t like the thought of blood. That’s all right. They say it’s heathen, it’s this, it’s that. It can be anything you think it is; it’s fine by me.
I believe in the Blood. And I exalt the Blood. And I get happy that the blood of Jesus Christ was shed. I’m happy not in the sense that I was glad to see somebody die not that at all, but I’m very happy in the sense that I’m prospered by what he did; in other words, it’s been committed unto me, or passed over to me. I’ve become an heir through that.
[115] [Now] …immortal God dressed in human flesh, and because he was born in a manger, in a stable full of manure, not a place to lay his head; born, people thought he had an illegitimate name tacked to him. [They tacked an illegitimate name to him.] All these things that he was…
See, they said he was the son of a Roman soldier, and Mary, they said, it was just a lie.
[115] All these things that he was, and how he come up a carpenter’s son, how he had no schooling, more or less, in the world, or the wisdom of this world, he didn’t have anything to do with it–none of this world’s civilization, education, or anything. He had not one thing to do with it, for He’s God. It would clash. If he tried to go to a seminary somewhere and learn something that these churches were doing… Why, it wouldn’t even… correspond at all with his thinking, for He was God. [All right.] So, education, schooling, seminaries, and such things are absolutely contrary to the will of God.
Now, that’s spiritually speaking, not physically speaking. You need an education. How did Christ pick up the scrolls and read? Do you think just because God was in him, that he read those scrolls? No. God came later at the River Jordan and filled him. But he was the Son of God. And he had to learn. He learned obedience by the things he suffered.
He grew in stature; in wisdom and stature and favor with God and man. It was a growth like every other human being. He went from diapers to what you call the knee pads; the knee pads to the long pants; it was robes, of course. From a tiny baby to teen hood, to teenager, to adult right down the line. That was a man.
That man at the River Jordan, till God came in the form of a dove and spoke and the Dove came and indwelt him, disappeared within him, because the Dove was just merely a form. It wasn’t a real dove, like a bird flying. It was in the form of a dove. Shape. You said, “Who saw it?” Well, at least John the Baptist saw it. Okay.
[115] The whole educational system is contrary to God. [See?]
What’s he talking about? The world systems of education are not dedicated to God and the things of God. Even the seminaries aren’t any more because they’re teaching a lie. The majority of seminaries are teaching three gods instead of one God. And they try to make it three gods formed in one. And they take a pitcher of water, and they say, “Now here’s three glasses. And look; it’s the same water, and so we pour in glass one, two, two glass, and the third glass, now the waters all gone, what about the pitcher?” Well, that disappeared.
Then you’ve got God amorphous. I can’t see a God that’s amorphous. I can’t see pantheism. Mm-mm. No, you’re not going to kid me on that one, brother/sister no way, shape and form. I don’t wave my arms and God’s there; breathe in, that’s God. Forget it, forget it, forget it, forget it, forget it. Mm-mm. No sir, He’s Person.
Now, I’ve got three persons, three glasses? When am I going to pour Him back now? What if we decide to pour Him back, what happens? Nothing to pour it into? Uh-uh. No, no, no, no, no. Somebody’s wrong. Somebody’s wrong. It’s not adding up. The educational system takes you right away from God. Why? Because it’s a revelation. See? That’s why some people…
Why do you think Luther left the Catholic Church? Because the Catholic Church he caught something in there that the Catholic Church had that was good to build on? Hogwash. He saw them doing penance, and he said, “That’s not it, the just shall live by faith;” the revelation hit him and he tore the world upside down and inside out, tore it to pieces.
It was a revelation; the Spirit of God did it. Great man, Luther. I know people don’t like Luther like I do. We’d be buddies. Maybe fuddy duddies, but we’d be buddies. I’ll tell you what: He’s my kind of a guy. Not that I pretend I’m like Luther; no, don’t ever get that. I don’t have his zeal. I don’t have his knowledge. I have admiration admiration by the ton. Fantastic person. Revelation hit him.
And out of that revelation, some of the greatest books ever written, right down the line, pure, beautiful consummate teacher of the Word of God… as far as he could go. As far as he could go. That mechanics was just right. If that had been God’s day for the Rapture, he’d have gone. He’ll go anyway now, (See?) because he’s in that place, that land where… oh my…
And look at that spirit being I talked about. Here’s Adam in a spirit form. We’ve got these men over there in a spirit form, with what you call a spirit body. They’re not eating and not drinking, but they’re perfectly sensate to the things that they can be sensate to. Are they diminished because they haven’t got a body? Oh, they’re the same beautiful people; going to come back for another body. Well, praise the Lord. Get to see these things. You understand God all the better this way. See? They’re in harmony; the whole things in harmony.
[115] Everything teaching away from God, all the time. When I hear a man say that he is Doctor, Ph.D.,
Ph.D. You know what is? Kind of embarrassed to tell you. But you know what Paul said? Paul said, “All of my thinking, my education was manure,” he said. It was dung. So that’s a manure head. Piled higher and deeper, you want to know the truth. Wasn’t so bad was it? It’s my x-rated sermons are going down again. And he says:
[115] …L.L.Q…
Do you know what that is? I think that’s the low-living quack, if you ask me, that preach, if you want to know the truth. Never heard of that one before, but it’s about the best I can figure that one out. Because any man that goes preaching for the Word of God against the revelation, he’s a quack, and he’s a low liver, I can tell you that.
He’s not living in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. It’s not a man that’s got the quantum theory or anything else in there… you know, some lively individual with a quantum theorem. Not that.
Now, listen:
[115] He’s just educated himself that much further from what he really was called to do. That’s right.
Now, I’m going to tell you something. Never forget this. God educated Adam. God educated His people in the beginning. Now, remember; Adam named the beasts. I want to ask you a question. Where did Adam drum up the knowledge of those beasts’ names? Come on.
There’s no man smart as all get out, and I don’t care how smart, he can drum up any name; he can take the Greek and the Latin, and something else; he can meddle around, and mix around, and say, “Well, I can see by this, that animal has such and such, and therefore, I’ll call him this.” And that’s a pretty good description.
But Adam out of the blue sky, by the Holy Ghost giving him the information, said, “That’s a horse, and that’s a cow, and that’s a deer, little tiny thing, ah-hah, that looks like a deer; that’s another kind of deer.” Yeah that could be the argali or the gazelle, and all these different ones. And there weren’t any unicorns either. Nah, all one-headed. I’m sure there wouldn’t any of those things. That’s a name of an animal, but I don’t think he had just that one little horn. I don’t believe that anyway. I never heard any… Man can put a lot of things, you know, in there.
That’s supposed to be a certain type of an ox, according to a literal translation. And if there was a unicorn, that’s fine. There’s lots of things that are extinct now, too. The passenger pigeon is gone, man destroyed him. He educated himself right away, but God’s got an education, because He educated Adam, and that education is revelation. And you get educated in the things of God.
Now, remember; we got this in the Book of Psalms. The Bible says that Israel saw the works of God, but Moses knew His ways. Moses was truly educated; Israel turned down the education! Israel could see the wonderful works of God, but Moses said, “I’m going to tell you what’s behind those works.”
And they wouldn’t stand still very long to listen! And when they’d listen, God would bless them and take them along the road, give them everything they wanted. And then they’d get away from God, the education would go, turn toward the world and what man had to say, and they lost out again.
And I’m going to tell you, when William Branham came on the scene manifesting the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of man ministry proving absolutely God in our midst once more, God in a prophet, God doing those things, the world said, “Well, that’s great, wonderful. We love the revival; we love the healing; love all these things, but we can’t believe what you say is behind it.”
That’s the whole truth, brother/sister. I’ve quoted you Moses. We’re in the Exodus. What more? What more? We’ve got it all nailed down here, absolutely.
[116] [Now,] Notice how they were now moved by the Holy Spirit. Now, that doesn’t mean that educated men can’t come in or don’t come in. Look at Paul. I guess there wasn’t a smarter fellow in his day than Paul, who was Saul of Tarsus. He was educated under Gamaliel, one of the greatest teachers of the day; great, strict Hebrew; a Pharisee of denomination.
…and a wise man, now, not some callow individual here that got his stuffed shirt because he had a lot of knowledge. He wasn’t like old Hillel. That’s why they came to Jesus and said, “Can a man divorce his wife for any cause?” Hillel had said, “Put her away any time you feel like, and anything goes.”
Is that a fact? Then why didn’t Adam divorce his wife? Why did he love her and stick with her? I just can’t… Well, you know. You know my feelings on that. I came out of Canada, back when they were rigid conservatives up there. Man, you got shot if you pulled something… if they could find you.
You talk about your old jokes down here in your South and all, but we had them in Canada. Brother, they were strict. I came out of strict, strict, strict. They got a lot of sin up there now; not that we didn’t have sin, too. Don’t misunderstand me. But our education was strict, brother/sister very strict.
So, they had this great man, not like Hillel. This was Gamaliel, very great man of God.
[116] And Paul was brought up under him. He knew all the Jewish religion; but when he came to the church, Paul said, “I never came to you with the education of men, and so forth.
He said, “I count it but dung.” And forgetting those things that are behind… And he warned them, “Don’t get the veil of Moses over your face.”
What was Moses? Moses wasn’t any veil; it was what Moses taught was a veil, then that was not the real truth either; the real truth is was what they taught about what Moses taught! And that’s where you can go haywire preaching William Branham. That’s why I like to take it word by word and bring everything to your attention, so we’re not getting off one Word, by the grace of Almighty God.”
[116] …he said, “I never came to you in the education of man, and so forth, because, if I had, then you trusted in that. But I came to you in the power and manifestation of the Holy Ghost, that your faith might be in God.”
What’s he trying to tell you? A vindicated Word. Paul the apostle was vindicated before he gave a word. So therefore, the Word he gave was vindicated. Vindicate the man is to vindicate the Word. Vindicate the Word is to manifest God. To manifest God in this hour is the Son of man in full view. Why? Because the words of a man don’t do that.
How could Brother Branham sit with me at table that day having lunch up there in… not Vero Beach but Jupiter, I think it was, yeah. Florida. That’s on the Highway Number One on the West Coast up there; East Coast, beg your pardon. And he said, “Did you notice something there, Brother Vayle?”
I said, “No, I didn’t notice a thing, Brother Branham.”
Well, he said, “I just had a vision of your wife.”
Now, he said, “When you get home,” he said, “you’ll notice,” he said, “you’ll drive up to the motel.” He said, “The lady that runs the motel will be hanging clothes, your wife out there will be talking to her.” Then he said, “She’ll start to walk away, and she’ll come back. And George [last name unclear] will roll down the window, and we’ll start talking. And there’s something on her mind, and I’ll tell her about it.”
Did it happen? Absolutely. So, how did he know? Same thing he knows what he said right about the Rapture and all these things. The vindicated man has a vindicated Word because God is manifested and ready to be revealed. And already the revelation in manifestation was the Lord Jesus Christ, and now to give His Word, which is the great thing.
Then people say, “Well, just talk about Jesus.”
How can you talk about Him without the Word? How can you talk about Him unless your Word is right? Because Paul said, “There’s another Jesus they’ll preach.”
Jesus said, “Another will come in my Name.”
And the Jews say to us, who were formerly Trinitarians; they say to us at that time, “Which one of them gods is your God?” Little better English, “Which one of those gods happens to be your God?”
All right. Now:
[116] There you are. That’s right. Many tried to impersonate these people, [That’s the prophets and the revealers.] but they get things all messed up just like they do today.
[117] There was one raised up before the time of Jesus and led four hundred people off. Now, you remember that’s in the Bible. Gamaliel brings that out.] And you know how the Scriptures reads about these things, trying to do it before the time had come.
Now, we had a man named Dowie rose up with a great ministry. And a man one day went to Dowie out of Zion City, you know, up there outside of Chicago… Zion City, Illinois, and said to Dowie, “You know, Brother Dowie, I’m sure that you are Elijah which was to come.”
And he said, “I grew very angry. I sent the man away,” he said. “But,” he said, “the more I thought of it, the more I began to realize that was correct.” Dowie was not Elijah which was to come.
Now, if William Branham comes in that scenario, and he says, “I am that one,” which he declared that he was specifically in New York, in “One More Time, Lord”… That was in November ‘64, somewhere in there I think it was… but declared who he was.
People say, “Well, there you are; we’ve had these Elijah’s before.” And they discredit the fact that Elijah must come.
Now, the question is this: what are the earmarks? What are you looking for? And you talk with people, they don’t know what they’re looking for. They just know that this couldn’t be it, “because, you see, it hasn’t occurred to me. And after all, if I’m not Elijah, well, who would be? But you see, I’m nothing.” You know. You know. Oh, brother.
They’re like… I haven’t got a hunchback, but look behind their back and see how hunched it is. You know, cover-up, just cover-up hypocrites. Cover-up hypocrites, that’s all it is. The whole church is full of hypocrisy. Get with it this morning, brother/sister. Get with and understand it. The church is full of hypocrisy. Pride!
You say, “It can’t be.”
Then you’re a liar, because you’re making God a liar! Because Laodicea says, “Rich, increased in goods, and don’t lack a thing.”
He said, “Wretched, miserable, blind, naked;” then, they’re liars. Don’t want to believe it. Sure.
Dowie came, but he wasn’t it. Jehovah Witness’ preach the Presence, which is the Appearing. Now that it’s come, “Well, we must be wrong, because we believe it.”
I’m going to tell you something: then everything anybody believes today is wrong, because it’s already been preached.
Then why talk about God? Because here’s what they base it on; even the Roman Catholics are stuck, because for the first time they can all have Bibles! Mr. Pentecost got the Bibles in there. Not so long ago the Roman Catholic Church said, “We don’t have a Bible; we are the Bible. We are the church; we are this, and we make it up as we go along.”
Well, why doesn’t the Pope do something for a change, except stupid, little politics? He couldn’t even save that poor little priest up there in Poland, or didn’t want to one of the two. I don’t know what happened, but something went haywire. Why don’t they just do something? Some little sign even. Throw a ball in the air and watch it hang there. A good spiritualist will pull that off.
Let them go to this Word. They ain’t going to do it. Jesus said, “Search the Scripture, for in them you think you have eternal life.” He said, “You got it figured out that you’re the ones that got it.” And He said, “You’re going to find It testifies of me.” And He stood there, and He’s appeared to the Gentiles in the last age in the form of the Holy Spirit and done the same things. They’re not going to understand it, there’s no way.
[117] …some of them tried to impersonate Him, [That’s Jesus Christ.] and they were all this, or that, or the other one. And Jesus said, “In the last days, how they would raise up false Christs in the last days, [That’s right.] and false prophets, and show signs and wonders.” And we have… that.
Now, what’s a false prophet? A man that is false to the Word, but he’s got all kinds of signs and wonders, just like old Balaam back there.
You say, “Do you mean to tell me that a man could actually have the Spirit of God anoint him and tell those things and him be false?”
Absolutely true. What about Judas? Bible said he was the devil, and he went out and healed the sick and raised the dead.
Now, don’t tell me he didn’t, because the Bible says he did. And you say you believe the Bible, then you got to believe that.
You say, “Well, I think that just got slipped in there.”
Then what else got slipped in there? We’re right back to a slippery God. A slippery Word and a slippery… Who needs it? I’ve got to have rock bottom.
I’m getting out of here one of these days. I’d like to get here quicker than I’m getting out of here, but that’s just not how it works. I’ve got full assurance that the other side is just fine. I’m ready for it, and it’s not ready for me. Evidently, something’s holding up the plan.
I have my reservation in, but I don’t know what happened. I know nobody’s checked out. I know the room is there; I’ve got no problem with that. Just the date hasn’t arrived for the convention. That’s right. Because you’ll see people up there you know in that new dimension we’re coming into. Sure.
Prophets, false, false to the Word. See, no doubt about it. Lying spirits get a hold of them, too. They can do everything but stick with the Word, brother/sister. Let’s understand that flat.
Now, we’ve already… Before there’s one counterfeit there must be an original or the counterfeit is the original. You’ve got to hit it right on the head where it belongs. All right. We’ve had it in our day, and Jesus said there’d be a true; the evening light would come, and then the false would come right after it. All right?
Now, we are well aware of false prophets, but do we realize the whole body can be false? We can have false teachers, we can have false pastors, we can have false evangelists, we can have false apostles, and we’ve got them.
You say, “Why do you believe there are people around this Message that could be in that category?”
I don’t think I’ve got much doubt of it to tell you the truth, some of the stuff I run across. I can tell you people are still back in Pentecost, teaching Pentecostal stuff. They can’t move away from it. They’re still legal. They don’t understand the grace of Almighty God. Evangelists? I don’t know where they are. No doubt they’re around there somewhere. Where are they? There’s true ones, then there’s wrong ones.
[118] Now, then we realize then that God sent His prophets. [We realize that it was God that sent His prophets.] That was the way He had of bringing His Word to the people, through the lips of His prophets. And notice, you know, Moses said, if you want to read it in Exodus 4:10-12 verses. Moses said when God spoke to him. God talked to a man lip to ear, and Moses said, “I’m slow of speech, Lord… I’m not sufficient. I can’t go.”
Now, I want you to notice something here, all the way through, Brother Branham points to his own ministry. It dovetails with the prophetic ministry of every age.
[119] God said, “Who made man to talk, or Who made him dumb? [That’s what the Scripture says.] Who made him to see;… Who made him to hear? Didn’t I, the Lord?” God said, “I’ll be with your mouth.”
Now, that’s right. It didn’t say, “I’ll be with your brain.” It didn’t say, “I’ll be with your hand.” It said, “I’ll be with your mouth.”
So therefore, when God was with the prophet’s brain, that was just fine, but that wasn’t it. And when God was with his hand, the signs and miracles now, that was fine, but that wasn’t it. It was God giving His Own Word without man having a clue to It and understanding of It, any part whatsoever, with It. I believe God even gave him the divine energy. I believe He did. See? In other words, they heard themselves talk.
[120] Jeremiah said, if you want to read Jeremiah 1:6… “God put words in my mouth.” See? He talked, lip to ear with one prophet, spoke through other prophets, who had not control at all, so God spoke through his lips.
In other words, he’s telling you the prophet does not have control. Now, let’s face it, brother/sister, that may sound very radical, but be honest with me. Isn’t that only way that God could actually get His Own Word over, unless He wrote it out on a rock or something?
You say, “Well, why didn’t God do that?”
Because it was His sovereign purpose to do it this way, and you and I don’t have a clue or a chance when it comes to sovereignty!
Some preachers came by, aided and abetted by a guy two years ago, and I really blew my cool, and they tried to tell me to ride herd on preachers. I’m supposed to set up myself as some authority and ride herd on preachers?
Let me tell you something, I don’t even ride herd on you people. I’m just glad you’re here listening to me preach so I can share these things with you, and you love me and I love you and we love people enough to get the Message out and help people. But I don’t have any authority over anybody. And if I tried, I’d have to bring you the Word, because that’s where the authority lies!
Then, if I didn’t do it because I loved you, and you needed it, then I’d be a hypocrite! So, they came and tried to make me ride herd over people. I don’t ride herd over anybody. But God rides herd over His Word! Because God’s in a different category! Like He said in the Book there… Where is that? In the Proverbs, He said, “Don’t give the sacrifice of fools,” he said, “because you’re in earth and God’s in heaven.
Therefore, let thy words be few.” In other words, you shoot your mouths off, you pay a price. But if you use the Word of God, the confession of Christ, which is that Word here, then you’re on good ground. And if you combine faith with It, you’re on a better ground! Then, if you let love operate It, you’re on the holy ground. You become a real temple unto Almighty God.
See, all these things work out, brother/sister. That’s the only way God could do it, is take somebody in complete control. Oh, I could tell you experiences I’ve had, and I’m no prophet. And I can understand perfectly, absolutely, God would do it this way. What other way could He do it? No other way. Unless as I said, He was going to write It on a big rock or something.
And the next thing come along, who is going to tell us the hour we’re living in and the Scripture for this hour? Like nobody knew when Jesus came here to fulfill the Word of God of Isaiah 53 that that was It! Nobody knew! John the Baptist said, “Behold the Lamb of God.”
Oh, they said, “Come on, what are you talking about? Nobody dies for anybody. Lamb’s a lamb. Hasn’t the Word of God told us, “Don’t make your children pass through the fire and don’t sacrifice unto me a human life”? Then you come along and try to tell us we’re going to have this man as a sacrifice of blood? Get out of here. You’re crazy.”
Why they’d blow the guy plumb out of camp without a revelation. And do you think we wouldn’t do the same thing today? And the churches have done the same thing today! That’s why we should really pity them and have sorrow for them. I get pretty crusty up here, but when I’m alone in my thoughts and I simmer down, I’ve got no problem with anybody out there; I’m sorry for them. God doesn’t reveal it, how are they going to get it? See?
“Oh Jerusalem, I would have gathered you with my prophets.” He said, “I brought the Word but you wouldn’t listen! I’d have brought you like a hen takes her chickens in a time of storm and needs a shelter.” Yeah, bunch of chickens. But the eagles are going to get out of here on the wings. Oh, yeah.
I’m going to quit now because time’s up, time’s way gone. I’d talk the next four hours and just run out and you’d run out on me. Love you deeply, appreciate you very much and we’ll start again maybe Wednesday, if I’m around here, and I’ll put a little word here. What is it, the 22nd today? Okay, June 22nd. We’ll end right here, talking about Jeremiah.
And we’re ending with the thought here, how that… What other way could God do it, you know, if He’s going to use some person, something outside of a strictly inanimate, and then if, He used the inanimate and did it, then how is He going to get it out someplace else? Well, come on. Brother/sister, see the wisdom of God? Why, you got to admit there’s no other way it really would work.
Just like Brother Branham said, that beautiful time, what is it? Matthew 5:48. He said, “Be ye perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect.”
And you know what he said about it? so perfectly, no theologian ever put it that way. He said, “God demanded perfection. And if God demanded, then God’s got to make a way for it!” And he said, “And the blood of Jesus Christ scatters sin until there be no evidence, then how can you make a man a sinner? Perfect before God.” See?
How could He do it except by prophets? How could He have a prophet except there be some manifestation? How could we receive, except someone was sent to us and how could the man that’s sent be any value unless there was someone to be sent to? The whole thing starts up in there and comes down here, and one day its going up to come back to perfection. I mean the physical, the whole thing.
Do you love the Lord this morning? See how beautiful it all works out? Simplicity… simplicity galore. Just like picking grapes off of a vine. Even my collie dog could do that. Wonder where the grapes were going… caught the dog taking the grapes. I don’t call anybody a dog here.
I’m just saying, hey, look here brother/sister, when it’s laid out before you, and it’s out here in nature, then what’s the matter with us not taking the good things of God, the fruit of the vine of God, the love of God, the Word of God and placing It in our hearts by the Holy Ghost, and going one day back to Him.
Let’s rise and be dismissed.
Gracious, eternal Father, loving Lord, we appreciate You so much this morning, Your lovely Spirit amongst us, Lord, with no bitterness, no guile, no sorrow, no threatening’s, no recriminations, none of these things, Lord, but a Spirit of love and a Spirit of life and the grace of Almighty God pouring through us, Lord, we believe wave upon wave taking us higher, heavenly Father. Let us not lose this moment, Lord. Seal it to us by Your blessed Holy Ghost. Help us to lock It deep within our hearts and our minds, Lord, and just be thoroughly satisfied, how beautiful, how simple, how much God It is, just like we know that that One that was born here and died for us, shedding the Blood, a part of God, so much so it’s a Son. And Lord so much so this Word is our life, inundating us, illuminating us, bringing us all down to a place of the grace and glory of God as never before.
Father, bless each one amongst us. If they’re sick amongst us, Lord, heal them; we all need healing. We haven’t Lord spoken so much of that in these messages over years, Lord, and we don’t want to denigrate it; we don’t want to lose it. We realize that we don’t want to major on a minor, Lord, but we certainly don’t want to lose the minor, for You said not one jot and one tittle of Your Word would pass away; therefore, how could healing pass away? Couldn’t do it, Lord, and we’re just confessing our faults this morning and our lack of indulging ourselves in Your perfect grace, O God. Forgive us, we pray, Lord, and help us to set our hearts and our minds once more for this grace of healing, Lord, that we might be all healed. And Father, we know there’s something even greater than that healing, and that is how the healing takes place, and that’s from the soul outward, to the spirit and to the body.
As John said, “That you may prosper and be in health as your soul prospers,” O God. And truly, Lord in heaven, we would desire that. There never was a time when the church was so prosperous with that Light that’s come in, because now is that end time; Headship has returned, and the same Light in the beginning has now settled upon us at the end. And Lord, here we are, and it’s settling upon us, Lord, to mature us, not to go out like a lion and convert the world, but to mature, dry out a Bride, and make her solid wheat before You, Lord, in Your very image. Father, we love that, and so, Father, how can we not then look at that and believe that we have all these things in there, Lord, healing in the atonement, all the grace and all the divine wonder.
O God, this morning spur us as never before, to lay hold of our claim, to be solid, Lord; I know Your Spirit’s moving this morning, Lord to that end. And I pray, O God, we shall not miss it, Father, as the prophet so often said, people out there are missing the visitation, and they could be healed, Lord. And some did miss, and so many did, Lord, but this morning Father, we don’t want to miss the beauty of Your Word maturing us. We don’t want to miss the understanding of Your Word putting us in a place of this love and this faith, O God, to get the best out of life, and that best out of life is Your moving in our lives and doing for us.
O God, as we see Your sovereignty, we place ourselves under Your sovereignty by faith this morning in love, and believe You, hopefully as never before, and if our mouths are not true with this, O God, fill our hearts with something so it will be true, that this is a never before trust, Lord; it is a never before in some respects, Lord, that is true, because we have the revelation, but now we want to go all the way, because we know the prophet never gave up on the healing of the sick. He said, “My ministry is to go out there,” and he prayed for the sick.
So, Father, that’s true. We believe that that ministry has never failed and it’s not going to get away now. There is help for every single one, Lord. There’s physical help, but on top of the spiritual, we know the spiritual is so wonderful. And there’s even financial help, Lord, for there, too. So, Father, this morning we pray, not to get our eyes on the obtuse or the minor, but realizing it’s all there, may we walk in the Light as You’re in the Light, having fellowship with the Word being fulfilled in a people. These mercies we ask, these graces we want, in the name of Jesus Christ, we pray. Amen.
The Lord bless you. We’re just going to sing, “Take the Name of Jesus with You”.