Making A Way

Good evening, friends. And may the Lord richly bless you. And thank you, Brother Neville, for that kind remark. So happy to be back at the Tabernacle tonight in the service of our blessed Lord, and to see our friends out tonight to worship Him with us. It certainly is a grand privilege to meet once more this side the coming of the Lord. And after we see, hear so many going away unexpectedly, so quickly, we just wonder time after time, who's next. But having this blessed assurance: that there's nothing can separate us from the love of God that's in Christ. There's neither death, nor nothing present, nor nothing future, or any powers that can separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus. And knowing this, that after this earthly tabernacle be dissolved, we have one

already waiting; (unfixed, unsettled), and we rest upon that blessed hope, so glorious.

I was talking to my wife, and Mrs. Wood, and them, just.... I come back; I was saying, “Well, it just seems like it's just trip after trip and place after place, but yet, they become more glorious.”

And knowing that we're coming to the close ... the nearness of the coming of the Lord, I said, “Well,” (talking to my boy, coming down the road the other day, coming from out of Sioux Falls, South Dakota) then I said, “You know, home is a wonderful place.” We were heading back home. I said, “We love this world; this is our home.” We might not think it is, but it is. We were born for this home. God put us here. We had no way bringing ourselves here; even our father and mother had no way; that had to be in the hands of God. Many people are married, never have a child. But God so saw that we could come to this earth. And then when we come, we begin to grow and build into a body by atoms, and lights, and so forth, as it begin to take on from the earth. And then after we got a certain age, they stopped growing; we still add them to us, but they're going away. Death is set in.

And then when this earthly tabernacle be dissolved, we have one there waiting, see. We enter into that; we'll know one another. We can't shake hands; we have no senses of that feeling. We can't ... I couldn't shake your hand, say, “How do you do, brother,” because you wouldn't have that type of hand, but yet we're not in a corporal body as we are now. We're in a celestial body. And then when this....

And I was thinking of down in Egypt, that when Joseph left a memorial to the children of Israel, his bones, that someday they were going out. And as they went out, they would take his bones with them up to the promised land. And every Hebrew that desired to be back in the homeland.... So, no matter how well he was treated, yet his longing was to be back at the homeland. And every time they passed by and saw those bones, they knew that someday they were going back to the homeland.

While we're here waiting to cross out of this place, we see an empty tomb over yonder in Jerusalem, let us knowing that something happened. And then when we take on that glorified ... not glorified, but celestial body, and we're walking around in the glorylands with Christ, looking at each other, speaking to each other, we can talk, souls under the altar crying, “How long?” And then what will be the memorial there that we're coming back to earth again to eat and drink and sleep? There He will be sitting there on a throne in a corporal body. Amen.

Someday He'll rise in that corporal body, and when He returns back, these celestial bodies will take on glorification, then we'll be like Him and we'll live forever in that body. What does anything else matter? It's all settled. That's.... Just anchor right there and that ... this....

My hopes is built on nothing less

Than Jesus' blood and righteousness;

When all around my soul gives way,

He's then all my hope and stay.

Christ was the One who made it possible, not my church, or not my denomination, not my friends, but Christ; “All other grounds is sinking sand, all other ground....” No wonder Eddie Perronett.... They thought he was mad. And that day sitting in there, as a slave to the people, the Holy Spirit reached and picked up the pen and begin to write that marvelous song. It'll be sang at the baccalaureate service of the inauguration of the King of kings: “All Hail The Power Of Jesus Name.”

Wonderful report from up in the north now, we had the ministerial ... not the ministerial, but the Christian Businessmen's breakfast up at Minneapolis. And the biggest breakfast we ever had of businessmen; two thousand came out. And the Lord gave us a message, and that morning in the altar call fifty businessmen came to Christ and was born again that morning in the service. Oh, that just thrilled my heart, of businessmen coming in. Marvelous services there where the Lord be praised and all glory to Him.

And now, I got a little note here, said, “When will I be in Indianapolis?” On June the eleventh to the fifteenth will be at Cadle Tabernacle at Indianapolis, Indiana—June the eleventh to the fifteenth—seating eleven thousand people.

Day after tomorrow we leave for Shreveport, Louisiana, and to be there through the weekend, at Shreveport, Louisiana. And then we leave Shreveport and go to Houston, Texas, and will be there two days, which will be Monday and Tuesday.

And then on the sixteenth we begin in Old Mexico—Mexico City, Old Mexico. Mr. Arganbright just called me, and they secured the big bull arena there, that has a seating capacity of sixty thousand. And there's four hundred churches cooperating, all ready signed up. We're expecting a hundred thousand at the meeting. And it's the first time this (we have something to praise God for), the first time in the history of Mexico, that the government has ever welcomed a Protestant in and give us a place to come—the first time in the history of Mexico a Protestant's ever been welcome.

And General Ajio is a general of the Mexican Army has just been born again and received the Holy Ghost. And by his courtesy to the Governor of Mexico, gives us the government rights to go in with the militia protection. And I've got the big bull arena; that's the biggest thing there is in all Mexico; it seats sixty thousand around like this, besides the room where they do the fighting at, you know, in there. And we got it for ten straight nights now without any interruption, right straight through for ten straight nights. Be praying for me. I just feel the ... hear the sound of abundance of rain down there. The Mexican people are very simple, humble believers, and once convinced.... They're Catholic, and once convinced that a truth is the truth, then that settles it for all.

Then I hurry right back from Old Mexico, get back here about the thirtieth, and the first (that's Easter morning) at the Tabernacle here for a sunrise service, and a healing service to follow it, and a baptismal service that night at the Tabernacle. And you can tell your friends now, to bring in all their sick and afflicted for the Easter service. The sunrise service early that morning, then following that up at ten o'clock, nine-thirty, regular Sunday school time.... You all plan on it for Sunday school. And a healing service to follow that, the regular healing service like we have in the campaign....

And so, then Mexico City is to be the first time that this new vision, that the Lord has told me, is going to be in operation at that time. So, we'll try again, the Lord willing, right here Easter Sunday morning using these two rooms, like right here. So, we're expecting a great time here Easter morning, and a proof that the Lord Jesus has risen from the dead. He's alive. Yes, sir. And He's been alive since that first Easter, and He's here with us even now. And I just trust that the Lord will give us a great outpouring of His blessings for that morning.

Then we go from here then, we go to Chicago for the eleventh ... third to the eleventh. And we leave on a Monday, begin there on a Tuesday. And begin through the ... no, it's third through the eighth, and then on the eleventh we begin in Charlotte ... no, Columbia, North Carolina, and then to Spindale, North Carolina, and then from there to Charlotte, South Carolina, and then Anchorage, Alaska, from there—up into Anchorage, Alaska. Then back, and not determined, but perhaps maybe by then, the tent will be ready to be on the road.

Oh, I've just.... You know what I want to do? Will you pray with me for this? Look, I want before too long, the Lord willing, to put that tent right here in this Fall's City and stay there for four or six weeks meeting, just stay right here until the battle is finished. And you be praying for that now. Now, I'd just like to stick it out here between Jeffersonville and New Albany somewhere, and just put up about a seven or eight thousand seating capacity in it, then we can add more as the days go by, and just stay right here until it's settled. Amen.

And then I think ... then on the eleventh to the fifteenth of June at Cadle Tabernacle in Indianapolis. And then the seventeenth, I believe, through the twenty-first of June, is at Minneapolis in the football stadium out there, seating twenty-seven thousand, at the International Convention of Christian Businessmen, speaking and having prayer for the sick each night. And now, be praying over these, do, and pray hard.

I just feel that we haven't got much time now. And I'll predict it. I don't say this is the Lord saying this now: I'm predicting that this year America will receive Christ or reject Christ, see. I believe this will be the turning point, that America will go in ... we'll have a revival in this day, or we won't have a revival. And I believe that this is the year that America will make it's decision. And I trust that they'll make it, and we'll have a great revival that'll just sweep....

We're having much preaching and much evangelism, but we need a revival, don't we? A real revival, that's what we need. The Lord bless you. Glad to see Brother Graham there, and (I believe) Brother Smith sitting right in front of him—Brother Smith from the Church of God. And there's several ministers in here, I'm sure. And we welcome you all, brethren, each and every one. And the strangers in our gates, all the laity, we just love you.

And now, with these announcements away, and realizing that tonight communion night, for the communion service.... And pray hard for our dear Brother Neville, who's holding the fort here at the Tabernacle, doing a great job, and for all the saints everywhere.

Oh, what a needy time, what a needy time. I hear it from down in Africa, and such a call for Africa. And Brother Arganbright was just telling me on the phone awhile ago, that the king of some of those countries down in there (I forget just where it was.), I believe up here in Sweden ... Switzerland ... (I'll get it in a minute) Denmark has wrote a special letter to make this the season to come there, at this time. In Africa, India, many different places, where.... Hawaiian Islands, got in the other day, that's about ten times straight that they've called for a revival. Christian Businessmen wants to go out there, just fly over it, make a ... organize a chapter and speak for them that morning, and then begin a revival in Hawaii.

So, the whole world has become our parish (See?), the whole world. And we are His servants, so let us just remember, friends, that this may be the last night, this may be the last year, or may be the last generation, see. We don't know. But anyhow, we do know this of a fact, that the living know they have to die. It's once appointed to man to death, and after that the judgment. And if there be any here tonight who isn't ready to meet that and has not this blessed hope, may this be the night that you'll decide for the Lord Jesus, for once for all, for eternity. Now, shall we pray.

Our heavenly Father, we want to thank Thee from the very depths of our hearts, knowing that we are waiting here, not flusterated at all, no matter how many atomic bombs they make, and how many civil service people they put out to watch the planes, the world nervous and shaky, we're resting upon this blessed hope that we have. We're trusting in the finished work of God at Calvary through Christ, knowing this, that after this earthly tabernacle is no more, we got one already waiting yonder: more glorious, far more, where there's no pain or suffering, sickness. No old age will ever strike it, never a gray hair, never a wrinkle, but we'll be young there forever.

The blessed Bible, which cannot tell nothing but the truth, has give us this blessed assurance, and the Holy Ghost also is a witness, bearing record of the same. Our hearts long for that. And we know the Bible tells us so, which is the Word of God, the seeds to be planted upon this fertile ground to let us rest in this hope.

God, I pray that You'll touch every person tonight outside of Christ and bring them to this close, marvelous walk. Heal the sick sitting here tonight, Lord. No doubt in this many people there's bound to be sickness in the midst of us. And we pray that You'll heal every one.

Now, come to the Word, Father, take the Word, which is a lifeline, the grass roots, Lord, of all civilization. We pray that the Holy Spirit will take each word and give it to the heart just as we have need. May we fellowship around the Word. For we ask it in Jesus' name. Amen.

For a little reading of the Scriptures tonight, for just a little text to try to hunt a context, and be swiftly, right to the Word so we can have the communion. Tomorrow being Monday.... I know we don't like to think of those things, of having to go back to work, but we have to face that. And many times you know, ... but after all, this is more essential than jobs and everything else, see. For your job will play out someday, and you'll play out with it, but if you got eternal life, you'll never have an end; it's eternal, lives on.

Perpetual, (think of it), a perpetual life has no end. When eons of time is passed on by, we'll still be there. When the millions of years roll by, we'd still be there. So, just for a few days here on earth, jobs doesn't amount to so much. Just.... They help us along, buy our little food and so forth, eat, which we have to have it.

Now, in I Corinthians the 10th chapter, beginning with the 12th verse:

Wherefore let him that thinketh he stands take heed lest he fall.

There has no temptation taken you but such ... is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that that ye are able; but ... with every temptation also make a way of escape, that we may be able to bear it.

What a beautiful verse. May the Lord add His blessings to that Word. Making A Way would be what I'd like to speak on tonight. You know, may He add His blessing to His Word, as we listen now to the Word.

It's my opinion that if the Word, which is the grass roots, which is the thing that takes hold.... Many times in my healing services, I try to, even after the teachers has already went through it all, I try to come back and take the Word and lay a foundation.

A few nights ago I got a little letter of criticism, which was fine. A man told me, said, “Brother Branham, you're just a boy yet.” Said, “I was preaching the Gospel before you was born.” He said, “I....” All of my forty-six years, but yet.... He was a teacher of some Bible school. He said, “But a man that ... of your kind, that teaches people, and yet would make a remark that you made the other night,” said, “I think it's ridiculous.” Said, “You said that the devil didn't have no power to heal.” He said, “Perhaps, what if I tell you that the devil has got power to heal?” Said, “Now, you'd ask me, if you were standing present, why I know.” Said, “I'll tell you.”

Said, “In our town there's a woman lives there which has a bad spirit. And people comes to her for healing.” Said, “She'll pull hair out of their head, and she'll pluck blood from their veins and wrap it up in this hair, walk down to the river, and cast this thing over her shoulder, and not look back, if she looks back,” said, “then the disease remains with the person. But she has to throw it in the river like it's forgetfulness and walk away.” And said, “Sixty percent of the people, we've kept count, are healed.” Said, “Now, if the devil can't heal, what about that?”

So, I answered him back, I said, “My kind beloved brother, with all due regards to your years (See?), all due regards to your years of teaching, but I'll tell you now, that Jesus Christ said that the devil has no power to heal. And if Jesus said it, that settles it with me. He said, 'If Satan cast out Satan, then his kingdom's divided and it has an end.' And he cannot cast out Satan. Then you'd ask me why was these people healed? Why, it's not the person, the witch had nothing to do with it, no more than I'd have to do with it, or any other man. It's the people that's approaching, thinking that they're coming God's provided way for their healing. It's their individual faith in God that does the healing.” See? That's the approach that they think. It isn't the witch, no more than it would be the man.

So therefore, the Gospel can only maneuver, or it can only reach out as the Word of God is taught. And men base their hopes upon God's eternal Word. “Faith cometh by hearing, hearing by the Word.”

Dr. Adair, here in the city, my beloved friend, said to me one day, he said, “Billy, don't you think if people had faith to touch the tree out there, they'd get the same results?”

I said, “How could you have faith in that? If you could have the equal amount of faith, believing that it was God's provided way for you to touch the tree, and it would do, then they could do it. But who's got faith in the tree? I got faith in what God said, and I just take that.”

So, faith isn't built upon the shifting sands of emotional conceptions. But faith is built upon the standard, God's eternal Word, the Rock of ages. There's where faith takes its solemn resting place and never moves, when it's built right there.

Now, Making A Way. I don't believe that God ever run His office just a haphazard way. I wouldn't run mine; you wouldn't run yours. Jesus didn't die at Calvary, just to say, “Well, now maybe people will feel sorry for Me, being that I go to earth and take on the form of flesh, and they'll really get saved. Maybe if they see how pitifully I die....”

God didn't do that. Jesus died for one purpose: and that was to save those who God foreknew would be saved. That's right. God knew there was going to be somebody saved, and there had to be a preparation, or a way made for them to be saved. If there wasn't, salvation wasn't possible. So, God foreknowing that people would be saved, knowing who they were, He had to lay a plan down.

Now, you'd say to me, “Brother Branham, then God knows exactly who will be saved?” Correctly.

“Well, why does He say, He's not willing that any should perish?” He isn't. He isn't willing that any should perish, but that all might come to repentance. But in order to be God, He has to know who will do that, or He wasn't God. Because He is omnipotent; He's omnipresent; He's omniscient; He knows everything. He's at every place, and all powerful.

So, foreknowledge looks back and says that He foresaw this, and knows that's the reason He could tell what the end was from the beginning. And therefore, knowing that all these marvelous days that we're living in now, and to stand and witness and see the things that we've seen now, God had to make a preparation for it.

The other night, was so amazed. A little woman come up to the platform, that big three-hundred-thousand-dollar place there, and she had a little makeup stuff on her face. She stood there and she started trembling. I said, “You're Lutheran,” by the Holy Spirit.

She said, “Yes sir.”

And I said, “You're here to be prayed for. And the reason you're walking the way you are, both knees have been broke.” I said, “That was caused by a car accident in a car that you were driving in four years ago.”

She said, “That's true.”

I said, “Your doctor's a little short fellow, bald-headed and wears glasses.”

Said, “That's right.”

And I said, “He's doctoring, because that in the knees the bone has become tubercular, and even the flesh is a rottening around the bone.”

She said, “That is right.” And she said, “Is there a hope for me?”

I said, “That depends on your approach to the Lord Jesus.” I said....

She said, “Can you help me?”

I said, “No, Ma'am. No one can help you now, but you have to help yourself to God's provided blessings for you.”

And she said, “I now believe with all my heart.”

I said, “The Lord healed you, sister; it's ”Thus saith the Lord,“ you're healed.”

She said, “Mr. Branham, I haven't been able to kneel,” she said, “for four years,” while weeping, standing there rubbing her hands. And a great audience of people weeping, watching her. Lutherans, Presbyterians.

And I said, “Why don't you go down to the altar and kneel down.”

She said, “Let me kneel right here, right where I'm healed.”

She never moved from her steps, but she knew she was healed. Something took place, see. She knew it; there wasn't any guessing about it.

I said, “Kneel down.”

And for the first time in four years, with both knees broke and all callused over, made over the bones together, that woman, like a young woman, knelt on her knees with the tears streaming from her cheeks, raised up her hands to God; why, just raised right up from there just as easy, like a little girl, and tipped off the platform. What was it? God had to make a way for that. Now, He sent doctors, that's right. And doctors are fine. And they done all they could do, but God had made a way. That's it, see. After the doctor had failed in his way, God's way is so much higher than our way. What a wonderful thing.

Now, to think tonight that you and I (don't want to think this), but we were actually natured after the world, say like pigs, and tonight have become saints. Something had to be done. Now, we couldn't go into heaven as pigs; we'd have to go into heaven as saints. So, a preparation had to be made for this. And God gave it so beautifully in the Old Testament, back in the book of Numbers, about the 20th chapter; and over in Exodus about 36 ... 32.

And we find out that on the day of atonement, God in the types, foreshowing what He would do in the antitype when He come, which was Christ. The high priest was commanded to take two goats, little goats, and take them in for atonement, an offering, and a bullock for his own family. And many of you readers here and studiers of the Bible, know just how that the atonements was.

But then, one goat.... There had to be a lot cast. And the lot fell on one goat; it died. And then the blood of this goat was placed upon the other goat, with the hands of the high priest, confessing the sins of the people—upon the living goat. And then a man who was worthy, taken the living goat under his arm and went way into the wilderness, where the goat would have to perish and go into an isolated, out-of-the-way place, never no more in that state to come back into the family of his own again, but to be isolated forever, bearing the sins of the people away.

Now, I know many scholars perhaps are sitting here, and especially the Adventists, they say that one goat was Christ and the other one was the devil. Now, brethren, I have to differ a little on that. We can't sacrifice to the devil. Both goats represented Christ. Both of them was Christ; Christ is ... or, He bled for our sins, and He bore them Himself away. Devil can't bear my sins; Christ is our sin-bearer. Get it straight, then you're faith won't move. Christ is our sin-bearer, and the sins of the world. Christ was the dying animal at the cross, (listen), the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.

And only the types, we were drawing dividends, knowing that the antitype would come someday. Why was He slain from the foundation of the world? Because God perceived in His mind how them things would be, and what the church would be, and what everything would be, and He spoke the Word. And when God speaks the Word, it's as good as done right then. So, He was slain from the foundation of the world. You see it?

When you get down to that now, and let your faith rest solemnly, not upon men, not upon theologies of men, not upon church denominations, as good they are, as good as man is, let your faith rest alone in Christ's finished work at Calvary for both sin and salvation. You see it?

Notice, Christ came and He was a dying animal, for He was already, in prefigure, slain before the foundation of the world. You see it? God spoke it and said it would be so. So, when God speaks, it's forever confirmed in heaven. The Word: That's where you ought to have faith. If you believe this to be God's eternal unchangeable Word, then every precept that's been spoken in God's Word is a seed. And everything that God has spoke of in the Word is already confirmed in glory. And it's been given to you to act upon. So, don't be afraid to take any phase of God's eternal blessed Word and anchor it in your heart.

Now, it has to be in soil. Now, for instance, I took a grain of corn and put it in blue pumice stone, or something like that, it perhaps would not grow, because it's the wrong kind of soil. But if it goes into good fertile blacktop soil, it'll grow as sure as it's placed in there.

And when the Word (here it is now), when the Word of God falls into a heart full of faith, it just has to grow; it's got to take hold. That's the reason the woman standing there with both knees, calcium over like that from the deposits, and the breaking of the knees, where both was mashed, and the bones rotten, with tubercular, and also the flesh, she wasn't afraid to bow her knees. For what? The Word had fell in faith, springs up. Do you get it?

God, before the foundation of the world, said that Christ would be here, that He was slayed, died, the innocent for the guilty. And when God spoke it, it was already confirmed when God spoke it. Now, before it can be a word, it has to be a thought, for a word is a thought expressed.

And then, if God in His mind perceived these things, then they were in His mind, then He spoke them, and they're as good as finished when God speaks, because He's infallible, and can do nothing else. Then God's attitude.... If God saves sinners back there on the base of accepting the burnt offering, the sacrifice provided, He's got to do the same thing today, or He did wrong when He took the first man in by it.

If God healed the sick back there upon the basis of the shed blood of an animal, upon the basis of the atonement, He's got to do the same today or He was wrong when He healed the first person, see. He can't change.

We grow; we mature; we find better things. We talk of better things. We wear better clothes, drive a better automobile. We're progressing. But God cannot progress in that way, because He was perfect to begin with. And perfection cannot progress anymore; it's already perfection. Amen.

So, He don't have to say, “Well, this is a different age; we got a better thought now.” If it is, He can't be God. So, if He is God, what He spoke back there, He has to stay with it, because He was perfect there and is perfect now, see. You see it? Then He can't progress; He can't.... What I mean, He can't embetter things, make this a little ... say this to be a little better.

You say, “What about the old lamb and this Lamb?” That was a type waiting for ... and He said it was.

He spoke of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. In the beginning, “I'll put enmity against her seed and the serpent's seed.” And then to wait till that fullness of time came, God gave a propitiation of sin through the shed blood of the lamb, pointing.... He gave the same thing through the moon at night, of being the sun in the daytime—the moon being a shadow of the sun, or the sun shining on the moon, making a shadow. The moon and the sun is husband and wife. And while the sun is gone away, it throws its light against the moon to give us a smaller light until the sun comes. And when the sun comes the moon fades out.

Christ is the Son who's gone to glory and shining on the church with the same kind of light He shined when He was here. And the church is the light of the world until Jesus comes and it all melts together, like the moonlight and the sunlight becomes one light when it emerges together. When Christ and His church comes together at the great Millennium, they emerge into one.

And today ye are the light of the world. In His presence ... in His absence, rather, He is giving you the light to shine with while He's here. All the old things, all the things of the earth are a type of the heavenly. Even to spiders and lizards and snakes and so forth, are only types of evil spirits reflecting back.

Why was a cancer called cancer? Because it has the form of a crab. And the word cancer means “crab.”

Now, you see, all those things which are types and shadows, so the scapegoat that was put away into the wilderness in an isolated place, separated from his fellow citizens, bearing the sins of the people upon his head, was a type of Christ being separated from God and out of His presence and bore our sins to hell. And there, God wouldn't suffer Him.... David said, “I'll not suffer My Holy One to see corruption; neither will I leave His soul in hell,” and on the third day rose again for our justification. But He typed the goat, the scapegoat, and also the goat for the sin offering, God making preparations and a provided way. God always makes a way of escape, every time.

Sickness pins you into the corner. Satan pins you down to a place after you become a Christian; maybe you've been a gambler. You see it? The cards are on the table. “Come on, John, we know it's in you.” Satan is there to tempt you, but God in every time will make a way of escape if you'll just accept it.

Maybe you've been a drunkard, and a glass is under your nose. “Now, come on, John.” Now, if you want to heed to that voice, you'll go right straight out to your wallow again. But God is always there. Turn your mind towards heaven and look towards Calvary and say, “Blessed Holy Spirit, come to me, I'm in need.” Watch what takes place. God will make a way of escape every time. For He will; God has always did it.

And now notice, before the destruction of the world, when men were sinful and the people were sinful in the world, God made a way of escape for those who desired to escape by it. God had an ark built, prepared. Noah built a way on an ark for the ... preparing this ark for a preparation of a way (listen) for a way of escape, as the wrath and the judgment of God was piling up in the heavens to be poured out upon a sinful nation and a sinful people, who rejected, and stiff-necked, walked against the commandments of God. All the time this wrath was being piled up in the heavens to be poured out upon the people in judgment, the merciful God made a way of escape for those who desired to walk in it—the way of escape.

Now, we've come to the place again where the judgments are piling up. And if that day in the antediluvian, how much more of today, when the ending of the history of time, when the ending of history of the nations, with coming to a climax, how much more is the wrath of God upon millions of more people, heaping together until sin has steeped in the world, until she's a tottering like a drunk man staggering home at four in the morning. Done gone beyond the moon and stars, until it's reached the garments of Jehovah, of Saboath.

Then she's staggering under the load of her own man-made theories, of her own self preservation, or her own theologies. They've taken the commandments of God and made them of none effect by teaching the traditions of men. Loving the praises of men more than the praises of God. Our teachers have become lukewarm and placing upon joining churches, saying, “That's all right; as long as you belong to church, just forget about it.”

But, brother, God made a way of escape, and you'll have to come to God's terms, and that's through Christ Jesus our Lord. No other foundation is laid but that which has already been laid. No one to build upon any other foundations, like stubbles and mud, the floods will wash it away and great will be the fall.

But Jesus said, “Upon this rock I will build My church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” What is it He built it upon? On the spiritual revealed truth that He is the Son of God. “Who does men say I, the Son of man, am?”

Some say, “Elias, and some say Moses, and some say John the Baptist, and so forth.”

“But who do you say I am?”

Without hesitation, without taking a second.... Listen sinner, that's the way you receive it. He'd been with Him, he knew what He was. And then before he could even think a second time, the Holy Spirit got a hold of him, and he said, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.”

Said, “Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-jona: for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you. You never learned this from somebody's theology; never come from a seminary with it, but My Father which is in heaven has revealed it to you. Upon this rock I will build My church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.”

The floods may come and the tides may go, and, oh.... But he who's safely in Christ will ride the storm of the atomic the same as Noah did the storm of the flood, safely in the ark. Let your faith drop down into that once, see what takes place. On God's solid rock, on the type.

God makes a way of escape every time. He has to make a way of escape. When the strategic time comes, God is the God, Jehovah-jireh. Jehovah-jireh means “the Lord will provide Himself a sacrifice, or the Lord will provide for Himself a way of escape.” God can provide it because He's the Creator.

And God, once for all at Calvary (Amen.), there, there when the archangels of heaven, when all the regions of demons trembled, when the earth took a nervous prostration and shook the graves, and when the sun had convulsions and hung back yonder and turned into blackness, when the moon and stars shook out of their places.... The redeemed of all ages, and through the ages will come, will recognize that hour, when the Son of God died there, stripped Satan of every power, even death and hell. The grave and all fear was swallowed up there at Calvary when He paid the supreme price. And when the Lamb died, and the sins placed upon Him—He was a sin-bearer—took them to hell where they belong, and God raised Him up on the third day. And by believing that we're justified by faith, on the basis of the shed blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. God making a way of escape.

Oh, brother, as you see ... hear the ambulance screaming. Every time you hear one, it's a marker that you're going that way. Every time you pass a graveyard, it's a marker you're going that way. Every time a wrinkle appears in the face and a gray hair in the head, it's a marker you're going that way. No wonder then Paul could say, with that real hope rooted and grounded in him, like this time when he got down to the end of the road, he said, “I've fought a good fight, I've finished the course, I've kept the faith: henceforth, there's laid up for me a crown of righteousness, the Lord, the righteous Judge, will give me at that day: not only me, but all that love His appearing.”

When you're sick and tired of this old life, and you love the appearing of the Lord Jesus better than you love your food at the table, or your wife, or your children, then there's a crown laid up for you, not a crown, a gold crown they put upon your head, but a body free from pain, crowned in the glory of God, crowned in the immortality of Jesus Christ. That's what's laid up for you, that the Lord, the righteous Judge, will give you at that day. That's the day we look forward to. God has made a way of escape for every one of us, certainly He has.

When Daniel the prophet, God's child, was throwed into a lion's den.... There was a time that Daniel, being faithful, who raised his windows and wasn't afraid of what the king said, and prayed. Regardless of what the proclamation was made, Daniel prayed anyhow, as he faced Jerusalem and prayed. If men faced Jerusalem and prayed, the city where the burnt sacrifice was made.... That's the reason Daniel looked that way and prayed. For the Lord had already said, “The people be in trouble at any time, look towards this holy place and pray, then I will hear from heaven,” when Solomon dedicated the temple.

That's the reason Jonah had the faith he did, when he had seaweeds wrapped around his neck, and standing in vomit in the belly of the whale, way down in the deep of the ocean on a stormy sea, he said, “They're lying vanities. But once more will I look to Your holy temple, God.”

God did something: He made a way of escape for Jonah. What He did, nobody knows. That's God's own secret. But no matter whether it was impossible, God can alter circumstances. He can make the impossible become a probable, and not only probable, but can He make it a reality, when men take God at His Word and accept the provided way that God provided for man.

God did something; He might have put a oxygen tent down there. I don't know what He did in the belly of that whale, but He kept Jonah in there for three days and nights as a type that Christ would lay without oxygen in the belly of the earth, and on the third day He'll come out again. It was a type; He made a way of escape. He always will.

When Daniel stood there, and the lion's come running to him, there was not a fear in that old saint's heart. But he stood there, and God wasn't finished with him. And just before the lions grabbed him, an Angel spread before them.

No doubt but the same burning light that appeared to Saul of Tarsus on the road to Damascus. A big light shined out, and they looked, and they didn't know what was taking place, and Saul fell from his horse, and a voice came from the light saying, “Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou Me?”

Said, “Who is it, Lord?”

He said, “I'm Jesus you're persecuting.”

It was the Hebrew children that had been faithful to the promise of God, that was laying down there in the fiery furnace ... or, in Babylon, rather, going to the fiery furnace, one step between them and death. How much that may be to men here tonight. There may be one day between you and eternal separation. You'll make your decision now. The way's provided for you, if you'll accept it.

“One step,” said Jonathan to David when they shot the bow. “One step between me and death.” One step between them and death, but just at that crucial moment, God provided a way of escape, and sent into that fiery furnace the Lord Jesus Christ, and kept the fire off of them.

It was Enoch, who claimed that he walked with God for five hundred years, and had a testimony he pleased God. He had a faith that he wouldn't see death. How could God do it? There wasn't even a jet plane in those days to get him off his feet. But God provided a way—a translation—that took Enoch from earth to glory without receiving death.

It was Elijah who stepped across the ocean ... or, the Jordan river that day, was divided from one side to the other. When Elijah was ready to go to heaven without dying, it was God provided a way for him, not a jet plane, but He sent a chariot of fire, trolled by horses of fire. God provided a way in the minute, a way of escape from death.

It was Moses, I believe, who followed the children of Israel ... or who led them, following the light, the pillar of fire through the wilderness. It was Moses who endured to the end. As Moses, a hundred and twenty years, after eighty years of service for God, who stood upon the mount and looked over into the promised land with the tears rolling down his cheeks, of an old man of a hundred and twenty years old. He'd come through the briar patches; he'd waded the deep waters; he'd tasted the bitter cup of gall and sorrow. He'd been with the disobedient people as their pastor. He'd led them from place to place, and put up with their murmurings, and throwed hisself in the breach and said, “God, take me before You do them.”

It was Moses who stood there as an old man, knowing that in every way he was a type of Christ, knowing somehow, someway, God surely would take him, because He had to bring him up again as a type of Christ. He was born as a prophet, as Christ, not only a prophet, but leader and so forth. He was hid away in the bulrushes and so was Christ taken into Egypt. He was a law-giver, as Christ was to the Mount of Olives, laying from Sinai. Every way he was a type of Christ.

And when he was old, and death staring him in the face, how would he ever bring forth the resurrection? But just as the crucial moment come, God provided a way. When the breath was leaving and gurgling in his neck, he looked, laying by his side, and there stood the Rock. God provided a Rock; the Rock was Christ Jesus who was in the wilderness. Moses endured to the Rock.

God give me grace to endure to the same thing. And when my last breath is being drawed from this body, let me see the Rock standing there. Stepped over on the Rock, and the angels come and packed him away. Eight hundred years later he was standing in Palestine with Elijah, standing there talking to Jesus before the cross. God made a way of escape.

Two of the greatest things in the Old Testament that I can see in the prophesies, two great factions was this: the people looked forward to a time to when the Messiah would come. And then after the Messiah come, they looked forward to a time that the Holy Spirit would come. Finally in due time, all the types back there that they had through the prophets and everything, all the types and the atonements they had, finally the Messiah come, and it was settled because God had said so.

Then they looked forward to a time to a great glorious church that would be without spot or wrinkle, that would shine in the earth as the stars. They looked for that time. How's it going to be? He'd been dead for three days and nights; He rose again; He appeared unto five hundred, and He ascended into heaven. He left them on earth here alone. How could it be this glorious church when the Leader was gone? God promised the church. How could it be? The light that would shine in His place after Him being gone, when He said there, “A little while, and the world sees Me no more; yet you'll see Me: for I will be with you, even in you, to the end of the world. The things that I do shall you also. Go ye into all the world and preach the Gospel. These signs shall follow them that believe.”

How can they do it with Christ absent from them? How can they do it, when God give them the promise? But look, God provided a Pentecost, when the Holy Ghost in person came down and took over mortal man's body, after they'd been cleaned by the atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ. And the Holy Ghost took that person into His own control and sent him forth with signs and wonders and miracles a following. God provided a way.

They couldn't do it in themselves; they were men like you and I. How could they do it? They couldn't. But God provided a way of escape. When they.... After the upper room, they thought the people would make fun of them; they thought they'd be this, that, or the other. They had the windows all closed and the doors locked. How could they do it? They were cowards; they had no backbone; they had a chicken wishbone, and not a real Holy Ghost backbone. They had the doors locked; they was afraid; they was ashamed to walk out and face the public. How could they do it?

But God sent a Pentecost, the baptism of the Holy Ghost. They flung the windows and doors open, and in the streets they went. God promised it. When God promises, God'll keep His Word. He'll make a way of escape. He'll never suffer you to be tempted above anything that He won't make a way of escape for you. He'll do it.

Here we are; we've lived through the day of a dismal day, cloudy, rainy; the church is halfway in and halfway out. They wonder how can they do this, and how can they do that—had no light. But the prophet said, “It'll be light in the evening time.” How can it be? The church in this day, that glorious church that's to be here on earth when Jesus comes to receive a glorious church.... We're receiving the latter rain to pour out a double portion of the Holy Ghost is coming on the earth and is sweeping every nation, and revival fires are burning on every hill. From China and Japan, from Korea to dark Africa, and everywhere, the Holy Spirit is being poured out upon the people. God made a way.

How did my blind eyes be healed? God made a way. Hallelujah! Yes, sir. He will always make a way. And for you here, that's in the earth today, You who are waiting for the consolation, you who are pilgrims and strangers, be like David.

David was going to the battle; he didn't go flusterated; he didn't go with a halfway mark; he didn't go thinking, “Maybe it'll do it.” But he waited in the mulberry bush until, after a while it was dead silent, nothing going. After a while, way back in the distance he heard the leaves start, got louder and louder and louder. After a while a great gusher of wind went on before him; he knowed that was God and a holy host of angels going before him. And he drew his sword, and took the battle, and set the enemy to flight.

Brethren, don't jump up and think something when you're not right to go yet. Stay there and see that it's not joining a church, not shaking hands with the preacher, neither is it being baptized in water, but it's accepting God's provided Sacrifice, Jesus Christ, as a Person into your heart. The Holy Ghost will move on before you like a rushing wind, moving everything from the way. Amen. That's it.

Then be Christians. You who are in the way, be real God-fearing men. There's coming up a revival here pretty soon, a big tent meeting; I can just see it. Right! What do you want to do? Conduct yourself.

Here some time ago, down in the southland, there was people used to go by and buy slaves and so forth. I just happened to think of this little story. As they went by ... would buy slaves, they'd notice the poor fellows had been beat; they hated to leave their country, and they know they'd never be back—the Negro people. It was pitiful how they was treated.

One day they happened to notice one young fellow with his shoulders throwed back; they didn't have to beat him. No sir. Some buyer come by, said, “Let me buy that slave.”

He said, “He's not for sale.”

He said, “Well, what makes him so much different? Is he the boss over the rest of them?”

Said, “No.”

Said, “What makes him different? Do you let him eat better?”

Said, “No, he eats with the rest of them.”

Said, “What makes him so much different?”

Said, “I happened to learn that his father is a king of the tribe. Though he's in a far land, he still throws his shoulders back; he's a royal-born man. His daddy's a king, though he's an alien, his father is a king.”

My Father is rich with houses and lands;

He holdeth the wealth of the world in His hands!

Of rubies and diamonds, and silver and gold,

His coffers are full, He has riches untold.

We, the people here at this Tabernacle have the infallible proof of the resurrected Lord Jesus, when the revival has swept the land from a humble little place like this, no more than the manger of Bethlehem, and probably more humble. But through here, God has sent forth a great revival that swept tens of thousands, yes, into the millions, into the kingdom of God.

Do you want to be a fellow citizen with us? Are you ready tonight, sinner, to throw down your differences, throw down your sinful life, and straighten up your shoulders, and join this rank of army of on-marching people, believing that the atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin. Shall we pray, as we bow our heads.

Our kind heavenly Father, tonight as we wait upon Thee, expecting the great Holy Spirit of God to move out through this audience and do the exceeding abundantly, as we're just now ready on the eve of taking the communion, O Father God, we pray that You'll speak to sinners' hearts tonight. Let them come, Lord, basically, not upon emotion, not upon some sad story, but upon truly, the unadulterated Word of God, that “God so loved the Word, He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have eternal life.”

God, grant tonight that the words of the Lord Jesus in Saint John 5:24, will ring in every heart: “He that heareth My words, and believeth on Him that sent Me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation, but's passed from death to life.” May many pass this hour from death to life, after we wait for the Holy Spirit. Through Jesus Christ's name.

And with your heads bowed, I wonder (as the sister plays), if.... Every one, Christian, in prayer. Is there a man, woman, boy, or girl, that would raise your hand to God, not to me, and say, right ... this: “I raise my hand to say to You, God, I believe that the judgment's ready to strike the earth, and I am under the condemnation of this judgment. I must be separated from God, from the presence of the church, from the presence of the Christian people. I must be tormented forever in an eternal hell. But, tonight, I feel Your Spirit speaking to me, that I must be chosen of God. For Jesus said, 'No man can come to Me, except the Father draws him.' And I feel a peculiar drawing in my heart. And I now want to accept Christ as my personal Saviour. And God, I raise my hand to You and say to this, 'I now accept Your Son, Jesus Christ, Your provided sacrifice for my ill and ill-famed sins, I now raise my hands to You.'”

Will you do it, man or woman, boy or girl in here at this moment would raise up your hands and say, “By this, I now accept the Lord Jesus Christ as my Saviour.”? Waiting a moment for you to make your decision. Just raise your hand. God bless you, little boy. Someone else raise your hand, say.... God bless you, my brother. All right, you're making it to God, not to me. “As many as believe was baptized and was added to the church, three thousand souls.”

There is a fountain filled with blood. Certainly. Will you plunge now, by faith, saying, “Lord God, I now cut loose. Oh, I've went up to the altar many times; I've done this, that, or I've joined the church. I've tried to escape the wrath. But tonight I'm coming this way: upon the basis of Jesus Christ dying in my stead; He was the sacrificial Lamb; He was the Scapegoat; He was all, and in Him I am complete. He bore my sins; He took my place at Calvary; He took my place under God's wrath; He took my place under God's punishment; He took my place in hell; and for me to take His place in heaven, to become a son of God, I now accept that basis right now; as a sinner I believe.” [Blank place on tape.]

When sinners plunged beneath the flood,

Lose all their guilty stains,

Lose all.................

Be in prayer, church, while somebody's making their decision for the Lord, pray. Lose how much? All their guilty stains. Jew, Gentile, bond or free, sinner or church member, priest, doctor, lawyer, whatever you may be, lose all your guilty stain by believing on the Lord Jesus, accepting Him as personal Saviour. Listen at this verse as we sing quietly now:

The dying thief rejoiced to see

That fou...................

At the end of the road, all hope's gone, and there appeared a fountain. Are you at the end tonight of your own will?

......plunged beneath.....

Lose all their guilty stains.

Lose all their guilty stains,

Lose.....................

Now, heavenly Father, it's all into Your hands. An elderly man and young boy raised their hands that they wanted to receive You. While the fountain has been opened through the Word, we appreciate Your fellowship, Lord, the Holy Spirit. Maybe they're all Christians, all saved. Thou knowest their hearts, Lord. They might have crossed over even the line between mercy and judgment, never again desiring to raise their hand, or never again desiring to have any feeling that You'd call them. I pray, Father, if that be the case, be merciful.

God, I pray that You'll save this man, Lord. I pray that right now down in his heart the joy bells of heaven is ringing. And that little boy, the same way, knowing this, that Jesus has made this statement, “He that heareth My words, believeth on Him that sent Me, has everlasting life and shall never come into condemnation, but has passed from death to life.” That's Your Word, Father, and we believe it. Give them everlasting joy now, that they have accepted everlasting life. We pray that You'll make their life full of joy, and fruitful, and happy. Grant it, Lord. Bless others as we wait on Thee. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.