Having Conferences

Thank you very much. You may be seated. We are certainly happy to be here tonight on this third night of this great conference. And I was speaking with Brother Weston and Brother David DuPlessis, as we were coming out, on the progress of the church in this day, how that God is moving among all the denominations and bringing people out hungering and thirsting for the Holy Spirit. We are indeed grateful for these things. And now, I met someone coming in out there, shook my hand. He said, “Brother Branham, I never had the opportunity to meet you,” he said, “or talk to you, but,” said, “I was healed in your meeting, in Palm Beach [I believe it was, somewhere].” Oh, I guess when I cross over the river I hope to see thousands of those that's been....

Sometimes here life gets so ... oh, I don't know you get in a hurry, and you rustle and hustle and bustle—as Mother used to call it —and you meet yourself coming back almost. And I don't see what we're in such a hurry about though, you see. We don't get any more done than they did in the days of Moody, and Finney, Knox, and Calvin. They rode in a horse and buggy, and had an old camp meeting like this, and set the tents up out in the woods, and had squirrel for breakfast and shucked beans for dinner. It was all right.

You remember that, Brother Sullivan? Way back in them old days down in Kentucky? [Brother Sullivan says, “I like them yet.”] I do too, Brother Sullivan. It's sure good. We're both Kentuckians and have a lot of things in common, this fellow over here in the corner. And he thought he had one on me when I was up here the last time. Said, “I bet you don't know what asafetida is.”

I said, “Don't you tell me I don't. I've packed a wad of it around my neck in school till no one would sit next to me even. Sure do.”

How many knows what it is? Well, look at the Kentuckians here, would you? Brother Banks Wood, did you put up your hand, wherever you are? I see you over there. That's fine. It's a good thing you did. Brother Wood was one of the men was along—he and his brother there—when the little fish come to life that day. He was present.

Well, we're all ... if you all are having as good a time out here on the campground as I am, around visiting the people and things. We're just having a wonderful time. And now, I think we should just make every ounce of this meeting count for the glory of God—just every bit of it. Now, I'm hearing pro and con: Some saying we ought to have a night of prayer for the sick; and some says, “Brother, don't never stop it, the way my soul is feasting.” Otherwise ... so, don't know but I think we ought to have a night of prayer for the sick and pray for them. You know people are taught that we should lay hands on the sick. To me, the way I see it, just know as long as the Holy Spirit is there, the work is done. That's all. It's finished.

And that's the way we find it overseas, Brother Mattsson. As long as they can see something happen, if they know that the supernatural power of God is close, they'll just accept it and get right up and walk away. They may stagger for awhile if they're coming out of a wheelchair or something, but they'll keep on moving till they get going. And so they ... but here it looks like you almost have to lay hands on the people. They've been taught that. Now, if you'll.... Now, that's all right. That's perfectly all right. But if you'll bear with me, in the Scriptures that was a Jewish tradition of laying on of hands. Now, look. When Jairus's daughter was at the point of death, Diaries said, “Come lay hands on her and she'll live.” See, Jewish tradition.

But when He went to the Gentile's house, where his servant was laying at the point of death, he said, “I'm not worthy that You'd come under my roof. Neither do I count myself worthy to come to You.” That's the reason he sent somebody to tell him. Said, “You just speak the word and my servant will live.” He said, “For I'm a man under authority, and if I say to this man go, he goes; and this one come, he comes.” In other words, “everything that's under my authority has to obey me.” And what was he saying, a Gentile, to Jesus? “I recognize that You're the Son of God and all sickness is under your authority. You can say to it 'go,' and it has to go.” See, everything that's under His power. And he recognized that sickness, and sin, and everything was under His control, that He could control it.

Now, I think that's the way we should see it today. I've tried for years, but, see, what does it, there's many other brothers on the field, and they lay hands on the sick and have great success. And that way I just broke it down and quit about a year ago, and said, “Well, as long as I'm in America, we'll just pray for the sick and lay hands on them.” That's exactly right, because I feel it brings a better result.

But really, the truth, if the Holy Spirit can stand here and go out through that audience out yonder and do the same works that He did when He dwelt in a body called Jesus Christ, can give you faith to believe it and me a gift to prove it, that it's absolutely the presence of the Holy Spirit, to me the work's finished. From Calvary, it's finished. And now, just believe it and keep acting on it. Just don't have anything more to think about it—just, it's finished and that's all. God said so, and that clears it up.

I keep on talking, why you'll freeze tonight sitting out there, won't you? This is nice weather up here. I'd rather have it like this than would be so hot you're just sitting there fanning just as hard as you can fan.

So, now, I want to read tonight from the Scripture for a text, and I'll try to let you out just as quick as possible.

But before I do, how many would think it would be nice to have a night of healing right away? I'd just like to see if it's in the making of the people. Now raise up your hand, you that thinks we ought to have it right away. Looks like we ought to have it right away, doesn't it? Sure does. About ninety-five percent. Well, we'll have healing service tomorrow night then, how's that? That all right? We'll have healing service tomorrow night ... or, pray for the sick. We don't know what God'll do. We won't say people will be healed. They always have been, but we'll just trust God for the sick tomorrow night. How's that? And I'll pray for you tomorrow night.

And now, tomorrow afternoon, I believe, being that there's so many, I'll.... Look, I'm a poor hand to judge. I'd say there's at least two thousand people or more here; and so, in that, there'd be about fifteen hundred here or more to be prayed for, if there's two thousand people. And then they would.... That's going to be a whole lot. There'd be a push and a squeeze. So we may have to take tomorrow night and the next night. I thought in a conference I would just speak to the people, if they could put up with it. And then after the conference is over I have two nights just to stay here and pray for the sick. That's Saturday and Sunday, and that's what I was going to do, and just use this for calling the altar.

Now, I want to say this, that I think that divine healing is a great thing. It's one of God's attributes—I believe that—to heal the sick. But I believe that the salvation of a soul is far beyond any divine healing, see. It's far beyond. And I noticed the other night, when I asked for how many sinners was on the grounds, there was only four or five of them, and they came here and stood for salvation.

And then if you're ...

if you haven't yet received the Holy Spirit, listen, my precious brother—as many times as people talk against it, not being today—it is for today, see, the Holy Spirit. And don't you leave this conference grounds until you have received it. You stay right with God. Just keep ... don't make up your way, the way you want to receive it, see. You've got in your mind that you have to see something, or have some sensation. When you go in there to pray, you just go in and say, “Lord, I come in to get the Holy Ghost,” see, and He'll take care of the rest of it. You just be real sincere and break down all thoughts of you're not going to receive it. Remember, tonight is the night you're going to receive it, see. That's just it.

Like there was an old man in days gone by, he couldn't keep saved. He would get saved, and then after awhile, he'd do something wrong. The devil would say, “See, you never got saved.” Well, that went on for a long time. And one day he got out in the field and he prayed through again. He said, “Now, Lord, I know you saved me. So,” he said, “Satan, I'm going to do something to you.” And he went over and got him an axe and chopped him a great big long stob, drove it down in the ground, and said, “Satan, if any time that you ever come to me and tell me I'm not saved, I'm going to bring you right back and point to this stob. Right here's where it happened, see. I'm saved from this on.”

Now you just drive down the stob tonight. Say, “Satan, from right here is where I'm going to stay at this stob until God gives me the Holy Ghost. You ain't going to take it away from me anymore, or take my thoughts away from me, and make me think I'm too tired, or I ought to do something else.” As long as you got those thoughts, you'll never receive it. You've got to go in there saying, “This is the time I'm going to receive it. This is my hour.” And then you'll get it. You be real business with God, and God will be real business with you. That's right. “Draw nigh unto me and I'll draw nigh unto you,” saith the Lord.

Well, tomorrow night, the Lord willing, I'll have Billy Paul, my son, out here to give out prayer cards for you people that wants to be prayed for. And how many is here from out of state that wants to be prayed for, or out of town, that's on the grounds? Let's see your hands. Oh, there's enough for plenty of prayer cards. So, he'll give them out early so it won't interfere with the rest of the meeting. What time do they usually start gathering in, Brother Sullivan? [Brother Sullivan answers, “Well, from five o'clock on, Brother Branham.”] All right, from five o'clock on till about six-thirty then, you get here, and we'll give out the prayer cards tomorrow night, and call up the line and pray for them as they pass the platform.

Now, this text tonight is a very odd text, and yet it's a very good text for ... and a very familiar text; but it's found in Isaiah, the first chapter and the eighteenth verse, and I believe let's read a few verses before that and just make a ... see if we can't get a context from it. Let's begin at the fifteenth verse, or the sixteenth maybe be better.

Wash you, make you clean; put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes; cease to do evil;

Learn to do well; seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow.

Come now ... let us reason together, saith the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, yet they shall be ... white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.

And now if I would call it a text for this, to draw a context from it, I would call ... what I want to speak on tonight is having conferences. Let us bow our heads now for a conference with God before we go farther.

Our most gracious and loving Father, the God of all life, that sent to us Thy loving Son, the Lord Jesus, that He might be the propitiation for our sins, took upon Himself the form of sinful flesh and was made sin for us, that we unworthy people might be drawn nigh unto God through the shedding of His blood once for all. And we have gathered here in this conference, Lord, in these nights, not just to be seen of others, or to so much as to associate with each other. Lord, we pray that if that has been the attitude of the people up to this time, and myself, that You will forgive us for our sin.

We have come, Lord, in the age of the dying. We've come in the time that when we feel we don't have much time left. And we have gathered here for one purpose and that's to get close to You. We want our sins under the blood. We want close fellowship. We want to talk it over with You, Lord, before You come, for on that day it'll be too late then.

And we pray tonight, Father God, that You'll put such a hunger in the hearts of the people until all up and down these riverbanks will be prayer meetings going on, men seeking God in a desperate condition, knowing that they must find rest to their souls and receive the Holy Spirit or ere they'll plunge someday into eternity without knowing You. O God, be merciful to us!

And as we see our churches and our own Full Gospel groups begin to cool down, and seems like there's no great crying for lost souls, there's no more of that sincere all-night prayer and meditation in the Word, it seems like that we have just drifted, Lord. Forgive us, O God, and let us renew ourselves tonight afresh in the Holy Spirit. We can think of the days gone by in the age of the Methodists when they prayed all night long, and wept with bitter tears for the lost, and they had no peace. And tonight seems like that we can dress nice, and sit down and listen, and go home unconcerned. O Lord, stir our hearts tonight. Put a zeal in us for lost souls. May ministers and the laity, every person becoming a part of the kingdom, and with a burning desire that we'd canvass cities and everywhere, and pull the lost out of the gutters and get them as firebrands for the Lord. Grant it, Father.

We read over in the Book that it is said that the angel went forth and put a mark upon those who sighed and cried for the abominations that was did in the city, realizing by the Scriptures that was the first coming of the Holy Spirit through the city of Jerusalem. And then on His second return in this age to call a people out of the Gentiles for His name, how much more should we be concerned, and sighing and crying for the abominations that's did. We see churches practicing rock'n'roll, and playing bingo, and having all kinds of swimming contests, and so forth, in the church, when prayer meetings and all-night tarrying meetings is forgotten.

God, send us back to the real thing. Let the Holy Ghost come among this people tonight, Lord, and start a Pentecost right here. Grant it, Lord, in every heart. Truly they want to. It's in their hearts to do it, but the cares of the world and the swiftness of passing of time has just wooed them out. Lord, start from this pulpit, from me, and go to the audience and move like never before, and give us a zeal for lost souls. Grant it, Lord. These comments that shall be drawn from the Word, if it be Thy will, we pray that it will be seed in the heart of the people to answer this prayer for Your servant. Grant it, Lord.

We believe, and I believe with all my heart, if such a meeting would break out on this ground that it would be a constant healing service all the time. Satan and his power could not stay in such a holy group as that. Grant it, Lord. I commit it all to You and waiting for You to speak the words now, and let Your Holy Spirit interpret it to the people's heart, for we ask it in the name of Thy Son, the Lord Jesus. Amen.

In this text tonight of conferences, we lately have heard so much about conferences. Wherever you pick up a paper you almost see where some diplomat or some official had a conference at certain places, and certain things taken place. And we wonder, what is conferences for? Why do we hold conferences? What are they to do? They are to get together and reason out different things. Where we come into a conference, we are to reason things together. And I think this is one of the most beautiful scriptures, when God said, “Come, and let's you and I have a conference. Let's us get together and kind of reason things out. Though your sins be as scarlet they shall be as white as snow, though they be red like crimson they shall be white like wool, if you'll only come and let's reason it out together.”

And we find, tonight, as everyone knows, that we are really losing ground. We are losing ground as a people. The world is creeping in among us some way. You can see it, feel it, and can tell it. The world is moving in among us. So I think this would be a wonderful time for us to have a conference, and come talk it over with God and find out what's the matter.

I was reading the autobiography of Charles G. Finney, of how him being an attorney, and there's many of our laws that's based upon the Bible, which caused him to study the Bible. And in there he was reading of where that God made these promises, and he seen the church, so many of them, praying for revival and defeated in their prayer. It's because they lacked faith. When you ask God anything, call Him down and talk to Him, and don't leave until you get the answer; then you know how to work from then on. And how that he—simple childlike way he went about it—and made that conference with God and talked it over. And was one of the greatest warriors of the age that's been since St. Paul, because that he talked it over with God, and got his grounds and got where he was standing and how he stood with God; and then went on. That's what we need to do. That's what could be done right here on this grounds. And it would accomplish more than five hundred gatherings outside of it.

So you say, “Let's let the preacher do it.” This is an individual affair. It's with every one of us. The preacher might do it himself. He might pray and get his soul blessed, and stay all afternoon under the anointing of the Holy Spirit, to walk into the presence of his congregation, anointed, feeling the power of God. But unless that congregation has stayed in the same way, see, it makes a difference. He's got to get the congregation under condition. But then if the congregation is ready to meet the Holy Spirit, then I'll tell you, sinners will weep their way to Calvary—if we can just take it as an individual. You're just as responsible as any of these ministers. God's going to hold you, as an individual, responsible.

And He said, “If there is any sin, if there is any doubt, if there is anything wrong, come, let us talk it over. Let's reason it out together, find out what's the matter. And though your sins be as scarlet....” Now, sin is unbelief. We know that. Though you have doubted, though you've wondered when you would receive the Holy Spirit, or would be healed, or so forth, though your doubts be as red as crimson, they shall be white as snow, see. God made the promise, God will keep His promise. And He's give each one of us an invitation to come. Let us come. The closing of the Bible said, “Whosoever will, let him come. Let him that heareth say, 'Come.' Let him that's athirst come. Whosoever will, let him come.” It's an invitation.

And what if you could have such an intelligence that the president of our United States would ask you to go hold a conference with Khrushchev? What a compliment it would be that the president would invite you to come speak with him, thinking that you could be able to hold a conference with Khrushchev. But remember, not the president but the God of heaven has give you an invitation to come for a conference with Him, for your good.

Now, conferences is a get-together, and usually conferences is held in a time, in a state, of emergency. Now, we had here some time ago what we know as the Big Four Conference, that was held in the Second World War when there come a crucial moment when the free world was just about at their wits' end. They gathered the best intelligence they thought they had, and they gathered them together because they had to put all they had together to bring out the answer of what to do.

I think today that it's time for the Pentecostal people to come together, to get away from our differences and come together on one common ground, for our churches is getting too loose. I think we need an all-night and all-day conference with God. “What shall we do?” for there is a crucial moment.

And when our president of the United States, and Mr. Churchill, and different diplomats from all the free world gathered together, they had a conference. And they talked it over, and they decided on certain things, and made decisions of how to go about to win that war so that the world could stay free.

I remember a minister in Louisville, Kentucky, a friend of mine, during the time of that conference.... People wait to find out what the returns are going to be, what kind of a decision was going to be made. And this minister had his radio on and he was hearing the returns from the conference. And that's when Mussolini, or Hitler and them, was making such great progress.

And while he was listening with all that was in him to hear, to see, what would be the outcome, what they had decided to do, some fellow knocked on the door. And he went to the door, and there stood a man with a bunch of papers under his arm, some kid—long hair down his neck, and some kind of overalls pulled down on his hips like a modern beatnik. And he said, “Say, Preacher, you're the pastor of this church here. You have a great influence in this city.” Said, “I'm a writer of poetry.” Said, “I want you to come down and give me a recommendation so I can get my poetry out.”

And this minister said, “Son, step in just a moment. I'm trying to hear the returns of this conference to see about our nation, see what they've decided to do.” And he said, “Won't you come in and sit down till this is over?”

“Oh,” he said, “this is more important than listening to that.” Oh, to a person ... if we are real Americans, there is nothing more important than hearing a conference like that to see where we stand.

That's the way people act tonight about church. They get out here and run around and carry on with the world, and they haven't got time to go to church to hear ... or sit in a conference to hear the gospel preached. Oh, we ought to be interested, and every meeting and every conference where God's people meets together, we should be interested in it,

find out. It's a crucial moment.

Then they had the Big Four Conference, then God gave them the leading. Then we had the Geneva Conference. And there was another one called the Paris Conference. And our own beloved president, Dwight Eisenhower, has recently been around all the free world having conferences, and so forth.

But you know God has conferences too. And when there is a crucial time happens, some great urgency, and the church is in a state of emergency, God calls a conference. And let's us go back now for a few minutes, and put all of our heart right into the Word now and listen for a few minutes. Let's look in on some of God's conferences. We see the world conferences, and we hear the results from that; now let's go back to some of God's conferences.

I want to start tonight from the Eden Conference. There was when God made man in His image, and took from his side a rib and made a woman, made a helpmate to him, and placed them in the garden of Eden to be His beloved children. When His children got lost, that shocking news struck heaven, “Your children is lost,” God brushed aside everything there was in heaven. He wouldn't send an angel to hunt them up, he wouldn't send a legion of angels; God come Himself to hunt His own lost child because there was a state of emergency. What a beautiful picture for somebody that don't believe in the deity of Jesus Christ, how that God was manifested in the flesh in Jesus Christ to come to the earth. Not trust it in the hands of an angel, or some church authority, but He came Himself, made flesh, and dwelt among us, hunt out His lost child.

And there, when no doubt that Michael might have stepped up, and Gabriel.... And when the message came into heaven, “Your children is lost. They have sinned and gone away,” God didn't take Gabriel and say, “Go down and hunt My children.” He came Himself! It was a man-sized job, a God-sized job.

That's the reason I believe that in this day, when we're living ... when they try to make Jesus just a prophet.... He was more than a prophet; He was God manifested in the flesh, the divine Son of the living God. He was more than just a seer or a good man; He was God manifested in the flesh. God came down to redeem man Himself just like He did in the garden of Eden. Oh, blessed be the name of the Lord! That's love—God so loved the world. Made Himself a body to dwell in and tabernacled here with us to save us.

No wonder people has gone insane trying to explain the love of God. That last verse, I believe it is, of that famous precious song of:

Oh, love of God, how rich and pure! and....

If we with ink the ocean fill,

And were the skies of parchment made;

Every stalk on earth a quill,

And every man a scribe by trade;

To write the love of God above

Would drain the ocean dry;

Nor could the scroll contain the whole,

Though stretched from sky to sky.

That last verse was found penned on the wall of an insane institution. No mind could ever fathom the love that God has for His people. When His son was lost, He wanted to hunt him Himself. A mother will dive through a fire to get her baby when it's in danger. A dad would jump from a fifty-story building to try to grab his baby, anything, give his life. That's what God thinks about His people, His church, His children, when they're lost.

“Let us reason together,” saith the Lord.

When God knew that that shocking state of emergency.... I suppose the first ever came to heaven was when He heard that His children was lost. And He came, frantically, up and down through the garden He went, looking under every bush, “Adam, O my son Adam, where art thou?” There stood Adam and Eve, with their fig leaves sewed together, behind a bush; Father going back and forth, screaming, “Where are you? Where are you?”

That same God goes up and down the aisles night after night, screaming the same thing, “Where art thou? Where art thou?” And He finds Adam and Eve the same way, with some sort of a creed that they have, or denomination they are depending on to save them, hiding yet behind some man-made theology. When God made a preparation for you, when He gave His Son to die in your stead, you must ... got to be borned again. Creeds won't work.

That conference is held at some society, but God's conference is held in Eden to take care of your sins. And there was one held at Calvary (that we'll get to later) to take care of your sins. And the sin problem, your sickness, and all that will ever happen to you, it's already been studied out. Preparations have been made. Just the only thing we have to do is come to God and reason it out, and say, “Lord, I didn't mean to do it.” Provision's already made for it.

Then we find then, when God found them standing behind a bush somewhere, shivering, and with their fig leaf aprons on, God, like.... Always the world conferences, they always try to get to Geneva and Switzerland, some beautiful spot, so it's inspiring. Make certain places, then call the conference together. I guess God ... when He found Adam and Eve hid behind a bush over there, they couldn't come out. They said, “We can't come out, Father. We are naked.”

“Who told you you were naked?” And then they started, just as it always is (what they call in the army), passing the buck from one to the other. God looked around and He found a tree, a certain place, a place He thought would be beautiful. And He got some skins and threw them back in the bushes, and said, “Cover yourself with this and come out before Me.” And they had a conference, they talked it over. Then God made a preparation for them. Oh, I'm so glad there was an Eden conference! Not let us go under fig leaves and something we can sew up together; but God killed something to cover their sins, and gave a promise that through the woman's seed would crush the serpent's head, foretelling what He would do.

I'm so glad of the Eden conference. He made a way, a preparation, a way to take away sin. He made a way that you could come back again, be brought back into fellowship, where you'd lost and standing out somewhere undone, without God.

God made a preparation at this conference. And He made just a preparation temporarily, until the real preparation would be given through the sacrificial life of Christ. He spoke that it would do that. But between that time the lamb had to die. Until that time ... until the Lamb of God came that was to bruise the serpent's head, and his head to bruise the heel, until Calvary. That conference was successful. Oh, it'll beat Satan anywhere. God's Word will defeat Satan any place, any time, on any condition. “Though your sins be as scarlet....”

“You said, 'any conditions,' Brother Branham.”

That's exactly what it said. “Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white like snow. Only thing I'm asking you to do is come to My prepared place, the altar.” God made an altar. There's an altar. There's a place where you meet God. “Come talk it over with Me. I've got a place prepared and a remedy for you.”

It started in Eden, the first conference. He made a preparation. The first emergency was called, and God gave the answer and give the preparation. But people don't want to take that preparation somehow.

But there was the first conference God held with man in the state of emergency. God made the decision. It isn't to us to make a decision, what we should do; God makes the decision what to do. It was God that said, “You must be born again.” It wasn't the association of some denomination; it was God that said that! And it was God that said, “Except you be born of water and spirit, you cannot see the kingdom of heaven.” You've got to be born. That's God's remedy! That's what He decided when He brought the human race in His presence.

There you are. If that ain't straight, I don't know it. That was His decision. The blood was the way! Not fig leaves, not any other kind of a covering, but God's decision at God's conference for God's children that was lost, the preparation was blood. Has been, always has been, and always will be!

You can stand pat on it, like Job of old on the burnt offering. They might accuse you of being this, that, or the other—holy roller, or whatever they want to say—but as long as you're standing on that blood offering, upon laying your hands upon the head of Jesus Christ and confessing your sins, and welcoming the Holy Spirit to you, and it bearing record that He has received you....

That's what God's decision was. That was the preparation that was made at that first conference. I'm so glad they had that conference. It settled sin forever when He had that conference. In the fullness of time, He sent His Son made in the image of sinful flesh, that taken the sins and delivered them that was under the blood of the goats and sheep, waiting for that time, and taken them into the presence of God. Oh, what a glorious thing to know that that conference was held! I'm glad. I know every Christian in here is glad that conference taken place. That was one conference.

Then let's speak of another conference in the state of emergency. I'm going to call this conference the burning bush conference. God had made a promise to His people, and the time of the fulfillment was at hand. And He had chose a man, a prophet, to bring His people out of Egypt. But this prophet had run away, had tried to do it within himself. See, just exactly like it was in Eden, trying to make a fig leaf apron again. Moses was a smart man. He could teach the wisdom of his ... teach the Egyptians wisdom. He was smart. He was schooled in all their learning. He was a military man, and a great man. And he tried that on his intellectuals, on how to deliver the people out from under the Egyptian bondage by his intellectuals. It did not work, and it won't work today!

God's got a provided way. God's got a way for deliverance of sin, and it doesn't come through intellectual powers. It comes through the blood and the covering of the Lord Jesus.

Moses tried his fig leaves, and it failed. It failed then, it failed in Eden, it'll fail today, it'll fail any time! You've got to be born again. You've got to come God's way, that His conference where they decided what to do for sinners ... and you've got to come to that preparation.

Moses tried like Adam did—covered hisself over and said, “I'm a great man.” And he seen one of his brothers mistreated, and said, “Now, I'm a great man. I know how to do this.” He slew the Egyptian, which was wrong. So you see, he tried the fig leaf way just as Adam did, and just as thousands right in this country is trying to do now. The fig leaf way won't work. God condemned it at the conference. Hallelujah! Excuse me. No, don't excuse me. Don't you do that. No, sir. I mean that. That's right. I'm not beside myself. I just feel good, because I know that there's only one way to get to heaven. That's through Jesus Christ. That's God's provided way that's been laid down. The Holy Ghost is the way. There's nothing will take its place. No theology, no church, no big buildings, no organizations, or nothing, will ever take the place of the blood of Jesus Christ, God's way—the Holy Spirit, being filled with the Holy Ghost.

The promise is to you, if you'll just receive it. God made a preparation for whosoever will. The conference was held, decisions was made.

Men all down through the age has stumbled at that. So simple—just accept the blood. You can't cover yourself; take God's covering. You can't learn how to do it. There's no learning about it. God does it Himself. It's supernatural. It's through life. God does the covering. You can't do it, and as much as you try to do it.... You can no more clean yourself from sin by joining churches and taking creeds than a leopard could lick his own spots off of him. No, sir. The more he licks them, the brighter they get. You've got to die to yourself, your own thoughts. Give up, and let the Holy Spirit cover you with His presence and His power! That's God's decision.

That's where the conference was set. That's what the decision was made. That's what ... that's the rules of God. Let's not try to figure out something else. Let's just take what He said about it, take God's provided way. That's it. Take it, accept it, believe it!

God made the decision. He wouldn't let an angel make the decision. He wouldn't let Gabriel make it, He wouldn't let Michael make it. He come to make it Himself. Hallelujah! And when He was made flesh and dwelt among us and died for us, He made the way Himself. That's the reason He is the way, the truth, and the life. No man.... He spoke it through the ages, it's always been God's way. God does it Himself. It's His own children, He won't trust it to an angel. Now, if He won't trust it to an angel, He won't trust it to a conference, or a group of men. Let them be bishops, popes, whatever they may be, how fine they are—that may be all right. But Jesus Christ is God's provided way! That's the way He said. He decided that at His conference. That's the way. That's what....

We must toe up to His line. What if in the U.N. when they were meeting, the Big Four, and one had went away and say, “I'll take it this way,” and the other nation that way? They'd've been apart, they'd've lost the war. That's what we are—Pentecostal people. We've got to unite ourselves together, and come to God on His grounds, through the Holy Spirit.

God had decided this prophet was going to deliver His people, and the prophet done just exactly like His first son did, Adam. He took the fig leaf route, so it wasn't no good. God condemned it. And then God had to come hunt him up. He'd run back out there and married hisself a wife, had a child, Gershom. And married Zipporah, and lived out there (a priest of Midian, his daughter), and was a graceful old sheepherder, getting along fine, nothing wrong. And here come God, just like He did in Eden.

There was something come up before Him. It shocked heaven again, like it did in Eden ... or, before the Eden conference. It shocked heaven. What was it? “I've heard the groans of my people. [Hallelujah!] I've heard their groanings, and I've seen their sweat and blood and toil for the taskmasters. I've come down. They wonder why they're not out of there.” So what did He...? Look around, He found His prophet running somewhere, fig leaf route.

That's exactly what He finds today. Finds His preacher going away to some big school to learn some theology, to be tested by a psychiatrist to see if he's got enough intelligence to be a missionary, or get somebody saved. That's where He finds him, out in that fix. Oh, what the church needs tonight is another conference, God-called conference! Yes.

So He found him. He looked all out through the desert, searching around. I can see that light going down in every little crevice, and every little fig pond, everywhere, going around to find out where this fellow was. And after awhile He found him leisurely walking around under Mount Horeb. Oh, having a good time maybe, playing with his children, and having a fine time, having a lovely little wife, and he was living at ease. And He found him in that condition.

So He said, “I've got to call a conference. I've got to get this runaway prophet back to the calling again.” I hope He does a lot of that on this ground. Oh, first thing you know, He selected.... He said, “I'll see where I can find me a bush at. I got to attract his attention some way.” So He climbed up in top of a bush and sat there. Oh, when Moses seen that bush, the top of it with a big pillar of fire laying up there burning, and the bush didn't burn down.... He called a conference.

I'm telling you, when you ever walk on them sacred sands on one of God's conferences, you come away a different person. Whenever you want....

Adam went away a different man. Moses went away a different man. Certainly. He was equipped then to go. Oh, sometimes it makes you do things real silly to the outside world. It'll make you do things that you think you would not do. But remember, you've been in the presence of God.

Let me say this right here, there is no preacher by God has never been ordained to stand behind the sacred desk until first he's had a conference with God, and come upon those sacred sands where him and God alone stands. You have no right to do it. You have no right. I don't care how much doctor's degree you have. That don't mean that much to God! Not a thing. You've got to have a conference. They had to have it then. Moses did, to meet God. He had to receive his orders from God. There's where it was.

And now there's so many different doctrines and things today—slick-tongued serpents—until they can explain all the things out of the Bible, put it off in some other day. Serpents. I don't apologize for it a bit—that's exactly what it was. Greasy-backed, go along, shiny, polished up, with waved hair and a tuxedo suit on. That's the way the devil looks. He ain't an old John Barleycorn, whiskey a-pouring out of his mouth; he's a polished up devil in these days, I'm tellin' you. The Bible said that he was so slick he would deceive the very elected if it was possible. That's right. Oh, he's a Bible student, a scholar. When he met Jesus he quoted scripture to Him, just one right after the other. Jesus said, “But it's also written....” Amen. He's some fellow.

So Moses, there he was, just as you have to be. No matter how slick the tongue is of a man, no matter how much they try to explain it away, if you've ever been at the backside of the desert, if you've ever been called in the presence of God and stood there and talked to Him, and felt His power surging through you like that light was coming out of that bush over Moses, and know that you've talked to God face to face, all the devils in the world could never explain it away from you. No, sir. That's a place where you met God.

Satan can't do nothing else, because it's an anchored place in your soul that nothing else can ever take its place. You've passed from death unto life and you're born again. You're on them sacred grounds. Nobody ... the devil can't put his dirty foot around there. He can explain the Scripture, and say it was for another day, and this one for another day, and that one for another day, that won't.... But when it comes to knowing God, you've met Him face to face, and you know what you're talking about.

Now that's what Moses hadn't done yet, you see. He had all the theology, but he took the fig leaf route, see. But now ... just like Adam did. But he wanted to be wise. He wanted to know something. You remember, that was Satan's technique. “You'll be wise, and know. You don't know now, but I'll give you some wisdom if you go to my school.” He'll give you plenty of it, all you want. But you only have to know one thing: Jesus Christ died to save sinners that come to Him, accept Him, repent. That's exactly, just as simple.

Said, “Though a fool, shouldn't err in the way,” Isaiah said. God made it so simple. I'm glad He did, or I'd never've understood it. So He just made it simple so we all could understand. That's the way God made it.

Now, and when He talked to Moses at the burning bush, and Moses got a close glimpse of God, he come on to a place where he'd never been before. Something anchored in him. A faith rose up in him. Where he couldn't do it with an army, here he's going to do it himself—him and God—with an old crooked stick. See? He'd had a conference. He went right down into Egypt and done exactly what God told him to do. He performed signs and wonders, and everything else.

And God let the hard times come—buffet him, and knock him down, turn him around. But he got right up again, and said, “I know it's right! I met God and I'm going to take them out yonder!”

When Jannes and Jambres could stand and throw their sticks down and turn into a serpent, and could do all the same things (like a spiritualist can almost do today, deceive the very elected if possible, call out great crowds, and have great so-and-so and everything), that don't stop it a bit. If you've ever been in the presence of God, you know where you're standing. You know who your Father is, you know where you was born from. If a man has no more than a handshake and a name on a book and a letter in some church, he don't know who his papa was.

If there's anything I feel sorry for is a mule. Don't you ... God created all things, but He didn't create a mule, no, sir, as Booth-Clibborn used to say. He didn't create him. No. You know, that was what man done. He crossed from the horse to the jenny. That's what caused a mule. He cannot cross hisself back. He cannot produce hisself no more. That's right. He has to stay right where he's at. And if there ever was a ignoramus, it's a mule. That's right. Why, you can sit and just holler at him, and just scream at him just as much as you want to, he'll stick them big ears out and just look at you.

I've seen so many of them at meetings. You talk about the baptism of the Holy Ghost, they get up and go home, like a mule. That's exactly right. They don't know who their father was. Just stand there and look, and “Haw, haw, the days of miracles is past. Haw, there's no such a thing as that. Haw, haw.” Now, a horse ain't like that. He's gentle and sweet, come up and put his neck over your shoulder, and nicker. He's gentle. But not an ignorant old mule. He don't know who his papa was, who his mama was. He can't cross himself back. He can't reproduce himself. He's just a ... he's a crossbreed.

That's what's the matter with a lot of so-called Christians today, crossbreeds with the world. No wonder you can't never be settled. Double-minded, never able to come to the knowledge of the truth! Man's got to know God by the new birth, and be born and filled with the Holy Ghost, stand in those seats, those tracks there where Moses stood, stand in the presence of God and hold a conference. That's when God called man. Certainly.

Moses goes right down in Egypt, no matter what hard thing come along. All the Egyptians and everything else could perform, and do and impersonate—that didn't stop Moses. He kept going on, because he had had a conference with God. There might be snake handlers and, oh, I don't ... fire walkers, and everything else, come up in the world. But a man that's ever received the Holy Ghost knows exactly where he's standing. If he's ever had a conference or talk with God, been born, those things don't shake him. Certainly not. He knows who he believes. He knows who his Papa is.

Isn't it mighty fine to look at a thoroughbred horse? You go back to his pedigree, you know who his father was, who his grandfather was, who his great-grandfather was. Just go on back—he's got a pedigree. I'll tell you, we got too many straggling Christians without pedigrees. Say, “I was a Methodist last week, a Baptist week before last, and Presbyterian before that, and a Pentecostal before that.” Oh, my, they got no pedigree at all.

But a man that's come to God and stood in the presence of God, and accept God's grace and His salvation, been born again and filled with the Holy Ghost, he is a son of God! Hallelujah! All the devils in hell can't shake him away from it. He knows where he is at, he knows who his Daddy is, he knows where his strength comes from! He knows who he has believed, he knows his God! Certainly.

He knows His Word, he stays with it, he believes God. He eats children's food, he eats sheep food. Too many feeding weeds today instead of sheep food, starving them to death. What we need today is the Holy Spirit back to feed the children, down by the shady green pastures and the still waters. Certainly. God's peace like a river flowing through our soul, knowing that we've passed from death unto life, that we are new creatures in Christ Jesus.

All right. He done just exactly what God told him to do. On his road out, he hit opposition—and you'll hit opposition. That's right. You're going to hit it right in the line of duty, testifying for God, doing the right thing. You're going to hit a snag. The Red Sea was there. Now we're going to talk about another conference. We're going to call this one the Red Sea conference. Right in the line of duty, where Moses run up against a snag, there was the Red Sea before him, Pharaoh's army coming, mountains and deserts on every side, no way of escape, looked like. Now, when we get in the line of duty and hit something like that, it's time to call a conference. I think that's where the Pentecostal church has come to tonight. In the line of trying to hold up the right thing, there's a place where we've hit a snag somewhere. It's time to hold a Red Sea conference. We've got to cross over. Sure, God gave the promise; we've got to go over.

And they hit that Red Sea conference. What did Moses do? He never got all flusterated and excited, said, “Well, I'll go join this other one, or come over to this other group.” Or, “I'll take up with Pharaoh. Maybe I was wrong. I ought to have a peace conference with him.” No, sir. He was in the line of duty, and he stayed in the line of duty.

But the thing he done was go over and select hisself a big rock somewhere (I'd imagine), and he got behind this big rock and stayed there for awhile, and said, “Lord God, I'm in the line of duty. I've done everything You told me to do. Now I'm up against something.” You know what the decision was made? I imagine I see angels sitting on every rock, around like this. There was Moses, right down.... There was God, standing there listening at him. Said, “I'm right in the line of duty and there's Pharaoh's army coming. And I know that You're here somewhere, because You was shining up there in that pillar of fire. So You're here somewhere.”

And all the angels gathered around. And the angels looked over to God, see what He'd say. Told one of the angels, “Go speak to him, and tell him to stand up! Go forward!” Amen. You never heard God say, “Go back.” Never go back! Go forward, as long as you're in the line of duty!

We've received justification, don't know what sanctification means? It's a line of duty—go forward. If you're sanctified and never received the Holy Ghost, it's a line of duty—go forward. If you're sick and you can't get well, you've done all the doctor told you to do and still you can't get well, your line of duty is go forward. “Go forward! Speak to the people, and then go forward, just keep moving on.”

Moses spoke to the people and said, “Quieten yourselves,” picked up his stick, and started walking towards the Red Sea. She just moved away.

That's what a conference means—moving the opposition! Amen. Then you can have a healing service, when you get all of the Thomases out, and all of the doubters out, and all of this, that, and the other, and all the formals out, all the fig leaves. Ought to strip them down to the skin, cover them with the blood—then they're sons and daughters of God.

Just as I have often said.... It's just like springtime now. The old mother bird will go out, and she'll make her a big nest and feather it all up, get ready for little birds. And she could lay a whole nest full of eggs, but if she hasn't been with a mate, them eggs will lay right there and rot. They'll never hatch, they're not fertile. That's the way a lot of church members are. Come into the church and you pat them on the back. They dress well, pay well in the church and everything, and almost take care of the preacher, all the time out to some kind of a social gathering, or something like that, all these kind of things. But if they haven't been with the mate, Jesus Christ, it's just like a nest full of rotten eggs. You might as well dump the thing out and start over again.

We need the baptism of the Holy Ghost with a conference with God, to come in contact with the mate, Jesus Christ. He's the mate of the church. He's the bridegroom to the bride. Come in contact with Him to be filled with His Spirit, the bridegroom.

So Moses had this Red Sea conference, received orders, and marched on. There was another conference I like. I got a dozen of them wrote down here, but I want to hurry to one now. There was a Gethsemane conference one time, where Jesus as a man.... Jesus was the Son of God, created Son of God. God overshadowed Mary and created a blood cell in her that brought forth the Son, Christ Jesus, and God came down and dwelt in Him. “In Him was the fullness of the Godhead bodily.” I Timothy 3:16 said, “Without controversy great is the mystery of godliness, for God was manifested in the flesh, seen of angels [and so forth], received up into heaven.” Oh, God—not a prophet—God made flesh and dwelt among us. There He was, Emmanuel. The Holy Spirit called Him Emmanuel, God with us.

And now it's God in us, the same Spirit. We receive it by portion, measure. He received it without portion or measure. In Him was the fullness of God. All that God was He poured into Christ, and all Christ was poured over the church. Amen. “That day you'll know that I'm in the Father and the Father in me, and I in you and you in me.” Oh, my, when it comes that day! Now we're working on, got orders, just keep moving.

Gethsemane. Come to a place He could have been King, He'd've never had to die. But will He make it? He said in that conference, when angels standing on every side to see what His decision would be, when they was spitting in His face, and going to do everything to Him, He said, “Not my will, but thine be done.” Oh, if we could do that! You say, “Well, now look, Brother Branham, if I receive the Holy Ghost, my mother, my father, my boss, my....” But what about your Lord? That's it. What's He going to say about it if you turn it down? “Well, my church....” I know, that might be all right, but what about your Lord? See, your church can't save you—it takes the Lord. See, you've got to make that decision. You've got to come to that time. Everyone has to. Every son that cometh to God must be tried of God, chastened, chastised, to see if he's a true son of God. There, He was standing there, He said, “Not my will but thine be done.”

Then there was another conference I want to speak right away, and that was the Pentecostal conference. Oh, brother, how we need another one of those! Those people were a hundred and twenty by number, of all of the fruits of His ministry, of all the great meetings He'd had, the tens of thousands He'd healed, He had a hundred and twenty was ready to stand by Him out of the nation. When they'd seen everything that could be done, all kinds of mighty works, and everything else, He had a hundred and twenty stuck by him.

And they had heard God say this: “But you shall receive power after this, the Holy Ghost, has come upon you. Then you shall be witnesses of me in Jerusalem, Judea, and Samaria, and all the world. You're to go into all the world and establish the church, establish the faith amongst the people. Lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the world. The works that I do shall you do also. These signs shall follow them that believe: in my name they shall cast out devils, speak with new tongues, take up serpents, drink deadly things, lay hands on the sick they shall recover.” Oh, my! “But wait a minute, don't you go ... a time yet. There's going to be a conference held. I'll send you word down. You just go on up to Jerusalem and wait up there. Turn on your radio and wait for the returns.”

“How are you going to operate this church?”

(I say this decently, reverently, lovingly, and respectively, to every man, every woman, and every denomination.) “We're going up there to find out whether we're to have denominations or not. Are we going to run it on a bunch of creeds? Are we going to run it this way or that way? How're we going to do it? Well, let's go up and wait till the conference is over. Jesus is gone up to the Father. We'll find out what comes back in a few minutes.” So they waited.

“How long are you going to wait?”

“Until the conference is over.”

“How many days? Two?”

“No, just till it's ... until.”

“Until what?”

“Until the conference is over.”

All right. After the conference was over, they was all up there waiting, these hundred and twenty, waiting to see what would happen, how they must run the church, what they must do. Should they have a great big log and carry all the names, or what must they do? Now, they're going to have the first fruits of it.

“While they were sitting together, there came a priest up with the holy eucharist in a box, said, 'Lick out your tongue.'” Doesn't that sound silly?

Here come one with a little salt shaker of water, and said, “We must ... you know—nothing like....”

Here come a Protestant preacher down the road, Dr. So-and-so. Said, “Give me the right hand of fellowship and we'll put your name on the book.” Wouldn't that sound like Pentecost? That's the way we try to make it. What is it? (Don't you get angry with me.) It's still fig leaves. Absolutely. It's fig leaves.

They were waiting in that conference to see what would happen to the church. And said there came all of a sudden a sound from heaven like a rushing mighty wind. The returns is coming back. And it filled all the house where they were sitting, cloven tongues sat upon them like fire. They were all filled with the Holy Ghost and begin to speak with other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance.

There was dwelling in Jerusalem Jews, devout men out of every nation under heaven. This was noised abroad, and they came together, and were confounded because they heard every man speaking in his own language where he was born. Others was mocking, making fun, and said, “These are full of new wine.”

Watch the chief spokesman now, after he had the returns from the conference. Said, “You men of Judea and you that dwell in Jerusalem, let this be known unto you, and hearken unto my words, these are not drunk as you suppose, seeing it's just the third hour of the day. [The saloons are not open yet. Yes, sir. This was the third hour of the day.] But this is that which was spoke of by the prophet Joel, 'and it shall come to pass in the last days,' saith God, 'I'll pour out my Spirit upon all flesh.'” That's the way the church is to be run.

Oh, they were pricked in their heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the men, “Brethren, what shall we do?”

He said, “Repent, every one of you, and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost, for the promise of the church is to you, and to your children, and to them that's far off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call.” That was the return from God's conference with His Son in heaven! That's the way the church was set in order! Hallelujah!

The Holy Spirit was to run the church. Not bishops and archbishops, and popes, and fathers and grandfathers, but it was to be run by the Holy Ghost. That's the way it's to be. That's what God's conference ... that's what the returns was. That's the way it was supposed to be. Anything else outside of that is a bunch of fig leaves and no-good. Come out from behind them, and then tear them off of you. Strip yourself before God, come and be reconciled. “Come and have a conference with Me. Let's talk it over. Though your unbelief has been like scarlet, I'll make it as white as snow.” He'll prove it to you. Conference, Pentecostal conference.

I got another conference and then we are going to stop. We got so many here, but I got one more I just got to get to. Then after about four or five days after Pentecost, Peter and John was just going up to the temple one day to pray. There laid an old crippled man, kind of lame from his mother's womb, about forty years old. And he rattled his little cup and wanted something. And I can prove that Peter and John was Pentecostal preachers. They said, “Silver and gold have I none.” That's right. Yes, sir. He said, “Silver and gold have I none. I haven't got any money, but what I've got, I'll give it to you.” God, let me have that! I don't want money; I want that! “Such as I have.... I got faith in Him. I've been filled with His Spirit. He dwells within my heart. He lives in me just the same as He lived in Christ. Not as much, but I'm His son. Such as I have I'll give to you. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk.” Whew!

Oh, my! A conference had to be held.

What did they do? The great Sanhedrin church, great organization, said, “We'll stop this nonsense. None of this divine healing around here. The days of miracles is past.” Sure, they believed it. “It might have been, way back in the days of Moses. But Moses said ... those days way back, somewhere else.” They're always putting it in the past, or way somewhere in the future.

I heard someone say one time that divine healing would be in the Millennium. Why, you got a glorified body then, so what do you need with any divine healing? If ... the devil trying to put you off in something over yonder, some Millennium you're going to be something. You are right now sons and daughters of God. Amen!

If your man-made theology just give you a little cold 'tater and told you to wait, you go ahead; but I got a full-course dinner of the Holy Ghost. Bless God, that's right!

They want to tell you stand off back here and eat some peelings, or gnaw some bones, and tell you the chicken's all gone from years ago. Don't you believe that. God has a full square meal for a full man that's got full faith in the Son of God, and believe it, and will follow the instructions. The menu reads to “whosoever will, let him come; and the promise is unto you and your children and to them that's far off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call.” Hallelujah! (I believe I could play that thing right now. I really do.) That's right, brethren. Same Holy Spirit with the same signs, same wonders, the same power. Yes, sir —God's Holy Spirit.

Oh, I know it makes you sound silly to the world, but what do you care about the world?

I think about like David did. He was so filled with God's glory, when he seen that ark coming he run out there and kicked his legs way up in the air and begin to dance all around. And his little self-styled wife (denominational light) looked out of the window, and she said, “Oh, how he embarrasses me.” So that night when David come home, she said, “David, what was you doing out there acting like an idiot (in other words), dancing around and carrying on, sticking your legs way up in the air?”

He said, “I was dancing and rejoicing before the Lord.”

God looked down out of heaven, said, “David, you're a man after my own heart.” Sure. And his wife got all puffed up about it. And what happened? She was barren the rest of her life. God put a curse on her. Cursed is any man that'll touch God's anointed. “Don't touch my anointed [That's right!], for it'd be better for you that a millstone was hanged at your neck and drowned in the depths of the sea than even to offend one [That's right.] of these little ones that believe in me.” And these signs shall follow them little ones that believe in me. That makes a distinction; that tells you whether you've been to the conference or not. That's right. “These signs shall follow them.”

Oh, He's so good. There's no stopping place, is there? Let's finish this conference out.

They took them up there and said, “Well, turn their backs around. We'll whip them down a little bit.” They said, “Let me tell you something right now! Don't you preach no more divine healing in the name of Jesus.”

Peter said, “Well, there's only one thing.” They let them out. Said, “John, let's go hold a conference.” They go up to get the rest of the party and come together. One speaking, “Well, the Lord did so-and-so down here.” When that Pentecostal group got together, testimonies was coming from everywhere, what God had done.

Said, “Let's hold a conference.” So they all got together, and they knelt down, like we ought to do tonight. That's right, all kneel down. And said, “Lord, why did the heathens rage, and the people imagine a vain thing?” Said, “truly, against thy holy child Jesus.” And said, “O Lord, give us power and boldness to stretch out His holy hands to heal the sick.” They was holding a conference, and they was waiting for the returns. And just about that time, the returns come from heaven. And when it did, power filled the place and shook the building where they were assembled together! And they spoke the Word of God with boldness and preached divine healing, until the last one of them was dead.

Conferences. Oh there's many of them, emergencies. What was he going to do? They were forbidden by the law to do it. “Who are we going to listen to, the law or God?” Peter said right there in the midst of them all.

They said, “Don't you preach no more in Jesus' name.”

He said, “Who should I listen to, you or God?” That's right. They said he was ignorant and unlearned. He didn't have enough education to sign his own name, and yet was left with the keys of the kingdom. How God does things! If that isn't wonderful. Yes, sir.

God give him the keys and told him, “What you bind on earth, I'll bind it in heaven.” And he couldn't even sign his own name. No, sir. What a man to leave the keys with. But they taken consideration of him. They understood that he had been with Jesus. That's what they want to know today. He had been in a conference one time with Jesus and he'd received something.

Now brethren, let me have just one more little conference before we close. Look, there's another conference coming. You might not have attended the Geneva; I didn't either. You might not have attended the Big Four, or the Paris, or any of those other conferences. And you may have never even attended any conference with God here. But let me tell you something this, my friend: there's one that you're going to attend, and that's this one—the judgment. All will be there. You're going to attend that conference.

And there's only one thing that God will recognize—that's the blood of his own Son. Have you been covered with it, friends? Oh, you're going to it. I don't care who you are, you're going to stand in the presence of God, and that's going to determine your eternal destination of His judgment. “And when I see the blood [and nothing else but the blood], when I see the blood, I'll pass over you.”

How many people here that has never attended God's Holy Spirit conference and been filled with Him? Let's see your hands, that has never yet been filled with the Holy Ghost, raise your hands. How many over the building has never received the Holy Ghost? Is there a sinner here that's never had a conference with God at all? Raise your hands, and say, “I have never had a conference with God. I'm a sinner.” Now, be honest. Be honest. “I've never had a conference.”

Let me just say this before closing. I'm impressed to do it right now. As a minister, I confess that it always scared me when I thought of death, what would happen to me between now, when I die, and the coming of the Lord Jesus. When I meet my friends in heaven, they'd be little spirits. I thought the spirit would go out of me. And I'd see Brother Sullivan, I'd say, “That must be Brother Sullivan, that little spirit. I can't shake his hand—it's rotten, in the grave. I can't look at him with eyes because his eyes is gone. Mine is too, see. I can't feel him, because he's just a spirit.” It worried me. I wanted to talk to him.

The other morning (about three Sunday mornings ago), I was lying in bed, and I woke up about seven o'clock. We go to church at nine-thirty. And I raised up, and I looked over at the wife and she was sleeping well. I just got to studying about that. I kept hearing something say “Press on. Just keep pressing on.”

I said, “Well, I'm fifty years old. I've got to do something for the Lord. I haven't done nothing yet.” And He put me in my life here and, my, anyone knows that something happened to me. I was a cocklebur and He made a wheat out of me. I don't know how it ever come. I said, “How could it ever be?” And I said, “What can I do, Lord? I'm fifty years old and my days are numbered. I haven't got very much longer to stay.” I said, “What can I do to do something for you?”

I kept hearing a voice saying, “Press on.”

Now remember, friends, here lays my Bible. If I'm a fanatic, I don't know it. If I am, I don't know nothing about it. I believe my heart's with God. And I believe He's proved that before you. I may be wrong in some things, but if it is, it's unconsciously wrong, see. And then, when we were.... I was thinking about that, and I kept hearing something say, “Press on.”

I'd say, “Who is that?” I said, “It must be my wife.” I said, “What did you say, Honey?” She never moved. I shook her. I said, “Mede.”

She said, “Huh?”

She was sleeping well, and I said, “Well, it wasn't her.”

I listened again. It said, “Keep pressing on.”

Now, I know visions. This could have been a vision. If it was, I never had one like it. And I said, “Maybe it's me saying it,” because one time I was all burdened and distressed, going to a meeting, and I knelt there on the floor to ... praying to get the burden off of me; and I heard someone standing at the door just rattling off something, talking in German or something. I thought, “Well, wonder who that is?” I slipped up and I couldn't see no one. And I thought, “Well, where's it at?” It was me—speaking myself, see—and I just held real still until it finished up. And that's when that woman, you know (you all know about it, I guess I've told you), that was healed, she.... Laying on the side of the road bleeding to death, and a half-hour farther she was there perfectly normal and well, the Holy Spirit making intercessions. And then ... and I thought maybe it might be me saying, “Keep pressing on.” So I put my finger over my mouth like this, and I heard it say, “Keep pressing on, pressing on.”

I said, “Who are you that's talking to me? Who is in this room?” And that's the way it comes. Just like visions here, it's just as real. Just a voice, just the same as you hear mine, said, “Keep pressing on.”

And I said, “Keep pressing on?”

Said, “The great reward is just ahead.”

And I said, “You mean apast the curtain?”

Said, “Yes. Would you like to see it?”

I said, “I would. It would help me if I could just see.”

And something happened. I felt myself leaving this body. Now, I never had a vision like that—I, looking back, seeing myself laying there, leaning up against the headboard of the bed with my hands up like this, see. And I looked at myself, and I thought, “I'm dying.” And I started moving out, and the first thing you know, I come into a little place that kind of set something like that. And as soon as I got there, here come thousands of people, and everybody looked young. Now, I'm in a mixed multitude. I'm your brother. You watch, I say this in the name of the Lord, you'll each meet me there if you'll be right.

But these young girls coming to me, throwing their arm around me and hollering, “My precious brother.”

Now, look. I've ... when I was a sinner I never run around. I wasn't ornery to run around with women. Now, I don't care how saintly a man tries to live and how godly he lives, if a woman puts her arms around a man, it's a human sensation. Now, you just might as well.... I don't care, you can call yourself sanctified—and I believe in sanctification, too—but you're still a human. That's exactly right, and there's a sensation. I don't say you'd do wrong. Certainly not. The power of God keeps you, and you go on. But even ... in that place that human sensation wasn't there.

And here come people, just throwing their arms around, saying, “My precious brother.” All them women had long hair, white garments, barefooted. They were young, about ... looked maybe about eighteen years old, twenty. They'd grab me, and throw their arms around me, and say, “Oh, our precious brother,” and just hug me, like that, and walk away, and somebody else....

I seen my first wife come up. Now, she died when she was about twenty-two. She hadn't changed. She come running. I said, “Surely she'll call me 'husband.'”

And she walked up, and she begin smiling, and threw her arms around me. She said, “My darling brother.” And then she hugged some woman that had just hugged me, some girl.

And here come men, looked like they were ... had kind of shaggy hair down on their shoulder. And they were the nicest looking people I ever seen—eyes as starry, pearly white teeth. They were throwing their arms around me, and saying, “Oh, our precious brother.”

And one of them hollered at the other one and said, “Think! He's arrived! He's arrived at last.”

And I thought, “Have I died and this is ... I've come into glory? Is this it?” And I thought, “It couldn't be.”

And I looked, and that voice that had spoke to me down in my room, I heard it again. I looked back and I seen myself laying there on the bed. I never had anything like that to happen. It's done something to me. I can never be the same no more.

So then I looked and I thought, “What is this?” I thought, “Well, all them people look young.” And I looked down and I was young. I'd turned back to a young man again. I said, “Well, this is strange.” And I looked. And I can't explain it, there's no words that I can think of. If I'd say superb, or supreme, or perfect, that wouldn't touch it. There was no tomorrow, there was no yesterday. They were in eternity. And they never got tired, they never had to eat, yet they had senses. I could feel them. They could speak, they was looking at me, they had senses. And I said, “I don't understand this.”

And that voice said, “This is perfect love.” Said, “Isn't that what you spoke the Holy Spirit was?”

I said, “Yes.”

“And this is perfect love.”

And about that time a big bunch of men lifted me up and took me to a place and set me up—kind of high, like a stand, or something. And here was people (I could see them) by the tens of thousands, coming from everywhere—every one young, beautiful—running, hugging me. I said, “Well, I don't get this.”

And just then a beautiful young woman run up, and she said, “Oh, my darling brother.” She said, “We're so happy to see you. Welcome.” And she walked away.

And I said, “Praise the Lord, sister.” I looked around. And then I thought, “What is this? What's going on? What's happened?”

Just then a voice said, “In the Bible, where it said that Jacob was gathered with his people, and the other one, this is liken unto that, where you will gather with your people.

I said, “All them Branhams?” I said, “I never believed there was that many.”

He said, “They're not Branhams,” said, “they're your converts. They're your converts.” Said, “That woman that you're admiring,” said, “do you know how old she was when you led her to Christ?”

I said, “I have no idea.”

He said, “Past ninety.” Said, “See, she's young forever.”

And she looked up at me. She said, “Brother Branham, Jesus will come someday, and then we'll go back to earth.” And said, “Then we'll receive our glorified body. Then we'll live together forever.”

I said, “Well, what are you setting me up here for?”

They said, “You was a leader. You led us.”

I said, “Oh, let me see Jesus, if I've passed over. I want to see Him.”

That voice said, “You can't see Him now.” Said, “He will come, but first He'll come to you and,” said, “judge you by the gospel you preached.”

And I said, “The gospel I preached?”

“Yes.”

And I said, “Will St. Paul have to stand before his converts?”

Said, “Absolutely. He will too.”

I said, “I never varied one word. I stayed just exactly the way the Bible said it. I don't care what anyone said or did not say, I stayed right with it like that. So if Paul's group is saved, mine is too.”

And a great scream from (looked like) thousands and thousands said, “We know that.”

I said, “Praise God!” I never was so happy that I stayed true to the Word. I never was so happy.

And just then, I looked.... Years ago I used to have an old hunting dog. His name was Fritz. And he was half Airedale and half Newfoundland. He was a great big dog. And he used to go with me everywhere—when I'd go hunting, and.... Best old thing I ever had. He'd lay with me. And he put me in school clothes from hunting, treeing possums, and skunks, and whatmore I trapped. And so, he just kept me in school clothes. And I'd leave him anywhere, he'd find his way home.

And one day, when we moved into the city, a policeman come by and throwed a dog button in the yard and killed him. When I come home and buried him—I was just about sixteen, seventeen years old—I patted the last bit of dirt on there, I said, “Fritz, I'll kill that man for that.” Went in the house and got my rifle and started down to the police station to get him.

And when I got on the road, a little old Ford run up behind me, and it was my father. He grabbed that rifle out of my hand (he's a little bitty man), slapped me up side of the head, and said, “Get in that car.”

And I went back, and I said, “Fritz....” Went to his grave, I said, “Fritz, here's what I will. If Pop won't let me do it that way, I'll find him on the street walking someday and I'll lose control of my car. I promise you, I'll get even with him, see, for killing you.” And I meant it. And about a year after that I was saved; and I lead this man to God and buried him after he was saved. Mr. Short, a police.

Old dog was gone.

I always thought—after I was saved—I thought, “Wonder when I get over there if I'll see old Fritz.” And while I was sitting there, I looked coming down across the hill, and here come old Fritz coming up to me. He was just licking his tongue, you know, and panting, like that, looking at me. I looked coming behind him, and here come old Prince, my horse, my saddle horse. And he run up to me, and he put his neck around me. And I said, “O God, what is this?”

Just then a voice spoke and said, “All that you ever loved and all that ever loved you, God has given to you. We're all here together.” Oh, my. My heart just melted within me. “All that you ever loved and all that ever loved you, is gathered here with you to meet God.

I said, “Oh, praise be to God.” And about that time I felt myself moving. I said, “I don't have to go back, do I?” And I kept ... in just a minute I was back there at the bed again.

Friend, death does not change a man; it just changes your dwelling place. I've got a wife, a very sweet wife, sitting right there. I've got three little children, two little girls and a little boy, and Billy Paul. I want to live for them, but my first purpose is to live for Christ, for my ministry. The second, I'd like to live long enough that I could see my little Joseph, sitting there, become a minister, take the spirit that I shall leave him. May my spirit come upon him.

When I dedicated him to God, standing there, in his mother's arms.... I don't know, there was ten or fifteen babies. When I picked him up, the Spirit caught me and said, “Joseph, my son, you are a prophet.” God, let my spirit come in a double portion on my son.

When I come to the end of the road and I can't go no farther, I want to hand this Bible to Joseph and say, “Honey, don't you ... don't you compromise on one word. Stay true to God. If it takes everything there is, you stay true to God.” When I can do that, and see Joseph take my Bible and walk to the pulpit as anointed servant of God—all done then, all I can do for God—it'll be a happy day. When I know that this old wrinkled-up, worn-out hull can be swapped, a leak in this old building, the life leaking out of it, there's a better home just across the river yonder.

Listen, friends, wherever that is, it isn't one breath between us and there tonight.

With all my heart (it's the first time I've ever told this outside of in my own church), with all of my heart, by the grace of God, with all I could do, I promised God, “I'll pull every soul, if I have to make it, and compel it, and everything else, to come to Jesus Christ.” For what a time that was, when those people—them bright-eyed women and men—standing there with their arms around me, screaming, “My darling brother,” and know that my ministry had been the cause of them being there. “God, help me forever to win souls to Christ,” is my prayer.

Let us pray.

Heavenly Father, as we are now at the very peak of this meeting, we are here in a conference with our brethren, with precious brothers, Lord, who believes this gospel, these full gospel preachers who stood on the street, many of them here, when I was a sinner boy, preaching this same Word and the baptism of the Spirit. Many old gray-headed mother here has broke up corn and tried to make bread for her children, and allowanced them at the table to try to push the gospel on. And here they sit tonight, old and gray-headed, many of them broke down, stoop-shouldered. I've shook their hands here, on this ground, and I know they're here. O God, just let them know that just one breath after this left here they'll turn back to young men and women to live forever in a land where there'll never be a gray hair or a wrinkle, where there'll never be a sickness or a heartache.

Oh, for that glorious place, wherever it was, Lord, that I was in that night, or that morning! I pray, God, that every person here hear me. O God, if I've ever found grace in your sight, let my prayer be answered. May every person that's here on these grounds, may I meet them, every one, over there in that glorious place, wherever it was or whatever it was, Lord. Let me meet them in that place. I love them and they love me, and You told me, Lord, “All that you ever loved, and all that loved you, has gathered here to be with you.”

O God, grant that that crowd will increase by the millions. Grant it, Father. Have mercy upon us. Let me never in all my life, Lord, never let me compromise with one word of this Bible, because I know first I'll be judged, and their eternal destination is resting upon that. Help, Lord. Let me be honest and sincere and tell the people that they must be filled with the Holy Ghost. Grant it, Lord. They must be born again. Grant it. Help us, forgive us of our sins.

God, tonight there's men and women here who raised their hands they didn't have the Holy Ghost. Grant, Lord, that this will be the night, this'll be the time that there'll be such a spirit take ahold of them, such a spirit of longing and thirsting. “Blessed are ye when you do hunger and thirst for righteousness for they shall be filled.” You said so, Lord. You promised it. I'm quoting your Word to You, Lord. If they're hungry and thirsty, You promised You'd fill them. And I believe every word that You said is the truth. Lord, let them be filled tonight. Grant it, Lord.

If some sinner was here and kind of cheated on his own conscience awhile ago, his or her conscience, know that they're sinners and they never raised their hands, God shame them, call them out from behind the bush. Cover them with the skin of the Lord Jesus, His covering, the Spirit. He was clothed and housed by the Holy Spirit. Let that come upon them tonight, Lord. Convince them. May they come out and hold a conference with You and be reconciled to God through the blood of Jesus Christ. Grant it, Lord, I pray, in Jesus' name.

And while we have our heads bowed, is there a sinner, any sinners here would like to walk up here just a minute? Maybe this might not help you, but I want to be sure of this. I've told you the honest truth, so help me. God knows that. I want to be sure that there's not a sinner on the ground. Let me say this, thus saith the Holy Spirit, “Except a man be born again, he cannot enter into the kingdom.” And if you're here tonight and thus saith the Spirit of God that's within me, I tell the truth, I lie not.

The very thing that vindicates it is the returning of that prophetic spirit that discerns the thoughts, tells you what you've done, what you will do, what'll happen to you, every predicament, every time, perfectly, for year after year. That's a vindication that I have told you the truth.

What did the word of the Lord come to? The prophet. He had the word of the Lord. Don't listen to some fig leaf idea. Come and believe. Come and receive. And Jesus Christ, who is my judge, knows that I have told you that I went into some place that was glorious, where the old become young, where they live forever and never died, and with a promise of returning to the earth to receive a glorified body. God knows that's the truth.

I invite you, my sinner friend. Please let me beg you, let me persuade you. If getting on my knees will do any good, if weeping, if persuading will help, let me persuade you. Don't go any other way, but come to Jesus now, old and young, and be reconciled to God. I stand here as a minister of the gospel ready to take you by the hand and pray for you. Will you come here now to me and let us pray together? Sinner friend, whoever you are, young or old, I wait to receive you. Will you come now while there is time for grace, and time that God is calling you?

God bless you. I see two, a man and a woman coming forward, coming right down. Brother Joseph, if you'll move just a moment there and let the brother come right through here, and the sister. Would some other sinners let me persuade you? Will you come be reconciled to God? Here comes a little boy and a little girl.

I tell the truth in Christ. I lie not. There's no man can take the doctrine that I preach and disprove it. There's no one can do it. I've never seen anyone could do it. It's the gospel truth. The discernments of the Spirit is perfect. No man can ever say that it's ever not been perfect. And I tell you now there is a perfect place, a perfect heaven, a perfect God, a perfect Saviour, a perfect blood, a perfect atonement, a perfect being for you.

Now, if you are a church member and have just made a confession, rake them fig leaves from you tonight. Walk up here before this audience, stand here so I can pray with you. Will you come? Just look at the people gathering up here now. Here's what Jesus said, “He that will confess me before men, him will I confess before my Father and the holy angels.” They come here to stand. Here's a man even on crutches trying to get up the steps. That ought to shame some of you that's able to walk up without the crutches. May he go down without the crutches is my prayer. Come. Some of you could come this way, come over here, come up this way, come here. Will you come? I'm waiting on you. God bless you, my brother. Come right there. Would some more sinners just rise up and come? Let me persuade you in Christ's name.

Here come an aged couple, holding one another's arms. How sweet that is to know even at this age they're coming now to be reconciled to God. Listen, look at me. If this couple here is coming in deep sincerity, I say this in the name of the Lord Jesus, if they're coming in great sincerity, I'll meet them in another land when they are a young couple again, and shake their hand.

Oh, you pass over it, it's so simple. God didn't make it complicated, a whole lot of rules you have to learn. You know what we're trying to do? Somebody say, “What must I do to be saved?”

You say, “You have to quit smoking. You have to quit drinking.”

We're telling what they have to quit doing; Paul told him what he must do: Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. That's all. Not what you have to quit doing; what you must do to be saved. Believe first —these other things take care of themselves. You believe first.

Will you come, sinner? I'm just going to wait a moment longer because....

Before I rose from that bed I shook my wife (sitting right there now). She was still asleep and I shook her. I said, “Honey.”

She said, “What?”

I said, “Something's happened.” And I told her. I got out on the bed. Is a picture of Jesus just above my bed, over on this side there's praying hands that was carved for me in Germany, souvenirs. On the other is little old shack I used to live in, some German artist painted on canvas. Right back on this other side is a picture of the angel of the Lord standing over. You've got the picture of it, many of you. I looked up. I said, “Before God, before Christ, before the heavenly host, I promise You, God, to persuade and beg and even compel the people to come. For even if I have to get them a little angry with me now,

how that ninety-year-old woman in the beauty of a young woman standing there looking at me said, “Oh, my precious brother.”

And that one that was talking to me said, “The reason she's saying that, she was past ninety when you led her to Jesus. Now she can never be old or die no more. No wonder she was appreciative.”

Won't you come? Is there another? Is there just another one would raise up? I just feel constrained somehow that I'm not doing my best. Come, let me persuade you. Let me ask you to come. Is there another? Is there another? Someone will just rise up and say, “Yes, brother preacher, I want to come now. I believe every word that you've said is the truth. I'm coming to be reconciled to God”?

All of you, my precious friends, from this little young boy all the way around to this middle-aged man, I promise you in the sincerity, I've told you the truth. God strike me if I haven't told you the truth, see. That's right. I've been honest with you. I'll meet you again if you're really sincere. I'll meet you again in a land where you'll all be young, where death is gone away. I speak in the name of the Lord Jesus, I lie not. That's true. Now you've come. Something drawed you, something said come.

I hope God makes a preacher out of you, son—I do—that will take the gospel, after you've maybe come to Brother Branham's grave someday, and say, “Yeah, he spoke to me one night at the Chatauqua in Ohio.” May He grant it, you little boys and little girls.

How many here hasn't received the Holy Ghost? Would you like to come and stand right here while we pray? Just come for a word of prayer. Remember, “Except a man be born again, he cannot enter into the kingdom. The promise is unto you and to your children.” (I don't think we have room for them up here, Brother Sullivan. I want them to just fill up the aisle there just a moment.) I want to pray. I want this done right. I want it rightly done. You've got correct.... I know, Brother Sullivan, you wouldn't let anyone in there but what would be real instructors in this room. That's good. This has all been taken care of by godly men.

Now, we're not condemning you. We're not condemning your religion, saying Presbyterian, or Methodist, or Baptist. That's fine. God bless the Presbyterian, Methodist, and Baptist. But you want to be a Presbyterian, Methodist, and Baptist and have the Holy Ghost. That's what you want. Whatever you are, you want to be Christ's. You stay with your church, that's all right. You'll be a light in that church to lead others. Let me tell you friends, you don't know what happiness is, remember, until you've crossed over the land yonder and really see what it is.

Look, would I do this as a servant of Christ? I put this Bible over my heart and say I have.... It could not enter, if that was one ... the first heaven I was privileged to see. And Paul was caught up into the third heaven. What did he see?

No wonder he said, “Eye has not seen, ear has not heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man what God has for them in store that love Him.”

You say then, “Brother Branham, Paul said we must believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.”

That's correct, but Paul also said, “Have you received the Holy Ghost since you believed? Have you received the Holy Ghost since you believed?” That's the next question. Now you want to receive the Holy Ghost, don't you? These people want to be saved. You want to receive the Holy Ghost. Now is that all that's coming? Is that all in the building or around the building that hasn't got the Holy Ghost? All right.

Now, if God keeps His promise, I can prove this at this minute. The Holy Spirit can stand here, and call a group of people in this audience, and speak to them. It's just a gift. You just have to just commit yourself to God and wait for it, it begins to speak. How many has seen that done? Of course you have, night after night. I tell the truth, now if you are sincere and believe this with all your heart, you're going to receive the Holy Ghost. You're going to receive it. Now, don't pay no attention if somebody's around you, maybe he's doing one thing, somebody else.... Don't look at them. You look at the sacrifice.

You're going in to hold a conference. You're going to talk it over with God right now, hold a conference. “Lord, something told me I needed the Holy Ghost. Here I am to receive it. Open up the windows, Lord. I'm ready for it.”

And to you here, “Lord, I want to be your child. I now receive Jesus as my personal Saviour.” Will you do that? Each one of you? Will you receive Him, son, as your Saviour? You around there, you will receive Him as your Saviour? All along here? All right. Do you want to receive the Holy Ghost? You're going in to hold a conference now to receive the Holy Ghost. If that's right, raise up your hand to God. “I'm going in to receive the Holy Ghost.” All that want to love Jesus, raise up your hand. “I want to serve Him. I will receive Him right now. Nothing I can do. I accept Him as my Saviour, Someone who died for me.”

Now, would I dare let you get off of here without I was sure, as humanly sure as I could, that God.... I want to meet you over yonder. I want to meet you children. I want to meet you people. I want to meet you. Now, with all my heart I'm going to pray, and I want each one in this building to bow your heads. I want you not to try to leave now. We're going to pray for the sick in a few minutes. Now I want you to bow your heads and I want you to pray with me that God will save these people here.

I believe my heart with all that's in me they're already saved. I'm just going to offer God thanks. They've done accepted Jesus. They raised up their hands that they accepted Him as Saviour, and “he that will confess Me before men, him will I confess before my Father and the holy angels. He that heareth my words and believeth on Him that sent me has eternal life, shall never come to the judgment but has passed from death unto life.” That's the Bible.

But I want you to pray, I want you to thank God. Then we're all going to go over here in this other room over here and stay there until something happens to us. Let's bow our heads everywhere. Pray with me, all you sainted people. In your own way, down in your heart, pray for these people.

Dear Jesus, how do I know this may be the last sermon I'll ever deliver? This may be my last opportunity to ever call a sinner to repentance. I do not know, Lord. I trust that I'll be able for years to do it until You come, if that be possible and permissible with You. But here is young, middle-aged, and old, standing on the platform humbly, sweetly, even to these little children with tear-dimmed eyes coming to receive You as their Saviour. You said this in Your own words, “He that will come to me I will in no wise cast him out.” Then they're Yours, Lord, they're the trophies of the message tonight. They're Yours because Jesus died. You said, “All the Father has given me will come to me. None of them will be lost. I'll give him eternal life, raise him up at the last day.” That's Your Word, Lord. You said that “He that heareth my word and believeth on him that sent me has eternal life, shall never come into the condemnation or judgment, but has passed from death unto life.”

Lord, I have called them, the Holy Spirit spoke to them, they responded and come. Now they're Yours, Lord, I commit them to You as God gives them to Jesus as love gifts of His grace. Bless them, Lord. May I be able, in that land where You had me the other day, see these people again, shake their hands. How they'll hug my neck and I'll hug theirs, calling brother and sister! How the old carnal sinful life will be faded away and all the old sinful nature will be no more, and we'll truly be unadulterated brothers and sisters. What a time that'll be, God! Let it come quickly, Lord Jesus. Come quickly. Transform these people tonight, Father, we pray. All that You've called, You said You justified, and all You justified, You glorified. I pray that they'll be yours from henceforth. I commit them into Your hands in the name of Jesus Your Son.

Here stands many around this altar at the bottom of this rail, men and women, boys and girls, that has accepted You as personal Saviour. They want to be filled with the Holy Ghost. Peter said on the day of Pentecost, the promise was to them. And we find it true in every age, and ever since then, that any man that will come thirsting and hungering, You never turn him away. You always fill him. You keep your Word. I pray, God, tonight with all my heart, with all that's in me, let not one of these ... I claim them every one for You.

Satan, you doubting spirit, you unbelieving devil, I charge thee in the name of Jesus Christ, the righteous Son of God, depart from them. May the Holy Ghost of God fall upon them this night and may they be filled with God's Holy Spirit, every one of them come out on these grounds tomorrow, preaching the gospel, testifying, going everywhere, scattering the news everywhere, that the Holy Spirit is still real. Grant it, Lord. I commit them to You with my sincere prayer, and it said, “The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.” When hundreds of righteous men in here, and women, are praying, God, receive them. We give them to You in Jesus' name. Amen.

All right. The leader right here is the man here to lead them. Turn right this away now to the prayer room. You go right down this way, my brother and sister. The brother that's got the sore foot there, you come out, I think, this way, to go down. Can't you make that curtain right there? Can get in there all right? Brother Sullivan will take care of that. Go right this way now for the seeking service, the waiting service. Don't you come out of there.... You go in there with a determination. You say, “I'm tired,” that's the devil. You say, “I'm going in, I hope I get it tonight,” that's still the devil.

“I'm going in to get it because God gave it to me! He promised it to me, and I'm going after it. I'm going to hold a conference, and I'm going to stay in this conference till God comes and answers me.” That's the way. “God, if You don't give me the Holy Ghost, You'll find me laying dead back here.” Get sincere. God'll be sincere with you.

I love Him, I love Him

Because He first loved me,

And purchased my salvation

On Calvary's tree.

[Brother Branham speaks to someone] Right here. Go right back and receive Him. He's right there waiting for you where you...

I just got something sweet. This darling little, pretty little, blond-headed darling—about like my little Sarah sitting there—she said, “Brother Branham, I just wanted to tell you something. When you were here last year....” Was it, honey? When I was here the other time, she had warts all over her. Said I prayed for her and the warts all went off. And tonight she felt she ought to come give her life to Jesus. Bless her little heart. God bless you, sweetheart. Go right back. Some of you brothers show her. Bless her little heart.

I love Him, I love Him

Because He first (Let's

raise our hands.) loved me,

And purchased my salvation

On Calvary's tree.

Let's hum it. Oh, praise His name. How that thrills my heart.

...my salvation on Calvary's tree.

Aren't you glad you had a conference with Him not long ago? Aren't you glad that He was there to answer you, seal you until the day of your redemption with the seal of His grace and His Spirit? Some man said to me not long ago, a very precious friend, an old preacher friend back when I was in the Baptist church, He said, “Brother Branham, Abraham believed God, and it was imputed unto him for righteousness.”

I said, “That's right, doctor.”

He said, “What more could Abraham do but believe?”

I said, “No more. But God gave him the seal of circumcision as a confirmation of his faith being reconciled.” I said, “Has He ever sealed you, doctor, with the Holy Spirit?” See, if you say you got faith and He's never give you the Holy Ghost yet, He's never recognized your faith, see. After Abraham believed God, God give him the seal of circumcision as a sign that He had reconciled him or recognized his faith.

If you say, “I got faith in God,” He's never give you the Holy Ghost, He's never recognized you yet. There's still something hanging on. But when He gives you the Holy Ghost, He seals you until the day of your redemption. Oh, my. Nothing to fear; just walk and scream “I love Him.” Oh, my! Just once more.

That sounds so good. Listen, don't that sound good? Dying. “You say it sounds good for people to die?” Yes. I like to hear them die like that. Amen. The Lord said precious in His sight is the death of His saints. That's right. That's why I like to hear them die like that. They're dying to themselves. Yes, sir. You say, “They're doing a lot of struggling.” Well, they're dying hard, that's all. But they'll get dead all right; then they'll be born again anew. Amen.

I love Him, I love Him

Because He first loved me,

And purchased my salvation

On Calvary's tree.

I was looking down to see I'd kept you late. I thought, “I'll apologize.” I thought, “No, Paul preached this same gospel all night one night. A boy fell out of the loft and killed hisself. Paul went and laid his body over him, because he was filled with the Holy Ghost. Laid his body over him and said, ”His life is coming back to him. Everything's all right.“ How many here has got the Holy Ghost? All right. How many's sick, raise up your hands. All right. You that's got the Holy Ghost, lay your hands on one another. Same Holy Ghost was in Paul is in you. Same gospel's being preached by the same power. He didn't say this sign will follow the preachers. He said ”These signs shall follow them that believe, every one of them.“

Lay your hands on one another and pray now one for another. Watch what happens.

Sister, brother, in them wheelchairs and things, what about it? Let this be the hour. Brother Boze, lay your hands on one of them people there; some of the rest of you pray for one another. That's it. You're all preachers, prayers filled with the Holy Ghost. God, in Jesus' name, pour out Your Spirit upon these people. Send down the Holy Ghost in great power, give unction, heal these people with these handkerchiefs and things represent. Grant it, Lord. Let Thy Spirit and Thy power come into these people. Let them pray the prayer of faith for one another. These signs shall follow them that believe. This is a conference. Let the Holy Ghost come and shake the building where we're assembled together and all sickness and things depart and go out of these people. I condemn the devil and all of his works, in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.