From That Time

Thank you very kindly, brother. Good evening, friends. It's a privilege to be back in the house of the Lord on this Saturday afternoon, enjoying the blessings of the Lord. And I want to say that we certainly had a wonderful time this morning at that breakfast. I just love . . . I love love. And that's . . . when God is love, and when He projects his love to us, then, oh, how sweet it is just to fellowship around the good things of God. So wonderful.

Now, I guess I'm just a little bit noisy for you conservative Canadians. So you forgive me for my, maybe, rude way of coming to the platform, and habits that I have, so. . . .

And someone asked me one time, said . . . was talking about nationalities and he said, “Brother Branham, what nationality are you?”

I said, “Irish.” And I said, “Well, if an Irishman can be saved, there's hopes for the whole world then. The whole human race has got a chance, if an Irishman can be saved.

So, coming up here with you Norwegians, and Scandinavians, and Germans, and what more, it certainly is a wonderful thing to us to come and fellowship around the blessings of God. And you know, over in the big land we will neither be Norwegian nor Irish. We'll be different then. We'll be changed. I'm so glad.

And since being converted, giving my life to the Lord Jesus, some thirty years ago when I was just a boy. . . . And if I had one regret in my life, the greatest regret that (I have many of them) . . . but the greatest regret is that I did not give my life to the Lord Jesus when I was younger. I was perhaps about twenty years old when I made that decision.

But if I'd've did that when I was the age of this little lad sitting here, I believe maybe I could have won more souls to Him. And if I'm turned down at the end of the road, He won't let me in, I'm going to love Him anyhow, because I just love Him because I love Him.

I asked Brother Mercier to bring up some of the testimony of the vision that the Lord gave me just recently. I want to call it a vision because I'm a little reluctant on saying something else, because it would sound like I was trying to impersonate a great apostle, Paul, who was caught up into the third heaven. But I was laying on the bed when it happened, and had slept well through the night. I've had many visions, as we know, but this wasn't like any I've ever had.

But I was always a little afraid of dying. I love people so much till I thought. . . . Not being afraid that I wasn't saved, but I did not want to be a spirit. I wanted to be a man all the time. And so when I was . . . wherever I was, it wasn't far away—another dimension somewhere.

And when we leave this body we are not spirits. If this earthly tabernacle be dissolved, we have one already waiting, see. God's got another type of body, where we are just as real as we are right here. Since then, it's took all the kinks out of my thinking.

And now, if it wasn't for my children and the gospel's sake (Well, I'd say first the gospel), and then my children and wife, my loved ones here, I'd welcome it at any time. Because there is no sickness, no sorrow, no sin, no nothing—it was perfection. And, oh, how I love to think. . . .

And when I was there I thought if I could ever go back I would constrain people to come to there. I would persuade them every way I could to come to that place. Friends, don't miss that. That's the greatest of all. You'd miss everything. You may have been a successful businessman. You may have been a good man, or a good woman, boy, or girl. But don't miss heaven. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ with all that's in you.

And now, I'm not very formal because, you know, God's without form. The Bible said so. So we don't have nothing formal. Around our home we . . . it's nothing formal. I have three lovely little ones at home, and Billy, my son, is with me. And we're just a great family of people that love the Lord with all of our hearts.

I've got a little boy about . . . yesterday he was six years old, and. . . . Was six years before he came. The Lord told me I would have this son, and I should call his name Joseph. And the little boy is already seeing visions, and speaking things that actually comes to truth perfectly. Just, someday I'll have to. . . . I hope to walk with him down to the Jordan, and catch my chariot and go up. I hope he screams, “My father, my father, the chariots of Israel . . . the horsemen thereof.”

My little girls, one of them is not so very little no more. She's already fourteen. They're daddy's girls. You know how we love our children.

Some time ago I was just thinking. . . .

I met a friend this afternoon, or a man who introduced himself as Mr. Pettigrew. He has the name of a fine Baptist minister friend of mine, in Louisville, Kentucky, Dr. Pettigrew. Speaking one day, I was thinking of a time that. . . . Brother Pettigrew was always such a diplomat in his speaking. He was so precise, and cut just to the moment, you know, and used very good grammar like that he taught Webster. And I'd use my old southern “his,” and “hain't,” and “tote,” and “fetch,” and “carry,” and all them.

And he said, “Billy, I believe you could polish up a little on your grammar.”

I said, “Well, I tell you, Doctor.” I said, “I was . . . I guess that's right. But,” I said, “I was raised in a family of ten children. I did not get an education. Since the Lord's called me, I haven't had time to polish up on it.”

He said, “Well, I think the people'd appreciate you more. You used that expression tonight,” said, “you said, 'the people passing by this polpit.' ” He said, “The people'd appreciate you more if you said, 'pulpit.' ”

I said, “Sir, that's perhaps right. But I want to differ with you, see.” I said, “Them people out there don't care whether I say 'polpit' or 'pulpit,' as long as I live the right kind of life and produce what I'm talking about. That's the main thing.” That's the main thing.

It isn't in grammar; it's in a surrendered life. Many times we've got too much on that. We've got to get so much in grammar, and so much that's the intellectual. God is not intellectual; He's spiritual. And we believe God by the Spirit, by faith.

A little kind of a parable: One night I'd . . . coming home, and the little girls was waiting up for me—little Sarah, and Rebekah's the oldest. And they, being daddy's little girls, they were waiting for me late. And their little eyes, the sandman sprinkled something in them, you know, and they got sleepy, and mama puts them to bed.

So I got in about three o'clock in the morning, after a great service and so . . . walking the floors, and coming down, dropping from that great dimension there, down here.

See, the ordinary man rides down here. The Christian rides a little above that, above the things of the world. But in this you go on beyond that into vision. You cannot explain it. There's no need of trying it.

And, friends, if I never see you again, that's truth. I can't answer for impersonators, or carnal comparisons. But I do know what's truth. God is God, and He's just as real as He ever was. And we know we have carnal comparisons, and impersonations, and so forth. That all goes in all kinds of life. You have to remember that.

And so, I got in about three o'clock in the morning, and I tried to lay down. And I slept for about one hour. And I could not sleep any longer, so I went out in the parlor, and sat down in the chair, and was sitting there, daylight.

And after awhile, back in the children's room, the blankets flew for a moment, and little Rebekah had woke up. And she thought, “Well, it's time daddy must be home.” So here she come through the house just as hard as she could. And that woke Sarah up. She was a little bitty tot then, about this size.

I don't know whether your children does it, or not. Mine, like I always had to, we had somebody's hand-me-downs. And you know what I mean by that. And so, Sarah was wearing Rebekah's pajamas, and they had feet in them, you know, and the feet was just about that much too long for her little feet. And she was just about to fall over, coming through.

And Rebekah could beat her. So . . . she was longer-legged. And she ran, and she jumped up on my right leg like that, and throwed both arms around my neck, and screamed, “My daddy, my daddy!” Oh, you know how it makes your heart feel.

So then—before little Sarah could get in there, the little brown eyed one about this high—she turned around, Rebekah, with her arms around me. And she reminded me of the great fashionable church that's always first there, you know. She turned around to me from my limb, and she looked back to Sarah.

And she said, “Sarah, my sister, I want you to know one thing. I arrived here first, and I've got all of daddy, and there's none left for you.”

Well, poor little Sarah reminded me of the little fellow that's kind of struggling along, you know. And her little mouth, little lips, turned down, and her little brown eyes started to water. And I looked over and winked at her, and motioned like that, and stuck my other leg out.

So here she come with them big rabbit-footed pajamas, you know, and jumped up on my leg. She was kind of tottering. She couldn't hold on. Her legs was too short, see. She just puts me in mind of the little new church that hasn't been out very long, the believer, you know. And I seen the little fellow might fall, jumping astraddle my leg like that. So I just put both arms around her, and hugged her up close to me. She had her little head leaning against me.

And after a while, she raised up, and them big brown eyes looked up to Becky. And she said, “Rebekah, my sister, I have something to say to you also.” She said, “It may be true that you've got all of daddy. But I want you to know one thing. Daddy's got all of me!”

So I might not be so fashionable in speaking, and so correct in my English. But as long as He's got all of me, that's all I care about. As long as He can just hold me, and tell me what to say, what to do, I just let it go the way I know it. That's all.

So now, we want to announce that tomorrow afternoon, the Lord willing, we have our closing meeting. I was so glad to meet the pastor here tonight from the service that we had three nights up at Grand Prairie. Such a lovely time with those fine Christian people there, and likewise enjoying the fellowship here. And I told him, Chris, if we didn't get that grizzly, maybe I'd come back this fall, and stop in again.

And somebody was telling me, brother, today, that one of the trappers, the Indian brothers, knowed where there's a great big one with a big foot. Wonder what size saddle he would use, if I could put on him? And so, we'll maybe come back after him if we. . . .

Going out now to rest. I've been six months in the service, and I'm so tired and nervous. So you pray for me. If you want to pray for somebody that needs prayer, then pray for me. You know, Jesus said one time to his apostles, He said, “Come aside into the wilderness, and let's rest a while. You've been a long time at it.”

So, tomorrow afternoon we expect to have the prayer line, and the people that's got the prayer cards from. . . . Unless some of them was perhaps left over from last night. I don't know whether you give out any tonight or not. However, we'll try to concentrate on tomorrow night, or tomorrow afternoon, to being the healing line to where we come and pray for all the people that wants to be prayed for.

So, if you did not get a prayer card yesterday or tonight (if he give out any tonight. That I do not know. I forgot to ask.), come tomorrow. What time does the service start, brother? Three o'clock. Then you'd better be here about two-thirty, so we won't interrupt the meeting. And anybody that wants the prayer cards can have them, and we'll pray for every one.

And now I trust that you visitors here in the city, that's from out of town. . . . There's some fine churches here, ministers rep-resenting this place here, in this meeting. Visit them tomorrow for Sunday school. And then, tomorrow afternoon when Sunday school's over, then we'll have our service here, so the precious brethren who let us have this beautiful sanctuary to worship our Lord in, they have service themselves tomorrow morning, and then perhaps tomorrow evening. So we will not have service here tomorrow evening.

Now I would like to call your attention to just a scripture here that comes into my mind to speak on for a few moments, if we should call it a text, to draw from it a context, of St. Matthew's gospel, the fourth chapter, the seventeenth verse:

And from that time Jesus began to preach, saying, Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.

And if I would want to call it a text, to build a little context around, to see if God would come into his Word and bless our hearts, I would like to take the subject, “From That Time”—the three words, “From that Time.”

You know, that has a great meaning to it, for many of us. And if we should sit down this afternoon and think back, we can start many things at a certain time it began, from that time. As a child, we might say something happened. Perhaps if any of you boys that smoked. . . . I don't believe you Canadian women would stoop that low to smoke cigarettes, but they do down in America. And so . . . but I wouldn't think you would do a thing like that.

But the boys, when they smoked, you remember the first cigarette that you smoked. Maybe it was made out of corn silk, or we call it. . . . Some Southerner laughed. All right. That's what they would do down South. The boys start off on corn silk.

But when you smoked that first cigarette, and thought mother would smell it on your breath, and you took some coffee grains, and you chewed it to keep mother from smelling it on your breath. And then she said, “Junior, have you been smoking?” What is it? The first thing now, a red light begins to flash: 'Tell her the truth. Don't go this way, little boy. That's wrong. Don't lie.' “

“No, ma'am. I . . I . . I haven't smoked,” and your little heart raced real. . . . You went out feeling real bad. Then it was twice as easy to tell a lie the next time. From that time, you started lying, see.

And we have different things started off “at that time.” A child, many habits in life, we can think “from that time.”

The immoral woman, she might raise up to testify, and say, “I was once as pure as a lily. My mother raised me to be a lady. My father was a godly man, and my mother also. They taught me to go to Sunday school, and to do what was right. And that I did, years and years.

“And finally, one time there was a young man visited our church, and I noticed that he was not just like the boys that were saved. But he was a nice-looking little fellow, and I went on a date with him. And he persuaded me to take a Coke one time, and it was . . . it had something in it. And when I come to myself, I was polluted. And from that time I started the wrong road. From that time, that started it.”

“We can go back and find the time I felt that my virtues of life were gone, and what difference did it make now? And so, I just started running, see, from that time.” It happened at a certain time.

The drunk man, the man that's an alcoholic. . . .

Here not long ago I was in New York City, just before. . . . I always make that the hopping off place. And I go to that arena there where they do all that wrestling and fighting. And we rent that, because I have thousands of friends in New York, and they usually pack it out for two or three nights' meetings. St. Nicholas Arena, that's where it is.

And Dr. Berg and I were very good friends. So, they had several missions down on the Bowery. And I said, “Dr. Berg. . . .” I was trying to get by without taking a yellow fever shot to go to Africa, and they wouldn't let me board the plane. So I had to wait over a couple of days, and go down to the Navy and get a yellow fever shot. They wouldn't accept me—wouldn't let me come into the country without it.

So I said, “Let's go down to the Bowery.”

And he said, “Very well, Brother Branham.”

We walked down to the Bowery, and got off . . . or went to the Bowery, rather, in the car, and stopped, and went down. . . . Perhaps many of you has been down along the Bowery under the trestle.

What caused me to do that, I was with a Swedish woman. I forget her name now—a godly old saint that was a friend to Sophia, the washwoman. And who hasn't read of Sophia, the washwoman of New York? Led even the mayor of the city to Christ.

When A.B. Simpson died, the flowers . . . they thought they'd lay some of the flowers from off of A.B. Simpson. After he was taken out, they had so many they could not take them to the graveyard; and thought they'd send some over to old Sophia. And when they got ready to preach her funeral, who come in but the mayor of the city, and sat down; chief of police. . . . And they all got to testifying, one to the other, how Sophia, the washwoman, had led them to Christ.

And her partner, a Swedish, or Norwegian, woman that was there staying in Mrs. Brown's home, was telling me about how she and Sophia worked the Bowery. It raised an enthusiasm. I wanted to go down and see what the Bowery was.

So, going down the street, we went into a little mission, and he introduced me to the pastor. And he said, “Brother Branham, could you speak for us tonight?”

I said, “No. I'm going to wait. I've got a big service coming in Africa, where I probably have 150- or 200,000 people waiting. So I'd better rest.”

And he said (talking about the alcoholics dying), he said last year from September until March, they'd taken 180 dead ones out of the church, that died right during the service—of alcohol and the dope. And I thought, “What caused it?”

So we walked out on the street and there were men, past harm as far as being immoral. They done passed that. Women would be perfectly free (they're beyond that) to pass through there. Laying on the streets, some of them laying back, and their clothes all soiled from not able to get up. . . . And, oh, such a condition! It was horrible!

And there laid a man with his arms laying back against the post, and his legs laying out into the street. And his clothes were all wet. And I said, “Let's pull him off the street.”

And Brother Berg said, “Well, he'll probably roll back out.” Said, “They watch them along here.”

So, I said, “Oh, that poor man.” I said, “What got him in that condition?”

He said, “Ask him.”

So I walked over, and he was too far gone. I went down the street a little farther, and it was. . . . When I got down there I met another man. He was standing there, going against the post like this. And it was dope. And I said, “How do you do, sir?”

He said, “Would you give me a quarter?”

I said, “What would you want with a quarter, my good man?”

He said, “I want to buy me another drink.”

I said, “I'm a minister of the gospel. What money I have comes from tithings from God's people. Therefore, I could not give you money to drink.” I said, “I will buy you a sandwich, cup of coffee, or something. But I could not do that.”

He said, “You're a Reverend.”

I said, “Yes, sir.”

He said, “Pardon me, sir.”

And I said, “I would like to ask you, my good man: what caused you to be this way?”

He said, “I am ashamed to tell you, but if you could raise your head, and go up to the top of that trestle, you can see the door of the bank that I was president of.”

“Oh,” I said, “surely not.”

He said, “I'm So-and-so.”

I looked over to Brother Berg, and he nodded his head, that would be right. I said, “A man of your stature? A man or your caliber would be laying here on the street, a drunken sot like that?”

He said, “Sir, I once was a noted, respectable citizen.”

And I said, “Tell me your story just in a moment,” I said, “if you don't mind, and wouldn't mind for me to repeat it at the pulpit.”

He said, “Certainly not.” He said, “Well, I had a lovely home, two fine children. One day I come home. . . . And I'd always suspicioned my wife.” But said, “There was a 'Dear John' letter laying on the table.” He said, “I'd never drank in my life, but I went out that night. And from that time. . . .”

There you are. “From that time.” What caused it? His wife had left him a letter that she was leaving him. He loved her in such a way that he could not stand to be without her, so he just thought he would ruin his life, or just drink it off. Not enough nerve to commit suicide, so he was just taking it the gradual way.

Now, that's the way those things happen. “From that time” starts from certain time. Most time, people that does wrong, on New Year they'll say, “Well, we're going to turn a new page now. We're going to be right after tonight.” And what do they do? They just turn a new page, so they can turn it back the next day. All their New Year vows goes away. That won't work.

Some time ago I was going into the psychopathic room from the auditorium, to pray for the people in . . . some of them in strait jackets. Well, how many. . . ? You've heard Charles Fuller, the old fashioned revival hour on the. . . . Well, that's where it was at Long Beach. We just left there a few days ago, where the big auditorium was. Oh, my! What a meeting we had.

And when we were there before, Brother Fuller, a wonderful Christian brother, he was going out that afternoon. And as he passed off the platform going out, there went his crowd out—fine-dressed, intellectual people. And he'd made an altar call, and one lady had raised up her hand that she wanted to receive Christ. Wonderful!

He dedicated a few babies, went out. Grand old saint is Charles Fuller. And I had the privilege of shaking his hand, a very fine man. But to know him personally (to say that I do), I do not—just know him by just to shake his hand.

But I noticed his group going out that afternoon, and our group waited out on the piers, and so forth, till his service was dismissed. And here come my group in wheelchairs, crutches, strait jackets. That's a lot different. When you can stand and talk some kind of a theology. . . . Nothing against Dr. Fuller, a godly man. But to stand and tell them about Christ that lives and will save them, let them raise up their hands, and put their name on a book, that's one thing. But when your faith has to buck against wheelchairs and crutches, and blind, deaf, dumb, insane, screaming, whiskers over their face, that's a lot different. The devil's sitting everywhere to see if there's one mistake in it, so he could throw the blanket on you.

So when I went into the psychopathic room. . . . Sometimes they have them out what they call the “emergency.” And I never will forget—a beautiful young woman was sitting there. There was some of them. . . .

Oh, my! I hope this is not a bad thing, but I have walked into the places, and see. . . . It's such a horrible thing, insanity. See a young woman use a bed pan, then wash her face like that, with. . . . Oh, just lovely people, but that's devil! That's a devil. How I could. . . .

I've refrained from testimonies that I seen going in the meetings among you, which has been. . . . Well, it would make volumes of books, but I refrain from saying it because I don't like to say it.

Jesus said, “See that no man. . . . Just don't tell it. Just go ahead. God will get glory from it.”

And I don't believe in a lot of advertising a lot things, that something's been done. Just let it alone. Let God take care of it. I like that better.

And so this young lady, she says to me, she said, “Are you Brother Branham?”

And I said, “I am.”

And she said, “Well, would you take me first?”

And I thought, “Why, you are not in this psychopathic room?”

She said, “Yes, I'm supposed to be.”

And I said, “Well, my, such a pretty woman!” Looked to be about twenty years old. Looked like she'd've made any little minister a little jewel, a little sweetheart. And I tell you, brethren, as we all know—minister or not—there's no one that can console you like a loving wife, a real wife.

When you come in tired and weary, and someone can sit down and take you by the hand, and say, “I understand. And I know it's hard,” there's something about it. God knowed what He was doing when He gave a man a wife.

And then I thought, “What a little jewel she would be for any man's wife.”

And I said, “Tell me your story, lady.” I said, “There's no one who seems to be rushing to it just now. What about it?”

She said, “Very well.” She said, “I was raised in a strict Christian home.”

“Yes, ma'am.”

And she said, “One time I started, against my parent's better judgment, of going with a boy that packed a flask in his pocket. And one night he persuaded me to take a drink.” And said, “Finally I'd taken that one drink. And all of them was telling me I was a wallflower if I didn't do this, that. And the first thing you know, I got the habit of drinking.”

She said, “Then I started public prostitution.” And she said, “They sent me to the Good Shepherd's Home which is a Catholic institution.” She said, “I served my time there three or four years and turned to be a Catholic.”

Said, “When I come out of this institution,” said, “then I was a Catholic. I started right back at drinking, and prostitution again. The law picked me up, and give me four years in the woman's penitentiary.

“When I was in there I served well, and kept away from the things, because I could not find the things in there to drink, and so forth.” Said, “When I come out, it didn't do me one bit of good. I joined another church. I've joined two or three churches.” And said, “Now they finally declared me insane.” And said, “They just watch me.” Said, “I'm a mental case.”

“Why,” I said, “you certainly do not talk like a mental case,” trying to find her spirit, you see, see what was wrong. And I just couldn't pick it up, somehow. And she said . . . kept talking.

And I said, “Have you ever thought of getting married? and have a loving, kind husband, and little babies like all real mothers long . . . or real women like to have little ones like. . . ?” See your little girl pushing her little baby cart, with a little dolly in it, and you know, because she's to be a mother, too. That's the reason she has to mother something.

And she said, “Oh, yes. I've thought about it, Brother Branham. But,” she said, “who would have me?” Said, “What could I promise a man? Not even a home. I'm no good.”

And when a person can realize that they're no good, then they're in condition they can be made something out of. But when you think that you're just the top when you're nothing, then you're past hopes.

Jesus said in the Bible there, “Thou art naked, miserable, wretched, blind and don't know it.” Could you imagine someone on the street that was miserable, wretched, naked, and blind, and did not know it? And you walk up to them saying, “You're naked, sir. You're naked, sister. Come. . . .”

“You shut your mouth! I'll take care of my own business; you take care of yours,” see. There you . . . that's a hopeless case.

But when you can . . . a man can realize his condition, that he is without God, without hope, and his sins are not under the blood, and he's a sinner going to a devil's hell. . . . And doesn't know he's doing that, then he's in a miserable condition. So this girl had something that you could work on. And after she talked a few moments the vision struck, and I saw then where it was.

And I said, “Young lady, did it ever occur to you that all these things, these reformings, and turning pages, and so forth, has just been a ritualistic routine from joining one church to another, and making vows, and so forth?”

She said, “Yes, sir. It has.”

And I said, “Did you ever think that it was the devil that's making you do those things that you don't want to do?”

She said, “Mr. Branham, I have always believed that.”

Those big black eyes flashed, and I said, “That's what it is, sister. You couldn't sign pledges or join churches enough. If you had books as high as the building . . . would never do you one bit of good. It's the devil that's driving you to those things, making you do things—a slave to him.

That's the way drunkards, and cigarette addicts, and immorals. . . . It's all the power of Satan that has the people in the grip, and they can't break it.

But there's One who can break it. And I said, “Here in your heart you are telling me that you'd love to be married, and have a husband.” I said, “You're a beautiful girl. You'd make a real sweetheart for some little tired preacher of God's.”

She said, “I couldn't promise a preacher or no one else nothing in this condition, Mr. Branham.”

I said, “But I want to tell you something. Your sins may be as black and smutty as hell. But I know there is a fountain filled with blood drawn from Immanuel's veins, where sinners plunged beneath the flood lose all their guilty stains. It can make you as white as snow.”

She said, “Oh, it seems like it could be just a myth, Mr. Branham.” She said, “I want to be that.”

And I said, “Will you pray with me?”

And she said, “Yes, sir.”

So she turned around, knelt down by the chair where she was at, and I knelt the other side. I said, “Now you pray.” See, she could pray for herself. So, I said, “You pray.” And she prayed real sincerely. I just held still, feeling if the spirit went away from her.

But after a bit she rose up, and she said, “Mr. Branham, I'm going take your hand and make you a promise, that from this day henceforth I'll never smoke again, I'll never drink again, or never play the part of a prostitute again.”

I said, “I believe, my sister, you mean that. But it's not over yet. You've done that so many times, but it isn't over yet. There has to be something happen.”

She said, “What do you mean, Mr. Branham?”

I said, “Kneel back down again, and just keep praying.”

So I put my hand over on her shoulder, and I began to pray, and said, “Lord God, you made this woman this way. She is a handmaid, and she is your . . . could be your servant, and could be a wife to some good man. She's a beautiful woman. And you can help her, Lord. And the devil has bound her. I pray Thee, Lord God, make him to leave her.”

She continued to pray. All of a sudden she began to change her notes in her prayer. In other words, she struck home run. Something happened. And she turned all of a sudden, and looked at me—those big staring eyes like an angel then, and the tears running down her cheeks.

She jumped to her feet, and she said, “Sir, I've never felt this way in all my life.”

I said, “Now it's over.” Something . . . that's been about six years ago, or seven. She's married now, and has two fine children. See, she was a prostitute until “that time”—that time when Christ took a hold. She was a good girl until the evil took a hold, from that time.

Many of you men in here can remember with me. I was just a boy at the time, when the first world war closed in 1919, about some forty-one years ago, or forty . . . yes, about forty-one years ago, when the first world war. . . .

Do you remember the good intentions they had? They said, “We will have no more war. This settles it. Send your boys on overseas, and we'll conquer this. And there will be no more war.” But what happened? Another one come along.

What did they between those times? They got what was called the League of Nations. They said, “Oh, we have achieved some-thing. We've got a League of Nations. They will police the world.” But we come right along to another war.

And now we've got what we call the U.N., and it's playing the same part.

Why is Castro doing what he's doing, if there's a police force that can stop it? See? We think that we can do these things, but we cannot. There's some little something starts, and from there it begins to roll.

That's the same thing starts in the church. A little tattle starts in the church, and it rolls up into a place that will break the church up, and separate it. That's what broke up the Pentecostal groups. That's what makes them about twenty or thirty different organizations. That's what broke up the Lutherans. And now we're nine hundred and something different organizations of all the Protestant churches. It's because some little something started. We should not be divided. We should be one church, one brethren, one brotherhood standing shoulder to shoulder in these days.

The young married couple might say this: “John and I got along real well. But one day we got into an argument. And from that time it went on, till we finally divorced. Here I am with the children; John's married again.”

Or it might have been: “I lived as true to John as I could, but a certain little curly-headed salesman come to the door one day, and I don't know what happened.”

Or you might say: “I was as true to Mary as could be. But one day I was in a certain store, and this girl kind of passed by. And well, from that time. . . .” There you are. See, it has to have a starting time.

Well, I keep telling you of things that starts wrong, and ends wrong. Is there anything that can happen that's got an eternal to it? something that can last that's good? Yes. I want to say there is. And that's when a man meets God. From that time on he's a changed creature. He's never the same no more. I don't care how low he's stooped in sin; I do not care how immoral the woman's been, or how low the man's been, how long he's been without God, and how many times he's spurned his grace. Yet, when he meets God, from that time he's a changed man, or a changed woman.

Let's just speak of a few characters that met God.

Let's think of Abraham. He was just an ordinary man. He was not any special person. You don't have to be a special person to meet God. You just have to be who you are, and then meet God. Now Abraham was not a Jew. Abraham was a Gentile from the land of Chaldea, the city of Ur. And he was just an ordinary man, walking out into the fields. And perhaps he come down from the tower of Babel with his father, and he dwelt in the land of Shinar.

And maybe he went out in the morning and picked berries, and had those, and went out into the bush, and killed an animal to get his proteins, and so forth. Probably lived an ordinary life. And he had married his half sister, which was Sarah. And when she was sixty-five years old, and he was seventy-five years old. . . .

I've got a good friend here. I don't think he's in the building tonight. I've looked everywhere for him. I like the man. That's Milo Dourney. I don't think he's here. Somebody said he was here the other night. But if he's here, he's certainly changed since I saw him. Mr. Dourney, if you are present and I don't recognize you, forgive me just a moment. I like Mr. Dourney. He's a real man. In the friendship that we had one day when. . . . I shot a bear up on top of the mountain, and we went up there to pick up a moose that Reverend Mr. Rasmussen, that you all know real well, I believe. . . . No, Mr. Baxter had killed a moose, and the bear was in the clean ups, and we were. . . . I'd shot the bear and he was laughing at me, because I'd shot it so far away and hit it so solid.

And then, on the road down we had a real good talk. And there's something about the man that I like. And now I understand that he's very, very sick. And I think he called the place where I'm staying today, or someone was telling me something about it. If you know him, or if he's here. . . . Don't you fail, Mr. Dourney, you be here in that prayer line tomorrow. You may be getting old, that's true. But God heals the old. You never get too old.

Let's look at Abraham. He was just an ordinary man like you, Mr. Dourney, that probably made his living out in the bushes, and so forth. But when he was seventy-five years old God met him one day, and said, “You are going to have a baby by your wife, Sarah.” And she was about twenty years past menopause, and he had lived with her since she was a young girl. She was his half sister. Impossibility!

But what did Abraham. . . ? Did he say, “Now, wait. I'm too old.”? No. The Bible said, “He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief.” Let's just . . . I hope it don't sound sacrilegious, but let's just take their little family talk for a moment.

I can hear him go in and say, “Sarah, sweetheart, I want to tell you something. Jehovah spoke to me out there today in the field, and said we're going to have a baby,”—her sixty-five, and he's seventy-five.

Well, I can imagine, after him taking God at his Word, he went downtown, and got some yarn, and said, “Sarah, knit the little booties now, and get all the little things ready, because we're going to have a baby.”

Could you imagine an old man and woman like that go down to the doctor here in Dawson, and say, “Doctor, we want to reserve a hospital room, because soon we're going to have a baby at our house, wife and I.”

Oh, I'd imagine the doctor would say, “Poor old man. He's kind of a little off at his head. Just let him alone. He's harmless. He won't hurt anything.”

But what? It was God's truth.

And the first twenty-eight days passed. You remember now, she's about several years past meno-pause. So I can hear Abraham go up, and say, “Sarah, dear, how do you feel?”

“No different.”

“Bless God! We're going to have it anyhow.”

A year passed. “Sarah, how do you feel, dear?”

“No different.”

“Hallelujah! We're going to have it anyhow.”

Ten years passed. “Still got the booties, honey?”

“Yes, they are laying right here.”

“Praise God. We're going to going have it.”

“How do you know?”

“God said so. That settles it. I met God, and I believe God. That settles it.”

From that time Abraham was a changed man.

And twenty-five years later he was a hundred, and she was ninety. “How're you feeling now, dear?”

“No different.”

“Glory to God! We'll have it anyhow. Greater miracle now than it was at the beginning, this twenty-five years.”

But we claim to be the seed of Abraham, and if God doesn't instantly heal us, we say, “Well, I missed my healing.” And then say, “We're the seed of Abraham”? Abraham's seed takes God at his Word, and holds on to it. They meet God on the conditions and say, “Here it is, Father. It's settled right here tonight.”

That's the way the real seed of Abraham . . . nothing can move them from it—no hurts, no pains, no aches, no nothing else; no doctor, no ten thousand could stand over, and say, “You're dying.”

“That's not so,” see. They refuse, refuse to hear anything else, when you meet God.

And sometimes, when you meet God it makes you act ridiculous to the outside world. Could you imagine Abraham going out, wanting to . . . telling the people he was going to have a baby by his wife? But he had to separate himself from all the unbelief. That's what God calls to every man or woman.

When He meets you and forgives your sins, and calls you to be his servant, He expects you to separate yourself from all unbelief—disassociate yourself from all things that's ungodly. Look not at the world. Come out from among the world. “Touch not the unclean things, and I will receive you, saith the Lord. You'll be my sons and daughters, and I'll be God to you.” Yeah, come out from among unbelief. Separate yourself. Segregation.

God is a segregationalist. Called Israel out. He called his people out. He calls his . . . the very word “church” means “called out.”

Now, He's a segregationalist. God don't want his children mixed up with the world or the things of the world.

But they had the baby just the same.

Now Moses, he was an intellectual giant. He'd been taught by his mama that he was going to be the deliverer. And he knew it was coming close to the time that God had promised Abraham, that his seed would sojourn four hundred years in a strange land; would be brought out by a mighty hand. And his mama, maybe, told him and said, “Moses, when you were a little baby your father, Amram, when he was working in the brick kiln, he'd pray every night all night long, 'God send a deliverer.'

“One night, in a vision upstairs, he seen a great angel stand with a sword and pointed north, and said, 'I'm ready to take the people out.' And I conceived you, Moses, right under the threat of Pharaoh, and I hid you in the bulrush and right amongst the 'gators that was fat upon the babies of Egypt. But God delivered you.

“You were a proper child when you were born. You were born to be a prophet, Moses. You are God's servant. And then you were raised up here under Pharaoh's doorstep. You're the next Pharaoh. But remember,” as Jochebed would have told him, “remember the commandments of the Lord.”

Then Moses studied, and he was a great military man. He was an intellectual giant. My! How the intellectuals. . . . He was so wise he could teach the Egyptians wisdom.

But then he tried to deliver the children in his own way. You can't do that. You've got to forget your way, and take God's way. That's what I'm trying to say tonight.

Divine healing isn't based upon some mental tantrum. Neither is it based upon some oil out of somebody's hands, or some hocus pocus. Divine healing is based upon the shed blood of Jesus Christ, the atonement. “He was wounded for our transgressions, and with his stripes we were healed.” So, it's upon the atonement.

And as long as we try to achieve a church for God, we're going contrary against his will. We must let the Spirit come into our lives, take over our lives. Let Him have his way in our hearts. Our great churches, I have nothing against them. But yet, brother, in all of it, we still need God.

We got the best churches we ever had—the greatest ministers we've ever produced, educational giants. But where is the power of his resurrection? Where is that Jesus that said, “The works that I do shall you also”? Where are they at?

Notice.

Moses then tried within himself, and slew an Egyptian. And what happened? When he slew the Egyptian he got scared, and run into the desert; and found a beautiful young Ethiopian woman out there, by the name of Zipporah. And he married her, and settled down, and had a child, little Gershom—and was probably well satisfied, because Jethro's herd of sheep he would inherit.

And he got old, and the vision of deliverance was all passed from him. And he was satisfied now to just to be an ordinary sheep herder. And he was eighty years old.

One day on the back side of the desert, walking down a little old pathway familiar, he was attracted—a bush on fire. And from that time Moses was a different man.

Notice, God said, “I'm going to send you right back down to Egypt. Go back down where. . . . Now, don't go back down and get a bachelor of art. Don't go down and study some more psychology. Do not go down and get your doctor's degree. But I'm giving you a crooked stick. Take this, and tell them I AM sent you.”

What was it? The next day a educated, smartest man in the country, the most ridiculous sight: he had his wife sitting straddle a mule, with a young'un on her hip like this, the old whiskers blowing, the old crooked stick in his hand leading a mule. “Come on, here. Let's go.”

“Where you going, Moses?”

“Going down to Egypt to take over.” One-man invasion. But the thing of it was, he done it. Why? Here it is. He had met God, and from that time he was a changed man. That was a stick on the hillside the day before. But in the hands of God's anointed prophet, it become the judgment rod of God that smote Egypt with plague. And it was a one-man invasion that delivered the children, because he had met God. He didn't need an army. He just needed God.

May I stop here a moment, if you'll pardon me, in my message? You have great possibilities. You are a fine people, you royal Canadians. But there's one thing that you need—is a coming together, and a meeting of God by the baptism of the Holy Spirit, poured out upon your churches here. Then things will take place.

You're fine, loyal. But you need to meet God one time. Then things are changed, when you meet God. Yes. It makes you act ridiculous, and it makes the world laugh at you. But the thing of it is, if God . . . you've met Him, and He said so, then you can do it. “God said so.” That settled it.

A little virgin, one day, she probably had a hard time, a beautiful little lady. She kept herself clean from the world, and she lived in a lots meaner town than Dawson Creek. She lived in Nazareth. But she had purposed in her heart that she would serve God. And she was just an ordinary little woman. She was going with a man that was a widower of four children, and his name was Joseph. And they were planning on getting married.

And one day she had a pitcher on her head, perhaps, going to the virgin well. They call it “the well of the virgin.” And as she come down off the hill to get. . . . Maybe, say it was Monday morning, she was going to get the daily supply of water. And those women can pack a jug of water on their head, one on each hip, and just walk as steady. And she was going down to get the water, and she had the jug, perhaps, under her arm. And she was going along thinking about a scripture that she'd, perhaps, heard the rabbi. . . .

Or maybe she and Joseph, looking from the front porch across the hill where they was going to have their home and. . . . He was a carpenter, and all the doors had to fit perfect, you know, and the little hearts on the wall, because he was taking his sweetheart to this one. This was a special house—him and his sweetheart was going to live in it.

And they was reading the scroll on the front porch.

And Joseph read this scripture the day before. “Unto us a child is born. Unto us a son is given, and the government shall be upon his shoulders, and his name shall be called Counsellor, Prince of Peace, mighty God, the everlasting Father. And of his kingdom there shall be no end.”

And maybe Mary said, “Joseph, would you read that scripture again, dear?” And he read it again. “Who was Isaiah speaking of there?”

“Oh, no doubt the Messiah. He will come some day.”

And the next morning on the road, just a little . . . common little girl of about eighteen years old, going along to get the water down at the well. . . . And on her road that morning, perhaps she seen a light flash, and she said, “It must have been the sun, maybe,” coming up in the early Judaean mornings, and the dew holding the fragrance down onto the ground.

How beautiful!

I think the break of day is the most beautiful time of the day. See, all the demons has ceased to run, and the Holy Spirit. . . . I think any man that comes to the pulpit to preach should stay in the quietness of God, come out as a sweet smelling savor, anointed with the Holy Spirit to speak the Word of God—come out from the morning after the night, step out into the brightness of the Holy Spirit.

And I see him there, as he . . . as she was going walking along. All at once a great pillar of light hung before her, and beneath this pillar of light stood the great angel, Gabriel. He said, “Hail, Mary! [”Stop,“ in other words.] Blessed art thou among the women, for you've found grace with God.”

And he told her of her cousin, Elisabeth, how that she in her old age had conceived, and once was called barren was going to have a child. And said, “You found favor with God, and God is going to give you a baby, knowing no man.”

She said, “How will these things be?”

He said, “The Holy Ghost will overshadow thee. And that holy thing that shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.”

Notice. Mary, she'd met God. She didn't wait till she could say . . . (excuse me, sisters) but she didn't wait to say, “Wait till I feel life; wait till I'm positive. Then I'll testify of it.” No. She didn't have to wait. She took God at his Word! She'd met God, and immediately she began to testify. “I'm going to have a baby, knowing no man.” Yes, sir. Why? She was positive. She had met God. Things had changed. She wasn't ashamed. She just as good as had the baby in her arms, because God said so. Oh, God! Give Dawson Creek some Marys like that.

“By his stripes I'm healed.” I had the stomach trouble, and Satan told me, said. . . . He kept telling me, “Now, you're not any better today. You know you can't eat nothing.” I just eat anyhow, and vomit up; in about two minutes eat some more and vomit it up; and eat again. . . .

And he said, “You know you're just making a disgrace.”

And I said, “Looky here, you old slewfoot! If you want to hear me testify, stick around. But if you're getting sick of it, get out, because I'm going to testify as long as I got a breath in my body. I'm going to give God praise for letting Jesus Christ come to this earth to heal me. I accept it as my personal property.”

He left me. Sure, he gets tired of hearing you testify about Jesus. He tries to keep you away from it. Don't you do it. You've met God. God's present. And you know He's there, and here's his promise revealed to you, “By his stripes I am healed.” Then something happens.

Notice.

She went right up to the mountains. Oh, I can see that little virgin. . . . Excuse me for taking so much time. I can see that little virgin as she climbs up the mountains, her little face just blushing. Oh, how she was going up the road, just praising God. And Elisabeth—you know, that was Zacharias' wife—she was about fifty five or sixty years old. But they had prayed all their life to have a son.

And her husband was a priest at the temple, and when he . . . in the days of his administration of waving incense while the people were praying, Gabriel came to him and said his wife would conceive. You see what kind of homes angels come to? It's homes that trust God. That's right. That's right. No matter what kind of a home it could be, just as long as you trust God. . . . Whether it's a little humble shed, or wherever it is, if you'll just trust God, that's all.

And we find out that Elisabeth had hid herself, now, for several months. She was to be mother, but she was worried. Now, you know, I see these ladies. . . . Please, sisters, excuse me by saying this, but these women that's to be mothers wearing these slacks out on the street, I think it's the most disgraceful thing to the race of humanity. It is a pity to think that they would do that. Oh, of course, I'm sure they don't do that around Dawson here, but they do it down in the States. It's terrible!

They hate me for saying it;

but yet. . . . A woman said to me some time ago, she said. . . . I was telling them about wearing them immoral clothes. I said, “God will make you answer for committing adultery.”

She said, “I do not commit adultery.”

I said, “But Jesus said, 'Whosoever looketh upon a woman to lust after her has committed adultery with her in his heart.' Then when that sinner answers for adultery, who did he commit it with? because you presented yourself that way. That's right. You'll answer at the day of the judgment.” That's exactly.

And she said, “Well, I'll just tell you right now,” she said, “I don't wear shorts. I wear slacks.”

I said, “That's worse. The Bible said it's an abomination in the sight of God for a woman to put on a garment that pertains to a man. God doesn't change. That's exactly right.

I was speaking this morning of this woman, immoral woman, washing Jesus' dirty feet, wiping them with her hair. Some of our Pentecostal sisters would have to stand on their head to get enough hair to wash their feet—cut it all off. That's right. It used to be wrong for you to do it. It's still wrong for you to do it.

The Bible plainly teaches that if a woman cuts her hair, her husband has a right to divorce her, put her away. Said if she cuts her hair she dishonors her head (her husband), and a dishonorable woman should not be lived with. I'd better shut up. I'll get you preachers around here. . . .

I'm only telling you the truth! You're going to face me with it at the day of judgment. That's “thus saith the Lord” in his Word.

A lady said, “They don't . . . all they make is these Hollywood, sexy looking dresses.”

I said, “They still have sewing machines and goods. Don't try to get around that.” No, sir.

I can see Elisabeth sitting back doing her sewing, her little booties and things, for the baby to come on. And she pulls back the curtain, and she looks and she sees Mary, this beautiful little girl, running just as hastily as she could.

In them days they had love, one for another. Oh, she gets up, and runs real quick. And she grabs Mary and embraces her, and said, “Oh, dear! I'm so glad to see you.”

I like to see people do that. I believe in being real brothers.

Here some time ago I was having a meeting down in Florida, and I went down. And they had a tent up back there on some big place, and we had a great meeting. And there was about eight or ten thousand people attending the meeting. And one of the managers said to me, said, “Brother Branham,” said, “the Duchess wants to see you.”

I said, “The who?”

He said, “The Duchess.”

I said, “What's that?”

Said, “The woman, the Duchess that owns all this property here . . . your tent's sitting on.”

And I said, “Well, now, looky here at them poor sick people that wants to see me too.”

“Oh, but,” said, “she's a Duchess.”

I said, “Well, does that make her any different from somebody else? Not a bit.”

You know, we stick our nose up like we . . . rain, it would drown us, and think we're somebody. And after all, we're only worth eighty-four cents in chemicals. That's all. You put a fifty dollar, or a hundred dollar, mink coat around eighty-four cents. . . . You really take care of it. But you got a soul that's worth ten thousand worlds, and you'll poke anything down it. Yes.

When I was coming off the tent that evening there was a great big, heavy-set woman standing there, with enough jewels on her hand to sponsor a missionary ten times around the world.

She said, “Are you Dr. Branham?”

I said, “No ma'am.” I said, “I'm Brother Branham.”

She said, “I am 'chawmed.' ” And she had that big hand up there.

I said, “Get it down here, so I'll know you when I see you again,” like that. I hate to see anybody put on dog, don't you? what they call dog. And she had a pair of specks—she had them on a stick. You know nobody can see out like that, holding that glasses out like that.

And said, “Are you Dr. Branham?” That's trying to be something that you are not. You're not . . .

as Congressman Upshaw once said, “You can't be nothing that you hain't.”

Now that was a congressman of the United States. Many of you know his testimony. They brought him to Los Angeles that time. He'd been in a wheelchair for sixty-six years. I saw the vision go over the top of him and I said, “Sir, Jesus Christ makes you whole.” And he run to the platform, touching his feet back and forth. Congressman Upshaw, dear old saint of God. Knowed Winston Churchill just like I'd know one of my minister brothers and all of them. Went and testified about his healing to him, and all this, and. . . . Just a glorious old man, just went home to meet God at nearly ninety-something years old, a year or two ago.

Now when . . . the other day I was going down the street with my wife, and there was a sister coming down the street. And we were driving along. And this sister said, “How do you do, Sister Branham?”

I looked around, and I said, “Honey, that woman spoke to you.”

And she said, “I spoke to her.”

“Oh,” I said, “I'm sure she didn't hear you,” I said “because I'm sitting not a foot from you, and I didn't hear you. So, how is she going to hear you out there, twenty feet on the street?”

And she said, “I smiled.” . . . a little old silly grin.

I like that old, big old pump-handle handshake, “Put it out here,” you know, like that. Don't you like it? so you got a feeling in it, that's right.

Paul Rader said one time, said he was sitting at the table and he and his wife got in a little argument. He started to go to work, and. . . . He always kissed her at the door, “Bye, honey,” went on out. And she'd wait, when he got up to the gate wave good bye, and he went on down the street. And said that morning they had an argument, and so . . . little family spat.

So he said he started down the street and she said, “Bye,” and waved at him at the gate—“Bye.”

And said he got to thinking. “She's such a good woman. What if she would die? What would I do? How would I do without her?”

So he said he got to thinking more about it, and thought, “I might die, and I wouldn't want. . . . Oh, she's a darling.”

He turned around real quick and run up the street, opened up the gate and run in, jerked open the door. He couldn't see her anywhere. He heard something going, “Sniff, sniff.” He looked. Standing behind the door . . . and she was standing with her head up against the wall, crying.

He just turned her around, kissed her, and said, “Bye, Sweetheart.”

She said, “Bye.”

He went out the gate and turned around. Said it looked like she was standing at the door, and he said, “Bye.”

She said, “Bye,” but said. . . . She waved just like she did the first time, but said the last time had a feeling in it.

So that's just about the way it is. We got to bring it from your heart. That's the way with our religion. If there isn't a feeling in it of divine worship to Christ, that you believe Him to be the Son of God, that you love Him with all your heart. . . . No matter how you might sing the apostle's creed, or the Doxology, you might be able to sing like a mockingbird, but if it hasn't got a feeling in it, God won't notice it. That's right. You've got to have a feeling of godly worship in your heart.

So I'd imagine when Elisabeth caught Mary, I can hear her say, “Oh, Mary! Why, you're so beautiful.”

“Why, Elisabeth! You haven't changed at all.”

“No? Well, thank you. Well, Mary, I guess you heard the news?”

“Oh, yes. I heard the news. You're to be mother.”

“Oh, yes! Yes, that's right.”

She said, “You know, I'm to be mother too.”

“Oh, you and Joseph are married already?”

“No, no. We're not married.”

“Oh, you've married someone else?”

“No, I haven't married yet.”

“And you're to be mother?”

“Yes.”

“How do you know?”

“God said so.”

“What's it going be? How you going to have it?”

“The Holy Ghost will overshadow me.” And she said, “And you?”

She said, “Oh, it's already four . . . or six months with me as a mother.”

Now listen. (You listen to your doctor, and I'm your brother.) Now that's subnormal, see. Life is about three to four months.

Said, “It's six months with me and there's no life yet.” Said, “I'm altogether worried.”

And she said, “Oh, the Holy Ghost overshadowed me and said I was going to bring forth a son too.”

“Oh, you are?”

“Yes.”

“Oh, Mary, it can't be so.”

“Yes.” And she said, “I should bring forth a son, and I'd call his name Jesus.”

And as soon as she said “Jesus,” the first time that that name Jesus was ever spoke from a human lips, the little baby, John, received the Holy Ghost and come to life and began to leap in his mother's womb for joy.

If the name of Jesus Christ will make a dead baby leap in its mother's womb, what ought it to do to the borned-again church?

Said, “Whence cometh the mother of my Lord? for as soon as thy salutation came to my ears, my baby leaped in the womb for joy.” Oh, my! What? John met God in his mother's womb. He was always a changed man.

Jesus said, “What did you go out to see? A reed shaken with any wind? Not John.” Said, “A man that's got his collar turned around and got all this fine clothing on? The gentleman of the cloth?” He said, “Them kind kiss the babies and make speeches at schools, and they're in kings' palaces.” The intellectual.

Said, “What did you go to see? A prophet?” He said, “More than a prophet. For this is of whom it was written, 'I'll send my messenger before my face.' ” Said, “Of all that's ever been born of a woman, there's not a greater man than John the Baptist.” Yes, sir! He received the Holy Ghost in his mother's womb. He met God in his mother's womb. He was changed from his . . . before he was born he was changed.

Peter, the little critic, one day to his brother Andrew. . . . Went to church, went up to the Galilean coast. They had been seining all night, and they went up there to see Jesus. Got him a chunk of wood and sat down. I imagine as Jesus went to speak, Peter moved up close and Jesus looked at him and said, “Your name is Simon. You're the son of Jonas.” And from that time he was a changed man. Sure. He'd met God.

Paul, the little hook-nosed Jew, crabby and sassy as he could be. . . . Oh, the great church, they'd made their choice—Matthias. Sure. He was the one . . . they cast lots. He never done a thing. That was the church's choice.

But God took a little Jew that was sarcastic as he could be, just bolted him around. He met him on the road one day and knocked him off his high horse, and he wallowed in the dust. Right.

He said, “Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou Me?”

Said, “Lord, who are You?”

Said, “I'm Jesus. [Back to the pillar of fire again, see.] I'm. . . .” Jesus said, “I come from God and I go to God.”

Now do you understand? He was the pillar of fire, the logos—any of you brethren know that—led the children of Israel. The angel of the covenant led the children of Israel through the wilderness.

That was the Christ, the anointing. It was made manifest upon a man. And when it was here on earth, we look at what it done. And immediately He said, “I come from God and I go to God.” After his death, burial, and resurrection, his ascension, Paul met Him on the road down to Damascus. And what was He again? Back to the pillar of fire. Right.

Now, if that pillar of fire is right—if it's here, it will do the same works that He did, because it's the same nature, see. Now we notice . . . and on his road down he met Jesus. He was a changed man—from a sarcastic little Pharisee until a godly saint, a messenger to the church, Paul. What a difference there was in him!

A blind man, Bartimaeus, sat by the gate one day, crying. The crowd went by him. Maybe some of them knocked him over. “Get out of the way.”

I can hear a priest say, “Say, you Galilean, so-called prophet. . . .” Little Zacchaeus had been sitting in a tree, before, and hid hisself. Said, “Rebekah told me He was a prophet, but I doubt it.” Hid hisself all over.

Here come Jesus around the corner. Stopped right under the tree where Zacchaeus was, and said, “Zacchaeus, come down. I'm going home with you for dinner.” Knowed right where he was, and knowed what his name was. Sure. He's still Jesus. You can meet Him tonight, just as same they met him then. When He went out of the gate at Jerusalem, started the other way, what happened? There was old blind Bartimaeus standing at the gate. Zacchaeus was a changed man. He wanted to make restitutions for all the evil he had done. He met God.

There when He come out of the gate, there was a blind man sitting there. I can hear the priest, the head of the ministerial association, say, “Get out of here, you fanatic! They tell me you raise the dead. We got a graveyard full of them up here. Come up and raise some of them,” see. But God doesn't clown for people.

Jesus just did as He said, as the Father showed Him. St. John 5:19 said, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, the Son can do nothing in Himself, but what he sees the Father doing: that doeth the Son likewise.”

And I imagine Bartimaeus got just a little bit disturbed, and he said, “Who passes by?”

And, “Oh, keep still!”

If you go mark the place, it was about two hundred yards from Him.

“What's all the noise about?”

There's something strange. Everywhere Jesus is, there's a lot of noise. Where God is . . . makes a lot of noise. I don't know why it is, but they do. Anything without noise, without emotion, is dead. That's scientific. If your religion hasn't got a little emotion to it, you'd better bury it (that's right), because it's certainly dead.

Notice.

Then we find out that as He went by this, said . . . some young woman might have walked up and said, “Old fellow, have they pushed you over?”

“Madam, could you please tell me what's all the noise about?”

“Oh, the prophet passes by, the Galilean prophet, Jesus of Nazareth. Have you never heard of Him?”

“No.”

“Oh. You're a Jew, aren't you?”

“Yes. I'm a Jew. Well, my mother used to tell me when I was a little boy that could see, when I played on them Judaean hills, along the Jordan here, she used to tell me that there would come a Messiah sometime. He'd be the prophet that Moses spoke of.”

“Oh, that's right. That's Him.”

“Well, if he's a prophet. . . . Oh, Jesus! Thou Son of David, have mercy on me!”

Now, all that roaring, carrying on, and making fun of Him; and some throwing over-ripe fruit at him, and some saying, “Hail to the prophet,” the other one said, “Away with the hypocrite”—He never heard it. But He felt it.

You know, He had the sins of the world on his shoulders, going to Calvary to be crucified. But the faith of one blind beggar stopped Him in his track. That's God. He stopped. Just as the woman touched his garment, Bartimaeus had touched it.

He said, “Thy faith has saved thee.” From that time he could see. Why? He'd met God. His faith had stopped God. If you're blind tonight, spiritually blind, your faith can stop Him. If you wonder what's the matter with people, when they are crying and worshipping God, you think there's something mentally wrong with them, your faith can stop Him, and you'll be a changed person from now on. That's right. Your faith can stop Him, certainly.

The maniac in Gadara one time run out—a maniac who was strong! A lot of people call that “man.” See what he was? He was a maniac. Some people say, “Oh, he's a man! Look at the muscles he's got.” That's not man; that's brute.

I've seen men that weighed two hundred pounds, and didn't have a ounce of man in him. A man's not measured by his muscles; he's measured by his character. I've seen a man weighed two hundred pound would throw a baby out of a mother's arms and ravish her. Would you call that a man? That ain't a man; that's a brute.

This maniac could break chains. They couldn't tame him. He wanted to live in the graveyard. Break chains—just think—because the devil had complete control of him. He was a superpower, because the devil had control. If the devil taking control of a person could give him a superpower, what could he do when God takes control? The lame can walk, the blind can see, the sinner can be made white, the wrongs will be made right, when a man meets God. When that maniac met God, he was a changed man from then on.

The woman at the well, the prostitute as we spoke of a few nights ago, when she met God there at the well, she didn't know who He was—just a man. But he looked at her, and said, “Bring me a drink.”

And she said, “You have nothing to draw with,” and so forth. Their conversation went on. After a while He said, “Go get your husband and come here.”

She said, “I have no husband.”

He said, “Thou hast said well. You have had five, and the one you are living with now is not your husband.”

She said, “Sir, I perceive that you're a prophet. We know when the Messiah cometh he will tell us all these things.”

He said, “I'm he that speaks to you.”

She was a changed woman. She met God. What did she do? She was living by a fountain. Not Jacob's well, but a fountain in her soul, that she could run into the street. . . . Though she was sinful, she run into the street and said, “Come see a man who told me the things I've done. Isn't this the Christ?”

One more comment I might make, Sis. You know what? Death met God one time. Did you know that? Death always. . . . The devil never did believe, until He was dead, that that was the Son of God.

He caught Him up on the mountain fasting, and he said, “If thou be the Son of God, take these stones and make bread out of them,” see. That same devil lives today. Said, “If these divine healings is right, how about old Mr. Jones down here that sells papers—this old man in the wheelchair? Go heal him.” See that devil?

When He was on the cross he said, “If thou be the Son of God, come down and we'll believe you,” see? Look when they put an old dirty rag, them drunken . . . spit of the soldiers, hawking and spitting on his precious face, and pulling the beard out of his face; smacking Him from one side to the other; and then put an old dirty rag around his head, and made a mock trial and hit Him on the head with a stick. And said, “Now if you're a prophet tell us who you are, who hit you, and we'll believe you.”

He could have done it, but He said, “I do just as the Father shows me.”

What was it? He always believed it. How could Satan say that that man could be God—a man that could take the challenge of a priest, and let a drunken soldier spit in his face?

Today we got the wrong conception of power. Power is overcoming, returning good for evil. That's real power that can love your enemy, do good to those that do evil to you. That's real power. That's God-power. Yes, maniacs can break chains. But it takes a real man to return good for evil from his heart. Not because of religious duty, but from his heart.

Notice, in closing. The devil said, “That's not the Son of God. He couldn't stand and let that spit hang in his face. And as many times as he's told these things, and so forth, and predicted things; and they smacked him on the head with a reed, he would prove that he was the Son of God. He isn't the Son of God.”

So in closing, let's take a little trip—a mental trip. Now listen close. Let's go back to Jerusalem nineteen hundred years ago. It was a strange, odd morning. Never was a morning like that morning. The sun come up, and it looked like a. . . . Very strange. Something was going on wrong.

Long about nine o'clock we're standing in a room. I hear a mob screaming, some one saying, “Away with him!”

I see a little woman run out in front of the mob and say, “What has He done? Tell me, what has He done? He's only healed your sick, and brought hopes to the hopeless. What has He done to deserve this?”

Who's she talking about?

I look behind. I hear something going bump, bump, bump. Here's an old cross coming, dragging down the street, blood just dragging out. The cross was dragging his bloody foot prints out, coming down the street; spit hanging over his face, blood and spit mixed together; tears and brine running together; a crown of thorns pulled down over his precious head. Bump, bump. The devil walking around saying, “Now, if He was the Son of God, He'd never put up with something like that.”

After awhile his little weak body fell. They laid the cross upon an Ethiopian. Here He goes up the hill. Look, I notice He's got a white garment on. But there's little red spots all over that white garment. What are they? As He goes up the hill, they get bigger, larger, larger, larger. After awhile, they all run into one great big bloody splash, smacking up against his legs. He's going to Calvary.

I see Satan say, “Come on, death. We got Him now. Come on! I command you, death,” said Satan. “I have your control, you know. Sting Him, because He's nothing but a man. He's just a man. He wouldn't put up with that.” I can see that bee come around, circling around Him, death. The sting of death.

But you know, an insect that has a stinger, a bee. . . . If that bee ever gets that stinger sunk real deep, he can never sting no more, because it pulls the stinger out. Brother, that's where the bee of death made a mistake. When he stung that precious body, He pulled the stinger out of it.

Now to the believer. . . . Like Paul of old, when they was building a block to chop his head off, and the bee began to hum around him (death), he said,

O death, where is your stinger? Grave where is your victory? . . .

But thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

What was it? Death met God. And from there on death don't have a stinger anymore. It can buzz and make a noise, but it can't scare us because I can look back yonder and say, “He anchored that stinger in Immanuel's flesh.”

So therefore there is a fountain filled with blood drawn from Immanuel's veins, where sinners plunged beneath the flood lose all their guilty stains. And no death has any more sting anymore. Do you believe that?

You can meet this, you can meet your fortune, you can meet your life's mate, you can meet your debts, you can meet your enemy. You can meet all these things and it doesn't have very much meaning to it. But one time when you meet God, you're changed eternally. Let us bow our heads just a moment while we pray.

I'm going to ask you a sincere question, knowing that we may never meet, you and I, on earth again. Tomorrow afternoon is dedicated mostly just to praying for the sick, but I wonder, tonight, if there's someone in this building that has never really met God. Oh, you've read his Bible, and you've made confessions, and you've put your name on books, or something like that, and joined . . . one church to the other one. But really you've never really met God, but you would like to meet Him.

With every head bowed, and every eye closed, wonder if you'd just raise up your hand? And by this say, “Brother Branham, remember me in prayer that I'll meet God in the forgiveness of my sins before I have to meet Him in judgment.

[Blank spot on tape.] . . . if I wanted to get right with God,“ said, ”you know what I'd do? I'd get somebody had some sense, that would talk to me.“

I said, “Forgive me then, lady.” I just felt led. I was holding my leading, just as I feel led to hold this altar call.

About two years from then, I come back to the same city. She was a reputable girl, a fine girl. She was going down the street, her underneath skirts hanging down. And I thought, “Surely, that can't be the same girl.” I walked close, and she turned around, said, “Hello, preacher.”

I said, “Oh, no!”

She laughed. She reached in her pocketbook, and she said, “Will you have a cigarette?”

I said, “Aren't you ashamed of yourself?

She said, “How about taking a drink out of my bottle?”

And I said, “Aren't you ashamed to offer me, a minister, a drink of your whiskey?”

She said, “I want to tell you something before you leave.”

Now listen to this, while you have your head bowed, praying.

She said, “Mr. Branham, you remember that night that you talked to me about my soul?”

I said, “I always will remember it, girlie.”

Said, “You were certainly right.” She said, “I grieved God's Spirit the last time.” She said, “I went from worse to worse.” And she said, “My heart is so hard,” she said, “I could see my own mother's soul fry in hell like a pancake, and laugh at it.”

That's what you get for grieving the Holy Spirit.

Don't turn Him away;

Don't turn Him away.

Oh, how you want Him to say

“Well done,” on that eternal day.

Don't turn the dear Saviour away

from your heart

Don't turn Him away.

You might do it tonight for your last time. Just raise your hand, say, “Pray for me, Brother Branham.”

What could He do now for us? He can give to us the exceeding abundantly above all that we could do, or think. Do you believe that? How many of you. . . ? How many's sick out there? Raise up your hands. Needy? Just raise up your hands, say, “I'm needy. I have need.” Let's just bow our heads just a moment then. Just pray and say, “Father God, let it be me.” Just have faith. Just keep praying.

There's a lady sitting here on the front row. She's praying for a friend that's not here that's sick. Do you believe God will heal that friend, and make them well? You can have it. God bless you.

Just keep believing.

Right back here to my left—you may raise your head—a man sitting there with a back trouble. Do you believe that God will make your back well, sir? He does. The next man there has something wrong with his side. It's your ribs, sir. That's right. Will you raise your hand if that's so? You have your healing.

That lady sitting there next with that arthritis, do you believe God can heal your arthritis, and make you well? Something wrong with your hands, that lady sitting there—hands and feet both. Do you believe that God will make them well? If you believe it with all your heart you can have your healing. God bless you, Mother.

Now what did they touch? Tell me what they touched. That's the High Priest. Is that right? Don't you see, they met God?

I don't know those people. All you there, that was spoke to there while the visions were going on, if you didn't know me and I didn't know you, raise up your hands. All you along in here, wherever you was, raise up your hands. That's right. All right, perfectly.

He's here. Don't you believe that? They met God.

There's a lady sitting right back here on the right-hand side. Can't you see that light over the woman? She has rheumatism. She's also got a growth on her breast. She's from Fort St. John. Her name is Agnes. Stand up, if that's so. I don't know you. I've never seen you in my life. Are those things right? Raise up your hand, if that's right. You have your request. She met God. That's what does it. If thou canst believe. . . .

There's a man sitting back there has got to die right away, if he doesn't believe God. He's got cancer of the chest, cancer on the lungs. You'll believe with all your heart God'll heal you? Stand up on your feet and accept your healing then, in the name of Jesus Christ. What was it? I don't know the man. He's a total stranger. But that's right, isn't it, sir? You met God. Go believing it. Amen.

You have faith in God?

Woman there praying for her son, got sinus trouble. Will you believe it with all your heart? You'll get well. That's right, isn't it, lady? If that's right, raise up your hand.

Got another sick friend praying for, too, that's not here. Just believe it with all your heart, and you have what you ask for. Do you believe God? If that isn't God, I don't know what God is. That's Christ among you, friends. Do you believe it?

You're becoming blind to me now—just looks like all over this building, just like a great white light. What could happen right now if you'd accept it? What would take place just now, if this audience could really just believe for one time? There's only one thing to keep every person here not from being healed. That's just your unbelief.

Just break that little banner of blackness there, and watch the Holy Spirit fall on this building and every person in here be healed.

Will you believe it? Stand up on your feet and accept it then in the name of Jesus Christ. Raise up your hands now to Him. Say, “I believe You, Lord.” I love Him, I love Him, because He first loved me. Do you love Him with all your heart? All your heart? Just raise your hands high and praise Him. Say, “Thank You, Lord Jesus.”

What's the matter, soldier boy? You're not going to commit suicide. The devil's lying to you, boy. You've only got a phobia. He's lying to you. He'll drive you insane if you believe him. Deny him. Renounce the devil. I command you in the name of Jesus Christ to renounce the devil and accept Jesus Christ as your healer. You'll go back and be a gentleman and a real, real, man. Do you do it? Raise up your hand to God and say, “Praise God.” That's right. Amen. Now go back home and be well.

All that believe Him, raise your hands, and give Him praise.

I will praise Him, I will praise Him,

Praise the Lamb for sinners slain;

Give Him glory all ye people,

For his blood has washed away each stain.

I will praise Him, I will praise Him,

Praise the Lamb for sinners slain;

Give Him glory all ye people,

For his blood has washed away each stain.

Now while we hum it—“I will praise Him”—turn around and shake hands with somebody. Say, “God bless you, pilgrim. God bless you, brother, sister, pilgrim.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . will praise Him,

Praise the Lamb for sinners slain;

Give Him glory all ye people,

For his blood has washed away each stain.

All of you love Him say, “Praise the Lord.” Say it again, “Praise the Lord.”

I will praise Him, I will praise Him,

Praise the Lamb for sinners slain;

Give Him glory all ye people,

For his blood has washed away each stain.

Oh, isn't He wonderful?

Wonderful, wonderful, Jesus is to me,

(Now worship Him.)

Oh, Counselor, Prince of Peace, the Mighty

God is He,

Saving me, keeping me, from all sin and shame,

Wonderful is my Redeemer, praise His name.

I once was lost, now I'm found, free from

condemnation.

Jesus gives liberty, and a full salvation.

Saving me, keeping me, from all sin and shame,

Wonderful is my Redeemer, praise his name.

Oh, wonderful, wonderful (sing it in the Spirit)

Jesus is to me. (Just close your eyes and look

how good He is.)

Counselor, Prince of Peace, Mighty God is He.

Saving me, keeping me, from all sin and shame,

Wonderful is my Redeemer, praise his name.

Don't you love Him? After the cutting message and so forth, then see sinners come to the fountain filled with blood, then see the Holy Spirit move and confirming that it's Him, showing Himself alive—the Messiah of God walking among us tonight there—then we can just sing in the Spirit and worship Him. Oh, my! Oh, let's sing that again. Will you give us another chord?

Wonderful, wonderful Jesus is to me.

He's a Counselor, Prince of Peace,

the Mighty God is He.

Saving me, keeping me, from all sin and shame,

Wonderful is my Redeemer, praise his name.

All that feels real good say, “Praise God.” Let us bow our heads just a moment now. I wonder if you know that song up here in Canada. It's one of our great songs of the South. “Take the name of Jesus with you.” All right. Give us a chord on it, sister.

All right. Let's sing it sweetly now. All these good little Norwegian voices come right out now. You might not be a melodious singer, but sing with your heart. I love good old Pentecostal singing, but I hate an overtrained voice—holding their breath, you know. I just . . . I like to hear real good Pentecostal singing. Yes, sir. All right.

Take the name of Jesus with you,

Child of sorrow and of woe.

It will joy and comfort give you,

Take it then where'er you go.

(That ear trouble is gone from

you there from [unclear word].)

Precious name, O how sweet!

Hope of earth and joy of heaven.

Precious name (precious name),

O how sweet!

Hope of earth and joy of heaven.

(Now with our bowed heads we sing.)

At the name of Jesus bowing,

Falling prostrate at his feet,

King of kings in heaven we'll crown Him,

When our journey is complete.

Precious name. . . . (How many believes

that you're healed now? Raise up your

hands in the . . . God bless you. . . .

God bless you. Oh, just look!)

Hope of earth and joy of heaven:

Precious name, O how sweet!

(Isn't that sweet?)

Hope of earth and joy of heaven.

Take the name of Jesus with you,

As a shield from every snare;

When temptations round you gather

(Devil saying, “You're not healed.”

Now what do you do?)

Just breath that holy name in prayer.

Precious name, O how sweet! . . .