A Greater Than Solomon Is Here

Thank you, very much. Let's remain standing just a moment if you will, while we go to God in prayer. As we bow our heads now before Him, I wonder if there's any special requests we'd like to be known to God by an uplifted hand. You raise your hand and your heart, say, “God, remember me on certain....”

Our heavenly Father, it's a grand privilege tonight to come and say “Father” to the creator of heavens and earth, knowing that He's concerned about us so much that He gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish, but have eternal life. We're so thankful tonight that we have believed, and have received eternal life by our faith in Him.

Now we have many requests among us tonight, Father. You've seen every hand. You know every reason behind that hand being raised. Answer, Father. I lay my prayer with theirs upon the altar, my faith with theirs, and ask that the merciful God will grant the requests, as we plead over the bloody sacrifice, the Lord Jesus Christ.

Now bless the message tonight, and bless the people who are here to receive it. Bless the ones that give it. And may the Holy Spirit have the right of way in every heart. May we leave here tonight, happy and rejoicing, and saying, “Did not our hearts burn within us as we met in his presence again?” For we ask it in Jesus' name. Amen. Be seated.

Very happy indeed again tonight to be here after last evening, and a glorious time with the Lord. Had such a wonderful fellowship last night around the Word of God. I was having breakfast this morning with someone, and we were talking about it. Immediately I met another person, and someone had been in the meetings, and they said, “Brother Branham, I was in your former meetings when you first started about fifteen years ago over here on the West Coast. It was down here at ... Santa Rosa, I believe, is the place. Santa Rosa? And one night there there was a gentleman trying to get in the prayer line—and a minister was with me then. Billy has took his place. He would give out prayer cards, and keep the lines straight. And oh, my! People would drive a thousand miles in a taxicab just to get to the meeting.

And he kept wanting.... Mr. Brown had put him out of the prayer line two or three times. He didn't have a prayer card. I heard him say, “Well, I only wanted to speak to him.”

So I said, “What is it, sir?”

He said, “I just wanted to know how you spell your last name.”

And I said, “B-r-a-n-h-a-m.”

And he said, “That's it, mother,” and walked over and sat down.

And I thought, “Well, now, that's strange. Why would he ask a thing like that?” I said, “May I ask...?”

He said, “Well, sir, about twenty-five years ago, when Pentecost actually first come to the West Coast,” he said, “wife and I received a gift of the Spirit.”

One of them would speak with tongues and the other would give the interpretation and give prophesies. And they wrote it down.

And said, “Tonight when I come home, I was reading in the paper an article of you being up here at Santa Rosa.” He said, “And I said to my wife, 'Honey, doesn't that sound familiar to you somehow?'” (And them people may be sitting present right now for all I know.) Said, “Doesn't that sound...?”

Said, “Oh, well,” said, “paper's been writing this minister up.”

And said, “But that sounds familiar.”

And after dinner, they went up in the attic and got some old—garret up there—and got this suitcase out, or the old something that they carried their prophecies in—an old yellow piece of paper. And one of them had spoke in tongues, and the other one had prophesied. And said “Thus saith the Lord, 'It shall come to pass just before the end time that my servant, William Branham, will come up the West Coast praying for the sick.' ” And said ... spelled “W-i-l-l-i-a-m B-r-a-n-h-a-m”—and that with old yellow paper of twenty-five years before that. And I'd have been about seven or eight years old. It'd have been about 1915, somewhere along there, see, that it happened.

And the West Coast holds many great memories to me, and I'm constantly going on this West Coast. Why? Civilization has traveled with the sun. The oldest civilization we have is in the east, and there's where the Holy Spirit first fell, was in the east. And civilization has traveled westward, and has come to the West Coast, just a mile or two over here. So, I suppose, we're on the sea. We go right back east again. Here's where all the heap of everything has pounded up, here on this West Coast, over here. Here's where both good and bad, the worst and the best, comes together—right here at the West Coast.

Before I leave the West Coast this time ... this is probably my last mission trip up and down here. And I want to preach on “When the East and West meets.” And I've had the context-like in my heart for a long time.

I was saying to this person.... Said, “Brother Branham, when you come, it was just a little gift. Every once in a while in the line, you'd catch somebody, and take a hold their hand, and stand there a few minutes, and look them in the eye and say, 'You have a certain disease,' and it was always right.

“But you prophesied, and you said there would come a time ... that the angel of the Lord had told you—that commissioned you to go that—you'd know the very secret of their heart, and would tell the people the things that they had done, and would do, and so forth. You prophesied that would come to pass.”

And said, “Your ministry today is a hundred percent plus higher than it was then, 'cause everything that you prophesied would come to pass, has did it, and your ministry is greater.” Said, “You stood last night to ... some woman down along the line,” said, “just reeled off her history, what was going on.” And said, “The people seemed to say, 'It's real nice.' ”

And said, “Just ... when you'd take the people by the hand in the first place, and just say one thing, the people'd rush to the altar as fast as they could.” And said, “You made an altar call last night.” And said, “Was there people sitting there?”

I said, “Backsliders, sinners, and everything else, see.” And said, “Not one would respond.” I said, “You see, God's gifts become perfected, but the revival's been over for a long time,” see. The revival's gone.

Nineteen fifty-six I prophesied in Chicago that Billy Graham that year would return and cancel his meetings. Tommy Osborn would return, and America would see its last call. And from then the revival would die. Now, just count back and see. We got that on record, see. And the revival is gone.

See, the light has to ... the water has to fall on seed that's got life, or it won't come to life. There's no life there to bring it to life. “All the Father has given me will come, and no one can come except my Father has called him,” see. That's right. So today .... The revival ended.

The ministry of Oral Roberts: I remember the first time I met Oral Roberts—little, ragged tent sitting on the other side. I was in Kansas City, Missouri ... Kansas, and he was in Kansas City, Missouri. We met around behind the stage, shook hands with me. And he said, “Brother Branham, do you think God would answer my prayers for the sick?”

I said, “He'll answer anybody's prayer for the sick.” And we got our pictures together. It's in the old copy of the “Voice of Healing.” Many of you have it, perhaps. And there, Oral started out.

Look how his ministry has growed, and now into the millions and millions and millions of dollars—now building a great big school of theology.

I think of Billy Graham, right down here in Los Angeles when all the Youth For Christ got to praying for him; how that the newspaper wrote him up critical—criticized him about saying the lion, Leo, kicked him in the belly and said, “See if that's one's fat enough” to lay his head onto. Think of a minister saying something like that. Today, they'd be scared to say it. But Billy Graham, his ministry has growed in such a way, see.

Oral Robert's ministry has growed. The little gift that God gave him prophesied. Look how it's growed, see. But yet, the revival is dying, dying, dying.

Billy Graham said in Louisville, when he was in my hometown, and he sat there.... I was at his ministerial breakfast. He said, “I go into a city, and I'll have there six weeks' meeting, and get thirty thousand [What is it he calls them? confessions? or decisions.], thirty thousand decisions.” Said, “I come back in six months, I can't find thirty.”

He said, “Paul went into a city, and he got one decision for Christ. He come back a year later, and found thirty or forty from that one.” He said, “Now, there's something wrong.” Sure, see.

Just when the revival's going, and the Spirit of God is moving, God is moving with the people. Then when He gets that crop out, weeded out, that's it. That's for that generation. Remember, He said, “As it was in the days of Noah, wherein eight souls were saved, so shall it be in the coming of the Son of man,” see. Each generation will just produce so many. And that's the way you see it today. Everywhere it's just a dying away, a falling away. Sin is collapsing in everything.

We've come to meetings.... I was at a meeting just down in Los Angeles last week at the exhibit yard there, where the place was packed out, of great crowds of people. And they seemed to all love the Lord. But it seemed like it's just almost over. Make an altar call; and honest, you couldn't get no one up to the altar. No one.

And when you do, they're not really Christians. They're ... what they are, I mean, just confessors. They are people who's once knowed the Lord, and just backslid away, coming back. So that ain't ... we couldn't call them converts. They've been converted when they accepted Christ. They just fell away—just renewing their fellowship, see. But converts, there's not a dozen a year, I guess, around ... especially in our little meetings. So you see it's just about gleaning over the fields.

But yet, the sovereignty of God to be sure that every one is caught, every grain is preserved! Even the pieces that was left off of the twelve baskets is picking up, see. God lets nothing.... He combs back and forth through the fields again, to catch it again. Aren't we thankful that we have a Father like that?

Now tonight ... last night I said, “We'll let you out at nine thirty.” Ten o'clock before I got out. So, I'm always late. You know, my mother told me I was a full nine-months baby. I was really a little late getting here, and I've always been late.

Here some time ago I was preaching at a United Brethren church, and I was just about an hour late. So the minister, when he got up to a waiting congregation standing around the walls, he said, “I now introduce you to the late Mr. Branham.” When I got married my wife had to wait on me about an hour and a half. I held her there for a long time. If I can just be late for my funeral, that's the next thing. If I can just stay here long enough to be late for that, that's what I want to be—real late on that one.

But some, you know, knows how to say it, and educated scholars to know how to place it out there; and I just, I just have to reach up and get it and just.... And I love to reach after it so much that I just don't know when to stop reaching, you see. And so, that's the only way I've got of doing it, so you bear with me a little bit.

And I got an alarm clock here that they give me over in Switzerland, but I'm just ashamed to make it alarm while I'm preaching, you see. So ... they gave it to me. I guess that was a hint. But I preached sort of a short sermon the other day at the Tabernacle at home—six hours, just six hours. Don't get scared. I don't do that now. The manager back here would pull me off before that time.

Let us turn tonight for a scripture reading over in the book of St. Matthew, 12th chapter. Let's read a little for a context. Now what little time we got, let's set it in for the kingdom of God now, see.

Now, the Lord spared my life a few days ago—all of you has learned about it—when that gun blowed up in my face, you see. You see all around my eyes, and them marks and things, that's where a Weatherby Magnum blew up in my face, and blowed the barrel on the fifty yard line, and cut down everything around me; and should have just cut my whole body plumb in two—that close to my eye when I was shooting targets on a range.

And the man that was standing with me is in the service tonight, sitting right back here looking at me. He should have just picked up my legs, that was all. And it never hurt me.

It weakened.... Fifteen pieces made a half-moon right below the sight, and went plumb back to the back of the eye ball—this one; went through and knocked the top of the tooth off, and cut me through the face. And three or four pieces stuck in the skull and sinus glands, around like that. Never bothered me.

So it looked like that He spared my life for some reason, and I'm here to place every bit of time right in on the kingdom of God. (While we're looking, let me get....)

Now, the gun was not an original Weatherby Magnum. I've always wanted a Weatherby Magnum. As you know, I hunt big game the world over. And I've always wanted one, but never thought I could afford one. And then, some of my friends might have bought me one. But I couldn't see them pay nearly three hundred dollars for a gun when I got missionary friends that ain't got shoes on their feet. So I wouldn't do that.

And Brother Art Wilson, up here, gave Billy Paul, my son, a little 257 Winchester—new one. And a friend of mine that has a Weatherby company, or Weatherby agency, said, “Brother Branham, I can have that gun rebored for you for a Weatherby for just a little of nothing.” Said, “Let me do it.” Said, “It won't cost me over ten or fifteen dollars. Here it is, right in the Weatherby magazine. It's guaranteed.”

I said, “Well, okay,” and he took it.

And I ought to've knowed enough about a gun to know that when I shot the first round of shells to find the powder, just between the primer and the outside ring it swole. I ought to've knowed it was leaking there, but I never noticed it, I was so thrilled with the gun. And the next time I put a shell in, and pulled it down, it went off.

I learned a lesson there, see. When you're becoming a Christian, or want to be a Christian, just don't fool around with this here handshaking stuff, this here overnight conversion. It'll blow up somewhere down along the road. Now, if that had been a Weatherby Magnum, began a Weatherby Magnum, brought out a Weatherby Magnum, it would've been all right. It would have been made for the shell. But when you're trying to put a big shell that goes in another gun, in something that ain't able to stand it, see....

If you want to be a Christian, you be borned again. Die to yourself, and start from the bottom and come forth. There won't be no blow-ups along the road. You'll be able to hold the charge that the Holy Ghost puts in you. That's right. If you don't, you'll never be able to stand it. That's all. The Lord bless you.

That's a rude thing to say, isn't it? But I hope you get what I'm talking about. I believe that you've got to die so dead till you're no more yourself. That's all. And then, be borned again new, a new creature in Christ, built from the very bottom of your soul all the way through—a real borned again Christian. Then the Holy Spirit knows what kind of load to put in you. That's right. You'll be able to pack it.

If you try to impersonate somebody else being a Christian, you're going to blow up somewhere. There's going to be a blow somewhere in it. Don't try to impersonate. Be a real genuine article of God, or don't ... just stay the way you are, see. That's right. Just don't make any confession. All right.

In Matthew the 12th chapter, beginning at the 38th verse:

Then certain of the scribes and of the Pharisees answered, saying, Master, we would see a sign from thee.

But he answered and said unto them, An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign; and there shall be no sign ... given to it, but the sign of the prophet Jonas:

For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale's belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.

The men of Nineveh shall rise in judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it: because they repented not at the preaching of Jonas; and, behold, a greater than Jonas is here.

The queen of the south shall rise ... in the judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it: for she came from the uttermost parts of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and, behold, a greater than Solomon is here.

Now, may the Lord add his blessings to the reading of this word.

Jesus had been rebuking that generation. If you read the previous part of the verse, the verse before it, they had called the sign that.... He had given them a scriptural sign that He was the Messiah. We spoke on it last night. And they had declared it to be Beelzebub, a fortune-teller, a devil. The very thing that they seen Him doing, those Pharisees....

Now they never said it right out in their heart, in their lips. They perceived it in their hearts. They said it within themselves, “He is Beelzebub, the prince of the devils,” and Jesus knew what they were thinking about. And He told them, said that sin.... When the Holy Spirit come to perform the same sign that He gave, a word against it would never be forgiven. He'd told the city....

The most horrible thing that there is, friends, is unbelief. That's the only sin that there is. There is no other sin but unbelief. I was preaching on that some years ago in a Methodist church. It was a nice big Methodist church, and they ... most of them, or some of them, believe in holiness, the southern Methodists. And they were ... I was preaching about.... I said, “Committing adultery is not a sin.” I said, “Telling lies is not a sin. Taking the Lord's name is not a sin.”

That was just too much for some dear old sister sitting there, with her little collar all up around. She said, “I pray you tell me, what is sin?” She just couldn't hold it any longer.

And I said, “Sin ... sin is this, my sister, see. Sin is unbelief. They do these things. They commit adultery, they tell lies, and they do these things. It's the attributes of unbelief. If they were believers they wouldn't do those things. They're unbelievers. That's the reason they do it. It's just the attributes proving that they are unbelievers, for Jesus.... The Scripture plainly teaches us that ”He that believeth not is condemned already,“ see. You can't even get started. So, the most horrible thing there is is unbelief.

Why is it people say, “The days of miracles are past”? 'Cause they're sinners.

A man met me not long ago, said, “I don't care what you do, and how many proofs you could show, I still don't believe in divine healing.”

I said, “It wasn't given for unbelievers. It was only given for believers.” That's right. It's only for those that believe; not unbelievers. They haven't got a chance. Don't criticize them, but just think of that shape that those poor people are in, see.

Jesus said, “You got eyes, and you can't see. You got ears, you can't hear.” And yet the highest of scholars in religion, the teachers and theologians of that day, Jesus said, “You blind Pharisees leading the blind,” see; because they did not believe Him, when the Scriptures plainly stated that's what the Messiah would be. And they called Him a devil. That's right. See. Unbelievers.

He said, “No man can come to me except my Father draws him first.” And here's the gracious thing about it: “All the Father has given me will come.” That's the part. I like that. Yes, sir! “All the Father has given me will come,” and I'm happy for that. So we don't know who is, and who is not. We just scatter forth the seed. That's all we can do. Some falls by the wayside, some falls this way, and that way; but some does fall on good ground (that's right), ground that's been prepared by God to receive the seed.

I think of that little woman that we spoke of last night, the little prostitute. How that little woman, standing there in the condition she was—five husbands and living with the sixth one—and what a horrible shape that poor little woman was in; and yet, you know, she actually knowed more about God than a big bunch of the clergy of this United States. She sure did. She knowed more about it than the high priest, and them of her day, for they said, “That's a devil.”

But as soon as that eternal light shone upon that predestinated seed, it come to life right quick. They saw it. They recognized it right quick. Look at the shape she was in. There was plenty big churches in her day, plenty of them. She didn't go to any of them. She just waited, because she seen there was something....

But the Bible says the antichrist in the last days would deceive all who dwelt upon the earth whose names were not written in the Lamb's book of life before the foundation of the world, see. Now, there it was, and when that light flashed across that little woman's path, she turned. And she didn't say, “You are Beelzebub.” She said, “Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet.”

What was it? That light had caught it. Right quick that seed come to life, see. Something in there in her, she seen it. She was ordained to see it. She was called of the Father, had been given ... the life had been given from the foundation of the world. And as soon as that light flashed across her.... No matter how much ecclesiastical training had been seen, they was blind to it; but when that light of God flashed across that little woman, she saw it.

She said, “Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. We know that when the messiah cometh, he'll tell us these things.” There it is, see. It has to be put in there by God, and Him alone.

Jesus had rebuked them. He said, “How can you be so blind?”, telling them, “How could you ... your unbelief...?”

And then they come to Him, and after all these ... and then they said, “Master, we would see a sign from thee.”

And now notice, He said, “A wicked and an adulterous generation seeks after a sign [What kind of a generation? A wicked and adulterous generation seeks after a sign], and it will get a sign. And there will be no sign given that wicked and adulterous generation, only the sign of Jonas.” Jonah.

They will receive the sign of Jonas, a wicked and an adulterous generation. Let's stop for a minute. He surely was speaking of this generation. See, look. Did ever you see such an adulterous generation? Maybe some of you might not know it. In traveling around the world, there is no greater crime wave of adultery than there is in America. It's the worst of all. They've even got clubs now—Los Angeles, Chicago, several big clubs, New York—where they all go together, and the men pitch their keys in a hat, and some woman reaches in there and gets it. That's her husband till they meet again. Wicked and adulterous.

I was reading in a Hollywood ... or in a newspaper down in Los Angeles here. I flew over Los Angeles out here on a call, and I picked up a newspaper when I was flying across in a plane. And it said that homosexuals on the West Coast had increased, I believe, twenty or thirty percent in the last year. Sin of Sodom. As He said, “As it was in the days of Sodom, so shall it be....” Wicked, adulterous. All we find, our telecasts, our newspapers, our signboards, everything, just full of vulgar dirt, filth, corruption, half-dressed women. It's a disgrace.

And why? That's the kind of a spirit that's in people desiring that. How could you sell a woman an old pair of button shoes like mother used to wear? Why, yet, they got more leather in them than a dozen pair that they wear today—better leather. But you couldn't get fifty cents a pair for them. They'd rather have a little split, or something, that they paid twenty-five dollars a pair for because it looks like the neighbors', or some Hollywood star.

Christians do that, too. What a shame! We are not supposed to pattern after Hollywood. Hollywood shines with brightness. But while Hollywood shines in brightness and glamour, the gospel glows with humility. There is a difference between shining and glowing. And the church is beginning to shine with polished scholars, and education, biggest church, and So-and-so. And our full gospel people's getting right in that same trend. It's a shame! Glowing with humility in Christ.

My, I didn't want to start preaching. I said in this meeting I was going to stand here and talk about divine healing. All right. Let's go back to it. All right. A wicked and an adulterous generation seeketh after a sign. And they will receive the sign, the sign of Jonas.

Now Jonah laid in the belly of the whale for three days and nights. So must the Son of man lay in the heart of the earth for three days and nights. Then listen. Bring it to yourself. It may be a new light on the Scripture. It may be something, but it's in the Scripture. The sign of Jonas would be the sign of the resurrection. The wicked and adulterous generation that's seeking a sign will get a sign of the resurrection.

Now we got resurrection by history. But then we got resurrection by sign, that Jesus Christ lives tonight in his church. He's not dead; He's alive. St. John 14:12, Jesus said, “He that believeth on me....” Not, “professes to believe,” but He said, “He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also. More than this shall he do, for I go to the Father.”

I know King James says here, “greater.” They couldn't do no greater. He raised the dead, He healed the sick, He stopped nature, He done everything. But the right translation in the original Hebrew, yet it says, “more than this.” Christ was in one man there, and Christ is in his church universal now. “More of the same works will you do, for I go to my Father.”

“A little while and the world [cosmos, world order] sees me no more. Yet ye shall see me, for I [Now, ”I“ is a personal pronoun as I have said.], I will be with you, even in you [how long?] to the end of the world.” “Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today, and forever.”

The evening lights are shining, and this generation is receiving the sign of Jonas, the Christ that they thought they got rid of. The church crucified Christ two thousand years ago, and they could not kill Him no more. He said, “I'm alive forevermore.” And here He is after two thousand years among his people, showing Himself, with the same things He did back there He's doing right here again. Two thousand years has passed. He is alive forevermore, and has the keys of death and hell. Amen!

I'm so glad of that. Oh, it would make a Baptist shout. That's right. I feel pretty religious myself right now, when I think about that. Think about it. He is positive alive! Not dead; alive!

I said a little thing here not long ago that sounded profound to me. I thought of Israel down in Egypt—slaves. God's people, slaves. And one day, coming down out of the wilderness come a prophet with a light over him. And he told them that there was a promised land flowing with milk and honey. They had never seen it. Nobody had ever been over there. But they believed that prophet. It was according ... his prophecy was according to the Word, and they believed him.

They followed him till they come to a place called Kadesh-barnea, the judgment seat of the world. There was one great spring with several little tributaries, which we could go into details if we had time to explain what that was—where the waters of life goes from the throne to the churches and so forth. But it was the judgment, and judgment begins at the house of God.

And then, at this Kadesh-barnea there was one among them named Joshua, which means “Jehovah-saviour.” He crossed over the Jordan, where none of them had been before, spied out on the land and brought back the evidence that it was a glorious land, with good ... filled with milk and honey. And everything that God had promised was in that land was there. He'd brought back the evidence after crossing the river Jordan (nobody had ever been over there), come back. Why, there was grapes growing ... two men packed one bunch. “What a place it is Jehovah has give to us. His words are true.” They didn't want to believe it. Yet two of them, Caleb and Joshua, quietened the crowd while they explained it.

Finally they crossed the Jordan. They inherited the land. They didn't have to be slaves, their daughters ravished, their sons killed at the ... and the bake ovens, or in the slime pits, and so forth, under the rulers of cruel, dark Egypt. They didn't have to do it no more.

They could have their own trees. They could grow their own vineyard. They could raise their children in peace. Other nations respected them. How I'd like to go in on that—a pattern of this nation.

Then the first thing, you know what happened. After awhile they got old, began to die. Graveyards become on the hillside of that glorious land. And no matter how God had blessed them, they still had to die.

Then there came another great warrior, come down from glory. His name was Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God. He told them that there was a land where a man don't die, that there's life after death. Nobody had been over there yet, and come back. And He came to his Kadesh-barnea, Calvary, where He not only stood judgment (the judgment seat of the world), but the world was judged there, and He paid the penalty of our sins at Calvary.

After Calvary He crossed what we call the Jordan of death. On the third day He rose up again, coming back from that land, bringing the evidence that a man, when he dies, he lives again. We are alive. We don't have to take.... Now He said, “I'm going to give you the earnest of this, give you the evidence of it. But wait up there at the city of Jerusalem until I send you the evidence that that land is good. That land frees you from sin.”

And now today after two thousand years, we still stand with the earnest of our salvation, the evidence, to look down and see where we were once unbelievers, where we were once dead in sin and trespasses, and now we've raised with Him in the resurrection. We died with Him; we raised with Him; and we are sitting tonight in heavenly places in Christ Jesus, already raised with Him in the resurrection (amen), with everything under our feet. Amen! Sickness, death, hell, all done destroyed by our great warrior, at whose right hand we stand by. Amen.

What's the scare? No wonder one of them come and said, “Death, where is your sting? Grave, where is your victory? Thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. I've fought a good fight. I've finished the course. I've kept the faith. And there is a crown laid up for me that the Lord, the righteous judge, will give me at that day—not only me, but all those who love his appearing.” Amen.

What if He'd have lived in this day? I can't stay with my text tonight somehow.

Now, they was condemning Him. He had showed them that He was the Messiah. That little prostitute woman, she said, “Sir [in so many words that we would understand], that's the sign that the Messiah's going to do.” And they disbelieved it, see.

Now He said there'd be an adulterous generation that will seek after a sign, and they'll get it. And it will be the sign of Jonas. As he was in the belly of the whale, and rose again out of the belly of the whale after three days, the Son of man will rise again.

Of course, any Scripture reader knows that all Scripture has a compound answer, all prophecies. Take your marginal reading, like “Out of Egypt I've called my son,” Matthew 2, and find out if that don't refer back to out of Egypt he called Joseph, see. Joseph was his son, and so was Jesus his son. It always has a compound meaning. So then, that also ... that generation did not believe the resurrection sign to both Samaritan and Jew.

And now here it is again, after two thousand years of ecclesiastical scruples, and ballups, and everything else. And again that Messiahic sign appears among us, and they still turn their heads from it, say, “I guess it's all right,” see. A wicked and an adulterous generation will seek after a sign, and they'll get it.

You know, so many people always condemn poor old Jonah. He was a prophet. Said he was out of the will of the Lord. I'm going take up for him a little while. I don't believe that that prophet was out of the will of the Lord. I believe the Bible said that all things work together for good to them that love God. A man surrender his life to God, and trying to walk in the footsteps of God, God makes everything work right for him. True.

We find Jonah....

'Course, God told him to go to Nineveh, that great city about the size of St. Louis, Missouri, over there—all in idolatry. They worshipped the animals, and the god of the sea was a whale, and they had all kinds of gods. Wicked, adultery, all kinds of things was going on, till their sins even come up before God. And He sent this prophet down there to cry out against their sins.

Now, if that prophet went down there just in them days, and cried out against the sin, them people would have laughed at him and walked away. So God had him to take the other ship. And he took his ship, and went ... instead of going to Nineveh, he goes to Tarshish. On his road down there, a storm came up. We know the Bible. And they bound his hands and feet, and throwed him out. And the whale swallowed him.

I know they brought a whale to Louisville, the bones of one, on a flatcar not long ago, and the man was making a talk. Said, “Now,” said, “you've often heard ministers say that the whale swallowed Jonah.” Said, “Looky here, a football couldn't go through his throat.” He said, “That shows that that Bible story was a legend.”

That was too much for me. I just waited till I got my chance. I said, “Sir, I'd just like to say something to you. You're saying that because you don't know the Bible.” I said, “God said He prepared a fish. This was a different kind. That's right. He had a throat big enough Jonah could've jumped in it,” see. I said, “That was a special whale that God prepared. God prepared a fish. Yes, sir. He made him big enough to swallow Jonah.”

God brings his Word to pass. I don't care how many critics says, like it was in the days of Noah, “It isn't going to rain.” It rained anyhow. God said so. And what God says, God's able to perform. What He says, Abraham believed it that way. And all of Abraham's children believes that way. And if we be in Christ, we are Abraham's seed and heirs with him, with the promise.

Then we got to have the faith that Abraham had in the Word of God. That's right. That's what brings the things to pass, is faith in what He said. You'll never move it no other way but have faith in what God said. You must take his Word above everything else. Let every man's word be a lie, and God's be true. What God said, just believe it.

If you can't believe it that way, you'll never get nowhere with God. You might be able to join a church somewhere, but I mean get somewhere with God, see. That's a whole lot different.

Now we find out that this whale swallowed Jonah. And then anyone knows.... You sisters, can you feed your little goldfish? When it gets its little belly full, it goes right down to the bottom of the little jar you got him in, the little vase, or ever what it is. He goes down there, and puts his little swimmers right down on the bottom and rests, because he's fed. He's prowled through the waters until he has found something to eat. When he gets his tummy full, he goes right down and rests.

Now this certain big fish that God prepared had his tummy full of the prophet, so he goes down to the bottom of the sea to rest. It might have been about forty fathoms down there.

And I have often heard people say, “I was prayed for last night. Look at my hands. They're still crippled. My stomach hurts just the same.” It's going to always do that, too. See, you are looking at the symptoms. Don't look at symptoms; look at God's Word.

Here some time ago a precious old patriarch, about fifteen years ago, a lovely old brother.... He had one son, and that son was dying. He had black diphtheria. And he asked me ... kept day and night to get me to go pray for that boy, and I was just so busy I couldn't do it. Finally, I got a chance to run over. The doctor wouldn't let me go in. Said, “You're a father; you got children. You just can't go in there.”

And I said ... I perceived he was Catholic, and I said, “I want to ask you something. If I was a priest, and had to go in to give him the last rites, would you let me?”

He said, “That's different.”

I said, “Not to these people it isn't. I'm just as much to those people as your priest is to you.” And I said, “I'm going in to anoint him for life, not for death.”

And he said, “Well, he's dying.”

I said, “Well, if he is, then won't you respect the faith of these people?”

And he dressed me up like a Ku Klux Klan and finally sent me in there. And so, we went in there, and the little nurse come around, and she watched. And she was kind of upset about me coming in anyhow. The cardiograph—some kind of a machine there they were looking at—had went way down. The heartbeat was only so many times.

And so I prayed for the boy just a few words of prayer, and laid my hands over on the little fellow. He was about twelve, fourteen years old. And I said, “Heavenly Father, upon the basis of the faith of this old father and mother calling me to pray for this child, and upon your Word, you said, 'These signs shall follow them that believe. Now, if they lay their hands on the sick they shall recover.'”

I said, “I've just come from the meeting where I seen You do great signs and wonders. I believe to be a believer. If I'm not, help my unbelief, O God.” I said, “For the sake of this child, I lay my hands upon this child and bless it in the name of Jesus Christ for its healing, that it will be well. Thank You, Lord, for giving us the promise. I believe it.” Committed it to God, walked away.

And the old father raised up, and put his arms around the mother, and they hugged one another. Said, “Mother, isn't it wonderful? Isn't it wonderful?” Not one change in the child—still laying there, pumping artificial respiration to him with pulmotor on him. Said, “Isn't it wonderful? O, thank God for healing our son!”

And that little nurse just stood there and looked. She was just a kid, just about eighteen, twenty years old, a little Snicklefritz as I'd call it, you know, standing there chewing that ... popping that gum, looking around like that. She said, “Did you understand what the physician said?”

And the old daddy turned around, and said, “I understood very well, child,” he said.

She said, “How can you stand there, and laugh, and pat one another like that, when your child ... laying here dying?”

And the old father cleared the tears back out of his eyes, and throwed that bald head back, and looked her in face. He said, “My child, my son is not dying; he is living.”

She said, “Sir, of all medical history, when that chart [ever what that hand is that drops down on there] ... it's never been known in all medical history for that hand to ever come back again. The boy is dying. He's been in a coma for two days. He is dying.”

He put his hand over on her shoulder. He said, “Honey, look. You are trained to look at that machine.” Said, “That's what you are looking at. I'm looking to a promise.”

The boy's married, and got two children now. What is it? See, it depends on what you are looking at. Don't look at the symptoms. If you fulfill what God said, believe it. That settles it. He's done it. That finishes it. It's all over. The boy never changed for three or four days later, but he got well because that father and mother wouldn't have nothing else on their mind. They wouldn't let the devil put his trash in their mind. They stayed right with it, and they held it. He lives. He's a missionary in Africa tonight, with two children.

Would you like to know who that was? That's Bob Bosworth. That's exactly who it is—old Dr. Bosworth's boy. Now, there you are.

Now. This preacher.... I've always thought of people having symptoms ... if anybody had a right to have symptoms it was Jonah. Now he was.... It's all right if you want to think he was backslid. He's got his hands tied behind him, his feet tied. He's in the belly of the whale, probably forty fathoms under the water, with a storm on top. Every which way he looked, it was whale's belly—laying there in that vomit, looking all around. He looked this way, it was whale's belly; that way it was whale's belly. Everywhere he looked it was whale's belly.

And he knowed that he was in the bottom of the sea. The fish had swallowed him, went down at the bottom on the sea. And there was a storm on the ocean, when he wasn't even safe in the ship up there. And here he is in the belly of the whale. Now, he had a good case of symptoms—he could have had. But you know what he said? “They are lying vanities. I will not believe it.”

You can't hide a saint from his prayer, no matter.... David said, “... I make my bed in hell, He'll be there.” That's right.

Now, he believed that when Solomon dedicated that temple, and prayed and said, “Lord, if thy people be in trouble anywhere, and look towards this temple and pray, then hear from heaven.”

He turned over on his back, the best direction he could get which was east, north, west, or south, towards that temple, and begin to pray. Oh, my! And God, by that kind of faith.... I don't know what He did. You scientists want to argue about it. I don't know. He could have put a oxygen tent down there, for all I know. I don't know what He done, but He kept him alive for three days and nights.

And the man that prayed that prayer, Solomon, finally backslid, and the temple was tore down. And if Jonah, under those circumstances with that kind of symptoms that he could've had, refused to have it, how ought we tonight? when we don't look towards a temple that a man dedicated, we don't look towards a man that backslid, but we look towards heaven, where Jesus sits at the right hand of God in the majesty on high, ever living to make intercession upon anything that we confess that He has done.

God is able to provide a oxygen tent, or whatever it takes. He is still Jehovah-jireh. The Lord will provide for Himself whatever He has need of.

Then we see people over the earth being healed everywhere, and taken care of like that; and then human ... a little bit of symptom, “My finger ain't no better; my tummy still hurts.” What difference does that make? Don't look to your tummy; look to what God said. God made the promise. It's God's business to take care of it.

What about Abraham? When God told him he was going to have a baby by Sarah.... He married her when she was about seventeen years old, and he was ten years older than her. They had lived together as husband and wife all their years. And Abraham was seventy-five and she was sixty-five, when God made the promise. She was about ten years past menopause then, change of life. And there she was. And God said, “You are going to have a baby by her.”

Why, I can see Sarah say, “My husband's a man of God. He is a prophet.” She started making booties, getting the Birdseye ready, and everything ready. She was going to have this baby.

Could you imagine an old couple going downtown now, and saying, “Doctor, we want to make arrangements at the hospital. I'm seventy-five. My wife is sixty-five”? God ... faith is ridiculous to everything but the person that's got it. That's all. But the one that's got it knows what he is talking about. He's anchored.

After the first month passed (See, Sarah was past that time), “Honey, how do you feel?”

“No different.”

“Glory to God! We'll have it anyhow. God said so.”

One year passed. “Honey, ain't you felt no different yet?”

“Not a bit.”

“Hallelujah! It will be a year greater miracle than it was if it had happened last year.” He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strong, giving praise to God. Sure.

After twenty-five years passed, now he's a hundred and she is ninety. “How are you feeling, darling?”

“No different. But I still got the booties. We're waiting for it. We are going to have it anyhow.”

Why? God said so. That settles it. God said so. That takes every wish, care, everything else out. You know it's going to happen, because God said so. That settles it.

And we are supposed to be the seed of Abraham. If we have the Holy Spirit, we are the seed of Abraham, the royal seed of Abraham through the promise—not through Isaac, the natural, but through Christ, the supernatural. You minister brethren know what I speak of. But they was going have it anyhow; believed it.

Jonah believed it. No matter where it was at, what conditions, how many symptoms, God made a promise. “If thy people be in trouble....” Solomon prayed and said, “Lord, if thy people be in trouble and look to this holy place, then hear them.”

Jonah, the prophet, was in trouble in the belly of the whale, in the bottom of the sea. And he turned towards the temple and prayed, and refused to see the whale's belly. “I don't see nothing but the Temple, the Shekinah glory. I see the pillar of fire hanging over it. I see Solomon, God's anointed, standing there with his hands up, praying. God, you'll answer me.” He got to breathing good. The ropes come off his hands. He might have stood up; might have sat down. I don't know what he did. He stayed there for three day and nights.

After a while that old whale circled all the way around, on a taxi trip around through the bottom of the sea. And after a while, about ten o'clock one day, all the fishermen was out there on the sea. And they had prayed to the gods of the sea that morning, you know, to give them a good successful day. Living in adultery, and everything else, walked out into the sea, and was pulling their nets.

After awhile up come the sea god. Licked out his tongue, and the prophet walked right out of his mouth, began to say, “Repent! Repent, for within forty days this place will be destroyed.” God knows how to do things. The god spit forth the prophet. Amen. He walked right down through Nineveh saying, “Repent!” Yes.

Jesus said, “As Jonas was in the belly of the whale for three days and three nights, so will the Son of man be....”

God through all ages has sent gifts and recognitions and signs to the people. Prophets has always been signs. Every time you see a prophet rise, you'd better be careful—judgment's on its road. Look at Noah, look at Moses. Look at Jeremiah before going into Babylon. Look at John the Baptist before the rejection of Israel. And oh, so forth, all along. Prophets are signs, and the Jews were commanded to believe these prophets. And when they come forth with these messages, God, through all ages, He was telling this wicked generation what they had done.

And listen, every age that God sends a gift to the church, and the church receives it, it's a golden age for the church. But when the church rejects it, it's judgment for that age.

Now, there come an age of Solomon Jesus referred to. Now, we all know that the days of Solomon was a golden age of Israel—no wars, and all the nations feared them. Why? God gave them a gift, and the whole nation believed it with one accord. It was a golden age.

If we Americans would only do that tonight, all the missile race and atomic bomb, and all these other things could be sunk out in the middle of the sea. God has give this nation a great gift—the Holy Ghost. But they don't believe it. Even the clergymen, tens of thousands of them, reject it. The church has turned it down, when it's doing the very same things it did at Pentecost, and down through the age, until the Roman cankerworm and palmerworm eat it up. But He said, “I will restore it again, saith the Lord.” He will.

Now notice. Solomon in his days, how great that he had a gift of discernment, and all the people rallied around that gift. Nobody talked against it. What if it was today that everybody, even Full Gospel people, would just talk just so glorious against ... about the Holy Spirit? how wonderful it is to everybody. What if every man in America that claimed to be a Christian just rallied around the gift of the Holy Spirit? Oh, my! The millennium would be on. Sure it would.

But our little petty differences between..., our organizational fences, and so forth, has separated them as far as the east is from the west. And God will never be able to do nothing to us until them walls are broken down, and we become one in Christ. That's right.

We find them there, and there they was. All, everywhere you'd go, say, “Oh, wasn't it wonderful? They tell me that God came upon Solomon yesterday, and a great thing taken place. Oh, glory to God!” Somebody else told somebody else, and somebody else, “Oh, hallelujah to God!” It was a golden age.

What if the church was like that today, brethren? Wouldn't it be wonderful? Oh, what could we do? Wouldn't it be wonderful! There would be no ... nothing would....

We would have a bomb shelter all right. It wouldn't be dug down in the ground. Them bombs will blow a hole in the ground 150 yards, or 200 yards, or something like that, deep in the ground, and spread out for 150 miles. Why, if you were a thousand.... If you was down into the lava, it would break every bone in your body.

You can't dig down; you have to dig up to get out of the way of it. We have a shelter. It's made out of feathers: under his wings. Amen. Carried away. I'm so glad for that shelter (yes, sir) under his wings. Why, the dust won't be settled till we'll be in Glory, safely under his wings. Oh, how that great wings of an eagle will pack us out of here one of these days.

Now, and we find out then, that in this great time, God moving, the whole nation blooming into one great, glorious, thing.... Why, you know, it didn't only stay in that nation, but it went to other nations—nation by nation.

They didn't have television then. It'd have polluted the world like they have now with it. Everybody staying home on Wednesday night to see, “We Love Suzy,” or some kind of a silly thing like that! Christians!

That shows what kind of a spirit is in people, when they love that kind of Hollywood tommyrot, filth and dirt; married several times, living out there like dogs, and then come around with this stuff. And then people stay home from prayer meeting. It shows where their heart's at. That's the reason there can't be a revival. That's right.

However, that's your pastor's place, see. He tells you that. Listen. I'm just telling you, too, so you'll know my part. Believe of it, too. I believe the same thing. Yes, sir. Oh, God! What we need is a revival, coming all the way from the pulpit to the janitor. Stir it up—an old-fashioned, backwoods, sky-blue, God-sent Pentecostal revival! That's right. Not whitewashed; but washed white. That's right. Not saying ... talk about the glory of God, but the God of glory revealing the glory of God. That's what we need in the church today.

Notice, that great age of Solomon, how it went on. How glorious! Other people began to tell others. And they traveled then by caravan, and so they come through, a group of camels going into another country. And they'd go down in another country, and say, “Say, I'm telling you, that Israel! You never seen such in your life. They've got a revival going on up there, the God of glory is among them! And they've took that man with that great gift, and made him their king. And God is honoring everything he does, just perfect.”

You'll finally reach plumb down to the utmost parts of the earth, to Sheba. That's a long ways down there—way down below the Sahara desert. And there's a little queen down there. You know, somebody come by and told her about it, and she just couldn't wait till the next caravan come.

“Did you hear? Did you come through Palestine?”

“Yes.”

“Is it so?”

“Oh, it's just.... I went and seen it. It's marvelous!”

Faith cometh by hearing the word of God. Her little heart began to hunger. See, what was it? The light flashed on that seed, though she wasn't a Jew. She was a heathen, but she was ordained to eternal life. She heard it. Others might've heard it, and paid no attention to it. “Oh, nonsense. Bunch of holy rollers.”

But she believed it. There was something on the inside of her said, “That sounds awful good.”

Next time another caravan come through, “Did you pass through Palestine? Tell me.”

“Oh, wait! I know what you are going to ask me. Them people are one heart, one accord, the whole nation. And God is working with them. They've got a man up there that's got a gift of discernment. You never seen anything like it—God working with them.”

She didn't know what discernment was. She was a pagan. “What do you mean by that?”

“It means that the God of all wisdom comes down in a man, and reveals the secrets of the people to him.” Oh, what a wonderful thing that was! Her heart began to hunger.

Now she had a lot of opposition. She sure did. But her faith didn't have any. You know, faith don't have no opposition. No. You might have a whole lot, but your faith doesn't if its real true borned-again faith. Her faith had no opposition.

Now, she was a pagan. Let's give a little drama here so the kiddies will get it. The next morning I see her get up, take her bath, and get ready. Her little maids got her ready. Remember, she's a queen. And she takes off over to the temple to say her morning prayers, and everything she had to do, you know; and meet the holy father, and all of them—probably kiss his rings and his feet, and so forth, and do all of her religion.

And while she got up there, she said, “Holy Father, I wish to say something to you. I understand that up in Palestine, they've got a God up there that's living in a man, showing himself through a man.”

“Hmmm, my daughter....” There's your opposition. “Now, that's just nonsense. Those people are always that kind of people, always something going on. There's really nothing to it. About crossing Red Seas, and all these kind of things, there's nothing to it, child. If there was anything going on like that, your own god here would be producing it. It would be upon your own priest.”

But you see, God has ways of doing things. “It would be right here in your own organization. If anything took place like that, it would be right here.”

If I could hear that little queen, she might have had a good answer to him. She might have said, “Now, listen. My mother served in this temple. She read all of your books. She taught me all the books. Her mother taught her all the books. Her mother taught her all.... For generation after generation we have seen statues, and idols, and heard of stories. But we haven't seen one move of anything yet.

“And they tell me that there is something up there that's real. There's something real. You can see it with your eyes, and watch it move, through a man called Solomon.”

“Now look here, daughter. You are a queen. You wouldn't mix up with such a bunch of people like that. You wouldn't do that. You just couldn't afford to lower your prestige.”

“Prestige or no prestige, something tells me that I must go. Someone brought me a scroll, and I read that that's what their God is—Jehovah—and He is reacting Himself in that man. Now I haven't seen one of those idols move yet; but we find Him in a man.”

“Oh, nonsense! Now look, daughter. If you do that, though you be queen, I'm high priest. I will have to excommunicate you from this loyal faith that your great-grandmother, mother, mother, mother and so forth, all served in this temple.”

“Well, you might as well take my name off the book right now, because I'm going.”

You know, there is something about it. When God gets a hold of a human heart there is nothing going to stop them. That's right.

Now she goes back. She had a lot of opposition. She had to first forsake her church. Then she said, “Now, let me think. If that is right.... Now, I'm only taking somebody else's word. If that's right, I'm going to take some money up there, and support it. But if it isn't right, I'll bring it back.”

Now that would do good for Pentecostal people to hear some of that. Support radio programs that make fun of you—that's right, radio programs that make fun of you—and your own man begging for money (that's right) to support his own program. That's right.

If it's of God, stay with it. If it's not of God, get away from it. “If God be God, serve him,” said Elijah. “If he isn't God, then find out who is God. Then serve it.”

She heaped some camels full of ... big packs full of diamonds, and frankincense, and myrrh, and so forth, and she loaded them down. Now, she had some good philosophy. “If it's of God.... I'm studying the books of what that God is. And if I see Him reacting Himself in that man, I know He's God that's concerned about his people, and living in his people. And I'm going to find out.”

Now remember. She had a long drive. It takes ninety days—three months—on the back of a camel through the hot Sahara desert (on the back of a camel, not a air-conditioned Cadillac now—on the back of a camel), to come from Sheba to Jerusalem. Think, ninety days! No wonder Jesus said she'll stand in the last days and condemn this generation. She come all that distance and made all that sacrifice to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and people won't come across the street right here in Santa Maria. Look what she did. Why, the light had flashed on that seed, and come to life. No matter what the....

Listen, here is another thing. Remember, Esau's children was in the desert in them days, and they were fleet-footed horsemen, and robbers. What ... easy it would be—for that little bunch of guards that she had—to cut them right down, and take all that treasure.

But you see, faith don't see any opposition. I don't care if the husband's against it, the wife's against it, if this is against it, and that's against it. If you've really got faith for your healing, you're going to hold on to it. I don't care, even the doctor says it's not so, you're going to believe it anyhow. It knows no opposition, stays right with it.

Bunch of little eunuchs with her (her guard), and a few maids with her on a camel; probably traveled by night (it was so hot in the desert), and rest at the oasis through the day. And she was reading these scrolls what Jehovah had promised. She wanted to be sure that she read the Word, and seen that this gift compared with the Word.

There's the thing to do. Check it. Check these things that's going around today, and see if it is of the Lord. Check it with the Word.

You know, God had a way of doing things in the Old Testament. If it was ... a prophet prophesied, and he went down to the Urim Thummim—the breast plate that hung in the temple. And then, when they prophesied ... and if the Urim Thummim with supernatural lights flashed on that, the prophet was telling the truth. If it didn't, no matter how real it sounded, it was wrong. Or the dreamer, or whatever it was, it was wrong if the Urim Thummim didn't flash it to be the truth. Now the Aaronic priesthood, when it ceased, the Urim Thummim went with the breastplate.

But God's got another Urim Thummim. That's the Bible. Let it flash in the Bible. And let the lights go, like, flash through the Bible. Say, “God promised it, and here it is. It's a promise.” Then you know you're right. God and his Urim Thummim: “If they speak not according to the law and prophets, there's no light in them.” Now let that be the light.

She was going to find out. She read it. All through the daytime she sat under the trees, and read these scrolls of the different prophets. And she was watching to see what would take place when she got there. Finally she arrived. She arrived in the courts.

Now, a lot of people—when a revival comes to town talking about God, a Pentecost revival—some of them say, “Well, I believe I'll go over and hear the holy rollers tonight.” And they'll go over and sit down. And the first thing that's said that crosses up their little petty doctrine, whether it's scriptural or not, out the building they go. That's all of it.

She didn't come for that. She just unpacked her camels, and set up the tents, and she was going to stay there till she was convinced. That's a good idea. I like that. She had all the scrolls. She could read, and see whether it was right or not. She'd compare it with the Word that this God had spoke of.

She was a smart woman. She sure was. We need more of them today. Then it would be better-dressed women, wearing long hair, getting away from shorts and everything else, like they should do. Instead of pattern after some down here in Hollywood, they would be patterning after God's example here in the Bible. That's right.

Then remember, sister, while I'm on the subject: a woman that dresses like one of these skinned wieners out here on the street, walk down the street.... Do you know Jesus said, “Whosoever looketh upon a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her in his heart already?”

You say, “I'm just as pure as a lily.” You may be to your husband, or your boyfriend, but if you dress yourself like that, and a sinner looks on you like that, and he answers for it at the day of the judgment, who did he commit it with? You. Whose fault is it? Yours, for you presented yourself. That's right.

“Oh,” you say, “that's the only kind of dresses they make.”

They still make sewing machines, and sell goods. There is no excuse, because that old lusting spirit come upon women, driving a many a pure lady into such tommyrot. That's the Word of the Lord. We've got to restore back again that real faith that was once delivered back at the beginning. Our Pentecostal churches, termites has eat the foundation out from under it with such nonsense. Sure. The Bible said so. It's a shame and a disgrace. Used to be it was wrong for them to do it, but now they've let down the bars.

An old Methodist minister used to sing a song, said:

We let down the bars,

We let down the bars;

We compromised with sin.

We let down the bars,

The sheep got out.

But how did the goats get in?

You let down the bars. That's what it was. Got back on some kind of a dogma. Then holler about the Roman church, and their dogma; and we got it right here in our own backdoor. Pot can't call kettle dirty. No, sir. Yes, sir. There's the Bible right before us, sir.

It's an abomination. A woman said to me, “I don't wear shorts.” Said, “I wear these [what do you call them?] slacks.”

I said, “That's worse than ever. The Bible says it's an abomination for a woman to wear a garment that pertains to a man.” It's a shame.

Oh, our women, our men.... And you men, with a wishbone instead of a backbone, to let your women smoke cigarettes, and act like that. Shame on you! I don't call that a ruler of his own house. I call that led around by the ears somewhere. Shame on you! Oh, “Our whole body,” Isaiah said, “has become putrefied sores.” We need a house cleaning, and a Holy Ghost revival, for the coming of Lord Jesus Christ—a cleaning [unclear words]. That's right. You know that's right.

Now here we go. The little queen took off her bundles and set them down, put up her tents, and she was going to stay till she was convinced. I can see her come in the first morning. The trumpets played, and the organs played, all the music played, and the psalteries and all went on. And they had a great meeting that morning. They rejoiced in the Lord, and praised the Lord while a thousand trumpets blasted out his glory. And the sacrifice was made. The smoke went up, and people fell on their faces and worshipped. It was all new to her.

Then after a while, Pastor Solomon come walking out. Oh, how everybody loved him! My! Wouldn't it be wonderful if our people just loved the Holy Spirit when He come down like that? We'd just obey, and be in ... so submissive to Him.

Pastor Solomon walked out very quietly, bowed himself to the people. And yet a king, but in his humility, sweet and humble. Didn't pray for great things—just to have wisdom to lead his people.

And she begin to notice the prayer line as it was that morning, that the secrets of the people's heart was being made known. I imagine she stayed up all night long, reading those scrolls. “I seen it with my own eyes. I seen it with my own eyes. I watched it.”

Finally her number was called. Her time come. She come up before Solomon. And the Bible said there wasn't one thing that God didn't make known. Oh, my! Her heart must.... She got so thrilled, she turned around and blessed the God of Solomon. And she blessed the men that went with him. She said, “Blessed are you who sit here, and your eyes behold this glory day by day.” Amen. No wonder Jesus said she will rise in the day of the judgment and condemn that generation, because a greater than Solomon was there. That's right.

Brother, sister, what happened? She seen something real for her first time in life. (We just want to have more time, but we ought to be closing right now.) She seen something real for her first time. It was something that was genuine, something that wasn't put on.

She seen something that come from God. That man couldn't have that wisdom of himself. He would know the secrets and reveal it. A gift. He was a prophet, and he could understand and tell them.

And here Jesus, the anointed Son of God standing there, was greater than Solomon, and they called it a spirit of the devil. “He's a fortuneteller.”

He said, “That queen will arise in the judgment with this generation, and condemn it.”

Now, if she rises and condemns that generation, how much more will she condemn this generation, after two thousand years of the gospel, with sweat and toil, and the Holy Spirit working in the churches and confirming it, with the printed Bible and everything laying before us? And we see his works going on, and yet we stand as if we was a haystack somewhere. Why, the little queen.... I'll close in saying this. She seen something that was real.

Now listen, just before we stop, and call the prayer line, I'd like to say this: I like to hunt as you know. I told you about the gun. A little story comes to my mind I want to tell you, just before closing.

I used to ... before I went into the evangelist work, I used to have a baking powder can. I saved nickels and things. When I was a game warden, I worked and I pastored a Baptist church—a Baptist Tabernacle in Jeffersonville—for seventeen years, without one penny of salary. I never drawed a salary. Never took a offering in my life. So I dropped my nickels, when I'd get paid, in there to take a hunting trip once a year.

And I used to hunt up in the north woods with some friends up there. And a good hunter, a fellow I hunted with, his name was Caul, Burt Caul. Fine fellow, about a half Indian. Also, he was a good hunter. I liked to hunt with him because you never had to hunt him up. He knowed where he was at. And a good shot, my! He was a dead shot, but the meanest man that I ever met in my life. That man was actually mean. He had eyes like a lizard, and they sat sideways, you know, like that.

And he used to shoot little fawns just to make me feel bad. And he'd shoot.... You know what a fawn is. It's a little baby deer. And he'd shoot them does, mother does and fawns, and things. Now, it's all right. If the law.... Now, I'm not ... you hunting brothers, I'm not condemning killing a fawn. That's all right, if the law says kill it. But just to shoot them just for fun, that's wrong. That's murder. In my book, it's murder (that's right) to kill them just to be killing. Now, not because it was a fawn....

Now Abraham killed a calf, and God eat it. So it's not the sex, or the size; but it's just killing them to be cruel to kill. That's what Burt would do, just to be mean, to make me feel bad. He'd shoot those little fellows, and watch them tumble over, just for fun.

And one year I went up there. It was kind of late, and I went up. And Burt, he had been waiting for me for two days. I told you I was always late, and even on my hunting trips. So he ... I was late.

He said, “Where have you been, preacher?”

I said, “I just couldn't get off from work, Burt.” We was right in time of quail season. I said, “I couldn't get off from work.”

He said, “Well, it's going be late.” Said, “Been hunting up here now for several days.” Said, “Them little white tails are like Houdini, the escape artist. They're gone just in a second.”

And I said, “Well, we'll try it. We know where we're at. We got about ten days now. We'll get one.”

So we started off that morning, and he said, “I want to show you something, preacher. You never seen nothing like it.”

I said, “What is it, Burt?”

Reached down in his pocket, and pulled out a little whistle, and he whistled it, blowed it. And it sounded just like a little baby fawn, crying for its mama.

I said, “Now, Burt, you wouldn't be that cruel.”

And he said, “Oh, you're like all the rest of the preachers. You're too chicken-hearted to be a hunter.” He said, “Get next to yourself, fellow.”

I said, “Burt, that's not being chicken-hearted. That's just acting with sense.” I said, “Don't you do a thing like that, Burt.”

He said, “Aw, go on, Billy. What's the matter with you?”

So, we always carry some chocolate. Chocolate is better than coffee, because it's stimulating. Sometimes you get turned around in the woods, may have to stay out over night. And you'd better have a little chocolate with you, or something, to keep you warm through the night, if you can't find some dry stuff to make a fire.

So we hunted till up about eleven o'clock, and we didn't see a track or a sign. About four inches, six inches of snow, good tracking weather—not a sign nowhere. Moonlight night—'course, them deer feeding at night. But we couldn't find even a track. And I said, “Well, it's going to be pretty bad.”

We walked on, about eleven o'clock. And all at once, he kind of ... we come to an opening. It was about twice the size of this building here. Burt kind of stooped down, and he put his hand back in his coat like this, and I thought “Well, we're going eat a bite of lunch, and maybe separate, and him go one way and I another, and work our way in. Nine or ten o'clock tonight we'd be back to our camp.”

So he reached down there, pulled out this little whistle, and I said.... Now I thought he was going to get his lunch, but he pulled out this little whistle. And he put it up to his mouth, and give a little call like a little baby fawn, bleating for its mammy, you know, like that. And when he did that, he looked up at me.

And I noticed right across the little opening there a great big, beautiful doe stood up. See, she was hid, but when she heard that call of that baby, she was a mother. Instinct in her rose up. Now, she wouldn't have ordinarily done that at that time of day. But I could see them big ears like that, and those big brown eyes looking around. What was it? A baby, and a mother. And he looked over at me, and them lizard eyes looked up at me.

I thought, “Burt, you wouldn't do that. You wouldn't do that.”

He said, “Shh,” and he took that whistle again, and he blowed it again. And the deer stepped right out into that opening. Oh my! That's unusual. And I seen him look up again, pull that lever back, and throwed that big 180 grain bullet in that 30.06—a dead shot.

I seen him level down like this, you know. And I thought, “Oh, oh. Just a second more, and he'll drive the heart of that mother, that loyal heart, plumb through her, see—that big 180-grain mushroom going right through that loyal heart, a mother looking for her baby. How could you be so deceitful!”

She stomped when the latch went out on the gun. You know what it is, in a model seventy—when the latch goes down it makes a little noise. She turned. She seen the hunter. Now usually she spooked, we call it—gone, like that.

But not her. She was right in the face of death, but her baby was in need. She was loyal. She wasn't a hypocrite. She wasn't putting something on. She wasn't a make-believe; she was a mother. There was something in her was mother. And I thought, “O God, there's a lesson. 'Yet a mother may forget her suckling babe, but never will I forget you. Your name's engraved on the palms of my hand.' ”

I thought, “Burt, surely you can't do that.” I was behind some bush to the deer, but I was looking through some snow hanging on the little spruce, and watching. And I seen that gun come up there. And oh, my! what a crack shot he was.

I couldn't look at it. I thought, “That loyal mother!” I thought, “How real. She's walked right out there in the face of that.” And them ears, that nose, she caught that hunter sitting there; but that didn't make her no difference. She was ready to go to death. Why? That baby was crying. And she was trying to find it. She was a mother. There was something inside of her was mother—inside of her. She was born a mother, and she was looking for that baby. She wasn't noticing the danger. It didn't make any difference. She was watching for that baby.

I turned my head. I couldn't watch it. I turned my head. I said, “Heavenly Father, be merciful to Burt. Don't let him do it, God. That precious mother standing there with that real loyal heart beating beneath there, looking for her baby.... Don't let him do it, Father.” And I kept standing there, praying to myself. I was listening to hear that gun crack any minute. But the gun didn't go off.

After about a full minute or two, I turned around, and the gun barrel was shaking like this. And he looked up to me, and the tears was streaming down out of them eyes. He looked at me, and his lips was quivering. He throwed the gun on the bank. He said, “Billy, I've had enough of it.” He grabbed me by the pants leg, and said, “Lead me to that Jesus that you are talking about.” He's a deacon in a Baptist church.

What's the matter? What was it? He saw something real. He seen something that wasn't put on. He seen something that was genuine, a real mother—something inside, that she wasn't afraid of death. She wasn't afraid of nothing, because she was a mother. Her baby was in need.

God, make me a Christian to love my Lord.... Like that mother was, as much mother as she was mother, make me a Christian.

With our heads the way they are now, with our eyes toward God, how many in here would like to be that kind of a Christian—as much Christian as that deer was a mother? Would you say, “God, be....”

Let us bow our heads. Heavenly Father, I guess long will I remember the story. I remember feeling them hands of Burt, as he grabbed a hold of my trouser leg, pulling on me; and the tears dropping off on that white snow. The expression on his face had changed him. He had seen something that was real. He wanted to be a Christian. And there on that snow bank that day, a cruel-hearted man with a heart of stone was melted, because that he saw something real.

The queen of Sheba saw something real. She was convinced. The woman at the well, she saw something real. She said, “Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. We know Messiah is coming.” She saw something real.

Philip saw something real. Bartimaeus saw something real when his eyes come open—a man that could open his eyes that was blind.

God, may we tonight see Jesus, see his power that changes our lives from sinners to Christians; from unbelievers, and doubters, and skeptics to true, unadulterated, Christian believers.

Bless every heart that was beneath those hands that went up. May they have no rest. May they be on the cold snow banks, too, until that realization that God has made them a real Christian in their hearts, to love God in the face of death, in the face of anything. Christ is first, the call of God and his Word. Grant it, heavenly Father.

We'll wait now, and trust that You—until this altar call is finished—will make yourself so real to us that we can leave here tonight like the queen of Sheba, going back down to her own country. She was convinced there was something real; Burt, coming from the woods, there was something real. Peter never wanted his nets no more. There was something real that he had saw. God, grant tonight that we'll see the real also, and realize that it is Christ in our midst. We ask it in Jesus' name. Amen.

Every time I think of that little old story up there of that mother deer.... I don't know what become of her. Burt started screaming at the top of his voice. I looked up. Them lizard eyes had done changed to a sweet expression. His lips was quivering, his arms around my legs. He said, “Lead me, Billy, to that Jesus.”

See, even though the churches and things he had been going around that held their peace, the rocks was able to cry out. That mother deer's life had cried out. There was something genuine, something that wasn't just ecclesiastical polish. It was something had come real, that wasn't afraid, that was genuine.

God grant tonight that my Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, will make Himself so real to you, till you'll see the real thing and will become his disciple, and be healed of your sickness.

I believe we started from A number 1 last night, called up a bunch of them. I don't know. I think there was a lot of them missing that we didn't get to. Let's start tonight from somewhere else.

Let's start from fifty, A50. Who has it? Prayer card A50. Well, maybe that's not there either. So we'll start from somewhere else, then. Pardon? I'm sorry, lady. Come right over here. A50, A51? Right here. 52? Who has prayer card 52? Would you come here, if you can. If you can't, we'll pack you. 53? Raise up your hand. 53? Right in front of me? 53? All right. 54? Who has 54? You, sir? 55? Somebody with prayer card 55. Would you stand? Is that.... No. 55? Pardon me. 55?

Now we we'll have to hurry. We're going to be late again. 55? Say it in Spanish, somebody who can speak Spanish. [Someone says, “Cincuenta y cinco.”] 55. They might have stepped out. If they step in, remember, during the time, they can come in the line. 56, 57? All right, thank you. 58, 59, 60, 60, 60?

The reason we do this, so they won't be running, cramming over each other. 60 not here? Oh, yes. 60? All right. 61, 62? That's good. 62? Raise up your hands so we can see you, see. 62, 63, 64, 65? That's the way to do it. 65? Just take your card, and give it to the usher, or Billy, or some of them down there. 65, 65, 66. Well, okay.

Please don't take the cards unless you want to.... See, you knock somebody else out, somebody come.... Maybe I preached a little long, and they had to go home. Maybe it's my fault. Forgive me. Might have been I preached too long. All right.

Now how many doesn't have prayer cards and you want the Lord to heal you, and you believe that He will heal you? Raise up your hands. All right. Just have faith now. Don't doubt; have faith. Remember there was a little woman one time that touched the border of his garment and she didn't have a prayer card either. But He looked around till He found her.

How many was here last night? Let's see your hands. Well, I guess all of you were here. You understood what taken place. Now, would you stand up a moment, lady? Now, I suppose that you and I are strangers. We are probably born miles apart and years apart. You are just a girl, and I'm a middle-aged man. This is our first time meeting, I suppose. You was in one of my meetings when you were younger. Was that here in California? Where? In Oregon. Probably back in my early ministry?

Well, I don't know you, of course. You've just seen me. I've seen millions of people since then, and been.... I never remember anybody like that anyhow. By the way, I wouldn't know what was wrong with you, or.... Let's just find out if the Lord will tell me what's wrong with you, then; just let alone anything else, just what's wrong. Would it convince you that...? You'd know whether I'm telling you the truth or not, wouldn't you? Would it convince the audience? Would you believe you'd see something real?

Here is a girl; with both of us.... Now I don't know what's wrong with her, she knows; 'cause she's just a young lady standing there. Somebody ... the boy comes down, and gives these prayer cards out. And people are out there—with prayer card, or without prayer card, it doesn't matter. They just have faith. That's all you have to have.

And here we are, and there's something wrong with the girl. If there is, then if the Holy Spirit will reveal it, if that isn't exactly the same thing that Jesus condemned that generation.... It's exactly. And the same thing that He promised, as last night, for this generation; and said to speak against it would be blasphemy of the Holy Ghost, and would never be forgiven a person.

Now, here it is. Now something has to take place. Here's where we can say.... In traveling, I was entertained one afternoon in India in the temple of the Jains, where seventeen different religions in there, every one of them against Christianity; every one of them—Buddhist, Mohammedan, all of them, against. Sikh, Jain, and what more was in there, and they was every one against Christianity.

But every religion in the world is false but Christianity. Every founder is dead. Buddha died about 2300 years ago. Mohammed, he died after Christ. Then we find all these founders are dead. Confucius with his philosophy, and all different ones, they're dead. Their founders are dead. But Christ died, and rose again, is alive forevermore.

Our religion produces a man that founded it—Christianity—and He's here with us. Nothing can kill Him. He's alive forevermore. And said, “The works that I do ... if ye abide in me and my word in you, ask what you will and it will be given to you. He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also.”

Now, if Christ stood here tonight with this suit that He gave me, and was standing here, and the woman sick, and if He would.... Could He heal her? Now, be careful now before you say, “Amen.” Could He heal her? No, sir. He'd say He'd already done it. Is that right? Sure. “My child,” He'd say, “I have already did that. By my stripes you were healed. Don't you believe this?” see. It's already done, see.

He wouldn't heal her. He's already done it. He might do something to confirm to her that it was Him, see. And He'd do it in the same way He did back there, to prove back there that it was Him. Is that right? Now, how did He prove it? We went through it last night. I bypassed it tonight just for Solomon. But now, tomorrow night maybe we can get into it again.

Now notice. He would do it the same way, because He can't make another decision. He's done made the decision, and that's God's final. What God says once He ever remains the same. That's the reason you can believe the Word. It never changes.

Now if the Holy Spirit will come on me, and.... It's just a gift. I can't make it work. It has ... I don't operate it; it operates me, see. And your faith will have to do it, see. No matter what He would do to me, it takes your faith to do it. Like He said to the woman, “Thy faith has saved thee,” see. That's his method of doing it. That's the way ... He's the same yesterday, today, and forever, and that's the way He operates, just the same way. He can't change. He's ever God.

Now, the only way ... if He would tell you this.... Now, if I come up and said ... you said, “Brother Branham, I'm sick,” I say, “All right. Come here (lay my hands on you), praise God.” The Bible said, 'These signs shall follow them that believe. Lay hands on the sick, they shall recover.'“ That'd be all right—maybe, like Brother Roberts, or some of them with that real bulldog faith, grab a hold of it. That's Brother Roberts. I can't take his place; he can't take mine. We're two different ministers—two different gifts, see.

But, if I told you, “Yes, you're sick. I'll lay my hands on you, and you'll get well,” now, if you'll believe it, you'll get well. But what if something stands here and tells you what's wrong, what has been, and what will be? Then it's hard to doubt that, isn't it? You got something to hold on to. That's right.

Now, you are facing an operation. That's right. And that's a tumor. Do you believe He can tell me where the tumor is? Would it help you? It's in the stomach. Do you believe that you won't have to have it, and it will be gone? Then don't never doubt it. It's all over, in the name of the Lord Jesus, if thou will believe.

Now you go ask the young lady, whatever was told her. Ask her if she knowed me, or anything about it; ask what was told her, find out if it's truth or not, see. Now, if she'll ever remain.... Whatever was wrong with her, if she'll ever remain with that faith that.... I noticed that light just fell right over her, and the dark shadow that was hanging there, left.

Now, if she'll ever remain with that faith, and won't turn it loose, she'll get well. If she doesn't, then something else will have to take place, see. Now, I do not ... I'm not the healer. God is the healer, and your faith in what God has already done for you.

How do you do? Now, we are strangers to each other. God knows us both. But do you believe that God could reveal to me something of your life, something like the woman that was just here? Would it...? Here again, just like our Lord met the woman at the well, two people, a man and a woman met for the first time in life. Here it is again, a man and woman meets for the first time in life. And, we being strangers to each other, then if there was any way in the world I could do to help you, and would not do it.... I wouldn't be fit to stand behind this Bible here, if I could help you and wouldn't do it. I couldn't call myself a servant of Christ.

And you might be so sick the doctors has give you up. You might be standing there for somebody else. It may be financial, it may be domestic trouble. I don't know. You are just someone standing there. But He does know. And if He will reveal it to me, would it help you? All right. You look at me, then.

Now the reason I say it like that, Peter and John said at the gate.... The reason I said that, I felt it come in, see. Like Peter and John at the gate said, “Look on us,” see, “look on us.” And they looked earnestly. Yes, there is something about blood. I see the woman spitting out blood. It's a rupture from the liver, and blood vessels, and it fills up on the inside of you, and you have to spit it out. That's “Thus saith the Lord.” You believe that God can heal you of that?

The very Spirit that's here.... You know there's something anointing me to tell you. You know whether it's the truth or not. Do you believe, then, that I'm a believer? You believe it to be God? It has to come from some source. Do you believe it to be God? Then come here, and just let me lay hands on you. Now, Father, it's between life and death. Let the Spirit of life heal the woman in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen. Don't doubt. Just go believing it with all your heart.

How do you do? We're strangers to each other, I suppose. I don't know you. Now, it's something happening. Somebody in here that looks different from this woman, that's praying ... a way ... great faith.... Keeps coming between me and the woman. It's a different looking person. I'll find it in a minute. Somebody is touching.... She's right in line with the woman, right behind her. High blood pressure, gray-headed lady with white-looking thing on, sitting there praying about high blood pressure. Raise up your hand, if that's true. You believe God? All right. Then the blood pressure will leave you. A different-looking person was standing between me and the woman. She was in line with her. She had....

Now I want you to believe me with all your heart. I'm just talking to you to see what He would tell me. You say, “What are you doing, Brother Branham?”

Contacting your spirit, like He did the woman at the well. Said, “Bring me a drink,” and went talking about religion, and so forth, and worship and a place to drink at, and so forth. But God ever remains God. You are suffering. One thing, you are extremely nervous, weak. That's right. Your weakness comes in the afternoon mostly, right after you get your work done, at sundown, or something like that. You get extremely weak. That is true.

Another thing, you've got a growth that you're praying about, that growth in your back. And if you believe that God will heal it.... You believe that he'll do it? You've had an operation, a tumor. That's right. Your husband's had a stroke. That's right.

Pauline, do you believe that God will make you well? Mrs. Pauline Capps, you go believe it with all your heart, and God will make you well. Don't doubt. Have faith. Believe God with all your heart.

Do you believe? Jesus looked upon the audience and perceived their thoughts. Is that right? Perceiving their thoughts. Now, the Word of God, Hebrews 4, is sharper than a two-edged sword, even a discerner of the thoughts of the heart. Is that right? And Jesus was the Word. Do you believe that? And He is the Word, and the Bible is Jesus in printed form. And it takes his Spirit to quicken those words, and bring them to life again. Do you believe that? Now, if you'll all believe that, and be just as convinced upon the evidence that God promised it....

Your wife's in trouble. I don't know her. I've never seen her in my life. She's rather heavy-set, and that's right. And she's suffering weakness, and everything, but her main thing is menopause. Change of life has made her nervous. That's right. Just believe, and it will be all right, sister, all your troubles.

God in heaven knows I've never seen that woman in my life. But here was this woman here, standing here. I knowed it must be his wife because I seen him in the house with her. Now he knows that. Just have faith. Never let no one cram nothing in your ears, brother. You believe with all your heart now. Ask her if I ever met her, or knew her. No, sir. I never seen her in my life, and God in heaven is my judge, and this is his Bible. But how could this woman here be standing by this man here ... and see them going through the house together? Had to be his wife. I just waited till I was sure before I said it, because.... Sometimes that way sin is called out in the same way, see. But I seen that actually was his wife.

How do you do? I'm sorry. I just happened to turn around there, and seen a woman standing by the side of this man, and I just had to ... have to do just as He tells me, see. Something real, something to get a hold of. Now you suffer, you do, sister, with headaches—have real, terrific headaches. You got a burden on your heart, and that's for a young fellow. It's your son, and he's in a backslidden condition, and got an infection. If that's true, raise up your hand. Believe now with all your heart, and may the Lord God grant your request. Don't doubt.

I just want to put my hands on you. I challenge your faith.

I challenge it in the name of the Lord Jesus. You believe that the real Christ, the Son of God, is not dead, but He's with us tonight.

You know what's the matter with the Pentecostal church? Is this: it's seen too much. That's right. One time an old ... a poet was going to the sea in England. He had wrote about the sea, what he had read in books. He thought ... he went down, and he was so thrilled because he was going.... (I'm saying this to kind of jerk away. That ... too much anointing makes me so weak, I just pull myself out of it.) And so ... going to the sea, and he met an old salt. You know what I mean, a sailor coming from the sea. And he said, “Where goest thou?”

He said, “Oh,” the poet said, “I'm going to the sea. I have read about it, and I have wrote about, and I've talked about it. But I've never seen it. Oh, I want to smell the salt water. I want to see the pretty white caps dip up, and see the reflection of the blue sky, hear the gulls scream.”

And the old salt twisted his pipe a few times, and spit, said, “I was born on it sixty years ago, and I don't see nothing so thrilling about it.” Spit, and went away. Why? Why wasn't it so thrilling to him? He'd seen so much of it till it become common. And that's what's the matter with you Pentecostal people. You've seen so much of the Holy Spirit till it's become common to you. One thing like that would set thirty or forty thousand heathens to praying right quick in Africa. That's right. One thing.

I'll tell you one night what happened. Just one little thing had taken place. I seen thirty thousand blanket natives break their idols on the ground, and come to Jesus Christ. And I seen women standing there, mother-naked—just a clout that wide on them—and standing there and didn't even know they were naked. And I asked them—Mr. Baxter, Mr. Bosworth, and them, said, “Brother Branham, I think they meant for healing.”

I said, “I did not mean physical healing. I meant you want to receive Christ.” And they had little idols sprinkled with blood of animals, and so forth. I said, “If you are sincere, break your idols on the ground.” And it looked like a dust storm come up, where they broke them mud idols on the ground. And I said, “Right on this place raise your hands to Christ, and say, 'The God that could interpret, and make this man like this, is the God of the Bible.' Believe it and raise up your hands.”

And when them women put their hands down, and walked away from there, they folded their arms like this to walk away. A few days later they'd found some kind of rags to cover themselves up with. How in the world could a native, a blanket native that don't even know which is right and left hand, and the very minute she receives Christ she recognizes she is naked; and women who is supposed to be filled with the Spirit taking more off every year? Explain that to me. They'll rise in the generation, in this generation, and condemn this generation. We're superstitious, and all kinds of thoughts and everything else; where they're simple-child to believe. Amen.

I did that, see, so much ... so I can pray for the rest of these people. So much of it gets me to a place I get so weak I almost.... You say that isn't so. Well, it is so. If you know Scripture, it is so. Jesus got weak from one woman touching Him, one person. Now, I couldn't stand one person, or no one else could, if He didn't say, “More than this shall you do, for I go to the Father,” see. That's right. Daniel saw one vision, troubled in his head for many days.

All right, the next person ... or are you the next person? All right, sir. We are strangers to one another, sir. We don't know each other, but God does know us. Now, just so that I can get the anointing back enough to pray for the rest of the people here, if God will reveal to me what's wrong with you, will you believe me to be his servant? You will. You do anyhow. That's the way I like it. All right, Reverend—a minister, Mr. Gee—Reverend Gee, you have arthritis. If you believe with all your heart walk off of here, and get well, be made well.

Now that made you feel real strange when I said arthritis. Now, if He can heal it for that man, He can heal it for you. Just go right off the platform, saying, “Thank you, Lord Jesus.

Back trouble, kidney. You believe that God can make you well? Just go right off the platform saying, “Thank you, Lord Jesus. I'll believe with all my heart.”

All right, come young lady. Look at me as you come. You are just a child. It's hard to have diabetes, and be a young child like that. Do you believe God can heal you? You do? You accept it? All right. Go off the platform saying, “Thank You, Lord,” and be made well.

Look here, honey. You're just a child. I've got a little Rebecca out here, just about your size and age. Now you've got a stomach trouble. It's bothering you in your stomach. Ulcers from a nervous condition. Do you believe God will make you well? If you do, walk off the platform, and eat what you want to, and believe God with all your heart. All right.

You have the same thing, nervous upset stomach. Go right off the platform saying, “Thank You, Lord Jesus. I believe You with all my heart.” Just don't doubt at all. All right.

Come right up here, sister. 'Course I see you leaning on there. A woman of your age would be that way. But there's surely something else different besides just a ladies' age. It is. Yes, one of your main things is nerves. You've been bothered with them for a long, long time. Do you believe this is the time you are going to be healed? Then accept your healing in the name of Jesus Christ, and go off the platform saying, “Thank You, Lord God,” and go be made well. Amen. Have faith.

Now you are a young woman and nervous. But yours is just the time of life that's striking you to be nervous at this time. Go, believe. Illusions, everybody telling you to “get next to yourself. There ain't nothing wrong.” But they are lying. There is something wrong. There's a dark shadow over you. Yes, sir. How can you go down through a.... If you go down through a building, or a dark alley.... There's got to be something that's got to certainly frighten those nerves first, before you'll be frightened. Ordinarily you wouldn't do it.

There is a darkness around you. But I want to tell you now, it's left you while you're standing there. If you go, and believe with all your heart, get well. You are going to be all right, sister. Just go on. Now you can be all right.

Well, you suffer with a lady's trouble, and have for many years. And one of your great things, you are afraid you are going to be crippled up with arthritis. If you believe with all your heart, you'll never be crippled with arthritis. Go and believe God in the name of the Lord Jesus.

“And the queen of the South shall rise in the judgment with this generation and condemn it, for she come from the utmost parts of the earth to see the wisdom of Solomon. And behold a greater than Solomon is here.” The Holy Spirit is here. The Holy Ghost, the God of heaven, the resurrected Lord Jesus is here. Do you believe it? Try to shake it out of one of their minds that's been here before, and find out. Ask them how they felt when they passed by here, watching that light settle down over them.

Have you ever seen the picture of it? the one the scientists took the picture? If you haven't, Mr. Woods has it back there, I guess. You do, Brother Woods? Where are you at? I guess he still has the picture. It's right there. It's a copyright from George J. Lacy, the head of the FBI. It hangs in Religious Hall of Art, the only supernatural being ever photographed.

Now, look. What was it that led the children of Israel from Egypt? A pillar of fire. Is that right? How many knows that that was Christ? Certainly, the angel of the covenant. It was Christ. Then, when He was here on earth, He said, “I come from God; I go to God.” Is that right? After his death, burial, and resurrection, and ascension we find out that Saul of Tarsus was on his road down to arrest a bunch of people that was in this way. And on the road down, a great big light—pillar of fire—struck him down. And he raised up, and He said, “Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?”

He said, “Who are you, Lord?”

He said, “I'm Jesus. I come from God, return to God.”

Here's that same light. Hallelujah! What? The same Jesus yesterday, today, and forever. What is it? It's doing the same thing. That first was God above you; then God with you in his Son; now God in you in the Holy Ghost—the same pillar of fire, proved by the scientists, proved here among you. To me it's as real, as positive as the love of that mother deer.

It's the real God of the Bible. It's the real confirmation of the last days. We are here in the presence resurrected; and in the presence of Jesus Christ with Him in his resurrection, for we have denounced our unbelief. We believe that God's Word is the truth, and He is here confirming it and proving it's right. Do you believe it?

Have you ever accepted Him as your Saviour? Do you know Him as your Saviour? If you got your name on a church book, and that's all you know, leave that where it's at, but come here and know Him.

You say, “I'm a Bible student, but I've never been borned again. I don't know nothing about the Holy Spirit.” Not to know his Book is life, but to know Him. Know Him; not the Word. Him. Satan knows the Book. Certainly.

A fellow said to me one time.... I was talking about the security of the believer. Said, “You don't know your Bible.”

I said, “But I know the author.” That's the main thing. I know the author. To know Him is life. That's right. And if you don't know Him, why not come up here now and stand right here in his presence?

Now you know I wouldn't do that unless the Holy Spirit was telling me that there was people in here that should do that. Just the same as He knows the hearts of the people, He knows your condition. Search yourself back, and see if the life of Christ is reflecting itself in your daily walk. Find out.

Let's bow our heads now, just a moment. I feel that this is essential. You raised your hand awhile ago you'd like to be a Christian, as much Christian as that deer was a mother. If you want that, and really mean it with all your heart, and you meant that, why not come up here and receive that, while we keep our heads bowed. As I have said before, I'm not much to persuade people. If the Holy Spirit in the preaching of the Word doesn't bring full persuasion, there's no need of me trying anything of my own, 'cause I'm bringing somebody up there under emotion. But if the Holy Spirit Himself can't convince you that you are wrong, look back at your life. Look at the way you live. Some of you ladies.... [Someone speaks in tongues; someone interprets. Congregation is led in singing.]

Won't somebody else come and join in with them now? Someone that doesn't know Christ? Or someone would like to pray with them? Somebody's not close enough to God would like to renew your vows again? Someone without the baptism of the Holy Ghost? Come right up around now, while the waters are troubled. Now's the time to step in. Come on up, each one of you now, would like to come up and pray, would like to say, “Lord, make me what I ought to be. Just mold me. I'm going down to the potter's house. Just mold me, and make me, Lord. I'm going to offer prayer now. I'm coming down to the potter's house, to get molded up, and fixed up right. Going down to get broke up first, so I can be re-molded.”

Come around. That's right. There's room for all of us around the fountain of the Lord. He's here. We know He's here. His presence is here. That feeling that you have in your heart, that's God. That's Him. That's Him, moving, operating, just his Holy Spirit. That's it. Oh, I like that. Move right on down. That's good. Oh, wonderful.

Wonderful, wonderful, Jesus is to me,

Counsellor, Prince of Peace, Mighty God is He;

Saving me, keeping me from all sin and shame,

Wonderful is my Redeemer. Praise his name!

Oh, wonderful, wonderful, Jesus is to me,

Counsellor, Prince of Peace, Mighty God is He;

Saving me, keeping me from all sin and shame,

Wonderful is my Redeemer. Praise his name!

Now everybody, just raise up your hands now, and praise Him, and give Him praise. Thank Him.