God in Simplicity

Good morning, friends. I certainly deem this one of the highlights of my
life,  to be in the Tabernacle again this morning, to see its  beautiful
structure  and  the order of the children of God sitting  in  His  house
today.

I was so astonished when I got here yesterday and seen the looks of  the
building.  I never dreamed that it would be this way.  When I  seen  the
blueprints,  that  when they had drawn up the blueprints,  I  just  seen
another  little  room  sitting on the side, but now I find it  to  be  a
beautiful place.  And we are grateful to the Almighty for this beautiful
place. And we are...

I'm bringing you this morning greetings from my wife and my children who
long  to  be here at this time for this dedicational service  and  these
week of consecration to Christ; but the children are in school, and it's
hard to get away.  And... They have about worn away from their  homesick
feeling  for the house, but we will never wear away the feeling for  you
people. You don't live that way.

There's  such as having friends, and I appreciate  friends,  everywhere,
but  there's something about old friends--no matter where you  make  new
friends, it still isn't the old.   No matter wherever I roam, this  spot
will always be sacred. For about thirty years ago in a muddy pond bed, I
dedicated  this piece of ground to Jesus Christ when it  wasn't  nothing
but a mud bed.  This was all a pond.  That's the reason the street's out
of cater there--the road had to go around to get away from the pond that
was in here.

And in here, there used to be lilies--pond lilies come up.  And the lily
is a very strange flower.  Though it is born in mud--it has to press its
way through the mud and then through the waters and slime to get  itself
up to the top to show its beauty.  And I think this morning that that is
a whole lot what's happened here.   That since that time, a little  pond
lily  has  pushed itself; and when it got to the top of  the  water,  it
spread its wings forth--its little petals went out, and it reflected the
Lily of the Valley.

May it long stand.  May it be a house fully dedicated to God. The Taber-
nacle  itself  has been dedicated in 1933 but thinking this  morning  it
would be a very good thing for just a small service of dedication  again
and  especially  to  the people who, with their  love  and  devotion  to
Christ, has made this all possible.

And I want to thank each and every one of you for your offerings and  so
forth that you have put forth to dedicate this church to Christ. And I'm
greatly in appreciations and thank the congregation to speak these words
in  behalf  of our good brethren here of the church who  have  dedicated
their  services to this: Brother Banks Wood, our noble brother;  Brother
Roy  Roberson, our noble brother; and many others who, with  un-selfish-
ness and with singleness of heart, have put months in constructing  this
place  the  way  it's been--stayed here to see that it  was  built  just
right. And...

When  I walked in to see this pulpit, the kind I have always longed  for
all my life--I--Brother Woods knew what I liked.  He never said he would
build  it, but he has built it.  And I noticed the building and how  the
construction--it's just all... it's supreme.

And now, there's no words to express my feeling. There is just no way to
do it, see, and--but God understands.  And may you each be rewarded  for
your contributions and all that you have done to make this place what it
is in the way of a building--a house of the Lord.

And now, I would like to say these words: Now the building, as beautiful
as  it is, inside and out...  My brother-in-law, Junior Weber,  had  the
brick masonry... I don't see how it could have been anything better than
what it is--a perfect job.

Another  brother who is here, (I never met the man) he put in the  sound
system.  But noticing even in a flat building like this, I  can  just...
there  is  no  rebound  to  the acoustics;  they  are  in  the  ceilings
here--different ways.  No matter where I stand, it's just the same, see.
And  every  room is constructed that the speakers are in them.  You  can
make  it any way you wish to hear.  It's--I believe it was the  hand  of
Almighty God who did these things.

Now,  if  our Lord has so given us a building that we  can  worship  Him
in...  For better than--around thirty years... We started off with a mud
floor--sawdust,  and  sat here by old coal stoves, and  the  contractor,
Brother  Wood, one of them, Brother Roberson was telling me  that  where
those  pilasters was, and those old stoves used to set in those  rafters
that went across, they had caught fire and had burned back maybe two  or
three  feet.  Why it didn't burn down only God that kept  it.  And  then
after  burning off and all the weight of the Tabernacle laying on  that,
why it did not fall in--only the hand of God. Now it's under-girded with
steel and setting on the ground built up strong.

Now  I think it's our duty to make the inside right by the grace of  God
to be so grateful to God that our...  This will just not only be a beau-
tiful  building that we will come to, but may everyone who comes in  see
the beautiful characteristic of Jesus Christ on every person that  comes
in.

May it be a consecrated place to our Lord--a consecrated people, for  no
matter how beautiful the structure is (that we certainly do appreciate),
the beauty of the church is the character of the people. I trust that it
will always be a house of God of beauty.

Now, in the dedicational service of the original cornerstone being laid,
a  great  vision came, and it's wrote in the cornerstone the  morning  I
dedicated it.

And  you  might've wondered a few minutes ago why I was so  long  coming
out.   My first duty, as I come into the new church, I married  a  young
man and woman standing in the office.  May it be a type that I will be a
loyal minister to Christ to get a Bride ready for the ceremonies of that
day.

And  now, let us do as we did at the beginning.  When we started at  the
first  dedication  of the church, I was just a young man  and  my--maybe
twenty-one,  twenty-two years old when we laid the cornerstone.  It  was
before I was even married.  And I always wanted to see a place correctly
in order in God's--for God to worship (see?) with His people. And we can
only do that, not by a pretty building, but by a consecrated life is the
only way we can do it.

And  now before we dedicate a dedicational prayer--read some  Scriptures
and  dedicate  the church back to God, and then I have  some--I  have  a
Message on evangelism this morning to build in to my Message coming up.

And  tonight,  I want to take the 5th chapter of  Revelation,  which  is
blending in from the Seven Church Ages to the Seven Seals.  That I--Then
we  will  have... Monday night will be the white  horse  rider;  Tuesday
night,  the  black horse rider and on down--the four horse  riders.  And
then  the Sixth Seal being opened, and then Sunday morning, next  Sunday
morning,  if  the Lord willing, (we will see later, announce  it  later)
maybe  next  Sunday morning have a prayer meeting for the  sick  in  the
building.  And then Sunday night close off with...  May the Lord help us
to  open the Seventh Seal where there's just a short verse, and it  says
this: "There was silence in Heaven for a half hour." That silence.

Now, I don't know what these Seals mean. I am just as much at the end of
my wits to them as perhaps some of you are this morning.  We have eccle-
siastical  ideas  that have been presented by man, but that  will  never
touch it.  And if you'll see, it has to come by inspiration.  It must be
God,  Himself  is the only One Who can do it--the Lamb, and  tonight  is
that Book of Redemption.

Now, in this I...  The reason I'm not announcing prayer meetings for the
sick or so forth is because that I am staying with some friends, and I'm
giving  every minute of my time to study and prayer.  And you  know  the
vision that I had just before leaving and going out west--of those seven
Angels come flying so you'll understand a little later.

So  now, now in the building I think that we ought to have in  this,  if
it's  been dedicated, (or going to be dedicated in a few minutes to  the
worship of God) we should keep it that way.  We should never buy or sell
in the building.

We should never do any business in this auditorium here--it should never
be  done in here.  That is, such as permitting ministers to come in  and
sell books and everything. No matter what it is, there's other places to
do that probably. We shouldn't buy and sell in the house of our Lord. It
should be a place of worship, holy, consecrated for that purpose. He has
give  us a nice place; let's dedicate it to Him and  dedicate  ourselves
with it to Him.

And  now,  this may seem a little rude, but it's not a place  to  visit;
it's  a place of worship.  We should never even murmur a word inside  of
here,  outside of worship, to one another unless it's absolutely  neces-
sary.   We  should never rally around; we should never run  through  the
building or let our children run through the building.

And so doing this, feeling not long ago that doing this, we  constructed
it so we could take care of all of  it. Now we have this set here...  Of
course, many people are strangers.  The Tabernacle folks know this, that
the building is going to be dedicated to the service of the Almighty.

Therefore,  dedicating  ourselves,  let's remember when  we  enter  that
sanctuary,  keep  still to one another and worship God.  If we  want  to
visit  each other, there's places we may visit each other like that  but
never  walking  around  where you can't hear yourself  think,  and  some
person come in, and they just don't know what to do, see.  It's so  much
noise and things--it's just humanly.

And I've seen it in churches until it has made me feel real bad, because
we  do  not come into the sanctuary of the Lord to meet each  other;  we
come  here to worship God and then go to our homes.  This  sanctuary  is
dedicated to worship.  When...  Stand outside; talk anything you wish to
as  long  as it's right and holy; go to one another's homes;  visit  one
another in places, but when you enter that door, be quiet.

You  come here to talk to Him (see?) and let Him talk back to  you.  The
trouble  of it is, we do too much talking and don't listen enough.  Then
when we come in here, wait on Him.

Now  in the old Tabernacle, there might not be one person  present  this
morning  that  was there the day of the dedication,  when  Major  Ulrich
played the music, and I stood behind three crosses here to dedicate  the
place.

I would not permit anybody...  The ushers stood at the door to see  that
nobody  talked. When you done your talking outside, you come in. If  you
desired  to,  silently you come to the altar and  prayed  silently.  You
walked back to your seat, opened up the Bible.  What your neighbor done,
that was up to him. You had nothing to say.  If you want to talk to him,
say, "I will see him outside. I'm in here to worship the Lord." You read
His Word or sit quietly.

Then  the  music--Sister Gertie, I don't know whether she is  here  this
morning or not, Sister Gibbs. The old piano, I believe, sat back in this
corner to the best of my remembrance.  And she would play softly,  "Down
at  the  cross where my Saviour died"--some real sweet soft  music,  and
then until it come time for the service, and the song leader got up  and
led  a  couple of congregational songs, and then if they had  some  out-
standing solo, they sang it, but never just a bunch of carrying on.

And  then  the music continually played, and then when I heard  that,  I
knowed it was my time to come out.  When a minister walks into a congre-
gation  of people praying and the anointing of the Spirit, you're  bound
to  hear from Heaven.  There's no way to keep from it.  But if you  walk
into confusion, then you--you're so confused, and the Spirit is grieved.
And...

We don't want that, no. We want to come here to worship.  We have lovely
homes  that  I'm going to speak about just in a minute and so  forth  at
home, where we visit our friends and take them. This is the house of the
Lord.

Now, there's little children--now little babies. Now, they don't know no
different. They, the only way they can get what they want is cry for it.
And sometimes it's a drink of water, and sometimes they need  attention.
And  so we have by the grace of God dedicated a room--it was  called  on
the  list  a "cry room," but it's right straight in front of  me.  It's,
other words, where the mothers can take their baby.

Now, it's never bothers maybe me here at the pulpit--maybe I won't  even
notice it, being anointed, but there's other people sitting near, and it
bothers them. See? And they come here to hear the service.

So  the mothers, if your little baby starts whimpering, you  can't  help
that. Why sure it's... you should, you ought to bring her. A real mother
wants  to take her baby to church, and that's the thing you  should  do.
And  we've  got a room there to where you can see every  corner  of  the
building,  all  the  auditorium, and a speaker there to  where  you  can
control  the volume any way you want to with a little toilet in the  end
and  water  basin and everything just exactly for the  mother's  conven-
ience.  With chairs and things you can sit down--a place to change  your
baby  if it needs to be changed and everything sitting there.  It's  all
fixed.

And  then,  many times teen-age children and sometimes adults  will  get
to...  You know, young people will pass notes or cut up or something  in
church. Now, you're old enough to know better than that. See? You should
know better than that. See?  You shouldn't come here... If you expect to
be  a  real man someday and raise a family to the Kingdom of  God,  then
start  it off in the beginning you see, and act right and do right.  And
now of course...

Now, the ushers stands at the corners of the buildings and so forth  and
if  any carrying on, they are ordained as their duty, (and trustees  sit
here  in the front) that in a case of someone getting misbehaving,  they
are commissioned to ask the person to keep quiet.

Then  if they don't have that respect, it would be better  that  someone
else had the seat, because there's somebody that wants to hear.  There's
somebody  come for that purpose to hear and that's what we're here  for,
is to hear the Word of the Lord.  And so, everybody wants to hear it and
we  want it just as quiet as they can be--just as quiet as they can  be.
That is, not a bunch of talking and carrying on.

Of  course, somebody worshipping the Lord; that's expected. That's  what
it should be; that's what you're here for, is to worship the Lord.  Yes,
if  you feel like praising God or shouting, just go right on,  see,  be-
cause  that's what you're here for, see, but--is to worship the Lord  in
your own way of worshipping.  But there's nobody worships the Lord while
you're  talking and passing notes, and you're helping somebody  else  to
get away from the worship of the Lord, see.

So, we feel that that would be wrong, and we want to make that a  ruling
in  our  church, that in our congregation, that to this  building,  this
church  will be dedicated to the Kingdom of God and to the preaching  of
the  Word.  Pray!  Worship!  That's the reason you should come  here--to
worship. Then...

And  then  another  thing, when service is over usually  the  people  in
churches...   I don't think it's here because I'm always gone, see,  be-
cause I get away usually even in preaching other services, the anointing
comes,  and  visions happen, and I'm wore out, and I step off  into  the
room,  and maybe Billy or some of the man there take me on to  home  and
let  me rest awhile 'til I get out of it because it's a very much  of  a
strain.

And  then, I have seen churches though, to where the children were  per-
mitted  to run all over the sanctuary, and the adults stand  and  holler
across  the room to one another.  That's a good way to ruin the  service
coming that night or whatever time it is, see.

As soon as the service is dismissed leave the auditorium. You're through
in  the worship then.  Then go out and talk to one another and  whatever
you want to do. If you've got something you want to talk to somebody, to
see them, why, you go with them or to their home or whatever it is,  but
don't do it in the auditorium. Let's dedicate this to God. See?  This is
His  meeting place where we meet with Him; see, and the Law  goes  forth
from the sanctuary, of course. And I believe that that would be pleasing
to our Heavenly Father.

And then when you come and you get to find out that gifts are  beginning
to  fall  among  you...  Now, usually it--I will trust  it'll  never  be
here--but  when people have a new church, the first thing you know,  the
congregation  begins to get starchy.  You never want that to  be.  After
all, this is a place of worship.  This is the house of the Lord.  And if
spiritual gifts begin to come among you...

I  understand that since I've been gone that people have moved  in  here
from different parts of the country to make this their home.  I'm thank-
ful,  grateful to God that I believe that the morning when  I  dedicated
and laid that cornerstone there as a young man, I prayed for its  stand-
ing to see the coming of Jesus Christ.  And when I did, owing  thousands
of dollars--and you could take up an offering in a congregation of  this
size  and  get thirty or forty cents, and our  obligation  was  somewhat
$150.00, $200.00 a month.

How could I ever do it? And I knowed that I was working, and I would pay
it off--seventeen years of pastoral without taking one cent, but  giving
everything  that I had myself, outside of my living, and all  that  come
into  the  little  box on the back to the Kingdom  of  God.  And  people
prophesied  and predicted that within a year's time, it would be  turned
into a garage.

Satan tried to take it away from us one time in a flaw, in a fraud of  a
lawsuit--some  man claimed he hurt his foot while he was working on  it,
and then let it go, and then sued and wanted to take the Tabernacle. And
for weeks I stood at the post, but in spite of all the misunderstandings
and  the predictions and what they said, she stands today as one of  the
prettiest  auditoriums  and the finest churches there is in  the  United
States. That's right.

From  here  has  went  the Word of the  Living  God  around  the  world,
see--around the world, and it has constantly taken its circle around the
globe  from  every  nation under Heaven as far as  we  know--around  and
around the world.  Let us be thankful for this.  Let us be grateful  for
this.  And  now that we have a place to dwell in, a  roof  under...  our
head,  a clean nice church to sit in; let's dedicate ourselves newly  to
the task and consecrate ourselves to Christ. And...

Brother  Neville,  our  noble brother and real pastor,  servant  of  the
Living God--as far as that man knows the Message, he holds with it  with
all  he's  got.  That's  right.  He's a gentle  person;  he's  a  little
afraid--not afraid, I don't mean that, but he's so awful gentle; he just
doesn't speak out.  You know, like to say a thing that's sharp and  cut-
ting or "sit down!" or "keep still!"  I've noticed that and listened  to
the tapes behind it.

But,  it so happens that I can do that, so I want you to remember,  it's
my words you see, and this is all being taped; see, everything is taped.
And please let every deacon stand to his post of duty, and remember that
you're under a commission from God to hold that post sacred,  see--every
trustee the same.

Pastor  is to bring forth... It isn't the pastor's place to have to  say
that; it's the trustees--or I mean the deacons, for they are the  police
of  the church.  That is, if young couples come on the outside and  blow
horns (you know how they usually do) or something like that, at meetings
or  get out there; and a mother sends her girl down here, and she  takes
off  out with some renegade kid and runs out there in the car,  and  her
mother  thinks  she's in church like that, the deacon ought  to  see  to
that. "You either come in here and sit down, or I'm going to take you in
my car and take you home to your mother." See? You must do that.

Remember: Love is corrective, see--always.  Genuine love is  corrective.
So, you must be able to stand the correction.  And mothers know now that
there's a place there for your baby.  You young kids know different than
to run around over the building, see. And you adults know different than
to talk and carry on your conversations in the auditorium, see. Don't do
that; it's wrong. It isn't pleasing to God.

Jesus  said,  "It  is  written,  My house  shall  be  made  a  house  of
worship--prayer--called  the house of prayer of all nations."  And  they
were buying and selling, and He plaited ropes and ran the people out  of
the  auditorium.   And we certainly don't want that to  happen  in  this
sanctuary here. So, let's dedicate our lives, our church, our tasks, our
service, and everything we have to the Kingdom of God.

Now,  I  want to read some Scriptures before we  have  the  dedicational
prayer. And then, it's just a re-dedication, because the real dedication
happened  thirty years ago.  Now...  Then if we read this Scripture  and
talk on it for a few minutes, I trust that God will bring His  blessings
to us.

And now, there was another thing I was going to say. Yes!  Where we used
to  have the recorders and so forth, we got a regular room  there  where
those  who wants to take recordings; there's special hookups and  every-
thing there that comes directly from the main mike in there.

There's  rooms, robes--everything for baptismal service.  And  then  one
thing--many  people has always felt bad at me, (many people  who  really
didn't know the Scripture) about having a crucifix in a church. I remem-
ber one time when something happened here about that. I had three cross-
es, and a brother got all shook up because he heard a--another denomina-
tion say that a crucifix meant Catholic.

I want some student or somebody or some born again Christian to say that
Catholics has got the option on the Crucifix. Crucifix of Christ doesn't
represent  Catholicism;  that represents God, the Kingdom.  Now,  saints
represent Catholicism.  We believe there's one Mediator between God  and
man, and that's Christ; but Catholics believe in all kinds of mediators:
thousands  of women and man and everything.  Any good Catholic,  almost,
that  dies becomes an intercessor.  Now, crucifix of  Christ  represents
Jesus Christ.

Did  you know the early Christians, according to the ancient history  of
the early church, they carried crosses on their backs wherever they went
to  signify and identify themselves as Christians.  Now,  the  Catholics
claim that was them.  Of course they claim they was--the first ones, but
the--the Catholic church wasn't even organized then; see, but Christians
packed the cross on...

You've heard people say, "Crossback."  You refer that to Catholic? It is
the real Catholic, the universal Holy Ghost Church of the world-correct.
We  are  Catholic; we are the  original  Catholic--the  Bible--believing
Catholic, see.  They are the church Catholic--the organization.  We  are
free from that. We are the continuation of the doctrine of the apostles.
We  are  the continuation of the Baptism of the Holy Ghost and  all  the
things that the early church stood for, and the Catholic church has none
of them. See?

So,  they placed the crucifix here that was brought--that was hewed  out
of  olive  trees under where Jesus prayed--that the crucifix  had  taken
years and was given to me by Brother Arganbright, and I want to dedicate
it with this church...  And how appropriate that ever who hung it  there
(I don't know who it was that hang it here) to my left--He pardoned  the
thief to His right. That's me.

And  another  thing it represents: As His head is bowed as you  see  His
suffering, any persons who are... it is looking over the altar, and He's
expecting  you here, sinner.  He will be looking down upon  you.   Later
they'll  have  a little light sitting here that when the altar  call  is
being  made, a light will flash on to that... that when people are  here
to...

You say, "Why do you need that? You shouldn't have an image." Well then,
the  same  God that said, "Don't make yourself any graven  images";  the
same  God said, "Build two cherubims and tip their wings  together,  and
put them at the mercy seat where the people pray." You see, it's without
understanding, see.  So, that is inspired and directly hung in its right
place, and I'm so thankful to be the one at the right side.

I  trust  that He has forgiven me, for I--as far as  literally  stealing
anything  as I know, I never did in my life; but I so misused  His  time
'til I stole that way,  and I've done many things that I  shouldn't  do,
and I'm grateful to God this morning that He has forgiven my sins.

And  now,  I want to read out of the Book of I Chronicles  17  and  just
speak for about five minutes on dedicational service; pray, and then  we
going into the message. Now, in I Chronicles, the 17th chapter:

Now  it  came  to pass, as David sat in the house, that  David  said  to
Nathan  the prophet, Lo, I dwell in an house of cedars, but the  ark  of
the covenant of the LORD remaineth under curtain.

Then  Nathan said unto David, Do all that is in thine heart; for God  is
with thee.

And  it came to pass the same night, that the word of the LORD  came  to
Nathan, saying,

Go  and  tell my servant David, (Go and tell David my  servant,  rather)
Thus saith the LORD, Thou shalt not build me an house to dwell in:

For I have not dwelt in an house since the day that I brought up  Israel
unto this day; but have gone from tent to tent, and from one  tabernacle
to another.

Whereas  I  have walked with all Israel, spake I a word to  any  of  the
judges  of Israel, whom I commanded to feed my people, saying, Why  have
ye not built me an house?

Now  therefore  thus shalt thou say unto David, Thus saith the  LORD  of
hosts,  l took thee from the sheepcote, even from following  the  sheep,
that thou shouldest be ruler over my people Israel:

And I have been with thee wheresoever thou hast walked, and have cut off
thine enemies from before thee, and have made thee a name like the  name
of great men that are in the earth.

I  would like to say that this place that David saw the same thing  that
we  saw.  David said, "It is not right that you people have built  me  a
house  of  cedar, and the ark of the covenant of my God is  still  under
curtain."  (That  was  skins  that been  sewed  together  of  sheep  and
animals.)   He said, "It isn't right for me to have a nice home, and the
ark of the covenant of my God remaining in a tent."

So God put upon his heart to build a tabernacle.  But David, being a man
of love and consecration to God, yet he had shed too much blood.  So  he
said... David speaking this in the presence of the prophet of that  age,
which  was Nathan.  And Nathan, knowing that God loved David,  he  said,
"David, do all that's in your heart for God is with thee." What a state-
ment! "Do all that's in your heart, for God is with you."

And  that same night--showing the consecration of David to the  love  of
God,  and then to see the same night, knowing that he was in  the  error
that he was not permitted to do it, God was graceful enough to come down
and  speak to Nathan.  And I always like these words: "Go  tell  Nathan,
My...  Go tell David, My servant, that I took you from  the  sheepcote."
Just... He wasn't nothing.

I would like to apply that here just a minute. "I took you from nothing,
and  I give you a name--you've got a name like great man that's  in  the
earth."   And I'd like to apply that in a confidential, yet in a way  of
making a point.

I  was  thinking that a few years ago I was standing down  in  the  city
here;  nobody  cared for me; nobody loved me.  And I loved  people,  but
nobody loved me because of the background of the family.  No  disregards
to my precious mother and father.  How I wish that Mama could have lived
to walked in this sanctuary this morning.

Many  of  the old-timers who placed their money to help build  it  here,
maybe God this morning will let them look over the banister.

But  the family of Branham didn't have a very good name around  here  on
account of drinking.  Nobody had nothing to do with me.  And I  remember
telling  my wife not long ago, just remember that I couldn't get  anyone
to  talk  to me.  Nobody cared for me, and now I have to hide to  get  a
little rest.

And  now  the Lord has give us this great place and these  great  things
that  He's done.  And He give me, besides a bad name, He give me a  name
like unto some of the great man; and He's cut off my enemies wherever  I
went.   There's  never  been  nothing  stand  before  It.  Wherever   It
went--but--and how grateful I am for that.

And  how  would I ever knowed, as a little ragged kid, up  here  two  or
three blocks from here to the Ingramville School, when I was the  laugh-
ing  stock of the school from being so ragged and skate on a little  old
pond.  How did I ever know that down beneath that pond laid a seed of  a
lily  that could bloom like this?  And how did I ever know that  no  one
talking  to  me and yet, He will give me a name that  would  be  honored
amongst His people?

And now, David was not permitted to build the temple. He could not build
it.  But He said, "I will raise up from your seed, and he will build the
temple,  and that temple will be an everlasting temple.  And  upon  your
son, the Son of David, will be an everlasting Kingdom He will  control."
Solomon, David's son in the natural (from his natural strength) built  a
house unto the Lord--a temple. But when the real Seed of David come, the
Son  of David, He told them there would come a time that there  wouldn't
be  one stone left upon the other of that temple, but He tried to  point
them to another temple.

John, the revelator, over in the Book of Revelation, he saw this  taber-
nacle.   (Revelation 21) He saw the new temple coming,  descending  down
from Heaven, adorned as a bride was adorned for her husband, and a voice
out of the temple said, "Behold, the tabernacle of God is with man,  and
God  shall  be with them and will wipe all tears from  their  eyes.  And
there shall be no more hunger nor no more sorrow, no more pain or death,
for the former things have passed away."

Then  the  true  Son of David, (as we're going to see  in  this  lessons
coming  on  in this week) will then come to His  temple--the  temple  of
God--the  real Tabernacle, which He has gone away to construct now.  For
He said in John 14: "In My Father's house are many mansions, and I  will
go..."  What did He mean by that?   Is already foreordained, "... and  I
will go to prepare a place for you, and will return back to receive  you
unto  Myself."   And of course, we know that'll be in the great  age  to
come. And... The true Seed of David will take the Throne, which is Jesus
Christ, and there will reign over the Church as His Bride--in the  house
with Him and over the twelve tribes of Israel throughout all Eternity.

And these little places--as David could not build the true tabernacle of
God, because he wasn't prepared to do it. There was nothing he could do.
He was a mortal and shed blood.

So is it today to us.  We are not prepared to build a true Tabernacle of
God.   There's only One can do that, and it's being in its  construction
now.   But  this little tabernacle, along with the temple  that  Solomon
built Him and along with the others are only temporary places of worship
until  the time comes when the real Tabernacle will be set up  upon  the
earth, and righteousness shall reign from sky to sky, and there will  be
no more sorrow.   There will be no funerals preached in that Tabernacle.
There  will be no more weddings, for the wedding will be one great  wed-
ding for Eternity. What a time that will be!

But let us purpose in our hearts today, that in commemoration and  wait-
ing for that Tabernacle to come, that we will so characterize ourself by
His  Spirit  that we will worship in this place as if we  were  in  that
other place, waiting for that place to come.

Now, let us stand to our feet, and as I read the Holy Script.

And  I  saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven  and  the
first earth was passed away; and there were no more sea.

I John saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of
heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.

And I heard the... voice... of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle  of
God  is  with man, and he shall dwell with them, and they shall  be  his
people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God.
[Revelation 21:1-3]

Let us bow our heads now. Our Heavenly Father, we stand in awe. We stand
in  respect and in Holy reverence. And we ask You, Lord, to  accept  our
gift  that You've given us grace--money to prepare for a  worship  place
for  You.  There's nothing or no place that we could  prepare  upon  the
earth  that  would be worthy for the Spirit of God to dwell in,  but  we
offer this to You as a token of our love and feelings toward You,  Lord.
And we thank You for all the things that You have done for us.

And  now  the building and the grounds being dedicated long ago  to  the
service, and we thank You for memories of what has been.  And now,  Lord
God, as the vision broke through years ago expressing this, that I  seen
in old buildings that the people once was in, and they had been repaired
and made new, and I was sent back across the river.

Now,  Lord God, Creator of heavens and earth, we stand as the people  of
Thy fold. We stand as the people of Thy Kingdom, and with myself and the
pastor  and  the church, the people, we dedicate this  building  to  the
service  of the Almighty God through the Name of Jesus Christ, His  Son,
for the service of God and for reverence and respect of God. And may the
Gospel  so flow from this place that it'll cause the world to come  from
the  four corners of the globe to see the glory of God going forth  from
it. As Thou hast done in the past, may the future be many times greater.

Father,  we now dedicate ourselves to the service to the Word  with  all
that's  in  us.  Lord, the congregation and  the  people--they  dedicate
themselves  this  morning to the hearing of the Word.  And we,  as  min-
isters,  dedicate ourselves to the preaching of the Word--to be  instant
in season, out of season, reproving, rebuking with all long-suffering as
it's  written there in the cornerstone from thirty years ago.  You  said
the  time  would come when people would not endure sound  doctrine,  but
would  heap  for themselves teachers having itching ears and  be  turned
from the Truth to fables.

Lord,  as we have tried to hold out the Word to the people.   May we  be
inspired  and strengthened with a double effort, Lord, as a double  por-
tion of the Spirit strikes upon the place, may the Holy Spirit as it was
in the day of the dedication of the temple when Solomon prayed, the Holy
Spirit  in  the form of the Pillar of Fire and Cloud came in  the  front
door,  rode  up around the cherubims, went over to the  Holy  Place  and
there took Its resting place.

Oh God, Solomon said, "If Thy people be in trouble anywhere, and look to
this  Holy Place and pray, then hear from Heaven."   Lord, may the  Holy
Spirit this morning come into every heart, every consecrated soul that's
in here. And the Bible says that the glory of God was so great until the
ministers could not even minister for the glory of God.

Oh, Lord God, let it repeat again as we give ourselves to Thee with  the
church in dedication for service.  And it is written: "Ask and you shall
receive,"  and we commit ourselves with our offering of the church  this
morning  to  You for service, for the latter day Light for  the  evening
time--Lights  that  we might bring consolation and faith  to  a  waiting
people that's waiting for the coming of the Bridegroom to dress a  Bride
in the Gospel of Christ for the Lord Jesus to receive. This we dedicate,
myself,  Brother Neville, and the congregation to the service of God  in
the Name of Jesus Christ. Amen. You may be seated.

David  said,  "I was happy when they said unto me, `Let us go  into  the
house  of the Lord'!"   And may it ever be with us that when  it's  men-
tioned, we will be happy to gather in the house of the Lord. Amen.

Now...  After the little dedicational service, I have an hour  now.  And
now, just remember now what we're dedicated to: to reverence,  holiness,
quietness before the Lord; worship before the Lord and be just as rever-
ent  as you can be in the house of the Lord.   And now... And when  this
service  is  dismissed--immediately after the service is  dismissed,  go
from  the building; see, and that gives the janitor time to get in  here
and clean it for the next time and get ready.  Then it's not a confusion
in the house of the Lord...?...

I think the place will be cleared out in about fifteen minutes after the
service  is dismissed. Be sure to be friendly; shake hands  with  every-
body, and invite everybody back.  And we expect to have this coming week
now, one of the most solemn services that's ever been held in the Taber-
nacle. We're looking forward to it.

Now,  I never dawned upon me 'til something... `til long late wee  hours
last night in prayer; I began to see something. So, I trust this will be
a  great  time, which I believe it will if the Lord will help  us.  Now,
when  I said "great time"... Now, I'm going to speak on something  about
that this morning.

You know what man calls great sometimes is not great, but what God calls
great,  man calls foolish; and what God calls foolish, man calls  great.
So let's bear that in mind. Weigh every word.

Now,  the  services are long; they'll be drawn out because it's  a  hard
service--much teaching, consecration and I just...  The place where  I'm
staying,  the people just kind of want to feed me everything,  but  I...
Said,  "Well, you've lost so much weight, Brother Branham,"  everything,
but I've been constantly in service.  I've got to leave here next Sunday
night  to get to another one right quick in Mexico, so it's just a  hard
thing. So, but I'm just trying to let off from so much eating and making
myself ready.

And I'm happy, this morning, to see Brother Junior Jackson, and  Brother
Ruddell, and--and the different ministers and so forth around; God bless
you all.

Now, I want to speak to you this morning upon a subject that I have some
notes written here on.  And I want to read first from the Book of Isaiah
the  53rd chapter.  Now, while you're turning to it I'd like to make  an
announcement or two. That, tonight, I want to speak on this Book, bridge
it between the last Church Age to the Seal opening.  Now, there's a vast
gap in there. And...

Before, when I ended up on the Church Ages, I also spoke there upon  the
Seventy Weeks of Daniel immediately following because it tied in.  And I
said,  "Now, if I ever take the Seven Seals, I will have to get  rid  of
this  Daniel's Seventy Weeks in order to tie in the  Seals--leaving  one
thing open."  And that was the 5th chapter of the Seven-sealed Book, and
we will take that tonight.

We  want  to try to start early tonight.  How about  me...  you  already
mentioned  it have you?... start early.  How about... can  everybody  be
here about 7:00? All right. Let's start the regular service at 6:30, the
song service, and I will be here by 7:00.  And then through the week  we
will make an early start.  And we...  Now, we've come...  There's nobody
loves  singing  like Christians does.   We love singing; we  love  those
things, but now we're in something else now.  We're in the Word, see; so
let's stay right with that. Now we're going...

We're in teaching, and you can realize what a great strain it is on  me;
see, because if I teach anything wrong, I'm going to have to answer  for
it.  See?  And so, I must not take what anyone says; I must--It must  be
inspired.  And  I believe that the Seven Angels who  was  holding  these
seven thunders will grant it. See? And...

Now,  in  Isaiah the 53rd chapter of Isaiah, the first verse or  two.  I
want  to  ask this question--now, this is not pertaining  to  the  Seven
Seals at all. This is just a message--for I knowed I had to have dedica-
tion  and  couldn't go into that because I wouldn't have  time.   But  I
thought, just for a little dedicational service, little memorial service
for   this  church,  (or  little  dedicational  service,  rather)   then
they--there wouldn't be time then to go into what I want to say, see, on
this opening of this Book. So I will tonight.

And  now, this is just a little service that--it--it'll blend  right  in
with it though, so listen to every word. Catch it. And if you're talking
it  on tapes or anything, then you stay right with that  tape  teaching!
Don't say nothing but what that tape says!   Just say just exactly  what
the  tape  says, see, because some of those things...   We're  going  to
understand a whole lot about this now--why it's misunderstood! See.  And
you be sure to say just what the tape says! Don't say nothing else, see,
because... I don't say that of my own!  It's Him that says it!  You see?
And... So many times confusion--people will raise up and say, "Well, so-
and-so said it meant so-and-so!" Just leave it the way it is!

That's the way we want the Bible--just the way the Bible says it, that's
the way we want it--just, just like that!   Don't put own interpretation
to it! It's already interpreted! You see? Now...

Who  hath  believed our report? and to whom is the arm of the  LORD  re-
vealed? Let me read it again now, closely.

Who  hath believed our Report? (Question) and to whom is the arm of  the
LORD revealed?

In  other  words, if you have believed our report, then the arm  of  the
Lord has been revealed. See?

Who  hath  believed our report? and to whom is the arm of the  LORD  re-
vealed?

Now,  I want to read also in the Book of St. Matthew's Gospel, the  11th
chapter of St. Matthew.  Now, you bring your papers and things,  because
constantly we're...  If you don't have a recorder, you bring your  paper
so  we can get it.  The 11th chapter of St. Matthew, the 25th  and  26th
verses. (St. Matthew 11:26-27)  All right.  Jesus speaking in prayer.  I
want to begin a little bit behind that.  Let's make it the 25th and 26th
verse  I  believe that's where I announced though, for I had  it  marked
here in my Bible.

At  that time Jesus answered and said, I thank thee, O Father,  Lord  of
heaven  and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise  and
prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes.

Even so, Father: for so it seemed good in thy sight.

Catch those two Scriptures.  "Who hath believed our report? and to  whom
is the arm of the LORD revealed?" Then Jesus thanked God that He had hid
the mystery from the wise and prudent, and would reveal it to babes such
as would learn, for it seemed good to God to do that.

Now from this text... from this Scripture reading, I draw this text: God
Hiding  Himself in Simplicity, Then Revealing Himself in the Same.  Now,
for  the  tapes  I keep repeating, so for the tapes,  you  see,  because
they're taping it. See? God Hiding Himself in Simplicity, Then Revealing
Himself in the Same.

It is strange to think how that God does such a thing as that.  God will
hide Himself in something so simple that will cause the wise to miss  it
a  million miles and then turn right back around in that... some  simple
thing  in the simplicity of His way of working and reveal Himself  right
out again.

I thought it made a text that we might study this before we go into  the
great teachings of the Seven Seals.  Many miss Him by the way He reveals
Himself.  Now, man has their own ideas of what God ought to be and  what
God is going to do; and as I have made the old statement many times that
man  still remains man. Man is always giving God praise for what He  did
do, and always looking forward to what He will do, and ignoring what  He
is doing.

That's the way they miss it.  They look back and see what a great  thing
He done, but they fail to see what a simple thing He used to do it with.
See?   And  then they look forward and see a great thing  coming  that's
going to happen, and nine times out of ten, it's already happening right
around them, and it's so simple that they don't know it.

One day a man, up here at Utica...  And if some of his people is here, I
don't say this for any radical exposure of the man.  He was a veteran of
the  Civil War, and I believe he was...  I don't know which side he  was
on, but I believe he was a rebel.  But he was an infidel, and he claimed
that there was no such a thing as God.  He lived in Utica; his name  was
Jim Dorsey.

Many of you people might've knowed him. He has given me many a watermel-
on when I was a little fellow.  He used to raise watermelons down on the
river in the bottom there. And he was quite a friend to my daddy. But he
said one day, one of the great outstanding things that was ever said  to
him, in contrast--I was just a little boy in those days--but in contrast
to  his belief that caused him to walk away and drop his head  and  cry.
And I understood that by this the man was gloriously converted to Christ
at the age of about eighty-five years old.

He  asked a little girl one day, who was coming from Sunday school,  why
did she waste her time on doing such a thing as that?

She said, because she believed that there was a God.

And  Mr. Dorsey said, that... He said, "Child, you are so wrong  to  be-
lieve in such a thing as that."

And  he  said that the little girl stooped down and picked up  a  little
flower  out of--off of the ground, pulled it from its petals, and  said,
"Mr. Dorsey, could you tell me how this lives?"

There it was.  When he begin to search back... He could have said to the
child, "Well, it's growing in the earth."  And then the questions  could
revolve  back:  "Where did the earth come from?  How did that  seed  get
here?  How did it happen?" And on and on and on and run it on back until
he seen.  See?  Not the great glamorous things that we think about,  but
it's the simple things that God is so real in--the simplicity.

So  it  pleases God to reveal Himself and then hide Himself;  then  hide
Himself  and reveal Himself in simple little things.  It's put over  the
top of the head of man because... If you'd say, "Why would a just God do
that?"  It's because that man was made up in the beginning not to try to
shift for himself.

A  man  was made to rely completely upon God.  That's the  reason  we're
likened unto lambs or sheep. A sheep cannot lead himself; he has to have
a  leader--and the Holy Spirit is supposed to lead us.  So man  is  made
that way, and God made all of His works so simple that the simple  could
understand it; and God makes Himself simple with the simple in order  to
be understood by the simple.

In otherwise, He said in Isaiah 35, I believe.  He said, "Though a  fool
should  not err therein."  It's so simple.  And we know that God  is  so
great,  'til  we expect it to be some great something, and we  miss  the
simple things.

We stumble over simplicity. That's how we miss God, is by stumbling over
simplicity.  God is so simple until the scholars of these days  and  all
days  miss Him a million miles; because in their intellects,  they  know
that there's nothing like Him so great.  But in His revelation, He makes
it so simple they go plumb over the top of it and miss it.

Now,  study that.  Study it all.  And you people who are visiting  here,
when you go to your motel rooms, take those things and ponder over them.
We  don't have time to break it down as it should be broke down,  but  I
want  you to do it when you get to the motel, hotel, or wherever  you're
staying, or at home. Gather together and study over it.

Miss  Him  by the way that He reveals Himself, for He is so  great,  yet
hides  Himself  in simplicity to make Hisself known to the  least.  See?
Don't  try  to get the great, because he goes over the top  of  it;  but
listen to the simplicity of God, and then you find God right here in the
simple way.

High-polished worldly wisdom, educated, always misses Him.  Now, I'm not
here... and I know there's school teachers--two or three that I know  of
sitting in here; and I'm not here to contradict school and education and
try to support illiterate-ness; I'm not here for that.  But what it  is,
the people have so placed so much upon that until they're... even in the
seminaries and so forth they're missing the very thing that God has  put
before them.

That's  why  I  not against brethren who are in  denomination,  but  I'm
against  system of denomination; because it tries to magnify itself  and
educate  its ministers in such--such a place, until if they  don't  have
the  proper  schooling and education, they're ousted; and they  have  to
stand the psychiatrist's test and so forth.   I will never think that it
was  God's will to test a minister by psychiatry but to test him by  the
Word--would be God's way of testing His man that He sent out to have the
Word--preach the Word.

Now,  today we preach philosophy; we preach creed and  denominationalism
and  so many things and leaving off the Word, because they say it  can't
be understood.  It can be understood.  He promised to do it.  Now  we're
asking Him to do it.

Now, we're going to take a few characters here for a few minutes.  Let's
notice  in  the days of Noah.  Noah's day--God seen  worldly  wisdom  so
greatly  punctuated and respected, He sent a simple Message by a  simple
person to show them His greatness. Now, we know that in the day of Noah,
they claimed that a civilization was so mighty then until we have  never
reached that spot yet in our modern civilization.

And I believe that it will finally be reached because our Lord said, "As
it  was in the days of Noah, so will it be at the coming of the  Son  of
man."  He gave some illustration.

And they built the pyramid and the sphinx there in Egypt, and they built
gigantic things that we have no power today to build such with. They had
an  embalming that they could embalm a body to make it look  so  natural
until it still stays today. We cannot make a mummy today; we haven't the
stuff  to make it with.  They had colors that hold so fast for  four  or
five  thousand years ago, it still remains just the same color  it  was.
See?  We don't have no such as that today. And many great things of that
civilization speaks of its superiority over our modern civilization.

And  so you can imagine how education and science of such  great  tokens
that  we  have  left that there was such a civilization,  what  a  great
civilization  that  must be while these memorial--how that  science  and
modern civilization and education was a must with the people.  They must
be. It had to be.

There was hardly any, I guess, any illiteracy among them at all.  And so
God,  searching through that great economy at that day in their  systems
could not, perhaps, find the right type of a man 'til He found an illit-
erate, maybe farmer by the name of Noah--a sheepherder.  And He gave him
His Message to preach to the people that was so simple 'til their schol-
arships  of that day, until the people stumbled over the  simplicity  of
the Message.

And  yet,  the Message was in the face of science,  radical.  How  could
there be rain in the skies when there was no rain up there? See. And the
simple  Message of building an ark, constructing something to  get  into
that  there was no water to float it; why, he become a fanatic.  And  he
become  a--what  we would call, (if you would excuse the  expression  of
today) a "oddball."

And nearly all God's people are oddballs--they are.   I'm glad to be one
of them.  So...  You know, they--they're different from the modern trend
of civilization.  So they become odd--strange.  He said His people was a
peculiar  people--odd,  strange--but  a spiritual  priesthood,  a  royal
nation,  offering spiritual sacrifices to God--the fruits of their  lips
giving praise to His Name. What a people! He's got them.

And  notice  now, what a great thing that must've been in that  day  for
some  fanatic  to come forth to the church, a fanatic, and  preaching  a
gospel that was seemingly all out of line to their way of believing. And
scientists...  Why, it was simply crazy.   How they could scientifically
prove there was no rain there.   But this simple sheepherder believed if
God said it would rain, it would rain.

And  so, let's just compare that with today about somebody gets  healed,
they  would say, "It's only emotion," or "I can scientifically prove  to
you  that the cancer or the substance or the thing; it's  still  there."
But to the simple believer, it's gone, see, because he's not looking  at
the substance, he's looking at the promise--just the same as Noah did.

So don't you see: "As it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be in  the
coming of the Son of man."  Scientifically, no one...  The doctor  could
say, "Looky here, your lump is still there. "Your cancer remain."  "Your
arm is as crippled as it ever was. You're crazy!"

And  remember, that's that same spirit from the days of Noah that  said,
"There's no rain up there.  We can shoot the moon with instruments,  and
there's no rain there."  But if God said there would be rain there,  for
"... faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of  things
that not seen."   And faith takes its final resting place on the Word of
God.  There's where it finds its resting place.  Do you understand?  Its
resting place is on God's Word.  That's where Noah rested it: "God  said
so." That settles it.

Now, if you notice again then, now Noah, in believing such, was a fanat-
ic.   And  the people of today who believe in the Baptism  of  the  Holy
Spirit...  Now,  the church said, "These people  are  fanatics.  They're
nothing but a bunch of worked-up, emotional, panic-stricken people." But
little do they know that the Word of God teaches that; it's a promise.

And  to Noah, no matter how much they said, "The old man was off at  his
mind," that he was scientifically wrong, and mentally he was wrong;  but
to  Noah it was the Word of the Lord.  And Noah stayed with it, and  the
wise  and  prudent  stumbled over the simplicity of it  and  lost  their
being. What a--a rebuke! Now, it is to that generation.

Many people say, "If I would of lived back there..."

No,  your took the same attitude, because today in the very  same  thing
being reproduced again today, only in another form; they stumble over it
today just like they did then.

No  doubt  in them days they had plenty of preachers, but Noah  was  in-
spired of God.  And Noah could look out and see that what was fixing  to
happen and know that an adulterous and wicked generation like that, that
God  would  not let stand.  So what can we do today, but  see  the  same
thing?--a modern Sodom and Gomorrah. See?  Wicked, adulterous people--so
polished  in scholarship that they stumble over the simplicity of  God's
manifestation of His being and His Word showing His Word.

There's  not a person in the world will tell that... and can  say  that,
"We  don't  see with us the very Word of God  made  manifest"--the  very
promise of the last days, the very evening Lights that was to shine.  We
are  privileged  people  to  see  that.   And  where  the  high-polished
world--it's hid from them.

Jesus said to God, the Father, He said, "It pleased You to hide it  from
them.  Even so, Father, You have hid it.  Let them with their wisdom..."
You see, it was wisdom that started the ball rolling in the muck of  sin
at  the beginning.  For Eve was seeking wisdom when she met  Satan,  and
Satan give it to her, see, and wisdom is contrary to the Word.

We're  not  asked to have wisdom; we're asked to have  faith  in  what's
already been said.  So you see... But today the scholars polish it up in
such  a  way  and  set  it over and  put  their  own  interpretation  to
it--always have. They do the same thing today. It's in the same measure.

Now,  people put--people then missed it just as they miss it and  do  it
today--same thing.  They do the same thing.  For they...  for the reason
they missed it, for they were too smart to believe it.  See?   Now,  the
message  was so simple that the smart was too smart to believe the  sim-
plicity of the message!  Oh my!  God made it so simple in Truth that the
smart and intellectual missed seeing it, because it was so simple. Well,
that's  what  makes  the greatness of God so  great--because  being  the
greatest can make Himself simple.

Man today, showing that they are not of God; they're great and trying to
get  greater and express themselves greater as Big Bishop,  Doctor  Holy
Pope,  everything--making themselves something that they're really  not,
and God being so great, brings Hisself down simple. Simplicity is great-
ness.  We can build a jet plane; we can fire a rocket to the to... put a
missile  in orbit, and we can do all these things.  Yes!  But we  cannot
build one blade of grass. Amen.  What about that?  But instead of trying
to  come back and see what makes that grass and accepting the  very  God
that  created the grass, we're trying to build a missile that  will  get
there quicker than somebody else can build one.

We  are  so smart and intellectual in our churches 'til we can  build  a
million  dollar building, or ten million dollar building,  but  yet--and
trying to build one better than the Methodist, or the Baptist build  one
better than the Presbyterian, and the Pentecostals got in the rat  race.
But  the thing of it is this: we are yet--we are so smart and so set  on
our ways until we fail to humble ourselves to realize the God that's  in
the little mission on the corner. See? That's right.  Well if that's the
way you stumble in simplicity. They've always done it.

Now,  they  were too smart to believe such a simple Message.  It  wasn't
polished enough for their scientific researches that they had. It wasn't
brilliant--the Message wasn't--enough for their educational program that
they had in that day.  See?  They studied to know that there was a  God;
and  they  studied to know that He was great; and they  tried  to  build
themselves up great with Him--when the way up is always down!

Now, who knows whether the North Pole is the North or the South Pole  is
the  North,  or the North Pole is the South, the South Pole  the  North?
Which  is up and which is down?  We're hanging in space.  We  say,  "The
North Pole is up." How do you know? The South Pole might be North.  See,
you don't know. So let's remember...

In  this words, said, "Then how would you say, Brother Branham, that  up
is down?--on the basis of Jesus Christ's Word. He said, "He that humbles
himself  shall  be  exalted,  but  he  that  exalts  himself  shall   be
abased"--be brought down. So then, actually, up is down and down is up.

As the old saint said in Chicago, that a man... A certain minister  from
a  certain organization got up where there were some Pentecostals...  He
had all his intellectual things together.  And he got up there and  used
words that the Pentecostals knowed nothing about.  And he got up  there,
and  he  seen it wasn't going over with the Pentecostal people.  And  he
went up with his chest stuck out, and he was Holy Doctor So-and-so,  you
know, from a certain big school there in Chicago.  And he looked around,
and them Pentecostals were looking at one another. They didn't even know
what he was talking about; he was so educated, so smart, brilliant. They
didn't know...

It  was something like a certain senator or man that just  run  recently
for President and was defeated. Tuck Coots told me, when I was preaching
Mama Ford's funeral and was telling about the resurrection--the  guaran-
tee of the resurrection. Just as sure as the sun rises, so shall I rise.
Just as sure as the grass dies in the fall, and the leaf falls from  the
tree, comes back again when the earth corrects itself around the  orbit,
it's got to rise again.

Tuck  said, "I appreciated that message, Billy."  Brother Neville and  I
were  sitting together in the car, and I said, "Tuck,..."  He  said,  "I
appreciate your messages."

I said, "Tuck, I have no education." I said,...

He said, "That's the good part about it."  See.  And I... He said...  He
went  to  see--well,  I guess the man forgive me;  I  don't  mean--Adlai
Stevenson, you know.  And he said he heard him fifteen minutes, and  Mr.
Stevenson  is such a brilliant speaker, supposed to be, you know,  until
Tuck  said, (I guess he's got a college education) he said he sat  there
and went to sleep. And said he went to sleep listening to him in fifteen
minutes.  And said, "With a college education, I didn't  understand  but
very few words he said. It was so highly polished."  He said, "You never
seen me sleeping in one of your services, did you, Brother Branham?"

See, it's the simplicity of it. It's simple. That's where God lays.

Now, they--they were too smart in that day to catch the meaning of God's
simple way of doing things. It wasn't polished for them. It's got to  be
polished.  It's got to be highly chromed, or they miss it.  Now, but the
great  Jehovah  was hid in His Word, and He made Himself  known  to  the
people  that believed in His Word by saving them and bringing to pass  a
simple Message--the simple Message of Noah, God brought it to pass.

Now, notice that. Now, then again in Moses' day. Notice--another time of
deliverance.   When  God is just about to do something  to  deliver  His
people,  God  sends a Message to the people, and it's so  simple--as  we
will  catch  in  the breaking of these Seals, (that was  my  purpose  of
bringing  this first) that we find out that the breaking of those  Seals
is so simple, the smart miss it a million miles.

On the simplicity of God, see--how God hides Himself in simplicity. Just
think, they could break atoms and do everything else, but when it  comes
to touching life, they can't even tell where it come from.

A simple blade of grass, and God is hid in it. They can fire a rocket to
the  moon  and shoot a radar over there or whatever more and  yet  can't
explain the life in a blade of grass. That's right. See, it's because it
can't be explained; it's so simple they overlook that.

Now, notice. Moses--in the day that God was going to deliver the  child-
ren  of  Israel according to His Word, He, what did He do?  He  chose  a
simple family; we have no record of them. See, just a son of Levi is all
we  know, and so we... and his wife.  Just an ordinary, probably  a  mud
dauber (as the world would think,) out there making brick for the enemy.
He  was just an ordinary slave in Israel, but God chose that  family  to
bring forth the deliverer--just an ordinary Jewish family. He never went
and  got royalty and celebrity or something or even got some priest;  He
took a common ordinary family, (see?)--simplicity.

Notice  what  He done then.  He brought forth a  child--a  simple  human
being.  He never...  He could have ordained the sun if He wanted to,  to
deliver them. He could have ordained the wind to deliver them.  He could
have ordained an Angel to deliver them.

Oh, hallelujah!  God can do whatever He wants to do.   "Well, how do you
know  that, Brother Branham?"  God don't leave His program.  That's  the
reason we know that this day, it's got to be simple. See? Now, He always
works in simplicity.   But God in the beginning that could have made the
sun  preach  the  Gospel, or the winds preach the Gospel,  or  an  Angel
preach  the Gospel, but He ordained man for that purpose, and  He  never
changes it.

He  never ordained indiv...  He never ordained denominations;  He  never
ordained  groups of man; He ordained man to preach the  Gospel--not  ma-
chinery, mechanical devices, or any angelic being--it was man.  And when
He brought deliverance to the people down there, He sent a simple  human
being, born of a simple family in a bunch of slaves.  Oh my!  What a God
He is!--unfolding Himself in simplicity.

Now, notice.  And He had him trained in worldly wisdom so that he  could
fail  and show that it isn't wisdom that we will ever be  delivered  by;
it's  by faith that we are delivered.  He let him go in and get such  an
education  until he could teach the Egyptians wisdom.  He was so  smart.
God  was  with that simple family, who could, perhaps, maybe  not  write
their name.

And  Moses  was  took into the highest of schooling with  such  a  great
education 'til he could teach this wisdom to teachers.   He could  teach
the genius.  Yes!  And God let him get that way so He could display Him-
self  in  humility to show that wisdom has nothing to  do  with  it--and
Moses miserably failed in his genius.   He let him get that way for  His
purpose, so he'd fail, and he did fail, and he fell.

So to show, not by power, not by might, but--not by the wisdom of Egypt,
not  by  the wisdom of our school, not by the power of  our  seminaries,
but--not  by  the amounts of our organization, not by the power  of  our
scholarly  teaching; but "by My Spirit, saith God."  His wisdom was  va-
nished  and at its end.  When he met God in the Burning Bush  there,  he
took off his shoes and humbled himself to humility and forgot all  about
his wisdom.

God, bringing deliverance, had to train him in wisdom to let him fall to
show  that  you cannot lean upon the arm of your  own  understanding  or
anybody else's understanding. Let him fall to show His hand. Can you see
it? God's purpose in doing so was to display Himself in humility.

And He let Moses become the highest until he would be the next  pharaoh.
He  was a mighty general.  According to history, he  conquered,  (Moses,
himself)  the countries around.  And then when he turned to the work  of
the  Lord with all of his talent, God let him take a headlong topple  so
that  He could put him out there on the desert and beat all that out  of
him and then appear to him in humility and send him down with a stick in
his hand to deliver the people.

When  he  couldn't do it by a military training, by an education,  by  a
scientific  education, and by a military force, he could not do it,  and
He give him an old crooked stick off the desert, and he did it with  it.
God in humility--simplicity.  God was in the stick and in Moses.  And as
long  as Moses had the stick, then God had it because God was in  Moses.
Sure.

Notice.  "Not by power, nor by might, but by My Spirit..."  But  by  the
simple faith, Moses had an understanding that he was to be the deliverer
from  the  teaching of his mother.  And he trained himself  in  military
might to do so, but it failed. See? He had the understanding, he had the
education, but that didn't work.  So he had to forget it all and come to
the  simple thing of taking God at His Word, and then he  delivered  the
people. Yes, sir.

God delivers by what?--faith in His Word. Always has been. We could take
a look if we had time. (We've got about twenty something minutes yet. We
have.)   We could take a look at Cain and Abel--how that Cain  tried  to
please  God  by some beauty.   Another way--people think by  great  fine
dressed congregation, by a priest, with ministers robed and robed choirs
and all the put-on--that pleases God.

Can you see where it come from?  Cain tried the same thing, and he built
him an altar.  No doubt that he made it pretty, and the man was sincere.
He  worshipped.  He thought, "As long as I'm sincere, doesn't  make  any
difference." It does make a difference. You can be sincerely wrong.

Notice,  he built this altar and he--more like put flowers and fixed  it
up and put beautiful fruit, and thought, "Surely, a great, holy,  clean,
beautiful God will accept that sacrifice."  But see, he done it with his
own wisdom. He done it by his own thoughts, and that's what it is today.
He...  They  do  it by their own wisdom, by their  schooling,  by  their
education and ethics that they have learned.

But  Abel, by a revelation, by faith, offered unto God a more  excellent
sacrifice.  Nothing  clean  about  it  as  far  as  it  looked,  humanly
speaking--the  little fellow and grabbed him by the neck and  wrapped  a
vine around him like that and pulled him along to this altar.  There was
nothing so beautiful about it--laying him upon the altar and hacking his
little throat with a sharp rock until his blood flying all over him  and
him bleating, dying. It was a horrible sight, see, to see it.

It  was simple though.  In simplicity he knowed that he was born of  his
mother  and father's blood--born in his mother's blood by  his  father's
blood, and it was blood that caused the fall, so it was blood that would
take it back.  So he offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice because
it was revealed to him.

And  some  of the brethren, today, who think they eat apples  and  pears
and...  I seen the most radical thing the other day in the paper.   They
said now they proved that it was not an apple that Eve eat; that I think
they  claim it was an apricot.   So...  Oh, see where that spirit  comes
from!

And they said that Moses never crossed actually the Red Sea, that it was
a bunch of reeds down there--a sea of reeds, and he brought the children
of Israel through this sea of reeds. Up at the end of the sea, there's a
big  bunch of reeds up there, and Moses crossed the sea, but it was  the
sea  of  reeds that he crossed--you know, grass, called like  tules  and
things that he crossed through there.

How  ridiculous when "The water," the Bible said, "parted from right  to
left, and God caused a mighty east wind to separate..." They want to try
to  figure  it out in their own way, and that's the way  they've  always
failed, and they'll continue to fail.

You know, all these things that Cain--the very type of the carnal minded
man today who is religious outwardly.  He wants to do something outward-
ly,  but he's--he goes to church, and he will do lots of things for  the
building.  There's only one Church, and you don't join that.  These  are
lodges.   See?   You join the Methodist lodge, the  Baptist  lodge,  the
Presbyterian  lodge,  the Pentecostal lodge, but you're  born  into  the
Church.  These all are lodges; they're not churches--they're lodges.  No
such a thing as Methodist church or Pentecostal church.  No, there isn't
such a thing. No, that's all wrong. See?  They're... That's right.  They
are  lodges  that people join, but you're born into the  Church  of  the
Living God, and that's the mystic body of Jesus Christ--being born.

Now, but it pleased God to reveal His secret to Abel by simple faith  in
the  shed blood.  Oh, I wish I had time to lay on that a  little  while.
See?   Yet in Cain with all of his wisdom, the smart man.  Oh, you  say,
"Now, Brother Branham, you say... you're trying to make him the educated
genius." He was. He was the smart... Follow his--follow his strain. Look
at his children.  Everyone of them was scientists and doctors and  smart
man--everyone.  But you follow the generation of Seth--they were  humble
peasants and farmers and so forth on down to the destruction. But Cain's
children  were the smart, intellectual group.  They even...  they  could
claim  could temper copper and make metals and builders, and  they  were
smart  man;  when these other man just dwelt in tents,  and  herd  their
sheep, and rested upon the promises of God. See?  See what it was?  Now,
just follow the genealogy down through and see if that isn't right. See?
They rested upon the promise of God.

That's  how Noah was chose from that kind of a people.  That's how  Paul
was taken out from his flock. See?  That's how John Wesley, Martin Luth-
er,  and  what-more.   That's how you come to be  what  you  are  today,
see--the same thing. Humbled to believe the simple promise of God.

Now,  notice.  It pleased God to identify.  Now, God always will  a-vin-
dicate whether it's the Truth or not.  See?  Now, many people try to act
themselves  into something that God stays a million miles  from.  That's
right.  But when you see God come back around and say it--punctuate  it,
say It's right. That's right. That's right. Then you know that's Truth.

Now,  when the offerings was on the altar, God refused his  intellectual
conception  of God.  But when He seen Abel, by simple faith  to  believe
that  it  was not apples or fruits of the field, but  it  was  blood--by
faith he believed it, by a revelation from God, God a-vindicated Adam by
accepting his sacrifice. See?

That's  where  we think of praying for the  sick--anything  else.  Jesus
said, "If ye abide in Me and My Word in you, just ask what you will, and
it  shall be done to you."  Now, as we're coming right on  down,  fastly
now, with twenty minutes more.

Notice. Elijah's day, God chose to hide Himself in a simple person. Now,
just think of it. God chose... That was His choosing. Remember, they had
rabbis, priests; they had great man in them days.  Even King Ahab,  him-
self, was a Jew.  He had great man in the land in that day, but God  hid
Himself  in a simple man--not a scholar, no.   Not a renown man  of  the
world--some  great  military genius or something, no--no  big  name.  We
don't even know who his papa and mama was.  We don't know anything about
his genealogy--just a plain old farmer somewhere that was raised up  for
the purpose to be a prophet.

God had him living to himself in the wilderness.  Only thing we know, he
stomped  right out of nowhere, walked right in, and condemned the  whole
ecclesiastical system. My!

And  you  know what they thought about him?  "What school  did  he  come
from?"  "What denomination is he with?"   "Is he with the  Pharisees  or
Sadducees," or what more they had?  He didn't belong to any of them, but
he condemned the whole thing.  See?  God chose to do that.  But a simple
man--no  education.  We have no place where he ever went to  school;  we
have  nothing about him--just a simple man, but God was pleased to  hide
in that simple person. God, back there with this simple man, hiding in a
human being.  Can you grasp it? God hiding in a illiterate crank (to the
world). Cause...

You   know,  they  accused  him  of  everything--even  being  a   witch.
Elijah--all prophets are accused that.  See, so... Jesus was accused  of
being  one: Beelzebub, being crazy.  Said, "Why, you're mad.  You...  We
know you've got a devil. You're off at your head." See?  That's where He
told them when it come in the last days that that would be blasphemy  to
do  such.  He forgave them, but it wouldn't be forgiven  in  these  last
days.  It had to be paid for with Eternal separation--never to be forgi-
ven in this world or the world to come.

But  Elijah was considered a crazy man.  Could you imagine, standing  up
to...  The  women  was all cutting their hair like the  modern  days,  I
guess, and painting up like Jezebel, the first lady of the land; and the
preachers  all gone worldly and everything, and then what  taken  place.
Then  here  come old Elijah out condemning the whole thing all  the  way
from Jezebel down.

When  they  thought, "We don't have to listen to you; we  got  pastors."
Sure they didn't have to, but he was their pastor anyhow.  He was  Jeze-
bel's pastor. She didn't want...  She might've had a different kind, but
God sent--he was. See?  He was God's sent pastor for her. She hated him,
but he was pastor just the same.

Notice. And Elijah humbled himself and stayed with what God said in such
a  way  that  it pleased God to take that same Spirit  from  Elijah  and
promise to shove it three times down the road from there, (Amen!) and He
did it. Amen!  Sure He did. Sure. He promised It that It would come. And
It  come upon Elisha, his successor, then come on John the Baptist,  and
according to Malachi 4, It's supposed to be here again in the last day.

God  loved  that Spirit that was upon that simple,  uneducated  woodsman
from back there in the woods somewhere.  He was so... It was so obedient
to  His Word that He could say, "Elijah, do this," and Elijah  would  do
it.  And God hid Himself in there in such simplicity 'til they all  told
him...  "That  old crank.   Don't have nothing to do with him,"  and  so
forth.

But  one day when he got old and his head bald and his whiskers  hanging
down, gray, what few hairs he had hanging over his shoulders, his little
old  skinny arms and the meat flopping on them like  that--come  walking
down  that  road to Samaria, and them eyes looking up toward  the  skies
with a crooked stick in his hand. He wasn't very much to look at, but he
had THUS SAITH THE LORD!

He didn't stammer with it. He didn't stutter. He didn't say, "Now, great
Ahab..."  He walked up and said, "Not even the dew will fall from heaven
'til I call for it." God had honored his simplicity.

Now  you see, while it was in the simple way and everybody against  him,
everybody was at his throat--all the ministerial association and  every-
thing  else was at his throat.   That's true--trying to get rid of  him,
everything else. But in that simplicity, even though they had no cooper-
ation  with his campaigns and whatever more they had, everybody  thought
he was a crank, God was hiding Himself.   But when it come time for that
seed to get ripe that had been planted, God manifested Himself by  send-
ing fire out of the heavens and licking...?... God hiding in  simplicity
and then revealing Himself again. Sure. It pleased God to do that.  He's
always did it in such a way. Yes, sir.

Now,  we find out that He promised these things.  The trouble  is  today
with so many of us people, we want to get so, you know, so seminary  and
denominational,  educated minded that God can't use us.  God can give  a
man a start to do something and give him a ministry. The first thing you
know, he will go to catering to what others say. And the first thing you
know,  he will be all wrapped up in a big bunch of stuff, and  then  God
just takes His hands off of him, let him alone. See? See?

Then He will try to find Him another man somebody that will do it.  See?
He's got to find something that will take His Word, will take the divine
revelation  and won't move with it--will stay right there on that  Word.
That's the way He does it.  He's always done it that way.   So when  man
gets   so   educated   and  smart  'til  he  tries  to   put   his   own
interpretation... well, like they say, "The Baptism of the Holy  Ghost,"
they say, "Oh that was for another day."  But if they don't... "Well, it
wasn't for another day, but I will tell you, it don't come just like  it
did  on the day of Pentecost.   We received the Holy Ghost when  we  be-
lieved," and all kinds of stuff like that, you see.

And talk about the Baptism in the Name of Jesus Christ, they--where  the
Bible teaches it that way.  They say, "Well, but the seminary says, and-
so-and-so says."  That's compromising. See?  God can't use a person like
that.  He may let a man be beat all across the country like that  and  a
man  cast  out and laughed at and made fun of and everything  else  like
that,  but  when the real showdown come, God stands  up  and  vindicates
Himself right in the same simplicity.

Rise right up like a flower, the seed look like it's over with; it  dies
and falls into the ground.  Dig the little seed up, and it's rotten  and
looks like a mess, but out of there springs life to re--reproduce anoth-
er flower again.

God in simplicity.  He does the same thing.  The way up is down, always.
Humble  yourself.  Don't never say, "Well, I've got this and that."  You
ain't got nothing.  Just remember, if you've got the grace of God,  just
be thankful for it. Just keep humbling yourself.

Now,  I'm going to have to hurry because the clock's... I don't want  to
keep you too long, because I don't want to wear you out, see.   We got a
long time yet through this week.

Now... And now, we find out that people get so smart and educated.  Now,
I  want to show you another.  The other goes so far to the  other  side,
they become fanatics trying to be religious.  Now, we know we have  that
group. See? They go to the other side...

That's  where I differ with the group of brethren that pulled  off  here
not long ago from the way of Light--they just couldn't see the phenomena
of  being done unless they made themselves a group, so they gathered  up
in Canada and made a group of people that they was going to give out and
make  apostles and prophets out of one another and things, and  it  fell
right through. See?  And it always will. See?  They become...  They feel
that  because that they are...  That they don't...  They so condemn  the
other things and the things 'til they go plumb on the other side.

See, there's one side that's highly intellectual, cold and indifferent -
they deny everything there; and the others get on the other side, on the
other side's a radical bunch of emotion and deny the Word.  But the real
true Church stays right in the middle of the road.

Now,  if you notice, it's got the Bible knowledge of what God said,  and
it's  spiritual  enough to be warm in its heart, and it's just  a  road.
Isaiah said it would be that way He said, "There shall be a highway."

And the blessed, holy, precious friends of the Nazarene church--a mighty
little move that God started up.  But what did they get?  When God begin
to  speak  with tongues in the Church, they were so religiously  and  so
self-starched  that they called it the devil, and you see what  happened
to them.  See?  They--the holier than thou.  And so we find out that all
those  things  goes to seed and dies right out.  See?  There--the  other
side.

Now,  one  side  becomes  a fanatic; the other  side  becomes  cold  and
starchy. Now, Isaiah said, "There shall be a highway." And the Nazarenes
and many of the old holiness people used to say, "The blessed old  high-
way--glory to God, we're walking up the old highway."  But you remember,
that  wasn't exactly what he said.  He said, "There shall be  a  highway
and..." And is a conjunction. "... and a way, and it shall not be called
a highway of holiness, but the way of holiness."

Now, a highway of holiness, people try to make themselves holy. And when
you  do,  it's just like I said before, it's like a... It'll be  like  a
buzzard trying to put dove feathers in himself to make a dove out of it,
when his nature is still a buzzard. See?  It would be like a crow trying
to put a pigeon's feathers in, or a peacock, and saying, "You see how  a
beautiful bird."

See,  it's  something manufactured.  But a peacock don't have  to  worry
whether he's going to have peacock feathers or not.  The dove don't have
to worry whether he's going to have dove feathers or not. As long as his
nature  is  a dove, he will have dove feathers.  And see,  the  holiness
people begin to think, "The women must wear long hair and long sleeves,"
and all these things, "and long skirts and not wear any wedding rings or
jewelry  of any type."   See, it become a self-righteous holiness.  See?
See?  That--that's  manufactured holiness, but the real  Church  of  the
Living God is...

Look what's happened to the denomination.  Now, they've all got cut hair
like the Pentecostals and so forth, and they all, nearly, wear rings and
so forth.

Look  at the Pentecostals years ago how they harped on that.  See?  "And
we, the church--we, the church."  The Church is Christ's body.   It's an
individual amongst other individuals that is born in the Kingdom of God.
That comes from the inside out. It's automatically lived.

You  don't ask the sheep to bear wool or manufacture wool, I mean.   The
sheep don't have to manufacture wool. He'd say, "Now, my master wants me
to have some wool this year.  I've got to get busy."  No, the only thing
he  has to do is just remain a sheep.  That's right.  The wool will  au-
tomatically--it will--he will bear it because...

And  we're  not asked to manufacture fruits; we're supposed  to  produce
fruit, (see?)--bear fruits. See?  We're supposed to bear fruits. See, as
long  as you are a fruit tree of God's with God's Word, God's Word  will
vindicate Itself. It'll bear fruit as long as the Word is in there.

Jesus  said, "If ye abide in Me and My Word in you, ask what  you  will,
and it shall be done." See? You don't manufacture it.  You work yourself
not up to it; it's just actually there. It goes on and on.

Now,  let's go--just, hurrying it up now with just a few  minutes  left,
and then we will close.

Now, others go so far as to be fanatics. Now, they go on the other side.
And they think just because that they jump up and down or get some  kind
of  a sensation or emotion--speak with tongues or give a  prophecy  that
happened  to be right or something like that--and they think that's  it;
that--they--they've got it, but it isn't.

Jesus said, "Many will come to Me in that day and say, `Lord, have not I
prophesied  in  Your  Name;  Your Name done  many  works  and  cast  out
devils?'" He will say, "Depart, I never knew you." See?  That isn't  it.
That isn't it, friends. That's the reason...

Is tongues, the evidence?  I believe in speaking in tongues, but I don't
take it to be the only evidence of the Holy Spirit.  No, sir!  The fruit
of the Spirit is the evidence. See? Now...

You see, that's the reason I have--differ with the move of the Pentecos-
tal brethren in that manner that they say, "If a man speaks in  tongues,
he  has  the Holy Ghost."  I differ--that's no sign he's  got  the  Holy
Ghost.  See?  I've heard devils speak with tongues just as fast as  they
could, drink blood out of a human skull, and call on the devil.

I've seen Indians take snakes and wrap around them in the rain dance out
there  in Arizona, hold their hands up like that, and run right  around;
the witch doctor come out lancing himself, and lay a pencil down, and it
write  in unknown tongues and give the interpretation.  See?  So,  don't
tell me that. I'm too old for that. See, so...

The fruit of the Spirit is the... Jesus said, "By their fruits..."  (not
tongues or emotions) but "by their fruits ye shall know them."  That  is
the fruit of the Spirit.

If  God unfolding Himself in humility, sweetness and everyday the  same.
There's something about a man that stays right with the Word--every-time
that  he sees the Word, he punctuates it with an "Amen," no matter  what
the other people say.

That's... He believes it, you see.

All right.  See?  But we go far enough then to rest upon a  fanatical...
and Satan gets amongst the people.  (That's Satan's business, and he's a
good  businessman.)  And he gets amongst the people to make  them  think
that  they've  got it just because they can jump up and  down--and  then
hate  your neighbor?  No, see?  To say things and speak in tongues  just
wonderfully and things like that. And remember, you can speak in genuine
Holy Ghost tongues and still not have the Holy Ghost. The Bible said so.
"Though  I speak with tongue of men and angels and have not charity,  it
profit  me nothing.  I am become as a sounding brass, and tinkling  cym-
bal." (I Corinthians 13) See? So, you don't--that don't do it, see.

The  Methodist said, "When we shouted, we had it," but they didn't.  The
Nazarene  said  when they lived holy they had it, but they  didn't.  The
Pentecostals said, "We speak in tongues, we've got it," but they didn't.
See,  see?  God unfolding Himself, not in sensations, no that...  Sensa-
tion,  yes with it.  You see the place?  He just gets it so humble  'til
anybody can see it, if you don't try to put--inject your own mind to it,
see, and your own thoughts--it's God. Now...

And then they become a bunch of fanatics.  Then here's the cold  formals
on  this side; here's the fanatics on the other side, and here goes  the
Bride  right  straight through it all,...?... God vindicating It  as  He
goes along--His Word.

Now--oh,  I've got to skip some of this because I've got too much  here,
and I got... my time's run out. I will hurry just as quick as I can now.

From  Eden it has come and been prophesied that there was coming a  Mes-
siah--all  the way from Eden.  Now, I'm going to skip over a few  of  my
Scriptures I've got wrote down here, and notes, just to get the  Message
off in time if I can.  God hiding in humility.  Now I talk fast, but yet
I want you to catch this, see.

Since  Eden, it had been prophesied that there would come a Messiah.  It
was foretold what kind of a person He would be.  We could linger a  long
time.   You know the Bible--what He would be, what kind of a  person  He
would be. Moses said, "The Lord, your God, shall raise up a prophet like
me."   They knowed that that Messiah was to be a prophet, the kind of  a
ministry He would have with Him. All the prophets spoke of what He would
do.

They  spoke  of it in symbols, and it went plumb over the top  of  their
head  and plumb under the rest of them, see, see? --went under  one  and
over  the other one.  See?  By the time that He arrived on the scene  of
time,  the  people to whom He was sent had their own  interpretation  of
what that He was to be in their own imaginary interpretation.

The Bible never changed. The Bible is always the same. That's the reason
I  say  the Scripture says, and I stay with that: "The Bible  is  of  no
private  interpretation."  So Methodists, Baptists, Pentecostals,  don't
try  to put your interpretation to it, saying, "It don't mean  that;  it
means this." It means just what it said--just exactly.

Someone said, "How can... ?" I don't know how, it's not me to say  that;
it's  God to take care of that.  He's the One Who said it, not me,  see,
and He will take care of His own.

But now, but--this Messiah had been prophesied.  The prophets told  just
exactly how He would come, what He would do when He come, but their  own
private interpretation of it amongst the people...  And when He come  He
was  in  such  a simple way in simplicity 'til the  whole  church  group
stumbled over it. Is that right?

There  those  man who had been taught a man could not be  a  teacher,  a
priest  until  he was born in a certain lineage--after  Levi.  And  just
think, his great-great-great-great-great-great grandfather was a priest,
laying right in that Word in the temple day and night like the  Catholic
priest or the minister; that's the handed-down minister from  generation
to the certain churches and so forth. "My great-great-grandfather was  a
Methodist bishop." "My grandfather was a bishop," and so forth. See?

All that--lived right in the Word, but they had formed their own way  of
it.   And their children had accepted it in such a way that the  fathers
had taught it, until the fathers had taught it off of the real way,  and
they'd  made such an organization out of it, that when the Spirit  tried
to  present Truth, they couldn't receive it.  And that's the same  thing
today.

I don't mean to be rude, but it's right. It's the same thing today. They
make  it  so complicated and some other way--they teach  you're...  Just
like  it's been said: God don't have any grandchildren.  You know  that?
God has sons, and He has daughters, but no grandsons and granddaughters.
Every  man must pay the same price and come the same way--just  as  your
father did, so must you. Now...

So, He was so simple--when this Messiah... For four thousand years every
prophet spoke of Him.  David sung of Him and all down through.  And when
He come, the people had their own idea built up what He must do--how  He
was  going  to do, how it was all explained, drawed out  on  charts  and
everything  'til  when He come in that real simple way, it  just  ruined
their theology. See? They didn't know it.  See, He come according to the
Word.

Now,  do you believe that God spoke through the prophets that that  Mes-
siah  would  come in a certain way?  It's too bad we haven't  got  about
another  hour that we could go through there and explain how it was.  We
all know how it was though, most of us.  How God said He would come  and
"How  that thou, Bethlehem of Judaea, art not the least amongst..."  and
all down through there and how He would do and what He would do. See?

And  yet He was so simple 'til those great scholars had got it so  mixed
up 'til they missed it.  But you know Jesus didn't come contrary to  the
Word; He come according to the Word!  But contrary to their  interpreta-
tion, see. He taught things that was against their ecclesiastical train-
ing about Him.

Now, they said, now for instance, "When Messiah comes, certainly He will
come up to the temple and say, `Caiaphas,' (or ever who is high  priest)
`I have arrived.' He will come with a ten million angel salute. God will
say,  `All  right, fellows down there, you're really  a  mighty  church.
You're  My people.  I'm going to turn the cranks here and let  the  cor-
ridors  of Heaven down, I'm sending you Messiah to you this  morning.  I
will  let it land right out there in the yard.'  And all the people  get
around and say, `Doctor So-and-so, you and Doctor So-and-so; you all can
stand at the head to greet Him first.'" You see.

That's perhaps something like they think today.  Now I know it sounds  a
little "rashal," but I don't--I'm trying to make a point.  "And that  is
that's the way it's going to be. And if it don't come that way, it's not
right.  It's  an antichrist.  If it don't come just that  way,  it's  an
antichrist, you see, so it won't be.  And so then there'll be a...  then
the next thing comes down will be about a ten million angel salute  with
their bands, and they'll land out there in the yard where Solomon  built
the temple, and oh, all up and down through here--this holy place  where
saints and sages had died," and so forth.

"Yes,"  Jesus said, "you hypocrites, you sons of the devil," said,  "you
garnish the tombs of the prophets, and your fathers put them in  there."
That's right.  That's right.  See?  "How many righteous man and prophets
was sent to you, and you slayed everyone of them."  See?  But what would
He call righteous then, what they called fanatics and cranks. Yes. There
they thought it would come that way.

But  when  He  come in a stable, born of a virgin, with  just  a  common
carpenter for a foster father and a little unknown girl... See, not  the
high  priest's daughter or what-more; He come as... from a  little  lady
that lived down in a little old mean country called Nazareth. And just a
common widower; his wife was dead. He had some children--Joseph. And she
was engaged. And then He come with a black name to begin with. They said
He was illegitimately born.

Oh  my! That hit their polish too hard. See?  Their  educational  ethics
could  not swallow that.  Their interpretation of the Scriptures  knowed
nothing about that, but yet it was THUS SAITH THE LORD.  Oh my!  Shivers
me to think it. And to see the same thing reoccurring again.  God cannot
change. (It's already 12:00. Shall I stop or just go on? I think you can
sit still just a little bit, see.   Now, this is... I'm basing something
here  for a Message coming, see.  And I will try to let you out just  as
quick--maybe the next ten or fifteen minutes if we can. God bless you.)

Notice.  Now, it's so simple that it just missed the mark for them,  but
it hit God's mark, see--it hit the Word. He come just exactly the way He
said, but they--their interpretation of it was wrong. The interpretation
of  deliver in Moses' time was wrong; the interpretation in the time  of
Noah was wrong, see, but God comes according to His Word.

Then Jesus came, and He taught things that was contrary: "If Thou be the
Messiah, do such-and-such."  You see? "If Thou be... come off the cross,
and  show it to us now," see, but God don't clown for people;  God  just
does the things that's pleasing and right.

They thought such a One would certainly have to come with a great salute
of Angels, but He come by a stable. And to their own polished ethics, it
was  ridiculous for an ordinary human being to think that Almighty  God,
the  great  mighty Jehovah, Who owned the earth and  created  the  whole
thing,  couldn't fix a place for His Own child to be  born--better  than
some cow barn over a manure pile. How could there--see...

What was it?--God in simplicity. That's what made Him so great. See, the
ethics  of education cannot belittle itself like that.  See?  It  cannot
stand it, but God is so great that He brought Himself down to  that--not
even  clothes to put on His Own child.  Think of it!  And  the  world...
There  was no room in the inn, and He went into a cow  stable--a  little
ledge, a little cave-like back in the side of the hill; and there upon a
straw bed came the Son of God.

Oh, that was a lot different from meeting up there... and His mother was
to  be  mother, she was found to be mother, oh, months before  they  was
even engaged to be married or even married.  See?  She was to be mother,
and the people saw it, and they knowed that it was this a way. And Mary,
in her own heart, she knowed what was going on. And Joseph didn't under-
stand,  but The Angel of The Lord came to him by night saying,  "Joseph,
you're a son of David. Don't fear to take unto you, Mary, your wife, for
that's  not--nothing bad, but that is of the Holy Ghost."  That  settled
it.

The  man, Joseph, with such connection with God 'til God could speak  to
him.  But  today we get our ecclesiastical jackets so drawed  around  us
'til nothing can speak to us outside of the ecclesiastical group that we
belong to.   I don't want to get harsh or radical, so I will leave  that
alone right there. Notice... But you understand what I mean.

Notice. A stable was ridiculous for them.  The polished... We don't even
have no record where He ever attended one day of school, and yet at  the
age  of  twelve years old, a simple boy confounded the  priests  in  the
temple by His preaching. Oh my! What was it?--God hiding Himself. I feel
pretty religious right now.

God hiding Himself in a barn. God hiding Himself in a little child. See?
Watch this go to display after awhile though, see. He had to... Where He
went  on the streets, the parents, no doubt would talk and  say,  "Don't
play  with that kid.  Don't have nothing to do with Him.  His mother  is
nothing but a common prostitute." See?   "And the father and mother--the
baby  was born before they were actually married. She was to be  mother.
Have nothing to do with it."

What Mary thought... But altogether--no matter what the outside thought,
she pondered all these things. They hid it in their hearts.  They knowed
they  couldn't say nothing about... against it.  God speaks to  His  man
sometimes, say, "Hold your peace. Don't say nothing about it."

I've  had  people  in my meetings say, "Well, if you  be  a  servant  of
Christ, you know this is going on there." Sure I know it's going on, but
then what are you going to do when He says, "Hold your peace. Don't  say
nothing about it."

Took  the man in there and showed him on a book.  Something spoke  years
ago. I said...

Said, "Well, I couldn't understand it."

I said, "You see there?" Here it was back there; got it dated and every-
thing  when it happened back there--when many people had seen it on  the
book  there, I said, "It'll come to pass that this will do this way  and
that way."

Said, "Well, why didn't you say something about that?" It had to be that
way! See?

And  Joseph knowed different. He knowed Who that baby belonged to.  Mary
knowed Who it belonged to.  Jesus knowed Who His Father was. What did He
say?  "I must be about My Father's business," not sawing wood and making
a  door, but about His Father's business.  He said that to  His  mother:
"Can't  you understand that I--it's time for Me to be about My  Father's
business?"

Now,  they thought this little cracked-up child--any illegitimate  child
is kind of an odd, curious thing anyhow, and there you are, you see. But
God hiding Himself... Listen.  God hiding Himself in what was thought of
the world as filth, corruption, illegitimate.  Look, God hiding  Himself
in the corruption of a dead seed to bring forth life.  See?  Do you  get
it?

God hides Himself in a simple little wash woman or an ordinary man  with
his dinner under his arm--kiss his wife and children good-bye and go out
there and maybe hide Himself in that man to do something the  archbishop
would know nothing about. See? You don't hear Him blow no horns and send
it out.  He, God just gets glory--that's all. The simple hear it and are
glad, see.

Now, God was hiding Himself in the simplicity of a baby--hiding  Himself
in the simplicity of a common family, God. And the ecclesiastics and the
great  man, the mind, the genius, and the--and all of  them--the  Herods
and  so  forth of that day, and the Neros--they all overlooked  it.  God
hiding in simplicity, (now, quickly).

John the Baptist, in Isaiah 40--we could get it if you want to.  Malachi
3, all--you mark it down if you want to. Isaiah 40, all you know--speak-
ing  peace to the... as it is.  Maybe I--It might be good that  I  would
read it right here, if you've got--you've got that much time; just for a
minute.   We will turn over here in the Book of Isaiah the 40th  chapter
and read here and just see what he says about this now. Look, here.

Comfort ye, comfort ye my people,...

Now, remember this is 712 years.  Look at the heading on there, see--712
years before He was born; here's the prophet speaking of Him.

Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith the Lord.

Speak  ye comfortable (words) to Jerusalem, and cry unto her,  that  her
warfare  is  accomplished, that her iniquity is pardoned: for  she  hath
received... the LORD'S hand double for all of her sins.

The voice of him... crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of  the
LORD, make straight (his path) in the desert a highway for our God.

Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made
low:  and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough... shall  be
made... plain: (What a man that was to be!) See?

Now,  turn  over to Malachi with me--the last book of the  last  of  the
prophets  in  the Old Testament.  Now, in Malachi, listen  here  Malachi
picks  it up just at the end-time, so you'll be sure not to  forget  it.
Malachi the 3rd chapter:

Behold,  I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the  way  before
me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple,  even
the  messenger  of the covenant, whom ye delight in:  behold,  he  shall
come, saith the LORD of hosts.

Still  speaking  of John. "Send my messenger before me  to  prepare  the
way." Jesus spoke of it in Matthew 11:10. Said, "If you can receive  it,
that's who was spoken of, `Behold I send my messenger before my  face...
`" See? That's right. Now...

How wonderful when it had been for 700 years there was to be a  forerun-
ner  come--before  the Messiah; but when he came on the  scene  in  such
simplicity,  they missed him.  They missed him. And remember, he  was  a
priest's son.  Well, look how ridiculous that was for him not to  follow
the  office of his father--go back to the seminary, but his job was  too
important.

At nine years old, he went into the wilderness, and he came out  preach-
ing.  They missed it.  He was so simple--too simple--for their high-pol-
ished  education  to believe such a one.   They thought  when  this  man
come--"How  about:  `All the high places will be made low; all  the  low
places be made high; all the rough places be made plain'?"  David saw it
and  said,  "The  mountains skipped like little  lambs  and  the  leaves
clapped their hands."

What, did it happen? An old whiskered guy like that with no education at
all,  with a piece of sheep skin wrapped around him, came stumbling  out
of  the wilderness of Judaea saying, "Repent, for the Kingdom of  Heaven
is at hand. And you bunch of snakes, don't you think to say `I belong to
a certain organization.' God is able of these stones to rise children to
Abraham."

My,  "Well, that's not him there.  We know that's not him." But  it  was
him! He was making the path clean. See?

There was when the rough places was made plain.  There's where the  high
places  was brought down.  "Don't you think you got Abraham to your  fa-
ther?  Don't begin to tell me that kind of stuff because God is able  of
these stones to rise children to Abraham."  The high places was  brought
down. Oh, glory be to God! That's it. Yes. See the difference?

He said that's what would take place.  And when they come, they thought,
"Oh,  my!"  They was just ready to receive him--if he come to their  own
organization.  But because he come like that, in such a simple  way--yet
interpreting the Scriptures, the high places was made low.  They  didn't
want to accept it, but they was.

Boy,  he shaved them off! He shook the hide right off them.  Said,  "You
bunch of vipers.  You snakes in the grass. I tell you the ax is laid  to
the  root of the tree, and every tree that won't bring forth the  fruits
is  cut  down and cast into the fire.  I indeed will  baptize  you  with
water, but there's coming One after me Who is mightier than I.   He will
baptize you with the Holy Ghost and Fire, and His fan is in His hand. He
will  thoroughly  purge the floor...?... straw, burn up the  chaff,  and
take the wheat to the garner."

That  was  when  the rough places was made plain, see,  but  the  people
didn't get it; but it was just exactly with the Word.   Just exactly the
way the Word said it--so simple that they missed it.  They missed seeing
it. Don't you be that blind. Don't you be that blind.

So,  listen.  Now, they missed it.  He was so simple  for  their  common
belief  of such a Person that they missed it.  Again, what was it?  God,
which  is the Word, hiding in simplicity--not a priest with  his  collar
turned around, with smart education.

Jesus asked them the same thing.  He said, "What did you go out to see?"
when John's disciples come over. Said, "What did you go to see?  Did you
go to see a man dressed with a priest robe on you know, and soft  cloth-
ing?" He said, "That kind of a preacher?"   He said, "Did you go to  see
that?"

He said, "No".

"Them kind kiss the babies, and, you know, and bury the dead. They don't
know nothing about a two-handed sword on the battle front.  They was out
there  with some intellectual speech to some Kiwanis Club or  something,
you know. They're all right there, but when it comes out there to battle
to  face it, they know nothing about it.  'Cause they--they're in  kings
palaces.  They fool around with that kind of celebrity."  But said then,
"What did you go to see?  Did you go to see a reed shaken with any wind?
A  man that could say...  Somebody'd say, `You know, you belong  to  the
Oneness, but if you'll go over here with the Assemblies, I will tell you
what I will do: we will make it...

`"I believe I will do that'"--a reed shaken... Not John. No, no.

"`If you'll come and be a Sadducee and not be a Pharisee,' or  something
or other. You didn't see anybody shook with the wind--not John." No sir,
brother.  Not him.  He said, "Then, what did you go to see?  A prophet?"
It'd take a prophet to do that, see. He said, "Now..."

That  was the evidence of a prophet. See? The Word of God with him.  The
Word comes to the prophet.   Said, "What did you go to see, a prophet?"

He said, "Yes, that's right."

"But I say unto you, even more than a prophet," for he was.  Why was  he
more than a prophet? He was a Messenger of the Covenant. Sure he was.

That bridged the way between law and grace. He was the keystone in there
that had been spoke of.  He said, "If you can receive it, this is he who
the  prophet spoke of."  "Behold, (Malachi 3) I will send  My  messenger
before My face, (see?) and he will prepare the way before Me." See?  Oh,
he was so simple. God again hiding in simplicity.

Then  watch  what he done. He preached that the mighty Christ  coming  -
"He's got His fan in His hand. He will--He's fanning His way.  I mean He
will thoroughly purge His floors. He will take up the trash and sweep it
out yonder and burn it.  That's right.  He will gather up the grain  and
take it into the garner."

See, he was inspired.  But when Jesus come, they was looking for...  And
all  them apostles you know was looking for a great something  to  come.
My, my! "Well, when He's coming. That's all there is to it. Boy, He will
be mighty.  He will kick them Romans off the face of the earth.  My,  He
will make them Greeks go this way and Romans go that when He come." When
He come, a little humble fellow being pushed around from one side to the
other. What was it?--God hiding Himself in simplicity. Oh, my!

Then He stood at the end of His Message and said, "Who can condemn Me of
sin?  What all the Bible said that I would do--If I do not the works  of
My Father, then condemn Me. But what did the Scriptures say that I would
do that I haven't done? Sin is unbelief you know. Who can accuse Me?  If
I cast out devils by the fingers of God, then show Me what you're  doing
about it."

Simplicity--even surrendered Himself unto death, but oh, on that  Easter
morning! He swept out the trash all right, brother. Yes, indeed. And the
wheat was sealed in the garner--laying there in the ground with  Eternal
Life resting there waiting for--that great day that we're going to speak
of the coming of the Lord when that life will come to Life, and we  will
rise in that resurrection and be caught away with Him in the air and  be
gathered into the garner.  And the trash will be burnt yonder, the husk,
it's  wrapped around and tried to pull it this way or that way  will  be
burnt with un-quenchable fire. Amen! Oh, isn't He wonderful! They missed
Him--God in simplicity.

Why? Why, He never even preached in the ecclesiastical terms.  He never.
He never preached like a preacher.  See?  He preached like a... He  used
the  terms  of simplicity of God--the terms like "the ax is  laid";  the
terms of the "tree," the terms of "snakes."  Not some seminary  teacher,
as  in the ecclesiastics of the day, like a Doctor of  Divinity,  Doctor
So-and-so.  He didn't do that.  He preached like a woodsman  out  yonder
somewhere.  He talked about axes and trees and serpents and things  like
that, and wheat and garners and everything like that.  He would be  con-
sidered I guess... I guess, a "soap box preacher." I think He was called
a  "stump preacher" in that day--standing on a stump down there by  Jor-
dan. God in simplicity, hiding from the wisdom of the world.

Now, let's find out... Jesus said, "I thank Thee, Father, that Thou hast
hid these things from the wise of the world and is going to reveal it to
babies  such  as will learn."  God hiding in simplicity in  Christ.  God
hiding in simplicity in John. See?  Just... see, He was... Just think of
it. God in simplicity, hiding Himself from the wisdom of the world.

Now, we will close in just a minute or two, because I don't want to hold
you no longer.

Look!  Let's stop just a minute--something personal.  Think of  the  day
that we're living in, (to close this off now).   Think of the day  we're
living in.  When God coming down in a little old humble place that we've
been  dwelling, healing the sick, and the rich and the haughty  and  the
high  scholared: "Days of miracles is passed.  There's no such thing  as
divine healing."

You  remember  the Message I preached from right across  this  piece  of
ground  here,  the morning that I left, about David and  Goliath?  Said,
"How are you going to meet an educated world out there, Brother Branham,
with all this?"

I  said, "I can't help how I'm going to meet it, God said,  `Go!'"  See?
That's all. See? It's His Word; He promised It. The hour is here.

When  that Angel, that you see in that picture over there, come down  on
the  river  down there that day, thirty years ago this  coming  June  or
thirty-three years ago, rather, this coming June, and said, "As John the
Baptist  was  sent forth," (before 5,000 people or more) "the  hour  has
come when your Message will stray the world.

Remember  the  criticism if any were there... I guess Roy  Slaughter  or
some  of  them sitting here might remember the day, or Mrs.  Spencer  or
ever  who  would  be--some  of the old  people  here  that  would  know,
see?--George Wright or some of them.   You know that?   How it was,  but
hasn't it done it?  It did it. And then in the midst when It turned down
and said, "It's just a mental healing." And God turned right back around
and  sent  an old dumb possum in there and was healed by that  power  of
God.

Lyle Wood and Banks, when we was sitting down there and know the God  a-
vindicated  Truth  when  a little old dead minnow fish,  laying  on  the
water,  and the Holy Spirit spoke the day before: He was going  to  show
them His glory and do something about it. And there that morning, stand-
ing  there, the Holy Spirit come down in that boat, and I raised up  and
spoke  to that fish, and it laying on the water--dead for a  half  hour;
its gills and entrails pulled out of its mouth--it come to life and swam
away  as  good as any other fish.  What is it?--God  hiding  Himself  in
simplicity.

God is able of these stones to rise children to Abraham!  God is able to
heal a possum or a fish or anything!  If He will bring His Message forth
and  the people won't believe it, God can raise up a possum  to  believe
it!   God can raise a dead woman; He can raise a dead possum; He can  do
anything He wants to do!

What  a rebuke to this generation!   When they stumble over it and  fuss
about  it  and "You didn't do this and do that," and God sent  a  simple
animal in. What a rebuke!  What was it?  God in simplicity, showing Him-
self to be great.  Oh my!  Rebuke these man of this generation of  their
unbelief.

Now, they think now like they always have--it must be done in their  own
way. "Now, if there's such a thing as divine healing..." Like a Catholic
man  told  me this--a fellow, the other night, told me about  that.  You
know, about... said this Iris that I went to see about his boy in  Hous-
ton. He said, "Well now, if that was a gift of God, it'd have to come in
the Catholic church." See?

The Methodists thought It'd have to come in their church, and the Pente-
costals thought It'd have to come to their church, but It didn't come in
any  of  them.  It  come  in the power  of  the  resurrection  of  Jesus
Christ..?.. That's right. Sure He does. Just watch it. Don't let it pass
from you. Keep it under your heart and remember; ponder it there. Got to
come  in  their  own way, for their--from their  own  denomination.  And
except it does that, it isn't Him.  See?  It's just psychology, or  it's
the  devil.  It's not God, because if it was God, He'd have to  come  in
their own way, you see--"The way we've got it interpreted."

That's  the way that Jesus had to come to the Pharisees.  It had  to  be
that  way, see. If--if God was going to send a Messiah, they had it  all
interpreted  how  He must be, and because He  come  different,  then--it
wasn't Messiah. He was the illegitimate something; He was the Beelzebub.
But, it was God hiding in simplicity.

The forerunner must be a certain educated man that there... Well, one no
doubt  each day, each year when they ordained their ministers  and  sent
them out as missionaries to proselyte and bring in...  Each one thought,
"This will be that forerunner that comes forth," but God raised him  out
of  the wilderness where there wasn't no seminary at all, you  see,  and
things like that. God hiding Himself in humility and then simplicity.

But now wait.  In closing, we say this: But to reject God's simple  Mes-
sage...   To reject It--God's simple way--is to be destroyed  eternally.
Now,  that's how much we talk how simple it is, and people think,  well,
they can laugh at it and run over it and treat it any way they want  to,
but it's Eternal separation from God.

Those  who died in the days of Noah, and did not listen to his  Message,
they  perished.  And Jesus went and preached to them in  the  chains  of
darkness  in  His  death  before He rose up, and He  went  to  hell  and
preached  to  the spirits was in prison that repented not in  the  long-
suffering of the days of Noah while a simple Message of God by a  simple
man was being preached.   He went, said, "Noah preached that I would  be
here, and here I am." That's right. See?

Those who failed to listen to that prophet's Message--Moses out there in
the  wilderness, that he received from God, properly a-vindicated  by  a
Pillar  of  Fire and was led out in the wilderness, and  then  tried  to
raise up and make an organization by it, and they perished and died in
the wilderness--everyone of them but two man--Joshua and Caleb. And over
there, the Pharisees was so blind they couldn't see that, so they looked
back, said, "Our fathers eat manna in the wilderness."

And Jesus said, "And they are everyone dead."

They  seen  the glory of God; they walked in the Light  of  the...  They
walked  in the Light.  They walked in the Light of the Pillar  of  Fire.
They walked in the presence of His power. They walked through the places
that the Holy Spirit made for them to walk. They eat the manna that fell
out  of  Heaven  that God provided and lost and went  to  hell.  They're
everyone  dead and if you take that word, it's Eternal separations  from
the presence of God. They're everyone dead. See?

Everyone that refused Jesus is perished. See what I mean? To refuse that
simplicity of God...  It's just not something--you say, "Well, I made  a
mistake."  You don't do it that way! God don't receive it that way;  you
perish eternally! We'd better be thinking about something. You bet.  Now
it's got to be properly identified by God. See?  Then if it is, it's His
Word.  See?  Like those that rejected Moses, rejected  Elijah,  rejected
John, rejected Jesus of their day.

Here, let me just tell you a little bitty thing, and then I hope I'm not
hurting  too much.  But, look.  The other day I was called  to  Houston,
Texas  to  try  to get a pardon... I gathered some  people  together  to
preach  a  message to get people there to sign a pardon  of  this  young
fellow  and  young girl, you know, that got in that  trouble,  (I  guess
you've read about it in the paper) and that was Mr. Iris' step son.

Mr.  Iris is the one who had taken the picture of The Angel of The  Lord
that you see right there--a Roman Catholic, and his wife was Jewish.

And he married this Jewish girl--they wouldn't speak religion among  one
another  and so forth like that and Ted Kipperman, which was  also  with
him in the business has the Douglas Studio.  And when he come over there
where Mr. Bess, Dr. Bess, of the Baptist church--holding his fist  under
Brother  Bosworth's nose, and shook it and said, "Now, take  my  picture
doing that." Said, "I'm going to take that old man's hide and hang it on
my study room as a memorial of divine healing."

And  before I went to Houston, Texas--the Lord God told me to go  there,
and I was there in the Name of the Lord. And you all know the debate and
things that come up--you've read it in the books and so forth, and there
it  was.  And that night, trying only to walk humble, "Why," they  said,
"they're a bunch of ignoramuses."  Dr. Bess said, "They're nothing but a
bunch of ignoramuses."   Said, "There's no such people believe in divine
healing and stuff like that. That's a bunch of backwash!"

They  don't know that it was God in simplicity.  "Why," said,  "the  man
ain't even got a grammar school education." He was polished with all the
scholars  of  degrees that he could, see, he thought  he  could  smother
Brother  Bosworth down anyway, but when it come to the Word,  he  wasn't
even one-tenth of a match for him. See?

Brother Bosworth know where he was standing.  Many of his people sitting
right here was at the debate. And there he was, and then he just throwed
off  on  us  saying, that we were being a bunch  of  ignoramuses.  Said,
"Decent thinking people don't even believe it."

Brother  Bosworth said, "Just a moment."  He said, "How many  people  in
this  city... (of about 30,000 that night, sitting among us  like  that)
"How  many people in this city here that goes to these big fine  Baptist
churches  can prove by a doctor's statement they've been healed  by  the
power of God since Brother Branham has been in the city, stand up,"  and
300 stood up. He said, "What about that?"

There it was.  God was hiding in simplicity. Then he said, brother... He
said, "Bring forth the divine healer. Let me see him hypnotize somebody,
and then let me look at them a year from today."

And  Ted  Kipperman and Iris there, the very one who  took  the  picture
said,  "Mr. Branham ain't nothing but a hypnotizer.  I seen a woman  who
had  a  goiter  on her throat, like that, and said  he  hypnotized  that
woman;  the  next day I talked to her, and she didn't have  no  goiter."
Said, "The man hypnotized her."

And  oh,  he just ridiculed me, said that I ought to be run out  of  the
city,  and he ought to be the one to do it, see, and all like  that--big
lines in the front page of the Houston Chronicle.

I  never said a word.  I was there to do my Father's business, and  that
was  all--stay  with  that  Word.  He sent  me  there...  and  it's  His
business...

That  night  when I walked down there, I said, "I'm  no  divine  healer.
I--I'm  not...  If anybody says that," I said, "they're wrong."   And  I
said, "I don't want to be called a divine healer."  I said, "If Dr. Bess
here  preaches  salvation, then he wouldn't want to be called  a  divine
saviour." And I said, "Then I preach divine healing, and I don't want to
be  called a divine healer, but he says he isn't a divine saviour.  Cer-
tainly  he isn't; neither am I a divine healer, but `By His  stripes  we
were healed.' I'm pointing to that." See?

And so... "He's nonsense." You know, walked around.

I  said,  "But if the presence and this gift of God--this Angel  of  The
Lord--if that's in question, that can be proven."  And about that  time,
here she come whirling down. Said, "No need of speaking now; He's alrea-
dy spoke for me." And I walked out.

I went--and Houston, that big city, one of the nicest cities there is in
the  country anywhere.  When I walked in there the other day, it  was  a
disgrace to look at that city.  The streets were dirty.  The counters of
the  place, right down on Texas Avenue, and I went into the  Rice  Hotel
where  movie stars used to stay, and went down there in  that  basement,
that  cafeteria and the ceiling's dropping out and plaster on the  floor
and filth and dirt and a confusion amongst preachers like has never been
or ever heard in my life.

Why? To refuse light is to walk in darkness.  That put their children in
death row.  Right.  God came down when simplicity was displayed and  re-
jected then God showed Himself in simplicity.  And there they took  that
picture  which has swept the world.  Even the scientists said  It's  the
only  supernatural  being  that was ever photographed  in  the--all  the
history  of  the  world, and hangs in Washington, D.C. in  the  Hall  of
Religious Arts. There it is--simplicity manifested, then. See? See?  God
hiding Himself in simplicity, then manifesting Himself. See?

Now,  He hid Hisself in the death of Christ, but manifested  Himself  in
the resurrection, oh my, so forth.  You can--we can--no end to it.  Just
keep saying... But there you are.  To refuse to say there is a  sunshine
is to go into the basement and shut your eyes from light. That's right.

And  remember,  the only way that you can be wrong is  first  to  refuse
right. And to refuse to open your eyes, you'll live in darkness. See? If
you just refuse to look, how are you going to see? See? Watch the simple
things. It's the little things that you leave undone--not the big things
you're trying to do. Oh my! Then, look here.

Let me tell you.  In Mal... Matthew 11:10, He said, "If you can  receive
it, this is he. See? This is he who was sent before Me." It was simplic-
ity.

It  was  asked  of Him one day, said, "Why does  the  scribes  say  then
that..."

He  said, "Son of man is going up to Jerusalem.  I'm going to be put  in
the  hands  of sinners, and they're going to kill the Son of  man.  He's
going  to  die  and on the third day He's going to  rise  again."  Said,
"Don't tell nobody the vision up there."

And  the disciples,... (now think of it) disciples who had  walked  with
John,  talked with him, eat with him in the wilderness, sat down on  the
bank, they said, "Why does the teachers say that Elias must first  come?
You say you're going up to the crucifixion and going to rise; you're the
Messiah--take the throne.  Now why does the scribes... all of our Scrip-
tures say here--the Scriptures plainly says that before the Christ shall
come, that Elias will come first.

He  said,  "He's  already come, and you didn't know it."  Now,  who  was
that?--disciples.

I'm going to hurt here in just a little bit now, but I don't mean  to...
for the next few minutes, see, just a minute; so that you'll be sure  to
understand. (Can you hear me?) Look: Why... Them man who had walked with
Christ--"Why  does the Scriptures first say that Elias must  come,"  and
they  were  John's own converts and didn't even know him.  Why  did  the
Scriptures say--the teacher?  See what I mean?  "Why does the Scriptures
say  that Elias must first come?"  Disciples that walked with him.  "Why
does the Scriptures say that he must first come before these things  and
restore all things?" He did to about a half dozen people, and that's all
there  was. See?  That's all that was supposed to receive it.  That  was
what was ordained to see it.

Jesus  said, "He's already come, and you didn't know it."  But  he  done
just  what the Scriptures said he would do.  He restored them, you  all,
that received and believed on Me.   He done exactly what the  Scriptures
said  he  would do.  And they did to him what the Scriptures  said  they
would do. He's already come, and you didn't know it." Are you ready?

I  want  to shock you a little bit.  The Rapture will be the  same  way.
It'll be so simple--no doubt it will be likewise--'til the Rapture  will
come one of these days and nobody will know nothing about it.

Now don't get up now, but study just a minute.  I'm sure enough closing.
The Rapture will come in such a simple way 'til the judgments will fall,
and  they'll  see the Son of man and say, "Wasn't we  supposed  to  have
such-and-such...  And wasn't there supposed to be Elias sent to us?  And
wasn't there supposed to be a Rapture?"

Jesus will say, "It's already happened, and you didn't know it." God  in
simplicity. See?

Now,  this week we're going to get in some awful deep teaching on  this.
Now, notice.  The Rapture will be... so few go in that Bride.  It'll not
be... Now, see how the teachers has got it? They've got charts, and they
are going to show ten million people coming up here--all the Methodists,
if it's a Methodist preacher; and if it's a Pentecostal, all the  Pente-
costals coming. It will never touch it.

It'll be, maybe one leave Jeffersonville--just somebody come up missing.
They'll say, "Well you never..."  The rest of them won't know.  There'll
be one leave Georgia.  See?  There'll be one leave in Africa.  And let's
say  there'd be 500 people living will go in the  translation--now  that
ain't the church body--this is the Bride. That ain't the church; this is
the Bride. See?  The church will come up by the thousands, but that's in
the next resurrection.  They live not for the space of a thousand years,
see,  but in the Bride.  If 500 people left the earth this very  minute,
the world would know nothing about it.

Jesus  said,  "There would be one in a bed, and I will take  one,  leave
one." That's at nighttime. "There would be two in a field," (over on the
other side of the earth) "I will take one and leave one." "And as it was
in the days of Noah, so shall it be in the coming of the Son of man."

Think! Everything will run just as common as it can be.  A fanatic  mes-
sage will go by, and the first thing you know something, "This  minister
going  somewhere, he's never come back.  He probably went to  the  woods
hunting; he's never returned no more. And this fellow went somewhere..."
"You  know what happened?  I believe that young girl--she  must've  been
called away somewhere, you know.  Somebody take that girl out and ravish
her, probably throwed her in the river. She was... nobody...?... half of
it.

Ninety-nine  out  of every... may say one out of every  hundred  million
will  ever know anything about it.  See?   Unless somebody's  acquainted
with... Say, "The girl's missing. Why, I can't understand. She never did
leave like that." No.

And when they say that the graves will open, how are the graves going to
open  when... ?  I haven't got time to get into this, what I wanted  to.
I'm  going to have to take this...  Just to show you the  simplicity  of
God.   And that calcium, potash, and everything --when, when  everything
that's in you of materials only makes a spoonful. That's right. And what
that does it breaks on back into spirits--life.

God just speaks and the Rapture will come.  It ain't going out there and
them  Angels come down and shovel out the grave and get out an old  dead
carcass here. What is it? It is born of sin to begin with--but a new one
made in its likeness.  If we have this, we will die again.  See?  Nobody
can say, "The graves will open.  The dead shall walk out."  That may  be
true, but not open the way you say open. That's right. See?  It won't be
like that. It'll be a secret, because He said He would come like a thief
in the night.

He's  already  told us this, the Rapture, then judgments will  strike  -
sins, plagues, sickness, and everything.  The people will cry for  death
to take them from the judgment. "Lord, why is this judgment upon us when
You said that there would be a Rapture first?"

He  will  say, "It's already come, and you didn't know it."  God  hiding
Himself in simplicity. Oh, my!

All  right. "It's already happened and you knew it not."  Why don't  be-
lievers believe the simple signs of His coming?   They're expecting  all
this  things that's spoke of by the Scripture, and the moon is going  to
go  down  in the middle--the sun in the middle of the day,  and  there's
going to be all kinds of things.

Oh,  if  we just had... I got the notes wrote here on it, to  show  what
them things are, and we will get it on the breaking of these Seals  this
week, anyhow. See, see?  There it is, just where it's already passed and
you didn't know it.  See if it is.  If The Angel of The Lord will  break
them Seals forth to us.  And remember, it's sealed with them seven  mys-
terious thunders. See?

Now, why can't people believe the simple simplicity of a humble bunch of
people (See?) and the Voice of the signs of God?  Why can't they believe
it?  Just like it always been. The true Word of God being made manifest.
It's--They're  too smart and too educated to believe the simple form  of
the written Word.  They want to put their own interpretation to it.  "It
don't mean this." "It don't mean that." See? It does mean that.

Listen.  May I say this right quick now? Even the visions that God gives
here at the place, it's so misunderstood.  That's the reason you hear me
on the tapes say, "Say what the tapes say. Say what the visions say."

Now, if you're wide awake, you'll see something.  I hope I don't have to
hold it in my hand to show you. See? See? It's here.  We're at the  end.
Yes, sir. Smart, education will miss it. The simple vision--when they're
revealed  in such simplicity, 'til it just covers over the top  of  peo-
ple's head.

Because  I  seen  the  vision and told you  all  about  going  up  there
hunting--and you know that just stumbled people.   And there God sent it
up  there  for the very purpose, and come back and  interpret  it  right
around--showing  the going of my mother and things like that,  and  then
come  back and told it beforehand, and it happened just exactly the  way
He said it would do.

See? And yet, John came right out there and confessed: He said, "I'm not
no Messiah, but I'm the voice of one crying in the wilderness." And then
them very disciples say, "Why does the scribes say--the Scripture  teach
that  Elias must first come?"  The simplicity of God goes... just  roots
right over the top of people's heads.

Let me take this, and then close, I will, by the help of God. See, Look.
Now, let's break this down then. I--I'm sorry to keep telling...?... I'm
sorry to hold you, but just a few hours, we come back.

Look,  Let's  take a simple drop of ink.  Everything is for  a  purpose.
You've gathered here this morning for a purpose.   I eat at your  house,
Charlie.   Nellie, you cooked for me for a purpose.  Everything is for a
purpose. This church is erected for a purpose. There's nothing without a
purpose and a cause.

Let's take the simple drop of ink now. (Can you hear me?)  Let's take  a
simple drop of ink and look at it. What is it?--a drop of ink. Where did
it come from? All right.  Let's take this drop of ink.  Now, it's--let's
say  it's black ink.  Now, that ink is for a purpose.  It can  write  my
pardon out of a penitentiary.  It can write my pardon from a death cell.
That right?

It can write John 3:16 and save my soul, by believing it. Is that right?
Or it can sign my death warrant. See?  It can condemn me at the judgment
bar. It's for a purpose. Is that right?  Well, let's look at that little
ink and see where it come from. Now, it's ink--it's been put together in
chemicals and so forth, 'til it's become ink, and it's black.

You drop it on your clothes; it'll stain it.  But we have manufactured a
stuff called bleach. You women use Clorox--bleach. Well, I take that one
drop of ink and drop it into a tub of bleach.  Now, what happened to the
ink? See? Why?  Bleach has been manufactured--invented--and manufactured
chemicals  together  that will break up that coloring so  bad  'til  you
can't find it.

Now,  part of the bleach is water.  Water is H2O which is  hydrogen  and
oxygen,  and both hydrogen and oxygen, both, are  dangerous  explosives.
And  then  hydrogen and oxygen are actually ashes.  That's what  it  is.
That's right--chemical ashes, just chemical ashes. Now, put it together,
you got water; but break it, you got hydrogen and oxygen.  You just keep
on going back. Now, in getting in this, let's take...

Now, I cannot. Now there might be chemists sitting here, and I would not
say it because there would be chemists listening at it. I don't know the
formula,  but I want to just explain it in my own humble  way,  trusting
that God will reveal Himself in it.

Look:  I dropped that drop of ink into a bleach.  What  happened?  Imme-
diately the black stain is gone.  You couldn't find it again if you  had
to--it's  gone.  You'll never see It no more.  What happened?  Now,  you
don't see nothing come up from it. You don't... Why don't  you?--because
it's broke up.  Now, science would say, "It turned back to its  original
acids."

What did the acids come from? See?  Well, you'd say, "It come from  cer-
tain things." All right. Say, for instance, like fumes made acids. Where
did fumes come from?  Well, it was--we will say, fumes was made by  mol-
ecules. Where did molecules come from?--from atoms. Where did atoms come
from?--from  electronics. Where did they come from?--cosmic light.  See?
You're plumb back a-past finding a chemist now. And if it is a substance
and  a  creation, it has to come from a Creator; so you're  not  sitting
here by chance.

I'm not holding 'til 12:30 or 1:00 o'clock by chance.  The footsteps  of
the righteous is ordered of the Lord.  See?  There's some reason for it.
There's some reason for you to believe.  There's some reason for you not
to believe--just like with that ink. Now, let's break that down.

Now, the first thing, say, after we get back to...  We bring it back  as
far as molecules.   Now, we took molecule--I'd say number one times mol-
ecule nine, times molecule twelve.  Now, if it had been eleven, it would
come out red; but it had to be twelve to make black.  Then we will  take
that down to atom.  It was atom nine-six, times plus four-three to equal
atom  sixteen-eleven.  If it had been sixteen-twelve, it  might've  been
purple. See? Then you keep breaking it on down.

It  shows that there was a something back yonder to begin  with.  That's
only  common sense.  It's a creation and has to have a Creator,  and  it
went out from a Creator.  And then it was determined and put into  these
different...  Now, science cannot take atom B-sixteen times twelve times
fourteen times... whatever what it was, like that, to make that. God had
to  do that.  And then it's brought down to a place 'til where it's  got
down into atoms, then science can begin to touch it.

Then  it comes out into molecules, then they can begin to see  a  little
better.  Then it comes down from that into something else, and the first
thing, it comes into chemicals and then they blend these together.

Now, when man--before he sinned... (I'm closing, but don't you miss it).
When man sinned, he separated himself from God and crossed a great chasm
and  put himself in death on this side.  He left; there's no  way  back.
Exactly.  There's no way for him to get back.  But then when he did, God
accepted a substitute which was a lamb or a goat or a sheep or something
for blood, which Adam spoke of... or Abel spoke of on the other side  of
the chasm.

On  that  side he's a son of God--he's an offspring from  God.  He's  an
inheritance  of the earth.   He can control nature.   He can speak  into
existence. Why, he's a creator himself. He's an offspring of God.

But  when  he  crossed,  he separated his  sonship.  He's  a  sinner  by
nature--he's under the hands of dominion of Satan; and God took a sacri-
fice of chemical of the blood, but the blood of bulls and goats did  not
divorce sin; it only covered sin.

If  I've  got a red spot on my hand and covered it with white,  the  red
spot  is  still there.  See, it's still there, but God  sent  down  from
Heaven a Bleach for sin.  It was the Blood of His Own Son, that when our
confessed sin drops into God's Bleach, try to find it again!  The color-
ing  of  sin goes back through the mediators and down through  the  time
until  it hits the accuser, Satan, and lays on him 'til the Day  of  the
Judgment.

What  happens  to  the son? He becomes in perfect  fellowship  with  the
Father  again,  standing on the other side of the chasm with  no  remem-
brance of sin against him.   No more... there's no more stain of  bleach
can be seen anywhere! He's free! Hallelujah! Just as that Clorox or that
ink can never be ink no more because it's broke up and sent back again!

And when confessed sin is confessed and been dipped into the... a man or
woman  that's been dipped into the Blood of Jesus Christ, it  kills  all
symptoms,  and every molecule of sin goes back to the devil and lays  on
him  'til  that Day of Judgment where his eternal  destination  will  be
throwed into a lake of fire; and the chasm is bridged and never to  come
into remembrance no more.   And a man stands justified as a son of  God.
Simplicity.

Moses--under  the blood of bulls and goats, with his confession  in  the
Word of God--and God could take that simple man and put His Words in his
mouth.  And he proved that he was Jehovah's servant, for he  could  walk
out  there...  And  Jehovah  spoke to him by vision.  He  walked  out  -
stretched his hands toward the east...  And now, remember, God had spoke
to him; it's God's thought. God uses man. God spoke to him--it's right.

He  said,  "Go stretch that rod in your hand toward the  east  and  say,
"Flies!"

And Moses, under the blood of that goat, sheep walked out there and took
that stick--reached towards the east, "THUS SAITH THE LORD, let there be
flies!" Never heard of flies. Walked on back--it's already spoke. It's a
thought; now it's spoke--it's expressed. It's the Word of God then. It'd
come  into a human's lips--a simple man under the blood of a  bull--bull
or goat.

The  first  thing you know, a green fly begin to fly  around.  The  next
thing  you know, they were five pounds per yard.  What was it?  Was  the
Word  of God spoken through Moses, the creator, because under the  blood
he  was  standing in the presence of God, and his own words  wasn't  his
word.

"Ye abide in Me and My words abide in you, then ask what you will and it
shall be given to you."  Where's the Church standing at?  "Let there  be
frogs," and there wasn't a frog in the country.  In an hour's time, they
were  ten foot deep in places.  What was it?   It was God, the  Creator,
hiding Himself in a simple man.

Now,  I want to ask you something.  If the blood of a bull or a goat  be
used for a bleach, which can only cover, could put a man in position  to
speak the creative Word of God and bring flies into existence, why would
you  stumble  at the Bleach of Jesus Christ's Blood Who  could  speak  a
squirrel or something into existence?

Don't  you do it! Don't stumble over simplicity.  Believe that He  still
remains God.  Oh, my!  Pardon the sin.  Oh, how I wish I could...  Then,
Mark 11:22: "You say to this mountain `be moved' and don't doubt in your
heart, but believe that what you've said will come to pass, you can have
what you said."

My, I've got three or four pages--we've got to leave it go.  Thank  you.
God,  hiding Himself in simplicity.  Don't you see?   There's  something
wrong  somewhere.  There's something wrong somewhere.  When God makes  a
statement, He cannot lie. He made the promise. See? He hides in simplic-
ity.  It's so simple the educated and scholars say, "Ah, ah, it's  tele-
pathy," or something. You know it's...

God can sweep Himself back down through the strings of time and tell you
back  there just exactly what happened.  Tell you just exactly what  you
are today, and what you will be to come.  That's still by the Bleach  of
Jesus  Christ, Who can take a sinner and bleach him into there,  and  he
stands  in the presence of God, "And if ye abide in Me and My  words  in
you, then ask what you will...?..."

"He that does believe on Me, the works that I do shall he do also." "How
do  you  condemn Me, when did not your own laws say that those  who  the
Word of God came to, the prophets, did not you call them gods? and  then
how can you condemn Me when I say I am the Son of God?"  They failed  to
see it. They failed to see it.

Now,  Church, in the coming Messages from tonight on, don't fail to  see
it.  See?  See the day that we're living in.  And remember, the Blood of
Jesus  Christ  takes sins so far from you, and they're not even  in  the
remembrance of God anymore. It takes all stains.


                      "Sin had left a crimson stain,
                      He washed it white as snow.
                      Then before the throne,
                      I stand in Him complete..."

Oh  my!   How can I be complete?   How can I be complete?   Because  the
Blood--not me, but that Blood stands between God and me.  I accepted It,
and He put It... I am a sinner, but He's God... But the chemistry stands
between me to kill sin, so God sees me just as white as the water in the
bleach.   The sin is gone.  They can't even reach him because there's  a
sacrifice laying there.

Where  is  our faith to believe the simple Word of God?  It's  what  God
said--take  Him at His Word.  God hides Himself now in simplicity  in  a
humble little bunch, but one of these days, He will manifest Himself  as
He always has in the days passed by. Do you love Him?

                      I love Him, I love Him
                      Because He first loved me
                      And purchased my salvation
                      On Calvary's tree."

Do  you love Him?  My, isn't He wonderful?  I hope and I trust that  the
Message will produce what It was intended to do; that It'll get you to a
place  that you don't look for flowerly things or some... When  you  see
God in greatness, look how humble it is, and then you'll see God.  Don't
look for Him...

When Elisha was back in that cave, the smoke went across blood, thunder,
lightning,  and, see, all these kinds of sensations we've had--blood  in
the  face  and in the hands, and sensations and  everything--they  never
bothered  that prophet.  He just laid there, but he heard a still  small
Voice. What was it?--the Word.  Then he covered his face and walked out.
See, that was it.

Remember, friend, don't look for great big... You say, "God."  He speaks
of great big things. There'll come a time there'll be this, that, or the
other--great  big  things.  I  hope you're  catching  what  I'm  talking
about--great big things, see.  They're all...  When this comes to  pass,
it'll  be great, big like this, and it'll be so humble you'll  miss  the
whole thing and just go right on. See?

You'll look back and say, "Well, that never did come to..." Passed right
over the top, and you never even seen it, see. It's so simple. God lives
in  simplicity  to  manifest  Himself  in  greatness.   What  makes  Him
great?--because He can simplify Himself.  A big great man can't simplify
himself--he's got to be a dignitary. See?  But he ain't big enough  yet.
When  he  becomes big enough, then he comes down like  this  and  humble
himself.

As the old saint said up there in Chicago--that fellow went up with  all
the  education and things, said he come down whipped  out--head  hanging
down,  walking out defeated.  He said, "If he'd went up the way he  come
down, he'd have come down the way he went up."

That's  right. See?  Humble yourself.  Just be humble.  Don't try to  be
peculiar, just love Jesus. Say, "Lord, if there's any guile in my heart;
if  there's  anything wrong, Father, I don't want to be like  that.  You
take it away. I don't want to be like that."

"Oh, I want to be numbered as one of them in that day, Lord.  And I  see
the day approaching."   You see these Seals begin to... If God will open
them  to us. And remember, He alone can do it. We're depending  on  Him.
God bless you.

Now I suppose our pastor will have a word for you to say--or for him  to
say, rather, to you before we meet again this afternoon. And I think the
service  will--the song service is 6:30; the door is open at  6:00,  the
song service will start at 6:30. And...

The Lord willing, I will be speaking tonight on the subject of The Seven
Sealed Book.  And then Monday night the white horse rider; Tuesday night
the black horse rider; Wednesday night the grizzle horse--the pale horse
and then the red horse rider. Then go into the 6th--4th, 5th and 6th and
then  Sunday  night... Next Sunday morning maybe...  evening  service  I
don't know.

Now  remember, we're dedicated to the Lord--ourself and the  church  for
the service of God.  God bless you.  I'm one hour late; will you forgive
me now?  I don't mean to do that.  But see, I just be with you this week
and be leaving again. And I don't know where I will be going; just where
He leads.  And I want to plan every minute I can because I want to spend
eternity with you. God bless you. Now, Brother Neville. seals001.htm    

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