Seeing God

You can find this sermon at ChurchAges.net

1 We were sitting here talking one with the other, Brother Thomas and I, and Brother Rhodes, that I've just had the privilege of meeting. And we were having... You know how we have a little sense of humor [unclear words] kind of what I was going to speak about this morning when I was here, but I haven't got time---"Letting Off Some Steam." So that's the only way we have of letting off steam, is when we have a little sense of humor.
And a godly, saintly old brother that's just went on to glory that most all of us are acquainted with, was Brother F. F. Bosworth. And he always had a great sense of humor. I used to be a little reluctant about watching and listening, because I want "Yea, yea," and "Nay, nay." When I seen this godly old man and the sense of humor he had, then I seen other great servants, Brother Vayle and these other brethren here and all of them, when they get together they had a little sense of humor, and I thought, "Well, maybe that's just a tradition of this last day amongst ministers."
And then I was reading in the pre-Nicene Council, and the Nicene fathers and so forth, of some of those great servants of Christ in bygone years, and they had sense of humor. And you know, I finally come out to find out that God's got a sense of humor.

2 And talking of fellowship, I was thinking one that Brother Bosworth used to say. He said to me, said, "Brother Branham, you know what fellowship is?"
I said, "Yes, I believe I do."
He said, "It's two fellows in one ship." That's what ... you'd be pretty close together there, you know, so that's a fellowship. And this is certainly a great time of it, of fellowship.
Now, I had ... as I get a little older I don't think as fast as I did when I was a young man like Brother Parker here. He was talking awhile ago, and said he was always telling his wife she's getting old and he's getting young, and so forth. And I try that at home, too, but it don't work very good. Well, whether you can make it work or not... But however, when I told him there's just ten years difference in our age I said, "You come on up the road ten more years, and instead of pushing that Bible away like that, you'll have to be looking through two glasses when you get a little older."

3 And so, we're very pleased with this meeting and its results. I was having a little time... Brother Parker here was explaining to me some of the scriptures, and I know what you all are going through with down there at the building, down at the Tabernacle, of this teaching of the Scripture. And what a humble, sweet way he approached it, to tell me about some things---which I told him, as soon as he got it on some paper let me have it, so I could sit down, study on it. And I like that approach (don't you?) to somebody, that don't try to poke something down you, but just let it be humbly and sweetly.

4 The other ... some days ago I was talking to a group of brethren who had ... of a certain denomination, and they were really pulling me through the coals. And they said, "It's ridiculous to preach divine healing." Oh, my! They knowed all the Book, you know, and said, "Why, that days is gone a long time ago."
I said, "Well, somewhere, brother, it's returned again, because I sure am..."
And they were telling me that, about I should not have tried to preach without having an education, without going to Bible school and learning something. And I just waited till they got finished, and I said, "You know," I said, "I tell you. You brethren really must have a great time." I said, "You know, in all my errors, and mistakes, and He loves me the way He does ... and I just can't hardly stand it sometimes." I said, "Wonder ... them that's in the truth, wonder how they can ever stand it then, loving it like that." In all this error that we are supposed to be in, you know, and if He loves us this much, how about those who really have the truth? I imagine they really have a time, don't you think? So, we'll just remain as we are until He shows us our error. And then, we'll move on up into what they think is the truth---if He says it is, and his Word declares it.

5 And so ... but in a group like this it's the closest place to heaven that there is on earth. When here we are sitting together this morning, we are already dead---that job's done over. And we're ... we are buried. That's right, all buried. And then we are ... not only that, but we are risen again. We are raised and in Christ in his resurrection. We're part of it. And now we're assembling together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus, see. We are in Him by baptism, see. By one Spirit all baptized in one body, and here we are now assembled, the body of the Lord Jesus.

6 And now, your services starts in about thirty minutes, or thirty-five minutes. And if I would try to use this text of "Letting Off the Steam," we'd be letting it off till noon, and I guess they'd be letting off right. But I thought maybe I would just take a little testimony of something, and so we can get back to the church. I'd love to be there, and sit under the teaching of these great servants of Christ, Brother Vayle, brother up there, and our precious Brother Parker, and Brother Iverson---many of the other brethren here---and would like to hear them. He was telling me the order of the meeting, letting the Spirit move. I like that. And then the next man that raises up carries that on in harmony. Now that's the Holy Spirit. That's right.
But when you find out someone comes in contradictory, then that breaks that time of fellowship. It breaks it, see. See, there's something wrong in that.

7 Now, I told Brother Parker as he graciously invited me one time, maybe ... maybe next year if the Lord tarries, might come back and I'd like to go down and have a day just to sit with the brethren and talk of my own personal experience, of how ... meeting the Spirit itself. You can't talk out before the world out there, those things. If you say something (I've watched it), just speak a word, and one will take it and lean this way with it; and the other one take it and lean that way with it. And the first thing you know, it's altogether off of the subject altogether than what... And then it gets out amongst the people, and some say, "Brother Branham says this." And that ... well, it's not only to me; it's with any brother like that. So, just to sit together with ministers, where you have the privilege of raising up... And that's what makes you pure, is when you can sit down and listen, and divide your thoughts together.

8 Now I appreciate all this wonderful time. I do solicit your prayers as I go on in... I've got to go now down south from here to Columbia, and then hurry right home. I get home Wednesday night leave Thursday morning. I get home Wednesday night, nine, ten o'clock. I leave about four o'clock Thursday morning to go to the West Coast to begin services at the Cow Palace. And from there... That's the great livestock ... Western Livestock Exhibit at Southgate, California. And then we go from there on up into Grass Valley, and that's near ... up towards Nevada. And then on to the ... up into the World Fair state this year, and then on into Canada. And we're kind of scheduled, waiting to see ... get to California from ... going on into Alaska from there. So pray for me.

9 Now, I appreciate Brother Parker and his great love, and at inviting me to come here to his convention, and the privilege of turning me loose on the platform to say whatever God would put on my heart to say. I appreciate a godly man. And brothers, sisters, I thought this morning just talk to you from my heart. There's not too many doors open for me. And I ... not holding this against my brethren, not at all. But I believe sometimes that... It's just like I said. The people take the wrong attitude and lean this way and that way with it, and it causes confusion among the brethren. And I can see they're shepherds, and can understand it. 'Course, I've been expecting it, and I believed that it would. And I have convictions of my own, as every minister does. I try not, amongst congregations, to try to sow a discord, because that's one thing God hates---is discord among brethren.

10 But when I'm out in the meetings I try to hold just the great ... I'd call it, I guess, great fundamental, evangelical teachings and doctrines of the Bible---the fundamental ... the personal appearance of Jesus, and the physical death, burial, resurrection, ascension and return, and so forth. I just teach those things---divine healing and so forth---which... All of us full gospel people surely agree upon that. And I want you to, brethren, to know that the tapes that I teach in my own church got out among you, and so forth, among your congregations, and I have my own convictions. And, of course ... now to back down on my convictions, I wouldn't do it, because I'd be a hypocrite, see. I'd be a hypocrite to do that. So, I do believe what I taught on the tapes. I believe every word of it. I would not feed the people the wrong thing. And if I'm wrong, and I pray that God will forgive me for it, because it's the best of my understanding.

11 And so ... but to invite me here and to have this ministerial fine group of ministers sitting here this morning, godly men... And I was at... A gracious brother not long ago (and sisters, excuse me)... I was at Phoenix, and a most glorious meeting with a precious brother who I love. And he called me to his room. He was deeply sincere, and he said, "Brother Branham," he said, "You know I love you."
And I said, "Thank you, my brother. I certainly love you."
And he said, "You know, we feel like that your ministry has kind of been a great cream of the crop."
I said, "Oh, don't say that." I said, "It's ... I don't ... that's not right." I said, "I just followed the Lord, and you've done the same." I said, "Look how He's blessed you, beyond what He ever has me, and the great things that He's given you." I said, "He never done those things to me."
And I said, "You have to take lots of money. And I never did take up money because I guess He would... You know, He ... maybe He couldn't trust me with it, see." And I said, "Another thing," I said, "my little ministry... I couldn't go to little bitty places like..." Just recently held a meeting where I only held twenty people; but the Lord led me there. And I want to go where He leads me, I don't need money, see. And I just want to go wherever I feel led to go.

12 And the other day, even in the midst of all this trouble, I looked over our books, and it's three hundred or better major cities in the United States calling for me to come to them, so ... besides the foreign fields. So, I was...
This brother said, "Well, here's what I want to tell you, Brother Branham." He said, "You are ... you're too radical."
I said "Well, I'm an Irishman by birth, first birth; a Jew by second." And I said ... anyway, I said, "Then, you know, mix that together," I said, "hard telling what you would have." And I said, "Maybe," I said, "I'm just actually radical, I guess. It's just my nature to be that way. I just go whole-hearted. When I think anything's right, I just sell out everything I got to it, you see." And I said, "That's the way it was with Christ, to me.
"And now, my people before me, back, was Catholic," and I said, "from Ireland---all come from Dublin." And I said, "Then they ... that... I heard about when I was a little boy, the things that happened. There was a call in my life.

13 "And then the Catholics said, 'We are the church,' and it shuts the rest of them out. And I go to the Lutheran, they say, 'We are the church,' and it shuts all the rest of them out." And I said, "About six, seven hundred, or maybe nine hundred different denominations, how we going to know what's right? So I just got to the Bible. And I just stay with the way I read it, and just keep it like that."
And he said, "Well, here's one thing." Said, "You're always hammering at them women." He said...
I said, "I am jealous of them."
And he said, "You tell them how they must dress and all about they're too sexy, and they shouldn't wear those clothes, and those shorts; and quit cutting their hair and all these other things you said." Said, "You hammer at that." He said...
"Well," I said, "that's in the Scripture."
So he said, "Well, I know it, too."
I said, "Don't you believe that, being a Pentecostal minister?"
He said, "Yes, but," said, "Brother Branham," he said, "the people believe you to be a prophet."
I said, "No, I'm not."
He said, "But they believe you that way." He said, "And you should be teaching those women how to receive great spiritual gifts, and things like that." And said, "Then the church would be better off."
I said, "Brother,..."
He said, "If you're deeper with God, teach the people deeper with God."
I said, "How can I teach them algebra when they won't even listen to their ABC's?" I said, "So that's just about..."

14 He said, "Well, Brother Branham, can I do something for you?" He said, "I believe if you would just leave that off, and just go ahead and pray for the sick, and I ... and let it go... God called you to pray for the sick."
I said, "That is true."
He said, "Then, just leave it go at that," see. "Just leave it go at praying for the sick."
I said, "But what about this other?"
He said, "I don't believe that either." But said, "You know what? If I said something like that, why, I said ... they would this, that..."
I said, "There you are. There you are," see. I said, "If we don't stand for it, then who is going to? This generation's got to be judged." And I said, "Then it's got to come from somewhere."
He said, "Well, I tell you what I'll do. Will you permit me to lay my hands upon you, and pray that God will open your eyes to truth?"
I said, "I will under one condition. If you'll let me return the compliment."
Said, "Very well." So we prayed for one another. I hope it helps me a whole lot. I certainly do. I hope his prayer helps me, because I ... if ... I want to be helped. I'm here for that purpose.
JOHN6:36-48

15 Now, it's just now twenty-five minutes until your service starts. But let me just read one word out of the Bible here, and just talk, give a testimony, and then we will go. Matthew 5:8. Or, let's see, I believe I'll read more than that. I've got something else I want to read. It just comes on my mind, if I can find it now, just where it was at. If I ... believe I can; I'm not too sure of it. I've got to read something here out of St. John. Yes, I want to read it from here. St. John, the 6th chapter. Let's begin about ... about the 6th chapter and the 36th verse:
But I said unto you, That ye also have seen me, and believe not.
All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.
For I came down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him that sent me.
And this is the Father's will which hath sent me, that of all which has he has given me I should [not] lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the last day.
And this is the will of him that sent me, that every one which seeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting life: and I will raise him up at the last day.
Jesus [pardon me]... The Jews then murmured at him, because he said, I am the bread which come down from heaven.
And they said, Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? how is it then that he saith, I come down from heaven?
Jesus therefore answered and said unto them, Murmur not among yourselves.
No man can come to me, except my Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day.
It is written in the prophets, And they shall all be taught of God. Every man therefore that has heard, and has learned of the Father, cometh to me.
Not that any man has seen the Father, save he which is of God, he hath seen the Father.
Verily, I say... Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that believeth on me has everlasting life.
I am the bread of life.

16 I was just thinking while I was sitting here at the table, and my little context of a text that I had wrote out there, "Letting Off Steam..." I thought this morning, what causes people to drive...? I got a friend here that's come all the way from Texas, and across the country. I got friends sitting here from Canada. And we got friends from all around in this little group of people this morning. Some of us are ministers, some are workmen, housewives, and so forth. And what is the purpose of us assembling together?
Many of you all come each year to hear our precious brother and his teaching. And many of you read his articles. And I've read them and I think they're profound. Always Billy, who's our secretary of the campaign, saves that "Midnight Cry" for me each time, because I like to read Brother Parker's ... his approach to the Scripture. And you read it, and you think of it. Then when the meetings are, we assemble together. It's because that there's something inside of us that longs to hear more, to get a hold of something. It's life. There is no greater word that we could think of this morning than life. "He that believeth not on the Son shall not see life."

17 How blind a person must be that can't see life. And think---that many people doesn't see life. Now we might see it, but the word "see" doesn't mean to look at; the word "see" means to understand it. Now Jesus said to Nicodemus, "Except a man be borned again, he cannot see the kingdom." Now, in otherwise, you be looking at something and you say, "I don't see it," you mean you don't understand it. To see (what we call see), that's to look at. But to see in Bible terminology is to understand what we're looking at, to be revealed. And we assemble together like this that Christ might be revealed among us. That's what the conventions are held for. And such a great thing as life...

18 I was thinking of a testimony, that I might give at this time, just to take up another ten, fifteen minutes. I preached one time, maybe here---I've preached it several places---on "Show Us the Father and It Will Sufficeth Us," and to see God all around us.
An old man used to live down on the river. He's gone on now. And he was an old fisherman. His little boy used to go up the river and fish with him. The little fellow ... one day coming down the river, he'd... The rain had come and washed out the skies from the dust and all the leaves off the trees, and a rainbow came out in the west, or in the east. They were going westward down the Ohio River. And the old fisherman began ... great big tears running down his cheeks as he watched the rainbow. And the little fellow was so enthused, he got up to the boat, to the middle of the boat, and he said, "Sir, I want to ask you a question." Said, "My pastor cannot answer it, my mother, my Sunday school teacher." Said, "If God is so great," said, "why can't one see Him?"
And the old fellow, overcome by the little fellow's expression, put his arms around him. He said, "Bless your heart, honey. All I've seen for fifty years has been God," see. He could see God---see life. God is life. Life is God.

19 A few ... about two years ago, my good friend, sitting in here somewhere, and I, were down in Kentucky squirrel hunting, letting off steam from the meetings. And we'd been camped out and I was dirty. And this is awful rude to make an expression like this before brethren ... I hadn't had a bath in two weeks. And so, I was really pretty ... well, I needed one pretty bad. So ... but Brother Wood and I, he needed it as bad as I did, so we just didn't notice each other. So we... It got awful dry back in the woods, and our beard out on our face, and so we went to...
The squirrels, they ... tramping on the brush, why, they can hear you. And, oh, my! Houdini, an escape artist, has nothing on them little fellows. And down there when they get shot at anyhow, they get wild. They just escape. And he said... I said, "Brother Wood, if we could find a place that had some hollows..." Wonder if these brother, you know... How many knows what a hollow is? That's all right. It's a ... you know, a ditch goes down through the woods. And usually there the water drains out and runs down. And it keeps the leaves wet.

20 I said, "If we had some..." This was a big flat woods we were hunting in. And I said, "If we could find a place had some big deep hollows where the springs keep it," I said, "we could find squirrels better."
And he said, "Oh, I know such a place."
I said, "Well, we'll go."
And we got in the car and left our camp. And on the road over, he said, "Brother Branham," he said, "I want to tell you," said, "you better let me do the talking."
I said, "All right. You're sure welcome."
And he said, "This man is an infidel. And oh, he's the rankest in the country."
I said, "All right. You do the talking then."
So he said, "I think he might know me." Mr. Wood was from down in that country.

21 So we went on over to the place. And we drove way back through the fields, and down through the gaps, and up over the hills. And so, I had never been in the country. And so, when we got over there, to this certain place, why, we stopped at a big house back there. And there was two old men sitting out there, pretty well stricken in age, I guess in their seventies, sitting under an apple tree shade. We drove up. Mr. Wood got out. And I heard the old Kentucky expression, "Come in."
You know, that's how they call the Indiana people "Hoosiers," see. How they got that, in the early days, in Kentucky, that was in the South. So when you come up to a southern home down there in the South they'd say, "Hello." You'd say, "Come in." No matter who you was, long as you was walking, had shoes on, or if you didn't have shoes on, come in anyhow---you're welcome.
But when you got across the line in Indiana they was a little suspicious. Say, "Hello." They said, "Who's there?" They want to know first. I'm glad I'm a Southerner. And I kind of like it that way.
And so he said, "Come in." So Mr. Wood went up. He said ... called the man by name. He said, "You are he?"
Said, "I'm that varmint."

22 So he said ... I seen he was rather a stern old fellow. And I said ... sat in the car. And Mr. Wood said, "I would like to ask you..." He said, "First I want to introduce myself." He said, "My name is Wood, Banks Wood." And he said, "I was squirrel hunting and I've been over here on a certain place." And he said, "It's flat woods, and it's got so dry over there. We knew you owned some acreage here that had hollows, and thought maybe I'd come over and ask you, and you'd let me hunt."
The old man spit his big chew of tobacco out and he said, "Are you Jim Wood's boy?"
Said, "I am."
He said, "Jim Wood?"
Now, they were Jehovah Witness, you know. David, he (I guess they've got in here this morning. They sell books there at the meeting.) ... his leg had been drawed up under him. And Mr. Wood, being a Jehovah Witness, had come to one of the meetings. And before I left the building the Holy Spirit had told me there'd be a boy there, and said, "His father's name will be Wood, and they're from southern Kentucky." And said, "He's got polio." And said, "Speak the Word; he'll walk." And I looked all around to see the vision. I couldn't see the boy. I went on. After awhile I spotted him way back in the back. Called his name, there come his leg straight, you see. So, he was no more Jehovah Witness.
I... By the grace of God, I've led every one of his family (his father a reader in Jehovah Witness) all to Christ and the baptism of the Holy Spirit, and re-baptized all of them ... so then ... by visions, what the Lord would give, and say things that would take place

23 So then, he said, "Anybody that's relation to Jim Wood's boy can hunt anywhere he wants to." Said, "Just help yourself." Said, "I have five hundred acres here of all virgin timber. Just help yourself."
He said, "I got my pastor along with me. You won't mind if he goes?"
He said, "Wood, you don't mean to tell me you got low enough down till you have to carry a preacher with you wherever you go."
And so he said, "Well," said...
And I thought it about time for me to get out then, you know. So I got out of the car and walked around the side, and I said, "How do you do?" And Mr. Wood was going to introduce me. Before he had time to do it... And oh, whiskers two weeks long, and squirrel blood---stink like a pole cat. So I started around there, and I said, "How do you do, sir?"
He said, "And you're a preacher?"
I said, "Well, I'd like to be. I..."
And he said, "Well, I just ... you know," said, "I'm supposed to be an infidel."
I said, "It's not much to brag about, is it, sir?"
And he said, he said, "No, I reckon it's not." He said, "Just one thing that I got against you fellows."
And I said, "Yes, sir. If it's just one thing that's ... you're pretty good shape." Some of them I've met today ... I got a lot of Christians, supposed to be, has got more than that against me. I said, "Well, that's pretty good."
He said, "What I got against you guys is this: you're always hollering about something that you know nothing about."
I said, "For instance, what, sir?"
And he said, "You're talking about God, and there is no such a thing."
"Oh," I said, "that's what it is?"
He said, "Yeah, that's it."
I thought, "Lord, You help me."

24 Now there's just two ways to approach anything, my brethren. That's the right way and the wrong way. I think... May I stop here a moment in my story, and say I think that's what's the matter with me, and many of us brethren. We've got a great product here, but we're approaching the public wrong with it too much, making us isolationists, see. It'll sell itself. Just live it, see. "Ye are the salt of the earth." And salt, as long as the savor's in the salt, it'll save if it contacts. But if it's lost its savor, no matter how loud we shout down here, and how much we jump up and down, there's got to be a life out here that backs that up.

25 So I looked at the old gentleman, and I thought, "Lord, poor old fellow, hammered around on these old clods here. My daddy would've lived, he'd been about that age. Now, there's just a little something here that You could help me to say, no doubt, that'd help the old fellow to see." And I've seen many that call themselves infidels, and I've stood by some of them when they were going. They're not infidels. They're just popping off, see. And so ... that's the street expression, but that's the way you'll understand it---popping off, and letting off steam.
And I said, "Well, it's ... 'course," I said, "that's opinion, of course."
And we stood there a moment. And we were sitting under an apple tree. He said, "I been to them meetings, and they're just like a lying dog." He said, "I used to have an old lying dog, and I shot him." He said, "I'd follow him every night. Take him out here and he'd be barking, and go up there... And he's supposed to be a coon dog." And said, "The coon would be up the tree." And said, "Then the first thing you know, he'd be barking up this tree like that, and I'd go around there and shine the light all up. The coon had done went out through the top."

26 I said, "But, sir, after all, the coon was there. It's just a dog," see. I hope he got what I meant, and I'm sure you do.
So he said, "So I shot him." And he said, "I don't like anything that'll lie. And I think if a man talks, he ought to be ... know what he's talking about."
I said, "I certainly agree with you."
He said, "There was one preacher that I heard, that if I ever get to see the man..." Said, "I never heard him, but I heard of him. If I ever get to see the man, I'm going to hear him."
And I said, "That's very nice."
He said, "He come to a little place over here called Acton. It's a Methodist campground." And Brother Wood looked at me, and I shook my head. He said, "Old Sister So-and-so up on the hill here [I forget her ... never called her Sister---Miss somebody---is about sixty-five.]" Said, "She was dying with cancer in the stomach." And said, "She had doctors out of Louisville here." And said, "They got a nice farm up there," and said, "they could afford it.
"They took her up to Louisville for an operation. Didn't do one bit of good. They cut her open, sewed her up. Cancer done wrapped her all through."

27 Said, "She gradually died here for several months." Said, "Finally got to a place that she was so bad and I..." (Excuse me my brother, sister.) Said they... (I'm just going to express it the way he said it.) She couldn't even get onto the bedpan. They could never put one under her, couldn't raise her that high. They had to use a draw-sheet, rubber sheet, and then a draw-sheet.
Said, "Wife and I went up there every morning and would change ... the wife change her bed. And I'd help get the sheets out from under her, and so forth." And said, "She was just ... the doctor said just give her a little morphine, or something, to keep her as easy as possible until she died. Said she had about two weeks to live."

28 And he said, "There come a preacher down here from Indiana, and had ... over here at the Methodist campground." He said, "There was several hundreds of people gathered over there, they said, to hear this preacher." And he said, "And that night," said, "while he was preaching," said, "her sister was sitting back there, which was Mrs. So-and-so that lives over here on another ridge."
And said, "This preacher was supposed to have something another, that he could tell the people about what they had done, and why they were sick, and all about that." And said, "I'd heard about it, but 'course, I didn't believe such a radical thing as that."
And he said, "But, however, this woman that night was sitting in the meeting. And while the minister was speaking, he turns to this woman---and her sitting in the back of the building---and said, 'When you left home tonight, back there, Miss. So-and-so,' said, 'you picked up a little blue hand... a little handkerchief with a blue figure in the corner of it off of a dresser, and you put it in your purse.' And said, 'You're praying back there for your older sister who's dying, by the name of So-and-so, that lives over here on the hill.' Said, 'The Lord has heard your prayer. Now take this little handkerchief and lay it upon your sister, and the cancer will leave her.'

29 "Well," said, "about ... around close to midnight that night, I thought they had the Salvation Army on the hillside up there---all the screaming and hollering."
I don't want to embarrass anybody, but that was Ben, sitting there---Brother Ben. You know that familiar squall of an "Amen!" he gives out every night in the meeting down there, that shakes the place. Brother Ben had took the woman up there ... her ... to her sister, and had laid the handkerchief on her, and Ben believed it. So he just started shouting before it happened. So he was just getting at it first. So Brother Ben...
He said, "I thought the woman had died. Well," said, "it was around midnight. So the next morning," said, "the wife and I went up there." And said, "You know what?" Said, "That woman was up, cooking her breakfast, eating fried apple pie!"

30 How many of you rebels know what a fried apple pie is? Oh, my, do I love them! I like them to put molasses on, see. And I'm not a Methodist; I'm a Baptist---I like to baptize them with molasses. You know, put plenty of it on, then eat them, hot butter and m-m-m.
So then when ... she was eating these fried apple pies. And said, "It really like to took wife and I off our feet." And said, "If you don't believe that," pointed his finger, said, "I'll take you right up there and show her to you right now. She's..."
And the old man sitting there, said, "That there is right." (The other old man, see.)
And I said, "Oh, I believe you."
He said, "They tell me the man's coming over here to Campbellsville, at the stadium. And said, "I'm going over to hear him. And I'm going to talk to him."
I said, "Yes, sir."
And he said, "And I'm going to ask him what that was that could tell him about that woman, and know that she's going to be well." Said, "Now, I just don't understand it."

31 "Oh," I said, "that's really phenomenal." I said, "It certainly is." And I thought, "Lord, You help me now. What is the next thing to say?" But I remembered my old mother used to tell me, "Give the cow enough rope, she'll hang herself," you know. So that's just about a good old southern expression that's true. I thought I'd just see how much he really cares. I'll throw him off the subject. I said, "You mind if I have one of them apples?"
He said, "The yellow jackets are eating them up. Guess you can have one."
You know what a yellow jacket is? just sucking around on the apples. It was about the middle of August. And I picked up one and rubbed it on them old bloody, dirty pants, and took a bite off of it. Said, "My, it's a dandy."
Said, "Oh, yes. It's a dandy."
I said, "How long ... how old is that tree?"
"Well," he said, "I planted the thing."
I said, "Oh."

32 He said, "It's about forty-eight years old." He said, "You see where that old chimney's standing up there on the hill?" Said, "I was borned up yonder." He said, "And when my pappy died..." He said, "We'd built this house down here." And said, "And then I moved down here, and all my young'uns has been born down here." And he said, "I've lived here ever since. And I planted that tree there, a little bitty thing. And I've just growed up with the tree."
"Yes, sir. I see." I said, "I notice all them apples are falling off."
He said, "Yeah, yep."
I said, "The leaves are falling."
"Yes, sir."
I said, "That's strange, isn't it?"
He said, "What do you mean?"
I said, "You know, we haven't had no frost, and yet those leaves are falling." And I said, "That's the reason we come over here to hunt in the hollow. The leaves on the trees are falling." And I said, "Wonder why they're falling before they have any frost?"
"Oh," he said, "they fall before they have frost."
And I said, "Yes, sir." And I said "What makes them fall?"
He said, "Well, the life left them."
I said, "I see. And where did the life go?"
He said, "It went back down the tree, into the root of the tree."
"Oh. I see." I said, "Otherwise, if that leaf stayed on there, and the life stayed up there, it would hold the leaf there."
"Oh, yeah."
And I said, "Then the leaf goes off the tree, back down to the root to hide."
"Yes."
I said, "Why does it go down there?"
"Well," he said, "if it stayed up there, the winter would kill the tree. The life has to go down into the root, in the warm ground, to preserve the life, to bring another leaf up next fall."
"Oh," I said, "I see. And every time it comes up it brings you up a bunch of apples and so forth?"
"Yep, that's right."

33 I said, "Well, sir, I'd like to ask you a question."
He said, "All right."
I said, "Pray tell me, what intelligence that tells that leaf before there ... or that life up in that tree, what intelligence tells that life, 'Get away from up here and get down into the roots, because if you don't you're going to die.'?" And I said, "Then the spring of the year, it brings up another leaf." I said, "Now what makes it go down into the root of the tree?"
"Oh," he said, "that's nature for the water to drop."
I said, "All right. Perhaps I'll set a bucket of water on the post out here. And about the middle of August it'll go down into the bottom of the post, and come back again next spring."
"No, it won't do it."
I said, "Why won't it do it?"
"Well," he says, "it isn't nature for it."
I said, "What is nature? Who governs nature? Why is it that it doesn't do it for the pine tree then? It stays up here. What different makes the ... differentiates the difference between them?"

34 The old man studied a little bit. I said, "You see, sir," I said, "there has to be an intelligence, because the tree has no intelligence. It has to be operated. It isn't a mechanical device. It is an intelligence that sends the life down into the root of the tree, like death, burial, and resurrection." Lived all that years and couldn't see life.
I said, "I have..." I'm a missionary, and I've heard all (I'm saying this to you) I've heard all the different ideas---Buddha, Hindu, and different theories---but they're all wrong. Christianity is based upon burial and resurrection. Not reproduction; resurrection. Not bring up something like it; the same thing that went down, comes up. The same Jesus.

35 If you'll notice, God testifies every day of our life. Of a morning the sun is born. At ten o'clock it's in its teenage. At noontime it's in its full strength, and it sets in the evening (Is that the end of it?), only to come up again---birth, life, death, resurrection. Constantly, God testifying in life.
The tree goes back down, the sap into the roots, to bring forth life again next year. We're ... you and I are hanging on the tree of life. We are the fruit of that tree.
The old man, after he sat there a little bit, he said, "I never thought of that."
I said, "You haven't answered my question. I want you to tell me what intelligence that controls that life in that tree that goes down. This intelligence can speak to that life. Not the tree; the life [the life that's in you, see.]. Controls that life, and runs it back down here and hides it [As Job said, 'Hide ... thou would hide me in the grave. Keep me in the secret place.'], and then brings it back again in the spring." And he couldn't answer me.

36 I said, "The same intelligence that speaks to the life in that tree and says, 'Hide if you expect to live,' that's the same intelligence that told me what to say to that woman how to live, believe."
He said, "You're not the preacher?"
I said, "Yes, sir. I am."
There on the ground that day, with a simple little story... I know it's getting late, I'm way ... ought to've been gone. I got ... there's some more goes to it. But on that ground that day, by just a simple little thing of the man just seeing life, I led him to Christ.
Last year I was back again and his widow was sitting on the porch when I come up. She met me. With her hands clasped in mine, she said, "Brother Branham, he died in the faith of the Lord Jesus. He's gone on."

37 "He that believeth on the Son shall have ... can see life." It's not hard for us then, that we can see that there's something controls our life. That's what we're here to seek---life, and that more abundant. And I pray to God this morning in this breakfast that we will have abundance of life. And He who can speak to the tree with his intelligence, and the tree quickly obeys the Master's call to hide, if it expects life... And I know another great hiding place to preserve life. Let's just hide there this morning. Not in a bomb shelter, but beneath his wings let's hide. Can we pray?

38 Our heavenly Father, oh, we know that today, even now we are just shrouded around with life. We feel it. We see the sun rise, set. We watch the flowers as they bloom. And then frost strikes them, and the funeral procession comes along, the fall rains, and cries big tears down and buries them. They lay in the grave and rot. But that's not the end of it. Thou hast preserved their life.
And then as soon as the sun, s-u-n, begins to rise, no matter if that seed... A big rock has been placed over it, or yards of concrete poured over it in the winter where that seed is buried. When that warm sun that controls botany life begins to warm the earth, that seed comes forth. We find the thickest of our grass right along the edge of the walk. It's the seed that was buried under there. It can't hide life. Life has to spring forth. We can put it in a basket and bury it in the bottom of the basket, hang the basket in a tree. But the little life will grow up to the praises of God.

39 God, may we not be so short-minded, so narrow, but just look around us and see God everywhere. And how much more can we see Him this morning in his lovely children, as we are fellowshipping together here in Christ Jesus, who is life. May every pilgrim, Lord... We are not of this world; we are pilgrims and strangers; we are sojourners. And as sojourners from Georgia, from Canada, from Texas, from everywhere around, has met together here in these little places to swap our ideas, and give our testimonies of his glory, may we go from this meeting just with abundance of eternal life that we might teach others the way to find it. We ask it in Jesus' name. Amen. Thank you.
[Someone says something to Brother Branham] Oh, that's okay.

40 And I've been thought of as an isolationist, but I'm not, see. I love fellowship. And here I'm holding the meeting down there, rush right on down. You all have eternal life, but just believe it. But here ... just a little place when I go to talking to people, you see... If anything is wrong, it starts bothering you; you catch it. And when you do that, then, you see, it just tears me to pieces for the evening again, see. And I'm sure Christians understand that.
It isn't I don't love you. My! If it wasn't for you, what would my ministry be? How about those out there? No matter how great the ministry would be, it can't be great until you make it great. I can't do it myself. It takes you and I together to do it, see. By myself, nothing; by yourself, nothing. But us together, the Lord produces his ministry. If you didn't believe it, it would never happen. You've got to believe it. Then that's what makes it happen, because you believe it. God bless you.