Come, follow Me

You can find this sermon at ChurchAges.net

1 ... well no, that was back before Becky was born. And so I thought, "Well, you know... I just eat a bowl of oatmeal---costs a dime." Well, I'd just ... they'd give me my ticket and just sign it, you see, and I paid for it ... give it back, and I'd turn it in, 'cause I had an expense account.
And one day when we had a patrolman's meeting, my, they said, "Who's this nut that turned in something like that? [See, the head guy, you know.] Ten cents for a breakfast!" So that looks real cheap on the other fellows, you know. Some of them turned in a dollar, see, two dollars for dinner. And I turned in just exactly what it was. Well, I said, "Well, now, there's no need of me turning in ... what would I do, if I just eat ten cents?"

2 Mr. Fields, which was the assistant superintendent, he said, "Billy, turn in a dollar anyhow. At least that's what the rest of them's doing." He said, "You got to keep that together."
"Well," I said, "I never eat but just a bowl of oatmeal and that's what I charge for."
Said, "Oh, don't never do that."
Well, then I thought, "What will I do with it?" Then I'd charge fifty cents for breakfast. Then take forty cents of it, if I wanted to spend anything, give it to some kids on the street---some kids you know, that looked like they need ... a sandwich too. Well, then, I thought maybe I might've... That was the company itself talking to me like that. That was a man out of the company. So I thought, "Maybe I did something wrong."

3 So here not long ago with a patrolman... Now they patrol by helicopters, you see. So he came by and stopped. He said, "Say, Brother Branham," he said, "this tree is growing."
I said, "Yep." I said, "Kids play under that out there."
He said, "Can we top it?"
I said, "Yeah, but don't cut it down, see."
He said, "Well, we'd like to cut it. We'll pay you for it."
I said, "No, no. Don't want you to cut it." Well, I know the laws of right-of-way too, you know, 'cause I was on it seven years. I said, "No, I don't want it cut, but you can top it." I said, "I keep it topped. But," I said, "you can top it if you want to." I said, "Brother Woods and I are fixing to top it. We top all these others along here." And I said, "But we'd like to keep that there on account of the kids. Joe and them little fellows play out under that tree."

4 I went away on a trip, and when we come back she was sawed down and moved out. Oh, what a suit that would have been on the company, you see, for cutting that tree, you see. And so I thought, "Now, now," I said, "Lord, I'm not going to even mention that," see. Whether ... if there is anything that I ... on that---sometimes turning in ... only eating a dime's worth and having to turn in fifty cents, you see. I said, "If there is something on that, let that make it up, see, that I put that in, you see. That I..." And I quit dreaming about it. Being in public service company then, see, 'cause it must have been something back in there. We have to watch what we do. We've got to meet it some day.

5 Kids, come over here. Your mother was over today---Trudy. I guess she didn't ... you didn't know this. It was kind of a surprise, I can see. And you're fixing to graduate. And we've had this trip out here together. I go into a meeting now. Immediately after this meeting we're going to go home. I thought it would be a good chance to talk to you all, and then also I thought it would be good to speak to the kids just a little bit before your graduation. Read a verse out of the Bible, and just talk to you from my heart for about ten minutes ... I'll step out of your way, see.

6 Before I talk to you kids, I'd just like to talk to the adults just a minute, or to all of you. It's... Now perhaps, maybe, a strenuous trip---it's been a... But the experience that I've learned from God, I wouldn't take ten thousand dollars for what I learned of the Lord since I've been here. I truly believe I've come in full obedience to the command of the Almighty, and I hope I can ever remain that way. There's a...

7 When I come, one thing, was by a vision---that I was standing above Tucson up here when a blast went off. Brother Fred was there when it went off. And they took a picture, you know, in the sky. And I didn't think much about it, never noticed it. So it began to impress me somehow the other day. And Brother Norman, Norma's father here, told me, said, "Did you notice this?"
And just as I looked, right there was them angels just as plain as they could be, sitting right there in that picture, you see. I looked to see when it was, and it was time ... same ... 'bout day or two before or, day or two after I was up there. I looked where it was at---northeast of Flagstaff, or Prescott, which is below Flagstaff. Well, that's just where we was at, see, just exactly.

8 Twenty-six miles high. Why, vapor can't go over four miles high, or five---moisture, any kind of fog or anything, you see. Planes fly at nineteen thousand. That's to get up above all the clouds, you see. And nineteen thousand is about four miles high. This is twenty-six miles high and thirty miles across it and in the shape of the pyramid, if you've looked at the picture.
And on the right-hand side, as I told you I noticed---outstanding---that angel, there he is. Chest out, wings back, coming right in, just exactly the way it was. I never noticed it when we first ... there's been so many things just...

9 Then coming down the road the other day there was something happen that's spoke to me about the thing that I must do. And it's a ... it's not my message. At one time Leo Mercier said, "Brother Branham, the time will come after this," said (about five or six years ago, maybe seven), said, "when the Lord's going to change your ministry, Brother Branham." And said, "When He does, you'll probably just light up hospitals, and speak them out of the beds and things."
It didn't sound right, although I believe Brother Leo was trying to be sincere about it.

10 But it didn't sound just right because, see, our Lord Jesus never did that, see. And He went into the hospitals. There was one in that hospital. Do you remember where it was at in the Bible? The pool of Bethesda. Great multitudes of impotent people laid there, crippled, lame, blind, withered---waiting for the angel.
Now, that was in a spiritual hospital where people waited on divine healing. And here the divine healer Himself came in and healed one and walked out. So you couldn't expect a mortal man, or a ministry to come forth to be any greater than that was, see. I couldn't agree with it.
But as I started to turn around, the Holy Spirit come upon me. I asked Leo for a pen. I got a piece of paper and I wrote it. And it's in his trailer today, if you're ever up where it's at. It's that old aluminum trailer where I had the loading outfit. Just as you go in the door there's a shelf on the right-hand side, right in front of the trailer. It's laying under there. I laid it up there. I said, "Someday you can pull this out." God will never change the ministry, but He'll change the man with the ministry. That's what's to be done.
See, I know what I've got to do, but I can't ... I can't do it in the condition that I am now, because I've got to... Something's got to happen within me that'll take God to do it.

11 We're aiming to go back home. Kids are homesick, all of them wanting to go back. So I'm figuring on taking them back, the Lord willing, maybe after service Saturday. And so ... go back. From there I don't know. But I know as soon as that something happens within me to make me feel towards people different from what I do now... I'd rejected the people, see, and I didn't want to have no more to do with them. You know what I mean---what I call Ricky and Ricketta. They'd ... the things that they'd did. I'd preached with all the sincerity, and God had confirmed it in every way. If they didn't want to believe it, why, let them alone then.
I was going up to join up with Bud this coming fall, start outfitting up there. Wait in the wilderness, let my hair and beards grow out. And if the Lord wanted me to go anywhere, He'd send me a word and I'd go down and do it.
And on the road coming in the other day He stopped me. And I seen where the ... what I was coming to. I'm on my road to something else now. And I thought when I got home I'd make what we call a heart-to-heart talk, maybe put it on tape. And then ... so that the public would see why the sudden change.

12 Now, you kids, let's just ... let's have a little word of prayer.
Lord Jesus, we are grateful for this time to know that we're assembled here, the young and old, and the middle-aged. And we have assembled this side of eternity once more to speak about You and about the things that pertains to everlasting life.
These young ones sitting in here tonight, some of them are graduating, some has already graduated. But I realize, Lord, something that happened just a few hours before that great shock, or great blast, had taken place in the mountain up there north of Tucson, when the angels of the Lord came down. I remember what was said and especially about the young people. I pray Thee, Lord, help us to understand. And may I be able to say something to these young folks tonight that'll help them along the journey. For, Lord, we all need that help at this time.

13 Bless us together. Forgive our sins. And if anything that we've done since we've been out here that's displeased You, we pray You forgive us for it. For we realize today that we have no guarantee of tomorrow. We don't know what tomorrow brings. We must be prepared today to meet tomorrow.
And Father God, there's only one way that we know to do this. That's to prepare to see You. For by and by we realize that we're all going to do it, and we've got to meet it some time, either in peace, as a friend or child; or as an enemy. Far be it, Lord, that we'd be anything else but your own beloved children. Grant these things we ask in Jesus' name. Amen.

14 Today, while I was chopping weeds real early this morning, I found a place in the Bible I thought would be a good thing to read at this time. And it's a ... may not be too dashing appropriate, but I thought just for a ... just a few minutes to talk. I want to read this out of the 18th chapter of St. Luke. All four gospel writers write of it. The 18th chapter, the 18th verse:
And a certain ruler asked him, saying, Good Master, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?
And Jesus said unto him, Why callest thou me good? none is good, save one, that is, God.
Thou knowest the commandments, Do not commit adultery, Do not kill, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Honour thy father and ... mother.
And he said, All these have I done and kept them from my youth up.
Now when Jesus heard these things, he said unto him, Yet lackest thou one thing: sell all that thou hast, and distribute unto the poor, and thou shall have treasure in heaven: ... come, follow me.
I think the word "come, follow me," that would be the best advice I could give if I was talking to ten thousand kids, or if I was talking to just what I am. It's a command, and the greatest thing that I think was ever offered anybody, and especially a young person: "Follow Me."

15 You're going to follow somebody. Now, you just ... you can remember that---you're going to follow somebody. And the way you follow the person, be sure that ... who this person's following, see. We ... Paul one time said, "Be followers of me as I am of Christ." In other words, "Just as I follow Christ, you follow me."
And now, at this turning point, this stage of life where we all come... And many times you've heard me holler "Ricky," or "Ricketta," and things. It's the age. It's the age that we're living in; it really isn't those people.

16 Those people are people like we are. Those kids out here with these hot rods running up and down the street and carrying on the way they are, and smoking cigarettes and drinking liquor, and girls dressed immorally and things---them's girls and boys like we are, see. They're human. They love, they eat, they drink, they sleep, they breathe, they got to die. They're people just like we are.
And yet they have been ... they've been possessed of an evil spirit. They don't know it. Not because of the people, but because, sometimes, some leader that they've been following have led them in the wrong road.

17 Now, you girls and boys know better than that. You know you've been taught better than that. You've got better parents, sounder training than to do a thing like that. You know better. But they don't, see. Because the churches that they go to are modern churches, modernistic. And they just live for the day---more popular, and, oh my, what's... The morals become virtue to them, see. So they ... what... As was said one time in a play that I seen down here not long ago of Sodom and Gomorrah, that this evil-possessed woman said to Lot, "What you call immoral I call virtue."
Jesus said, "As it was in the days of Noah, so will it be at the coming of the Son of man." So we're back to that place again.

18 Let's look at this fellow for a few minutes that we read about. No doubt that this kid was born in a good home, like you kids are. He was brought up with good parents 'cause it proved it. When Jesus presented to him the commandments of God he said, "I've kept these since a youth." It showed that he had been brought up right. He wasn't just a snatch-out, and ... you know. He'd been brought up to know what's right---kids like you all are. Probably come up under a God-fearing mother and daddy to teach him right when he was a kid. Well, that's good.

19 Maybe as a little baby his mother had high ambitions of him being a great man some day. His father was worth money that could school him and give him an education that he could ... he'd come out with a good education and be able to be something in the world.
And with the sincerity of this mother and dad educating this kid, and perhaps come to his graduation time like you are, see, the time when he passed through school and had his education, no doubt that he perhaps was the pride and joy of that mother and daddy's life. No doubt in them days he had fine horses, like you have automobiles; and the good dad and mother, like you all've got, that sees to it you've got good clothes, and a car, and can just enjoy life---just something like you have today.

20 And the father and mother with the ... praying constantly that their son would not turn out just an ordinary man, that he'd be an extraordinary man. All parents want that. Did you hear Jesus refer to that commandment: "Honour thy father and mother,"---then stopped, see.
And that's the ambition of any parent: to do the best for their children that they can. Educate them, give them things maybe that they wasn't able to get. That's the way I feel about my children.
I think, sometimes, in going to school... Now I think ... send Becky and Sarah and Joseph into these high schools and things where all this go on's at. I think I'd take them and get back into the mountain and raise them up there, that they'd ... like the Indians live.

21 But here's what it is---what's in the kid's going to come out. No matter where it is, it's got ... it's going to come out. If it's evil in there, it'll come out in the Indian camp. If it's good in there, it'll come out in any camp, see. It's what's in the kid, the make-up of the kid, what's on the inside of you. And what you are now is what you'll probably be the rest of your life. You're on a changing spot.
Do you know what? Eighty-six percent of the conversions to Jesus Christ is done before twenty-one years old. It shows it---statistics shows it. Eighty-six percent that come to Christ come before they're twenty-one. After you pass that age you become more molded, or set in your ways. Oh, it's possible, sure. They come seventy, eighty, years old. But it's very rare.
You make yourself when you're young. You set your ambitions to what you want to do, and what you're trying to achieve in life. You think of it. And as you think, of course, your mind ... it's presented into your mind by an unknown something that dominates your mind. And then when it becomes in your mind, then you speak it that you're going to do it. And then your ambitions drive you to it.

22 So, mother and father expected this young man to ... his ambitions to be great, enough money to carry it out, and then no doubt prayed that this young lad would get that opportunity. You see, they had done all they could do. He'd maybe had fine horses. And maybe he was very popular amongst the women. And what would go for men would be for women, vice-versa, see. 'Cause we're talking about human life---souls---both men and women.
And then, after all this opportunity the boy had, see, he become on "Easy Street," we call it---on a place where he didn't have to worry about too much. His parents had money. He had ... he was very ... he'd become a ruler. The Bible refers to it here as the young ... rich, young ruler. And we see the ... at a young age, maybe in his teenage just out of school, just out of graduation, maybe, a few weeks before, or something---he become a ... he's a ruler. And he had all that hearts could desire.

23 And the boy wasn't no modern Ricky. He was a fine kid. I believe when Luke wrote about it, or Mark I believe it was, Jesus looked at him and sighed, because He loved him, see. There was something about the kid. There was a nice personality hooked with this kid. Where did he come from? Out of a nice family who had taught him the commandments of God and seen that he kept them. And he did it from his youth up. And the boy had an ambition: he wanted eternal life. He said, "Good Master, what could I do to inherit eternal life?"

24 See, of all you got in the world, yet the soul on the inside of you tells you there's something that you need that you haven't got. Just by wealth... Or it doesn't always have to be wealth. It could be popular---some pretty girl, she's got her beauty that she can think of. Maybe she's very popular in school.
Maybe the boy can get any girl he wants. He feels that he's kind of secured. That's not security. That'll fade just like the flower in the field, see. It'll go. Won't be long, just a few turns of the sun and that's gone. Then you've got a soul that has to live eternally.

25 And this young kid must have had a nice personality because he presented himself to the Lord Jesus kneeling. He bowed upon his knee. He said, "Good Master, what could I do to have eternal life?"
He said, "Why do you call me good," said, "when you know there's only one good, and that's God?" See, what did the young man express in this? That He was God, see. He said, "Thou knowest the commandments. Keep them."
Said ... so he said, "What commandments, Master?"
He said, "The commandments of 'honour thy father and mother,' and so forth."
He said, "This I've done from youth up," see. "I've did this."
He said, "Yet you're lacking one thing. Go sell what you have and distribute it to the poor, and follow me."
What an opportunity! That could have been Peter, James, or John, one of them. See, the kid had been trained and brought up right, and been presented to Christ to use him. And all the potential that he had in him to use---probably educated, young, rich, influence---where he could have presented the gospel; and yet turned it down. What a rashal thing that was for that young boy, see.

26 "Follow me." Now see, he had to follow someone. Now he had to either follow the influence of the people he was associated with---the influence of some young lady, some influence of a gang of boys that he was associated with, his colleagues in school---or follow Jesus Christ. Now all of this goodness, yet he knew he didn't have eternal life.
Kids, that's what you got to think about, see. Now look at the boy tonight---what he could have been, and what he is, what he is tonight. He's somewhere. He was a man. He's somewhere. He's waiting the judgment. He's waiting to face the judgment at that day. Turning down the same opportunity that's presented to you kids, almost under the same circumstance: fine kids, good personality, fine fathers and mothers, what you have; don't even have to work 'less you want to, see.

27 But there's something else that goes with that. There's something goes with that. That Word tonight never dies. It's still a challenge to every young man and every young woman. "Follow me." See, words don't die. Whenever you speak anything, just remember---whether it's in your car in the secret, whether it's in the pulpit, whether it's down on the street corner with your boy friend or girl friend---wherever it is, it never dies. It's got to live forever.

28 When I seen that girl that I ... the other night in the vision. Young pretty girl, Hollywood actress, and I seen her dying, reaching, trying to get to help. And she died in a heart attack. Miss Monroe. And then ... that's been two years ago, and I seen her dying. Then two days later she did die.
And then the other night I heard that girl's voice. How? The kids had been telling me, "Daddy, you go down that 'River of No Return' all the time." Said, "They got a play like that on tonight." They told me a certain night it would be on, a week or two ahead of time. I thought, "Well, I want to see that, 'cause I've been down that river two or three times---about five times I think."
Well, I went to see it, and Miss Marilyn Monroe acted that out. Well, that was the girl I saw in the vision. And there she was in picture---and the actions, the very act that she made on "The River of No Return," when she took that picture, perhaps fifteen years ago (it was an old picture, maybe twenty years ago). And she's been dead two years; and there she is again alive. Every action and every word, see, it's still so caught in magnetic tape until it's alive again.

29 Not only that, but everything that we say is alive. Every word that we speak cannot die. Coming through the room is words now, forms of people. Television picks it up. You can speak right here, and ring it around the world that same second. Even before you can hear it in this room it goes around the world, by electronic. And God's great screen picks that up. And every move and every act that you make, you've got to meet it at the judgment, see. So, young fellow, it's a good thing to stop, think about these things, see, 'cause you're going to meet it again, see.

30 Let's trace this young man, the opportunity he had. And put yourself in his place; and the girl, just the same as it is---Becky, Marilyn. Just like ... just the same as you was standing in his place, and you could hear that voice which is still alive. It's still alive. It's still moving. Science says in twenty years from now they'll pick up his literal voice that he spoke two thousand years ago. It's still alive. Like a pebble dropping in the ocean: the wave never ceases; it goes to the shore, thousands of miles, and turns back.

31 When a voice is once spoke into the air like that, it never dies. There ain't nothing you can say at the judgment---it's right there. There'll be the voice of Jesus Christ bidding that young man, "Follow me"; and him turning away (on the screen), sorrowful, because he had great possessions, see. It might not be even ... always have to be money. It can be other things, see. Anything that we hold dearer than we do that call, see, it becomes like a money to us. It becomes something that corrupts us.

32 Now, let's follow him a little bit. What happens when he turns away? He didn't listen to that voice of Christ; he went with his friends. Which, you kids, you're all fine kids and you're bound to have friends. But watch what kind of friend you have. If that friend's following Christ, go with that friend. Follow Christ too. But if it don't, don't do it.
Let's look at him. We find out, he perhaps kept his friends. He become a great ruler. He was a ruler then. Later we find him so prosperous until he had to build extra barns to put his stuff in. And then he said to hisself, after he got old, and the cares of young life and things has passed... All he done maybe, was entertain.

33 When... An old man and an old woman---like me, my wife, your mothers and dad---there isn't hardly anything that they can think of. They can't ... don't want to get out and run up and down the streets, you know, as young fellows would, and young women. Dates, and who's going to be your wife, or your husband, or ... see, they don't have that in their mind. They got children, they're interested... That's going to be you all tomorrow, if there is a tomorrow.
And see, the fellow then with ... maybe he never even got married. And ... however, he was a great ruler. And he set up on... As it is in Jerusalem yet today, they eat on the housetop this time of day when it gets cool, out in the evening. And we find another character pictured with him---a beggar.

34 And the man, from being raised to honor the neighbor, and do unto others as have others to do unto you... See, by rejecting that call of Christ, finally... It looked like a boy been raised in a home like that, that would never've got away from him, but it did. It did. And there laid a man at the gate by the name of Lazarus, begging him for food---in vain. He would have eat the crumbs that he swept off---not even to the beggar, but to the dogs---and was full of sores. But the man had been so polished in society then he had no more feelings. He'd become numb, because he had rejected that offer of Christ.
Then maybe one evening, this time making his toast with fine wines, and lovely women, jeweled, around him, and things like that, with all his hearts could desire, and toasting, the beggar laying at the gate... And before daylight dawned the next morning, he was in hell screaming for that Lazarus to come put water on his tongue---the change of the scene.

35 And you notice, when he said, "Father Abraham..." Now he still remembered that Abraham was the father of the Jews. He said, "Father Abraham, send that beggar Lazarus down here with a little water on his fingers to put on my lips. These flames are tormenting me."
He said... And Abraham said, "It's ... I can't do that," in so many words. "And besides all this, you see, you had your opportunity in life."
When did he have it? When Jesus said, "Follow me." But he turned it down. He went the way that he could make money. And that's all right---nothing wrong with making money. But follow Jesus while you're doing it, see. He'd went the other way with the crowd. And you find out, he said, and Abraham said, "And besides all this, there's a gulf fixed between you and he, that no man has ever crossed over and never will. Them that are there cannot come here, and these here cannot go there. It's been fixed. No man has crossed or will cross."

36 Notice, then, he wants to be an evangelist then. The call that Jesus had given him to follow Him had (and to be a soul winner as a young man) returned to him again. He remembered it, that he had five brothers, and ... back on earth, and he didn't want them in that place. He said, "Send Lazarus then back to tell my brothers not to come this a-way."---in other words, accept the call, "Follow me."
But He said, "They won't do it."
He said, "Yes, if one would raise from the dead, like Lazarus, and go back and tell them."
You see, it shows that after we die, you're still conscious. He remembered. Abraham said, "Son, remember in your days..." See? You still remember. You don't lose your memory. You remember. And the memories that man could have, and still in the same place, remembering---the opportunity he had of hearing Jesus say, "Follow me." But he followed the wrong person, the wrong crowd. He got in the wrong crowd and went to the wrong place. He ended up in the wrong eternity---be annihilated at that day from God forever.

37 Jesus also said a great striking word, "Though one raise from the dead, and go back, yet they would not be persuaded. 'Cause they got Moses and the law, and if they won't hear that, then they won't hear though one would be raised from the dead. They will not be persuaded."
Why? Why? Do the laws speak something like that? Yes. "Do unto others as you'd have them do unto you." And he had lived under the law; but he let the beggar die at the gate, see. He had lived under the commandments of God, and yet failed to see that great eternal life.

38 Kids, you each one seem like mine. You each one seem like just my sons and daughters, and in one way you are, see. Spiritually speaking, that's right. The Lord God has put your souls into my care because you come listen to me. You believe me, see. And in one sense of the word you are my sons and daughters. That's right. And always remember, keeping the commandments of God is a great thing. Being raised in a good home is a heritage from God. And to be fine kids with personalities as you have, good. Wonderful to have an education. It's wonderful to even live in this free land. We've got many things to be thankful for. But there's one thing that you just don't inherit; you've got to accept it. That's eternal life. And you'll only do that by following Jesus, by a born-again experience. Don't neglect that.

39 Little story one time I heard of a man who was ... oh, he was poor and he always wanted to... (It's a little fairy story, like. It always stuck with me though.) And one day he picked a flower. And the flower was magic, and the flower answered to him, and said, "You've been poor all your life." He said, "Now ask what you will and it will be given to you."
He said, "That yonder's mountain would open up, and I could go therein and find the gold in the mountain."
"Well," he said, "you'll have to take me with you wherever you go," see. "You'll have to take me with you, so wherever I am, then you can ask what you will."

40 He walked to the mountain, and the mountain opened up, and he went in. And the shelves was full of gold and diamonds, as the little fairy story goes. He laid the flower down on a table, or a rock. And he run and grabbed a great big gem. And he said, "I must go show this to my friends. And now I'm a rich man. I have everything now. I must show this."
And so the flower spoke and said, "You have forgot the main thing."
So he runs back and picks up ... said, "Well, maybe I'll get a piece of gold. I'll get a piece of silver." And so he said, "I'll hurry out to tell the people how rich I am, what all I've got."
And he got to the door and the flower said, "But you forgot the main thing."
So he runs back again. He said, "In here we find all kinds of materials." So he picked up a stone. He said, "I'll go take this stone and show the people what kind of a stone this mountain's made out of so I can find my way back to it," see.
And he started out the door and the flower said, for the ... its final time, "You have forgot the main thing!"
"Oh," he said, "oh, shut up."
See, he didn't want to hear it any more, "Forgot the main thing." And he ran out the door. And when he did, the door closed behind him with the flower on the inside. The main thing was the flower, see. The main thing was the flower.

41 Years ago---as a kid, as you all are---here ... cattle ranch above here, above Phoenix, I was reading a piece of prospect ... a paper about a prospector. Then there was no roads through here then---just little sand paths. They still do a lot of prospecting in here, you know.
But this prospector had come in, and he'd found a lot of money. And he struck a lot of gold. And on his road in he stayed in a cabin he'd found. And he had a dog with him, and the dog tied up on the outside. And that night there'd been an outlaw following him to get this gold. He'd picked it up in old Spanish mines, and he was coming in with it. And the dog started barking. And the man didn't want to be bothered with that dog. He said, "Shut up." He said, "Tomorrow I'll take this in to the city. [And the morals of the story was this.] And I'll have it weighed up. And I'll be a rich man. And I'll buy great cars. And I'll have all kinds of women and big parties. And I'll be a rich man, because I've already struck the claim. I've got the gold here, much of it." And said, "I'll..."
And while he was trying to go to sleep the dog kept barking, because the dog seen the outlaw coming up, slipping up, waiting for the prospector to go to sleep. And he raised up again and screamed at the dog again, said, "Shut up." And the poor dog whined and tried to warn his master that danger was lurking.
And when he ... the next time when the dog started barking... The prospector had a shotgun. He didn't want to be bothered, so he just raised up and shot the dog. And the prospector was killed that night by the outlaw. All of his fancy dreams done him no good. Why? He stilled the voice that was warning him.

42 There's nobody can try to do anything... You kids would never be able to do anything wrong, after being raised the way you are, unless you feel something tell you not to do it. Now, don't never still that voice that's warning you. And always remember, accept that voice that said, "Follow me." And you'll always come out right. I believe you will. I've got confidence in you. But just always remember, that Jesus...
That voice is alive in the earth tonight---just the same as every voice and every word we spoke is still alive. When that voice goes out on that ether wave of the air... See, you've got a transmitter here that sends it out. You are the transmitter that sends it out. Now it takes the station to pick it up. And Jesus was the transmitter of God's Word, for He was the triunity of God manifested in one man. He was complete God and complete man.

43 And the trinity of God ... the trinity of the attributes of God as being Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, was represented in that one man, Jesus Christ. So there He was the Word. And He was the transmitter that said, "He that heareth my words, and believeth on him that sent me, has eternal life," see. "Verily I say unto you, he that heareth my words, and believeth on him that sent me, hath eternal life."
Now that word's went out from a transmitter. He said one day, "Verily I say unto you, if you say to this mountain, be moved and don't doubt in your heart, but believe that what you have said will come to pass; you can have what you said."
Now, if you can just be the station to pick that up, by the ... some control inside of you by faith, it'll move you right into the cycle of God to the new birth and be born again. Then you'll always be in contact to hear that voice that'll always warn you when danger's along. When things are wrong, going wrong, it'll always be a warning to you. And then, instead of some day being like that rich young boy that we're speaking of, be a man like apostle Peter, Paul, or somebody that won souls for Jesus Christ. You do that, kids. Can we pray?

44 Lord Jesus, youth, men and women for tomorrow, if there is a tomorrow, we must train them, Lord. We feel that burden to train them like there will be a tomorrow. If there is not, then today is the day.
And then Father, we know that no one is accepted in your sight. No flesh can glory, no education (although as good as these things may be), no good works, no religious institution, no psychology, no nothing can confirm God but the Holy Spirit. He's the instrument, God Himself, in the form of eternal life that can come to us as an individual. And we're thankful for this. Truly it's expressed when Peter made the confession and Jesus said to him, "Flesh and blood has not revealed this to you." You never learned it in a seminary. You never learned it in some school. It's a personal thing, something that each individual has to receive.
He said, "Upon this rock I'll build my church; and the gates of hell will not be able to overcome it." We're thankful for that, Lord.

45 That voice is still alive tonight. And there's still posts, outposts, listening posts, receiving stations of faith that can accept it. We pray that each one of these children will receive that, Lord, in their hearts. And remember that not what they do to be good, but they ... God does not judge us by what we do, but by what we have accepted. We are saved by our faith, and not in our works.
So we pray, heavenly Father, that they'll catch the vision now, and see and hear that great eternal invitation of "Come, follow me." May each one of them, Lord, turn aside from all the things of the world, this mortal, fringy, life. As they're here tonight and their golden blond hair, and some of them with their black hair, and dark eyes, and blue eyes, and sitting here, very best that they'll ever be... And as the great writer said, "Remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth, while the evil days come not nigh. Then thou shall have no pleasure in them."
How Lord Jesus, You said to Peter, "When you were young you got up and went where you wanted to. But when you get old, someone packs you where you would not go." Let them remember: Now is the day, this is the time. Grant it, Father.
I claim every one of them, from my own child here tonight, to every child in here that I feel that You've put in my hands, to watch them. I claim them all from Satan and from death, to life in Jesus Christ. Amen.

46 Bless you, kiddies. Really nice to say a few words to you, and I'll get back along here. Fine kids, appreciate you. Brother Fred, the Lord bless you. God bless you, sister.