Paradox

You can find this sermon at ChurchAges.net

1 The Lord bless you. It's certainly deemed to me a grand privilege to be here this morning. That was ... it's a unexpected blessing because I didn't think I'd have this privilege to get to speak here, especially to just you---what we'd think ... we'd call a selected group---the ministers, and my brethren here, who are cooperating in this meeting and making it possible. I've wanted this opportunity. This way I get a chance sometimes to explain things, that I don't do at the platform 'cause you're in a mixed audience there.

2 And I met an attorney here this morning, one of the brethren, the Christian Businessmen. And last night I was speaking on Zacchaeus once there, you know, when he ... Jesus was in the... He hardly believed (as the little drama was) that He wasn't a prophet. But when Jesus stopped under the tree and looked up, He called him by name, and he come down. I never did tell just what happened to Zacchaeus. You know what happened to that fellow? He become a member of the Full Gospel Businessmen's... Charter member, that's right. Of course, Jesus wouldn't have nothing else but a full gospel, you know. He being a business man, that was what ... so you could remember that.
And so, I was speaking the other day on---up at the last meeting ---on having a court trial, and Jesus brought, or God brought in, about His Word for a breach of promise. Many of you has heard it. And so I was thinking about maybe giving that Sunday afternoon, this court trial. And then this attorney here---he might be able to correct me on some of the procedure that I go about.

3 So I, but sitting here this morning, it's certainly a privilege. I was looking around to different friends and a little boy here, a little friend, here, just called me over there. And he's crippled.
He said, "Brother Branham, if you'll just tell me that I can walk out of here, that's all I want you to do," see.
And I just thought how lovely, see. But see, these things are a little different than what we, you think they are, see. See, now that's where I think many of the brethren gets off the track. See, God will let them do something with a little faith. Then they figure that everything they bounce into they just say it, and that's all. But you see, how can I say, "Thus saith the Lord," until He tells me first? I've got to have it first. If He didn't, I'd say, "Thus saith William Branham," and that wouldn't do any good. But, see, He's got to tell me first.

4 A man drove up in an ambulance with a baby, and I was real busy. And he said, "Well, I... If you'll just tell me, and come here, and say my baby will be all right, that's all I want to know."
Well that, how lovely. But how can I say that, until I know it, see? If I, some go... People just go on impression---"The Lord told me to do this." Well, that's yourself many times, see. You've got to actually see it, and know it. How could I ... Brother Fox here say something, unless (if he's honest)... He said, "Brother Branham said so-and-so," and if I didn't say that, he's falsely accusing me of saying something I didn't say. But if I really said it, then I've got to stand behind it. So when the Lord says anything, that does it.

5 I met a little Baptist here, a while ago. Maybe he isn't Baptist. I think he's a Pentecostal Baptist, like me. And he's another good old Southerner. I watched him eating this Georgia ice cream this morning here, this grits. And so, he was one of those persistent type, you know. And he smoked cigarettes, and a very good Baptist. And he had a lot of things that he was going on. And he kept on...
Now out here in the meeting, it's those ... you people---the people---they're doing that themselves, see. And it's Christ coming to His body.

6 Now let me get that, right now, just stop with you just a moment. See, Christ coming to His body---that don't mean it's just me. I'm not the body. I'm just a member of that body, see. You're part of that body too. "By one Spirit (I Corinthians 6:15, I Corinthians 12), by one Spirit we are all baptized into one body." We are members of that body, every one of us; whether you are Methodist, Baptist, Lutheran, Oneness, twoness, fiveness, or whatever you got, see. By that one Spirit we are all in one body.
If God accepts the oneness in with his peculiar idea, the Church of God in with his peculiar idea, the Methodist in with his peculiar idea, the Assemblies in with his peculiar idea, that's up to Him. I got nine brothers, and every one of them different from another; but we all got the same parents. See, we're every one Branhams. Now my brothers, I'm the hunter---I like to hunt and fish. The rest of them don't care for it. They like to play golf, and things like that. But not me. See, that's my peculiarity. But yet their father is my father, see. But we all agree when it comes to daddy---that's all our daddy.

7 And that's the way we do, too.
Now look. The church has become, see, just growing up. Just like I was going to speak tonight, upon the "Unveiling of the One True God." But I think it'll take a little too long, and I notice that people, after about nine o'clock they get restless, and I thought I'd just wait till sometime at the tabernacle. I got something else on my mind maybe for tonight, to bring a message of salvation. That's what we're trying, that's our ... what we're trying to do here.
Now you minister brothers, we ... this divine healing, as old Doctor Bosworth---he just went home to glory down here, recently ---he used to say, "Divine healing is a bait that you put on a hook. You never show the fish the hook. You show him the bait; and he gets the bait and gets the hook." So that's the way it is when you... Divine healing just draws the attention, see. And then salvation is what we're after. We're after the strength of the body of Christ, you see.
And every one of your different organizations... I'm not too much on the organizations, just saying, "I belong to this..." I was ordained a Baptist.
And then when I heard about Pentecostals, I thought, "My, what's this?" And I thought, "That's what I'm going to join up with." And I come over here---they're as broke up as the Baptists is, and just all different types of things, and there's...
And I thought, "Well now, I'm not going to join any of them. I'm going to stand right between them, and put my arms around all of them, and say "We're brothers." And see, the system that keeps us from being that, that's what I'm against, the system that ... see. And that's the reason I'm with one group, and that's the Full Gospel Businessmen, see. We want to stretch our tent so far that it'll take everything, all of them, see, everybody. We're all brothers. See, we're every one brothers in Christ.
Now, one of my great sponsors is Assemblies, and United, and the Four Square, and the Church of God. And all those brethren---they panned out to be real men.

8 Now what is it? Christ coming to His body. Christ is the Word. We all know the anointing is Christ, that comes on the Word that makes the Word live. Is that right? That is the anointing. Christ is the anointing, the Spirit that comes upon the Word, that quickens the Word to make it live. Now the Word is in your heart. You believe in divine healing, whatevermore, see.
And Christ, the anointing, coming to His body (see the connection there), just like husband and wife to become one. Now the church has got to get to the ministry until the church and Christ become one. He can anoint you for every blessing that's in the Bible. All of it is yours. Everything that's promised of this age is yours. But if we leave anything out, see, then... If anointing strikes that, it'll, it will anoint it. It's just...
Here ...

9 like I use this for an illustration. There's a doctrine called pyramid doctrine. But don't never get that in your idea, that I---that I believe in pyramid doctrines. I believe in the Bible, see, and although I believe the pyramid part played something in it.
I believe God wrote three Bibles. He wrote one in the skies, which is the zodiac. Anybody knows that---Job spoke of it. What? Look at the zodiac. It starts off with the virgin, it ends up with Leo the lion. That's how He come. First was the virgin. His next coming will be Leo the lion, see, coming as the Lion of the tribe of Judah. And all of them---that crossed fishes, and what we're in now, the cancer age, and everything---it all speaks. But forget it, see. That ain't your Bible.
Then the pyramids, exactly how they were drawed---the headstone was rejected. Still, that's not your Bible.
Then God wrote it on words.

10 Jesus comes three times. One time He come to redeem His wife. Next time He comes to catch her away. And the next time He comes with her---three comings, see. Everything alike: Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, see; all, everything, in a three. The mathematics of the Bible is perfect. If you keep those mathematics right, you can keep your story right, see. But if you get off the mathematics, you'll have in your picture a cow picking grass on top of a tree. So it won't look right, see. Stay in the mathematics, see, of the Bible, and you place it out right.

11 Now, I was telling about this here young, fine-looking fellow sitting here. He kept coming. Every time they'd put his name on for a private interview. Well, when he would do that, then he'd wait a long time, till finally his time come up. Here he come.
Now, in private interview it isn't like this, see, it isn't sitting in a meeting like we do here. You wait until the Lord speaks and shows you what to do. Well, it never... He never did ... his time would run out. Well, he wouldn't be discouraged, he just put his name down for another one. So he finally worked down to be a few hundred, till they got to him again.
Then one day, sitting at the place... He would try---he would take all the psychological ideas that he could, to lay them cigarettes down, and he couldn't do it. But one day it come, thus saith the Lord. That was it. That was the last of it. And so, here he sits this morning. So we're thankful for that.

12 Now, let me just give a little explanation a minute, if it's all right to take just this much time. I think I'm watching the clock there. At ten o'clock we're supposed to be out, I understood, I heard through the grapevine just a few minutes ago. And I'm just like a freight train, I'm long-winded. And I remember the first time when I started to preach. And I was a little Baptist preacher. I carried that Bible under my arm, and I thought I was just a real preacher. Somebody'd say, "Are you a preacher?"
I'd say, "Sure. Yes, sir, really am."

13 And it reminds me when I was a boy out on the farm. My father was a rider. And he'd break horses and follow the rodeo to break the horses, and so forth. He was really a good rider. Well, I thought being his son, surely I was a rider, too. So I...
Daddy would be away out at the back of the farm with his horses, you know, and I'd take out the old plow horse, you know---old, and stoved-up, and stiff and tired. And we had an old water trough hewed out of a log. How many ever seen one of that? Well, what part of Kentucky are you from, anyhow? So, and we used to go down there, and get stung with the honey bees. You know, they come to get their water. So I looked to see Daddy making his rounds in the corn field, way back at the back. I'd go in and get his saddle, and a handful of cockleburs, you know, and slip it up under the saddle, and pull up the cinch, and climb up in it. And that poor old horse...
My little brothers sitting all around, they all hollered, "Ride him, Billy. Ride him!" You know. And the poor horse so tired, he couldn't even get his feet off the ground, and so... I thought, "Man, am I a rider!" I had read too many western stories. That was... So I thought, maybe, you know ... well...
You know, I got...

14 One day I decided that they needed me out in the West to break their horses, you know (about eighteen years old). They had to have me, and my services was needed. So I slipped out, went out West, and I tried to buy me a pair of chaps. I was a little bitty fellow, you know, and I thought that was pretty. It had A-R-I-Z-O-N-A and a steer's head on it. And I thought, "Oh, my, that's beautiful!" When I put them on I looked like one of these little game chickens, you know, with them feathers on. I couldn't walk with the things. So I just got me a pair of Levis.
And I thought, "Well, I'll ride the silver saddle. I'll go out and get me some..." And I sat out there. "And wait till they bring them bucking horses out. There's some of them guys get throwed. I'll show them how to ride them. My daddy is a rider."

15 So I climbed up on the fence, and they had ... was breaking some horses. And I looked over there in the pen, and I seen them outlaws in there that... My, that ... you couldn't even throw fodder in to them; they was so wild they wouldn't eat it.
So I thought, "Say. I don't know. That don't look like that old plow horse I rode." I looked at him for awhile. After awhile, they had one there they called the Kansas Outlaw. So they brought him out---a great big heavy horse, about seventeen hands and it ... he was really a horse.
So they put a ... had a fine man there with all of his great uniform on, and everything, the girls all waving at him. He was quite a star. I looked at him as he come out of his automobile. And they said, "This man can ride this horse." So they put him in the chute, and he got up on there, and got him saddled up, and he got set in his saddle, and they opened the gate.
My, oh, my! About two twists and a sunfish, and he looked like he could throw the saddle over the moon. I never seen such a... Well, the pickups got the horse and the ambulance got the rider.
Here come the caller around, you know. He said, "I'll give any man here five hundred dollars, that can stay on him sixty seconds." He come right down the line. I don't know how it ever was, he picked me right out, sitting there with this ... sitting there by all these old disappearing cowboys, you know. My legs wasn't bowed enough, and I thought I was a real rider. I was sitting there with them. I was fellowshipping with them, you know, with a hat sitting on the back of my head (about seventeen years old, I guess), looking around like that.
And he come said, "Are you a rider?"
And I said, "No, sir."

16 When I was a little Baptist preacher, I used to think God called me to be the defender of the Word, see. I was to defend the faith. One day I was over in St. Louis, Missouri, and I went into a tent meeting, and I run into a Robert Daugherty. He's a Pentecostal preacher. And I stood upon the platform with him. Man, that man preached till he'd get blue in the face, and buckle his knees together, and catch his breath (you could hear him for two city blocks), and come back up preaching. And then somebody'd say, "Are you a preacher?"
And I'd say, "No. sir." I get amongst the Pentecostal people, I don't say much about being a preacher. I was with that like it was with the horse, see. I'd just say, "No, the Lord called me to pray for His sick children."
So we're happy to be here this morning in this...

17 While we're on the thought of riding, I love outdoors. That's where I found God. And I used to herd quite a bit in Colorado---go up there. Now I usually ride the roundups, and so forth, we have up on Troublesome River. Now many a time I stood there by the side of the gate, when we was having the roundup---spring roundup---send the cattle up. The Hereford Association grazes the valley. Raise two ton of hay, and you have the right, on your ranch, to put a cow on the forest. And some of them has hundreds of head 'cause they got where they can irrigate. Down there---they have that wild meadow.
And then they ... every spring, when they run them cattle up on the forest up there, they... The ranger stands there and counts those cattle, and watches the brands. They're each one branded. The little group that I worked for didn't have too many---about 150, 200 head---a little tripod brand. And Grimes, the Bar---the Diamond Bar---had about 1500 head.

18 But there's one thing I always noticed. When standing there, after we got the cattle up there, and the ranger stood in the drift fence (that's to keep the cattle from getting on private property again), I used to sit there and put my leg around the horn of the saddle and watch that ranger. And he'd watch them cattle coming through, standing there. Every cow went through you had to inspect. You notice, he didn't pay much attention to the brand that was on them. But there's one thing he really watched---that was for the blood tag, see, because you can't put nothing in there on account of the breed---keeping the line of breed right, see. Nothing but a genuine Hereford could enter that park, nothing but a Hereford. Had to have a blood tag, to show that it was examined. And it had the blood tag to show it was a Hereford. I think that's the way the great roundup will be. He won't ask us whether we were Assemblies, or whether we were Foursquare. He's going to look for that blood tag. No matter about our brand, He'll watch for the blood tag. "...I see the blood."
I'm so glad to be associated with such people as that this morning. The Lord bless you real richly, now. I sit and talk to you, my time will get away.

19 I want to read a Word of the Lord, because no service is complete without the reading of the Word. And now, let's turn over in the Scriptures here with just a few thoughts I had lined out. Used to be I could think of the things that I was going to say without even writing a note. But since I've passed twenty-five, the second time, I can't think of it like I used to. So I have to kind of make a note, write down my text what I'm going to say, and think of it. And then I think, too, a little more... I was a kid then. I just splattered, like shooting a shotgun, see. But now you got to zero it.
People come to hear me because I was just a boy preacher. This is thirty-three years behind the pulpit for me. But now I meet great men, like I'm sitting before this morning. You've got to hit the target. It's got to be the Word.

20 Remember the old Baptist preacher that ordained me. I remember my first time up to preach. I just cried and beat on the desk, and everything like that. And some of the elderly women come by and patted me on the back and said, "Oh, honey," and crying, "you're going to be a great servant to Christ."
Old Dr. Davis, sitting there looking me right in the eye, I said, "How did I do, Dr. Davis?"
Said, "The worst I ever heard in my life." He upbraided me. So he was an attorney. So he said to me afterwards, "Come over to the study, Billy," He said, "Billy, all your emotion, and all that you went through," said, "you was just trying to act like a preacher." He said, "I got the same thing when I become an attorney." He said, "I ... my first case was a divorce case." And said, "Really didn't have no grounds at all." But said, "I said, 'Oh, this poor woman!' I cried, and I run with my eyes. And said, 'I ... this poor little woman, her husband did so-and-so, and things.'"

21 And said, "I got the same thing I give you, and I thought it'd be a good thing.
Said, "The first thing you know, the ... so the other attorney struck the desk and said, 'Judge, your Honor, sir, how much more of this nonsense will your court stand?' Said, 'He hasn't said one thing to defend the person---not one part of the law. He's just crying and jumping up and down.' "
He said, "You know what? That deflated me, and put me back where I came..." Said, "Now Billy, you done all the emotions---crying and jumping up and down---but you never brought one thing of the Scripture that really gives the basic things, boy." That's right.

22 Now, we're shooting a rifle. It's got to be zeroed. It's got to hit the spot. Lord help us now, as we read from Joshua, the 10th chapter. And I'm going to begin at the 12th verse, and read Joshua 10 and 12, down to the 14th or 15th verse.
Then spake Joshua to the Lord in the day when the Lord delivered up the Amorites before the children of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, Sun, stand ... still upon Gibeon; and thou, Moon, in the valley of Ajalon.
And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed, until the people had avenged themselves upon their enemies. Is not this written in the book of Jasher? So the sun stood still in the midst of heaven, and hasted not to go down about a whole day.
And there was no day like that before ... or after it, that the Lord hearkened unto the voice of a man: for the Lord fought for Israel.

23 Now, if you will pardon me for a minute, I want to take a text here this morning on the subject of one word. Now, you say, "Brother Branham, that's not ... that's not too much for all these here 150 people or so. That's not enough." Oh, yes it is. It's enough. It's the Word of God, see, no matter it ... it's not the quality, it's the quantity.
Like here, not long ago, in Louisville, Kentucky, I was thinking of a little boy that climbed up in the attic---was searching around one day. And he found in an old garret, a little trunk, he found a postage stamp. And he thought, "You know, this might be worth something." So he took off and found a collector. And, of course, he had ice cream in his mind.
He said, "What will you give me for this stamp?"
He said, "I'll give you a dollar for it."
Oh, my, that's about ten cones there, you know, so he had thought he had made a bargain. That man sold it a little later for five hundred dollars. And I forget, now it goes into the thousands, what that stamp's worth.
See, as far as the paper, it wasn't worth nothing. But it's what's wrote on it what makes the difference.

24 This is just ordinary India paper. But it's what is on it. It's God, in letter form. Yes.
Sometimes it's a ... no matter how little it is... That's where we people make our mistake. We're always wanting to do something big. Maybe it wasn't ordained to do something big. Maybe it's the little things that we're leaving undone is what's hurting us.
Like in Canada, I was standing there with my good friend Dr. Ern Baxter, who used to be my platform man---very fine, eloquent man. And when King George (who I had the privilege of praying for, you know, when he was healed with the multiple sclerosis), when he and his wife passed down the street that day in Vancouver, there... As they went down the street, there she was in her beautiful blue dress, and the king himself sitting up there, trying to sit straight, hurting and sick, his ulcers bothering him. But yet, he knowed he was a king, and so he bowed to the people.
And when he went by, Ern and I listened to it. Ern just turned his head and started crying: He couldn't hold it. He said, "Brother Branham, my king is passing by."

25 And I thought, "If it'll make a Canadian feel like that, what will it do when we see our King go by."
They turned out all the children at church, or the schools did, to see the king. They give them little British flags to wave. When they returned back to the school after their regular procedure, they found out that one little fellow didn't come back. And the teacher got alarmed, so she went out to look for the little fellow. And she was standing (a little girl), standing behind a post, crying her little heart out. The teacher picked her up and said, "What's the matter, sweetheart?" Said, "Didn't you see the king?"
She said, "Yes, I saw the king."
And said, "Did you wave your little flag?"
Said, "Yes, I waved the little flag."
Said, "What you crying about?"
She said, "You know," she said, "I'm too little." She said, "I saw the king, and I waved my flag, but the king didn't see me," see, and her little heart was broken.
That's different from our King. You can't be too little... You can't do anything. He knows every little move that you make. He knows all about you.

26 Now, my subject this morning I'm going to speak on, for a few minutes, the Lord willing, is "A Paradox." What is a paradox? According to Webster, here, it means something that's incredible, but true. I think we've witnessed that, the last few days, minor stage. But a paradox---an incredible, but yet it's true. That makes a paradox.
In Hebrews, the 11th chapter, and the 3rd verse, we see that the world was made and framed together by the word of God.

27 A few weeks ago I was in New York City at the Morris Auditorium. And I heard this tape of Einstein talking of that galaxy, of how many... If we left here, and went (I think) 150 million light years---traveling at the speed of light---take us 150 million light years to get over there; and then 150 million light years to get back. And you know how fast light travels, see. And just think, 150 million light years...
Well, if you'd run a row of nines around, around and around the world, you'd never break it down in years. It's nine, nine, nine, close together around the world, you couldn't break it down in years. For, just think---light travels at what? At eight hundred ... a hundred and eighty-six ... 186,000 miles per second---in a light year.
In 300 million light years, try to figure it up. You know how long, then, we'd been gone from the earth? Fifty years. That's right. See, they broke in, to find out if eternity... They say that John Glenn, the astronaut that went around the ... it never taken one second off of his life, even the speed that he was traveling, about 1700 miles...
So then, see, we broke into eternity. We're an earth-bound people that knows just inches, and so forth. When you break into that unknown, you can't fathom that. Our minds are not comprehending. We couldn't fathom what it means to get into that. But we know that it's true.

28 And Einstein said, "There's only one sensible thing to say about the world. By faith, we understand that God framed the world together," see.
And the world standing there in space, it had to come from somewhere. The science says it's a piece of the sun. Then where did the sun come? See, you keep breaking it down, till finally you come to a place that you have to find out it had to have a beginning, see. God created the heavens and the earth, we're taught in the Bible.
And how does it stand there in space? It never moves. You can't take an instrument... I have wore for my ... my meetings overseas, and Switzerland, one of their best watches that was give me while I was there. It's a ... really, I think in American money it costs a hundred-fifty, two hundred dollars, maybe more. And yet that watch will gain, and lose, just in a few days.
I took it to a jeweler. He said, "Well, we have nothing that keeps perfect."

29 But the world does, perfectly, at a time. They can tell the eclipse of the sun and moon, many, many years apart, just to the minute. How it turns---and yet nothing holding it up.
Which is up, and which is down? We don't know. Is the North Pole up? Or the South Pole up? We're in space. That's a paradox, isn't it? It cannot be explained. Anything that cannot be explained like that, is simply a paradox. So we find out that it was a paradox for the world to be in space. All right.
And time and seasons---how does it cross its seasons just the same time? How that summer and winter... How it leans ... it's leaning backward. If it was up straight...

30 Now, we proved that one time it was up straight, 'cause God said it was. Up in the British ice fields, they can blast 500 foot through that ice, and there's palms, ferns. It showed it was once a tropic. And now, see, it leans back, from the antediluvian destruction, that leaned it back. And I believe the very thing that they throwed it out of its cycle then, is ready to throw it back in its cycle now.

31 Man destroys himself by his knowledge, see. He never, God destroys nothing. Man ... and you... We can't, no matter what, we can a-liquidate; we cannot annihilate. There's nothing, and even as far as the closest we have to annihilation... But you can't annihilate. When fires are burning, that's gases breaking apart. It goes right back to its original condition again. You can't annihilate nothing.
Some people get so guilty till they want to take their body and have it burned, and blow it to the seven winds of the seas. But that doesn't make any difference. Your ... it isn't annihilated; you can't annihilate. God created it. You can't tear down. You can pervert, or carry on or do other things; but you can't annihilate. God's the only one who can annihilate. He's the creator. He's the only one that has the right to do it.

32 How it stands in space? So much we could say to that, it'd take hours upon it.
But we find out here that, Joshua stopping the sun---now that's a paradox. I remember the time... My old father, he had no education, and I ... he could just hardly sign his name. But he used to say to me, he said, "You know, I never could believe that the ... but what the sun turns from the world."
And I said, "Well, I don't know, Dad."
And one day in high school, I know I was talking to the high school teacher there of the Bible. And I asked him this question about Joshua. He said the turning of the earth made the gravitation, and the gravitation held the world up.
And I said, "Then, why, then---you teach the Bible---did Joshua command the sun to stand still?"
He said, "God winked at his ignorance," see, "and stopped the world."
I said, "You just got through telling me [Now, he didn't believe in the miracles of God, see, and he said...], you just got through telling me that if the world ever stopped, it would stop its gravitation. And then it would shoot like a comet through the air. Now," I said, "the Bible said that the world stood still here, for twenty four hours."

33 It's a paradox, but God did it anyhow. What? By a man---not a god, not some great angel coming down from heaven---a man with faith in the mission that he was given, to take that land, the Word of God was behind it. "I give you this land. And everywhere the soles of your foot shall set upon, that I give you. It's yours." Footsteps meant possession.
And the sun is what... The achievement he was trying to do, see, his enemy was routed. And he knew if the sun ever set, them kings would get together, and they'd come back upon him with double forces. So the sun was going down, and Joshua, a man commanded to do this, said, "Sun, stand still."

34 Whatever God did, I don't know. But the sun stood still, the moon over Ajalon, because a man, a human being---a human being! ---was in the line of duty. In the line of duty he commanded the sun to stand still. And if we're Christians we have to believe this to be the infallible Word of God. Everywhere... He stopped the world, stopped the sun, whatever He did, it stood still for twenty-four hours. I believe it.
Jesus said in St. Mark 11:22, "If you say to this mountain be moved; and don't doubt in your heart, but believe that what you said will come to pass; you can have what you said."

35 But that takes motive and objective. Of course, you've got to have a reason for it. You can't have faith, unless you've got some reason.
As I tried to say last night, some people's faith is in their textbook. Some people's faith's in something else. But depends on where your faith is. I want to believe God's Word. What He says is true. Then I've got to see whether it's His will or not. Then if it's His will, I've got to check out my objective to it, and then my motive in doing it.
If I do it because I'd say, "Well, I'm going over the mountain here. There's a mountain before me. There's a million people on that side perishing. I've got a hundred million over here I'm preaching to." Well, if I can't get over, around, or under the mountain or nothing; and yet something in my heart keeps telling me, "Go over the mountain, go to them, go to them," and I can't get over it---now Jesus said, "... they shall move this mountain," see.

36 Now, the thing of it is, is first ... what if I say... Now first, I never created that in there. Something created that. It's for a good cause. Because why would I go to one million, when a hundred million here are perishing on this side? But it's something in my heart, saying "Go over on that side."
Now, the first thing I have to say, "Well, if I go over there ... this side can only pay me so much a month, and over there..." See, my motive's not right. My objective is not right. No.
Well, what if I say, "No, I don't care about the money. But when I get over there, some day---the ages to come, they'll---put up a great big monument, say 'Brother Branham, the great missionary.'" Then still my motive's not right.
But, when I don't care if they ever know who went over there, ease sits in my heart. Then I'll speak to that mountain, it'll happen, see. It's got to.
But see your motive, and your objective depends on who you are, and what business, what your ... what... That's where the church misses it so far. They get worked up in an emotion. And first thing you know, an enthusiasm... They don't stop to check it back here again. Check there, for sure. Then it's thus saith the Lord---see whether it's right.

37 Joshua had a commission to go over and to take that land, and God caused a great paradox. Even science can prove today the scar is still in the sky where that absolutely happened. I heard in Chicago, not long ago, a scientist talking, that was showing on a little chart where it happened.

38 Now we find out again, Moses was in the line of duty too. And there was the Red Sea. Did you see that rashal article that some of them people are trying to make now, that Moses went through a bunch of reeds---a sea of reeds. Wasn't that horrible? It's just trying... The devil, inspiring those people to take away the truth of the Word. How could the waters... Then did the reeds drown up Pharaoh then when he come? Crazy.
Then we find out that Moses had a commission to bring those people out of Egypt to that mountain. And there it was in the line of duty. And Moses begin to cry unto God, when he saw the pillar of fire hanging up here, and there come Pharaoh's chariots. And he cried, and the pillar of fire came down---was light to them, and darkness to them. And God said, "Why are you crying to me? I commissioned you to do it. Speak, and go forward." Oh, my!

39 The trouble of it is, today the churches speak, look like they say, "What did Moody say? What did Sankey say?" Speak, and say what God said. Let's go forward, not look back. Go this a-way.
It's hard, on these turning corners. Church don't want to believe that, you see. They're always referring back from where their educational standpoint. 'Course, that's a school in itself, see. They learn that through book-learning. We know that through experience of trusting God, see, and knowing that He does do this. It was a paradox, that God opened up that Dead Sea, and did that great thing.

40 Noah, in his time... Remember, Noah preached in an intellectual, to an intellectual world like we're preaching to now---a day when they were farther advanced in science than we are now. We could never build a pyramid. There's no way for us to do it. We haven't got the machinery to do it with. Some of them... If you was ever there, why, them boulders weighed tons---hundreds of tons, way up in the air. We have no machinery to lift it up there. Nothing at all to do it with, no power that would lift it up there. They did it.

41 I remember in school, we had a debate on that. And I took the side to say that they had some secret. They didn't know... And my opponent, he took the side to say that, why, they got enough men around it, and they made a level of dirt like this, and then they rolled it up.
I said (I worked in a section gang), I said, "Why, we can't... You take a box car with wheels, and them greased, and put them on a railroad track; and you can't put enough men along there to push that box car, and it empty. That's right. You just get one layer of men, and then the next man is pushing against that man, see. You couldn't move it if you had to."

42 They had the secret. They knowed how to do it. They had a greater instrument. That pyramid sits so perfectly in the center of the earth, pointing, that there's not a shadow around it, no matter where the sun is. It's never got a shadow around it, see. It's a perfect thing that they did. And their instruments was far beyond what we have now.
And Noah preached in that great intellectual age.
And Jesus said, "As it was in the days of Noah,"---another great intellectual age, see.
Now, remember Noah had a message from God: It was going to rain. Well, there had never... See, the world sat up straight in them days. They had never had rain. But Noah said, "It's going to rain." The water was on the earth, not in the skies. They could take an instrument and prove there was no water there. But Noah said, "It's going to happen anyhow," see. And it rained. That was a paradox, see. Something that could not be explained. But God shook the earth somehow, just in condition so it would rain. So we see it was a paradox for Noah to do that.

43 Also it was a paradox when Israel stood on one side of the hill, and Goliath on the other side of the hill. They had a great challenger over there. He was a great scientist. He knew all the ins and outs. And when the enemy thinks he's got you to the wall, that's when he likes to bark the loudest.
I remember when I first started out in this ministry, that Pastor Davis said to me, he said, "Billy, what in the world did you eat that night for supper?" He couldn't understand it.
I got a group of ministers together with me. They said, "What's the matter with you? You think that that..."
I said, "I don't care."
"In the day of this scientific age that we're living in, and you mean to tell me that God..."
I said, "I don't care what you say. That man, that angel of the Lord, has never told me anything wrong." I said, "If He sends me out there, there'll be somebody that'll listen to it. If the Baptist church don't want to, then here's my fellowship card." That's all. I knew God said so, and that settled it.
Said, "You can't do it."

44 That's that giant standing yonder saying, "If you'll come over here, and send one of your men and fight me, then we won't have no bloodshed."
Oh, my. How easy. How they like to bark, when they got it like that. Said, "You let one of your greatest men..." 'Course, Saul was head and shoulders above his army. And he knowed better than to go out and meet that fellow on his grounds.
He said, "Now, we won't kill anybody. We'll just let two of us ... one of us die---just one man die instead of the whole armies here die." He had a psychological point, and you notice he said... Israel was scared to death. They wouldn't want to meet the challenge.

45 But one day a little old ruddy fellow come up, piece of sheep skin wrapped around his shoulders, bent down, his hair in his face. Come up there to bring his brothers some raisin cakes, that his father sent him up there. His name was David. Little bitty, old scrawny fellow, standing around there...
But you know, there'd been, a few days before that, a prophet had anointed him. They wanted to put it upon his bigger brother's head, because he looked better. You know that makes impression to the people he's going to stand before---he looks like a king.
Oh, that's what the world's still got their eyes full of---Hollywood. Ought to be full of Christ. That's the reason it's so hard to get the program over to the people, the message. They want to be Hollywood. Hollywood shines. Well, it's a shine...
I live...

46 I'm a prospector. You know, fool's gold shines brighter than real gold. Anything glitters ... everything glitters is not gold. After all, gold doesn't glitter; it glows. And Hollywood shines with glitter, while the gospel glows with humility.
Hollywood shines with its great fine churches, its psychological, educated ministers, who can speak and use their nouns and pronouns, and everything just right; while in humility the gospel of Jesus Christ glows to the glory of God, where they know no more about it than a rabbit would know about snow shoes. They just ... (Excuse that expression. This is no place for that.)
But I ... that's what I try to mean, you know. They don't understand it. They think it's got to be all polished up with scholarship. And our Pentecostal people's getting like that. Their ministers has got to go away, and have so many degrees of psychology, know just how to say "Amen" just right. That's right. Oh, it's a disgrace, friends. It's a disgrace among us.

47 Now it isn't that I'm against the church; I'm against that system that's taking godly men and doing that. We need not to shine. We'll never get the enemy over on our ground, or, we can never go over on the enemy's ground and try to have fine glitter, well-dressed, and clergy collars, and everything, and our choir all robed, and everything like them. Don't go on their ground. We can never compare with them.
Let them, if they're hungry, come over to us. We're full gospel. Amen. Let's stay that way. The gospel came not in word only, but through power and manifestation of the Word. That's what the writer said. Power and manifestation---in other words, the Word vindicated is the gospel, see, Mark 16.

48 Notice now, we find that in the days of Noah that while he preached, they could hardly believe such a thing as that---they ... Noah believing for such a thing. But finally the paradox came, and it happened. It actually rained.
Then in the days of David, we find out that when Saul was up there with all of his great army, this little ruddy-looking fellow come up there, and come to bring some cakes to his brother from his father. And this giant came out and made his boast one time too many. There was a real man of God heard that boast.
And he turned around, he said, "You mean to tell me that you, the armies of the living God, will let that uncircumcised Philistine out there stand and tell you the days of miracles is past, or, well, uh [Audience laughs. Brother Branham says, "Same principle."] ... let that uncircumcised scientist tell you---defy the armies of the living God?" Said, "I'm ashamed of you, and you supposed to be trained men." Said, "I'll go fight him." Oh, I admire his courage. He knowed what he believed.

49 So Saul took him up there and said, "Son, I admire your courage. But remember, you're nothing but a youth, see, and he is a warrior from his youth, see. And you know nothing about a sword and things. Now how you going to meet that fellow, meet his challenge?"
He said, "Saul, I was herding your servant's sheep, and a bear come in and got one of them. And he run with it. I went and took it away from him. And a lion come in and got one, and I run out after him. And I took a sling shot and knocked him down, and when he rose up I slew him." Said, "The Lord God that gave me the victory over the lion and the bear, how much more will he give me the victory over this uncircumcised Philistine?"

50 You know, I think about that when I'm praying for you, see. See, a lion called "cancer" come in and got one of his sheep. I ain't got no medicine, I have no shots, I don't know what radium is. I don't know nothing about theologies, and these man-made things; but I know how to send this little sling shot. I come here after you, now. I want to bring you back. It's my Father's sheep. Sometimes I have to scold you, and fuss at you. But it's because I love you. Always, always bear this in mind, that love is corrective.
If your boy's sitting out here in the street, and you say, "Junior, dear, you shouldn't sit... Oh, bless your little heart. If you want..." That's not a real mother, or dad. You'll go get him and turn him over his arm, and give him a little posterior protoplasm stimulation. It'll fix him up just right, see, if you bring him in.
But you ain't going to stay there, and say, "Now, Junior, dear... ," when you know the little fellow can get hurt! You love him. That's the reason I'm fussing. It's not trying to hurt some organization. It's, "Wake him up!" That's the truth.

51 So we find out that David said, Saul said, "Well, I tell you, if you're going to fight him, I'll..." And he put his armor on him. Huh! I imagine little David, probably about five foot tall, and stooped shoulders, and this shoulder pads out about like this, and this steel... Saul finally said, "Take the thing off of him."
Said, "I never proved this. I don't know nothing about your ethics, and your, oh, your pulpit manners, and things you're supposed to have," see. He found out that his ecclesiastical vest didn't fit a man of God.
Said, "Take the thing off of him. He knows nothing about it."
Said, "Let me go with what I know is the truth, where God has blessed me." That's right! Let me go with the Word; not with some educational program, or something somebody's cooked up somewhere. I know God's Word will never fail; other man's word will fail. And God's His own interpreter. Said, "Let's go like that. Let's believe it."

52 Doctor, no doubt, will give you the best examination he can, and helps you every way he can. But that's the best he knows. We know something different. When all hopes is gone, then He's the one that comes to help us.
We see this then, David---not with a bow and arrow, not with a... 'Cause you couldn't hit the giant nowhere. He just had one place across his eyes.
Just think, his big spear he had would probably weigh four hundred pounds. His fingers was fourteen inches long. And just think of the helmet, was over top of his head. And all this breast plate... And brave David had a little bitty rock, that's all he had. He had four more in his sling. Do you know what them five rocks meant? F-a-i-t-h in J-e-s-u-s. That did it, see. He had faith, you see---faith, grace. He was the grace of God.
And then he went to meet the giant. He only had one place, and God directed that rock. And when he slew that giant to show that it could be done, then the rest of the armies grabbed their swords and away they went. They fought them to the bottom.

53 Now, a few years ago they said there's no such a thing as divine healing. But when we stepped out to prove that there was, then the fire caught in the Pentecostal church, and we've had a fifteen-year revival. Brother, them critics that wanted to give a thousand dollars for any proof, they've shut up now, because it's proven. Doctor's statements, and everything---cancer, blind, deaf, dumb; even to them that's dead been raised up, because you've just received faith by seeing one thing done. God is. The whole thing's based upon that. Believe every word that He said. For healing ... I believe in the rapture, I believe in everything that He said. It's going to take place. It's called a paradox, something that was unscientifically, but it happened anyhow. It was a paradox.

54 Now my next thought was Samson, with his jaw bone of a mule. Very, very strange to see this guy Samson... A lot of people try to think that he was a... I seen the psychological effect, or picture of Samson with shoulders as big as a barn door. Well, that would be no strange thing to see that man pick up a lion and tear him apart. But Samson was a little bitty, curly-headed shrimp (as we'd call him), little bitty old guy, mommy's little boy, long curls hanging down his back.
And when you see ... now remember, when the lion run out to roar upon him, notice what happened, see. What happened? The Spirit of the Lord came on him. That's what made the difference. That's the reason they could bind him, one time, when the Spirit of the Lord didn't come to him. His Nazarite sign wasn't there. But as long as he could feel that Nazarite sign, let anything come what wanted to.

55 And that's the way it is with you Pentecostals. When you get to that ethicals part, when you get to that spot to where you want to listen to the creed, and so forth like that, I don't know about you then. But if you'll just come back to this Nazarite sign, the Holy Ghost working in you, everything's all right then. Don't be afraid of nothing. As long as the Holy Ghost is there to identify that Word, let them say what they want to. Yes, sir. God still performs paradox.
And we find out that Samson... Think of that. With an old brittle jaw bone of a mule, that had been laying out on that prairie there, for many years... And anyone knows you could hit it against a rock, it'd fly to pieces. And, "Samson, the Philistines is upon thee," and he looked around. He had nothing in his hands. And here was a thousand Philistines standing there.
So he just reached down and picked up this old jaw bone.

56 And you think of those helmets, was sometimes an inch-and-a-half thick over the top of their heads. And he took that mule's jaw bone and beat down a thousand Philistines, Did it! Them sticking up in the rocks, hiding, said, "You want some of it? Come on down."
It was a paradox. But the Spirit of the Lord was upon him. That's what made the difference. It was a paradox to see a man---with well-armed men, trained men to fight, with long spears, and knives and so forth, helmets and armors---and this one man standing alone out in the field with the jaw bone of a mule, and beat down a thousand of them. But it's the truth. The Bible said it was.
A man that could take the gates of Gaza, that weighed down there probably eight tons apiece, big brass gates... And they fenced him in one night. Said, "We'll get him." Said, "We'll comb every hair in here till we find him, and we'll get him." But this little shrimp come out about midnight, and looked out there and the gates was in his way. So he just picked them up and put them upon his shoulders, and walked up to the top of the hill, and sat down on them. It was a paradox.

57 You can't fence God in. You can't tie Him in nowhere. He's God. Sure. Great victories that he won, Samson... God used him, and made paradox. He'll use anybody as long as you'll take His Word, if you're ordained for the cause. If you're not, well, then just stay with the ones ... listen to the message, then.
Now we'll hurry. I see I got about ten minutes left.
The virgin birth was a paradox [Someone says "You've got till 10:30."] Ten-thirty. I'll try not to take all that. You've been such a nice audience everywhere. Now, I know I'm supposed to stand here, and make a speech to these Businessmen and so forth, but I can't make speeches. I don't know anything about it.

58 Only, I remember here, not long ago, Billy just before his conversion (he was with me), he said, "Daddy..." We was in a place to eat, and there was a song going on you know, like that. And he said, "Ain't that a pretty song?"
And I said, "What song?"
And he said, "Daddy, you know there's only one thing about you that's wrong?"
And I said, "What's that, Billy?"
He said, "The only thing you think about is Christ---that's all."
I said, "That's a compliment, son." Yes, sir. He thought he'd get next to me, you see; but that did. That's what ... I just know Him. That's all I want, and to know Him is life. And to know these other things, I don't know about it. It might identify me as a smart man. And I don't want to be a smart man; I just want to know Him. I know Him, as Paul said, in the power of His resurrection, that when He calls I'll come out from among the dead. That's all I want. I want my name on the right place.

59 Now, it was a paradox when God caused a woman to conceive. It was a paradox that how God, the Eternal that fills all time and eternity, could come down and become one little baby crying in a manger. That was a paradox. It was a paradox when He died at the cross. That was a paradox, to think that God would come human so He could die as a human, to redeem His own creation. He had to do that. There was nobody else. If that was anybody else besides God, see, if that was anybody else besides God, we're lost.

60 For instance, what if I had the jurisdiction over you as God had over everything? And I'd say, "Well, I tell you what. Anybody looks at that light's going to die. Like, take the tree." And the first thing you know, this brother sitting here this would look at that. I feel sorry for him; I don't want him to die. So I'll have Terry here to... That wouldn't be right. No. What if I'd have my own son to do it? That wouldn't be right. There's only one way I can be just, and that's take his place. And God could not take a human's place, being a spirit.
So, God created a blood cell which was His own son, Jesus Christ. And God came in and lived in there, and lived ... identified Himself in Christ. That was God Emmanuel. Jesus said, "I and my Father are one. My Father dwells in Me," see: God in Christ reconciling the world. Jesus was the body, the tabernacle; God was the Spirit that lived in Him.

61 Now, for instance, we have the Spirit by portion. He had it without measure. He was the fullness of the Godhead bodily---God. But we have it by measure. Now, for instance like the little gift that we have among us now. Now, that's like taking a spoonful of water out of the ocean. Jesus was the whole ocean; but this is just a spoonful. But remember, the same chemicals that's in the whole ocean is in this spoonful, only there's more of it out there, see.

62 He was God. We are not God. We are not God, but together...
If you notice, it was so beautifully illustrated, when that great pillar of fire that followed the children of Israel through the wilderness appeared to St. Paul. When it come down on the day of Pentecost it broke up and tongues of fire sat upon each of them. It was God in this pillar of fire, the Logos, separating Himself among His people, showing that Christ and the bride, see (God and His church), are becoming one. Why, it's just the most beautiful thing you ever seen. Then together, brethren... Not in different organizations we'll ever stand. I'm a Kentuckian. Together we stand, and divided we'll fall.
Why did the Indians lose this country to the white people? It's because they wasn't ... they was divided among themselves. How are we going to lose this great race? It's because we're divided. How we going to do it? We got to stay together. We're all believers in God. The Holy Ghost takes us all in. It'll be a paradox if God ever gets us together. But He will; just trust Him. The virgin birth... He knows how to send the persecution. It'll run us together. Now, the virgin birth was...

63 Now, Pentecost was a paradox, how that God chose a bunch of illiterate fishermen, that didn't even know their ABC's. There's told that Peter couldn't even sign his own name. The Bible said that he and John (Acts 4) was ignorant and unlearned. But yet they'd taken notice that they had been with Jesus. That's the main thing.
And how God chose! Now the church had trained up a bunch of men for that---thousands of fine, intellectual priests who knowed that Word, they said, from all the meanings of it, and everything---studied it day and night, just had it in their heart; and failed to see it. And God chose a bunch of men that didn't even know their ... how to sign their name.
That was a paradox, from taking a man who was trained for the Word, and by the Word; and take a man knowed nothing about the Word, and confirming the Word through him. That was a paradox, certainly was.

64 It was a paradox, how that them people up in that upper room, there, afraid of the Jews, and had walked with Jesus; but when the Holy Ghost came, they wasn't afraid no more. Out into the street they went, screaming, and falling, and acting like a bunch of drunk people. That was a paradox. The Holy Ghost came upon them---women and all. They wasn't ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ. It certainly was a paradox.
The old prophet's visions was a paradox. We can't explain a vision. How are you going to explain a vision? It's something that happens to the person, that he foresees things for years to come. And it happens exactly on the dot. That cannot be explained. There's no scientific way of doing it.

65 Here some time ago in a fuss with a doctor, when I was at a Kiwanis meeting, he said, "Mr. Branham, I don't ... I like to hear you talk," he said, "but I tell you," said, "I can't believe anything but what is scientifically proved."
I said, "You claim to be a Christian?
He said, "Yes. Some of it's puzzling to me."
Then I said, "Then, you can't be. You must believe all of it, see."
He said, "I can't believe the virgin birth."
And I said, "Well, I can believe the virgin birth better than I can believe the natural birth." Certainly can.

66 How ... if you'd ever see the natural birth, how that sperm from male and female, and where... Who determines what it's going to be? Here is the sperm from the male with the hemoglobin, the blood, in it. And here's the woman, which is the egg, up here. Now the first two that meets, the germ crawls into the egg, and the rest of them die. And there's tens of thousands times thousands of those germs.
And you say, "Well, the first in front."
No, no. They stop. And maybe it'll be a germ come up from the middle of the germs, and the egg come from the very back end, and they'll come across one another and meet. It's determined whether it's going to be a boy or girl, whether it's going to be red-headed or black-headed, what disposition it's going to be. Something unknown to science determines it.
If that ain't a paradox, what is? Point to point is the closest way around, we understand. But not that time. God determines it. Why, the natural birth---if we had time to break it down, even to the chemistry of the blood and so forth, and prove that out---my, it's a great mystery, how... We take it commonly.

67 And that's the trouble with these Pentecostals. We're taking God too commonly. The whole thing, we just let it pass by. Don't do that! That's not right; don't do that. Look at it, and praise God for it. Every little thing that takes place, give God praise. That's what He ... shows you appreciate. What if somebody keeps going things for you, you don't even thank him, or nothing, see? Then after awhile they get tired of doing that, see. So now, God will too. Now remember, He's able of the stones to rise children to Abraham.
Now, them visions of the old prophets were certainly paradox. We cannot explain them: they're without explaining. But every one of them happened just according to the way that they said.

68 Listen, right now in our midst, Jesus Christ is here. That's a paradox, how that He's alive after two thousand years. Who could explain that? How that He, that Spirit unseen, can come among us, and take an individual and identify Himself exactly, impersonate Himself in an individual---as you as a believer, and to a gift. That's a paradox. Nobody can understand that.
Nobody can know how perfectly He can just say to each person what it is, and what's this, and where's this, and what's that---never be mistaken. Because He's God, He can't mistake. That's a paradox. How is it that now, as I come in last night in hearing my brother, my field manager here, Mr. Borders, speaking---I just got the last part of it---about George J. Lacy taking a picture of that angel of the Lord. Search it. If that isn't the same pillar of fire that followed the children of Israel...
See, how do you know? It's got the same nature.

69 When Jesus was on earth He said, "I come from God, and I go to God." And we know that He was the I AM. And the I AM was that Logos, that pillar of fire.
And then, when He went back to God and ascended up on high, Saul of Tarsus was on his road down to Damascus, one day, and that same light fell in his ... before him, and blinded him. Now look, it's possible that one can see it, and the other one can't. Tens of thousands have seen it. When I used to tell about it, they'd say, "Aw, that's psychology. He just imagined that---them people just so under emotion."
But when George J. Lacy took that picture, he said to me that day over at Houston, there in the building, before all that "Times," "Life," and "Collier's," and all them other magazines, he said, "Mr. Branham, I'm one of your critics, too." He said, "But I want to tell you, I said it was psychology." But said, "The mechanical eye of this camera won't take psychology. [blank spot] The testator's dead, see." He said, "But some day after you're gone it'll be on ten cent stores." Said, "I'm in position to know there's never been a supernatural being that's been scientifically proven." But, said, "This is scientifically proven. The light struck the lens."
Then you see, the testimony that I've given since a little bitty boy, that I've seen that light before me always---and you know, you've read the books and seen the documented statements, see---it's the truth. Now I'm not here to deceive you.

70 I got a wife, I got a little boy ... called me the other night, on the phone, crying "Daddy, come home." How he'll cry, and go on, when he sees me leaving, because so many accidents in planes, and things like that. My little girls, and them ... why, they're Daddy's girls, see.
I get paid from my church. I never took an offering in my life. I don't ask people, and people gives me money. I put it in foreign missions, see. Some of my trustees are sitting present right now, knows that's true. I don't spend one cent of it. I take the gospel myself. And I get enough built in there, I take off overseas and preach to people.
It's you ... you're sponsoring them. They don't have one penny of money. And then when I go over there, then I go in and preach the gospel over there. The way's already paid by you Americans. You're building your home. You don't know nothing about it. But that day you'll understand, see. It's you doing that. I get a hundred dollars a week from my church, and that's right.

71 I don't have no reason to be out here, no other way. But it's something in me. I can't curse it or bless it. It's pulsation---it drives me to it. You think it's easy, standing here speaking against organizations? And see these brothers sitting here, brothers who stuck their neck right out to have me to come here?
Even my Christian Businessmen brethren, when I had to tell Demos about "thus saith the Lord," what was going to take place in that organization---which it did a few weeks ago by Brother Ford and them. Told them two years ago to watch what would happen, see. You're getting into it. You're going to make it an organization. When it does, then I'm through with it, that minute. It's been a oasis, because the people that minister come in, because that's their support, see. And then I get to bring the message, and plant the seed, everything I can.

72 It's not because I want to be different. If I'm that way, then I'm a hypocrite. Then God'll never work them things through a hypocrite. God identified in a hypocrite? Far be it from God. It has to be truth. But if we could just shake ourself a minute, and realize. And don't think it's some man---some man's got nothing. Some... God has to choose somebody.
Now, you historians here, did God ever use an organization? Never. Now, I want to ask you something else. When a man raised up with a message, and that organization organized the organization behind that message, it died right there, and God put it on the shelf. And it never did come to life. Now just ask. Ask yourself that question.
Now, see, now that's not talk against...

73 Now, these Catholic's: all my people are Catholic. I'm an Irishman, and all my people are Irish-Catholic, and they're fine people. And I'm not against the Catholic people; it's the system. I'm not against the Methodist, I'm not against the Pentecostals. It's that system that bars us out. We're that... See, we're working for one achievement here, and we're trying to produce God, the Bible. And they've already got their documents drawed, their form of religion, what they believe, and outside of that you can't cross it.

74 And you think it's an easy thing for me to stand here, and say that to brothers who love me? You think it's easy for me to bawl you sisters out, with short hair? You think it's easy for me to bawl you men out for letting your women wear shorts and things like that, when them women puts money in to support me, a missionary overseas? If there was no money went in the church, my children couldn't live. And somebody who's nice to you, kind to you... You think it's an easy thing for me to stand there, when I love people?

75 When I was a little boy, my father being a bootlegger, I was hated. Anybody who'd go downtown, I'd start talking to somebody. Nobody'd have nothing to do with me. The minute they'd see somebody else come along they could talk to, they'd walk away and leave me. And I always loved people.
When I was a little boy I studied, and reading my history book. And I was reading one day, and seen there where Abraham Lincoln got off of a train, down here in New Orleans. And they was auctioning off a big colored slave, down there, to breed him over to some bigger women to make better slaves. And Abraham Lincoln took his hat off, and twisted his fist (he was a Kentuckian, too). He said, "That's wrong. That's wrong."
And I still say it's wrong. God made man. Man made slaves. God makes us our color, just like He does the flowers. He has a white flower, a blue flower, a red flower. Let them alone. Don't hybreed it. Leave them alone; let them the way they are. They're all God's flowers. It's His bouquet. God made man, and man made slaves. We don't need to be slaves.

76 Like I said, this Martin Luther King's leading his people to a crucifixion. It's communistic. Sure it is. If them people were slaves, then I'd be down here fighting for them. That's right. But they're not slaves. It's a argument where they go to school or not. Won't go talking about that. I just thought I'd express it, see. All right. Notice, it's just the devil. Certainly.
We're all human beings; we all come from God. God by one blood made all nations. A colored man can give me a blood transfusion. His blood's just the same as mine is. Mine, just is ... I can give him one. Who am I to argue? He's my brother.

77 But I don't believe in marrying, and intermarrying them like that. I don't believe in a white... What business would a beautiful, young, intelligent colored girl want to marry a white man for, and have mulatto children? What would a fine, intelligent, colored girl want to do a thing like that for? I can't understand it.
And what would a white woman want to marry a colored man, with mulatto children? Why don't you stay the way God made you? Be content with such as you have, see.
Now, notice the virgin birth, and the prophets... All right.

78 Now, today, He's still alive. He's still here. He's proving Hisself by His Word. This Word is God. You believe it? Then this Word is 'lotted here for this day. There's got to be somebody come by, that that Word can become quickened, and make that Word live. That's when He was borned a virgin birth. It was unusual, out of the ordinary. These things are out of the ordinary. And He couldn't help it,

79 no more than Joseph could help being who he was.
Look at those four patriarchs: Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph. Abraham, calling; Isaac, election; (or vice versa) Abraham, election; and Isaac, calling; Jacob, grace; Joseph, perfection. Nothing against him. That's God working His way out.
Watch. Luther, Wesley, Pentecost, and the capstone, when the church and the Word becomes the same. Same thing exactly, perfectly. Everything in the mathematics in the Bible perfectly sets it. I wish I had a month here with you nice people. We could sit down and talk that over. We could run in, and out. If it looks spooky to you, you walk away and say, "I wonder." Many of them---not you, but many of them---say, "I wonder." You see, you just have to hit the end of it, and walk away---just enough that you can see, see? And that's the way that God calls His people. He always does it that way.
Notice, now.

80 Now, He's still alive today, a paradox. The pillar of fire identified among us scientifically---and it's still here, since plumb back in the wilderness with Moses. He's still the I AM. Not I was, or I will be; I AM---present tense---scientifically, and by the...
Notice this pillar that put the eyes of Paul out (Saul), and them men standing there didn't even see nothing about it. They didn't see it. But it was so bright to Paul it put his eyes out. He always was bothered with his eyes from then on, see. He put it... Now look, that'd be in the Hebrew.
And he said, "Lord, who are you?"
Now, would that Hebrew have called some kind of a spirit "Lord," that staunch man who was taught under Gamaliel, renowned teacher? And he knew that if it was Lord, it was the Lord that led His people out of Egypt. There was that pillar of fire standing there, said, "Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou Me?"
Said, "Lord, who are you?"
He said, "I am Jesus."

81 Now here He is the same yesterday, today, and forever, see. He returned, and promised that He'd return in the last days. There He is, the Holy Spirit, see, returning in the last days to bring the people... Now look. Right at the end of the Jew and the Samaritan, this manifestation of the Word of God, knowing the thoughts that's in the heart, He showed that to them before they were taken away. And the veil over their face (that I was going to preach about tonight) had blinded them. They didn't see it.
Now, if He ... if He done that before, on them two races of people (which I say there's three: Ham, Shem, and Japheth), if He did that, and He lets this church here go in on intellectual conceptions, then He did wrong. But He's the same yesterday ... to Ham, Shem, Japheth, the same yesterday, today, and forever. And He promised to do it. So He's no respecter of persons.

82 And watch how Abraham come up through His signs and things, and the last sign that he saw done by God, was God, Himself. He saw Him in lights, and everything else. But God, Himself, was manifested in a human being, and eat and drink.
Some man said to me one time, (a minister, Brother Fox), he said, "Brother Branham, do you mean to tell me you think that one that eat was... That man stood there eating that calf, and eating cornbread, and the milk, do you think that that was God?"
I said, "Certainly. Abraham said it was. He was the one talked to Him. He ought to know it. He said He was Elohim." I said, "You ... see, He come down to make an investigation---as He is now in investigation judgment---to see who is believers. We've been hollering so much about it. Just investigating, see who really is believers, see. And He made Hisself manifest.
He sent the little wheat type down in there, like in the modern messages we hear in Babylon.

83 But watch what He done there to that church-elect. He give it a chance, too, see. See what I mean? And he's bought by...
My God? What did He do? You know we're made out of sixteen different elements of the earth: potash, and petroleum, and cosmic light, and what more. He just reached over and got a handful of atoms, and cosmic light, petroleum [Brother Branham makes blowing sound], and said, "Step into it, Gabriel." And made one to step into Himself. That's our God.
And when He give His message to Abraham, He vanished and turned right back to God again. All them atoms and things just broke up---like a fire breaks up the ashes and chemicals in the wood, or coal, or whatever you're burning---turned back to the unseen. I'm so glad my Father's like that.
See, I know after this body's become nothing that you can't see no more, just the chemicals where it was, some day He'll call and I'll answer Him. Yes, sir.

84 My wife said here not long ago... I was combing these two or three hairs I got left. And she said, "Billy, you know what? You're getting completely bald-headed."
I said, "I haven't lost a one of them."
She said, "Pray, tell me where they're at."
I said, "All right, sweetheart, I will when you do this: tell me where they was before I got them. Wherever they was before I got them, they're there waiting for me to come to them." Hallelujah!
That's my God! That's our God. Sure. If we're Abraham's children, we believe it. Yes, sir. He's our God. (I got to hurry.)

85 The pillar of fire is identified scientifically, and by the reaction, by its character, and everything else. Just the same as it was when it was dwelling in the body of God's only begotten Son, so does it dwell in the body of His adopted sons for the last day.

86 Now, I know, brethren, we've had a lot of this impersonation. But the Bible said it would happen, you know that. As Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses, see, it's just got to happen. But don't let that that blind you. When You see a bogus dollar, remember it was made off of a real one, see. If it isn't, it's the original. But there is original Holy Ghost, original Christ, certainly. He is the Holy Ghost.
Notice now, and the pillar of fire---still alive today among us---after all these thousands of years, and still it's here. It's a paradox.

87 The seed in the ground is a paradox (and I'm going to close---about twelve minutes). The seed in the ground is a paradox. How that that little seed will go in the ground and die, and then when that little seed dies in the ground, then it... You might take a handful of the dirt and take it to the laboratory and examine it, you couldn't find that germ of life if you had to. There's nothing scientifically there, show it's there. But just let the sun rock around in its right position. Watch what happens. It comes from somewhere. It rises. That's a paradox. They can't explain it. See everything in it dies but the life, and the life is unseen. And wherever the little life is, it's supernatural. And the natural body's completely gone. But the supernatural still lives.

88 Now, if that little seed could be buried (now listen to me, friend), that little seed could be buried in the ground. And if that seed hasn't become germitized with the mate, I don't care how pretty the seed is, it'll never live, see. I don't care how pretty our churches get, how nice we try to dress, how fine and intellectual we become, unless we become in contact with the mate---and the mate is the Word---see, you can't rise. There's no way for you to do it, see.

89 You know, we take corn. We're living in a day of hybrid. Everything's hybrid, till they've even hybred the church. That's right. They've hybred the church from the Word to intellectual creed, denomination. Jesus never did say, "Go make denominations. He never did say, "Go build schools." Said, "Preach the gospel. Demonstrate the power of the Word of promise for the day," see. But we've hybred. Now we've got a prettier church.
You Pentecostal women---your mothers used to stand on the corner with no stockings on, little old wore out shoes (and them tennis), beating a tambourine. And the denominations laughed at her, and made fun of her. Dad stood there with ... needing a hair cut, and picking up corn on the road somewhere, to feed you kids. It's too bad you got away from it.

90 Now you got a bunch of Rickys in there that wants to come like the rest of them, like Israel did---wanted a king of their own. You wanted to make your own, see. And now what you got? A bunch of educated Rickys. That's right.
They got this intellectual ... they want to be like the rest of them, Dr. so-and-so, and Dr. so-and-so, see. And where's it got you to? You're more prettier. That's right. You're better churches.
But where's that spirit was in there? Where's them all-night prayer meetings for them sinning in the city? Remember, the Holy Spirit said in the last days, "Go seal those only who cry and sigh for the abomination that's did in the city."
Now I want you ministers to lay your hands upon that member of your church, you Pentecostal ministers. And then when you find it, then you come, and I'll apologize to you. You find that member of yours that can't rest day and night, for crying for the abomination of sin that's done in the city. Ninety percent of them stay home, and see "We Love Suzy," instead.
Oh, you speak with tongues, sure, jump up and down and shout. That's all right. Nothing against that. Nothing against your organization, either. But I'm trying to talk about life. Where's it at?

91 Now you show me that member. Look how worldly, how indifferent.
Always the outside expresses what's on the inside. By their fruits they're known. Where's it at? Now, I just ask ... just ask you a question. Before you condemn it, see, just ask that question. Fine.
See, now, I'm not trying to hurt you. I'm trying to help you, see. I'm trying to help you. That seed must die. "When (a Jew) these Greeks come to Jesus and said, "We would see Jesus," Jesus ... what did He say? The first thing He said, "Except a corn of wheat falls into the ground, dies, it abides alone." He showed them how to see. And die to yourself, die to your ethics, your creeds, and all this. Just be born in the Word, into Christ. That's a paradox, to see it come forth. Yes.

92 I remember here not long ago, I was down in a little place called Acton, Kentucky, way back in the mountains, never been there before. A fellow named Mr. Woods and I... He was a Jehovah Witness. And he was at one of the meetings, and the Holy Spirit spoke. He had a boy with a crippled leg drawed up under him, like that. I was standing on the platform just preaching, and I looked, and I said, "I see a man sitting way in the back of the building." It was three times as long as this is here, a big tent. And I said... And we was up around ... oh, it's up on the Great Lakes.
And this man, I said, "He's got a boy. The man comes from Kentucky, way down in Kentucky. He's a contractor. His name is Banks Woods. He's got a boy that's got polio. His leg's drawed up under him." I said, "Thus saith the Lord, he's healed." So the woman stood there.
Now, there's just many people standing, right here this morning, my people, that knows David Woods. How many knows David Woods, knows? ... That's right. Right then he raised up, and his leg perfectly normal. That settled the Jehovah Witness problem. And besides that, by them same visions has led his whole people...

93 His brother come in to make fun of him, and just tear him apart. Said, "What are you doing, following some kind of a fanatic like that, some of these modern-day cults?" (A reader in the Jehovah Witness.)
He said, "Why, the man's out there cutting grass." And I had on a big old straw hat, and out in the field mowing. And I come in, sat down. He said, Brother Banks said, "This is my brother, Lyle."
And I said, "How do you do, Mr. Woods?"
Said, "How do you do?"
Oh, real arrogant. I sat there a little bit, and the Lord gave a vision. I said, "Mr. Woods," I said, "I suppose you don't believe this?"
He said, "I certainly don't." And he said, "There's no such a thing as things like that." Said, "It's just a bunch of make-up that you got my brother all mixed up in."
I said, "You know, the Bible said, 'One word against the Holy Ghost will never be forgiven'?" I said, "What... And Jesus was doing the same thing." See, he'd never seen it yet.
So he said, "I don't believe in no such."
I said, "All right. If you would believe in such, you'd go back to your wife that you've left."
He looked around at me. He looked over... Now, he didn't know that I was catching his thoughts.

94 How strange---people come around, see that on the platform, and think that you don't know just exactly... Why, He reveals things right around, see. But you can't say it. Jesus knowed Judas was with Him all the time. But just let it alone, 'cause there's a purpose of it, see. And just...
So he sat there, and he said... Looked around at Banks as if Banks told him (that's his brother). I said, "You've got two children---two little blond-headed boys." He looked back to Banks, see. And I said, "What are you thinking? That Banks told me that."
I said, "How about this? Night before last, you were running with a woman that's got auburn hair, and you was in a room. And in this room, there was somebody knocked on the door. And you sent her to the door because you was afraid. It's a good thing. You'd've got your head blowed off. Another one of her lovers was standing there with a pistol in his hand."
He said, "God be merciful to me."
God knows how. Now he's a sweet, staunch Christian. His father came the same way, his sisters, and all of them.

95 We were down in Kentucky, squirrel hunting between one of my meetings. I had two weeks. Got real dry. How many ever hunted squirrel? Oh, my brother, there's nothing like it. So, give me a .22 rifle in the middle of August, and I'm at home. How the Lord speaks out there, and know things, so forth.
Notice, then when it got real dry up on the ridges where we were at, he said, "I know an old man that's an infidel." Said, "He's got five hundred acres of just hills like this, and down in the valleys [hollers, we call them there] that you can walk, 'cause it's wet." Said, "We might get to some squirrels." Said, "But he's a rough old fellow."
I said, "Well, let's go down and see him."

96 So about a couple months before that---how we knowed the place was there---I had a meeting on the Methodist Camp Ground at Acton, Kentucky. And that night, while the Holy Spirit was making discernment, there was a woman sitting way back in the back of the grounds. And it called her name, and said, "You got a sister that's dying with cancer of the stomach. She's just been to Louisville, and they opened her up. The cancer was wrapped so around her that they couldn't operate. And it's Mrs. So-and-so." She raised up and started crying.
I said, "When you left home tonight, on a marble top dresser you taken a little handkerchief, and you put it in your purse. It's got a little blue figure in the corner," see.

97 You say, "How ... that sounds very..." Well, how about Jesus telling where that fish had the coin in his mouth? How about the prophet telling the man that the mules had returned back? See, you just... The devil has an impersonation, yes. But you never hear of one of them preaching the gospel and getting souls saved. See, by ... see. You ought to know better.
So then, we find out, told her that, to "take that handkerchief and lay it upon your sister. For thus saith the Lord, she'll live."

98 Well, I don't know whether you ever knowed Brother Ben (I forget what his last name---Bryant, that's right), Ben Bryant. Oh, my, you'll never... You'll always know him, if you ever see him once. If he'd been here, he'd been screaming, throwing his hands and feet in the air like that, screaming. So one time... Then he went with this woman, put it on her (handkerchief), and put the handkerchief upon her up there.
And about two years later, when we went squirrel hunting, he said, "Let's go down into that..." Yeah, that was that same country, about twenty miles from where we were. So we went down there, and drawed way back over the hills, and down the hollers, and up though a broom-sage patch, and over this way, till we come to a big old house. And there sat two old men, sitting under an apple tree, and their old slouch hats pulled down. He said, "That's him, and, boy, he's a rough one." Said, "He's a terrible ... an infidel."

99 So we stopped, and I said, "You better go talk to him then. He know I'm a preacher, he wouldn't let us hunt at all." So he said ... walked up there and stopped.
He was standing there with a big chew of tobacco in his mouth, and it running all down through his beard, standing there. So he got around, and said, "Hello, come in."
So he got up there, and he said, "My name is Woods." He said, "I'm Banks Woods." Said I ... we been ... me and my friend's been hunting over here," said, "for a few days up here around Acton." He said ... and said, "I," or, "It's so dry," said, "We can't get into the woods. The squirrels are so scarce." Said, "I know your place is posted, but I thought maybe I'd come ask you, you'd let me hunt."
Said, "What Woods are you?"
He said, "I'm Jim Woods' boy." That's the Jehovah reader, the Witness reader, see.

100 He said, "Old Jim Woods is one of the most honest men you ever [they lived in Indiana then]," said, "...most honest men that there ever was in this country." Said, "I can certainly trust you not to kill one of my cows, or start a fire." He said, "Just help yourself." Said, "Go ahead and hunt anything. I got five hundred acres here. Make yourself at home."
"All right. Thank you." He said, "I guess it's all right for my pastor to come, too."
He said, "Your what?"
Said, "My pastor." (Am I taking too long?) He said, "My pastor."
And he said, "Woods, you don't mean to tell me you got so low down till you have to carry a preacher with you wherever you go." And he said...
I thought it was about time for me to get out then. So I got out of the car and walked around, and said, "How do you do?"

101 Looked at me, and washed his tobacco around, you know, and spit down like that. He said, "And you're a preacher, huh?"
I said ... looked, squirrel blood all over me, and whiskers (hadn't had a bath for two weeks, you know.), and laying in the woods sleeping, you know. And so, I said, "Might not look like one, but," I said, "I am."
And he said, "Well," he said, "at least I can respect you looking like a human being." He said, "You look more like a preacher than some."
So I said, "Well, thank you, sir."
He said, "I'm kind of against you fellows."
And I said, "I understood from Mr. Woods you was."
He said, "You know, I'm an infidel---I'm supposed to be."
And I said, "Yes, but I don't think that's anything to brag about, do you?"
And he said, "Well," he said, "I don't know." He said, "I think you fellows are barking up the wrong bush." (And you know what that means? A lying dog, see. The 'coon ain't up there, see.) So he said, "I think you are barking up the wrong bush. There's nothing up there, and you all are just lying about it."
I said, "'Course, that's to opinion."
And he said, "Yes, I guess that's the way you think it." He said, "Looky here, Mister." Said, "See that old chimney up there? That's where the old house. I was borned up there. My pappy built this house down here," he said, "about seventy-five years ago." Said, "I was raised right here, walked over these hills. I've looked everywhere, up in the skies, all around. I ain't seen no God, no angels, or nothing else."
I said, "Well, that's to opinion."
And he said, "I never seen one here but what I thought was lying." He said, "I don't want to hurt your feelings, Mister."
I, well, am I going to go hunting, or am I going to really trim him down? So I thought I'd just give him... Mama always said give a cow enough rope, it'd hang itself, see. So I said, "Yes, sir. That's right."
He said, "I met ... I heard of one preacher one time, that if I ever meet the guy, I'm going to talk to him." Said, "He might've had something."
And we talked a little while, you know, and I said, "Who was that?"
Said, "There was a fellow..." said, "what was his name? He was up here at Acton. I believe they called him ... I forget what his name was. Branham!"
I looked over to Woods, and Brother Woods, said, "Huh-huh."

102 And he said, "You know, the ... old lady Casmo lives up here on top of the hill." And said, "We taken her to the doctor in Louisville, and said she had cancer, and they just sewed her back up." Said, "The doctor gave them medicine to give her keep her quiet till she died. And she was then just about time for her to be gone." Said, "She couldn't even raise in the bed." Said, "We had to pull her bed sheet out from under her, she couldn't put her on the bed pan, see, right from under her." Said, "Wife and I'd go up and clean up her bed every morning."
And said, "There was a preacher from way out yonder, somewhere in Indiana." Said, "He come down here, and he had a meeting up there." And said, "That man stood there that night, and told her sister So-and-so of a handkerchief she had in her pocket." Said, "Put it on."
And said, "They brought a bunch of them holy rollers over there," and said, "I thought they had the Salvation Army up on top of the hill that night. (That was old Ben crying out like that, you know.)
So he said, "I said, 'Well, you know, she died. Said 'That's her family.'"

103 You know how it is back in the country. They just have one another; and they love and live for one another. It's too bad we don't do that around the big cities.
So they said, "We ... and if was going to die..." Said, "I thought, 'Well, that's her.'" Said, 'Well, it's late, we can't get her body out till morning.' Said, 'I'll get my wagon. I'll go up there and get her, and haul her out so we can take her to the ... over to Campbellsville, Kentucky, about forty miles from there, to the undertaker.' Said the undertaker had to come to the main road, which is about eight miles---ten miles out. Said 'He can pick her body up from there.' Said, 'No need of goin' over there tonight, They'll just be crying.' Said, 'We'll just wait till daylight.'"
Said, "You know, the next morning when I went up there, that woman had cooked some fried apple pies, and her and her husband sat at the table eating them. And she was living on barley water.
I thought "Uh, oh." I said, "Oh, now---now wait a minute." I said, "You don't believe that."
He said, "And you don't believe it?" He was the one that said it.
I thought, "Old boy, you're going to preach to me now."
He said, "You don't believe it?"
I said, "Man, do you mean to tell me that such a thing as that could happen in all these scientific age, where they have the best doctors?"
He said, "If you don't believe it, I'll take you up there and prove it to you." Now the infidel is preaching to me about God.
I said, "Well, you a ... you mean that?"
He said, "Yes."
I said, "Well, what was it?
He said, "I want to... If I ever meet that man, I'm going to ask him what in the world it was that told him about that, and how he knowed that woman would be well," see. Said, "I'm going to ask him about that."

104 I said, "Uh, huh." I said, "Well, that'd be a good thing." And I said, "Say, do you mind if I have one of them apples?" And it was laying on the ground (fall of the year, you know, second week in August), and the leaves was dropping off the tree. And the apples was there---nice apples. And I picked it up and rubbed it on these old dirty pants, and went to eating it, you know like that.
He said, "Yeah, help yourself. The yellow jackets are eating them." How many knows what a yellow jacket is? So he said, "The yellow jackets eating them up. You can help yourself."
So I said, "All right." So I went to eating, and I said, "Boy, it's a fine apple."
He said, "Oh, yes. I planted that tree there myself, fifty years ago."
"That's strange." I said, "Hey, you know we're going to have an early fall." I said, "You looky there." I said, "Wonder why them leaves are dropping off that tree before we even have a cool night. August's the hottest."
"Oh," he said, "the life left it."
"Oh, is that what does that?"
He said, "Yeah, they're turning yellow and dropping off."
I said, "Where'd the life go?"
He said, "It went down into the root."
I said, "Well, how ... what'd it do that for?" See.

105 He said, "Well, it's because, if it don't go down in the root," he said, "the winter'll kill the tree. The germ of life is in the ... in the sap that's in the tree, and it goes down in the roots."
What a beautiful testimony there, see, of death, burial, and resurrection again, see. Now, I said, "Then it ... what happens then? Does it stay down there?"
He said, "No, no."
I said, "Comes back the next spring, and brings you another bunch of apples. And you sit there and eat them."
"Yeah."
"And then you say you never seen God."
He said, "Well, that's just nature."
I said, "Is that right?"
"Yes, sir."
I said, "I want to ask you something. If it's just nature, tell me what intelligence warns that tree? That sap in the tree, it has no intelligence of its own. But what intelligence runs that sap down to the roots, say, 'Get down here and hide in the depths of the earth, now, till all the trouble's past. Then I'll bring you back up again.'? Tell me the life that was in the leaf... Just the body dies; the leaf dropped off. The life itself went down, coming back with the new, see." I said, "The life hid, went down in the ground."

106 Job, as I said last night, "Oh, hide me in the earth, till thy wrath be past." He seen the tribulation coming, of course, see. Notice, he said, "Hide me."
He said, "Well, that's just nature."
And I said, "Mister," I said, "if I put a bucket of water out here on the post, and then every August that water run down to the bottom of the post, and then in the spring of the year it come back up in the bucket again?"
He said, "Oh, oh, no. It don't have any life."
I said, "There you are. Now you got it. See, it's life. Now I said, "See, that's God."
He said, "You know, I never thought of that."
I said, "Tell me what does that?"
He said, "I don't know. I don't know what does it."
I said, "If nature," I said, "well, who controls nature? Is nature an intelligence? No."
He said, "Well, I never had thought of it just like that."

107 I said, "I tell you, I'm going out here squirrel hunting, if it's all right."
Said, "Help yourself."
"Now," I said, "when I come back, when I come back---you study real hard now---and when I come back you tell me what intelligence that tells that life in that tree to go down in the root, and come back next spring; and I'll tell you what, the same thing, that told me that woman was going to live up there that had the cancer.
Said, "Told you?"
I said, "Yes, sir."
He said, "Are you that preacher?"
I said, "Yes, sir. I'm Brother Branham."
And there under that tree that afternoon, by a simple little thing like that, I led him to Christ, tears running down his cheeks.
A year later I went down. I pulled my truck up in the yard. They'd moved away. He was gone. He'd died. And when I come back the lady was standing there to give me a bawling out for hunting on posted ground. He'd told me to hunt any time I wanted to. She wasn't ... didn't hear him say that.
So I come up, and I said, "I'm sorry." I said, "I come here early this morning, and parked the car here where you could see it."
Said, "That an Indiana license on there?"
And I said, "Yes, ma'am." I said, "Your husband..."
Said, "My husband's been dead almost a year." And she sat peeling apples on the back porch, off that same tree. And I said, "Well, he told me before he died..."
Said, "I don't believe it."
I said, "I was sitting right out there one day." And I said, "And I come up, and I was talking to him. They said he was an infidel."
She dropped that apple and looked at me, and said, "Are you Brother Branham?"
Said, "Yes, ma'am."
She said, "Forgive me." She said, "Forgive me." She said, "He died shouting, both hands up in the air praising God, knowing, as that leaf come back, he'd come back again." See, a paradox, unexplainable.

108 Sat and eat some ice cream (just in closing), sat and eat some ice cream not long ago. An old druggist told me, said, "You know, Brother Branham, I got... Do you believe in paradox?"
And I said, "Yes."
He said, "I heard your message one time on a tape, 'A Paradox.'" He said, "Many years ago during the depression," said, "people on county, on relief, had to come get an order," and said, "to get their medicine." And said, "They had to stand in long lines." And said, "One day a strange thing..."
He said, "I was sitting back here reading a paper, and my young boy," he said, "he was up there."

109 And said, "A little woman been standing in line out there. Since she was to be mother, you know, any time, she had to get some medicine. The doctor prescribed it. Had to get the prescription filled."
So said, "The (boy) or, the mother couldn't stand up no longer. He brought her up there. Said, 'Sir, I'm going to stand in line. I got to take my wife home,' see. Said, 'Can I take her home? The doctor said to have this medicine this afternoon, and she can't stand any longer.' Said, 'Can I, can I get this prescription filled? See, I got the order here, I got this ... just get a note to say that I can do it.' And said, I'll bring it right back to you.'
"And the young boy ('course, in times of depression, you know), he said, 'I'm sorry.' He said, 'I can't do that.' Said, 'We got orders not to do that.' Said, 'I can't do that.'"
And said he just happened to turn around and listen to what it was, and looked up there. And that poor little woman---her mouth white, and holding against the side of the wall, like that, and her husband standing there just as nice as he could be---he said, "Wait a minute, son."

110 Said, "I went and got the prescription, filled it, brought it back." Said, "Brother Branham, when I went to hand it out," he said, "I looked, and I put it in the hand of the Lord Jesus." He said, "I rubbed my eyes, and I looked again." And said, "He was the one reached out, and got that prescription." Said, "Do you think I'm beside myself, Brother Branham?"
I said "Oh, no. 'Insomuch as you have done it unto the least of these my little ones, you have done it unto Me.'" A paradox---sure it was. It fulfilled the Word.

111 There's many paradox we could talk about. But, dear friends, as we close let's think of this. There's one great one coming, the rapture. Let's all be ready for that one there. Let's condition our souls now, before God, that when that time comes that we'll go.
When the trumpet of the Lord shall sound,
And time shall be no more,
The morning breaks eternal bright and fair.
And when our chosen ones are gathered
To their home beyond the sky,
When the roll is called up yonder,
Let's all be there.

112 I sat at the table this morning looking at you. You know, we may never eat another breakfast together. Do you know that? This may be the last time we'll ever eat breakfast together. But there's one thing sure: by the grace of God, we're going to eat a supper together one of these days.
I'll look across the table there and see you. And I'll say, "Remember when we was down at Tampa?"
"That's when I made my full surrender."
And my! 'Course tears will run down our cheeks. Then the King'll come out in His beauty, wipe all tears from our eyes and say, "Don't cry anymore, children. It's all over. Enter into the joys of the Lord that's prepared for you since the foundation of the world." Let us bow our heads.

113 Heavenly Father, our time element means so much, Lord. We're just earth-bound. And just a few minutes here and there, just runs out on us. And when we talk with You, we believe that we are risen with You now, sitting in heavenly places, in Christ Jesus. And You're with us, this morning. We're conscious of that. We know that You're here.
And we're speaking on the subject of paradox. That's the supernatural. It's a paradox that you ever saved a wretch like me. How that all my people---sinners---raised in the backwoods, a cocklebur---how'd you ever make a grain of wheat out of it, Lord? Paradox.
Most of my people dying with their boots on, fighting, guns. O God! But Your grace saved me. I'm ever grateful, God, forever grateful.
I pray for others, Lord. If I could... If they could just know this wonderful person, Christ. When I see them, Lord, as they sit back with an intellectual conception of it, and really don't know what the person Christ is---Lord, make it real to them. Help these fine bunch of men, Lord, my brothers. These ministers and Businessmen, who in this great hour of darkness, they've identified themselves, Lord, their convictions. Even sometimes against the better thinking of their organizations, they want it anyhow. Bless them, Father. Bless each one.

114 Now, while we have our heads bowed, I wonder this morning if there's any here that's not sure that the little leaf---that you're making shade for somebody else---if the life should leave it to go back to the ground, would it rise again? Is the seed germitized with the mate that would make it come back again? If you're not absolutely sure of that, friend, let us pray about it now.
You know what the life is? It's the Holy Spirit. If you haven't received that Holy Spirit in you, which is the life that was in the first plant that raised up, see---Christ, first fruit of those who slept... Now, if that life that was in Him (that same Spirit) is not in you, no matter how nice you try to be, you can't come forth. There's nothing there to raise you up. You can take corn, hybreed it with something else, it won't bear no more. It's finished.
If you just belong to church, and you're really not filled with the Spirit of God...

115 I know it's hard to make a stand now, 'cause they call you everything. That don't matter. They called Him the same thing. And all that live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution. They persecuted the prophets which was before you. They do it today. They persecuted those who believed the prophets that was before Him. So will they do to you.
If you're not sure of it, with your head bowed and your eyes closed, I'm going to ask you one more thing to do. Please understand me. Bow your heart, will you? Just bow your heart for a minute. And you say, "Brother Branham, [nobody looking but God and I], I, truly, I'm a little in doubt whether I'd come up again. Will you remember me in prayer?"
Now, we can't make no altar call. I'm only ... if you just raise your hand. Just raise your hand and say, "Remember me, Brother Branham." God bless you, and you, and you, and you, and you, you, yes. Thank you.

116 Heavenly Father, little simple words, but yet the great Holy Spirit's near. He even knows the secret of the heart. And they've raised their hands that they're not sure. But yet, they believe You. They want to. And they ... this, that, they haven't got that... They just don't know how that road will be---down the limb, out of the branch into the limb, out of the limb down into the trunk, back up again. You're the guide, Lord.
Like on a hunting trip, if you don't call ahead and make arrangements for the guide, you can get lost. And we're calling ahead now, to the guide of life who said, "I am the resurrection and the life." You know the way, Lord, and I'm writing you this little letter in the form of prayer. And they're writing the same thing. Receive them, Lord.

117 They want to make reservations for the rapture, that great paradox. They've been in the meeting this week, and they've seen Your presence, and they know You're here. They're not that starchy, to think that... Men who bring messages are not angels; they're men. And we know that You work through men. And I pray now, that their reservations will be made this morning.
You said, "He that will confess Me before men, him will I confess before my Father and the holy angels." When that day comes then, You'll guide them over the river. Out of the branch, down into the vine, into the root of the tree, if You tarry; then bring them back up again in that great paradox at the end of the road. They're yours, Lord. It's between You and them. I pray, Lord, if they've never been baptized in Christian baptism, that they'll do that. And then they'll be filled with the Holy Ghost, the life that will guide them. For it's in the name of Jesus Christ we ask it. Amen.

118 Thank you for Your kindness. Way overtime, and I feel that I'm responsible. If there's any difference to be paid than what there was for the hall this morning, I'll pay it myself. That will make it right.
I love Him, I love Him,
Because He first loved me;
And purchased my salvation
On Calvary's tree.
Notice the form of the rapture, how it will be. We meet one another before we meet Him, 'cause He knows that when we got there, I'd be wondering if you were there, you wondering if I were there. But the Bible said, "We which are alive and remain to the coming of the Lord shall not prevent [or hinder] those which are asleep. For the trumpet shall sound, and the dead in Christ shall rise first. Then we which are alive and remain shall be changed in a moment, in a twinkling of an eye, and be caught up together with them." Oh, what a worship it'll be that time! Now, caught up together with them. Now, if we become part of that before that time comes, catching up into the rapture...

119 Let's just shake hands, just for a moment. Then we'll be dismissed officially, just in a moment. While we sing "I Love Him," let's just shake hands with one another and say, "God bless you, brother; God bless you, sister."
I love Him, I love Him,
Because He first loved me;
And purchased my salvation
On Calvary's tree.
God bless you, brother. Now let's just raise up our hands and close our eyes. Now, real sweetly,
I love Him, I love Him,
Because He.........