Adoption by humans and adoption by God 

We update studies as the Lord Jesus leads us. You can find the latest update of this study at ChurchAges.net

Brief summary

Humans adopt a person as a son or daughter by bringing that person into a new family.

God adopted His Son Jesus when He glorified His body by transfiguring Him on Mount Transfiguration.

God adopts every member of His living Bride by providing a glorified body wherewith each person will be changed and caught up to Heaven to meet Jesus at His Second Coming.

Julius Caesar killed the Roman Republic when he became Dictator for life. His five descendants were the first dictatorial Emperors of pagan Rome. Four of them were adopted.

Babylon had always used force to impose their own version of religious belief.

The Roman Empire died and resurrected up as the Roman Catholic Church on the ruins of the Roman Empire.

The Roman Catholic Church is thus baptized paganism.

The beast from the sea is the succession of Popes. The final Pope will rule the world.

Caiaphas the High Priest broke the Law when he tore his clothes. That ended the order of the Levitical Priesthood. The death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus made Him the High Priest of the order of Melchizedek. He was both High Priest and Sacrificial Lamb. That made Him far, far superior to the Levitical Priesthood.

Only the Bible is the Voice of God.

Roman Empire died and rose as the Roman Catholic church

Adoption by a person means that an adult takes full responsibility to raise a child as if the child is the natural-born son or daughter of the adult. The adopted child has all the inheritance rights of a natural-born child.

Rome was a Republic ruled by a Senate and two Consuls. The Consuls were only elected for a year. The Romans did not want a King who could rule as a Dictator and then be followed by his son. They did not want a family dynasty to rule the Republic.

"Father and Son" is a good business model but a recipe for disastrous religious leadership.

Julius Caesar destroyed the Republic by setting himself up as Dictator-for-life.

In 63 BC, Julius Caesar had bribed his way into being elected Pontiff, the High Priest of the Babylonian Mysteries. Caesar had total power as he was both the political and religious head.

The Old Testament never allowed that much power to a man as a king of Israel could not be a priest, much less the High Priest.

Grabbing power creates dangerous and ambitious enemies.

Caesar was killed, but in his will he adopted his sister’s grandson (who was later called Augustus) as his son and heir. As Caesar’s son, Augustus was able to fight for the rulership of the Romans and eventually became their Emperor.

Emperor is a polite word for what, in reality, is a Dictator. Rome thus became an Empire under a one-man dictatorial Emperor, not a Republic. The Emperor was also the religious Pontiff which gave him supreme power.

Thus, the Roman Empire which was a worldwide Dictatorship, got established by the process of "adoption by man".

Dictatorship was an effective way of ruling a large Empire.

After Caesar’s death, the people of the City of Pergamos got permission from Augustus to worship Julius Caesar as a god.

Augustus, who was Emperor and Pontiff, then gave the people of Pergamos permission to worship him as a god while he was still alive.

Making a god out of a leader is a good way of unifying a huge group of different nations.

Augustus adopted his stepson Tiberius, a murderer and abuser of children, who became the next Emperor.

Tiberius adopted Caligula. Caligula went mad and demanded to be worshiped as a god. He was succeeded by his uncle Claudius who was appointed by the army. Politics was now ruled by military might.

Claudius adopted Nero after marrying Nero’s mother. Five years later she poisoned Claudius so that Nero could become Emperor. Nero later had his mother killed.

Nero burned Rome and blamed the Christians. He then launched a vicious and deadly persecution of Christians in a reign of terror.

Nero died by suicide in AD 68. Ending the adoptive Dictatorial family dynasty of six members.

A succession of family members was not a long-term solution for the Dictatorship.

The Roman Catholic church, when it arose on the ruins of pagan Rome, refused to let a Pope marry to stop any family dynasty. A Council of Cardinals would choose the next Dictatorial ruler, called a Pope or Pontiff.

The Roman Catholic Church followed this Dictatorial pattern of Caesar’s family of Emperors. Each Catholic church has a Priest or Bishop in charge who rules it as a Dictator.

(The Protestants stole this idea from the Catholics by making the Pastor the head of a church).

The Pope is the only Dictator in Europe today as well as being the Pontiff of Mystery Babylon with its pagan 25 December birthday of the Pagan Roman sun god that has been turned into a Catholic Mass, called Christ’s Mass or Christmas. Satan also used this unscriptural “Christmas” when he fooled most of the Protestants too.

REVELATION 17:10  “And there are seven kings: five are fallen, and one is, and the other is not yet come; and when he cometh, he must continue a short space.”

A king is a Dictator, a one-man ruler.

Seven men turned the Roman Republic into a Succession of Dictators (who were called Emperors after Caesar’s death) where one man was the only political ruler as well as being the religious High Priest or Pontiff of the Babylonian Mysteries.

“Five are fallen”.  Julius Caesar. Augustus. Tiberius. Caligula. Claudius.

“And one is”.  Nero was alive as a depraved and horrific Dictator and Christian killer.

The apostle John was imprisoned on the Island of Patmos in AD 64 under Nero’s savage persecution and released in AD 68 when Nero died.

“And the other is not yet come; and when he cometh, he must continue a short space.”  This was Galba, a Roman general who usurped the position of Emperor but was killed seven months later. A usurper finished the line of Julius Caesar.

Then Domitian, from a completely different family, became Emperor in AD 81. He persecuted Christians and imprisoned John again for a second time. John was finally released in AD 96 when Domitian died.

Galba is a preview that the final Pope, the man of sin, will somehow usurp the position of Pope without being voted in by the Council of Cardinals. This final usurper will end the line of the succession of Popes.

In 2025 Pope Leo 14 was elected. The First American Pope.

William Branham had a vision of the Roman Catholic Church ruling America and ruining America.

DANIEL 11:20  “Then shall stand up in his estate a raiser of taxes in the glory of the kingdom: but within few days he shall be destroyed, neither in anger, nor in battle.”

“The glory of the kingdom” refers to the church world.

This sounds like a Pope who will have a brief reign but will be famous for collecting money.

Sounds like a big natural disaster will occur to America with its huge debt. Perhaps the sinking of Los Angeles in an earthquake and tidal wave. The world depends on the American economy. The Catholic Church is the only organization that could raise enough money to take over the ruined American economy. Then the Catholic church will rule America. [This is a possible scenario. It may happen differently].

A Pope will finally rule the world in great Tribulation

The Roman Catholics unscripturally made a Priest the head of a church.

Protestants stole this wrong idea by making a Pastor the head of the church.

Having one man as the head of a church is unscriptural as it leads to Dictatorship.

EPHESIANS 5:23  “For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and he is the saviour of the body.”

In the end, when the churches are forced to combine, their one-man Dictatorial ruler will the vile man of sin.

DANIEL 11:21  “And in his estate shall stand up a vile person, to whom they shall not give the honour of the kingdom: but he shall come in peaceably, and obtain the kingdom by flatteries.”

Then comes the man of sin who will not be given the Papacy by being elected by the Council of Cardinals. Somehow, he will usurp the position, like Galba did. He will be the final Pope who is destroyed at Armageddon.

“Adoption by man” was used to set up the Dictatorial rule of the Roman Emperors.

The Popes then picked up this Dictatorial power that was lost by the Roman Emperors.

REVELATION 17:11  “And the beast that was, and is not, even he is the eighth, and is of the seven, and goeth into perdition.”

The beast is the evil spirit that wants to rule the world.

“The beast was”. The beast is the Dictatorial-spirit or power that gave rise to the first family of Roman Emperors that ruled the world as Dictators.

“And is not”. Nero died and ended that first family succession of Dictatorial Emperors.

BUT, “and is not” also has a deeper meaning as it describes AD 476 when the Barbarians destroyed the beastly pagan Roman Empire, and no further Emperors ruled.

Satan had a big problem. The pagan Roman Emperors had ruled the large Roman Empire for about 500 years before the Empire became too weak and too bankrupt to protect itself.

Conquering territory and defeating armies was not a long-term solution to world power.  It cost too much and the world was too big, as Alexander the Great had discovered.

The green and yellow represent the size of the Eastern and Western Roman Empires. The Empire was massive for its day but very small in terms of the world’s land mass.

How could Satan rule the world when the Portuguese and the Spaniards learned to sail across oceans and reveal the full size of the earth?

When the Roman Empire ended in AD 476, Satan had to do some clever re-thinking as the huge spiritual power of the cruel and pagan Romans needed as new strategy.

The new Empire must be spiritual. They would conquer the minds of men in the different nations as a church. That required no army, just preachers.

Money for a worldwide church was an obvious problem. They hit upon a brilliant solution. They claimed there was no salvation outside the Roman Catholic church. If you paid in money to the church, the Pope could guarantee you a place in Heaven if you obeyed him and did not argue.

A fantastic idea. You paid the church instead of the church having to pay for huge armies.

The more the church spread, the more people came in and contributed wealth to the church. The richer the church got. Especially when they looted the silver mines in South America and the gold of the South American Inca Empire.

1.4 billion Catholics today is proof of the success of conquering the world as a wealthy church.

Protestants frantically copy this model with their megachurches and Prosperity Gospel.

They say, “I must be right with God because look how rich I am”.

The fake Catholic Christmas became the world’s best-seller, drawing Protestants into the Catholic camp.

Catholics and Protestants unite in their lust for money and power. They show little interest in understanding the revealed mysteries of the King James Bible.

The Catholic church started by infiltrating paganism into the church as it moved away from the written Word. Today, there are more than 2000 variations of Non-Catholic or Protestant churches that have followed this example as they spend their time justifying all the unscriptural things that they do.

Churchianity has replaced Christianity. Even same-sex marriage is now tolerated in churches.

Seven completes a system. Seven days in a week.

Eight forms a new system.

The power of the Roman Empire beast was killed but, on the seven hills of ancient Rome, the beast-spirit of pagan Rome resurrected back to life as the Roman Catholic church.

The new leader was the Pope.

“Even he is the eighth, and is of the seven”.

Eighth means a new system, a new Empire was conquering the minds of men as a church, not their territory as an army. But the Popes were OF THE NATURE of the first seven Roman leaders who called themselves Emperors but were one-man Dictators.

Each church was ruled by a Dictatorial ruler who was either a  Catholic Priest or the copy-cat Protestant Pastor (after the Reformation).

Why did the succession of Popes work so well?

Popes were not allowed to marry. So, there was no family dynasty.

I TIMOTHY 4:1  “Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils;”

I TIMOTHY 4:3  “Forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from meats”…

Forbidding Priests and Popes to marry is a doctrine of devils, as it forms the basis whereby the Popes can maintain their line of succession over almost 2000 years.

In addition, Catholics had to eat fish, not meat, on Fridays.

Friday is named after the pagan fish goddess Freya.

A Council of Cardinals was appointed by the Pope. They were free to choose the best candidate as the next Pope.

As they endlessly choose the best man, this succession of Popes will go on forever. It cannot be stopped until the man of sin usurps the headship of the church.

The succession of Popes forms a long snake. The final man of sin will be the deadly head of the snake.

REVELATION 17:8  “… when they behold the beast that was, and is not, and yet is.”

Catholics claim falsely that Peter was a Pope. Thus, there always was a Pope, according to them.

“And is not”. The Pope dies.

“And yet is”. A new Pope is elected.

The beast is the Dictatorial power of the Roman Catholic Church that took over from the pagan Roman Emperors. The Pope rules by intimidation.

Babylon uses force to make people believe.

Near the end, the Pope will rule America because the Catholic Church will take over America.

An American Pope is a big step in this direction.

Then America and the Vatican will be destroyed by Russian nuclear missiles.

By then, the final Pope will have moved to Jerusalem to imitate Christ.

Christ will head to Jerusalem to meet the 144000 Israelites. That is why, worldwide, the people want the Jews out of Israel. The liberal left hates Jesus and want to stop Him from meeting the Jews in Israel.

Then comes the climactic battle of Armageddon.

Jesus was adopted as a Son by Joseph

When Augustus was Emperor, Jesus was born.

God had to enter the human race to die for our sins as a fellow human Being.

That was achieved by the amazing miracle of the virgin birth.

MATTHEW 1:20  “But while he thought on these things, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a dream, saying, Joseph, thou son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife: for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost.”

The man who places the seed of life in a woman’s womb is the father of that baby who is conceived.

Thus, the Holy Ghost is the Father of Jesus.

A baby cannot have two fathers.

This establishes that the Holy Ghost is God the Father. They cannot be two separate Persons.

After His water baptism, Jesus stood on the bank of the River Jordan.

The Holy Ghost was manifested as a spiritual Dove coming down and resting UPON Him.

The Holy Ghost did not go INTO Him.

This was an outward anointing, not an inner filling with the Holy Ghost.

Jesus the Man was being anointed for God’s service.

This ceremony illustrated that the obedient Lamb must be guided and controlled by the Dove.

Our physical human nature must be in subjection to the spiritual guidance and purpose of God.

Everything that we do will only be effective if we line up with the Will of God which is the Word of God.

The Spirit of God alone knows the end from the beginning and thus only the Spirit of God can guide us, or drive us, down the right path of His choosing.

But Jesus is unique because He is the beginning and the ending. He is Almighty God.

REVELATION 1:8  “I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, saith the Lord, which is, and which was, and which is to come, the Almighty.”

MATTHEW 3:16  “And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up straightway out of the water: and, lo, the heavens were opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him:”

The Holy Ghost is the Father of Jesus. It is the Holy Ghost that spoke from Heaven and called Jesus “My beloved Son”.

MATTHEW 3:17  “And lo a voice from heaven, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”

NUMBERS 23:19  “God is not a man”.

God is a Spirit. God is not flesh and bone.

As a Man, Jesus is not God.

So why did Thomas call Him God?

JOHN 20:28  “And Thomas answered and said unto him, My Lord and my God.”

Because the fulness of the supernatural Godhead dwelled fully inside His human body.

COLOSSIANS 2:9  “For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily.”

You are everything that is in your body.

Jesus, as a natural Man, is God, because all of the supernatural God the Father dwelled within Him.

The manifestation of the supernatural Spirit of God as a Dove, coming down on Jesus, was the public anointing because Levites had to be thirty before they could minister to the people.

I CHRONICLES 6:16  “The sons of Levi; Gershom, Kohath, and Merari.”

NUMBERS 4:2  “Take the sum of the sons of Kohath from among the sons of Levi, after their families, by the house of their fathers,”

:3  “From thirty years old and upward even until fifty years old, all that enter into the host, to do the work in the tabernacle of the congregation.”

NUMBERS 4:30   “From thirty years old and upward even unto fifty years old shalt thou number them, every one that entereth into the service, to do the work of the tabernacle of the congregation.”

A Priest or Levite had to be thirty before the Jews would listen to him.

LUKE 3:22  “And the Holy Ghost descended in a bodily shape like a dove upon him, and a voice came from heaven, which said, Thou art my beloved Son; in thee I am well pleased.”

:23  “And Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of age, being (as was supposed) the son of Joseph, which was the son of Heli,”

The supernatural Spirit of God that fully dwelled in Jesus was publicly manifest as an outward  anointing of the natural Man, Jesus, and starting Him on His earthly ministry.

This anointing is often symbolized by pouring oil on the head of a man who is anointed.

Jesus ascended to Heaven and will stay there until His Second Coming.

ACTS 3:21  “Whom the heaven must receive until the times of restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began.”

Jesus sits on the Mercy Seat in Heaven to wash us from our sins in His blood, yet He was able to project His Spirit as a bright Light to Saul of Tarsus on the road to Damascus.

ACTS 9:3  “And as he [Saul of Tarsus] journeyed, he came near Damascus: and suddenly there shined round about him a light from heaven:”

ACTS 9:5  “And he [Saul] said, Who art thou, Lord? And the Lord said, I am Jesus whom thou persecutest: it is hard for thee to kick against the pricks.”

This is similar to the supernatural God living inside the Body of the Man Jesus, and yet able to project His Holy Spirit outwards, looking like a Dove that descended on Him.

Jesus cannot change as a Person.

HEBREWS 13:8  “Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever.”

LUKE 4:1  “And Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost returned from Jordan, and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness,”

If Jesus was full of the Holy Spirit after His water baptism, and if He cannot change, then He had to be full of the Holy Spirit before His water baptism too.

The mystery Priesthood of Melchizedek

The washing of Jesus in Jordan and His anointing by the Holy Spirit established Jesus as the High Priest of a new Priesthood that was older than Aaron and the Levitical Priesthood.

Jesus crossed the threshold when He was washed and anointed.

This introduced Him as the High Priest of the most ancient Priesthood. He became an intense new threat to the Levitical Priesthood. They wanted to destroy Him.

The Priesthood of Melchizedek claimed pre-eminence when Melchizedek as a Priest (God in a temporary body created from the dust) gave bread and wine to Abraham.

Bread, when broken to be eaten, represented the future death of Jesus. Wine represented His future resurrection.

When He died, Jesus became the Sacrifice for sin.

Thus, Jesus was both High Priest and Sacrifice. This totally eclipsed the Levitical Priesthood.

Jesus established His ancient time-honoured authority when He said He was before Abraham, the father of the Jews and great grandfather of Levi, from whom came the Levitical Priesthood.

JOHN 8:58  “Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was, I am.”

Not only was Abraham before the Levitical Priesthood, but Jesus was also, “I am”.

“I am” is God Himself, Who had spoken to Moses at the burning bush, long before Moses had washed and anointed Aaron as the first High Priest.

Aaron, the first High Priest of the Levitical Priesthood had to be washed and anointed.

EXODUS 40:12  “And thou shalt bring Aaron and his sons unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, and wash them with water.”

:13  “And thou shalt put upon Aaron the holy garments, and anoint him, and sanctify him; that he may minister unto me in the priest's office.”

Jesus had to follow the same pattern. But His anointing was done by the Holy Ghost, not by oil.

Jesus was baptized and anointed by the Holy Spirit to follow this pattern. That made Jesus the High Priest of the Melchizedek Priesthood as Joseph, the adoptive “father” of Jesus, was not from the tribe of Levi. Thus, Jesus had nothing to do with the Levitical Priesthood (which by then was very corrupt).

Melchizedek was the oldest Priesthood.  It now had a High Priest for the New Testament.

The Melchizedek Priesthood was going to be greater and far more effective than the Levitical Priesthood.

But the Levitical Priesthood first had to disqualify itself before the Melchizedek Priesthood could take over.

Jesus also had to be washed by John the Baptist as the sacrificial Lamb.

The Old Testament burnt offering represented Jesus as He carried our sins down into the Pit of Hell and walked over those awful fires to dump our sins on the Devil. Jesus gave the Devil a good hiding and took the keys of hell from him.

REVELATION 1:15  “And his feet like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace”.

Hell fire is associated with sin. Jesus was sinless so His feet could not be burnt up, though He carried the massive load of our sins. But the evidence of the intense heat was on His feet. His struggle against sin was far more intense and painful than what we can comprehend.

The Gentile image that Nebuchadnezzar saw had feet of clay and iron that represented the Bride and the Roman Catholic church in the seven church ages.

Jesus’ feet had been in the fire but emerged unharmed. His feet also represent the seven church ages. They represent the Bride who will have a hard time for 2000 years but eventually emerges safely, by God’s grace, at the Second Coming.

2 CHRONICLES 4:6  “He made also ten lavers, and put five on the right hand, and five on the left, to wash in them: such things as they offered for the burnt offering they washed in them; but the sea was for the priests to wash in.”

Ten lavers for the burnt offering represent the 5 wise virgins and the 5 foolish virgins in Matthew Chapter 25. Virgins are clean women. They represent saved people in the churches. Sadly, some Christians are fooled by their leaders and thus a future shock awaits them. These foolish, or fooled virgins, will wake up too late to buy oil before the Lord comes.

Buy means to pay a price, the price of being rejected by your family, friends, and church. Oil burns and that light illuminates the revealed Word of God so that the King James Bible can be read with understanding.

There is much of the Bible that the foolish virgins do not understand and they justify their ignorance by saying that they do not need to understand. That is a serious mistake.

DANIEL 12:10  “But the wise shall understand”.

To qualify as the wise virgins, we must understand the Scriptures.

But what is illuminated in the Bible is scary, when we start to search.

Not one parable about the end time church says anything good about the church.

Not one prophecy about the end time church says anything good about the church.

Crossing the Threshold

Crossing the threshold is an event that drives a person into understanding a deeper relationship with God.

That makes a person change because God has taken control of their lives and removes their self-will.

God’s Will takes over their lives and this results in a collision course with Satan as spiritual war is declared.

A person has to ignore the loud noise and thunder of self-praise that surrounds a church’s earth-shaking successes. Ignore the fiery rhetoric of gifted preachers who cannot prove their point just from Scripture.

Direction depends on disregarding the self-advertising noise of people and getting the signal, the scattered clues from the written King James Bible that the churches reject or ignore and never read.

The Bible becomes a small voice as few believe and understand all that is written.

But joining Bible verses together into a theme is our only accurate spiritual compass.

Jacob crossed a threshold at Peniel when he wrestled with God who was in a temporary human body. After that, he limped. He walked differently as he was weakened. And God could use him more effectively. God has to wrestle with us until he weakens our ego, vanity, selfishness, greed, and self-centredness and then we walk differently in humility, meekness, and obedience to the full Word of God.

Elijah crossed a threshold by learning to ignore the dramatic and spectacular tornado-like wind that broke rocks into pieces. Then the fearful shaking of an earthquake and a blazing fire were ignored. These were big in-your-face events that were so impressive and yet signified nothing.

I KIJNGS 19:11  “And he said, Go forth, and stand upon the mount before the LORD. And, behold, the LORD passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks before the LORD; but the LORD was not in the wind: and after the wind an earthquake; but the LORD was not in the earthquake:”

Then came a blazing fire. That demands attention as the most painful way of dying is to be burned to death. Yet this sensational and spectacular event also signified nothing of spiritual importance.

No human achievement is of any real spiritual value. Human success is a mirage that soon fades.

Nobody remembers the names of the millionaires in ancient Babylon.

Many very wealthy boxers ended up poor. Wealth and fame are fickle and temporary.

I KINGS 19:12  “And after the earthquake a fire; but the LORD was not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice.”

Then Elijah crossed the threshold as he took his attention away from everything big and noticeable.

He then only focused on what others overlooked as insignificant.

The still small voice that speaks to us from God’s Word. That is our only true guide.

ZECHARIAH 4:10  “For who hath despised the day of small things?

A threshold is where our direction is clarified.

We then know where to look for direction. We follow Jesus as He is revealed walking through the pages of His Word.

We need a new clarity as we must choose whether to stay in the familiar swamp of over 2000 different churches and denominations, or step into the unknown.

What worked yesterday will not sustain tomorrow.

Readiness happens in secret places where nobody watches or sees.

The Devil cannot stop what he cannot see.

Being unnoticed enables God to use us in ways that surprise the Devil.

But we must be ready to move and not hesitate. Our sails must be up when God sends the wind.

God is calling a third Exodus out of our busyness in the church business of the rich Laodiceans (where they make up their own form of religion) so that we can find direction back to the first church age of the apostles. We need that spiritual alignment and purpose rather than the distractions of modern-day doomscrolling on a smartphone.

Remember the goal.

Become like the first church age. Love the teachings of Saint Paul and the apostles.

Computers are crossing a threshold of becoming increasingly more powerful. That is only because engineers have learned how to make increasingly small microchips for the computers.

The smaller the chips, the more powerful the computer.

The more we listen to the Scriptures that the churches are rejecting, the smaller the group that we belong to and the humbler we become. Then we get closer to God as we have less people that we can rely on.

Jesus crossed a threshold with His baptism and anointing.

As the High Priest of the Melchizedek Priesthood, Jesus found Himself at war with Satan as Jesus had to atone for the sins of mankind.

By fulfilling the Word of God, Jesus automatically found Himself at war with the corrupt Jewish religious leaders. Pharisees and Sadducees were never mentioned in the Old Testament but during the Jews’ 70 years of captivity in Babylon, they had become the religious “church” leaders. A violent and greedy bunch, obsessed with power and money. Especially the power to take the people’s money.

Everything Jesus said and did after He left the River of Jordan was another step towards His fatal showdown with Satan at Calvary. Satan was like a bee with a stinger of Death. Satan could sting and kill any human because human flesh is rotten with sin, thus Satan would not lose his stinger.

Jesus looked weak and helpless. Falsely accused, insulted, spat-upon, and whipped, Jesus did not look like a conquering Messiah but rather like a defeated weakling.

This fooled Satan into stinging Him at midday, High Noon, as the ferocious battle between good and evil then raged for three hours.

This teaches us that we serve God better when we are weak rather than when we are strong.

The invisible supernatural Spirit of God the Father dwelled fully in the body of Jesus, hidden from the sight of Satan.

COLOSSIANS 2:9  “For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily.”

The supernatural Spirit of God, living within the man Jesus, grabbed the Stinger of Death and wrestled for three hours to pull it out of Satan.

Death lost his sting.

The sting of Death is sin. When a sinner dies, the sinner goes to hell. But Christ paid the price for sin at Calvary. Now, when a sinner repents that person becomes a believer. When a believer dies, that person goes to Heaven.

I CORINTHIANS 15:55  “O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?”

The Sun blacked out for those three hours as the Devil desperately tried to pull out his Stinger of Death. The Devil failed as Jesus was sinless. This darkness was supernatural and not an eclipse because the longest eclipse of the Sun is only 7½ minutes.

The Sun simply refused to shine when the Light of the world was being killed.

But in the process, Satan lost his power over Death.

Jesus now held the keys of Death.

God adopts sons by transforming them

Joseph effectively adopted Jesus as his Son by accepting him as his own Son and then raising Him. Because Joseph was a descendant of king David, Jesus thus inherited the right to be the King of the Jews, the Lion of the tribe of Judah.

Then came the big difference between God and Rome.

Roman men adopted a person as their son at the beginning.

God adopts His children at the end by changing our sinful bodies into glorified bodies at the resurrection and the rapture when God catches His Bride up to Heaven.

ROMANS 8:23  “And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.”

I CORINTHIANS 15:52  “In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.”

Our adoption occurs when our bodies are redeemed by being changed just after the resurrection of the dead.

This supernatural process will be known as the seven Thunders.

The seven Thunders will show us how to be transformed into eternal bodies.

63-0318 — THE FIRST SEAL

“And then there is coming forth seven mysterious Thunders that’s not even written at all. That’s right. And I believe that, through those Seven Thunders, will be revealed in the last days in order to get the Bride together for rapturing faith. Because, what we got right now, we wouldn’t be able to do it. There is something. We’ve got to step farther. We can’t have enough faith for Divine healing, hardly. We’ve got to have enough faith to be changed, in a moment, and be swept up out of this earth. And we’ll find that, after a while, the Lord willing, find where It’s written.”
We cannot be raptured now or caught up to Heaven to meet Jesus in these sinful bodies.

Our bodies have to be changed into immortal glorified bodies just like the glorified, resurrected body of Jesus.
I JOHN 3:2  “Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is.”

Only then will God adopt His sons and daughters and take them up to Heaven for the Wedding Supper.

God does not adopt His people as sons.

God adopts His sons when He transforms or transfigures them.

GALATIANS 4:5  “To redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.”

God will do the adoption OF sons, not the adoption AS sons.

The transfiguration of Jesus

The Holy Spirit descended at the River Jordan to anoint Jesus as High Priest of the Melchizedek Priesthood. Jesus was recognized as the Son of God.

JOHN 3:22  “And the Holy Ghost descended in a bodily shape like a dove upon him, and a voice came from heaven, which said, Thou art my beloved Son; in thee I am well pleased.”

Jesus then swung into action.

His next step was to be transfigured which signified that God the Father had accepted Him.

Jesus took Peter, James, and John up a high mountain. No easy destination. Climbing a high mountain is tiring and takes a lot of energy. This means that at the end, the going will get tough.

MATTHEW 17:2  “And was transfigured before them: and his face did shine as the sun, and his raiment was white as the light.”

Jesus suddenly changed and He began to glow with a heavenly light.

The invisible God signified the adoption of His Son by means of radiant light. His garments shone with a supernatural glow.

MATTHEW 17:3  “And, behold, there appeared unto them Moses and Elias talking with him.”

Moses represents the resurrection. Elijah represents the rapture to Heaven without dying.

Thus, the resurrection and the rapture are the times when the members of the Bride are transformed into their glorified bodies.

But a major problem is the Trinity spirit. We humans are easily fooled into thinking that someone is co-equal with Christ. We struggle to see Christ as Lord God Almighty, totally superior to everyone else.

MATTHEW 17:4  “Then answered Peter, and said unto Jesus, Lord, it is good for us to be here: if thou wilt, let us make here three tabernacles; one for thee, and one for Moses, and one for Elias.”

Peter saw three men and wanted to glorify each one with a tabernacle as if they were equal to Jesus. Three co-equal persons. This was totally wrong.

MATTHEWS 17:5  “While he yet spake, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them: and behold a voice out of the cloud, which said, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; hear ye him.”

God does not want any prophet to be promoted up to be equal with Jesus in any way.

Never call William Branham the Voice of God. There is no “Voice of God” in the New Testament.

60-0804  AS  THE  EAGLE  STIRRETH  UP  HER  NEST

We know the Bible is right; that's not my voice; that's God's voice, speaking.

63-0707   THE  INDICTMENT

I don't care what you believe; it's what the Bible says.

63-0630   THE  THIRD  EXODUS

for they can hear plainly the God's Voice, calling, through His Word

...  Listen to the Bible, the Voice of God

calling to you in this day.

MATTHEW 17:8  “And when they had lifted up their eyes, they saw no man, save Jesus only.”

Our focus must be on Jesus only.

In the end-time, the great revelation that the churches fail to grasp is that we see Jesus not as a Man but as the revealed Word of God that can be understood.

We are not perfect but we must have a perfect foundation for our faith.

Consequently, we are forced to regard the King James Version of the Bible as the Absolute Truth. If a Bible has any mistake in it, it is flawed and then you cannot build a perfect faith on a flawed foundation.

Levitical Priesthood was disqualified by Caiaphas

Caiaphas was the High Priest of the Levitical Priesthood. There was one Law that he had to obey. He was not allowed to tear his clothes.

If Caiaphas, as High Priest, broke that Law then he broke the Levitical Priesthood.

LEVITICUS 10:6  “And Moses said unto Aaron, and unto Eleazar and unto Ithamar, his sons, Uncover not your heads,

neither rend your clothes;

lest ye die, and lest wrath come upon all the people: but let your brethren, the whole house of Israel, bewail the burning which the LORD hath kindled.”

Aaron was the first High Priest. His sons would follow him when he died.

When Jesus as a Man stood before Caiaphas, the High Priest had two options.

Accept Jesus as Messiah and Emmanuel (God with us) or destroy Jesus as a threat to the High Priest’s position and wealth.

Matthew 26:65  “Then the high priest rent his clothes”…

saying, He hath spoken blasphemy; what further need have we of witnesses? behold, now ye have heard his blasphemy.”

His outer clothes were His robes of office that gave him his authority.

His undergarments meant nothing as all men wore undergarments.

By this act, Caiaphas broke the Law and ended the Levitical Priesthood.

God recognized this by tearing up the Temple veil.

MARK 15:38  “And the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom.”

From the top meant God was doing the tearing.

This disqualified the Temple and the Levitical Priesthood that ran the Temple.

Jesus died in the year AD 33.

Thirty seven years later the Roman army under General Titus burned down the Temple and much of the City of Jerusalem.

They killed 1.1 million Jews including the Temple Priests and the Sadducees and Pharisees, the entire corrupted religious leadership.

The Jews were exiled worldwide in AD 70 and only regained a small portion of their Promised Land in 1947 when this was granted by the United Nations.

Today, only 7 million of the world’s 16 million Jews are back in Israel.

Soon, the 7 Trumpets in Revelation Chapters 8 and 9 will drive the rest of the Jews back to Israel during the 3½ years of great Tribulation.

President Trump is a sign of the times that we are approaching the time of the 7 Trumpets.

When Caiaphas tore his robe the Levitical Priesthood ended and Jesus took over as High Priest of the ancient Priesthood of Melchizedek.

Jesus’ robe of office was a seamless coat that He wore. Four greedy Roman soldiers wanted to tear up this robe but at the last moment they decided to gamble for it.

The outer robe, that showed His office as the High Priest of the Order of Melchizedek was not torn up. That obeyed the Law of Moses and proved Jesus was the genuine High Priest.

Undergarments have no real meaning as they do not indicate either rank or office.

The four greedy soldiers at the cross tore the undergarments into four quarters.

JOHN 19:23  Then the soldiers, when they had crucified Jesus, took his garments, and made four parts, to every soldier a part; and also his coat: now the coat was without seam, woven from the top throughout.”

Something about His outer coat, that showed His office, stopped them from tearing it up. It had no seam. This represents that the Life of Jesus runs seamlessly through the Scriptures. It was woven from the top. Indicating that the Scriptures are written by God as He weaves His mysteries and His Commandments through the Bible.

The soldiers gambled for His coat and thus it was never torn. That established Jesus as the High Priest who replaced Caiaphas with his torn clothes.

JOHN 19:24  “They said therefore among themselves, Let us not rend it, but cast lots for it, whose it shall be: that the scripture might be fulfilled, which saith, They parted my raiment among them, and for my vesture they did cast lots. These things therefore the soldiers did.”

A new Priesthood arose on the Day of Pentecost.

PETER 2:9  “But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood,”

Who is Peter writing to?

Saved Christians, who as strangers are scattered around.

I PETER 1:1  “Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to the strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia,”

I PETER 1:5  “Who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.”

Strangers who are not known to the regular churches who claim to be the only truth-bearers.

65-0220 — GOD'S CHOSEN PLACE OF WORSHIP

“They think you have to belong to that certain church or you cannot go to Heaven. That’s wrong. To believe that, is antichrist. I say this: If you believe such a spirit, you’re lost. That’s a good sign you are lost, because it’s taking away from what God did.”

All saved Christians are Priests. There is no Priest above another Priest.

Only the High Priest is above a Priest.

63-0324  THE SEVENTH SEAL

“May you always bear that in mind: to be a gem in the crown of Jesus Christ. Paul said to the church, "You are the jewels, gems of His crown." We want to be the gems of the crown of Jesus Christ.

We don't want never put a man in it.

You forget anything about me. I am your brother, a sinner saved by grace, not fit to live;

that's exactly the truth; and I ain't saying that to be humble; that's facts.

There's nothing in me, not one sound thing at all.

But the grace of God has let my poor dimming eyes look beyond the curtain of time and see those things yonder, and I come back.

[See things in the future such as the Seventh Seal and the seven Thunders]

There's no great man among us.

We're not great men, not great women--we're all brothers and sisters, all the same in the same bracket. We're no great.

One don't make one greater than the other one--not a thing at all to do.

No, sir. But we're just all human beings.

Don't try to interpret the things.

Don't try to do anything more than just live a close life, giving praise and honor to Jesus Christ.”