Matthew 17 - A preview of the end-time
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The biggest mistake at the end-time is to take our eyes off Jesus and lift up some man like Elijah
- A preview of the Second Coming of Jesus
- Three church ages restored the Bible truth
- Revelation 10 reveals the New Testament resurrection
- How the seven Thunders will affect the Jews
- The deceptive nature of the Trinity spirit
- No Christian must be elevated above other Christians
- There are two Elijahs
- The number of the Beast is the number of the man Peter
- The church can get a lot wrong
- Truth died but was then restored again
- Churches want payments for forgiveness
A preview of the Second Coming of Jesus
Jesus can only come when events on earth have reached the final stage of sinfulness. The churches must reach the final and relentless criticism of the King James Version of the Bible. Error and unbelief must sufficiently triumph in order to justify God demolishing our world systems. He can then clear the stage for the 1000-year Kingdom of peace to be established. This can be called the Millennium.
Why is the Millennium so important?
MATTHEW 17:1 And after six days Jesus taketh Peter, James, and John his brother, and bringeth them up into an high mountain apart,
“After six days”. This event happens on the seventh day.
Symbolic of the first six church ages that must be completed before the seventh church age produces the Coming of the Lord.
A day with God is as 1000 years.
II PETER 3:8 But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.
In the beginning, there were no humans so God did not have to use a human day of 24 hours. God used His own days.
For 6 days or 6000 years, God made the created earth into a suitable Paradise for man to dwell on, as described in Genesis Chapter 1.
The son of God Adam and his bride were left to rule the earth for the 7th day of 1000 years.
Somewhere in that time, they fell and sin entered. Satan wrecked God’s Plan and took over the earth.
Since then, God’s big problem is to restore His original Plan in spite of having to deal with us sinful humans who have free-will, selfishness, greed, arrogance, and a blindness to our own faults. We are not great material for God to have to work with. No wonder Satan is convinced that he can fool us all into joining his side.
Since Adam and Eve fell, Satan has ruled the earth for 6 days or 6000 years. His aim was to turn the Paradise of Eden into a hell-on-earth. You can judge how successful he has been. His rule will, however, end at Armageddon.
Then Jesus, as the Son of God, and His Bride, who are the resurrected church and the living wise virgins, will rule on earth to fulfill that 7th day.
The 7th day of rest as a 1000-year Kingdom or Millennium is of utmost importance to Jesus as this is the only part of God’s original great Plan that has not yet been achieved. Satan interrupted that 1000-year day of rest and there has been very little rest on the earth since then.
Then the New Testament Bible truth, which was revealed by the apostles in the first church age, was lost in the dirt and darkness of the Dark Ages. In the third church age, gross error entered with the unscriptural word Trinity at the Council of Nicaea in AD 325. The Triune God has no name. You cannot find one name for 3 People. Then the unscriptural Good Friday entered and by AD 350 the unscriptural Christmas on the pagan birthday of the sun god which was 25 December. More and more unscriptural ideas followed.
The Roman Catholic church was firmly established during those centuries when the Bible truth was lost after the first church age.
The major focus of God since the end of the Dark Ages, which was the fourth church age, has been to restore the original Bible beliefs of the first church age of the apostles.
Martin Luther in Germany would restore salvation by grace through faith alone in the 5th church age. John Wesley in England restored holiness and outreach in the 6th church age. Between 1604 and 1769 the King James Version of the Bible was translated and checked and re-checked. By that stage, Christians were saved and living decent lives and the great missionary age, starting around 1782 spread the King James Version of the Bible around the world. That opened the door in 1904 to the Welsh Revival and the 1906 Azusa Street Pentecostal revival in Los Angeles which started the 7th church age with the restoration of the supernatural gifts. The climax of this Holy Spirit restoration was for the mysteries of God to come down so that the written Word of God could finally be understood. This happened during the ministry of William Branham in America between 1947 and 1965. Since then the wise virgins should have been seeking to establish his quotes in the King James Version of the Bible. Brother Branham came to reveal the Scriptures, not to replace them.
The Bride now has to learn how to prove these revealed mysteries for themselves, from Scripture.
The quotes of brother Branham must be established from Scripture before they can be called the truth.
64-0823M QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS.1
But those who can accept the Word in Its fullness,
not me preaching It, because It's the Bible says so.
Those who accept that is free, because the Word's already been judged.
AN EXPOSITION OF THE 7 CHURCH AGES. CHAPTER 9. LAODICEAN CHURCH AGE
…for a true prophet will always lead one to the Word and bind the people to Jesus Christ and he won't tell the people to fear him or what he says, but to fear what the Word says.
62-0318 THE SPOKEN WORD IS THE ORIGINAL SEED.2
Now, all these things I've said, if they don't jive with the Bible, or dovetail with God's Word, they're wrong, they're wrong,
65-0801 THE GOD OF THIS EVIL AGE
… so that the peoples that has believed the Message
that the Lord Jesus has given me for this hour, might know what's taking place,
and placing it in the Scripture.
Three church ages restored the Bible truth
Jesus only took three disciples, Peter, James, and John to witness this great event on Mount Transfiguration.
These three men represented the restoration of Bible Truth in the 5th, 6th, and 7th church ages as described in Revelation Chapter 3. These three church ages must try to restore us back to the first church age beliefs.
There are three steps to natural birth. The water breaks, then the blood, and then the breath of life as the newborn takes his or her first breath.
There are three steps to the spiritual rebirth of the church.
In the 5th church age, Martin Luther preached Justification by faith alone, washed in the water of the Word.
In the 6th church age, John Wesley preached holiness or Sanctification, sins washed away in the Blood of the Lord Jesus.
In the 7th church age, the Pentecostal power was restored and William Branham revealed the deep mysteries of Scripture so that the baptism of the Holy Spirit could guide us into all truth.
JOHN 16:13 Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth:
60-1209 THE SARDISEAN CHURCH AGE
Justification is right here under Luther; and sanctification is here; and here is the Holy Spirit. See?
Now, that three elements that worked in those three church ages, that's what it takes to constitute the full birth.
They were only conceived as a little germ in the womb of the mother. That's right, the Holy Spirit coming to birth.
60-1209 THE SARDISEAN CHURCH AGE
Now I want to ask you something. When a natural birth takes place, what's the first thing happens? Water. The next thing? Blood. That right? Next thing? Spirit. That's right.
What came out of the body of Jesus when He died? They pierced His side, and water and Blood came out, "And into Thy hands I commend My Spirit." Water, Blood, Spirit.
It took the last three church ages to complete the restoration of the Bible truth that had died in the Dark Ages of unscriptural doctrines during the third and the fourth church ages.
“An high mountain”.
The Gentile image in the Book of Daniel was destroyed by a rock that grew into a mighty mountain, the symbol of the Millennium or 1000-year Kingdom of peace that follows Armageddon.
So, Jesus is giving us a preview of the events which happen just before the battle of Armageddon clears the stage of human sin, corruption, and unbelief.
He is making the disciples climb up the mountain of prophecy to give them a clear view of the future from the top.
This teaches us that we face an uphill struggle if we want to know the truth.
MATTHEW 17:2 And was transfigured before them:
and his face did shine as the sun,
and his raiment was white as the light.
There was a total change. A transfiguration.
His face shone like the sun.
When the sun rises and shines in its brightness, all the stars fade away and cannot be seen.
This warns us not to try to elevate some man into the place of Christ. No man can compete with Jesus or compare with Him.
The seven great messengers to the seven church ages are symbolized as stars in the right hand of Jesus.
REVELATION 1:20 The mystery of the seven stars which thou sawest in my right hand ...
The seven stars are the angels of the seven churches:
But no star can compete with the sun.
John the Baptist, the first forerunner, summed it all up well.
JOHN 3:30 He must increase, but I must decrease.
When will the Bride be transfigured? When they are changed into their new bodies?
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.
First, is the resurrection of the dead saints from the seven church ages. Then the changing of the bodies of the living Bride.
Revelation 10 reveals the New Testament resurrection
The mighty Angel of Revelation Chapter 10 comes down to raise the dead.
64-0119 SHALOM
And when the great Director comes down and bears that stick down, then, "time shall be no more."
When that Angel, of Revelation the 10th chapter,
puts one foot on land and one on the sea, and a rainbow over His head, He swore, "time shall be no more."
When that time comes, you will rise up from among the dead.
While the rest of them lay there, you will go in.
REVELATION 10:1 And I saw another mighty angel come down from heaven, clothed with a cloud: and a rainbow was upon his head,
and his face was as it were the sun,
and his feet as pillars of fire:
“His face did shine as the sun” Matthew 17:2
“His face was as it were the sun” Revelation 10:1
Jesus, on the mountain, was illustrating the ministry of the mighty Angel whose face shines like the sun, so brightly that it even brings light into the graves as the dead from the seven church ages rise.
MATTHEW 17:3 And, behold, there appeared unto them Moses and Elias talking with him.
Moses died and then Michael the Archangel took his body from Satan to resurrect Moses.
JUDE 1:9 Yet Michael the archangel, when contending with the devil he disputed about the body of Moses,
durst not bring against him a railing accusation, but said, The Lord rebuke thee.
55-0109 BEGINNING AND ENDING OF THE GENTILE DISPENSATION
Michael was Christ, of course,
When Jesus appears as an Angel then He is the top Angel, the Archangel Who is called Michael.
When Jesus comes as an Angel, then that is not a Coming of the Lord. His Second Coming is when He comes down in a Body of glorified flesh to catch up His Bride to Heaven.
“His face like the sun”. This symbol indicates that He produces the resurrection of the dead.
Look how the resurrection is symbolized on the mountain.
MATTHEW 17:3 And, behold, there appeared unto them Moses and Elias talking with him
First, they saw Moses who symbolized the resurrection of the dead Bride from the seven church ages.
Then they saw Elijah who symbolized the living Bride who, after the resurrection, will have their bodies changed and be caught up to Heaven as Elijah was.
Both Moses and Elijah were talking to Jesus. In other words, they were careful to be exactly Scriptural as Jesus is the Word.
But this Scripture has a compound meaning. It applies both to the church and to the Jews.
At the end-time, as the Bride moves up to Heaven then the Gospel will move over to the Jews.
It is rather like a relay race with the Gentile church passing the baton of Redemption onto the Jews.
The final redemption is the changing of the body to receive an immortal body. Then we cannot sin anymore.
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.
According to Revelation Chapter 10, when the mighty Angel raises the dead then there will be seven Thunders that utter their mysterious unwritten voices.
REVELATION 10:3 And
cried with a loud voice,
as when a lion roareth: and
when he had cried,
seven thunders uttered their voices.
“Cried with a loud voice” is exactly what Jesus did at the resurrection of Lazarus.
JOHN 11:43 And when he thus had spoken, he
cried with a loud voice,
Lazarus, come forth.
When the Angel cried with a loud voice the resurrection happened.
The resurrection of the dead will be the roar of the triumph of the Lion of the Tribe of Judah. Life has conquered Death.
Then after the Angel had cried there were 7 mysterious Thunders that have two functions to perform.
The Angel only comes down because all the mysteries have been revealed.
We will never understand the mysterious unwritten Thunders unless we have first been able to understand the written mysteries of the Scriptures.
The mighty Angel does not come down to reveal the mysteries, He comes down after the mysteries have been revealed.
He comes down because the mysteries are finished.
62-1230 IS THIS THE SIGN OF THE END SIR
But, this One didn't come from the earth. He come down from Heaven,
BECAUSE the mystery is all finished.
And when the mystery is finished, the Angel said, "Time shall be no more," and Seven Thunders throwed their voices out.
What if it is something to let us know how to enter into the Rapturing Faith?
Is it?
Will we run,
leap over walls?
And is there something fixing to happen, and these old, marred, vile bodies are going to be changed? Can I live to see it, O Lord? Is it so close that I'll see it? Is this the generation? Sirs, my brethren, what time is it? Where are we at?
II SAMUEL 22:30 For by thee I have run through a troop:
by my God have I leaped over a wall.
The troop of death will not be able to touch the living Bride at the time of the rapture or the catching up of the church.
The wall of time that separates our natural world from the supernatural.
We need new bodies in order to jump over that wall.
When you receive your immortal body you will step out of time into eternity. You will never age, get sick, or die.
The Thunders will reveal to us how to receive Rapturing Faith. We cannot be raptured in these present bodies. So the Thunders hold the key to showing us how to undergo the changing of the body into an immortal body. That will require great supernatural power.
“Leap over walls”.
63-0724 GOD DOESN'T CALL MAN TO JUDGMENT WITHOUT FIRST WARNING HIM
Oh, not many in number, but what a powerful group that's got Eternal Life! Said, "They shall run through a troop and leap over a wall."
Yes, the "troop" of death will have no holders to it, She'll run right through it.
Leap over the "wall" between natural and Supernatural,
and go into the arms of God, into that great Eternity. Lord God, we thank You for this. We know the time is approaching at hand.
Our changed bodies will easily move into the supernatural dimensions when we are caught up to meet the Lord in the air.
The seven Thunders will show the Bride how to prepare to be caught up to heaven.
How the seven Thunders will affect the Jews
The seven Thunders will give the Bride great supernatural power to change their bodies and be caught up to Heaven.
Moses and Elijah, the two Jewish prophets, will receive great supernatural power from the seven Thunders in order to interrupt nature as they protect Israel from the brutal armies of the final Pope.
63-0321 THE FOURTH SEAL
Now, we had him coming last night with his great sword to kill. We find out that he gets killed with the Sword too, the sword of the Word. God's Word, sharp, two-edged sword slays him, puts him right down.
Wait till them seven thunders utter their voices to that group who really can take the Word of God and hand it there. It'll slice and cut. And they can close the heavens;
they can shut this or do that, whatever they want to. Glory.
He will be slayed by the Word that proceeds from His mouth; it's sharper than a two-edged sword. They could call for a hundred billion tons of flies if they wanted to.
Elijah closed the heavens for 3½ years of drought. Moses called for flies.
Elias is the Greek for Elijah.
JAMES 5:17 Elias was a man subject to like passions as we are, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain: and it rained not on the earth by the space of three years and six months.
When the Bride goes up, Life leaves the earth and Death enters. Death is just the absence of life.
Great Tribulation starts but the two Jewish prophets will have been empowered with vast supernatural power so that they can control nature.
The deceptive nature of the Trinity spirit
Deeper visions easily produce human errors.
Peter saw this great supernatural event on the mountain top and promptly got totally the wrong revelation.
Seeing the supernatural does not mean that you know the truth.
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.
The Catholic church is built on the authority of Saint Peter. And here Peter got it wrong. He immediately began to think in terms of a Trinity of persons.
That is why the Catholic church imposed the Trinity doctrine on the churches in AD 325 at the Council of Nicaea. This doctrine is so firmly fixed in people’s minds that even the Protestants and non-Catholics believe it.
Notice, his three tabernacles will elevate Moses and Elijah to the same level as Jesus.
This warns us of a future spirit that would sweep through the Bride at the end time.
The elevation of the end-time Elijah to the Godhead as the infallible Voice of God is all wrong.
We are just as easily fooled at the end as Peter was fooled at the end of this great transfiguration experience. Fooled by the desire to elevate a holy man above the congregation or laity. A Nicolaitan spirit.
MATTHEW 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.
Because of this double error of wanting to elevate the two prophets to the place of Jesus as well as introducing three Persons as objects of worship, which is the basis of the Trinity, God blotted everything out.
The voice which spoke did not emphasize Elijah in any way. The voice that spoke did not refer to Elijah in any way.
The lesson God wants to teach the Bride at the end time is that you cannot compare Elijah to Jesus in any way. There is only one Person Who you can listen to. Jesus, Who is the Word of God.
Today Jesus speaks to us through His written Word, the King James Bible.
When Peter tried to compare Elijah to Jesus by building each of them a tabernacle, God simply blotted Elijah out of the scene. Then the voice spoke and put all the emphasis on Jesus, the Word of God, and Him alone.
“Hear ye Him”. Hear ye the written Bible. Prove everything that you believe from Scripture.
In other words, brother Branham as the end-time Elijah came to reveal and explain the Scriptures. He did not come to replace them.
MATTHEW 17:6 And when the disciples heard it, they fell on their face, and were sore afraid.
This event symbolizes the end-time. Peter had missed what the whole scene was about. The scene was to glorify Jesus but he interpreted it as meaning that he should also glorify Elijah and Moses. So much for human opinions. We cannot trust our own ideas. We must prove them from Scripture by joining the relevant Bible verses together. Only trust Scripture.
The top disciples got a sharp rebuke and were dead scared.
We should always be dead scared of not uplifting Jesus above every other person.
If we glorify brother Branham then we are heading for a painful rebuke in the 3.5 years of great Tribulation. The horror of that awful time will knock all that nonsense out of our heads.
We are not saved by inventing clever doctrines. We are saved by being strictly Scriptural and only uplifting Jesus.
No Christian must be elevated above other Christians
All saved Christians are priests. No priest is above another priest.
The only Person Who is above any priest is the High Priest, Jesus Christ.
MATTHEW 17:7 And Jesus came and touched them, and said, Arise, and be not afraid.
We must be touched in our hearts by Jesus. His Spirit must inflame our souls until His Holy Spirit guides us into all the truth that has been revealed in our day.
JOHN 16:13 Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth:
That is the evidence of the Holy Spirit baptism. Being able to understand the revealed truth of the Bible mysteries at the end-time.
MATTHEW 17:8 And when they had lifted up their eyes, they saw no man, save Jesus only.
They looked up and saw no man above them, only Jesus.
God does not want us to exalt any man, however powerful their ministry.
No priest is above another priest.
I PETER 2:9 But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood,
Every saved Christian is a priest and thus has nobody above them. We are all equal as brothers and sisters, however powerful a person’s ministry might be.
The only Person above a priest is the High Priest, Jesus Christ. He is the only Person that we must look up to.
Jesus is the only Person Who is Infallible as the Absolute Truth.
The only way to spread the Gospel is to lift up Jesus as Lord God Almighty, and believe that the Word of God, the King James Version of the Bible, is the only Absolute truth. Jesus is the Word.
JOHN 12:32 And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me.
Brag about Jesus as the Word and you can attract true converts to God.
Notice how Jesus says "I" twice, for emphasis.
Brag about a man and you make church-followers. Second-hand Christians.
This was the secret to the disciples’ success. They could see no man, only Jesus the Word of God.
Moses and Elijah were great prophets but they just faded away in the presence of Jesus, like bright stars fade when the sun rises. There is only one sun in the sky. There is only one Jesus in Heaven. Nobody can in any way compete or compare with Jesus.
MATTHEW 17:9 And as they came down from the mountain, Jesus charged them, saying, Tell the vision to no man, until the Son of man be risen again from the dead.
Moses represented the resurrected saints. But nobody would understand that until after the resurrection of Jesus.
They had seen the preview of the Second Coming. God will only turn to the Jews after the rapture.
So Elijah represented the raptured saints who will be caught up to meet the Lord in thr air.
Only when Jesus rose in the resurrection would He turn to the Gentiles and the church would be able to understand the deeper meaning of this glorious experience.
Elijah, William Branham, would play a big role in preparing the end-time Bride to understand the Scriptures of the New Testament so that they can be prepared for the Lord’s Coming.
But this event on the mountain had a double significance. After the Gentile church is caught up to meet the Lord in the air, then God will use the two prophets Moses and Elijah, to take the Gospel to the 144000 Jews.
There are two Elijahs
Jesus now explains a deep mystery that there are in fact two Elijahs.
The last prophecy of the Old Testament concerns Elijah and has a compound meaning.
MALACHI 4:5 Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD:
:6 And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse.
The above Scripture cannot be fulfilled by one man because it has two opposite directions for the truth to flow.
First, the fathers turn to the children.
In this case, the children have the truth. So, the children must be the younger generation of Jesus and the disciples. Jesus alone had the truth and He was teaching this to the disciples. The Jewish fathers had to turn away from their errors, which was their obsession with the Law which they had modified, and turn to their children and learn from those of their children whom Jesus had chosen as apostles.
God always turns those that are wrong to those that are right.
Then the second part of the verse cannot apply to that same situation because God will not turn the children who have the truth back to the errors of the Jewish fathers. There was no way that Jesus and the disciples had to turn to the older generation of Jewish Law-keepers to find the truth. The older generation of Jewish fathers was so deep in error that they crucified their Messiah, instead of turning to Him. They preferred to hold fast to their traditions rather than accept the revealed Word of their day.
Thus the sentence, “And the heart of the children to their fathers” was not involved with the ministry of John the Baptist.
So, a second Elijah must come on the scene to fulfill this half of the Scripture.
The disciples asked about Malachi’s prophecy concerning Elijah which the scribes would often refer to. Especially since it was the last prophecy of the Old Testament.
MATTHEW 17:10 And his disciples asked him, saying, Why then say the scribes that Elias must first come?
The disciples had totally missed the ministry of John the Baptist. They had no idea that he had fulfilled the first part of Malachi’s prophecy.
The angel spoke to John the Baptist’s father.
LUKE 1:13 But the angel said unto him, Fear not, Zacharias: for thy prayer is heard; and thy wife Elisabeth shall bear thee a son, and thou shalt call his name John.
LUKE 1:17 And he shall go before him in the spirit and power of Elias,
to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children,
and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just; to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.
The angel confirmed that John the Baptist would fulfill the first half of Malachi’s prophecy. The Jewish fathers had been disobedient to the Old Testament Scriptures and were totally unprepared for the first Coming of the Lord. They needed to turn to Jesus and His disciples.
The disciples had missed the ministry of the first forerunner, John the Baptist.
Today, message-followers have missed the ministry of the second forerunner who came to reveal the deep mysteries of Scripture. Instead of using his quotes to reveal an understanding of Scripture, they have used his quotes to replace Scripture.
It is very easy for disciples to miss the real purpose of the forerunner.
Today, message-followers make the sad mistake of elevating the forerunner, William Branham, to the Godhead by calling him the Son of man. The Voice of God.
MATTHEW 17:11 And Jesus answered and said unto them, Elias truly shall first come, and restore all things.
Elias is the Greek for Elijah.
Jesus gives an answer that first refers to the future and then refers to the past.
This clearly shows that there will be two Elijahs. The future Elijah will be involved with the Second Coming of the Lord just before the awful Tribulation time. Before God hits the earth with nuclear missiles and the curse of their lingering and deadly radiation.
Elijah’s main ministry is to reveal the mysteries of Scripture to us spiritual children of today so that he can restore us back to the first church age beliefs of the apostolic fathers.
When Jesus ascended to Heaven, the disciples who were the children of the older Jews then matured and became the fathers of the early church who established the New Testament.
In the end-time, we are the little children who have to be turned back to the Bible beliefs of the first church-age apostolic fathers.
MATTHEW 17:12 But I say unto you, That Elias is come already, and they knew him not, but have done unto him whatsoever they listed. Likewise shall also the Son of man suffer of them.
Jesus now refers back to John the Baptist and also calls him Elijah. The disciples never recognized John for who he was. They knew him as a man but did not grasp the significance of his ministry.
MATTHEW 17:13 Then the disciples understood that he spake unto them of John the Baptist.
John was the first of the two Elijahs. There has to be another Elijah to follow him in our day, just before the nuclear radiation curse of great Tribulation.
The disciples never understood John's ministry properly when he was preaching.
Today, the disciples of William Branham have also not properly understood his ministry.
He came to reveal the Bible but they feel that he came to replace the Bible.
Brother Branham is thus revered by many but understood by few.
The number of the Beast is the number of the man Peter
You cannot blame Peter as he never made these claims.
But the Catholic church promoted Peter to the position of deciding who can enter Heaven. They claim that he has the keys to Heaven and thus can open the Door to Heaven for whoever he wants to.
But only God can make that decision. So, that claims that Peter stands in the place of God.
Then the Pope claims this power as the successor of Peter.
But by changing the voice of the seventh angel into the Voice of God, the message-followers miss the purpose of his actual ministry. This promotes brother Branham into the Godhead as being infallible.
Promoting a man into the Godhead is a Catholic spirit.
In AD 754 Pope Stephen 2 in his forgery called the Donation of Constantine, then described Saint Peter as VICARIVS FILII DEI in Latin which means “In place of the Son of God”.
In Latin capital U is the same as capital V.
V is used instead of U because it is easier to carve straight lines rather than curves.
This idea has been copied as can be seen from the word PVBLIC.
In Latin the capital letters I, V, X, L, C, D, and M represent numbers.
I = 1, V = 5, L = 50, C = 100, and D = 500. (X = 10 and M =1000).
Replace each of these 5 letters with its relevant number.
V I C A R I V S F I L I I D E I
5 1 100 1 5 1 50 1 1 500 1
This adds up to a total of 666.
The mark of the beast is involved with promoting a man, Peter, to the Godhead in the place of Jesus, the Son of God.
Peter is not to blame for this as he never claimed that.
A score is 20.
REVELATION 13:18 Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.
Peter is the only man that VICARIVS FILII DEI has been applied to.
Vatican City is built around St Peter’s church which is shaped like a key.
The next diagram shows the outline of the wall around Vatican City, the smallest state or country on earth. St Peter’s church is shown in red. Vatican City is the dangerous "little horn" of Daniel's prophecies.
So, the whole Roman Catholic church rests on the authority of Peter standing with the keys to Heaven in the place of Jesus.
Every church that catches this Catholic spirit will promote a man to the Godhead so that his quotes can replace the Word of God.
The Pope was declared to be infallible in 1870.
The Roman Catholics do not regard the King James Bible as being the Absolute and infallible Truth.
Message-people are now calling brother Branham infallible and claiming that there are mistakes in the King James Bible. They are catching the Roman Catholic spirit.
The 1769 Version of the King James Bible is infallible as the Absolute Word of God. Jesus alone has this perfection.
No man can be infallible. No man is the Absolute.
The church can get a lot wrong
The church can be a serious problem rather than the solution.
Wrong spirits that make people believe wrong doctrines are a big problem amongst church people.
MATTHEW 17:14 And when they were come to the multitude, there came to him a certain man, kneeling down to him, and saying,
:15 Lord, have mercy on my son: for he is lunatick, and sore vexed: for ofttimes he falleth into the fire, and oft into the water.
MATTHEW 17:16 And I brought him to thy disciples, and they could not cure him.
People are often helpless and cannot cast out these wrong spirits.
MATTHEW 17:17 Then Jesus answered and said, O faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you? how long shall I suffer you? bring him hither to me.
Jesus is very unimpressed with the quality of His followers.
At the end of the 7th church age, the church of the Laodiceans is such a serious problem for Him that he has to stand outside the church.
REVELATION 3:14 And unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write;
:20 Behold, I stand at the door, and knock:
Few things are more deceptive than church people believing that they are right and serving God well when actually they do not know that they make more mistakes than what they get right.
The sign on the door says, Christian. The business inside is deception.
LUKE 17:10 So likewise ye, when ye shall have done all those things which are commanded you, say, We are unprofitable servants: we have done that which was our duty to do.
Unprofitable. They cost more than what they earned.
Even when we have done what we should do we still manage to make more mistakes than what we got right.
MATTHEW 17:18 And Jesus rebuked the devil; and he departed out of him: and the child was cured from that very hour.
This is a warning to us all. The devil is far more in our midst than what we realize and we are not able to get rid of him.
He is taking over our minds with his unscriptural ideas that cannot be proven from the Bible.
61-1119 PERFECT STRENGTH BY PERFECT WEAKNESS
Oh, my, talk about the lid off of the kettle:
demons going around, powers of the devil under the name of Christianity, teaching for doctrine the commandments of men,
theological seminary doctrines,
leaving the Bible alone.
Hallelujah. Who's able to... Who's strong enough, who's wise enough? Who's powerful enough to tame this legion
stripping the clothes off of our women in the name of preachers,
Methodist, Baptist, and even Pentecostal?
Painting their faces like Jezebel, and bobbing their hair, and wearing pants just like men, our preachers, not enough get up about them to tell them about it: devil-possessed...
It was the legion that tore his clothes off of him. Who is this roaring devil?
MATTHEW 17:19 Then came the disciples to Jesus apart, and said, Why could not we cast him out?
Human failure in the face of demonology that controls so much of our thinking.
The Devil is a tough opponent. He has got Christians believing many unscriptural things. That is why there are 45000 different types of churches and denominations. All different and all claiming to be right. There are over 100 different versions of the English Bible.
Satan is really making fools out of modern-day Christians who are all claiming to be right, despite all the enormous range of differences.
MATTHEW 17:20 And Jesus said unto them, Because of your unbelief: for verily I say unto you, If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you.
Moving a mountain. This has not been done before but will be done sometime. During the 3.5 years of great Tribulation the man of sin, the final Pope will push his armies and navy against Israel. Imagine hundreds of warships in the Mediterranean Sea as they head for Israel to bombard their cities. The prophets Moses and Elijah speak with the authority of their great supernatural power. A mountain flies into the air and crashes into the sea in the midst of the warships. The tidal waves that are generated would destroy the warships like matchsticks. By interrupting the laws of nature, Moses and Elijah will deliver the 144000 Jews until they accept Messiah.
The power that is available in God’s Word is awesome.
We can only build up our faith by better hearing and understanding the Scriptures.
We really need to know what God is trying to achieve in our present day.
MATTHEW 17:21 Howbeit this kind goeth not out but by prayer and fasting.
This calls for real dedication. The Devil is a dangerous enemy. We have to be totally dedicated to the King James Bible and not doubt it at all. Only if it is the Absolute truth can we build any worthwhile faith on the Bible. Finding a fault in the Bible just means we have a loophole in our faith and the Devil enters where there is any sign of weakness in our belief.
Prayer means contacting God. Fasting means denying self.
Success comes when we turn away from ourselves towards God. The Bible is the mind of Christ because it tells us how He thinks.
Truth died but was then restored again
Bible truth will die in the church during the Dark Ages but be restored during the last 3 church ages.
MATTHEW 17:22 And while they abode in Galilee, Jesus said unto them, The Son of man shall be betrayed into the hands of men:
Galilee is where Jesus started His ministry. He returns back to Galilee and stayed there.
That is telling us once again that the church must return to where it started with the New Testament beliefs of the apostles. Then we must stay with what the early church believed and not move away into some clever man-made ideas.
MATTHEW 17:23 And they shall kill him, and the third day he shall be raised again. And they were exceeding sorry.
The disciples were sorry. They were too wrapped up in their personal circumstances and thus did not understand God’s plan.
We have the same problem.
God has a Big Plan that He has to achieve and our personal circumstances will not divert God from His Plan. We must learn to fit into God’s Big Plan and accept our circumstances without complaint.
The Jews had a night of lockdown in Egypt and then they marched into a new life in the wilderness.
The COVID-19 coronavirus in 2020 forced us all into lockdown. God wants to lead us into new circumstances, not back into the old church-routine that the virus closed down. We all need a deeper insight into the mysteries of Scripture.
If you just go back to your same old church after the virus pandemic then you missed the reason why God closed all the churches down.
On the third day, Jesus raised from the dead to set a pattern for the church.
The church began under the apostles during the first church age.
Christ, the true Word, was in the midst or centre of the candlesticks. This was the first church age.
REVELATION 1:13 And in the midst of the seven candlesticks one like unto the Son of man,
In the 2nd church age, a one-man-church-head took over each church as a Bishop. This was the Nicolaitan spirit that God hates.
In the 3rd church age at the Nicaean Council in AD 325 the unscriptural Trinity entered the church. The truth was dying. God lost His name and gained a pagan birthday on 25 December. The Triune God has no name. You can't find one name for 3 People.
Bible truth died in the fourth church age of Thyatira (dominating woman) when the Roman Catholic church dominated Europe.
EVIL meant that the church was moving away from the beliefs of the apostolic church of the first church age.
Then came the restoration that began in the 5th church age with Martin Luther preaching salvation by grace through faith alone. John Wesley in the 6th church age preached holiness and outreach that led to the great missionary age.
Luther reversed EVIL to make it mean LIVE by moving back towards the first church age.
The 7th church age saw the Pentecostal revival and then William Branham revealed the Bible mysteries that should restore the last church back to the first church age.
The restoration took 3 church ages.
Christ rose from the dead on the third day.
The Bride would be restored to the Bible truth of the apostles and rise from the deadness of denominational man-made traditions during the third church age of restoration.
The church was restored during church ages 5, 6, and 7 as it strives to be restored back to the beliefs of the first church age.
At the end of the 7th church age, which is the 3rd age of restoration, Christ will resurrect the dead saints from the 7 church ages. Then the 7th age true church is pulled off the earth like the seed in the harvest is pulled off the plant. The Word seed in the harvest has to be the same as the Word seed in the first age church that was planted by the apostles.
Churches want payments for forgiveness
Christianity has become big business but you must pay if you want favours from God.
TV evangelists claim that their theories are the truth, even though there is much disagreement amongst themselves.
But every half-hour program is interrupted to advertise books and CDs for sale as well as reminding people about where their donations can be sent to.
According to them, if you want to know the truth you must pay.
MATTHEW 17:24 And when they were come to Capernaum, they that received tribute money came to Peter, and said, Doth not your master pay tribute?
Capernaum means the village of consolation.
We find consolation in repentance so that we can have forgiveness of our sins.
Then the Roman Catholic church decided that you had to pay for your sins to be forgiven. This was called Indulgences.
Rome wanted to build up a church that would rule the world. A world church-empire would need a lot of money to build it up.
Remember, Judas held the money bag.
MATTHEW 17:25 He saith, Yes. And when he was come into the house, Jesus prevented him, saying, What thinkest thou, Simon? of whom do the kings of the earth take custom or tribute? of their own children, or of strangers?
Kings do not tax their own children.
God is King of the Universe which includes the earth. Thus Jesus, as the Son of God, had no need to pay tribute.
But Peter said that Jesus did pay tribute. Thus Peter was claiming that Jesus was not the Son of God.
So Jesus prevented him or challenged him.
Despite what Peter had seen on the Mount of Transfiguration, he was still agreeing with the common opinion of the Jewish religious leaders that Jesus was just a man. It is almost impossible for humans to look at the Man Jesus and realize that He is the 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.
REVELATION 15:3 And they sing the song of Moses the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb, saying, Great and marvellous are thy works, Lord God Almighty; just and true are thy ways, thou King of saints.
:4 Who shall not fear thee, O Lord, and glorify thy name? for thou only art holy:
Only the Lamb is holy. If the Father and the Holy Spirit are separate People, then they cannot be holy.
MATTHEW 17:26 Peter saith unto him, Of strangers. Jesus saith unto him, Then are the children free.
Only strangers can be taxed. Born again Christians are the sons of God and must not be taxed.
The fish who swim unseen underwater represent the underground persecuted Christians in the Dark Ages.
The king who wore a crown in the church was the Pope who had great political power and taxed and demanded money from the people to build the Vatican City and spread its influence worldwide. This is the smallest country on earth. The deadly “little horn” of Daniel’s prophecies.
During the Dark Ages the Pope squeezed as much money out of the nations as he could. Religion became Big Business when people could buy indulgences to have their sins forgiven.
The sale of indulgences allowed the Popes to build the Sistine Chapel and Saint Peter's church in the Vatican.
The people suffered from these fraudulent payments that were worthless while the church lived in luxury.
Those Christians who are born again are the children of God. They have forgiveness of sins for free. They are free from having to pay the tax or tribute money for this false church system of buying forgiveness for sins or for learning Bible truth. Christians were never asked to pay money to put up church buildings and cathedrals (an unscriptural word).
The Bible never asked us to pay for a whole church hierarchy with elevated titles like Pope, Cardinal, Archbishop.
Meanwhile, Vatican City has grown to become the world’s wealthiest organization as it controls 1.4 billion Roman Catholics worldwide.
America must be careful. If they get hit by a natural disaster like a massive earthquake on the San Andreas fault line on the west coast of California, Catholic President Joe Biden would approach Vatican City for financial help.
The 2020 COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic caused Biden to borrow huge sums of money to rescue the economy. Thus this debt burden would hit America extremely hard if some natural disaster struck. Then the Catholic church would take financial control and lead America to ruin, as brother Branham saw in his 6th vision.
60-1113 CONDEMNATION BY REPRESENTATION
Then when these women help elect the wrong person, then I seen a great woman rise up in the United States, well-dressed and beautiful, but cruel in heart. She will either guide or lead this nation to ruination. (I've got in parenthesis "perhaps Catholic church.")
Many women voted for Biden because they did not like Trump, who had helped Israel, and Biden had promised to give money for abortions. So women will play their role of electing the wrong person.
Modern women want permission to kill unborn babies.
MATTHEW 17:27 Notwithstanding, lest we should offend them, go thou to the sea, and cast an hook, and take up the fish that first cometh up; and when thou hast opened his mouth, thou shalt find a piece of money: that take, and give unto them for me and thee.
It was almost as if the fish was paying tithes to Jesus. The fish owed Him from Noah’s day. All the drowned corpses floating around had given the fish a huge feast as the fish had benefitted from the Flood.
Jesus knew that this payment was unfair, but He paid up anyway.
This was a preview of how much money the Catholic church would raise unfairly in the Dark Ages.
Fish swim out of sight underwater. So, a fish also represents the persecuted church that stays out of sight. In the Dark Ages, the 3rd and 4th church ages, the true church was heavily persecuted by the Roman emperors and then by the Roman Catholic church. Tens of millions were killed and their goods and property confiscated by the church. Thus, a lot of the Roman Catholic church system was built up from this unfair confiscated money. Plus loot from the terrible crusades against the Muslims. The conquest of Mexico and South America made Spain and the Pope rich as the Catholic mercenaries murdered the local people and looted their gold and silver.
Other wrong payments made by the Catholic church during the Dark Ages were indulgences.
People were fooled into believing that they could pay for the forgiveness of their sins. This was Big Business at one stage. The money collected was used to build St Peter’s Church in the Vatican. Tetzel, who collected this money from the sale of indulgences made Martin Luther so angry that he began his public attack on the Pope’s money-raising system of indulgences in 1517. By 1520 Luther had launched the Reformation.
Jesus used Peter to collect the money. In later years the Pope, as the successor of Peter, collected the unfair sale of indulgences to build St Peter’s church.
Matthew Chapter 17 began with Peter getting a Trinity spirit to worship three men, Jesus, Moses, and Elijah. The Roman Catholic church developed and spread this Trinity spirit worldwide once they adopted Peter as their main leader, the so-called first Pope.
The unscriptural Trinity, the love of money, and elevating some man. This is the Catholic legacy that has spread throughout most churches.
By the end of the Dark Ages, the Roman Catholic church had established their power base in Europe and was spreading over the world thanks to the global empires of Portugal and Spain which were strongly Catholic nations.