1961-1963
He said to Noah back there, as we're getting into this morning, "It's going to rain." Why, there wasn't—never was a cloud in the sky. The biggest stream of water was a branch where God irrigated the land, a little spring somewhere. That was the biggest stream of water there was.
Now, people say, "How in the world is there going to come any water down from up there? Show me where it's at up there in all that hot sun (See?), if be any up there."
"If God said build an ark, that it's coming, it's my business to build the ark and get ready, 'cause it's coming. He's Jehovah-jireh; He can provide water up there."
And the only thing He done was let men, foolish, silly men, do exactly with his science, to bring to pass that what He knowed would come. God never destroyed the world; man destroys the world. God don't destroy nothing; God tries to preserve everything. Man destroys himself by his knowledge, like he did in the garden of Eden at the tree, so forth. And so some fanatic got ahold of some atomic power somewhere that... They had it.
They—they could work with it then, 'cause they could do things then with it that we have never learned yet. We are not that far advanced. Maybe take three or four years yet or more, 'fore we can do it, to do what they did. They built the pyramids and the sphinx and so forth. We could never do that. We couldn't reproduce that; there's no way for us to do it, only 'less we can get an atomic power. Gasoline power, electric power, wouldn't lift one of them boulders, wouldn't move it off the ground. And some of them are a city block high, up in the air, and weighing a billion tons. How'd they get them up there? See, they knowed.
And they let that loose; somebody let one of them atomic bombs fly into the screen of some other, back in the days, 'cause 'As it was in the days of Noah,' as it was, that kind of a civilization, that kind of a smart people. 'As it was in the days of Noah, so will it be, so will it be in the coming of the Son of man,' a repeat of what it was.
("Revelation Chapter 4, # 2 (Twenty-Four Elders)," January 1, 1961, message #61-0101)Comments:
Here the self-proclaimed prophet of the age, Wm. Branham, said that God didn't destroy the world by a flood. That directly contradicts what God Himself said in Genesis 6:13 where we read, "And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth." Furthermore, Wm. Branham also said God never destroys, but "tries" to preserve things. I suppose that since the flood actually happened, it means God didn't try hard enough! The fact is, God is the one who cursed the earth way back in Genesis 1. He builds up where He wills, and He destroys where He wills: "So that people may know from the rising to the setting of the sun That there is no one besides Me. I am the Lord, and there is no one else, The One forming light and creating darkness, Causing well-being and creating disaster; I am the Lord who does all these things." (Isaiah 45:6-8, NASB) Wm. Branham was quite wrong.
Finally, another problem we see is that Wm. Branham actually adds something to the Word of God when he said that man destroyed the earth himself with atomic power. Also, he said that the pyramids existed before the flood. If that were true, that would mean that the Egyptians pre-existed the flood (See, "God's Provided Way," message #53-1201, paragraph 56), and that they came back again after the flood, even though the Bible says that it wasn't until after the tower of Babel that God dispersed mankind into separate nations. Why would God allow a true prophet to make such egregiously false comments on His Word? He wouldn't, and that's why we know Wm. Branham was a false prophet.
Now, my precious brother, I know this is a tape also. Now, don't get excited. Let me say this with godly love. The hour has approached where I can't hold still on these things no more: too close to the coming. See? "Trinitarianism is of the devil." I say that THUS SAITH THE LORD.
("Revelation Chapter Four, #3 (Throne of Mercy and Judgment)," January 8, 1961, message #61-0108)Comments:
Wm. Branham just said that God tells us, "Trinitarianism is of the devil." As a Christian, that is a horrifying thing to hear someone say. Would a true prophet of God say something about God that denies what is so definitively revealed in the Bible? There are three passages in the Bible where, if we read them one after the other, there is no denying that God is One and revealed in three distinct, interrelational persons.Those 3 passages are:--Matthew 3:16-17Did Wm. Branham make that God-denying statement because he sincerely believed it? I have no doubt. But his belief was not based on what the Bible says, but on what he thought the Bible meant when it says, "Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one" (Deuteronomy 6:4). God is indeed One; one in essence which is Divine. But in the Divine, we see the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, which are distinct in Persons, yet each defined in the Bible as being God. The human mind has a hard time trying to understand that because we have nothing in our natural experiences that we can compare Him to. All we have are His Word and our faith to believe His Word to convince a true Christian that the doctrine of the Trinity is an accurate summary of the biblical revelatioin of God.
--John, chapters 14-17
--Matthew 28:19
I believe the hour will come when they'll actually find out that the world don't even run. I believe that with all my heart. I don't believe—how much they scientifically prove it or anything more. They done a lot of scientific proving they had to take back. See? God said the world stopped... The sun... I mean the sun stopped instead of the world (See?), the sun. I actually don't believe the sun... I—I—I don't believe the sun does what they say it does. I know the moon travels, and I believe the—the sun runs also. See? But some of them say, "He looked at the ignorance of Joshua (See?)," and said "He stopped the..." said, "It was..." Well, he said, "He stopped the world." I said, "Then you told me, 'if the—if the world would ever stop, it would just shoot like a comet through space.' See?" I said, "Then, what happened then?"
("Questions and Answers," January 12, 1961, message #61-0112)
Now, the star does not reflect its own light. The star reflects the light of the sun. Is that right? [A brother says, "No."—Ed.] Huh? ["In a sense. The moon does; the stars reflect their own light."—Ed.] Yeah, the moon... Yeah, really... I really mean that the moon reflects just the light. Yeah. Now, if a—if a star reflecting its light, then its light would have to come from the—from God, because it is a glacier of some sort. Isn't it? [The brother says, "Sun."—Ed.] Huh? A sun of itself, off of the sun. ["The suns farther away than our sun."—Ed.] Yeah. And they... We're told that those suns come from the big sun. The sun throwed these missiles off and they're little burning missiles like the sun. So they're amateur suns to us. Is that right? Amateur lights. ["Some are... Most of them are bigger than our sun."—Ed.] I mean to us, to us. See? We're talking about ourselves here. All right.
("Questions And Answers," tape, number 61-0112)
Now, we're made up of light meters. Inside of us is cosmic light. Now, that cosmic light is a light that they can take an x-ray with. The x-ray doesn't come from the x-ray light; it comes from your own light. And then if that cosmic light, say, could be pushed to a place to where not cosmic light but Eternal Light... God could dwell supremely, to do our thinking, do our walking, do our talking, then it's no longer the man; it's God in the man.
("The Messiah," January 17, 1961, message #61-0117)
Seeing our Pentecostal women dress in dresses that looks like they're skin tight. A woman said to me the other day, said, "But Brother Branham," said, "well, they don't make anything different from that." But they got sewing machines and goods, so there's no excuse. Jesus said, "If you..." Jesus said, "If you do that, you'll be guilty at the day of the judgment for committing adultery ." The Bible said, "Whosoever looketh upon a woman to lust after her, has committed adultery with her already in his heart." And you dress like that and a sinner looks at you, he's going to answer at the day of judgment, and you're going to answer for presenting yourself that way to him. So you're going to be guilty of committing adultery whether you went through the act or not, because said, "Whosoever looketh," and you present yourself.
("Expectation," February 7, 1961, message #61-0207)
But He [God] said, "I am El Shaddai. I am the breasted, mother God."
("Abraham’s Grace Covent," March 17, 1961, message #61-0317)
Remember, let me tell you, THUS SAITH THE SPIRIT OF GOD that's on me, this is the last sign to the Gentile church before the rapture. THUS SAITH THE WORD OF GOD, THUS SAITH THE HOLY SPIRIT that speaks, that, knows the secret of the heart, THUS SAITH THE LORD, you are receiving your last call. Call Me fanatic if you wish to and blaspheme the Holy Ghost.
("But It Wasn’t So From the Beginning," April 11, 1961, message #61-0411)
Now, someone, as I said last week, they said, "John wept because that he could find nobody worthy." It wasn't that. A man under the influence of the Holy Ghost wouldn't weep for that. Thought that, "'Cause he wasn't worthy," maybe John himself wasn't worthy. There's nobody worthy. But he didn't weep because of that. I believe he was weeping for joy because that he had seen the whole plan of redemption was wrote in this Book here. It wasn't because there wasn't nobody worthy, because there stood a Lamb right there was worthy. So he was weeping there, he said, "Oh, glory to God." Listen at him directly when he goes to shouting. Now, but we find him here weeping because that he was so happy because that the Lamb had taken the Book out of the hand of Him that set upon the throne…Then John started weep.
("Revelation Chapter Five," June 18, 1961, message #61-0618)Comments:
In this quote, William Branham directly contradicts the Bible where it specifically says in Revelation 5:4, "And I [John] wept much, because no man was found worthy to open and to read the book, neither to look thereon."
Get away from your Methodist, Baptist, Presbyterian ideas, your Pentecostal, Assemblies, oneness, threeness, and fiveness, whatever it is, Church of God, Nazarene, Pilgrim Holiness, Church of Christ: all antichrist movements. And I realize this strikes the world. All wrong, all of the devil... There's godly men in every one of them, godly people in every one of them movements, but the organization in itself is not of God, and God will never bless it. He never has done it.
(Gabriel's Instructions to Daniel," July 30, 1961, message #61-0730M)
You say, "But I'll tell you right now, I live a Christian life; I live a good, clean, sanctified life." That's true, but you've come to the showdown, come to the place, the borderline. And if you turn away from that, then it's impossible for those who were once enlightened..." See?
In other words, a man comes through justification; he goes, says "I believe I want to preach the Word." He gets saved; he said, "I'm tired of sin." All right. Then he goes out, and first he still smokes, and maybe he lusts or something. After while he says, "God, this is not becoming to a Christian, especially a minister, to look upon women in the wrong way, to smoke cigarettes," or; "I do take a sociable drink of beer with the fellows, but—and even my congregation, but it don't seem right. Sanctify me, Lord." And then the Lord sanctifies him, takes all that lust away from him, everything. Then he's a sanctified vessel. Then what God presents to him is the baptism of the Holy Ghost. To do that, he has to come out of that bunch he's with. There's where he shows his color; then he backs down. What does he do when he backs down? He tramps the Blood of Jesus Christ that sanctified him, as though it was an unholy thing, not able to take him over there. Then it's impossible for him to be saved. And then what does it was? But on to the fiery indignation and the judgment.
"Questions and Answers," October 15, 1961, message #61-1015M)
Even our altar calls that we have, in bringing people up around the altar, they didn't do that in the Bible time; that's a tradition of our people, originated formally in the Methodist church. But look, it's a good thing. I don't like this dry eyed repentance. I like to see somebody get up and really be sorry for what they done, and really mean it.
("Will I Find Faith When I Return?" May 8, 1951, message #51-0508)I've always been against an altar call. Might as well say it. I don't believe in them. There's no such a thing in the Bible. How can any man come 'less God calls him? You couldn't keep him away. You don't have to call anything if God's called him. Altar call's a Methodist idea. That's right. Altar call... They get ahold of them, say, "John, you know, your mother died a long time ago..."
"Oh, boo hoo; yes, brother; hoo hoo." That's not conversion.
("A True Sign That's Overlooked," November 12, 1961, message #61-1112)
THUS SAITH THE LORD. The baptism using the title of "Father, Son, Holy Ghost" is false. THUS SAITH THE LORD.
I command every one of you, on here or on tape, that hasn't been baptized in the Name of "Jesus Christ," be baptized again in the Name of Jesus Christ.
("A True Sign That's Overlooked," November 12, 1961, message #61-1112)
And when I can prove to you by written Word out of the Bible, exactly the days and years, that Peter never did leave Palestine but one time, and went to Babylon down by the Euphrates. Never was in Rome, by the Scriptures, THUS SAITH THE LORD. It's all a pagan idea.
("Christianity Versus Idolatry," December 17, 1961, message #61-1217)
My daughter back there, Rebekah, was saying, "Daddy, in school we proved that the… that there are millions and millions of years this world is old. Then isn't that contradictory to the Bible?"
"No, sir," I said. "It isn't."
"Well," said, "if the—the different study of rocks and formations, and stalactites and stalagmites and so forth, prove that, dripping, of millions of years, and God said He made the heavens and earth in one twenty-four hours, doesn't that misprove, disprove the Bible?"
I said, "No." If you'll notice, God telling Moses about the Bible, He said, "In the beginning God created the heavens and earth." Period! How long it took, that's none of our business. Then He goes ahead and begins to bring in His time of putting seed in the earth. But, "In the beginning," might have been hundreds of billions of trillions of years, aeons of time, but, "God created the heavens and the earth." Period! That settles that. That's the first step. See? He makes no mistakes.
("The Spoken Word is the Original Seed," March 18, 1962, message #62-0318)
Then, "Except a man be born again." Why must he be born again? He's dead, the flesh he's in. He's a hybrid. He's got to be born again. Why? He was born in sin, from Eve's sin, shaped in iniquity; come to the world, speaking lies.
("The Spoken Word is the Original Seed," March 18, 1962, message #62-0318)
Jesus may not come for another five thousand years. I don't know. He may be here yet tonight. He may come tomorrow. I don't know when He's coming; nobody else knows. Frankly, He don't even know Hisself. That's what He said. Nobody knows.
("Questions And Answers," May 27, 1962, message #62-0527)
Listen. Do you believe me to be His prophet? I haven't confessed that before. But I believe by saying it, the people will understand and know what I'm trying to get to you. There's people in here that's professing Christianity should be right here. Come, won't you? Let me ask you, how are you ever going to? You'll never receive another sign. This is it. THUS SAITH THE LORD. Would a prophet of God make a statement like that if it wasn't true? You're receiving your greatest sign, and your last sign, before the appearing of Christ.
("Jehovah-Jireh #3," July 7, 1962, message #62-0707)
Well, see, when people die, they—they don't immediately go up with God. . .
And when a Christian dies, he goes into the sixth dimension.
And God is in the seventh dimension.
("Present Stage of My Ministry," September 8, 1962, message #62-0908)
You get it? These people who died in here [Hebrews 11:32-40] are depending and waiting on us. So this church has got to come to perfection in order to bring the resurrection, and they're under—souls under the altar, waiting for this church to come to its perfection.
("The Stature of a Perfect Man," October 14, 1962, message #62-1014M)
And did you ever notice, our young boys has become Ricky and Elvis. You got a child named that, change it right quick, call him number one or two, or something. Don't... That's a horrible... You say, "What difference does the name mean?" Why, sure, it means something. Your name characterizes your life. "Now, Brother Branham, you're on numerology." No, I'm not. I'm on THUS SAITH THE LORD. Why was it when Jacob, he lived to his name as—as deceiver, supplanter, Jacob. And when God changed him, He changed his name. God changed Saul to Paul, Simon to Peter. Certainly, it has something. And Ricky and Elvis, and such names as that, is the modern American name which throws a child automatically right into that.
("The Voice Of God In This Last Days," January 20, 1963, message #63-0120M)
When man sinned, he separated himself from God and crossed a great chasm and put himself in death on this side. He left; there's no way back. Exactly. There's no way for him to get back. But then when he did, God accepted a substitute which was a lamb, or a goat, or a sheep, or something for blood, which Adam spoke of—or Abel spoke of on the other side of the chasm.
On that side he's a son of God; he's an offspring from God. He's an inheritance of the earth. He can control nature. He can speak into existence. Why, he's a creator himself. He's an offspring of God.
("God In Simplicity," March 17, 1963, message #63-0317M)
In the Old Testament when a man had been sold to slavery, there come a year of Jubilee every fifty years (forty-ninth year and then the year of Jubilee). And when a slave heard this, and he wanted to go free, there's—there isn't nothing that can keep him from going free. He can throw down his hoe and say, "So-long," go back home. The trumpet sounded. That's right.
But if he don't want to go, and he's satisfied with his slave master, then he's taken into the—the temple, and they take an awl (you know what an awl is), and they pierced his ear, and put a hole in his ear. And it's a mark that he can never go back. Is that right? He has to serve this master for all time. I don't care how many more times the Jubilee sounds, whatever happens, he's absolutely has—has sold out his birthright of being free.
And when a man turns down the Gospel Truth, Satan marks him. Where? At his ear. He deafens him so he can't hear the Truth no more. And he's finished. My. He stays with the group that he's with, if he won't hear the truth.
("The Second Seal," March 19, 1963, message #63-0319)
Now, there was a natural bride in the garden of Eden. (You remember last night?) That natural bride, she was Adam's sweetheart, not yet his wife, 'cause he hadn't knew her yet as a wife. Just like Mary was Joseph's wife, but he never knew her yet. She was found with a child. See? Now, before Adam knew his wife, she was just a bride to him.
("The Third Seal." March 20, 1963, message #63-0320)
Now, remember, before there was a grain of—of seed on the earth, before there was a sun that ever struck the earth, your body was laying on the earth, 'cause you are the dust of the earth. See? You are. God's the Contractor.
Now, the way He was going to do it was reach down and get like He did Adam, a little bunch of calcium, potash and cosmic light, and, "whew." [Brother Branham makes blowing sound—Ed.] Say, "There's My other son." See? Then He'd bring up some more and, "whew" [blowing sound—Ed.], "There's another one."
But what did Eve do? She corrupted that way, and she brought it through a sexual act; then death struck it.
("The Fourth Seal," March 21, 1963, message #63-0321)Comments:
Compare with Genesis 1:27-28 Where God tells Adam and Eve to multiply and replenish the earth.
I was talking to a person not long ago. He was trying to discuss with me and saying, "Aren't you ashamed to say that God created the heavens and earth in three days—or in six days?"
I said, "That's what the Bible said."
Said, "Well, we've got evidence and can prove that the world is millions of years old."
I said, "That didn't have anything to do with it. In Genesis 1:1, it said, 'In the beginning God created heavens and earth' period. See? That's all. Now, the world without form and void." And I said, "I believe every seed was laying right there from some other civilization or something, and as soon as the water lifted off and the light struck it, up come the trees and everything."
("The Fourth Seal," March 21, 1963, message #63-0321)
Jesus and the Father was the selfsame Person, just the same as the Holy Spirit in me. You're looking to me preaching, but it's not me. It's not me can speak a word that could bring, as you know, an animal; set there and looked at it, and kill the animal and eat it. That's creative power. That doesn't lay in a human being.
It's not me could take a little boy here laying—the doctors laying him on his back, with heart trouble tonight, and say, "Thus saith William Branham..." No. "THUS SAITH THE LORD, it's finished." And bring him down to the doctor the next day and it's all gone.
A kid with leukemia, till its eyes were bulged out, and yellow all over, and its stomach... until they taken it to the hospital to give it blood and things to even get it here; and in five minutes time, cry for a hamburger, and take it back to the doctor the next day and can't even find a trace of it. That's Thus Saith William Branham? That's THUS SAITH THE LORD. Yet He is an individual different from me, but the only way He's expressed is through me. See
That's how Jesus and the Father was. Jesus said, "It's not Me that doeth the works, it's My Father that dwelleth in Me."
("Questions and Answers on the Seals," March 24, 1963, message #63-0324M)
And now, today we are trying to educate people to that—to the scientific approach to God, and you can't do that. God is known not by science, but by faith we know God. And I'd say this, that—that a man can set down and look at a bunch of flowers, a bouquet, and study that thirty minutes sincerely with all of his heart, and know more about God than he did if he know—had all the degrees that a Bible school could give him.
("God Hiding Himself in Simplicity," April 12, 1963, message #63-0412E)
You know, sin is unbelief. You know... Did you know lying is not sin? Committing adultery, that's not sin. Drinking whiskey, smoking cigarettes, cursing, using the Lord's Name, that's not—that not sin. That's the attributes of unbelief. You do that because you're not a believer. There's only one thing... I said that one night in a Methodist church. And an old sister standing there, you know, with her collar up high, she said, "Reverend Branham, pray tell me, what is sin?" I said, "Unbelief." That's right. You do that because you're an unbeliever. If you do that, you're still an unbeliever. That's right. There's only two things: you're either a believer, or not a believer. So then, the—the Bible said, "He that believeth not is condemned already," See? So sin is... The only thing that it's the attributes of unbelief.
("Be Not Afraid," June 7, 1963, message #63-0607)
I said the people... I've never regarded myself... Anybody knowing this... But people have said, "Brother Branham, the Lord called you to be His prophet." Well, I—I've never regarded myself as that, but I begin to get to the time that I was about ready to do it: to think, "Well, maybe I am. If I am, I'll live back in the wilderness. And if I live back in the wilderness, then I'll—I'll—I'll be His prophet."
("Standing in the Gap," June 23, 1963, message #63-0623)
Oh, how it was He that said in prophecy to the vision, "It shall come to pass." It was He that said, "If one among you prophesies or sees a vision and tells it, and it comes to pass, then remember it's not him; it's Me. I am with him." Oh, my. What could I go on and say, it's He, it's He, it's He.
("Why Cry? Speak!" July 14, 1963, message #63-0714M)
Just what I've seen in my own ministry, seen Him done, you couldn't pile the volumes on this platform here, if I wrote it in details, what I seen Him do, just in my own ministry—seen Him do it. See? He had more success in my ministry, than He did in His own. Now, remember, He had more success now, not me; He had. Glory. Hallelujah. He had more success in Jeffersonville, than He did in Nazareth. He did. In that wicked city and this wicked city... Amen. Glory. 'Cause He could perform no miracles there, but He did here. He finally broke through here. He got it done here. He might've had to get people from somewhere else, but He got it done anyhow. So He had more success right here, than He did in—in Capernaum, or—or Nazareth in that... He done more miracles right here in this Tabernacle, than He did in the entire ministry on earth. That's right. He did it.
("The Token," September 1, 1963, message #63-0901M)
I've always felt... You... And all the people that's knowed me all these years knows I've always wanted to go west. You know how it is. It's always been something to the west. But because an astronomer told me one time the same thing, that I should go west... The stars, when they cross their cycles and so forth, I was born under that sign, and I'd never be a success in the east, I'd have to go west. And last year I took off west to—to fulfill what a lifetime's desire has been (See?) to—to do it.
("Souls That Are in Prison Now," November 10, 1963, message #63-1110M)
Do you know, God Almighty could command dinosaurs to come upon this earth; in the next hour, they'd be forty miles deep. You know, God could destroy this world with fleas? He could call for fleas. Where do they go when they die? What happens to the housefly? Whatever happens to the grasshopper? Wintertime comes and goes forty below zero; and go out the next spring, grasshoppers all over everywhere. Where did they come from? He's the Creator that speaks it into existence. He's God. Nature obeys His Word.
("He That is In You," November 10, 1963, message #63-1110E)
Like by the same means that the mother Eve corrupted the whole world to a physical death, the mother Eve... (Listen.) Mother Eve corrupted the whole human race by physical death. How? By rejecting the Word and accepting something almost like It. She caused all physical death because she left the true Word, and believed the true Word all but just a little bit. One little disagreement with the full Word of God caused every heartache, every death, and everything that's ever been on the earth. Eve done it, the mother of death. Now, you see where we're coming? The mother of death... Notice, she just disbelieved the Word.
("What Shall I Do With Jesus Called Christ?" November 24, 1963, message #63-1124M)
It's not easy for a person to go to hell. A man fights his way to hell. The first lie you ever told, you know it was wrong. The first cigarette you ever smoked, you knowed was wrong. The first evil you did, you knowed was wrong. But in your conscience told you it was wrong, but you continually run through the red light, run over the barricades. You're reckless; you want to do it anyhow; show you're some big guy. See? But remember, you fight your way to hell. It's not easy to go to hell.
("What Shall I Do With Jesus Called Christ?" November 24, 1963, message #63-1124M)