Turning into the book of Amos 3:7 you will find the basis for our thought today. All of us, I am sure have one desire or goal in mind and grace of our Lord Jesus Christ! We can not merit that desire through our own good works. it is only by the grace of God can we achieve. Only then are we able to yield ourselves to him in order to allow Him to plant His revelation in and through our lives. Then and only then will we grow in the knowledge and stature of the Lord Jests Christ.
On occasion we are impressed to speak in behalf of this endtime message. trusting that as we sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus (Eph. 1:3) we can all understand and fully agree we are living in the last days just before the coming of Jesus Christ for his bride church. Our spiritual lives are determined or gaged on how we look at something which has happened here at the end of the age. We are dealing with a most familiar passage of scripture to those believers in the endtime message. In this message, with God’s help I trust we may be able to show you what the familiarity with this verse has done to the minds of certain people. As a matter of fact. some things can absolutely become so familiar to a person, if they are not careful their eyes may become blinded to its actual true meaning!
AMOS PROPHESIES TO ISRAEL
Amos 3:7 declares, Surely the Lord God will do nothing, but he revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets. The words uttered here were spoken by Amos the prophet in the 8th Century B.C. Amos the Prophet, according to his own testimony, was not the son of a prophet, nor did he descend from a prophetic line but instead was a herdsman and a gatherer of sycamore fruit (Amos 7:14-15) when God called him to become a prophet. God called him to prophesy warning judgment prophecies unto Israel. not Judah. Recall after Solomon’s death and after the break up of the twelve tribes they were then to be recognized as Israel and Judah, two sister nations. Only the ten northern tribes were known as the nation of Israel to whom Amos prophesied. No, it was not the two southern tribes known as the House of Judah he prophesied unto, in fact, you read while Amos was bringing judgment prophecies against the Baal religion and the heads of ten northern tribes, they informed Amos. this is the king’s place of worship, DO NOT DISTURB IT! We do not like your kind of prophesying! Go on down to Judah and prophesy–they enjoy that kind of prophecy. In other words, Amos your words are absolutely too harsh and strict for us up here in Israel. (Amos 7:12-13)
MOST MISINTERPRET VERSE
Therefore on the basis of Amos 3:7—may I say, this has become one of the most misinterpreted phrase of the hour, and has now received this interpretation—that only the word of the Lord comes to the prophet!! No, I am not on shaky ground concerning what I am about to say although some of you may be! Because many have so mistreated the scriptures, in their spiritual minds today they do not know what they actually do believe! They could not take the Bible and prove one thing! This poor, wretched, blind, naked, Laodicean religious world (Rev. 3:17) is in a mess today and because the age was prophesied almost 1900 years ago to be in this prophetic condition God knew centuries ago he would have to do something for a people in Laodicea in the seventh and final period of the grace age at this endtime, to straighten up certain people’s thinking and get them out of this religious, gentile mess they have drifted into. Thus we have lived too long with this modern philosophy or concept of religion–It doesn’t matter what you believe, as long as you believe in Jests. THAT IS PURE NONSENSE! No one can produce one verse of scripture to justify such a philosophy or statement as that!
SETTING OF AMOS 3:7
What setting prevailed in Israel causing Amos to prophesy that which he did in Amos 3:7? Thousands of years ago God permitted the children of Israel, the ten northern tribes, to be taken completely out of the land by Assyria which later was swallowed up by Babylon, the first world empire, which later was responsible for carrying Judah away. Throughout their years of captivity they all became dispersed throughout the Babylonian Empire. God did this to chasten Israel for her disobedience seeing she had already, many hundreds of years before, forsaken his word. However-during that period of time while Israel was forsaking God’s word for some new light of understanding. she was continually drifting deeper into that pagan apostasy of Baalism. Long ago Israel had already begun to branch off into their various erroneous theological schools of thought. And get this, the farther Israel drifted off into this deceptive trend of theology—theology which I remind you had to be taught by someone who claimed inspiration—the more they embraced misleading carnal ideas, superstitious trends, traditional ideas, etc., Israel continued on generation after generation in this state of being until finally God, becoming so provoked over Israel’s disobedience and their continual forsaking the right way or true revelation. was compelled to drive them all into captivity. Before the dark hour of Israel’s captivity she had sunk so low into idolatry and apostasy. being led by other spirits. it did not much matter to God which direction an Israelite drifted in their latest trend of apostate ideas! One idea was as perverted as the other! No person in that hour could say to another, I am better than you, they had all drifted far out of the will of God. Over and over God had warned Israel by the mouth of his prophets to return unto him.
THREE OFFICES OF OLD TESTAMENT
In the Old Testament period God had three offices through which he worked in order to speak, to guide and to deal with Israel. (1) When it was to bring forth his word. God used that prophetic office. (2) If it was for leadership in warfare, etc., that fell under the office of kingship. Recall Israel having a king was not God’s divine plan, however, because Israel desired to be ruled over by a king as other nations were, God gave them the office of a king. When time came for Israel to enter into battle God would anoint that king and he would lead the people into battle. (3) When it came to making in-tercession for Israel, the priestly office performed this role. The prophet was not to offer sacrifice. It was the priest who was ordained to offer sacrifices and burn in-cense.
ISRAEL’S PROPHETS-Major &Minor
As we begin to speak of Old Testament prophets, bear in mind you must deal with this word “prophets” under two categories. Major prophets and Minor prophets. Because if you do not, somewhere along the line you will miss God’s plan. God had warned Israel over and over by the mouth of many prophets. both major and minor, to return unto him. Nevertheless through these prophets was God’s way of showing mercy to his people before driving them off into captivity and national dispersion. Naturally whenever God purposed to do something it is absolutely true that he always speaks through that prophetic office. If it was time for that office to be exercised in a major capacity. God would do so.
HIGHEST PEAK IN PROPHETS MINISTRY
As a major prophet spoke. he always spoke with the terminology that the majority of his prophecies was a rebuking message to his generation. Though it was a rebuking message, dealing with Israel’s present tense perverted. religious condition, God would never forget while warning Israel of her idolatrous present tense condition, he would also con-tinually point them back. remin-ding them of the truth from which they had strayed! Never once did he tell them, you are perfectly alright, go right ahead. You are doing good’. NO SIR! That was God’s purpose in the first place, of sending forth a prophet. If the man wore the mantle of a major prophet. he was usually sent to Israel in an hour that while he prophesied against Israel’s present day apostate condition, in order to prove to Israel his office was genuine. God. through that man’s prophecy, would reach way out into the distant future and bring into the scope of his prophecy future prophetic statements and then return his prophetic statements back into the present tense hour where the prophet lived. Such prophesying as this was the highest peak of his calling. Why was it the highest peak of his calling? Because when that prophet, through the Spirit of God, looked into the future and produced a picture giving insight into something which God would be doing in the future ages, that prophecy would then become recorded in scripture and be carried down through the centuries of time until the hour arrived for God to actually fulfill what that prophet prophesied. Furthermore, you could rest assured, the majority of times God would have still another vessel of clay on the scene to take that prophecy and drive it straight home into the exact place it belonged! And remember, whenever that prophet did stand in his allotted hour. it was never to take any scripture and disassociate it from the rest of scriptures nor was he without understanding as to where the scripture belonged, not placing it still further out somewhere into the future. NO, GOD FORBID! As these prophets were raised up from generation to generation, and century to century, not only did they speak forth THUS SAITH THE LORD in their hour, they studied everything everyone else had spoken in prior times before them!
PART 2 – – – Watching Prophet Spirit Build Up And Climax In Christ
COMMUNICATING THROUGH THE SPIRIT
Had mankind never fallen from his original relationship with God, he would have never known the will of God only in part. Instead he would at all times have known the perfect mind of God. God is Spirit. Man, in his makeup, is spirit, therefore the will of the eternal creative father was to communicate to the inner man knowledge as to how he wanted his children live to please him. Since God is that great eternal spirit who does not walk with man like another person would, as Spirit that he is, how does he intend to fellowship man? By living in man’s vessel he would manifest himself to this creative inner man through the realm of the supernatural. Through the realm of the super-natural, you who are totally natural human beings, would be able to become acquainted with God.
DEGREE OF PROPHET SPIRIT
Isn’t it strange, after the fall of mankind, until Seth’s line began to multiply, do we see men begin to call on God. Why? Seth’s line had revelation! God communicated with man (Seth’s line) through the realm of the Spirit. Examine each patriarch’s life (in the Old Testament) and you will see a degree of that prophet spirit working in him. Note, if you will how this prophetic spirit will build up in pre-eminence as we watch God who is Spirit working in a prophet manifestation through Seth, Enoch, etc. Enoch, seventh generation from Adam, when his son was born, by divine inspiration named him Methuselah which meant—when he is gone, it will come! The birth of that child and knowledge of his name caused Enoch to begin walking in closer fellowship with God. As Enoch walked with God, it is easy to see the prophet spirit of Jehovah working through him. Jude declares Enoch prophesied the coming of the Lord with ten thousands (verses 14-15) of his saints to execute judgment on the ungodly. Enoch (seventh from Adam) prophesying that not only shows that prophetic spirit working through him but also sets a perfect type of the resurrection and translation of the saints at the end of seven church ages!
PROPHET SPIRIT IN NOAH
Look at Noah who is listed in Heb. 11:17 as one of the great patriarchs of faith, a preacher of righteousness. As I said before Noah did not suddenly step out in the dark by presumptuous faith saying, I got a funny feeling a flood is coming therefore I am going to build a boat. No, God supernaturally spoke to Noah and told him he was going to send a flood and for Noah to build a boat! No rain had ever fallen from the sky. The sky had never turned black or filled with lightning and thunder, much less a flood of water come down. God supernaturally spoke to a man who had never in his lifetime seen a flood. Speaking supernaturally to Noah was that prophetic spirit of Jehovah working through his creature! Those revelated words rang in his being, Noah build a boat. Next that same inspiration moved Noah to become a preaching prophet or a preacher of righteousness. This is about one of the first times we notice man inspired to preach.
PROPHETIC SPIRIT BUILDS UP
Using various individuals we want to continue watching that prophetic spirit as it continues to build up into preeminence in Christ! During Noah’s hour, nothing had as yet been inspirationally written because mankind lived such long lives they retained the knowledge of certain events and passed them down to successive generations.
PROPHETIC INSPIRATION MOVED ABRAHAM
Passing the flood and coming about ten generations we reach the call of Abraham where once again God speaks supernaturally. Abraham didn’t suddenly get the peculiar feeling like many people do today and call it inspiration. No, God spoke to Abraham through the Spirit and said, Abram, get thee out of thy country and from among thy kindred and come into a land which I will show thee. With those words ringing in Abraham’s ears, something was set in motion inside him. Abraham is a prophet because not only did God speak to him by means of the supernatural along the route to Canaan, God also spoke to him by vision and by means of angelic beings! Making his covenant with Abraham, God even appeared in theophany form and ate with him. Do you see Jehovah slowly building up that prophetic manifestation? After all, who is the prophet’s manifestation—Jehovah is! When Jehovah God chooses flesh, it is through that flesh that he might manifest his nature and portray his plan and will to benefit mankind. Thus we see, from generation to generation, God slowly building up this prophetic manifestation of himself in various men—for what purpose? It is the stepping stones to the day God himself will become also a man in flesh and he will be the prophet of all prophets! In Christ will lay every characteristic of that spirit which spoke from these patriarchs of old. Watch as time goes by, through each prophet, God gave even a greater insight and a revelation to his plan. Abraham’s insight was greater than Noah’s, Enoch’s or Seth’s.
PROPHETIC SPIRIT IN ISAIAH AND JACOB
Abraham’s sons now begin to appear and in a minor capacity they were prophets. Within .their lives, Isaac and Jacob each carried a manifestation of that Spirit of Jehovah. Remember in later years, when Isaac, almost blind, blessed his two sons (Jacob and Esau). Isaac was an inspirational prophet and inside him lay an inspired blessing. In Isaac dwelt that spirit to be able to speak the word and it would be fulfilled. God had already spoken in advance of Jacob when he was born; coming forth from his mother’s womb, holding onto Esau’s heel, wrestling with him. Did not the Spirit inspire Paul to declare what is not altogether written in the Genesis story—how God declared the elder shall serve the younger! After Jacob tricked Esau out of the inspired prophetic blessing he had to flee the land from his brother’s wrath. Jacob may have been out of God’s will being out of the land, nevertheless he was not out of God’s will where he journeyed unto because each time his father-in-law cheated him, God reversed the plot against the father-in-law. Recall how Jacob, that inspirational prophet, received knowledge when he peeled those saplings and placed white rings around them and supernaturally marked all the pregnant cattle, sheep and goats, at the waterhole Gem 30:38-39, and all babies born were speckled! Jacob had some kind of insight from above on what to do! Then comes the birth of Joseph, the prophet and dreamer. God used Joseph being a prophet to reveal through him the things which would affect his family, as Jacob’s family (70 souls) finally winds up down in Egypt for 400 years. Between Joseph and Moses is a period of Israelite history where very little is recorded—until Moses’ generation.
TYPES AND SHADOWS PORTRAYED GRACE
See, along the way God is building up to something, God is revealing his plan of redemption for mankind. However in the Old Testament God uses a certain genetic race to unfold his plan through, as well as record a book of letters, which is the history of his dealing with Israel. Through certain established types and shadows of the old period he might portray his next age (of grace) which would be the hour when he would deal with mankind in a universal law.
MOSES THE PROPHET
Moses was raised and educated in Egyptian culture in the house of Pharaoh, nevertheless he was of that special Jewish race or breed of people which God purposed to use ,to further unfold his plan. Finally the hour again arrives for God to deal with Israel and we see the call of Moses, who also is a prophet. When Moses was 20 perhaps he did not see this, however later on something began turning over in him. As we watch Moses in the Sinai we see how God begins to speak to him in a great supernatural way. First came the voice out of the burning bush, then came a sign in the hand also the use of a shepherd stick. From the desert to Egypt we see a prophet especially anointed of God for a specific purpose and now you are going to see the operation of Jehovah in a manner that no human, up till that day, ever saw it! The hand of God delivered Israel from Egypt, by the leadership of a prophet! Moses was a major prophet who took a greater pre-eminence in the role of that one particular office than any before him. Moses was also a writing prophet! Here for the first time man is used to write. Moses wrote the first five books of the Bible. The Israelites knew little about recording records of their people. Had not Moses been raised up in Pharaoh’s palace, it is doubtful he would have known much about recording records. Being educated in all the Egyptian learning, Moses was chosen by God and ordained with that natural ability to become Israel’s first writing prophet as well as being Israel’s law giver at Sinai. Moses is a diplomatic prophet referred to as a lawgiver, one sent with a prophetic message through whom God has made known a covenant for mankind.
PROPHESIES OF CHRIST THE PROPHET
Watch these special characteristics beginning to build up that prophetic office, especially in Deut. 18:18-19, concerning the very prophet which all other prophets foreshadowed. “A prophet like unto me will the Lord raise up of your brethren and him shall ye hear,” prophesied Moses. What does that mean? When the Prophet, Jesus Christ, arrives on the scene, in him would be the identical characteristics of purpose and objective of God as ex-pressed through Moses to Israel. Jesus Christ, horn of woman, born of the seed of Abraham would be that prophet who took upon himself the seed of David to fulfill the great covenant promises given unto Abraham. Who is behind that prophetic spirit which continues building up and projecting itself? God is! Unto what purpose? God is dealing with a race of people in order to lay a foundation through types and shadows which point to a future event (of grace), when he intends dealing in a far broader scope. Because then it would not only be of one race but for the races of the entire world!
PROPHETIC SPIRIT GIVES GREATER INSIGHT
Leaving Moses we enter into the period of the various judges, and passing through that period we enter the scene where men again walk in that major prophet capacity. Here came Isaiah who not only was an inspired writing prophet, he was also a seeing (vision) prophet as well as an exhorting prophet. In him was manifested that spirit of Jehovah even in a broader capacity. Isaiah saw the glory of God, witnessed angelic visitations and heard the voice of God. See, all the time that prophetic spirit enlarging itself!
SPIRIT OF CHRIST IN PROPHETS
For years Isaiah is inspired to speak and write and many prophecies are recorded. Because in this prophet also dwelt the Spirit of Christ (I Pet. 1:11) building a story, laying a foundation. From Isaiah we pass quickly to Jeremiah the weeping prophet, who lived in a time of great apostasy, shortly before Israel was carried away—the two southern tribes later also taken into captivity. Jeremiah also was an inspired writer as well as a judgment prophet used in an hour when Israel was being chastised, having forsaken God’s revelated ways. Standing at the temple he would prophesy, telling evil Israel all of the words of God.
JEREMIAH WEEPING PROPHET
In Israel was also prophets who prophesied as some do today. Jeremiah, the weeping prophet, would prophesy–you are going to be carried away into another land and I am going to tear down this place. You are wrong, some smart aleck false prophet would say as he slapped Jeremiah’s face—Thus saith the Lord, God is going to bless this place! That generation, like this generation today, will follow anything that claims they have some great anointing rather than sticking closer to the true quickened revelation power of the word! Remember, that true anointing always leads you straight into Bible truth! This is a day which the prophet of all prophets, the Lord Jesus himself, prophesied about, showing how it would be like this! The word is your only rescuer. Only those who will stand on this revelated word of truth will come out all right! Everything else will be shaken. Hosea prophesied, once more will I not only shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land, but I will shake all things! Paul said, this shaking means everything is going to be shaken which has not found its way into the perfect plan of God!
EZEKIEL HAS FUTURE GLIMPSE
Leaving Jeremiah we turn to Ezekiel the prophet who, along with Israel, was carried into Babylonian captivity. His prophecies dealt with both the condition causing their captivity as well as prophecies of the future regathering of the entire house Israel and the glorious thousand year reign of Christ when Christ reigns as king in the restored temple! No other prophet saw that! God gives his future glimpses to various prophets. Isaiah never saw Christ in the millennium glory sitting in the temple. Reading between the lines of certain scriptures you see him sitting there. From Ezekiel we go .to Daniel. The greatest height or peak of his prophecy was Israel’s seventy prophetic weeks! A mystery of Daniel which Jesus in Matt. 24 prophesied of shortly before his crucifixion said, when you see the abomination that maketh desolate, ,standing in the holy place Daniel spoke of, let him that readeth scripture understand. The holy place signifies the holy city and the holy temple ground.
MALACHI (MINOR PROPHET) PROPHESIED COMINGS OF ELIJAH’S SPIRIT
Leaving Daniel, we see the restoration of Judah from Babylon and the men serving as minor prophets were Zechariah and Haggai, men who dealt with present conditions of the hour. We jump quickly from them to Malachi, another minor prophet who has one of the shortest prophetic writings yet he prophesied both comings of the Lord and is the prophet who prophesied concerning that spirit of Elijah to be sent before both advents of Christ! There the chronology of the Old Testament prophets ceased. Remember, we have built a story. Surely the Lord will do nothing except he reveal his secret unto his servants the prophets. (Amos 3:7) Israel’s entire character is built around prophets!
JOHN SENT TO ANNOUNCE
Approximately four hundred years without prophetic inspiration passes in Israel. If Israel was ever visited in a supernatural way, it was by some man through which God operated. When they did not have prophets that no doubt is what caused them to go after Baal and other pagan gods! Suddenly down by the old crossing of the Jordan, exactly where Joshua led the children of Israel across in the sight of Jericho, appeared an odd looking character, resembling some backwoods wild man and everyone who came to the river to cross got yelled at–repent for the kingdom of the Lord is at hand! In this chronological order of the calling of prophets, what was John the Baptist? Scriptural wise he was the man who fulfilled Isaiah 40:3, the voice of one crying in the ‘wilderness. John is also the one in Mal. 3:1, behold I will send my messenger before my face. Here the Spirit of Christ the Lord speaks through Malachi saying, I will send someone to announce my appearing. That person was John! Also John was that spirit of Elijah seen in A-part of Mal. 4:5-6 not in the entirety. Because when the angel spoke to Zacharias the priest, concerning his son whose name would be called John, the angel said John would go before the Lord in the power and the spirit of Elijah to turn the heart of the fathers to the children! Note in Mal. 4 :5-6 where the angel stopped quoting! Everyone knew the ministry of John the Baptist—he had the forerunning spirit of that prophet upon him, which was the spirit of Elijah.
PROPHET OF ALL PROPHETS–JESUS CHRIST
Now we see the one called Jesus of Nazareth who fulfilled all scriptures. As far as the sacrifice lamb, being the seed of woman, the son of man, the seed of Abraham, the son of David–Christ took upon himself the seed of David—everyone of these scriptures he fulfilled! In those scriptures the prophets of old had continually pointed to this great climax and consummation of that one great spiritual prophetic movement projection of God himself–through man building to that climaxing hour!
PROPHETS UNTIL JOHN
One day Jesus declared, Lk. 16:16 the law and the prophets were until John. Since that time, the kingdom of God is preached and every man presseth into it. John not only was a preaching prophet but also an introducing prophet who announced there was going to be another dispensation of time referred to as kingdom of heaven. When Christ came on the scene he was that prophet of whom Moses spoke and because of his ministry as a seer he was always referred to as Jesus, the prophet of Nazareth. No need for any man to tell Jesus anything about another man, he knew all things about every man. Why? Because those who stood before him were standing in the presence of God himself!
CHRIST—FULFILLER OF THE PROPHET’S ROLE
Now if you can look at Jesus before Calvary from the other side of the cross, you will be able to see each prophet as the Spirit or anointing of Jehovah which is referred to in I Pet. 1:11 as the spirit of Christ in the prophet’s writings or speaking in them during their hour. See it was God building up a great profile of a plan. When Jesus said the law and the prophets were until John-what did he mean? He meant the hour hnti nrrivad when righteousness as far as the law being applicable was only until John. Since that time, as John announced another dispen-sation, that dispensation would go into effect or force once the death of the lamb of God had been con-summated. Like Moses who was a law giver and brought God’s covenant for that hour, it was nevertheless not placed in force until after the death of animal sacrifice was set in motion! Likewise, once God had given to mankind that new covenant, the covenant of grace, Christ also would be a lawgiver. However it would not become effective until after his own death!
COVENANT GOING INTO EFFECT AFTER DEATH OF SACRIFICE
Therefore in order for Christ to declare that covenant and be a lawgiver he had to be a prophet in like manner as was Moses. Jesus was also a preaching prophet because throughout all Galilee he preached the kingdom of God with all kinds of miracles and wonders following his ministry. Christ declared the law and the prophets were until John, meaning the dispensation of all that prophetic succession (irregardless of the periods of time between) was only until John. Since John had announced another dispensation, it shows the order of events dealing with Old Testament prophet offices is going to be changed! No, that does not annul Malachi’s prophecy concerning the last day prophet. But it is going to set in motion another order of ministry. Try to see it from the biblical standpoint—Jesus was a prophet on the other side of the cross. He was the one about whom Moses spoke as well as the one all the other prophets prophesied concerning. He climaxed that role! The miracles he performed caused Israel as well as those who saw him by revelation, to call him a prophet.
JESUS THE PROPHET OF NAZARETH
As he rode into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday on the back of a donkey, the priests, hearing all that mob screaming and carrying on, declared it was over the prophet, Jesus of Nazareth! See, from the other side of the cross Christ definitely was referred to as the prophet because the great story of prophets had been building up to him who is the central theme of the Bible! Christ, the Prophet, was none other than God himself in the flesh! Jesus, riding into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, 33 A.D. fulfilled prophesy in Zech. 9:9, thus climaxing the 69th prophetic week because Dan. 9:26 states, after 62 prophetic weeks Messiah shall be cutoff. Christ was cut off four days after the 69th prophetic week ended after having presented himself king to Israel. What a sight that was to behold–scripture was being fulfilled. Multitudes pulled palm branches and strewed them in his path as he entered through the temple gate called Gate Beautiful or Golden Gate. Multitudes were fulfilling Zechariah’s prophecy (Zech. 9:9) when they cried Hosannah, Hosannah, blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord! No wonder when some one told them to be quite Jesus remarked, if they hush up (now) the rocks will cry out! Up in the temple area, in the priest’s quarters those blinded priests hear all this commotion, and being totally unaware scrip-ture was being fulfilled, began to inquire–what is that commotion; who is making all that noise? Perhaps looking out the windows someone said, oh, it is that Jesus, the Prophet of Nazareth: Did you hear what they called Jesus? It is Jesus, the Prophet of Nazareth!The Jews recognized the things Jesus did caused him to be a prophet. Visit Israel today and ask any orthodox Jew if they believe in the man called Jesus? Sure they do! What do they believe about him? THEY BELIEVE HE WAS A PROPHET! THEY DO NOT BELIEVE HE WAS THE ANOINTED ONE, THE MESSIAH! Through what John had introduced and announced as well as what Jesus himself spoke showed he was also a preaching prophet. No, Christ never wrote anything himself, yet why do you suppose the first four gospels (of New Testament) were recorded? They are the records of what (the prophet) Jesus began to say and do! Not only was Christ a preaching prophet, he was also the seer of all prophets. Everything he spoke was an inspired word. The words I speak to you, they are Spirit and they are life, said he. I say or do nothing in myself. Though I may look like another man to you—in every essence of flesh he was a man but in every essence of eternal life and spirit, he was God! It waF that spirit in him which was the fulness of the Godhead–that Spirit which the other prophets had only a minor portion! Take all those Old Testament prophets and line them up (some being major and some minor prophets), Jesus’ office was, the climax–he was the major of all major prophets!
PART 3 – – – Prophet Role Ceases, And Fivefold Ministry Begins
Dying on the cross, Christ as a prophet set a new order as well as a new ministry in motion. The hundred and twenty who remained in the upper room received the same identical Spirit which was in him, only in him it was in the fullness of manifestation to fulfill every one of these scriptures which fulfills’ God’s plan. Christ made a covenant with mankind and set it in force by the offering of himself on the cross, yet it won’t become applicable nor accessible until his ascension.
NEW COVENANT CARRIES NEW ORDER OF MINISTRY
Entering into the presence of the Holy of Holies, Christ took on the appearance and authority of a high priest. Therefore when we pick up Paul’s new revelation concerning Christ we hear this Jew speak from this side of the cross looking back through the new covenant. Before, all the prophets had looked toward the cross and saw a figure who was a prophet. Paul, through revelation, looks back and since he is in the beginning of that first generation after Calvary, has a clear glimpse and revelation through the Holy Ghost as to what Christ is to this new age. The Old Testament prophets -would have pictured Christ hanging on a cross as the prophet to Israel, the Messiah, the seed of woman, son of man and son of David and all this! However Paul sees him from an entirely different standpoint! And get this, Paul is the one who had the revelation and wrote the largest part about Christ from this new side of Calvary! Had the gentiles never strayed from Paul’s revelatory teaching, you would not have needed Mal. 4:5-6 in its latter fulfillment! Though Malachi lived over four hundred years before Christ (the prophet) the inspiration or Spirit of Christ in him spoke and signified that the gentiles would absolutely stray from Paul’s teaching! The epistle of Hebrews is a letter directed to ‘the dispersed Hebrew Christians for remember what other people than Hebrew Christians could better understand Paul writing–he used the temple worship, priestly order, etc. This letter does not bypass gentiles though it does give prominence to Christian Hebrews.
FIRST JEW TO CALL CHRIST AN APOSTLE
What is Paul’s office? He is the apostle for the new covenant to the gentiles (not to the Jew). Paul knew Old Testament scripturalwise that the gospel was first offered to the Jew. Yet, by the authority invested in’ him he also knew once they had rejected it, it automatically became accessible to gentiles. Thus writing Hebrew Christians–Heb. 3:1, wherefore holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the Apostle and High Priest of our profession, Christ Jesus! Did you catch that? Paul is the first Jew who ever called Jesus Christ an apostle! Before, all Israelites had called Jesus the prophet of Nazareth. Why do you think they went out asking John the Baptist if he was that prophet about whom Moses spoke? Israel could only see a prophet. It was ordained to be. All scriptures built around their spiritual environment present that concept–he was a prophet! But Paul, representing the new covenant, the new dispensation which was now set in motion, saw the entire picture from this side of the cross. Moses the prophet was a lawgiver. He made a covenant. Christ was that prophet of whom Moses spoke. He too was a lawgiver. He made a covenant. This covenant was not only offered to the Jew, it is offered to the entire gentile world—Because Christ the central figure fulfilled all of those scriptures pointing to him! Therefore had the story ended with Christ, the prophet of all prophets, we would probably be in a different order today. However it did not end. It goes to show that once Christ fulfilled everything up to that point, something else is going to start being accessible and applicable from that point of the cross, on through still more time. Paul, a Jew, is the first man to call Christ an apostle! I wonder why Paul, from this side of the cross, never once referred to Jesus as a prophet? Because the new covenant Christ made is going to be of an entirely different nature and ministry than what the old covenant was! The first covenant was made to one race of people while his covenant (of grace) is made through which all mankind may be blessed! This will fulfill God’s promise unto Abraham–in thee and thy (one) seed shall all of the families of the earth be blessed. That seed, according to Paul’s revelation, was Christ, it was not a natural seed line (Gal. 3:29). It was that seed of promise—Jesus Christ! And for this seed of Abraham to bless the gentile world, it had to be through the accessibility of another covenant! Therefore Jesus is referred to by Paul as an apostle—ONE SENT! Now watch, if Christ was the prophet back on the other side of the cross to which all the prophets pointed, he would surely have to be the apostle of all apostles as well! He would be anything before and the head of everything after! Why? Because he is to receive all pre-eminence. Is it not written, he is the beginning and the end. Christ is the beginning of prophets and he is the end of prophets! He is the beginning of Apostles and he is the end of apostles! Paul referred to Jesus Christ as the apostle and high priest of our profession. Since Paul is the apostle of the grace age and has written more books than any other apostle, let us examine his teachings. It is odd all of those original ones were called apostles of that first age–Jude, James, John, Peter were all apostles. Whenever they wrote they never hesitated in saying so either. They were not trying to lift up their flesh, they were simply declaring their authority’ This is the day people don’t want any authority, yet one day there will be a body of people on earth who is going to have a few men within it to stand on this book. They are going to have authority to stablize the course of God’s people Today every man does as he pleases, yet it won’t be so in the true church of the living God. God will present certain circumstances and you are going to find yourself doing the will of God whether you want to or not–that is if you are one God foreknew. If you won’t, then there is a law of elimination. That is why I say, God is not going to change the religious confusion out there in the religious world. Sure there are fellows out there who call Themselves mighty prophets (such as Old Testament prophets) who declare great anointings. Yet strange their anointing never preaches or teaches the truth! The anointing of the Old Testament prophets hewed the line of the word! The anointing of the fivefold ministry in the New Testament always led them to preach the truth. Nevertheless the Bible declared it would be this way in the end. Just remember, in the beginning the anointing always taught truth yet we live in a day when men would rather tickle your ears with some fantastic sensation of some manifestation, declaring, I am so anointed. Thal kind of false anointing seem to turn into a ratrace with others to see who has the greater anointing.
PAUL’S NEW REVELATION
Paul declared Jesus was the apostle and high priest of our profession. I am sure Paul wasn’t changing the situation. If he knew enough to baptize the same way Peter did, I am sure he had sense enough to write this thing the correct way! Paul, writing about 64 A.D., to Ephesus, that model gentile church of the first age approximately seven or eight years after the church’s birth declared to them a wonderful revelation of the grace covenant which affected both Jew and gentile who made up the mystical body of Christ. Look back 1900 years ago and you would see true Jewish disciples sitting in that Ephesus church, alongside the Christian gentile. A few months previous these Jews worshipped in the Ephesi an synagogue, praying and chanting the old Hebrew prayers, reading the old scrolls and wondering—when will he come! One day Paul entered their midst and said, I have a revelation for you Jews as well as you gentile proselytes. Yes, he has come—Jesus Christ is his name. They hung him on a cross; they buried him but he arose; he has ascended upon high but he has sent back the Holy Ghost (the Spirit of the Lord) and he is in my heart ! You Jews can have him too! For three months Paul continued preaching in the Jewish synagogue and many accepted it. Later with his new converts, he was run out of the synagogue. Paul entered a school building and continued preaching and it was here during a three year period that the gentiles throughout all Asia were con-verted These gentile conversions was Paul’s signal ( his revelation alone) that the gospel which had been to the Jew first, was now being driven to the gentiles! Paul was the first Jewish apostle to see this! Encouraging the entire body (both Jew and gentile) of disciples at Ephesus. Paul is saying in Eph. 2:19–Now therefore ye (gentiles) are no more (considered as) strangers (by the Jew) and (you Jews are no more seen as) foreigners (by gentiles) but (together you are) fellow citizens with the saints and of the household of God. Converted Jew and gentiles are both fellow citizens now because they belong to a new kingdom, a new house. You Jews no longer sit in your synagogue looking down on the gentile proselyte, feeling he is a stranger Nor you gentiles who once attended the temple of Diana, don’t look upon Jews as foreigners anymore but in Christ ye are both fellowcitizens with all the saints (everywhere) and of the household of God. You both make up God’s spiritual house.
WHY APOSTLES BEFORE PROPHETS
Eph. 2:20—And (you) are (both) built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets. Why would Paul place New Testament apostles before Old Testament prophets when he knew the order—the prophets of the Old Testament had come first, then the apostles! Paul was aware no gentile could possibly understand how they had been brought into God’s plan unless they could first understand it through the eyes of the apostle’s revelation! Thus the gentile has to see his relationship in Christ by looking back through the apostle’s
revelation in order to understand what the prophets of old had prophesied about concerning them! For example, Hosea 1-2; Amos 9 and Acts 15 concerning the gentile church.
APOSTLE JAMES QUOTES AMOS THE PROPHET
Where James the apostle referred to Peter going to Cor-nelius’ house and how the gentiles received the Holy Ghost, James by revelation quoted a portion of what Amos the Old Testament prophet had prophesied–how God would take out of the gentiles a people for his name and when that period was fulfilled he would again return and build the tabernacle of David, close up the breeches and the gentiles would come (to it in the millen-nium) and glorify the Lord! Recall Amos prophesied that while the old Solomon temple was standing, yet here he prophesied there would be a rebuilt temple following the dispensation of the gentile church age! The gentile would have to see what the Old Testament prophets spoke through the revelation of the apostles.
BUILT ON FOUNDATION OF APOSTLES & PROPHETS
…And are built upon a foundation (your faith has been built upon a groundwork. Examine that groundwork through what the Apostle Paul taught. Looking back to the footing of what the Old Testament prophets had laid down, Paul says, Jesus Christ himself being the chief cornerstone. Christ is always the beginning. Note the Old Testament prophets prophesied what they did because the Spirit of Christ in them moved them to do so! All their prophecies hinge around and was built around this one thing! And as Paul stated, both the converted gentiles and Jews were built upon a holy foundation of the apostles and prophets! The apostles are placed first only because that allowed the gentiles to look back through the apostle’s revelation to understand what it is all about! Continuing on Paul states in Eph. 3:1, For this cause I Paul the prisoner of Jesus Christ for you gentiles. If ye have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which is given me to you-ward; how that by revelation he made known unto me the mystery (or his secret) as I wrote More in few words…Paul’s statement here carries the same meaning as seen in Amos 3:6-7, Surely the Lord will do nothing except he reveal his secret (his mystery) unto his servants the prophets. Given me to you-ward (all) means given for the benefit of you gentiles. Continuing in verse 4…Whereby when you read ye may understand my knowledge. In other words, if you will read this and look at what I am saying then you will know why I say what I do! If you can see what I am talking about–my knowledge in the mystery or secret of Christ.
THE MYSTERY REVEALED TO APOSTLES THAT WAS HIDDEN TO O.T. PROPHETS
Verse 5 looks back—which in other ages was not made known unto the prophets, the sons of men, as it is now…Get this, the word now brings the revelation into a present tense hour. Praise God, it leaves the past and comes over into the present as seen in chapter two. Therefore apostles will always be present this side of the cross but prophets as mentioned in Ch. 2 would be connected only to the old covenant and on the other side of the cross! By Paul saying, now the mystery is revealed, brings it all totally over unto this side of the cross! AS IT IS NOW REVEALED UNTO HIS HOLY APOSTLES AND PROPHETS BY THE SPIRIT! Amen. Verse 6, Paul speaking exclusively about the secret of the foundation itself (apostles and prophets)…that the gentiles should be fellowheirs and of the same body and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel. Paul is saying, God, through his revelation had made known to his apostles and prophets the new dispensation as they, by revelation of the Spirit, looked back into the old dispensation and looked into the framework or the pattern or foreshadow how God had included the gentile! Why did Paul do to the Romans in Ch. 9 as he did; why did he quote the Old Testament prophets Isaiah and Hosea? Because by that revelation he was invested with the authority to take all that revelation of Old Testament prophets and plant it this side of the cross and say, gentiles come on and get your portion! Beloved, God had revealed to a man named Paul a revelation which no prophet of old, though he prophesied it, had ever understood!
HOW ENDTIME PROPHET COULD CALL PAUL A PROPHET
Now you can see why the prophet to our age being in that Old Testament spirit of Elijah to fulfill Mal. 4:5-6, would call Paul a prophet. If that spirit on him is the spirit to fulfill that Old Testament prophecy, he would have to speak, feel and act in a major sense like that of the Old Testament prophets! If that be true, why would it not be then that Amos 3:7 would continually be in his bosom! Whatever you fulfill scriptural wise you can’t help but be moved by that revelation! However ask Paul to speak that way–you couldn’t get him to! Paul doesn’t see himself as a prophet, he can not see it, he sees it all strictly from this side of the cross. While it is true the man (the prophet ) lived on this side of the cross also and though his anointing is that to fulfill an Old Testament scripture, he does live on this side of the cross and his message would be to pick up here at the end of the grace age and declare to the gentile Christians collectively, you have strayed from the teachings of your apostolic fathers. Turn around, go back to it! He can point you, as far as your salvation is concerned, no further back than to what Paul laid down! Your salvation has to fit the New Testament scriptures that the gentiles had strayed from
Part 4 – – – Why One O.T. Prophet Office Placed Into N.T. Age
We realize it was Israel’s final prophet in the Old Testament period who prophesied concerning the last days when God would send forth that spirit of Elijah. For centuries within this grace age, too many gentile believers have wanted to look upon Mal. 4:5-6 only in the sense that this scripture refers to none other than John the Baptist who truly did come in the spirit and power of Elijah MK 1:17). True it was John the Baptist who fulfilled that role of the first advent in the New Testament of the spirit of Elijah! However, John’s role before the first advent of Christ was not the consummation of all the scripture of Mal. 4:5-6. It is just as biblical to say this same spirit of Elijah would also precede the second coming of Christ where he receives his Bible church unto himself (Eph. 5:27) as to say that spirit of Elijah would forerun the first advent of Christ in the person of John the Baptist. And here is why–because we gentiles would (at the close of this age) be just as far out of line with the holy scriptures and their true revelated teaching, and how we applied them, as was that Jew who heard the message in the day John the Baptist appeared at the Jordan River at the close of the law age briefly before the first advent of Christ. In. fact, in some sense the gentile believer of this hour was farther away from the true revelated teaching of scripture as taught by the original apostles than was the Jew believer of that hour from the teachings of Moses and the Law! Therefore it would be of necessity that God do something on earth to awaken a gentile people. to turn them around, to shake them up and bring them back to something.
JOHN’S ADVENT IS HISTORY
Isn’t it strange that for these 1900 years there is not a gentile religion 14 organization on earth which does not know and recognize that God sent John the Baptist before the first advent! They will not argue with you; they gladly accept it you know why? BECAUSE if IS HISTORY!! People can accept history, but O Brother, do they ever fuss over revelation! Remember, revelation which is present tense revelation is not history. No, it has not become history until it has already been fulfilled and has produced its purpose. ONLY THEN DOES IT BECOME HISTORY! Notice, wasn’t it strange the Judaistic church of that hour could not recognize John’s office–THEY HAD NO REVELATION! Yet everyone who, through the Spirit, did recognize John’s position or office became a disciple of John in his hour and later these same People received the revelation of 4 who that man of Galilee was whom John baptized and scripture says they left John and began to follow Jesus (Jn. 3:22-30). BELIEVERS SEE BY REVELATION It was from this following who first received the revelation who John was that later, by the Spirit, recognized who Christ was, who finally produced the New Testament church! I want you to know there was not a disciple throughout all the land in that hour who did not know God had sent that spirit of Elijah upon John into the earth! No, you did not have to stand in the assemblies and preach it every time they met! God had sent the spirit of Elijah upon a man before the first advent and they knew it! PAUL. AT EPHESUS Over 20 years after Pentecost Paul was at Ephesus and found certain disciples converted through the ministry of Apollos from Alexandria, Alexandria, Egypt, and Paul asked these 12 men (Acts 19:1-7)– dId You receive the Holy Ghost since (or when) you believed? Note, they were living on a past revelation because they answered-we not whether there be such a thing or not. Paul said, Unto what (or how, as stated in the Greek) were you baptized? Isn’t it a shame people will say it does not matter how you are baptized, just as long as you love the Lord! That is completely unscriptural! It was very important in the beginning of the church how you were baptized and it is still very important! How could you possibly take Col. 2:12, which states, ‘and we are buried with him in baptism’ if we are going to declare it is actually not important! When you make an issue on certain scriptures by declaring they are actually not important, then there are scriptures you must tear out of the Bible ! Scripture was never given nor spoken for anyone’s private interpretation. Private interpretation of scripture is when someone says, I see this part but as far as the rest of the verse–it is unimportant! Private interpretations produce private application, private experiences as well as private religion which usually ends up in the home! And when I say that, understand I am talking strictly about this private interpretation stuff!
WHAT O.T. PROPHET SPOKE BECAME SCRIPTURE
When the Lord had these words spoken in the Old Testament, “surely the Lord will do nothing but first he revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets”— remember whenever God was ready to do anything, whether it was to bring destruction or a blessing, a prophet was on the scene through which God revealed the truth of his intentions before it happened and when the prophet spoke it, it then became a part of the scriptures.
REVEALING SECRETS THROUGH O.T. PROPHETS
Let us examine Amos 3:7 in this light. Bear in mind, from that major prophetic office (whose word after being spoken becomes scripture) will always come that word of God. When a major prophet speaks and that part of his message which is not a rebuke begins to reach out and bring into the scope of the prophecy certain things concerning the future or begins laying down certain prophetic events for the future, this prophecy of the future is now going to add unto that already established or previous word of God which already is scripture, which also was established by that same kind of prophetic office earlier and this too, now becomes God’s word for all time. God’s moral law never changes, therefore it now becomes the word of God for all time, and it is only when the people stray from that spoken word, God brings on, in another decade still another major or minor prophet. Keep in mind, that prophet will never nor can he ever change the word of God which has already been spoken. no! That word already spoken must remain as is established for all times! But God, through that prophet, will reveal his secret which then becomes or which is his will as to what he (God) intends to do in order to answer the present situation.
PROPHETS REBUKED SIN IN ISRAEL
Look at the example of Amos and Hosea. God did not allow Israel (ten northern tribes) to drift for 390 years into apostasy once she had broken from the two southern tribes without sending them prophets! Thus Amos is called on the scene warning them. Here comes Hosea also warning them. And get this, neither of these prophets ever altered or changed the already established word of God which had been established for all times! Nevertheless Amos and Hosea were prophets and they too had God’s word for that hour. It is rebuking; it is exhorting and furthermore they make known into the people what God is going to do about the present situation. God did not allow the Assyrians to come in and take those ten northern tribes into captivity until first he warned them of their erroneous ways by the succession of many prophets.
O.T. PROPHECIES CARRY MEANING FOR N.T. BELIEVERS
Usually this was the fulfillment of the prophetic statements in which God would say, if you do not obey the word of my prophets, I will do such and such—and those things simply fell right in line. All down through the ages one prophet after another was sent to Israel to deal with the present situation at hand because all Israel had forsaken the word of God already delivered by prophets. Through these prophets, God continued dropping in those certain prophetic utterances which continued to keep building or were stepping stones, building a dispensational picture for the future. All these prophecies; all those utterances by these prophets will require much time to all culminate out there in the dispensation for which they were originally intended when spoken. Every one of these prophecies spoken along the way, somewhere brought forth little utterances which pointed toward this grace age according to the word of God spoken by the Apostle Paul in Eph. 3:1-7. When an Old Testament prophet prophesied (bringing in all those little phrases and nuggets concerning the grace age), I ask you, what was causing that prophet to prophesy or act in that manner? It was because the Spirit of Christ moved upon that prophet (I Pet. 1:10-11). Recall, Christ is the prophet of all prophets. therefore look at it in this respect– from the very beginning back in Genesis where prophetic inspiration began to fall upon men, watch this spirit 1st–Upon Enoch, Jude 14 Those prophetic utterances are stepping stones building a picture! Some of those prophetic utterances reached so far into the future they would never be fulfilled until the second advent of Christ! Yet in all that time God never took one of these prophecies out of the analysis of his word. They were laid or placed there and are to be stepping stones for his people that through revelation they walk or move forward toward the consummation of the ages.
MAL. 4 :5-6–TWO FULFILLMENTS
Look at this scripture of Amos 3:7, in the light of God sending the spirit of Elijah back into the earth before that dreadful day of the Lord (Mal. 4:6) as it appeared on John the Baptist to fulfill Mal. 4 :5-6 (A-part), I can truthfully say no living soul ever told me God would do that! Somehow while still in a denominational church I knew that! I received it out of the Book of Luke where Zacharias was in the temple and the angel appeared to him, telling him his wife Elizabeth, who was barren would bring forth a son and his name would be called John. And that he would go before the Lord in the power and the spirit of Elijah to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children (note the wording). When I saw that (turn the hearts of the fathers to the children), I said, that angel did not quote the remainder of Mal. 4:5! Then where does the remainder of the verse lay? Right then and there I knew somewhere this spirit of Elijah would definitely have to precede both comings of Christ!
MAL. 4: 5-6 NOT FULFILLED IN JEWISH RACE
Naturally our protestant denominations will quickly remark, Mal. 4:5-6 is to the Jewish race and will be fulfilled when one of the two prophets to Israel has stepped on the scene. That scene is recorded in Rev. 11, however, note that chapter is not the children being turned tack to the fathers as Malachi said the spirit of Elijah would do! Instead Rev. 11 shows the Jewish race being returned to the one they rejected during his first advent! I repeat, in both the 7th and 14th chapters of Revelation the Jews are not turning back to the faith of the fathers! Instead they are turning to the revelation of who Jesus Christ is because we note in Revelations they have their father’s name written in their forehead! It is the revelation of who Jesus Christ Is! If we gentile believers after 1900 years of every kind of churchanity and church programs are looked upon by Almighty God in Malachi as having strayed far away from the original teachings of the apostolic church (as we did) then it would take that spirit of Elijah here in the endtime to do something to turn us around, would it not! Don’t say that this gentile religious world has not strayed from original truth! They absolutely have! And if God permits this to continue another three years, they will stray even worse! This modern eccumenical unity which is being propagated is not unity based upon scriptures. Oh no! It is a unity which is a disguise of the devil. It is being propagated today using only the name of Jesus Christ and it is tremendously deceiving mankind! Now beloved, if that spirit of Elijah was to come into our day, is it not strange that it would be in our day exactly as it was in the day of Judaism! I ask you, were they searching for that spirit of Elijah”! Recall, concerning this spirit they had their own individual schools of thought and ideas along this line. That is clearly shown from the discussion of the three disciples asking Jesus what they did coming off the mountain (Matt. 17:10). They (the Jews) had their schools of thought, yet it was not running true to revelation! So is it today even in our gentile religious system. They have all kinds of schools of thought, no doubt some of them are good. They teach Jesus is coming soon. That is a wonderful thought ! People in denominations believe the Lord is coming soon, yet they are still spiritually asleep. Their spiritual alarm clock has not been correctly set to awaken them! Beloved, certain things are required which must set off an alarm in people’s spiritual minds in order to awaken them.
MESSENGER CRIES OUT
In Matt. 25:6 it took a cry or message to awaken all the sleeping virgins. The true church or the spiritual minded throughout the ages in every religious hour has believed that Jesus is coming. God intended for that blessed hope (Titus 2:13-14) to keep the spiritual minded aggressive and spiritually awake. Even in his day, Paul taught the coming of the Lord was soon and for believers not to become all tangled in worldly affairs. Paul’s revelation to the Thessalonians (2 Thes. 2:1-3) concerning the coming of the Lord and our being gathered together unto him (the catching away) mentions two things which must first happen before Christ comes for his own. First there must come that falling away and second the man of sin be revealed, who is none other than the son of perdition. See beloved, if it was not for the fact that God was to awaken and alarm us by spiritual fulfillment, everyone of us would still be asleep in our denominational ways and would walk headlong into satan’s trap! We would not anymore be able to recognize what time it was than anything! Therefore as shown in Christ’s parable (Matt. 25:6) the period which refers to the end of the age and who God would send at the end of the age, God sends us the spirit of Elijah to awaken and tell us it was time to trim our lamps (the Word of God) Psm. 119:105 and go out to meet the bridegroom!
PROPHET HAS HUMAN WEAKNESSES
That spirit of Elijah will rest upon a man who will react just like an Old Testament prophet would, who also is a human being with human weaknesses and human frailties. No, I am not fearful of where I stand in the word, yet in relation to this endtime message I am fearful and afraid of where many people are standing! That man would not come to say things nor would he cause things to be written which would add to or change in any way God’s word which is for all time already established! I repeat, what this man would do and say by revelation will by no means take away from God’s word which is already established for all times nor does it add to it! Well, someone may say, if he is a prophet, what does he do? His office is to reveal and to restore back the true revelated word which was already established, that word from which you and I have strayed! You may say, I am confused, I thought a prophet was to speak the word of the Lord! That is true but remember, Isaiah the prophet spoke many things which was not for you and I. It was strictly for his own wicked generation in which he lived. Recall, he prophesied in Isa. 40:3 saying, Lo, there is the voice of one crying in the wilderness, make his path straight. Just try to fulfill that again! You can not, it has already been fulfilled! Now that prophecy is history; that prophecy pertained strictly to John the Baptist. Thus, let it be recorded, that is the part of prophecy which is now history! There is no way you could make it alive or applicable to ever work again. Every prophecy which was fulfilled in the days of the first
advent of Christ can never be made to live again. They have already served their purpose, they are already fulfilled and have become history. That is why Peter, in his second sermon in Acts 3, warned those Jews to repent and be converted. After having given a geneology background of their Jewish fathers, on up through John and Christ including his crucifixion, he stated that all the scriptures he had previously referred to—hath God fulfilled! You can not ever rerun those again!
RESTORING OFFICE
Well, if you can not rerun all those scriptures again, what do we have to live on? There are other scriptures which are laying there in the book to be germinated and quickened to our hearts. As the church would come down through the ages she would stray from the teachings as well as stray from the unity which was in that early church. Therefore at the end of the age God would again send that spirit of Elijah. Not to write another book, NO, that is not what Mal. 4:5-6 (B-part) declared this spirit of Elijah would do! He is to take the one and only book the Bible, the holy scriptures which are already established for all time, and through a labor of love’ with a burdened heart and tear-filled eyes would hour upon hour throughout the years preach with words which fit his own vocabulary, words that fit his own terminology ; Words whichwere spoken to turn you and I back to the book of all books–THE BIBLE! HIS OFFICE MAKES HIM CHURCH AGE MESSENGER If all those denominational churches today who are working so hard for this great world unity called eccumenicalism knew how to apply this Bible, you could rest assured there would not be all this religious filth out there with which we are plagued today! Yes, God sent the church a prophet and because God did send a prophet who came in this Laodicean Age of grace his office also made him the messenger to the Laodicean Age. Yet the gentile religious world with their great earthly denominational headquarters could never accept that fact! They are just as blind as the Jewish leaders were in their hour when that spirit of Elijah came to forerun the first coming of Christ! Let us lift the setting out of that period and place it down in this hour before the coming of Christ who receives all he purchased at Calvary, place it upon a level where you and I live and are af-fected by what God did in this hour to straighten up people’s thinking concerning the holy scriptures. Get this, if this man is standing in the spirit of Elijah, then he too must also speak in much the same term, right? His personality also has to react in much the same likeness as it did on John the Baptist as well as on the original man named Elijah. (1) he must speak in the terms much like an Old Testament prophet would. To do so he automatically uses that scripture of Amos 3:7 or shall we say that scripture would also apply to his ministry—-Surely the Lord will do nothing but he revealeth his secret unto his servants the (many) prophets. Note, prophets is plural, not singular!. His ministry would also be included in Amos 3:7, moreover if that spirit of Elijah is to come at the end time to turn the hearts of the children back to the fathers, truly that man, because he is living at the end of the gentile church age of grace in the Laodicean Age would definitely be the Laodicean Church Age Messenger. However, in all that it won’t change his actions or his spiritual feelings. He must still characterize that spirit!
DOES THE WORD TODAY COME ONLY UNTO PROPHETS?
Within this endtime movement today there are those who carry this verse (Amos 3:7) to such an extreme it causes heartache everywhere! They carry it into this stream of thinking—The word of the Lord comes ONLY to a prophet! If you are going to live in the Old Testament, you could absolutely say it that way. However, if you live under the grace age, don’t you ever say that! Christ the prophet of all prophets who climaxed and finished the old covenant including the role of prophets. both major and minor ushered in a completely new covenant of grace. With it came a new and entirely different ministry from that of the O.T. prophet office (Amos 3:7). In this new ministry the word of God came strictly to the apostle office. Recall, Christ in Luke 16:16 declared the law and prophets were only unto John, since then the kingdom is preached. With this new covenant came a new fivefold ministry office (Eph. 4:11-12) –The apostleship headed this new ministry. The first twelve men Christ called into the ministry in reference to the new covenant were apostles, NOT PROPHETS! Paul, the one who later declared himself to be an apostle born out of due season, declared Christ to be an apostle (not a prophet). Paul never once declared Jesus nor himself as a prophet! Why? Because as already stated, Paul is on this side of the cross and saw everything from the grace covenant picture therefore he only saw Christ as the apostle of all apostles! In reference to the question, in this hour of the grace age does the Spirit of Christ still speak only to an O.T. prophet? The answer is. POSITIVELY NOT! The scripture shows O.T. prophets do not appear in a N.T. covenant! Therefore, if the word of the Lord came only to an O.T. prophet, none of the apostles under the new covenant would have ever received anything from God! Yet Paul stated the apostle office under the new covenant of grace was given far more revelation or shown far more secret things on the scriptures in the O.T. which pertain to this grace age than were shown the O.T. prophets (Eph. 3:5) who had ac-tually prophesied concerning the age of grace! Nevertheless, in order to fulfill an O.T. prophecy, Mal. 4:5-6 (B-part) and bring an O.T. prophet office over into the N.T. grace age to complete those two appearings of the spirit of Elijah shown in the O.T., never forget, – that O.T. spirit of Elijah had to reappear again before the second coming of Christ in order to restore the endtime people back to true revelation on the scriptures as taught by those original apostles—Now get this, while that man was here on earth in his restoring O.T. prophet office (not N.T. prophet office) we can say his was that one O.T. prophet office in all the entire N.T. Age and that was to restore the church back to original truth whereby the fivefold ministry (especially the N.T. apostles office) could once again function in truth–the word of the Lord seen in Amos 3:7 coming to the prophets would definitely apply to his office! However, when that prophet restoring office role was fulfilled and lifted from the scene, in order to continue on with his program, God now turns the true word ministry back into the hands of the apostleship (as well as thr fivefold ministry). Therefore that statement—the word of the Lord comes ONLY to the prophet can no longer apply anywhere in this grace age and furthermore it is only those who still desire to hinder the true working of the Holy Ghost leadership as he does once again begin operating through his chosen fivefold ministry-who continues to say-as did the prophet—that the word of the Lord comes ONLY to the prophet. I repeat, while he was here that was absolutely true. but now that the O.T. role has been lifted out of the N.T. setting, the word of the Lord will come to the apostles just as it did back during the early church age as these men .continue on in their ministry unto the Lord! May I say, had we never strayed so terribly far from that original revelatory teaching of those God given apostles within the early church, God would never have sent the spirit of Elijah after 1900 years back into the earth at the endtime in a restoring office under a N.T. covenant whatsoever! Therefore I ask you, when are people going to wake up and allow this God given ministry to function strictly, not as man wants to dictate how it should operate and what they should say, but allow it to function strictly under the leadership of the Holy Spirit as God intended as he continues to speak into this N.T. office ministry! Show me any place in the New Testament where Paul ever referred to himself as a prophet! You say, but the prophet to the age called him a prophet. And I answer you back, it could well be God wanted you to hear it that way too!
PLAY OF WORDS
We live in an hour when the play of words has become so very technical. My faith and your faith can either grow in God through the proper understanding or it can be diminished to a fear overnight! Denominations use an Kind of gimmicks to support their movements. Why? Because they are blind and unconcerned about what the scripture teaches–only what their particular movement teaches, the rest is unimportant! Are we that way also? Sitting in denominationalism one day I realized there was truth in this book our movement would not teach. It was then God enabled me to hear the man I believe to be the prophet to this age. He would stand for hours under the anointing and God would speak words through that little vessel of clay which would absolutely dumfound the gainsayer standing present. Some of whom would go away shaking their heads saying No, they absolutely could not believe and today some of them are six feet under ground. They could not believe what he said because they have no spiritual mind to receive a spiritual revelation from God. True, because of his office, Mal. 4:5-6, this man in the spirit and power of Elijah has to react like that Old Testament Spirit! If he does and he is the prophet to turn us around, it is definitely his office to take the scriptures and give to the scriptures their true revelational interpretation because this is the very thing the church back through the ages strayed from (true interpretation). Therefore if he has to characterize that spirit of Elijah, let’s first watch the original Elijah of old to see if once in a while he as a prophet, ever made a mistake! Let’s see how he reacted under pressure.
DO PROPHETS MAKE MISTAKES
Let us illustrate something by watching the human side of Elijah. Here is your great argument today. Someone says–HE WAS A PROPHET AND I’LL HAVE YOU KNOW PROPHETS DO NOT MAKE MISTAKES! You said that, God did not! Show me anywhere in scripture where God ever said such a thing! On the contrary, if you know anything about your Bible you will know only too well that the Apostle James wrote something which sounds just the opposite, James 5:17, when he referred to Elijah as a man subject to like passions such as you and I (a man of flesh and blood as we are; a mortal man like ourselves.) Now would anyone dare say the apostle James is trying to tear down Elijah’s image? Is he trying to drag him down in the mud? If not then what is he trying to do? HE IS SIMPLY TRYING TO SHOW SOME PEOPLE WHO HAVE A SPIRITUAL MIND WHERE HUMAN FLESH LIVES! And at the same time, irregardless to man’s weakness or fraility, how God can still use human flesh! However human flesh is the part gentiles can not differentiate between. It is the nature of a gentile to do one of two things—either blaspheme something God is using or else deify it! Apparently they do not know the difference, although they are ready to argue with you that they do. James clearly stated the prophet Elijah was a man subject to like human passions as we, and Elijah proved that was so true as we shall later see what he did. Take human passions or frailties to the dictionary and see what it means. It means weakness, failures, imperfections. As long as you live in mortal flesh it matters not who you are, there are those moments of your life when you look at things as the Bible describes–through a glass darkly–sometimes it seems we see more from the dark side than we do from the light side. Why? Because we are mortal. James, spoke those things concerning Elijah to show Elijah was a man subject to human feelings like anyone else. Could you have lived when Elijah did three thousand years ago you would have seen him to be a man with human feelings.
HUMAN SIDE OF ELIJAH
Let us take a trip with Elijah over to Mt. Carmel, not to belittle him but to show he was a human being who had human frailties and answer the question–do prophets make human mistakes or error in judgment. Elijah, that spiritual, righteous man had lived through those 31/2 years when no rain fell in Israel. God fed Elijah by a raven up in the hills after the brooks dried up. Later he came out of hiding and we know according to James, Elijah had prayed ear-nestly that it would not rain and IT DID NOT RAIN FOR THREE, YEARS AND SIX MONTHS. Afterwards he prayed and God sent a downpour, didn’t he? Time has arrived when Elijah has practically reached the climax of his ministry. Recall, Elijah came to Israel in an hour to deal with apostasy, to restore a people back to a revelation of something from which they had strayed. Having rebuked Israel (10 nor-thern tribes ) for months and years, finally the hour arrived for a showdown at Mt. Carmel and the climax of his ministry. What a beautiful spot for a showdown. Mt. Carmel was the highest point in all Israel–where hardly even a bush would grow. This mountain divided Judah from Israel. If anyone didn’t want to go upon the mountain called Carmel overlooking the. Mediterranean Sea, then they could stand ten miles away and still watch the fire fall from heaven when Elijah prayed.
CONTEST ON MT. CARMEL
Early one morning Elijah brought these 450 prophets of Baal up there and instructed them to build their altar and call upon their god. Their altar built and wood placed on it, next came their sacrifice. Alright, said Elijah, start calling on your god! Elijah, who was under God’s anointing waits for his turn. For days this contest has been turning over in his soul. By, revelation he already knows what God is going to do! 450 preachers begin to go through their little chanting rituals. Don’t tell me they hadn’t been able to do these little tricks before. Yes sir, they carded the anointing of the devil and they had done things before. However on this day they are not making much headway with their gad! Why, Because God has bound things up. Those prophets or preachers of Baal coming up on the mountain, all dressed up, were going to show that smart aleck who god is around here. There sits that little anointed Jew, Elijah, waiting his turn. 450 preachers spend all day calling upon their god yet NO FIRE FALLS. Elijah mocked saying, Scream a little louder, maybe he is asleep or gone on a journey. Elijah wanted Israel to hear and see this, that is why Mt. Carmel was chosen for the contest. For many miles around Israel below the mountain could see the scene transpiring on top. Sometime .during the day fire is supposed to fall and Israel would hear whether it was Baal or Jehovah who sent it. Later in the evening what a bloody mess they had become as now they began cutting and slashing their bodies. One by one, defeated they hang their heads. Finally Elijah, knowing exactly what God is going to do, steps up and says, tear your altar down. Certain men working with him gathers many stones and builds a new altar, gets a sacrifice and places wood around it. Elijah now instructs them to get 12 barrels of water and pour on it. In other words, before all Israel who had now lost knowledge as to what was right and wrong, before a people who no longer know what scripture means, Elijah is going to give them the benefit of the doubt who God is. Barrel after barrel of water is poured on Elijah’s sacrifice. Beloved, Elijah simply backed up, called on the name of the Lord (speaking only 68 words) when suddenly from nowhere I see a terrific black cloud. Out of that cloud comes a sudden loud clap of thunder and a bolt of lightning issued forth to the earth, licking up stones, water and wood and in a (lash that sacrifice is gone! For miles and miles around Israelites are watching the top of that mountain and see fire falling from heaven. They knew something had happened!
WORD REACHES JEZEBEL
Elijah now had Jezebel’s 450 prophets beheaded and that report scattered from village to village until it reached the city of the Queen, Ahab’s wife who wasn’t in being at Carmel, because had she been interested in what Jehovah did, she would have been trembling by this time, as all ISrael was. here goes a runner to Jezebel. There wasn’t any need to go to Ahab but go to Jezebel because she ran everything! Isn’t that sad! No sooner had word reached the palace and Jezebel was informed what Elijah had done to her 450 prophets than she flew into a rage and said, you tell that old man by this tomorrow I WILL HAVE HIS HEAD!
Running From A Woman
Watch closely for you are about to see the human frailty of this man Elijah. From that moment on Elijah did not know what to do! We are discussing this only to show you how that spirit of Elijah will react on a man. When word reached him what the furious queen had said–you are next, you killed my priesthood, so you are next! Perhaps some of Elijah’s followers may have instructed him about it, everything will be alright. That same God who answered you by fire will protect you. I can hear his personal friends giving him all kinds of advice, yet for some reason Elijah wasn’t listening. Why? Because now he is not anointed! Elijah is scared of who-A WOMAN! Elijah started running and remember, he was way north of Jerusalem when he started and did not make his first stop until over at Bathsheba, way down beyond the Dead Sea! That is how frightened this human being was. Poor, frightened Elijah was so exhausted running from the queen, when he did stop running he fell asleep and later was awakened by the presence of the angel of the Lord standing over coals of fire preparing him a cake. The journey has been too great for you stated the angel. Rise up and eat. With that meal he had strength to journey still another little distance and fell exhausted. Face it, Elijah was a prophet, now reacting like any other man with human weaknesses. ELIJAH WAS SCARED! He is fleeing for his life! He does not have Thus saith the Lord! No, I am not dragging his image down, I am only attempting to show you the reaction of the spirit of Elijah and further to see if the scripture will back up what people continually say-if he is a prophet he cannot make a mistake! Then we want to bring all this over into our day and see how it effects us. In a moment we are going to watch still another man in jail, who also had the spirit of Elijah upon him and to see how he reacted in times of pressure. And finally we arc going to watch that same spirit on a gentile who lived in our day!
REACTING AS OTHER MEN WOULD
Elijah falls asleep and again is awakened by the presence of an angel standing over the coals of fire preparing another cake for God’s servant. Again the angel says, rise up and eat, for the journey is too great for thee. With the strength received from that second meal, Elijah continues on his 40 days to the mount of God. God was with his frightened servant, protecting him. God knew Elijah was a frightened prophet not knowing what to do reacting like any other man under such pressure. Now Elijah did not have THUS SAITH THE LORD! Elijah not only journeyed 40 days to reach Horeb, the mount of God but he found a cave on the other side as far away as he could to hide in and there in this cave he sat. What is Elijah doing in a cave? He is frightened. He has 450 men’s lives to reckon for who, by revelation of the word, he had killed! Now HE DOES NOT KNOW WHAT TO DO! Now there is one woman who he does not know what to do with. Why? Because God has Oven him no revelation on how to handle her! God was saving Jezebel for a later hour, a pack of hungry dogs would take care of her.
GOD NEVER INSTRUCTED PROPHET TO FLEE
Let’s listen to God talking to Elijah in the cave. After all this running for his life, God says to Elijah, what are you doing here? God knew why Elijah was there but he wanted Elijah to admit what he was doing there! The Lord read every terrified thought along the journey because everytime he stopped to sleep his inner cry was, Lord, please take me. I have done the best I could, I am ready to go–Lord just let me die! Elijah ac-tually did not want to die. That is why he is running. If he wanted to die Jezebel would have gladly obliged his decision. In the cave the Lord said, what are you doing here? Elijah answers, Lord, they have torn down your altars, killed all your prophets and I AM THE ONLY ONE LEFT ALIVE (or so he honestly thought). lie actually thought he was the sole survivor left alive who knew how to serve God-and now God, they are after me! The Lord no doubt shocked Elijah with his answer when he said–I STILL HAVE 7,000 MEN WHO HAVE NOT BOWED THEIR KNEES TO THE IMAGE OF BAAL. I am glad that, although a prophet (or man ) does not always see or know the picture in its en-tirety–GOD DOES! Listen to God speak to Elijah. Elijah, you have been in this cave long enough, I want you to go back, God intends to do something with that woman of whom Elijah is afraid. I want you to go back and anoint Hazael to be king in Damascus, Syria. I want you to anoint Jehu to be king of Israel (10 northern ‘tribes ). And I want you to anoint Elisha to serve in your stead.
ELISHA COMMISSIONED
Elisha was a young farmer out in the field plowing with his 12 head of oxen, up front leading the 12th head when Elijah found him. Elijah, making his way back into the land is alright now because he knows what God wants him to do. He has Thus Saith the Lord! • He has been commissioned to do a job. Elisha is his first stop. Beloved, I know this God won’t ever just slip upon you. Somewhere something had been working with Elisha’s heart. Read between the lines! How many believe Elisha is going to be a prophet? Well, if he is going to serve as a prophet then there would have to have been certain workings of God already going on in his life. That can be seen in Samuel’s life even as a small boy in the temple when his mother turned him over to the priesthood! Elisha is in the field plowing as Elijah passes by, hig thoughts deep in meditation before God.
A REVELATION IN ELISHA
Note, Elijah knew exactly where to go and don’t tell me Elisha did not already know of Elijah. Sure he did! No doubt Elisha had great admiration for Elijah the prophet of God. Certainly Elijah knew Elisha from all the other lath in Israel. By some past experience or social contact Elijah knew him because he WENT STRAIGHT TO HIM!
STROKING SHOULDER
Watch closely, just hurriedly passing by, Elijah merely reached out and Stroked Elisha on the shoulder and kept going! Imagine Elisha in his field when some total stranger passing by tapped him on the shoulder. Examining this scene from a carnal standpoint, Elisha would say–who are you, why did you stroke me on the shoulder, what are you up to? However the scriptures do not paint that kind of picture, does it! Here is the way scripture sounds. As Elijah struck Elisha on the shoulder, Elisha turns and says, wait until I go kiss Dad and Mom good-bye. I will follow you! No doubt some time ago Elisha had a revelation showing him this old prophet coming along and God no doubt spoke in that dream or vision saying, when that happens YOU WILL FOLLOW THAT MAN! Note, Elijah simply answers–what is that to you and keeps right on going! In other words, it is simply Elijah’s way of testing the situation to determine whether or not there does lay a real revelation of God within hint which would cause Elisha to drop everything and follow him. Elijah simply struck him on the shoulder and kept on going. Running home quickly, Elisha said goodbye mom, dad, I will see you again one of these days. God bless you. Grabbing up a sword he goes out to his 12 head of oxen and begins cutting their throats! Tearing up his old plow for wood, he built a fire and called all his friends in and said, I am going to sacrifice unto God. Praise God, he has called me into the ministry! We are examining this only to see whether or not scripture shows that prophet, like any other human, can make a mistake! Soon we will come to our day and see a little man whose job was not to go up on Mt. Carmel or have 450 men killed. No, but let me tell you one thing, the revelation on the word of God he brought sure killed many a carnal idea, school of thought and carnal interpretation on the scripture!
JOHN IN JAIL
First let us examine still another prophet who also came in the spirit and power of Elias (Luke 1:17), who is sitting in jail, we want to see if a prophet can make a mistake! Today we hear so many people say, if he is a prophet he can not make a mistake! One day from the bank of the Jordan River John screamed out something. Earlier he had been instructed by the spirit of Almighty God that on whosoever he saw the Spirit descend and remain was the anointed one of God. Announce him! Baptize him! Therefore one day as John saw the sign over a certain man he screamed out, behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the world! It was Jesus of Nazareth, his cousin. (He was so positive he announced the right man as Messiah – However watch him later.) How did John know that– he had been waiting for the revelation! It lived in his soul and he could hardly wait for the day he would introduce the anointed one and fulfill his mission. After John baptized Jesus and the Spirit led him into the wilderness for a 40 day fast, Jesus returned and John’s disciples began to follow Christ! One day some of John’s disciples approached John saying, Lo, he whom you baptizeth–all your disciples are leaving you to follow him. This never disturbed John in the least. John joyously declared, I rejoice for the friend of the bridegroom must rejoice. lie must increase and I must decrease. See, here John is ab-solutely sure he introduced the right one!
DOUBTS OWN REVELATION
Fearless John the Baptist later preached quite a sermon, one which landed him in jail. Sitting in that dungeon, week after week, anticipating when his doom might come, John began to hear of the mighty fame of Jesus now spreading everywhere. Doubt seemed to trouble John concerning the things he had earlier declared concerning Christ. Now John wonders, have I introduced the right one. Before he was absolutely positive he had introduced the right one, now sitting in jail and pondering over the thing, he wonders if he has introduced the right man to Israel to take away the sins of the world—God’s Lamb. John still had two close friends who stood nearby. Because there is much doubt in John’s mind con-cerning what he has previously done, he tells these two men to go do something. What was it? John the Baptist, the man with the spirit of Elijah upon him tells these two disciples to go and ask this man (Jesus) if he is the one we look for or do we look for another. No, I did not bring that up to belittle John’s image-only to show you John was a human being like anyone else, and he acted as anyone else would. Although John ‘was a mighty prophet, he too could make a mistake! Making their way to Jesus, they ask him, are you the one we look for or do we look for another–John the Baptist wants to know! What a service they had been in! Jesus said, you go tell John the things you have (just) seen, how the deaf are made to hear, the blind to see, the lame walk and the lepers are cleansed and blessed is he who is not of-fended in me! That was good enough for John. That is scripture upon scripture being fulfilled! That is also good enough for me! When John heard this, doubt left—that settled it! Now I ask you, why did John want to know this? Why did he have to ask a second time if Jesus was the ( anointed) one or was Israel to still look for another-especially after he was the very one under the anointing who had screamed it out that day at the Jordan when he introduced Jesus as the Lamb of God! This only goes to show when flesh is put under pressure as John was there in prison, it has to react the way of all flesh! In jail JOHN HAD NO REVELATION concerning his future welfare. However, when that report of Jesus’ service reached John he could put two and two together and know he would be leaving shortly. My job is over–I have introduced the anointed one! John knew if his job was over he would soon be going off the scene.
WATCH THAT ELIJAH SPIRIT TODAY
Bring that same spirit of Elijah over into our day. It has to react the same! No, this prophet in our day was not in jail. was he? Nor was he fleeing from a woman. People today say prophets do not make mistakes-If they are prophets they can not make a mistake. The scripture has already proven, more than once, that statement to be utterly false and the scripture used the two prophets who carried that special anointed ministry! This man who isn’t in jail and isn’t running from a woman but who is also clothed in this spirit must characterize it as well as they! How then will the spirit be characterized in this hour? Many of you saw and heard this man. You live in the day before the coming of Christ when God had to take the holy scriptures and give to them the proper and correct in-terpretation in order that you and I might be able to place our faith back–not in some other mental concept of them but back in the correct revelatory understanding whereby we can believe what the Bible does teach and what the Bible does not teach, and what the Bible will not hack up, we can ditch that!
CONTINUAL PULL ON SPIRIT FOR ANSWERS
Because this man was that prophet ordained to bring forth the true revelation on what the scriptures say. he faced a people who also knew this fact and therefore he was constantly faced by conditions and Circumstances as the people continually pulled heavily upon his spirit–Bro. William Branham, what does this mean: Bro. Branham, what does this mean! He was constantly aware of all that. There we sat (past tense), each one wrapped up in our different denomination ideas declaring we were ready for the rapture. We were ready for the anti-Christ had God not done something! The prophet knew all this. Here he stood to give the proper and correct interpretation on the scripture with everyone’s spirit constantly pulling upon him. However, if God had not revealed to him what the correct in-terpretation of some particular scripture was, you can rest assured, he as a human being, is going to give that passage of scripture whatever meaning he best feels in his spirit will fit the passage. However, when the time has arrived that he truly, by revelation. would bring that passage into its proper perspective and understanding, he will then see it and will place it by revelation of the Spirit into its proper perspective! Oh, people who simply do not know what the scripture reveals on this subject will argue with you–but a prophet just does not make mistakes! I read in the Bible where a young prophet once made a mistake and because of it a lion killed him. Under the inspiration of the Spirit, that is absolutely true, there can be no mistake! But when the prophet is looking at something and God has not definitely stated to him whether the line of thinking is correct or incorrect he is therefore allowed or permitted to speak however or whatever his human feelings feel is the thing!
PROPHET ALSO HUMAN
That does not diminish his image; that does not mar his office. It merely shows that he, like the prophets of old, is also a human being! The only sad part of it is, we as gentiles live in the hour when God gave unto us a prophet who fulfilled Old Testament scriptures (on the other side of the cross) thus it was imperative he use Amos 3:7. Why? Because that verse affects that Old Testament prophet spirit (of which he was a part). Therefore because of that prophet office of his spoken to fulfill Mal. 4:5-6 (B-part ) he would exercise his office in that capacity of Amos 3:7. That is why he will look upon Paul and call him a prophet although you will never find Paul calling himself a prophet! Every epistle Paul ever wrote declares, I Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ, called of God and not by man.
FIVEFOLD MINISTRY IN NEW COVENANT
Why? Because Paul lived on this side of the cross or advent of Christ. It was Paul who said in Eph. 4 now he (Christ) that ascended is the same that descended first into the lower parts of the earth, and (first) he led captivity captive (out of the lower part of the earth at his death) and (secondly) he gave gifts (which were all in himself) unto men—which is Paul’s way of saying, and .as he did this he put some in the church, that is, Christ who first fulfilled all the fivefold offices simply broke himself up in his earthly ministry and placed those five offices in the mystical body on earth—apostle, prophet, evangelist, pastor and teacher offices.
STRAYING FROM FIVEFOLD MINISTRY
These offices and gifts are at-tributes of the office of Christ him-self. That is what Paul taught and laid down. However, the church later strayed from that fivefold ministry and instituted in its place a priesthood, which you very well know is as far from being apostolic as daylight is from dark! Through the ages, especially after 1500, we have had all kinds of protestant ministries. The protestant denominations produced all kinds of ministries and evangelists who have worked to build carnal manmade systems and organizations. Nevertheless, if this was to be a prophetic office which was to shine in the last days, it was an office to turn a gentile people around and restore them back to Bible truth and to restore a people back who would know how to take the revelation of the word and come back into complete unity and oneness of the word in order that a fivefold ministry of men could stand in the ranks of the true church who absolutely would defy the powers of organization and all those men will have within their bosom only that one true scriptural revelation on the scripture! They are men who can stand on their own two feet, without a cirutch-‘bypassing human influence! Why? Because God planted a living revelation in their bosom and because they are fully aware what God has done in the last days and are in no way ashamed to declare it! They will stand and scream without an apology, informing people, this is the right way, this is the truth, this is a revelation. Furthermore, they will be able to take the holy scriptures in their Bible and show you verse for verse what God’s purpose and plan was in sending a man like that into the earth.
RESTORED FIVEFOLD MINISTRY
Naturally because every sermon he preached was recorded, it has been a trick of the enemy to declare that those sermons are the same as thus saith the lord and therefore are placed on the same equality as the holy scripture! THAT IS NOT SO! You say, well you are going to lose my friendship if you speak that way. WE HAVE ALREADY LOST IT! I have lost many friendships throughout this land, but if you have the Holy Ghost let me say this, it took the office of a prophet to do this in the endtime but It will require the absolute ministry of which Paul speaks in Eph. 4:10-11, to take this thing and properly apply it to the hearts of the people! The biggest percentage, simply because they heard the prophet, now say they won’t listen to any man! I have the Holy Ghost, I know what this thing says. Well, isn’t it strange that they who deny that God would have apostles; deny that God would have New Testament prophets and also deny that God would have these other ministries–every last one of them who deny this are out trying to be a leader of some new fangdangled, unscriptural revelation!
BRIDE GONE–NEW REVELATION
Recently I heard of a new revelation cooked up in our part of the country. No, they do not get it out of the Bible but from their interpretation of something the prophet said. This lets me know it is only by revelation and not by every verbal statement—YOU HAD BETTER KNOW WHAT THAT PROPHET SAID, else you are heading straight for quicksand! The new revelation floating around is this–the rapture has already taken place and no one can now be in the gentile bride! Here is one thing which helped launch or promote such a ‘false revelation–something stated in two different books. In the Church Age Book, it was recorded, that the seven thunders have already been sounded! (If they have been sounded naturally they have already been revealed). Certain individuals say if the seven thunders have already been sounded and revealed-and Bro. Branham stated Christ would return for his bride church some-where around the time the seven thunders of Rev. 10:4 are revealed–then the rapture would (now in 1975) have already taken place!
By the same token, because the prophet also stated in the Seal Book there was only 3′ years left for the Jew and because the year 1977 is being used by many for the termination of all things, certain individuals naturally calculate from that figure 1977 back and they see that si nce we are already in the middle of 1975 we have already entered in and passed the marginal line of 31,42 years! Therefore they have to say the rapture is already in the past! Why? To justify such a carnal revelation as that! No, they do not get it from the Bible, THEY GOT IT FROM THEIR OWN UNDERSTANDING OF THOSE BOOKS! SEVEN THUNDERS NOT SOUNDED NOR REVEALED But I go to the other book! The thunders have not sounded! I repeat, the seven thunders of Rev. 10:4 have not sounded! If they have, tell me when Jesus is coming. The prophet said when they sound they bring us knowledge of when he comes! You say, what are they? I do not know and neither do you, so quit probing at them! God will reveal them in his own good time. There is going to be some people one of these days who are found continually keeping their mind in this Bible which that man placed us back into. No, he did not place everyone back in this Bible of holy scripture but there are a few who are going to remain in this Bible. Notice the man who will remain in this book, because here is the real danger point showing where people live-they won’t remain in this Bible!
MADE ’77 FOCAL YEAR
Because of the focal year of 1977, because of 31/2 years and thirdly, because one book states the seven thunders have already sounded and another book says they have not….one book states they are something that is already here, it just has to be revealed, thus they say it is the opening of the seven seals while the other book states it is something that is not even in the written word. CONFUSING, ISN’T IT! This Bible is right! You can walk on it (stand on the word) but don’t tread it underfoot! Thy Word, Oh, Lord is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my pathway. It will guide you through every storm, provided God has shone his light on you. If it be you have the revelation of that true name, he will never permit you to stray very far from this precious book. Through this Bible (the word) is a beautiful pathway and it is forever leading you higher and upward. Still someone says–but don’t you know there is no more revelation? To some there isn’t any more revelation because their eyes are already closed! Well if there is, they say, it would have to come from the mouth of a prophet. No, it will come through a New Testament fivefold ministry! The church that has the correct revelation which was spoken by a prophet will turn to the scriptures by the revelation of the Spirit and God will place in their ranks the offices of his ministry who will have a revelation in their bosom of what this book is all about! His love will shine upon those people. There will be no confusion at all in their minds. The devil will try to cut the foundation out from under them every time, but they can lift their hands and say thank you Jests for the truth of thy word!
RESURRECTION BEFORE RAPTURE
Beloved, have you ever thought that if the rapture has already taken place then according to Paul’s revelation in I Thes. 4:16, there has also been a resurrection of the dead taken place. THIS MUST COME BEFORE THE RAPTURE! The devil must simply shoot all these revelations out here to lead the element astray who are not to benefit from the true Meer No, I do not know a bit more than you do of what those thunders are. But I will say this, up until July 1975 they have not sounded! Yet you know, we have at least four or five characters throughout the land who are already preaching that they, as a person, know what the seven thunders are, yet if you get each one’s teachings and compare them—YOU WOULD FIND OUT THEY WILL ALL BE DIFFERENT! One of these days there will be a people over this world, though few in number, whose minds will be in the right shape. They will be preaching the same thing no matter where they are. When all these people’s seven years and 31/2 years that they have all figured out has already passed, then God’s seven years will begin! When God’s seven years begins, you will be able to see something start happening in Israel. Then will be the time for that little handful of gentiles to start looking up!!
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