CONTINUING ON FROM OCTOBER, That 47th verse, of Luke 24, says, and that repentance and remission of sins, not sin, sins. That is the things that you have committed in your human body. It may be in your mind, it may be things you have done in your body. Baptism is the important thing, in order for you to be connected unto the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the Bridegroom. When you are baptized in His name, and then receive the Holy Ghost, you then become a part of the Bride of Jesus Christ as you produce fruit of the Spirit. Repentance and remission of sins is your first step is salvation. Remember, the blood of Jesus Christ took care of your sin of unbelief when you believed from your heart, that is the inherited sin you were born with. You did not commit sins when you were three months old, but you were born with inherited sin. That is what the blood of Jesus takes care of. The sins, (plural) are the wrong things you do and allow in your life. Those are the sins that are remitted in baptism when you truly repent and get baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. God begins to convict you of those sins; then you become responsible for them. Therefore Peter’s message was, Acts 2:38, “Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.” Luke expressed it this way in the 24th chapter, verses 46 and 47, as he was preaching about Jesus, “that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.” That is why the people asked in Acts 2:37, men and brethren, what must we do. Then that is when Peter rose up with the message to unlock the door. That is why he was given the keys, that he might unlock something pertaining to salvation. If somebody hands you the keys to something, then there is somewhere that has a lock on it, and when you place that key in that lock the tumblers move, you know you have the right key. When Peter placed that key in the door, it says that three thousand souls were added. What? Does the Bible come to a certain place, then becomes a liar? You know it does not. You know Paul said, that whatsoever you do in word or deed, do in the name of Jesus Christ for the glory of God the Father. Because it was Jesus who gave His blood, who gave His life for our salvation. They did not take His life from Him, He willingly gave His life. All they did was beat Him and put the nails in His hands. At any time He could have escaped, even when He was already on the cross, He said I could call more than twelve legions of angels, seventy two hundred angels that He could have called. But then salvation could never have been competed. You would not be here this morning because salvation was not offered to the Gentiles before Jesus died and rose again, because the message right here in Luke, was, go into all the world and preach the gospel, beginning at Jerusalem. If he made a mistake here, then he made a mistake in Acts by saying that. We had better be glad he said what he did. The 8th verse of the 1st chapter of Acts, says, “But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me (Jesus) both in Jerusalem, (This is the starting point, this is what Luke said.) and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.” So that included us in this day and hour we live in. We see the finished work of it all, we cannot deny what we have, we cannot deny what He has shown us. If we deny what He has shown us, then we have disobeyed the scripture, and we have come very close to blasphemy. Jesus said if you speak against me it will be forgiven, but if you speak against the Holy Ghost it will never be forgiven. That is not only what you would see that somebody was healed, but that is against the Word of God, what people would hear and say of others, that is just a bunch of foolish people, whenever you know it has been by the Spirit of God that he has shown you these things. So what the Spirit of God is, we know it is the Holy Ghost, the same Spirit that abode in Jesus, now dwells in us. You do not see Him, so that is why His Spirit is referred to as a ghost, but you know when He in abiding in you. Everyone who receives that Spirit knows it, because His Spirit bears witness with our spirit that we are sons and daughters of God. If there was not some witness to it, we would be like this Muslim world out here. Jesus said, love your neighbor, love and curse not, but in the Koran there is no word about love in it, it is not there because it was not founded on love. It was all built on hate. They can blow themselves up, and blow you up if they get the chance. They think they are going to go to heaven, and the men think they are going to live with seventy two virgins. That is a lie of the devil. Jesus said, love one another, then you fulfill the law after you have loved God. Let me now get back to my subject. What was my subject? It was a question, are we going to crown Him. I have heard we were, heard that all my life. But I looked for it in the scriptures and could not find any such statement. That is what tradition tells you. Tradition is not Bible. Tradition is man’s ideas. What kind of crown are we going to use to put on that worthy head? If the church world today was going to crown Him, they would put some kind of golden crown on Him, with a lot of rubies, diamonds, a lot of jewels and stuff of that nature. They would put a lot on there, then they would stack them up and just keep going. Well what kind of crown are we going to wear? The best place to find out is in the Word of God. Let us go to 1st Corinthians, the 9th chapter, verse 24. “Know ye not that they which run in a race run all, (That is just like that marathon up there in Boston. There were some of those people that knew they were not going to win it when they started. But the top runners, every one of them thought they had a chance to win it. Let us take the top ten, they all figured they had a chance to be the winner, but all of them cannot win.) but one receiveth the prize? So run, that ye may obtain.” There are people that have already given up on this, they gave up early, because they did not believe they have a chance. There is one thing that gives you that chance, and that is the Holy Ghost, when you totally submit to that Word. Then you begin to see yourself shrinking, you begin to see yourself smaller and smaller and smaller, and He becomes larger and larger and larger. He is the only thing larger than life, I do not care what they say. Everybody is always saying, this is larger than life. But He is the only thing that is larger than life. “And every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown; (What is a corruptible crown? It is something that man places on your head. That is a corruptible crown. If I should come and place something on your head, then it would be corruptible. It would not last, even gold tarnishes. A lot of these places, when you go to buy a ring or something like that, they will give you something to give that a bath every once in awhile, because it is not going to look new unless you do something about it. That is because it is corruptible.) but we an incorruptible.” Can you see the difference there? Well God can make that last. He will make it last but it is not something that you are going to be wearing around on your head all the time. Because the apostle brings in many things that are a crown, and never something that is corruptible. “I therefore so run, not as uncertainly; so fight I, not as one that beateth the air.” These boxers stand and beat each others’ head’s in, that they may receive some kind of reward. On the other hand, the day we receive the Holy Ghost and we live that life, that is the only requirement there is for eternal life, receive the Holy Ghost and we live a dedicated life, giving Him first place. You cannot buy your way into eternal life, you can’t work your way into it. It is a free gift. Eternal life is a gif,t and it is not something that you receive today and your name is written in the book of life then, your name was already written in the book of life back in the beginning of creation, when God made this thing, because He saw that you would be obedient to His Word. He also saw that we would have to have to have a Redeemer. That is why it says in John the 1st chapter, In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and the Word was made flesh, because it was the thought of God expressed in flesh. God thought it all out at the beginning. Why did He not just make us perfect beings in the beginning? Why did Adam have to sin? Because he was given a choice. The angels were given a choice. That is why there is a judgment at the end of the Millennium, because the people in the Millennium are given a choice. You see where they go out upon the breadth of the earth by the leading of Satan that deceived them. They surround Jerusalem, the camp of the saints. The devil feels, that if he can get Jerusalem, then he has the war won. So he takes his army against it. Just like today, they make a red line, they walk over the red line, then there has to be another red line. But Israel has already done some things about it. You have to be like Teddy Roosevelt, say it and carry a big stick. But the thing about it is, don’t push Israel. “But I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection.” Paul talked about it once and said the Lord gave me a thorn in the flesh, lest I would become puffed up through so many revelations. God will find a way to make, or keep us humble. I will say this, maybe some people will not like it, but God will never raise up two ministries, one pulling one way and one pulling another way. Jesus said concerning Himself, and concerning Beelzebub, whenever they accused Him of casting out devils with devils, He said, if Satan be divided, his kingdom will not stand. Sure, they accused Him, you have a devil, or demon, just because He healed a man with a withered arm on the Sabbath day. Do you know why they said that? They were jealous, because it was not being done in what they were doing. There they go all those years, no miracle, no move of God, they were just church people. Let us not become just church people. I am looking for and I am hungering for the move of God in Faith Assembly, that will totally change things, regardless of how He determines to do it, let Him do it. All the gifts, the ministry is a gift, there are five it speaks of in Ephesians, and all five are gifts. Those five are not all the gifts there are, and that is not all the gifts that anyone will have, because in the congregation, God can work miracles. Some godly man or some godly woman can see the power of God work in their own live. God does not just speak in tongues. If you ever look at these broadcasts on television, the preacher will stand up there and say let’s pray in the spirit. What he is saying is, let us pray in tongues. Then you hear everybody start speaking in tongues, and you see a lot of them tattooed all over, women with tattoos all the way up their shoulders, with their arms uncovered. Some of them with big rings in their ears, look like some kind of trophy somebody has won. Now in the Old Testament, if you go past fifty years and you have not let go, that is the year of jubilee, if you are not let go, if you will not take your freedom then, you can go back to your farm, you can go back to your work and it is all yours if you are a Jew. But if you decide not to go back, they take an awl and put a hole through your ear. I see some of these young people with big holes in their ears, with a ring inside there. They work in restaurants waiting on people. They look nasty. Girls with these studs in their lips and their nose, in their eyebrows: I just have to say, You are ugly. You take something that God has given you of beauty, and you have made it ugly. I want to say that in this way, U-G-L-Y. The devil has transformed this one into a sick generation. As a certain sister told me the other night, it is getting to where you cannot even discriminate against robots. You might hurt that robot if you discriminate against it, you might hurt its feelings. America, how much lower can you go before judgment comes? This silly doctor up north, that aborted those babies: they had them in a refrigerator in alcohol, and they had their lunch in there with them. Nobody was standing out front protesting that. Oh, he is doing a good service. No, he is a murderer, taking some of those babies that were living after they had aborted them and snipped their spinal chords. There is a hell waiting for all such as that. Then the hell is cast into the lake of fire, where everyday from there on, as long as that lasts and as long as the skin holds onto your body, you will regret that. So many od these preachers want to preach a prosperity gospel, and that is all they know, when the world of just religion is going to hell. Some people say you don’t preach these things anymore. I have said it three or four times. I don’t mean to hurt animal lovers, but they put up a sadder story about a little animal, than they do about aborted babies. The people that get these animals: let these horses die in stables and the other animals that they are cruel to, you will pay for that. That is a part of God’s creation. But you are going to pay more for your murderous ideas, than you will for that. Wake up, family of God! I don’t mean this in a wrong way, but we all have work to do in our own lives. I am talking to number one right here first. I so want to see and I long to see God working in our midst. That is a part of His work, because the Bible says these signs shall follow them that believe; and I know that to be true. The only thing I have to do is shape up my life, and get my life in order. If I ever point my finger at you, I have a thumb pointing back at me. I am saying today, get ready, let’s get ourselves ready for what is to come, because there is going to be a shining number of saints leave this earth one day soon. Let us first get our attitude right. I see some of these young people, I know it is a struggle, I know it is a hard time for you, but make sure you live for God, and just let the world go by. I don’t need a lot of what this old world has to offer. I don’t need to keep up with fads that trap so many people. If I ever buy anything, I go to the sale rack first. I got a jacket a couple weeks ago at J.C. Penney’s, a $125.00 jacket, I got it for $24,99. It did not just look new: it was new, and I did not see another one on that rack that was at that price. I did not necessarily go in there looking for something like that, because I did not think I would find anything like that, but it was my size so I did not leave it on the rack aftere I saw it. If I get burned, it is going to be the government that does it, and they are trying to do that right now. I have no use for the IRS. I have paid Social Security ever since I was 65, and I am now 76. I was not supposed to be paying it, but they still want it. I was not the one that fixed out my taxes. I will do whatever I have to do, but I will not like a lot of it. We live in a cruel world, we live in an evil world. Here I am paying for people that bombed this nation, hundreds and thousands of dollars that they have gotten from the government, and the government wants more. They have always got their hand out, more, more, more. They can just get so much and when they have, one of these days they will be got. I will give Caesar what belongs to Caesar, but I will be like Peter, I will not like it. I will go to the Lord and say, what must I do? God is good, He has been good to me. As the song goes, He has been my doctor: He is still my doctor. He has been my lawyer, He still is. If somebody finds a good lawyer, you have found a miracle. Jesus said, woe unto you lawyers, woe unto you doctors. He was talking about the doctors and lawyers of the Law. But sometimes you are not going to get your answer anywhere else but from God. The woman that had suffered twelve years with this bloody condition, spent everything she had on the doctors, and that would be easy to do in the day and hour we are living in. I was getting some medical attention through the mail. They told me I would not have to pay anything for it: that my Medicare and my insurance would take care of it. I got a bill for $240.00, even after I made sure, by saying, Now you are not going to charge me for this? No, no, this is all taken care of. Then I got that bill. I let it go for maybe even six months. Then I thought, well I just as well pay them, so I did. Then I got another bill after that for $56.00, after I had paid the other. I did not pay it, because I had already paid them what they asked for. When they called me I said, you told me there would be no charge for this. I said, I am going to pay it, but do not ever send me anything else through the mail, I don’t want it. They did not. The only thing they sent me was another bill. Cheats and liars fill this nation today. Most of the people you talk to on the phone, you cannot understand. Sometimes I just hang up and say, I cannot understand you. I just simply cannot understand those talking to me from another country. Saints: we live in a cruel world. It is just as the sister testified this morning: sometimes we just have to wait for an answer from the Lord. How did I ever get off on this? This is not my subject, but let me say this, today, we are compassed on every side by somebody, or something that never gives up. The devil never gives up. I certainly do not want to live that last half of the week of Daniel, because, Revelation 12 says he comes down to earth because he is cast out of heaven. Has he ever been in heaven? Look in Job. Oh yes, he still presents himself with the angels of God, God gave him that opportunity, that he might work in the heavenlies around the earth. Remember, in the book of Daniel, when Daniel was praying, the angel heard him, Michael. For twenty one days he prayed and Michael came and introduced himself to him and said, you were heard the first day, but then I was battling the prince of Persia. He was not talking about a man, he was talking about these angels that war against your soul. They are out there. They are the ones that try to make you doubt, try to convince you that you do not have anything and if we do not keep our guard up, we are likely to compromise to the point where we do not prosper. I am not talking financial prospering: I am talking about prospering in taking on the stature of the Lord. We need to be climbing instead of being on a down hill slide. I hope this helps somebody. I have not just told you these things for my benefit. I cannot change what the government does, but one of these days it is going to be changed. Think about how shamed these people are going to be, even when God’s judgment comes against this world: it says they will hide from the face of Him. Hide in the rocks and mountains and all these other things, from the face of Him. Why His face? Because He is going to make them see what they look like. No, He will not wear a man made crown, but everybody will know that He is crowned. He sits there making intercession today. I wonder what that looks like. It is a place of glory. Revelation 5 talks about the lamb as it has been slain, a bloody lamb, but that is just a representative of who He is, the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world. When I say He takes away the sin of the world, That is referring to our sins, about mine and yours, the world is still filled with sin. But He can take out of us all the bitterness, all the things that would try to defeat us. How many love Him today? Did you hold up your hand? Do you love Him? I don’t ask these things very often. I am not a television preacher, trying to boost everybody up. I serve a God that will boost you to where you need to be. He is always present to help us when we call upon Him.

WE SHALL CROWN HIM?
5-5-13 PM

I did not get into very much of my subject this morning, as I went through the different other things. I had a question asked me this morning, and I want to go through that a little bit before I go on into something else.

ANSWERING QUESTIONS

Jesus never did ask too many people their names, but He did ask the demon possessed man, what is your name? I am sure he had another name, but he answered, my name is Legion, because we are many (devils). Before it was over with, the devil had met the one that had power over him. If we look at Him (the Lord) in the right way, He will conquer the things in our lives, things that we think so many times are such minute things, but they are things that keep us from God’s purpose, things He wants to do for us. It is good at times, just to admit to Him, that we have failures or something in our lives that we need to deal with. Because our life is to be given to Him, for Him to delegate the parts of our lives that are lacking, or that are weak. Because He has strength to uphold us in any hour of time. The question that was asked this morning was concerning the foolish virgins. I guess that could work into my message. In Matthew 25 He said, “Then shall the kingdom of heaven be likened unto ten virgins, which took their lamps, and went forth to meet the bridegroom. And five of them were wise, and five were foolish.” We know that is not the number that He was speaking about, but it was a number that was going to equalize the two groups. “They that were foolish took their lamps, and took no oil with them: But the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps. While the bridegroom tarried, they all slumbered and slept.” To a point, that is, the message had not come to affect them. I remember when God called me out of the denominations in 1963. There was a reason for that. The foolish virgins, before that, were not affected, nor were the wise affected, because they were mixed up, enjoying the same experiences. You may look at it differently, but up until that time, there had not been a call made. Up until that time, you had the great multitude and you have the great multitude beyond that time. Some here and some there. The great multitude were different than foolish virgins. You see that difference in Revelation 7, because there were many in that number. I remember Bro. Jackson going over that in this way. He said if you become a Christian and six weeks later you were killed in an accident, or something happened to you that you died, six weeks later or whenever, you were not in the Bride because you had not had time to develop and bring forth any fruit of the Spirit. What he was talking about was the different attributes that are invested in a Christian life, that will bring forth fruit of the Spirit. The fruit of the Spirit is the fruit of the Holy Ghost. It is what God has produced for us to work into our every day life to glorify Him. As I read this, it says in the 4th verse, “But the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps.” They did not only have a Holy Ghost experience, they had a life filled with the works of the Holy Ghost, which is God, the very Creator. I am not talking about being out here working in hospitals and things like that. It was what God was able to work through their lives, to bring forth, some thirty, some sixty and some a hundred fold. All of them were fruit bearers, but they did not all bring forth the same. As Jesus talks in the 13th chapter of Matthew, He talked about the good seed that it did bring forth. You can see that it took so length of time for seed to bring forth fruit. This is what made the wise what they were. They had vessels and they had oil (the Holy Ghost) in those vessels. We know, that at one time the foolish virgins had some measure of the Spirit also, because they said our lamps have gone out. Lamps go out when there is no more oil in them. Notice, “While the bridegroom taried, they all slumbered and slept. And at midnight there was a cry made, Behold, the bridegroom cometh; go ye out to meet him. Then all those virgins arose, and trimmed their lamps. And the foolish said unto the wise, Give us of your oil; for our lamps are gone out. But the wise answered, saying, Not so; lest there be not enough for us and you: but go ye rather to them that sell, and buy for yourselves.” In the seals as Bro. Jackson went over that, he quoted what Bro. William Branham had said about what is going on in the world now, the denominational world of 1962 and 1963, along in there, it began to happen that even many of the Catholics began to speak in tongues, it was a wonderment just what is going on. Nuns were speaking in tongues. Brother Branham was asked the question, what about that? He said, that is the foolish virgins going out seeking oil for their vessels (In other words, the Spirit of God in their lives.) The foolish virgin and the wise virgin were all seeking oil (the Spirit of God in their lives), but the message that came forth was the message to the wise virgins, and the foolish could not receive it. Those seals that were brought out, were to the wise virgins, that received them and rejoiced, but the foolish virgins left, because they could not understand the message and therefore wanted no part of it, because they were too concerned about their experience in speaking in tongues and manifestations of things their flesh enjoyed. They made their way into the denominational church world and all the different avenues of it. That is when the move began to start, in 1963, because that is when the cry was made. The cry was made in 1963 when those seals were preached. From then on, you have that part of the foolish virgins that would last on into the last half of the week of Daniel; and among both elements, there were those who only has a spirit of religion, and not really the Holy Ghost. When you go on into Revelation 14 and 15 and 19, you go into those verses of scriptures where they give their lives because of their faith in God. There were the foolish virgin type back at the time this cry was made, that have died off, but they were not of the great multitude. Do you see the difference between the great multitude and the foolish virgins? The great multitude was of true believers that had not lived long enough to produce fruit of the Spirit. The foolish virgins were the ones that went out to find oil. You have had both ever since that time. Some of them are older now, but some of them have already died off, but they were already foolish because they did not accept truth. They all had the same opportunity, but the foolish lived their life without truth, because their lives have been in the denominational world of religion, or we could say, in some move of something that they feel is satisfying to that longing down in their soul, even though they had some kind of an experience with God. This is not a case that the great multitude rejected the truth, but you have to say the foolish virgins did, because they just wanted a good feeling without living a sanctified, truth loving life. Let us read on, we will see. “Then all those virgins (They could not be called virgins, unless they had already had some kind of experience with God.) arose, and trimmed their lamps. And the foolish said unto the wise, Give us of your oil; for our lamps are gone out. But the wise answered, saying, Not so; lest there be not enough for us and you: but go ye rather to them that sell, and buy for yourselves.” That is a parable, that is when they heard truth, but they did not accept truth. “And while they went to buy, the bridegroom came; and they that were ready went in with him to the marriage: and the door was shut.” (The door of opportunity to receive a revelation was closed to them, because they separated themselves from truth.) “Afterward came also the other virgins, saying, Lord, Lord, open to us. But he answered and said, Verily I say unto you, I know you not.” That is like Adam knowing Eve, but this is knowing truth. They did not accept truth, and this statement, I know you not, means that they were not impregnated with the truth of God’s Word: it was not in them, I put it that way to make it as plain as possible. That is why He said, I know you not. He was not rejecting them entirely: He was rejecting them from ever being able to see what truth is, because there is a point of no return. They heard about serpent seed and said, I don’t want that. They heard about predestination and said, I don’t want that. They heard about all the other things of truth, and rejected them. The great multitude had not rejected truth, but there was something in them that just never let them progress to the point of being Bride people. I remember the illustration Bro. Jackson used. He talked about his own dad. He said before his dad died, he accepted the Lord, but he said he did not have time to produce fruit of the Spirit. Then he talked about Sis. Jackson’s dad. It is in the seals message, if you would desire to hear it and hear him say it. He was telling about his wife’s dad calling the family together. After he had talked to them awhile he said, I am going where your dad and Bro. William Branham are. He had never made that confession before. Bro. Jackson said he did not have time to produce fruit. So he said they would be in the great multitude. There is where you separate the two. Then in the message of Matthew 22 in the first verses, it talks about the different ones going out at different times of the day. Some go out the first hour, the third hour, and the ninth hour, then in the eleventh hour. Then you come down to the twelfth hour, which is not mentioned, but there had to be a twelfth hour because he said to every one of them, from the first hour to the eleventh hour, he paid them and said, give every one of them a penny. He agreed with the first one for a penny, and they agreed. But he come down to the eleventh hour and gave them a penny also. Then as the parable illustrates, the illustration is the good man of the house said, I agreed with you, you agreed with me that every one would receive a penny. So he said, I can do with it whatever I want. You are getting your wages, they are getting their wages, so he said the last shall be first, and the first shall be last. The first is those that come through time in the great multitude, which will be raised from the dead last. But the foolish virgins that went through the tribulation time will be raised first. Every one of them get the same reward, every one of them. But the foolish virgins that spent this last hour of time, will be raised first, because they will be the ones to judge who goes into the Millennium. Because He said there in Matthew concerning the sheep people, when He comes to the sheep people, He tells them what they have done. They said, we did not know we had done that. He said, you visited the sick, you visited the prisons where those foolish virgins were, you fed the hungry. This thing going on now, all these preachers saying that is talking about this hour, they go out and feed the hungry and everything and say that is it. It has nothing to do with feeding hungry now. It has to do with tribulation, the people, that were foolish virgins, and these sheep people have gone into the prisons and ministered to them, they have done it out of the goodness of their heart. They were good moral people, young people, and some were older. Why do you say that? It says at the end of the Millennium that the old man will live out his thousand years even though he is upon his staff. Age will not have anything to do with it. But the young people that are preserved, you can see now the way that these colleges and schools, going all the way back, they want your children now from four years old to start school. They just force unheard of laws upon society now. That is the reason that the foolish virgins are raised first. It is not that He thought more of them than the ones that had come through time, but they are raised so that they may judge who goes into the Millennium, by the way they treated the abused believers in that tribulation time. All of those natural people are separated and judged by the way they reacted to the needs of the foolish virgins that were willing to suffer and die at the hands of the antichrist forces rather than deny their faith in God. The same thing is brought before the sheep people and the goat people, but He says to the goat people on his left, depart from me into everlasting punishment. He did not make any exceptions: they were either sheep people or goat people. I hope this helps to answer the question for some people who did not understand before. Sometimes the answer is not just a few words. In the 25th chapter, 45th verse, “Then shall he answer them, saying, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me. And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal.” Can you see and understand the difference? Everlasting punishment, which is not an eternal word, it is related to a period of time. But then the others go into eternal life. He did not make a mistake when He said that.

CONTINUING ON WITH
THE MESSAGE

Now I want to go further into my subject. As I mentioned this morning, the 9th chapter of 1st Corinthians, which I did not get very far with it. It is talking about the ones that run, receive a corruptible crown, which is something that is put upon a man’s head when he has run and won a race. The writer goes ahead and turns it around and says, but we receive an incorruptible crown, which is not the same thing. What is the difference in a corruptible crown, if it is made by man, and an incorruptible crown, if it is made by man, what is the difference in them? It is a crown of life, that is what it is. Let us go to Philippians chapter 4, verse 1, where we will find the difference explained “Therefore, my brethren dearly beloved and longed for, my joy and crown, so stand fast in the Lord, my dearly beloved.” He said that those dearly beloved were his crown. They are added to his account. Is that a man made crown? Or is it something that he is rejoicing over because this is something that he feels he has done to help someone, and it is more or less a crown of glory to him? Let us go to Colossians 2, verse 18. “Let no man beguile you of your reward (Let no man deceive you about your reward.) in a voluntary humility and worshipping of angels, intruding into those things which he hath not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind, And not holding the Head, (which is Christ) from which all the body by joints and bands having nourishment ministered, and knit together, increaseth with the increase of God.” There, he is talking about the head and then the body, which all receive strength, one of another, by bands, by joints. Joints and bands, the little bands in your arms that hold your joints together. You are looking at flesh, you are not looking at what holds it together, or what makes it move. I move my arm automatically. They say a message goes to your brain to tell it to move, but I know nothing about that. The body of Christ is held together by bands. The Bible says we are His workmanship. We are His temple. We are the temple of the living God. Not holding the head, which all the body by joints and bands have nourishment ministered, and grow together with the increase of God. It is God working through each joint, through each band. The body has a little member up here that is working all the time. The scientists call it gray matter, but there is something in there that causes the gray matter to work. There must be something in our spirit that is telling us that we are sons and daughters of God, knit together. We are a part of each other. The Bible tells us we are not our own, and that we are bought with a price. So that makes each one as important as the other. God does not look at thirty, sixty, or hundred fold and say, I like this one, I don’t like that one. One of them may be weak, but actually that weak member gets strength from that strong member. These people that have their names on church books somewhere, that is man made: it has nothing to do with a true experience with God, because it says we are members one of another. We are members of His body, we are bone of His bone, Ephesians 5. That is why he brings that in, there in Ephesians 5, as a woman and man being married together, because Paul said so at the end of that message. He said let a man love his wife, as Christ loves the Church. He went ahead to say these things, I say concerning Christ and the Church. “Wherefore if ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, as though living in the world, are you subject to ordinances.” I want to go to 1st Thessalonians chapter 2, verse 18, and read this, “Wherefore we would have come unto you, even I Paul, once and again; but Satan hindered us. For what is our hope, or joy, or crown of rejoicing? (Now he is putting the crown to be a crown of rejoicing.) Are not even ye in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at His coming?” You are a crown of rejoicing at the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. “For ye are our glory and joy.” Paul rejoiced in seeing saints of God increase in faith, because he felt like this was a part of him. In one place he said, I have begotten you again into this hope. In other words, he had gone to people and they had struggled and kind of got lax as they did there in Revelation in the first age. We find out right there, that they had lost their first love. Jesus Christ Himself said to them, you have lost your first love, so go find out where you lost it. It is up to us, if we lose something, to go find it. The hard thing is, is when we find it, to admit we were wrong. God will show you when you are wrong. I used to hear this all the time, “I will just let my conscience be my guide.” Your conscience will not guide you: your conscience will tell you when you are wrong, like, I should not have said that, I should not have done that, I have hurt somebody, and that was wrong. That is what your conscience does. What is Paul doing here? He is trying to build up faith and love in the people. You are my crown or my hope and joy, or you are my glory and joy. He was looking for a reward in the people he served. That is why in, in one place he said, I have shed many tears. It is easier to sit in the pews or to sit in a chair back there and let somebody else do all the right things. I remember when Bro. Jackson was living, Bro. Bud and I preached every other Thursday night. Many times our discussion was, whose is going to be next, wanting to put it off on the other one. Bro. Jackson said one time when we were on a hay ride, (he was sitting on the wagon and I was sitting close to him) living a life is kind of like a hay ride, you just ride along relaxed, all at once it hits a bump, then it can jar you off, or you have to hold on, one or the other. That is the way it is. About eight and a half years ago, our wagon hit a bump. We had a course that we had to hold steady on. I had two preachers come to me wanting to tell me what they wanted to do. I am glad I did not listen to them, because two of them were the ones that stood here and preached, and then left. I did not even consider listening to them. The first of the convention, one met me right back here and said, I would like to counsel with the preachers. You could not even understand him when he preached, because he never did carry out a subject, nor a sentence. You did not know where he was going to go with it. (You ought to know who you are, if you are listening), because your own people have told you that. People will quote what is supposed to be scripture all their life, but when you look it up, it is not in the Bible. Many times we get in the groove to follow. That is why my question up here is on this, we shall crown Him, question. 2nd Timothy 4, let me start in verse 6. “For I am now ready to be offered, (He is talking about his time being about up. He is not talking about going over and telling Nero to take his head, he is talking about Nero was going to take it, by this time the sentence has already been passed and he had already heard. Also, he had already determined within himself, for me to die is gain, but it is better that I live for your sakes. It is better that I die and be with the Lord, he said. See, he does not really die, you give up the ghost and the (the spirit) spirit goes back to God that gave your life. If you have lived the life that the scripture says, you go into paradise, which now, not in the heart of the earth, but it is in heaven.) and the time of my departing is at hand.” He is writing his last letter. This is the last time that you are going to hear from the apostle Paul. But his last letter is not with grief and with anguish. You read in the first part of that 4th chapter, the instructions he gave to Timothy. He said they will heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears. They will heap them like cordwood, just to hear something that pleases them. “I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, (Listen to each one of these statements, it is positive. I have fought a good fight. I knew that he did. I have finished my course, he has run his race. He is no longer telling Timothy, take to yourself the whole armor of God, he has already instructed him in that. He is telling what his reward is now.) I have kept the faith.” What faith was he talking about? The same faith that he was talking about in Hebrews chapter 11, because in each one of those he said, by faith. He said faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. “Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, (A crown of righteousness. Did he say there is laid up a crown of gold to put on my head? A crown of righteousness for a white robed saint.) which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day: (At that day, what day is he talking about? The day of the resurrection, for Paul, when this body is joined with our spirit being, which the spirit being is already gone, gone into heaven. Paul’s body is laying somewhere, no doubt in Rome, already decayed, gone back to dust. But when it is raised, it will be a glorious body, like unto His, talking of Christ.) and not to me only, but unto all them also that love His appearing.” What do you mean? Oh, I want the Lord to come. But that is words, the thing that he is speaking about here, is love His appearing, longing for His appearing, desiring His appearing. Paul was positive about this, because he had already said, there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at His appearing, and not to me only, but unto all those that love His appearing. During the day, no matter how hard you have had to work, no matter how much strain there is, it never leaves your mind. I do not know what my mind is doing when I am sleeping, but I know, when I am awake, and He never leaves my mind. Troubles come, but He is still there. That longing, that He is coming, and not only that He is coming, but He is coming for us, you, you, you and me. Don’t be discouraged. We may think we have a lot of accidents in this life, but God’s people do no’t have accidents. They have mishaps, because the angel of the Lord is right there with you, even in death or in life. How would you like to have a sentence passed upon you like Paul did. Would you have that kind of joy? Or would I? Because he said it would be better for me to die and be with the Lord than to live, but for you, it is better that I live. This life, sometimes, can become a drudge or a drag on the old body and mind, but when you look at it the right way, it is just shaping us up for His appearing. When you do not have grudges, and you do not hate your enemies, like I remember Bro. Jackson saying, that if somebody was broke down on the road, that had done evil against me, or had turned away from me, I would still stop to help them, but I would not go to have supper with them. There is a difference in a feeling for someone that is in trouble, than there is being in fellowship with them. We have brothers and sisters that are in circumstances they cannot help, but God has helped each of you to live out the beginning of that circumstance, and to make it to be better, because you have made up your mind that nothing is going to change you from the assurance you have in the love of God. Nothing and nobody is going to change my mind, because my hope is in the Lord Jesus Christ and what He has done for me. Paul talks about a crown, a crown of righteousness, a crown of hope. It is all joy when you look at it the right way, joy is your crown, that is your hope. Let us go to the book of James, chapter 1, verse 9. “Let the brother of low degree rejoice in that he is exalted: But the rich, in that he is made low: because as the flower of the grass he shall pass away. For the sun is no sooner risen with a burning heat, but it withereth the grass, and the flower thereof falleth, and the grace of the fashion of it perisheth: so also shall the rich man fade away in his ways. Blessed is the man that endureth temptation: for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life, (he shall receive a crown of life, when he is tried. See? I have read, crown of joy, crown of righteousness, crown of life.) which the Lord hath promised to them that love Him.” I would rather have that crown than something somebody can set upon my head. Just wait, when the Bride is raptured, they are all going to be recognizable for what they are. Jesus put His Bride right up there with Him. God put the Bride right up with Him in a lower category. I do not have it written down, but this is the last place I will go for now, to Romans 8, verse 14. “For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons (and daughters) of God. For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: and if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and (joint-heirs with Christ;) if so be that we suffer with Him, that we may be also glorified together.” What an elevation, what a privilege, that God thinks so much of us that when He created the heavens and the earth, before He ever created them, Jesus was the Lamb of God in His thought, to take away the sins of the world, and that was for you and me, the sins, He (Jesus) had no sin. For what purpose? That we might be heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, because He is putting us up on a scale to reign with Him. He will be King and we will reign with Him. The reality is, we will be the Bride and He will be the Groom. You cannot be closer than that. When Adam was created, he was lonely, there all alone. God said, I will make him an help mate. He made all the animals, but Adam was still lonely, so God makes him the help mate that He wants him to have. He made a female help mate for him, and Adam called her Woman. When he sees her the first time, he said, she is now bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh. She shall be called Woman. In the 5th chapter of the book of Ephesians, the statement is repeated, but it is Christ and the Bride. That makes me happy, to think that the great God of heaven thought so much of us that He would give His Son on that old cross, that we might be able to rule and reign with Him, because when He died and rose again from the dead, and went into heaven to make intercession, that blood He shed, is what made us pure. That old Adamic sin was gone. When we were baptized in water we took upon us His name. That is why we are called the bride of Christ. As I was talking about it this morning, we took upon us His name, that we might be a part of His family. As far as God was concerned, we became Bride people. You are Bride people. Now we are the sons and daughters of God by a new birth

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WE SHALL CROWN HIM?

5-12-13

I am going back to my main subject now; and I don’t know how long it will keep going, whether it is another week or what. When I began this, it was because of questions I had received. What I was on this morning was also because of other questions that had not been answered, so if there are still more questions on anything, let me know, so I can do my best to answer them in a scriptural manner, not just what I think. The only acceptable answer to anything has to be scriptural and by a revelation of that scripture. As I was reading this morning, from the 25th chapter of Matthew, that which has somewhat to do with the subject I am on, when it was talking about the saints there, where He will come back with His angels. If you go back to 1st Thessalonians 3:13, you will find that He comes back with His saints. As we look into the scripture, we find when the question was asked by the Sadduccees, (which did not believe in the resurrection, nor did they believe in spirits, but they asked the question testing Jesus, concerning the woman that had lost seven husbands. The question was asked by them, which one will she belong to in the resurrection? Matthew 22:29-30 “Jesus answered and said unto them, Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God. For in the resurrection they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels of God in heaven.” Now don’t get that mixed up, because there will still be your identity, your identity will be what it is, but He is talking about the angelic beings, that there is not that desire for the human flesh. But then the Bible says you will know even as you are known, but the desire of the flesh will be gone, and you will be as the angels of of God in heaven. These preachers that want to say that the angels in the 6th chapter of Genesis, where it talks about the sons of God looked upon the daughters of men, the denominational world, the ones that talk about prophecy, will talk about the angels being pressed into human flesh, to have relations with the daughters of men, which if that were true, that would make angels creators, which we know they are not. That will never happen. As you go back into the lineage of Jesus, in the book of Luke, you will see that each one is passed back all the way back to Adam, which is the son of God. So the Bible mentions us as being sons and daughters of God. We see here the scripture is not confusing, but man confuses it. The ministry that God has raised up for this hour is to straighten these things out. That is what it says in the 4th chapter of Ephesians, For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: until we all come into the unity of the faith and into the knowledge of the Son of God. We see here, a contrast to what the prophecy preachers and all the denominational church world believe in this hour of time. Remember, it is as it says in the 28th chapter of Isaiah, line upon line, and repeats it, line upon line, here a little and there a little. Then he repeats it again, line upon line, precept upon precept, here a little and there a little. This is the way the scripture is written for us, not to be able to figure out theologically, but to have a revelation from the Holy Spirit of what He really means in His word. In this hour, the revelation will be brought out by the ministry that God has chosen. We will leave it at that, because that is how God ordained it to be. As I mentioned the 25th chapter of Matthew, as the Son of man sits upon the throne of His kingdom, and all the holy angels with Him, we know that angels can be a part of His judgment, but we know the saints of God are going to be as angels. So we see here that there is no contradiction in scriptures, it is all in natural man’s mind, where the contradiction comes from. We have scriptures that we have not yet gotten into, that I want to look at tonight. As we are talking about the crown, preachers will still quote that supposed-to-be scripture, the saints shall crown Him. What are we going to crown Him with? Is it a crown of gold? Is it going to have all kinds of rubies and diamonds, things of that nature? You will see what your crown is, then compare it to His. As we go into Paul’s writings, so I want to go to 1st Thessalonians, the 2nd chapter. Let us start with the 18th verse. “Wherefore we would have come unto you, even I Paul, once and again; but Satan hindered us.” Now this is kind of the beginning of the church age. The reason we talk about the church ages, is because this applies to and is concerning the Gentiles. Because you read that the first one was the Ephesians, at Ephesus, where Paul broke away from the Jewish people. He did go into synagogues and things of that nature after that, but he told the Jews that were following him, that were causing so many problems, he said, behold you have turned away from God, therefore I go to the Gentiles. Not in those words, but to paraphrase it. So this was the beginning of the ministry to the Gentiles, in the Ephesians church age, the Ephesian church where the apostle Paul really started his ministry to the Gentiles. He always had problems with the Jews, because they always pointed back to his past, especially at Jerusalem. They wanted nothing to do with him, because of his persecution of the believers in Jesus. Then when he was converted on the Damascus road, they had doubts about him. He never got to tell his story, the story of what happened to him. We read about him in Galatians, the only ones he would present himself to was to Peter and James, whom he referred to as the Lord’s brother. Then fourteen years later, he went back to Jerusalem. He had to leave. You brought a Gentile in here they said, there was always somebody hounding him on his journey as he traveled from place to place. He said, since you reject this gospel, I therefore I turn to the Gentiles, after this had gone on so long. So here he is talking, wherefore we would have come unto you, even I Paul, once and again, but Satan hindered me. He is actually saying that he would have come to them twice, once and again, but Satan hindered him. “For what is our hope, or joy, or crown of rejoicing? (In every scripture, he will mention a crown, but it pertains to something else other than placing something on your head.) Are not even ye in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at His coming? That is his crown of rejoicing, that those Gentiles that have turned to the Lord, and in the time of the Lord’s coming, that is going to add to his reward. “For ye are our glory and joy.” This is all talking about the crown that he will receive at Christ’s coming. As we look at this and as we look at the crown we will receive, it is a crown of life. Let us go to another scripture now, 2nd Timothy, 4th chapter, 1st verse. Here he is laying a charge to Timothy, “I charge thee therefore before God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at His appearing and His kingdom; (He is laying this charge on him, and he is talking about Christ’s appearing and His kingdom, so our works follow us more than what our life is, more than what our life span is.) Preach the word; (This is part of the Word, preach the Word.) be instant in season, out of season.” Jesus tells us when we are brought before a court for something, he says, do not depend on your own intellect for the answer, because the Holy Ghost will give you the answer at the time that you are standing before that judge. We do not have all the answers. If I stood before a judge today I would not have all the answers, but I am sure that God would give me something to say at that time. It would not be necessarily what a lawyer would tell you to say. If you ever had a lawyer, then you would see that he would tell you never to plead guilty because when you do, the case is over. Some of the dirty stuff that goes on in the courts any more, lawyers take cases they know is wrong, but they will defend them to the last minute, knowing that they are wrong. The Holy Ghost will never direct you wrong, but he can give you an answer that would astound the judge, or a lawyer, or whoever else is prosecuting the case. I did not say that anyone should never get a lawyer, I did not say that, because there are times that you have to. But the thing about it is, what Paul says in the scripture concerning one another, that we should go before the Church. If you go before the Church, and you have a ministry that is doing what they know to do, to be right, then they are going to give you the right answer. “For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; and they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.” Fables are manufactured things given instead of a true answer. When a man runs his revelation out, then he has to manufacture something. That has happened much in this day and hour we are living in, used as if it were truly scripture, but it will not hold up in God’s court, because there is a reckoning day coming. I am glad for what Paul had to say in 2nd Thessalonians, as he talks about the day of the Lord, when it will come. I could go back to the 5th chapter of 1st Thessalonians. We can see there, a pattern of how God is going to work His will in the hour in which we live. There has never been an hour like this one. We have never been this close to the coming of the Lord. Do not think that it is still years and years off, because there are too many things going on right now, that are pointing to that time. “But watch thou in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry. For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith.” (Now listen to this verse.) Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, (Just like the robe is, there in the 19th chapter of Revelation. That white robe, that linen robe, that the Bride will wear, when we look at it, it is a robe of righteousness. I am not saying that people will not wear a white robe, I am not saying that at all: I am just pointing to the fact that much of this is spiritual language, that you cannot apply literal things to. Many years ago, after the death of Bro. William Branham, I had an experience, actually in a dream. The dream is too long to tell, but I had gone to Bro. William Branham’s house to wait on him, to be able to speak with him. He had already passed off the scene at that time. When he finally came to the door and opened it, I was standing there waiting, and he was dressed in white. He had a black belt on, but the rest of his clothes were white. He said to me: I heard when you first knocked, but so and so hindered me from answering the door, and I knew who they were. Well anyhow, the apostle said, Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness…) which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day: (Notice who gives it to him. Which the Lord will give me at that day, so I ask you, is He placing a crown of some kind on his head? No, it is a crown of righteousness. That would be the best crown you could ever experience, not some man made crown that somebody had placed on your head.) and not to me only, (Not for me only, but for who?) but unto all them also that love His appearing.” Pay close attention to this, because I want you to imagine seeing the Lord going around placing gold crowns on everybody’s head. It is mentioned as a crown because it is life, because we read here about the crown of life. On the picture we have back here, representing the bride of Christ, you see all the little things all around here, they represent people, that is what makes up the Bride, it is people, men and women, which receive a lesser reward than what He receives. The crown of life is the same that He receives, but lesser because of his part in all of this. Jesus is the Bridegroom. As for the Bride, the reason she is Bride, she has taken on His name in water baptism. When Peter preached that day at Pentecost, after they had received the Holy Ghost, they came to him and asked him and the rest of the apostles, men and brethren, what shall we do? That is not a question of what can I do, no, it is what must I do? He said, repent. Not long ago I heard a person quoting Acts 2:38 and he quoted down to that part, that men repent, because if he had read the rest of it and had something about it, then the church would have ousted him, and the truth is, men love the praises of men more than they do of God. Do you think I could preach this in the Methodist church? I knew I could not, because it had already caused me trouble, caused me to have to move from one place. Then the last place I was sent to, in Bowling Green, Kentucky, I told the people, there were five people that wanted to be baptized and I baptized them in a pond. I said, I will not baptize you in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. I said, I will only baptize you in the name of Jesus Christ. They said O.K. I do not know whatever happened to them, they might have just gone on their jolly way as though it was alright, the same as Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. I sure was not going to be guilty of doing something against my conscience. When they asked Martin Luther to recant, he said it would not be good on my conscience to recant. Let us go back to 1nd Thessalonians, 5th chapter, starting with verse 1. “But of the times and the seasons, brethren, ye have no need that I write unto you. For yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night.” He is saying a mouthful when he is talking about this. He did not stop there. “For when they shall say, Peace and safety; then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall not escape.” Let me read that verse again before I get to the next one, for when they shall say peace and safety, then sudden destruction cometh upon them as travail upon a woman with child, and they shall not escape. “But ye, brethren, are not in darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief. Ye are all the children of light, and the children of the day: we are not of the night, nor of darkness. Therefore let us not sleep, as do others; but let us watch and be sober.” What is he saying? That day is not going to overtake you as a thief. It is building up to something, and when we come to the time which could be very soon, the time when Israel will get their land back, we had better be watching and waiting. Now would be a good time to begin. “For they that sleep sleep in the night; and they that be drunken are drunken in the night. But let us, who are of the day, be sober, (He is not talking about drunkenness, like on alcohol: he is saying we had better be sober minded.) putting on the breastplate of faith and love; (This is where we protect our righteousness, our heart will talk to us. My heart talked to me when I was under conviction. It pounded, sounding like a hammer in my ears. Do any of you remember anything like that? That was God speaking to your heart, because, in the heart are the issues of life. As God deals with our inner being, it sends a message to our head to make a decision. That is not the only time. If we let God speak to us, He will send us a clear message of what is right and what is wrong, how far to go and how far not to go. Let us, who are of the day, be sober (minded), putting on the breastplate of faith and love…) and for an helmet, the hope of salvation.” He us clearing this thing from here, on up. If He can ever get it cleared, and I am talking about Him speaking to us and convicting us, telling us what is right and what is wrong, it will go from here up, it will control the rest of the body. Listen to this. What is he talking about? He is talking about the end time right here. That is his message as he starts this. In the 9th verse he says, “For God hath not appointed us to wrath, (What is wrath? In this case, it is tribulation. We are not going through the tribulation, and we are not going to judgment. In the 11th chapter of the book of 1st Corinthians, he tells us there, that if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged. But when the Lord judges us, then we are punished, that we might get things right. God knew at the very beginning, that there would be failures in us, but we are to overcome. That is when you take communion, there are a lot of people that never would take communion because they didn’t feel like they were living good enough to take communion. But then He tells you to confess your faults, and to take it. God is a loving God. He is a forgiving God. But He expects us to live right. In 1st John He says we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, who is the propitiation for our sins and not for ours only but for the sins of the whole world, the whole Christian world. He has not appointed us to wrath, (WHICH IS) the tribulation. Isaiah 26 says so, said that He hides us until the wrath is past.) but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ.” Salvation is a big word, but salvation is deliverance. Don’t make these words stand out so far in front of you that you never get the victory. Oh, God is too righteous for me to come to Him, He would never forgive me. Then why did He say He would? I am not talking about deserving, I am talking about eternal security, which works with predestination. Go to 2nd Thessalonians, 2nd chapter. “Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto Him.” That is the rapture. I know Bro. William Branham talked about rapturing faith. I do not stand here to dispute my brother, but is that speaking about something that we have got to keep reaching for, and reaching for, and reaching for until finally we are raptured? What about the dead? It would take more faith to get changed, if we are looking at it in that way. It is going to take more faith to be raised from the dead, than it will to be changed. The promise is, if we live right and live before God as we should, you will be raptured, because the scripture talks about not everybody having the same faith. You say, where do you see that? It talks about people that do not have faith to be able to eat certain foods, when Paul says everything is eatable before God. When Bro. Jackson preached about Paul, he said he had even ate rats. Why? For sustenance that he might be able to preach the gospel. That was not on his regular diet, was not what he preferred, but he knew that God, through prayer and sanctification, had cleaned up that old rat. So if you turn on the television and watch some of these stations, they are telling you to eat all the right things. If you eat what they tell you to eat, then take the vitamins they tell you to take, you will be broke. They are after your money. They have proven that organic is not always organic. One will say, if you want to eat organic, eat this, and another will say, no, eat this. Do not eat meat from grain fed cattle, eat meat from grass fed cattle, because the grain fed has got chemicals in it. What about the grass fed? It is fertilized. When you eat, ask God to sanctify it, to make it pure, to make it holy. I am sure Paul believed thatway when he ate certain things. “That ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, (He was no’t going to write a letter like that, but there were others that would say, this is from Paul. In order to get Bro. William Branham to say the things some people wanted him to say, they would splice his taped messages. That is when they had the old reel to reel tapes. They would cut out certain things and put in certain things. He said, I am not responsible for that. He said, Judas went out and hanged himself and said you can splice tapes and things and you can get them to say, go out and hang yourself. He knew all the followers really were not genuine followers of the Word of God he preached.) as that the day of Christ is at hand. Let no man deceive you by any means: (In other words, wisdom in the Word of God will teach you. You may hear something taught otherwise, but do not just jump on it: be sure it is scriptural.) for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition.” The denominational world and prophecy preachers have got two men coming, one of them is the antichrist and the other is the false prophet. How did they get that? I do not know, I just know it is a deception. When the rapture takes place, the man that is sitting on the throne then in Rome, will be that man. He will not be in Jerusalem until the middle of the week. Nevertheless that will be the man of sin, the antichrist. There will be a peace treaty signed between Israel and the Vatican, or you could saythe beast. The beast is made up of those nations of Europe that go along with it peace treaty. Israel will sign a treaty with them and then the two prophets appear in the streets of Jerusalem. No doubt the bride Church will still be here at that time, because we are going to know that this is the man of sin before we are raptured. “Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God. Remember ye not, that, when I was yet with you, I told you these things? And now ye know what withholdeth that he might be revealed in his time. For the mystery of iniquity doth already work: only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way.” Until the Holy Ghost is taken out of the way. There will be no more restraint after the Holy Ghost is taken out of the way. There will be no more restraint. That is what that verse means.

WE SHALL CROWN HIM?
5-19-13 AM

We have been on this subject for quite awhile now. There are other things to go into with this. I have some questions I want to answer, maybe not this morning. Sometimes God just wants us as ministers, to go further, because it is the gift, it is a calling of God, it is not called by men, but of God. As we see the hour we are living in, we are not only expectant, but God is expectant that we walk in His presence and live in His great presence and believe His word. He said in the 16th chapter of Mark that these signs shall follow them that believe. Jesus said, in my name, He did not say in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. No He said, in my name shall they do all those things mentioned. So it is His name that we look to our Father for the things that are needed, because He was the one that shed the blood for our sins. That is the reason we have remission from our sins. It is not because of anything that we have done, because we can never do enough work to merit anything ourselves in this great salvation experience, because the Bible says it is a gift of God. If somebody comes and hands you something and says this is a gift, you know you did not work for it. Sometimes we feel like we do not deserve it; and that is right: I know I do not deserve what He did for me, but the gift is still there, and it is there for the taking of all that are dealt with by His wonderful Spirit. The thing about it is, there is predestination to consider. I cannot predestinate anyone to be in the family of God, only He, because of his great foreknowledge was able to do that. Neither can I kick anyone out, that He has brought into His family. If you come in these doors back here, it is your privilege. If you leave through those same doors, then that is up to you. I know that no true seed of God has ever left because of the truth that is preached here. Those that have left here, left because they did not believe the truth they heard preached. Neither I or Bro. Bud have sought to promote ourselves. That is just the way it is, whether someone accuses us of that or not, that is up to every individual, but I know better, and that is what counts. These people that just shame me and make me want to bow my head when I hear it said, are those who like to say, Allen and Bud were just waiting until Bro. Jackson died, so they could inherit this. I do not know anything more low down, than to have someone accuse us of something like that. Nevertheless that is not my problem, that is your problem if you feel like that. I can say that, because God knows our heart’s, He knows our mind’s, He knows our attitudes. I feel that is one of the last things we have to do on our own, is to get our attitudes right, and to give ourselves wholly unto the Spirit of God. As they sing the song, I came here expecting God to move, we should always do that, always be in expectancy of the Spirit of God to move among us. Just like He did this morning, nobody worked that up. Nobody caused anyone else to shout. I did not come in here and gouge somebody and say shout. The denominational church world today, make extreme efforts to promote speaking in tongues. They tell everybody in the congregation, Now let us all pray in your tongue, pray in the spirit, that is what they are talking about. Then you can hear all over the congregation, people speaking in some kind of tongue. That is between them and God. But I have seen mockery out of it. Whatever we do in worship, we need to be comfortable with our Lord, that He may be comfortable with us. When we come into the assembly, He says for us to do things decently and in order. Continued next issue