Abraham (55-0624)
|
E-1
Good evening friends. I am happy to be here again tonight. Just a
little tired. I have just closed several great services before I left
the U.S.A. So I'm going to take a little rest when I get home, if the
Lord willing. But we are certainly thankful to be here in Switzerland
among you fine people.
I believe of everywhere I've ever traveled, I have never seen nicer
people than I've met in Switzerland. That is true. I mean that. I
didn't have to say it, but I mean it from my heart. But we trust that
the Lord will bless you mightily, and I hope I will be just as much
blessing to you as you have been to me. And maybe sometime in the
future, if God willing, I could come back again, maybe, and be with you
longer. Just two more nights of the service, and then I have to go I
suppose.
E-2
And that's usually the way it goes, just when you get acquainted with
people, then you've got to say good bye. But I'm hoping someday where
there'll–or we will all speak one language, we will never be old, no
sickness, no death. We will meet again, and then I want an appointment
with each one of you for a thousand years. We will have plenty of time
then. This is the day; we must work while it is day. Night cometh when
no man work.
Now, there's many letters here, and we are thankful that you have that
faith in God. And now, that someone might misunderstand but this–these
are not that we have anything we put on these letters, it's just
obeying the Word of God. I have thousands of testimonies at home of
people that's been healed this a way. God honored His Word.
E-3
Now, we're going to pray for them, and I pray that God will bless
everyone. Could–would you bow your heads with me, and pray with me?
God will hear your prayer, too.
E-4
Our heavenly Father…?… and as we are praying over these
handkerchiefs, let Thy spirit come upon us. We realize that there's
nothing in us as man, just obeying Your Word. There was no virtue in
the serpent on the pole. Neither was there any virtue in the pole it
hung on. But to they who looked they lived, for it was obedience to
God's Word. O God, Creator of heavens and earth, may it be likewise
with these, when these are brought to the sick, may every one of them
be healed. If we Your servants have found grace in Your sight, let this
be so, Father. In Jesus' Name. Amen.
E-5
We have just been holding a little too late at night, I understand.
Last evening someone was telling me of our party, that many people had
to catch a train at nine-thirty. I'm sorry that I held you late. I
don't mean to do that, I–but I just run over time. Forgive me, please.
In Genesis 22, beginning with the 7th verse, we read this Scripture:
said, My father: and he said, Here I am, my son. He said, Behold the
fire and the wood: but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?
Now, the 24th verse.
E-6
Shall we bow our heads again? Almighty God, Creator of heavens and
earth, Giver of all good spiritual gifts, Author of Eternal Life, send
Thy blessings upon Thy Word. Circumcise the lips that speak, and the
hearts that hear, and may the seed of God fall into the hearts tonight,
and many believe on the Lord Jesus, and be healed of their sickness.
For we ask it in Jesus' Name. Amen.
Now, you watch for me that I won't be too long. Watch the time for me.
I just said to the managers back there to watch the time for me.
E-7
We want to speak tonight again about Abraham. And I just love those old
Bible characters, because all the Old Testament was a shadow of the New
Testament. All things you see back there pointed to the cross, and all
since then points back to the cross. So in the cross, all the plan of
salvation and healing was finished there for believers.
Now, last night we left Abraham where he had made the–seen the
confirmation of the covenant. How we find that God had give him a
promise, and Abraham believed it, though He never give it to him just
then, but He gave him the promise. So if you've got the promise, you've
got it anyhow.
E-8 If I ask… (Do you have acorn trees here? Acorn trees here?) [Brother Branham speaks to the interpreter–Ed.]
If you ask me for an acorn tree, and I give you an acorn, you've
already got an acorn tree in a seed form. And that's what we try to
preach the Word from the Bible, for that is the Promise of God in seed
form.
Jesus said that the Word of God is Seed that a sower sowed. And
any–any Divine promise of God will be received into your heart, no–no
unbelief mixed with it, it'll produce just what it promised, for it's
God's promise. Just hold on to it like Abraham did, and He will make it
real to you.
E-9
Now, to you people that are along here, setting in these chairs and
stretchers, God loves you. No matter what is wrong with you, God,
if–if He's Almighty God, He can do all things, and if He cannot do all
things, then He is not Almighty God. I would not stand here and speak
to you, unless I knew what I was speaking of. I…
You notice, now every night there's someone raises from the stretcher
or wheelchair, paralyzed, or something wrong with them. They go out
well, the deaf hear, blind see, and signs of the living God. See, God
is still alive. God never leaves the earth. Sometimes He takes His man,
but never His Spirit. He took Elijah, and His spirit came upon Elijah.
Several hundred years later, it came up on John the Baptist, and
predicted to come again in the last days. God promised it.
E-10
Now, the devil, he takes his man, and it–the–the spirit remains here
on someone else. Jesus said to the Pharisees, because they did not
believe Him. He–they–He would not teach their doctrine. He said "You
are of the devil, your father." Said, "Which one of your fathers has
not persecuted the prophet?" See, the spirit remains here, and the–the
person goes on. Then the resurrection is the judgment.
Now, Abraham was the first to go out in a strange country and–and
sojourn just on the promise of God. But he separated himself from all
his associates of the world, and walked alone with God to be a friend.
E-11
Last night we found out how that God confirmed the covenant, and we
find the beautiful picture there of what He did at showing Calvary,
where He was going to offer His own Son. Then we find Him appearing to
Abraham again, and tell him He was the Breasted One, so that Abraham
could be like a baby to Him, and just nurse from Him, strength, because
Abraham was old. He was already a hundred years old, and Sarah was
ninety. That was fifty years or forty years past menopause. He married
her when she was a little girl, and he was just a young man. And they
had lived together as husband and wife all of these years. Then when
menopause ceased, then forty years passed, and they were still
believing God's promise. That–that's wonderful.
E-12
That's the kind of faith that we all want. Do not argue about it.
It's… The Bible is not to be argued. It… The Bible is to be
preached and lived. Jesus said, "If I do not the works of My Father,
then believe Me not. But if I do the works of My Father, then believe
the Word." And today, if we don't live the Christian life, well then,
would–people can say we're not Christians. But if Christ is in you, He
lives His Life in you.
E-13
As Paul said, "It's no more me, but Christ that liveth in me." And if
Christ lives in a man, He… Christ lives His Life like He did when He
was here on earth, for He said so. He said, "A little while and the
world won't see Me no more, but you shall see Me. For I will be with
you to the end of the world. And the things that I do, so shall you
do." And He's raised from the dead, and He's here now in the same power
that He had when He was here on earth, doing the same thing, saving the
same kind of people, healing the same kind of sick, showing the same
kind of visions.
E-14
And over in the New Testament, and the–when the church was first
inaugurated, Peter said in his sermon to the church, that God said, "In
the last days I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh. And your sons
and daughters shall prophesy. And your young men shall see visions."
God has promised, the things that Jesus did would be done again in the
last days. And we're living in that day.
Jesus did not claim to be a great Healer. He gave all praise to God.
And He said, "I can do nothing in Myself." when He was questioned why
He didn't heal all the sick people.
E-15
When He went out to the pool of Bethesda, there laid thousands of
people, lame, twisted, and halt, and blind. He walked among them, till
He found a man laying on a pallet. He made him well and left the rest
of them. That's Saint John 5. And in the 19th verse, He is being
questioned. He said, "Verily, verily, I say unto you, the Son can do
nothing in Himself. But what He sees the Father doing, that doeth the
Son likewise."
Christ had perfect faith in God. For Jesus is just the body, and God
was in Him. The Bible says that God was in Christ, reconciling the
world to Himself.
E-16
Now, Abraham, as he received the promise, he journeyed on, after
he–God confirmed the promise to him. So we find him now in about the
18th chapter of Genesis, after Lot had separated himself; Lot went out
into the Sodom and Gomorrah, a very beautiful type of lukewarm
believers today that love the world and the things of the world. The
Bible said, "If you love the world or the things of the world, the love
of God's not even in you."
So Lot went down with the backsliders. But Abraham stayed out where God
placed him, for he knew that God promised to him that he was going to
heir the whole thing.
E-17
So the–the lands were poor. The herd probably was very thin. One day
while Abraham was setting under the oak, he lifted up his eyes, and
standing in front of him, stood three Men. And One of them was Almighty
God Himself. I wonder why that God appeared in that form with dust over
Him. Abraham invited Him in, and he went and killed a calf, cooked the
meat, got some butter and some milk, and Sarah went and got some cake,
and set them down before Them. And Almighty God eat food like a man.
Do you imagine what God did there. He just reached out and got a
handful of atoms, and some petroleum, (petroleum, you know, oils and
stuff) [Brother Branham speaks to the interpreter–Ed.],
and got the–the cosmic light, what the human body's made up of, and
put it together, and lived in it. It was a preview what He was–what He
was going to be anyhow. For He was manifested in the flesh in Christ
Jesus.
E-18
Oh, He's wonderful. Some glorious day these bodies of ours are going
back where they come from. But if our spirit is right with God, at the
resurrection every body will come back again.
The other day I–I was combing my hair, and my wife said, "Billy, you're losing most of your hair."
I said, "But, honey, I haven't lost a one of them."
She said, "Where are they at?"
I said, "Where was–where were they before I got them? They're there
now waiting for me in the resurrection." Amen. They was one time they
wasn't. Then there was a time they were. Now, there is a time they are
not. But according to the Bible, there'll be a time when they'll be
again.
E-19
I met a doctor the other day. I said, "Doctor, is it true every time we
eat, we build blood–blood cells in our body that makes us grow?"
He said, "That is true."
I said, "I ask you a question. I'm eating the same kind of food now
that I eat when I was sixteen. When I was sixteen, I eat the food, I
grew, got stronger, bigger. And now, I eat the same food, perhaps
better and more of it, and I'm getting older and weaker all the time."
I said, "Explain that." It's not scientific.
If this glass has got water in it, and you pour more in it, it just
keeps filling up, filling up. But why is it, it gets to a certain spot,
and you keep pouring water in it, and it keeps going down? Because God
has said. That's why. God has a way. Just like that flower, it started
up; it come to its maturity, then it starts wilting away, but it comes
back again.
E-20
Now, when God told Abraham when He met him there in a body, he had to
wash the dust off of His feet. The Bible said that was God… And He
turned His back to the tent; He said, "Abraham, where is Sarah?"
Said, "She's in the tent."
He said, "And according to life, as it is with women, I will visit
you." And Sarah heard it. And when Sarah heard it, she laughed in her
heart, not out loud. The Bible said that He had His back turned to the
tent where Sarah was, and He looked at Abraham, said, "Why did Sarah
laugh?"
See what I mean? God knows all things. He knows what you are. He knows
what's wrong with you. That always been a sign of God…?… see,
foresee, foretell. Look at the woman at the well, when Jesus told her
she had five husbands. Why–why she said, "I know when Messiah cometh
He will do these things," but she thought He was a prophet, but He told
her He was the Son of God. And He's the same today. That was the Son of
God back there with Abraham, exhibited in a body. Oh, I hope you see
that.
E-21
Now notice, then God told that, that would be the next month then. And
the next month it was with Sarah as it is with women, after it had
ceased forty years. I want you to notice another little thing here. I
know, my brethren, you're going to criticize this, but I want you just
to be quiet for a moment, and look this over after you get home. Watch
what God done to Abraham there, when He give him the promise.
Now, we all know that something had to happen to Sarah. She was nearly
a hundred years old. Now, when you read the Bible, if the only
experience you got come out of some school or some seminary, you lack
something.
E-22
Listen, first you've got to be borned again of the Spirit of God. If
you're not, you'll never understand the Word of God. God has said so.
God said, "I have hid this Bible from the wise and prudent, and will
reveal it to babes such as will believe." If you want to get anything
from God, just be a baby. Open up the Bible. Fall in love with Jesus.
E-23
Now, when my wife writes me a letter, well, I read it. And she starts
off, "Dear Billy, I am setting here tonight. I am thinking much about
you." That's what she's saying on the paper, but I can tell what's
between the lines, what she's reading.
The Bible, you must read between the lines, because God has hid It from
those who just read the word alone. I am quoting Scripture that He has
hid It from the eyes of the wise and prudent, and will reveal It to
babes such as will learn. All that's ever read that in the Bible say,
"Amen." [Congregation says, "Amen."–Ed.] Then it's the baby that'll humble himself, not be puffed up, but be humble, and say, "Lord, I believe It."
E-24
A friend of mine, John Sproule, he came over to France for a little
visit. I believe it was Alsace Lorraine. And he walked into a garden,
and there was a statue of Jesus…