Bible Believers' Newsletter 394
"We focus on the present Truth – what Jesus is doing now. . ."
ISSN 1442-8660Christian greetings in the precious Name of our Lord Jesus Christ; we thank you for joining us for fellowship around God's unchanging Word.
Please uphold our Church, the Church Website and myself in prayer. Our main article in this issue is a much abridged sermon by Brother Branham, Perfect Strength by Perfect Weakness.
This Newsletter serves those of like precious faith. Whoever will receive the truth is welcome to feed their soul from the waters of the River of Life. Everything presented should be confirmed personally in your own Bible.
Your brother-in-Christ,
Anthony Grigor-Scott
New Suicide Bomber Guidelines for International Assn. of Chiefs of Police
"When we start instructing police to profile people for head shots, we're in a whole new world"—one that will require "altering the police mind-set" to encompass "adversaries who are soldiers in a war, as opposed to simply criminals. This is a major departure from the present police culture" . . . traditionally trained center-mass shots may actually detonate a bomber's explosives or may merely inflict nonfatal wounds, allowing the bombing mission to proceed. A head shot is the only reliable placement for instant de-animation.
Aveni agrees. "But I've trained thousands of cops, and I don't think most have the skill to deliver a head shot" from a distance, especially with a handgun . . .
"Whether the demands of society for increased protection will also allow for forgiveness when terrible mistakes occur, only time will tell". . . Full story: theiacp.org theiacp.org
Comment: The world is insane. "Suicide Bomber Guidelines" for Police Chiefs throughout the world!! How many billions will need to be borrowed from the banksters to finance this psyop, and how many hundreds of millions will it terrify (thesis)? How many more fraudulent bombing attacks (antithesis) will the people who have devised this scam have to execute before they have we plebs conditioned to submissiveness as obedient NWO serfs (synthesis)?
The international Police chiefs readily capitulated, swapping intelligent, independent thought as mature adult human beings for the promise of job security, a guaranteed pension and Noahide serfdom as mind-controlled automatons of the NWO.
New Orleans: A Geopolitical Prize
During the Cold War, a macabre topic of discussion among bored graduate students who studied such things was this: If the Soviets could destroy one city with a large nuclear device, which would it be? The usual answers were Washington or New York. For me, the answer was simple: New Orleans.
If the Mississippi River was shut to traffic, then the foundations of the economy would be shattered. Industrial minerals needed in the factories wouldn't come in, and the agricultural wealth wouldn't flow out. Alternative routes really weren't available.
The Germans knew it too: A U-boat campaign occurred near the mouth of the Mississippi during World War II. Both the Germans and Stratfor have stood with Andy Jackson: New Orleans was the prize. Full story: stratfor.com
The Aftermath
September 12, 2005 — The American Imperium will collapse at the first sign of a real challenge. It's hard to escape this conclusion, in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
The terrorists might be right, in this regard at least. The cult of the individual has hollowed out the 21st Century American sensibility. One good push and it may well collapse.
You may point to the rally-round after 9/11, the rush of patriotic fervour and fellow-feeling. September 11 was a pinprick. Three thousand dead? A couple of city blocks? Pah! Tell that to Baghdad. Or Kabul, or Falluja. Or Grozny, Kandahar, Beirut; we all know the list.
Now in New Orleans we have a demonstration of the moral sinew of the society so many must die to protect. This is the world's policeman. The model of a free-market culture we are meant to emulate. Here are the gloried American values under pressure. And what happens? . . .
The non-existent international outpouring of sympathy and support is a mirror image of the callous indifference shown by the bulk of the American public to the suffering of others, much of which has been caused by their various governments' policies.
We can't blame them too much. It's hard for them to empathise with people they've never heard of and know nothing about. They still believe they are a force for good in the world. On the other hand they are the most highly-connected people the world has ever seen. They really should be better informed . . .
A cultural one-way mirror surrounds the US. They may not see the consequences of their actions, but others see the emptiness at the core of the neo-con project. There is no heart left in America.
Strategic rivals—China, Europe, the jihadis—observe this. As they take advantage of it, it will eventually dawn on American strategists that they have no capacity to absorb setbacks.
And when they realise they have nothing of any worth left to protect except their own power, and no means to protect it except their weapons, the rest of us are left to hope that their God is a compassionate one. Not much evidence of that so far. Full story: abc.net.au
Tom Beardon
"A Nobel prize was awarded in 1957 for substantiating the process for extracting free Electromagnetic energy from the vacuum, yet not one current Electrical Engineering or Classical Electromagnetics textbook mentions it".
August 27, 2005 — I suspect most of our storms from now on will have appreciable weather engineering added, to cause more damage.
We have entered the operational phase of asymmetrical war against us, and—as Secretary of Defense Cohen confirmed in 1997—the "terrorists" are using "electromagnetic" weapons to stimulate volcanoes into eruption, cause earthquakes, and control our climate and weather.
This hurricane already made a right angle turn west to move across the tip of Florida, and into the Gulf, where the warm Gulf waters will increase its intensity and the damage it does. Some 40% or so of US oil comes from that Gulf, hence the strategic importance of the targeting. The most lucrative damage path would be through the oil rigs and platforms, and then hit shore centered on New Orleans. We'll just have to see if that is the path generated. Full story: cheniere.org
Energy Information
I believe there is a conspiracy of silence concerning decades old and current energy technology? Yes, I have experienced this for more than 25-years. Full story: gasgouging.com
The Vicious Downward Cycle of the American Economy
The outsourcing of jobs and the importation of foreigners on work visas are emptying the pipeline of qualified Americans and destroying US technical occupations . . .
It is detrimental to the future of freedom that at this time, when our civil liberties are under attack by the Bush administration and diminishing economic opportunity is breathing new life into class war, libertarians and market economists are demonstrating more commitment to ideology than to the welfare of fellow citizens. By associating freedom and market solutions with policies that are eroding Americans' prospects, freedom's defenders are unwittingly stabbing freedom in the back. Full story: opednews.com
Comment: Not unwitting but social and economic chaos meticulously engineered to induce martial law from whose ashes the phoenix of totalitarian one world government will arise.
CFR's Plan to integrate the US, Mexico and Canada
July 13, 2005 — The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) has just let the cat out of the bag about what's really behind our trade agreements and security partnerships with the other North American countries. A 59-page CFR document spells out a five-year plan for the "establishment by 2010 of a North American economic and security community" with a common "outer security perimeter."
"Community" means integrating the United States with the corruption, socialism, poverty and population of Mexico and Canada. "Common perimeter" means wide-open US borders between the US, Mexico and Canada. . .
This CFR document, called "Building a North American Community," asserts that George W. Bush, Mexican President Vicente Fox, and Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin "committed their governments" to this goal when they met at Bush's ranch and at Waco, Texas on March 23, 2005. The three adopted the "Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America" and assigned "working groups" to fill in the details.
It was at this same meeting, grandly called the North American summit, that President Bush pinned the epithet "vigilantes" on the volunteers guarding our border in Arizona . . .
The CFR document calls for creating a "North American preference" so that employers can recruit low-paid workers from anywhere in North America . . . for a fraction of US wages . . .
To no one's surprise, the CFR plan calls for massive US foreign aid to the other countries. The burden on the US taxpayers will include so-called "multilateral development" from the World Bank and the Inter-American Development Bank, "long-term loans in pesos," and a North American Investment Fund to send US private capital to Mexico.
The experience of the European Union and the World Trade Organization makes it clear that a common market requires a court system, so the CFR document calls for "a permanent tribunal for North American dispute resolution." Get ready for decisions from non-American judges who make up their rules ad hoc and probably hate the United States anyway.
The CFR document calls for allowing Mexican trucks "unlimited access" to the United States, including the hauling of local loads between US cities. The CFR document calls for adopting a "tested once" principle for pharmaceuticals, by which a product tested in Mexico will automatically be considered to have met US standards.
The CFR document demands that we implement "the Social Security Totalization Agreement negotiated between the United States and Mexico." That's code language for putting illegal aliens into the US Social Security system, which is bound to bankrupt the system.
Here's another handout included in the plan. US taxpayers are supposed to create a major fund to finance 60,000 Mexican students to study in US colleges.
To ensure that the US government carries out this plan so that it is "achievable" within five years, the CFR calls for supervision by a North American Advisory Council of "eminent persons from outside government . . . along the lines of the Bilderberg" conferences. Full story: eagleforum.org
Kabbalist urges Jews to Israel ahead of Upcoming Disasters
Israel, September 14, 2005 — Israel's leading known Kabbalistic Elder, Rabbi Yitzchak Kaduri called upon worldwide Jewry Tuesday night to return to Israel due to natural disasters which threaten to strike the world.
"This declaration I find fitting to issue for all of the Jews of the world to hear. It is incumbent upon them to return to the Land of Israel due to terrible natural disasters which threaten the world.
In the future, the Holy One, Blessed be He, will bring about great disasters in the countries of the world to sweeten the judgments of the Land of Israel. I am ordering the publication of this declaration as a warning, so that Jews in the countries of the world will be aware of the impending danger and will come to the Land of Israel for the building of the Temple and revelation of our righteous Mashiach (Messiah)."
Rabbi Kaduri also stated that the upcoming year would be a year of "secret and revelation" in the world . . .
The Mashiach is already in Israel. Whatever people are sure will not happen is liable to happen, and whatever we are certain will happen may disappoint us. . . Full story: israelnationalnews.com
Comment: The Rabbi is right on many points. Great disasters will strike the world and Israel will be as the land of Goshen. Christ returned in 1963 but it will be about four years before the elect in Israel see His "secret and revelation." They will recognize that the third Temple is not a building made with human hands but Messiah and His Bride (Ezekiel 48:35). Brother Branham, the Elijah of Malachi 4:5-6 and Revelation 10:7 said, "Many Jews are in the United States—which they won't escape from" (C.O.D., p. 97:235).
Is a New Super Volcano set to hit the Pacific Coast?
Bend, Oregon — A recent survey of a bulge that covers about 100 square miles near the South Sister indicates the area is still growing, suggesting it could be another volcano in the making or a major shift of molten rock under the center of the Cascade Range. Recent eruptions at nearby Mount St. Helens in Washington state have rekindled interest in the annual Sisters survey and its findings.
They say it probably began growing in 1997 and has been rising ever since at a rate of about 1.4 inches a year. It was first observed from space using a relatively new imaging technology known as radar interferometry that can measure changes in the Earth's surface. The likely cause of the bulge is a pool of magma that, according to Deschutes National Forest geologist Larry Chitwood, is equal in size to a lake 1 mile across and 65 feet deep. The magma lake is rising 10 feet each year, under tremendous pressure, and it deforms the Earth's surface as it expands, causing the bulge.
Full story: rumormillnews.com
Russian Scientists warn of Impending North American Catastrophic Event
September 9, 2005 — Russian Scientists are reporting today that their latest computer models are now showing that the continuing building pressures upon the North American Plate are nearing 'Insurmountable Levels' and that 'Little time is left' before the occurrence of a 'Catastrophic Event'.
These reports further question the motives of the American Military Leaders in not warning their people, as they have equally efficient and powerful computer models showing these same probabilities yet have not warned their people, unlike Russian Scientists and Government Leaders who are rushing massive aid to our Far Eastern Regions, and as we had previously reported on in our August 18th report titled "Russian Forces Prepare For Massive Earthquakes as Gulf of Mexico Becomes 'Zone of Death' and New Madrid Fault Zone Heads Towards Cataclysmic Event" wherein we had stated:
Russian Emergency Services are preparing for massive earthquakes in Kamchatka after Russian Scientists have determined that the growing instabilities presently occurring in our earth's core regions will likely lead to a series of Global Massive Earthquake and Volcanic events by December of this year.
Russian Social Scientists point out though that after many decades of not just ignoring the predictive values of computer models, but also in discouraging their probabilities from being 'taken seriously' by the American public, that the American Military Leaders' reluctance to prepare for these events may lie in the very psychological mindsets they have instilled in their civilian population to begin with, and as we have reported on previously these psychological mindsets are for the controlling of their peoples against social unrest and disorder, not to saving their lives.
But the time is soon coming where even the most controlled American citizen will no longer be able to ignore the catastrophic changes being made to their country, not just by nature itself, but also in the reordering of their entire social order towards Fascist rule as more of their freedoms are stripped away and their country becomes totally militarized.
Once again also our Earth has been hit by yet another massive Cosmic Blast in our Southern Hemispheric Regions that was so powerful that it lit up the skies. . .
But of greater concerns to Russian Scientists are the 'unrelenting tectonic forces' building upon the entire North American Plate, and where this week's New York Region 3.6 Magnitude Earthquake provides yet another warning to these people. . .
The Darwinian mindsets of these Americans do not allow for their being able to understand the clear warnings of these events that would lead them to the protection of their lives by preparing for these events. Even as the entire world continues to suffer grievous blows from unrelenting weather changes, massive storms, unremitting droughts and horrific earthquakes, the American people remain the least prepared to either protect themselves, or to understand the sheer apocalyptic nature of the changes our World is going through. Full story: whatdoesitmean.com
American Al Qaeda Member warns of Attacks
September 12, 2005 — American intelligence officials believe the man who appears on the tape to be Adam Gadahn of Orange County, Calif. Last year, Gadahn delivered a similar taped communiqu?? for al Qaeda. That tape was later deemed authentic.
On the new tape, delivered to ABC News in Pakistan on Saturday, Gadahn's message contains a very pointed al Qaeda threat against Los Angeles and Melbourne . . . Only a few years ago, Gadahn was a Southern California teenager with interests in the environment, the Los Angeles Dodgers and heavy metal music. . .
According to Associated Press—Adam Gadahn also goes by Adam Pearlman and Abu Suhayb Al-Amriki . . . Gadahn's aunt, Nancy Pearlman, described her nephew as inquisitive and quick to learn languages. He read about several religions, she said, noting his mother's family is Catholic and he had a Jewish grandfather on his father's side.
Full story: abcnews.go.com msnbc.msn.com
Comment: Another sayanim?
Perfect Strength by Perfect Weakness
By William Marrion Branham
I want to make this clear so that you'll understand. There never was an altar call made in all the Bible. There's no such a thing in the Scripture. Nowhere down through the ages was it made till the Methodist age, about two hundred years ago. See?
Altar calls are when people come up and try to persuade and pull people, "Come on, John, your mother died praying for you. Come on, John." That's not conviction, friends. No! Seldom you ever hear one that ever goes very far. And in that you get everything. The reason the church is as muddled up the way it is today is because of such things.
Conviction, you don't have to say a thing, brother; God's there and done done the work. "While Peter spake these Words the Holy Ghost fell on them that heard the Word." There's no altar call (See?) no such a thing.
Now, the altar is the place of prayer where. . . Every person coming to the church should first go in, kneel at the altar, silently pray to God, and offer their petition of prayer for their loved ones, thanking God for what they have had done for them, then go back to their seat.
And then the church is the place where the Word of God. . . "And judgment begins at the house of God," where the judgment of the Word goes forth. But today we've changed that around so much.
Now, I have nothing against anyone who makes altar calls. See? . . . you collect too many people. . . Jesus said, "No man can come to Me except My Father draws him first. And all that the Father has given Me will come to Me." That throws your altar call completely out altogether. See that? "All the Father. . ."
Our responsibility is just to preach the Word. The Bible said, "As many as believed were baptized." Repent, and be baptized in the Name of Jesus Christ for the remission, forgiveness of sins. What? Be baptized in the Name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins (See?) and you shall then receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.
But when you persuade and pull and scare people, and talk people in . . . People must come sanely, soberly, under conviction, and receive Christ. Then the first thing they do as soon as they receive Christ sitting in their seats, the next thing is to be baptized in the Name of Jesus Christ for the remission of those sins that they have been convinced that they're wrong. That's how they're remitted of their sins. See? 'Cause they have repented; been baptized as a memorial to the people, that, "I have received Christ as my personal Saviour;" then you're a candidate for the Holy Ghost. . .
We are very grateful that we still have a kind heavenly Father Who looks over our mistakes and doesn't reckon them to us.
I was reading over in the Book of Romans the 4th chapter, where Paul wrote the Divine commentary of the life of Abraham. Now, we know that Abraham many times got kind of flusterated like we do. But when his commentary was written, there wasn't any of his flusterations mentioned (You see?), never mentioned them at all, said:
"Abraham staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong. . . giving praise to God". See, and that's the way I hope mine will be written down there, is not my mistakes and everything, but just what I try to do, the intention of my heart to do for God's people.
Hebrews 11:32-40, "Now what shall I more say? For the time would fail me to tell of Gideon. . . of Barak. . . Samson. . . Jephthae . . . David. . . Samuel, and of other prophets: who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promise, stopped the mouth of lions, quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, and out of weakness were made strong, waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the armies of the aliens.
Women received their dead raised unto life again: and others were tortured, not accepting deliverance; that they might obtain a better resurrection: and others had trials . . . cruel mockings . . . scourging, yea, moreover of bonds . . . imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn asunder, they were tempted, were slain with the sword: they wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins; being destitute, afflicted, tormented;"
Watch this parenthesis. "(Of whom the world was not worthy): they wandered in deserts, and in the mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth. And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise: God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect".
When I read the stories of those gallant soldiers, I wonder where our little testimony will stand with those people at that day.
II Corinthians 12:9, "And He said unto me, (this is God speaking to Paul) My grace is sufficient for thee: for My strength is made perfect in weakness".
If we have weakness we have strength. And I've said before, I only try to pray through the week and find out what would be good for me to bring before the congregation. If it was just coming here to be heard, I would much rather hear someone else this morning stand here.
Frankly, on until couple days ago, I was down in Kentucky with Brother Gabehart's people there. When I'd left their place, this precious brother and wife and family and them, till I struck this thought.
I'd went into a home just a little before that. I was standing on the outside, and the lady said, "I'd like to speak to that minister." And I went into their little home. And she said, "You're Brother Branham?"
And I said, "Yes, ma'am."
She said, "I am so ashamed of the looks of my house," and she said, "to ask you in." She started weeping. She said, "But I have such a need and I got real confidence in you."
And I'd found out it had been where our little Sister Cox that we stay with some down there, a little grandmother with a tape recorder going through the neighborhoods playing the tapes. That's it. That's the idea. See?
I looked around in this home, a little humble home, about like I was raised in, but the wall full of pictures of Christ. There laid a Bible on the table. I said, "I never any more honor in my life; this is the kind of home I like to walk into." She asked a request for someone. Five hours from the time that we prayed together, this little grandmother and I prayed together, God had answered.
So we prayed again, and Mother Cox and I and them around the table that morning had bowed and asked God to give us an opportunity to do something through the efforts she had made. And through asking that, God opened up a way. You see? He's God.
We try to make our weaknesses our excuses. We want to tell how big we are, how great we are. I think one of the reasons God gave me this text was to get that out of our mind.
There's little things that we do. And that's what we come to church for, is to find out where our faults are, and the things that we might better ourselves by. If we come to church for any other objective than this, I'm afraid we won't get too much out of coming to church. We must come to find our weaknesses, find our bad places and see how little we are, and put our trust in Somebody that's strong.
There are so many of us that like to think that we're insufficient; and therefore, we make that an excuse, "I have no education; I have no ability; I'm unable to do this." And if you keep that up and keep going like that, then you can't amount to anything. But the very thing that we make excuses by our weaknesses, God uses that very thing to tackle the job with. See? He waits for us to get to that condition so that He can use us. We take the excuses and say, "Well, I can't do this, I'm insufficient. I can't do it." And God takes that very thing to do the job with. That's true.
That's the reason why He chooses us, because we're in that condition. Now, that sounds strange, but just a few minutes we'll get to the reason of it, if God being willing.
We find out, just as we've been reading, that those people who are the weakest and rejected by the outside world, are God's heroes, that conqueror up in the front line, is he who feels himself unworthy.
Three Methodist brothers came to this church from northern Indiana not long ago. They said to me, "Brother Branham, we just received the Holy Ghost, shall we now seek gifts for our ministry?"
I said, "Don't do it. Let it alone."
And one turned and looked at me, said, "I just read a certain brother's book that told us after we received the Holy Ghost we should seek gifts for these to use this Holy Ghost."
I said, "And become a stuffed shirt." See?
If you notice in the Bible, it's always those who are trying to get away from it that God uses. As long as a man wants to do something and thinks he's got enough ability he can put the job over, God could never use that man. Look at Moses running; look at Paul running, and the rest of them trying to get away from it.
I said, "Don't seek nothing. If God's got anything for you He'll give it to you." See? "And just let Him take care of that." I said, "Then you get some of these times like we have today that everybody's wanting to do this and do that and become some great person.
Instead of trying to be great, we ought to be trying to find out how little we can get. See? Then God can use us.
Notice it takes the weakest and the rejected, and practically every hero God ever had on the front line was that type of person. A person that was rejected, a person that thought he was insufficient, a person that had no ability at all, then that person's just in good shape so God can start using them. That's right. When they feel like that they haven't got anything, that's when God can take ahold of them and do something with them. But when we are thinking that we're able to do it, then God can't use us because we're wanting to do it ourselves.
And then, the other side, we get these feelings and we think then that we're insufficient, and we don't want to do it; but then if we just listen to the call of God, that's the very thing that God wants us to get into, that kind of a shape so He can.
When we are insufficient ourselves, then we are subjects to yield to God's Spirit. As long as we think that we can do it, then we can't do it. But when we get to a place where we know we can't do it, then we yield ourself to God and He does it. So then if it's us trying to do it we'll fail, but if we'll just yield ourself to God then God can't fail. There's only one thing that God cannot do, and that's fail. He can do anything else but fail. But He cannot fail.
So as long as we're trying in ourselves and depending on our own abilities, and so forth, why, we'll do nothing. But when we get to a place where we know we're nothing, then God can use us.
There's one thing that we've got to master if we expect to fulfill God's desire in our life; that is, we have to master the thought of human ability. If we ever get to a spot where we think that we can do it with our own intelligence and our own abilities, we've got to master that in such a way that we can get rid of the thing and lay it aside so that God can use us. That's right.
And make a complete surrender. We cannot use one ability. We've got to make a complete surrender. And to come to God, you've got to surrender to Him both soul, body, and spirit. Everything that you are has to be surrendered to God in order that He can work His will in you and in me.
Now, that's hard; I know; 'cause we're always wanting to put our part in, something that we know, you know, that we want to do it. We say, "Well, I just know it should be done this way." But as long as you're doing it that way it's going to be wrong, and God will never use that effort. Maybe with the help of the Lord we're going to get into that in a few minutes and just show you how God cannot use your ability.
That's what's the matter with the world today: there's too much seminary experiences too much placed upon education, too much placed upon relationship or fellowships in denomination; we rest on one another; we rest upon men with ability.
The Bible said, "How can you have faith when you're preferring one another?" When we are expecting, saying, "This guy, he's a great person. This is a great person; I'll just lean upon him," that displeases God when you do that. We must lean upon God and God alone. We mustn't trust the ability of ourselves or any man. We must completely yield to God.
No ability, I don't care whose it is, will ever be usable in the sight of God. God has to get all of our abilities out of us before He can achieve His purpose. If He's got something for us to do, and as long as we feel that we're doing a pretty good job out of it, then we'll never be able to be used of God.
Now, you say, "You're making an awful broad statement there, Brother Branham." And that is a broad one, but just look around and find out if whether it's right or not.
Look around today at all of our great achievement we think we've done, and where is Christianity in United States? Look at all of our churches and denominations, and our evangelists and healing campaigns, and everything else we've had, and what is it? Worse than it ever was in the beginning. It's worse off today than it ever was, because that we have tried to do it in human ability.
They gather together and make long prayers and go out here. And how the other day where they had so many, a hundred and fifty thousand, or something like that, gathered together, both Protestant and Catholic, say some prayers, and so forth. That just might as well not have gathered; it's not worth a thing in the sight of God.
Now, if I get critical, forgive me. See? You've got to drive the thing down. See? You've got to make it hit the nail.
And what good did it do? Nothing. And it'll never be until every person that professes to be a Christian will forget his own ability and yield himself to God. Then God can achieve His purpose by sending, not a revival, but, brother, what He needs to do first is send a killing (That's right) so we can revive. You have to die before you can be born again, and you have to. . . He needs a killing of ourselves. This Tabernacle needs a killing, and me with it. All of us, we need a killing so that we can be revived in a new life, a new hold, a new hope, a new experience. We need first a day of mourning.
We need a place of yielding to the Spirit and instead of so much depending upon schooling and upon our programs, and our campaigns and all that we have. We rely upon cooperation with so many different ministers to cooperate. . . "If we can't get so many, why, we won't do it. We won't go to the cities without that." And then, when we do that, we're making it in a great big machine that's got a carbon knock in it. See?
So we've got to get away from human ability. We've got to get to a place where we can surrender our souls and lives, even to the housewife, to the farmer, to the mechanic, or whoever we are, we got to surrender completely to God and know that "we are nothing." Then let God start from there. Then He starts moving, working. And that includes all of us, everyone. That's the thing that we got to do.
History proves, does now, proves (history does) that God always chose the nobodies to become His somebodies. God takes the person that's nothing.
Today, unless you got a good theological background, you'd better not even try to approach the city; you better not even try to approach a meeting. But if you've got great backgrounds, with great training and things behind you, you can go into any city and get a cooperation, have a great meeting. Well, it is a meeting, just like anything else, but what good does it do? See, you get these little girls and boys coming up, chewing chewing gum, and going up to the altar, and women and men going up there just to say they went up to the altar, go into the room to instructions and come back out and be sprinkled or immersed, or whatever they are, and a year from there. . .
One of our greatest evangelists said, if he could know that he could save ten percent of his (so-called) conversions for one year, he would be happy. Then, if he had a thousand conversions, the next year there ought to be ten thousand of them. See, we're missing the goal; we're missing the purpose.
Some of us build it upon intellectual conception, "Oh, this know-it-all, this man's a trained scholar. We should train our people and school them." The next one bases it upon some sensation of movement, shaking, crying, shouting, dancing in the Spirit, or something, some emotional outward work. And that's just as bad as the education. If the devil can't get you on this side, he'll push you off that side. The thing of it is, having nothing that you can depend on in your own self or anything that you can do, just a complete, total surrender of your weaknesses to God, and say, "Here I am." Have nothing, no ability that you can trust in.
Search back through the Scripture and find out, God always used the nobodies to become His somebody. He has always taken those that the world had rejected, the modern age had rejected, and that's the kind that He picked up to use.
Consider the apostles. Think about Peter, the fisherman, not enough education to write his own name; John, ignorant and unlearned, those men. He bypassed the nobles, and the educated priests, and the celebrities of those days, the scholars, the church members, and those who thought they were somebody, and picked up those who were nobody and used them.
Now, a somebody can become one of His people; God can use them if they're ready to forget that they are a somebody. If you're ready to forget that you're a somebody and become a nobody, then God can use you and make a somebody out of you. See? But you've got to forget that you're so important.
Some people, as soon as they become Christians, they become arrogant, indifferent (That's right.) when they're just going backwards instead of forward. The more you can get out of yourself, more room you've got for the Holy Spirit to come in.
Like Elijah told Jehoshaphat and them, said, "Dig this place full of ditches. Deeper you dig, the more room you're going to have for water." And the more of our own selves, of the rubbish of our own abilities that we can throw out of us, the more room there'll be to be filled by the Spirit of God; long as we can do that.
Paul, the one we just read about here in II Corinthians, this man was a great man. He was a scholar, a great man. But he had to forget all he ever knew in order to know Christ.
Let's turn to I Corinthians 2:1. This man was trained. He could speak pretty near any language there was in the world. He had to brag about it. He was brought up under the strict sect of the Pharisees, and his father was a Pharisee. Later he was "a Pharisee of the Pharisees." Meaning that he was absolutely the strictest of the Pharisees. He was a great fellow. And he had authority, and he was smart.
His father had given him an education under the best teacher there was in all the land, Gamaliel, at that time the most notable teacher of any of the schools. Paul become that type of a man. He learned every language. He learned psychology. He learned all the different things that there is to be learned in that way. And he leaned hard to the tabernacle of the priests and the great men. And he was going about making havoc of the Church.
Listen to this same man with all this education after he had received Christ, listen to what he said, how strong and great he was, he had to forget it. He had to realize that he could not depend upon himself. He had to realize that his education was nothing. He had to realize that all of the training he'd ever had, he'd have to forget everything he was ever trained for:
"I, brethren, when I came to you, came not with excellency of speech or of wisdom (See?) declaring unto you the testimony of God."
I never come to you to tell you, "Now, I am Doctor Saul from the School of So-and-so, I am out of the great sect of this denomination. I never come to you like that."
"For I determined not to know anything among you, save Jesus Christ, and Him crucified."
There, listen at the testimony of a man like that. "I'm determined to know nothing about your abilities. I know that there's nothing in you, and I'm only determined to know one thing that I see in you, that's Jesus Christ and Him crucified. The crucified Saviour among you, that's all I'm going to recognize."
Listen to him. "And I was with you in . . . (greatness? In what?) . . . weakness, and in fear, and in much trembling."
Could you imagine a man, a Pharisee of the Pharisees, a teacher of the teachers, a man that was trained from childhood for the ministry to be an eloquent man that was smart and brilliant, to come before a class of people like the Corinthians and say, "I was with you in weakness, and in fear, and much trembling" . . . A man who turned the world upside-down, the greatest missionary that's ever been known, confessed that he came in weakness, not as a trained scholar, but in the weakness and fear, lest he'd step off the path somewhere, in much trembling, because he could not trust in his own ability.
The reason he was fearing, not because he was scared of anything; but he was scared he would displease God in some way, that he'd get his own ability mixed up into it; something that he'd learned. He was telling them that, "I didn't come to you with great excellency of speech; I came to you in fear that I would come that way; but I come to you knowing nothing but Christ and Him crucified. And I came to you in fear, and weakness, and in much trembling. And my speech and my preaching was not with the enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and . . . power".
Listen to this man who was a warrior who had stripped himself. Amen. If there's anything that our schools need today, if it's anything our churches need today, it's a stripping of themselves, of your own thoughts and your own abilities. Strip yourselves before God unless you would try to do something within yourselves.
I hope that gets down deep to us, that you realize that you've got to become nothing: not a know-it-all, not a great somebody, but a nobody. You have got to become dust. You've got to get to a place that you know that you're nothing. And don't ever rise above it, for as soon as you rise above it, you rise above God. You've got to keep yourself in the dust and on the road to Damascus. You've got to keep yourself off your high horses.
"My speech," he said, "isn't in the enticing words of men and man's wisdom, but in the demonstration of the Spirit of power."
Now, watch. "What for, Paul? Why'd you do this?"
". . . power . . ." That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.
Oh, what a preacher, this great man who sought God, and he said, "God, I am weak, and I don't know what to do. I just pray You, God, to strengthen me, take my infirmities away from me, and these things, so I can be stronger."
God spoke back to him, said, "Paul, My strength is made perfect in your weakness."
Then Paul said, "When I am weak then I am strong." Yes, he said, "Then will . . . I glory in my infirmities of my weaknesses and so forth. I'm thanking God that I got all of it out of me. And when I get everything out of me, then God can come in. But as long as I got some of myself there, then God can't get in."
There, that's it; we smother Him out. We drive Him away with our . . . From the poorest of us to the richest of us, from the least to the greatest, we keep God out of our lives because of our ownselves.
I've often said, "The greatest enemy I got is William Branham." He's the one that gets in God's way. He's the one who gets lazy. He's the one that gets to a place sometimes where he thinks he can do something about it, and when he does, that shoves God right out of the picture. But when I can get rid of that guy, when I can get to a place that he's out of the way, then God can come over and do things that William Branham knows nothing about.
That's when God can use you. That's when He can use any of you. He can use anybody when we get out of the way. But as long as we have ourselves in the way, then He cannot.
Now, we find out this great fellow Paul was a prince among the preachers. He was respected by every denomination. That man could have gone to a city anywhere and had a meeting. Because he had credentials. Why, he was so great, and so determined to smash out all the people that were weak, he got power from the high priest, the highest authority, to bind every one of the Christians. Political power from his church to bind all of them . . . Oh, he was strong. He could bind the Christians and throw them into jail because they wouldn't agree with him upon his theological doctrine, upon the doctrines of the Pharisees and Sadducees. He was binding the Christians.
But notice; he had to become bound himself so he could lose it, so he could lose his strength and authority. He became bound himself to lose what power he had to bind with. He had to lose what he was in order to be bound.
God passed the nobles. He bypassed the priests. He passed those who were arrogant and He chose Paul, this great man, and made him fall in the dust of the earth and act the same way as those he was arresting. He bound Paul by the Spirit of God to get him loose from the power that he had to bind Christians with. Tell me that God doesn't know what He's doing? He took away his strength in order to loose his hold on the world.
How many ministers could God use this morning if they'd only let God bind them with His Word and with His power, and loose them from the strength of those denominations and organizations. How many sincere people in this city this morning, that go to these great organization churches, how many could He fill with the Holy Ghost, and set this country afire with the Gospel and the power, if they'd only take and loose themselves from the power that they have and be bound by His Spirit to be as Paul was, a love slave to God.
God took Paul and made a slave out of him, bound him to Himself and sent him to the Gentiles whom he hated. But, you see, he had to be loosed from his ecclesiastical power, to be bound to the power of God. He had to lose his strength and become weak and nothing in order to receive the strength of God, to be bound to God, to do what God would tell him to do.
That's what we have to do today. That's what I need. That's what every man needs, is a loss of himself, loss of his ability, loss of what he is, that he might have a complete yielding to the Holy Spirit. The housewife needs that. The schoolboy needs that . . . even our little children.
"Come, Lord Jesus, catch away Your Church. And if it be Your will, Lord, just before that Church is raptured, may there rise power. O God, fill these vessels. Raise them up, Lord. Shake this world once more. We know it'll be past time; there'll be no repentance; they'll be too far for them then. But show Your power, Lord; fill those vessels and shake this world like it's never been shook before. Take Your Church then. Leave the world in her chaos that she sets in, O God, they struggle.
"Then we know the great Holy Spirit will come to the Jews then. When we seen the hundred and forty-four thousand standing on Mount Sinai, standing with the Lamb, but the Bride was already in heaven. She'd already been took up, and the Lamb had come back, Joseph to make Hisself known to His people. And the Bible said that there'll be a breaking up among them when they'll look and see Him standing there. When He makes Hisself known, they say "Where'd You get them scars?"
He said, "In the house of My friends."
And then they'll say, "It was Him that we crucified."
And He'll say as Joseph did, "Don't worry, because God did this to save the life of the Gentiles. It wasn't your fault." Then they said they would separate, one family from the other; they would mourn like the only son would've been taken from the home." nl394.htm
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Brother Grigor-Scott is a non-denominational minister who has ministered full-time since 1981, primarily to other ministers and their congregations overseas. He pastors Bible Believers' tiny congregation, and is available to teach in your church.
Bible Believers' Church
Gunnedah NSW
Australia 2380e-mail Bible Believers URL Bible Believers' Website
PowerPoint presentation The Second Coming of Christ
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