1-1 There's lots of sick people, and I can't get to all of them at once. I'm certainly happy to be here again tonight in this beautiful auditorium and amongst this wonderful group of people. And we was coming in out there a few moments ago, the people standing out on the street said they couldn't get in. And I said, "Well, maybe I can get you some room," and they wouldn't let them come down. So I'm sorry we don't have enough room for them. They said the basement was full also, and so we are sorry about that. But we're happy to be here and happy to see all this fine group of ministers and businessman here, and all you delegations from different parts of the country. 1-3 I had the grand privilege of speaking this morning at the breakfast which I certainly cherish to be an honor to speak before such fine people. And I was on a subject of, "The Shuck Won't Be Heir With The Wheat." I didn't get to finish it, and it was not the--the brother's fault. He tried to get the management to let us stay a little longer, but he just wouldn't do it. I certainly appreciated that, Brother Demos. It's very, very nice. I certainly thank you for your kindness, each and every one. But they just wouldn't let us do it, so we just had to--had to close off. I'll pick that up some other time to finish that up. "The Shuck Will Not Be Heir With The Wheat." Did you understand that--you that were there? I hope there was enough that it would be understood. 1-4 Now, I know tonight there's a panel also [Brother Branham is referring to a question and answer panel regarding the Baptism of the Holy Spirit sponsored by the Full Gospel Business Men which appeared over television in Los Angeles at the time this Message was preached--Ed.], so I don't want to keep you here long enough that you'd miss that, because I do think that was certainly an asset to--to the Pentecostal believing people, that panel we saw the other night. Such a fine bunch of men and such wonderful answers: straight. It made me feel real good to see that, and I trust that the Lord will bless it tonight, and ever who that looks, may they believe. That would be my sincere prayer. 2-1 And so many reports coming in today from--in the mail and by calls of so many being healed in this meeting. I was so glad of that. To... That's the... To see people sick... That's kinda of my ministry. I'm--I get up here to preach, I'm... You know, I'm not a preacher, but I... With this, my Kentucky grammar, "his," "hain't" and--and all those words, so I--I can't say this what we call a modern preacher of today. I couldn't take that place, because I--I have no education. But I do like to express what I know about it to others, or what I feel that I know about it to others, how I've learned it, how He is to me. He's all my life. All that I could ever expect to be, and so much more than I ever thought that I'd ever have a friend, hardly, on the earth when I was a little boy. But I certainly am thankful for great friends today. I'm... [Conversation regarding public address system--Ed.] Oh, I'm sorry. I--I'm kinda out of focus here somewhere he said. 2-2 Now, to get right straight into the service, let's turn for some Scripture readings. I'm--I always like to read the Bible, because It's the Word of God. I believe that, and I believe It to be God's infallible Word. And now, I have a few Scriptures written down here and some notes that I'd like to refer to for a few moments, maybe for forty-five minutes, and then we'll get out in time to go see this wonderful panel again tonight. And I trust that God will continue to bless you right on through. And I know what you've got to do, and I'm supposed to drive to Tucson yet tonight. See? So you can imagine. That's ten hours' drive. And I'm leaving for overseas, and I've got to get a yellow fever shot on test in the morning at the Government, so I--I got to get over there. I had to postpone it the other day, and they're not going to take no "no" for an answer again now. And I've got one more tetanus and typhus to take, and my boosters. 2-3 So I'm so thankful for this opportunity, and--and this fine meeting we had prior the convention certainly did thrill my heart. You're a fine bunch of people; I trust that God will bless you. And when the great hour ever... That great monster laying up yonder that flipped hisself over in Alaska a few days ago, threw its tail up again this morning along about down around Washington. He could head this way mighty easy. And if the Holy Spirit ever tells me definitely... Some of you has been answering--asking me that: "Is it going to happen here, Brother Branham?" No, I don't know that. I just don't know, and till I do know... That's the truth. I always wanted to be honest with you. I'm just not going to presume, take any ideas, or some--what I believe, or something like that. When I tell you, it's going to be... Well, He's got to tell me first, and then I'll tell you. I--I know the whole world is in a shaking condition; we're at the end time. But one thing I've tried to be... 3-2 Brother Shakarian was saying this morning how he used to go through the prayer lines, and reach down there, and get those cards before the people come up, and look at them, and see whether--whether I told them what they had wrote out there. They write all kinds of stuff on their prayer cards, you know, and he was going to see if it was right. He said out of the hundreds that he'd checked, there'd never been one wrong. There never will be one wrong (See?), because that it's as long as it is God. If I ever project myself into it, then it's wrong right there to begin with. A little girl whose father's setting listening at me now come to me not long ago. She had a dream. She said, "Brother Branham, what does this dream mean?" I said, "I don't know, sister. I'll have to find out if the Lord will tell me." So I went on and tried to ask the Lord, and He never did tell me. So the little girl come back again; she said, "Well now, where is the interpretation of my dream?" I said, "Come here, honey, and set down." I said, "Your father and mother are very good friends of mine (See?), and they've come all the way from Canada, retired, and sojourned here with me. They believe this what I'm trying to say, and I've never said anything wrong to anybody willfully in my life. If I... I think I know what the dream means, but until I see that dream myself, and then He tells me what it means, I can't tell you. See, if I just make up something, there might be a time where you needed me between life and death, and then you wouldn't know whether to believe me or not." 3-6 If I tell you anything in the Name of the Lord, it's truly that that's Who told me that. And so far, of all these years throughout the world and around the world, it's never been wrong one time, because... Now, you know a human being can't be that infallible. It takes the Spirit of God to do that. And now I have a message that I'm responsible for. And many times I've been considered amongst the people (Well, maybe someone who just didn't set down and think a minute), that I was a--a--oh, an awful person, that I didn't like people and I was always cutting them. And that's not so. That isn't so. I love people. But you know, love is corrective. 4-2 If your little boy was setting in the street out there, and you said, "Junior dear, I don't want you out there, but..." and cars buzzing by him, and you brought him in, he run out again, why, you should correct him. If you love him, you will. You have to... If you seen a man floating down the river towards a falls in a little boat, that you knowed that boat was going to sink when it hit the falls, would you say, "John, you, maybe you ought to think awhile. Maybe you might not make it." If I know he's not going to make it, I'm going to almost jerk him out of the boat, if I can, because it is love that does that. 4-4 And now in these messages that I speak, I never try to bring in any doctrine, or so forth. I--I do that in my own church. But out here amongst men and women who are different denominations and different ideas, I just try to take it in a mild form and explain, but enough to where if you are born of the Spirit of God, I believe that you'll understand what I mean amongst Christian men, Methodists, Baptists, Presbyterian, whatmore. 4-5 Now, tonight, I want to turn to Genesis the 24th chapter, and I want to read the--beginning with the 12th verse of the 24th chapter of Genesis. And he said, O LORD God... my master Abraham, I pray thee, send me good speed this day, and shew kindness unto my master Abraham. Behold, I stand here by the well of water; and the daughters of the men of the city come out to draw water: And let it come to pass, that the damsel to whom I shall say, Let down the pitcher, I pray thee, that I may drink; and she shall say, Drink, and I will give thy camels drink also: let the same be she that thou has appointed for thy servant Isaac; and thereby shall I know that thou hast shewed me kindness to--unto my master. 5-1 And then in the book of Revelations... That's the first of the Bible: Genesis. Now, in the last of the Bible, I want to read in the 21st chapter of Revelation and the 9th verse. We know what this Scripture of Genesis here... You read the whole chapter if you wish to. It's God sending out Eliezer--or Abraham sending out Eliezer (pardon me) to select a bride for Isaac. And the beautiful Rebekah came out and was perfect answer to the prayer that--that Eliezer, the servant of Abraham, had just prayed. Now, in the 9th verse of the 21st chapter of Revelation: And there came unto me one of the seven angels which had the seven vials full of the seven last plagues, and talked with me, saying, Come hither, and I will shew thee the bride, the Lamb's wife. 5-2 Now, I want to take for a subject tonight for that: "The Choosing of a Bride." And this is a... If my brother that records here will... This is the tape that you can go ahead and let out. And now in this, it doesn't exactly mean that I'm speaking this to this congregation present, but these tapes go around the world. They're translated in practically, oh, a great deal of the languages, even into the heathen lands around the world. We send them tapes free on a society of the church, and they're translated in all out through the jungles of Africa, and to India, and around the world goes these tapes. 5-4 Now, choosing a bride... In many things of life we are given a choice. The way of life itself is a choice. We have a right to make our own way, choose our own way that we want to live. Education is a choice. We can choose whether we are going to be educated, or whether we are not going to be educated. That's a choice that we have. Right and wrong is a choice. Every man, every woman, boy, and girl has to choose whether they are going to try to live right or not live right. It's a choice. Choice is a great thing. Your eternal destination is a choice, and maybe tonight some of you will make that--that choice of where you'll spend eternity, before this service ends tonight. There'll be one time that... If you turn God down many times, there'll be one time you'll turn Him down the last time. There is a line between mercy and judgment, and it's a dangerous thing for a man or a woman, boy or girl, to step across that line, for there's no return when you step across that deadline. So tonight it might be the time that many will make their--their decision where they will spend the endless eternity. 6-2 There's another choice that we have in life. That's a life's companion. A young man or a young woman, stepping out on life has a--has been given a right to make a choice. The young man chooses, the young woman has a right to accept or reject it, but it's still a choice on both sides; both man and woman, they have a right to choice. Also you have a choice as a Christian. You have a choice of the church here in America (so far) that you can go to. That's your own American privilege to choose any church that you want to belong to. That's a choice. You don't have to go to any of them if you don't want to, but if you want to change from the Methodist to the Baptist, or the Catholic to a Protestant, or so forth, there's nobody can tell you or make you come to any certain church. That's our--that's our freedom. That's what our democracy is that every man can choose for himself freedom of religion, and that's a great thing. God help us to keep it as long as we can. 6-4 You have also a choice whether... When you choose this church, you can choose whether you, in this church whether you choose a church that will guide you to your eternal destination. You can choose a church that has a certain creed, that you might think that creed's just what you want; or the other church has their creed. And then there is the Word of God you have a choice of. You have to make your choice. There's an unwritten law among us of choosing. I believe it was Elijah one time upon Mount Carmel, after the showdown in a great hour of the crisis, that we're just about to come to right now. Perhaps it may be to you or I tonight, that we make this choice like the Mount Carmel experience. Frankly, I think it's going on worldwide now. 7-1 But there will soon be a time where that you'll have to make a choice. And you men here of your denominational churches, just believe this, that the hour is right on you when you're going to make a choice. You're either going to go into the World Council or you're not going to be a denomination anymore. You're going to have to do that, and that choice is coming soon. And it's a dangerous thing to wait till that last hour too, because you might take on something that you could never shake out of it. You know, there's a time when you can be warned, then if you step across that line of warning, then you're already marked on the other side, branded. 7-2 Remember, when the jubilee year come, and the--the priest rode with his trumpet sounding, that every slave could go free; but if they refused to accept their freedom, then he had to be taken to the temple to a post, and an awl bored him through the ear, and then he served his master always. And it's put on his ear as a type of hearing. Faith cometh by hearing. He heard that trumpet, but he didn't want to listen to it. And many times men and women hear God's truth and see it vindicated and proven truth, but yet they don't want to hear it. There's some other reason. There's some other choosing that they have than to face up to truth and facts. Therefore, their ears can be closed to the Gospel. They'll never hear it again. My advice to you, when God speaks to your heart, you act right then. Elijah gave them a choice which they should, "Choose you this day whom you shall serve. If God be God, serve Him; but if Baal be God, serve him." 7-5 Now, as we see that all of the natural things is a type of the spiritual things, that we went through in our lesson this morning, as the sun and its nature... That was my first Bible. Before I ever read a page in the Bible, I knew God. Because the Bible's written everywhere in nature, and it just corresponds with the Word of God: how the death, burial, resurrection of the nature, and the sun rising, crossing, setting, dying, rising again, just so many things that we could type God in nature that we have to bypass for this message. 8-1 Now, if the spiritual--or the natural is a type of the spiritual, then the choosing of a bride in the natural is a type of choosing a Bride, the Bride in the spiritual. Now, it's a serious thing when we go to choose a wife. A man... For the vows here is until death do we part. That's how we should keep it. And you take that vow before God that only death will separate you. And I think we should... A man in his right mind that's planning a future, that he should choose that wife very careful; be careful what you're doing. And a woman choosing a husband, or accepting the choice of a husband, should be real careful what she's doing and especially in these days. A man should think and pray before he chooses a wife. 8-3 I think today what's got so many divorce cases now, that we lead the world in America, in divorce cases; we lead the rest of the world. There's more divorces here than anywhere else (this nation), and supposed to be, and thought of, a Christian nation. What a reproach: our divorce courts. I think the reason of it is because that men has got away from God, and women's got away from God. And we find that if a man prayed and a woman prayed over the matter, not just look at a pretty set of eyes, or big strong shoulders, or such as that, or some other worldly affection, but would look first to God and say, "God, is this Your plan?" 8-5 I think today there's so much cheating, just like in school. When--when the kids come by of a morning, many of the kids in the neighborhood that--that's friends of mine will come by and say, "Brother Branham, will you pray for us? We're having a--a test today. I've worked all last night and I don't seem like I can--can get it settled. Pray for me." I think that any school kid, if you would, if you... And the parents at the table of a morning, if you'd say, "Mother, John's got a test today; let's pray for him now," I think that it'd be the--all that you could ever do any other way, or looking over on somebody else's paper and cheating. I think that if you'd just come out and pray over the matter... 8-6 And if we would study what we were doing when we were going to get married, when we choose our wife or husband, if we'd study it over... A man should pray earnestly, for he could ruin his entire life. Remember the vow is "Until death do we part." And he could ruin his life by making the wrong choice. But if he knows what he's making the wrong choice and is marrying a woman that isn't fit to be his wife, and he does it anyhow, then it's his fault. If the woman takes a husband and knows that he's not fit to be a husband to you, then that's your own fault after you know what's right and wrong. So you shouldn't do it until you thoroughly pray through. 9-1 The same applies of choosing a church. Now, you must pray over the church that you are fellowshipping in. Remember, churches have spirits. Now, I don't want to be critical, but I realize that I'm an old man, and I got to leave here one of these days. I've got to answer at the day of the judgment for what I say tonight or any other time, and I--therefore, I've got to be dead earnest and truly convicted. But you go into a church, and if you'll watch the behavior of that church, you just watch the pastor awhile, and you'll usually find that the church acts like the pastor. Sometimes I wonder if we just don't get one another's spirit instead of the Holy Spirit. You get to a place where a pastor's real radical and carrying on, you'll find out the congregation's the same way. I'll bring you to a church where I seen the pastor stand, jerk their heads back and forth. You watch the congregation; they do the same thing. You take a pastor that'll just gulp down anything, usually the church will do the same thing. So if I was choosing a church, I'd choose a genuine, fundamental, full Gospel Bible church, if I was choosing one to put my family in. 9-3 Choose... I looked... The boys the other day... Brother Shakarian's son and his son-in-law taken me up here to pray for a young fellow, a singer, a dandy boy, that just come back (Fred Barker, that was his name.), just come back from a trip, and they called me that Fred was dying, and then before I could get in the house, another message come, "He may be dead right now." And he said he'd a hemorrhage in the brain, and he was paralyzed, and--and he was dying; and his wife wanted me to pray for him. And I thought, "Oh, I--if I try to fly, he'd be dead 'fore I get there, and may be dead now." So I called quickly and got the little lady on the phone, and--and we got the phone hooked up into Fred's ear. He couldn't swallow. They was giving him artificial swallowing. And when we prayed for him, he said--motioned, take it out of his throat. He could swallow. The doctors didn't believe it; they took it out, and he could swallow. And he was setting up the other day. 10-1 A church--choosing a church... Phone call just come in awhile ago this morning. A member of my church, which is really a Baptist woman out of Louisville, she died early this morning. And my church at home, a real group of consecrated men, assembled themselves together and went down before the undertaker embalmed her, stood over her, and prayed until life come back in her, and she's living tonight: the elders of my church. Why? They'd been taught to believe that all things are possible. Come to God sincerely. 10-2 So you must make the right choice. Again, the kind of a woman that a man would choose will reflect his ambition and his character. If a man chooses the wrong woman, it reflects his character. And what he ties himself to shows truly what's in him. A woman reflects what's in the man when he chooses her for wife. It shows what's down in him. No matter what he says outside, watch what he marries. I go to a man's office and he says he's a Christian, pinups all around on the walls, that old boogie-woogie music going on, I don't care what he says; I don't believe his testimony; because his spirit's feeding on them things of the world. What say if he would marry a chorus girl, or what if he'd marry a sex queen, or just a pretty modern Ricketta? It reflects; it shows what he has in his mind of what his future home's going to be, because he took her to raise his children by, and whatever she is, that's the way she'll raise those children. So it reflects what's in the man. A man that takes a woman like that shows just what he is thinking of the future. Could you imagine a Christian doing a thing like that? No, sir, I could not. A true Christian will not look for such beauty queens, and chorus girls, and sex queens. He'll look for Christian character. 10-4 Now, you can't have all things. There might be one girl that's real pretty, and the other girl maybe she's a--her statue looks better than this one. And you might have to sacrifice one for the other. But if she's not the statue of a lady, of a woman, and she's... I don't care whether she's pretty or not, you'd better look at her character, whether she's pretty or not pretty. Now... For it is becoming if a Christian would choose a wife, he ought to choose a genuine borned again woman. Regardless of what she looks like, it's what she is what makes her. And then again, that reflects his own godly character and reflects what's in his mind and what's going to be in the future, for his family will be raised by such a woman, for the future plans for his home. If he marries one of these little modern Rickettas, sex queens, what could he expect? What kind of home could a man expect to have? If he marries a girl that ain't got enough moral about her to stay home and take care of a house and wants to work out in somebody's office, what kind of a housekeeper will she be? You'll have baby-setters and everything else. It's true. 11-2 Now, I'm not much of this modernistic taste of women working. When I seen these women with these uniforms on riding around in this city on motorcycles as police, it's a disgrace to the--any city that'd let a woman do that as many men that's without work. It shows the modern thinking of our city; it shows the degrading. We don't have to have them women out there like that. They ain't got no business out there like that. When God gave a man a wife, He gave him the best thing He could give him outside of salvation; but when one goes to trying to take a man's place, then she's about the worse thing that he could get ahold of. Now, that's right. Now, we can see the spiritual application. I--I know that's bad. You think it's bad, but it's the truth. We don't care how bad it is; we've got to face up to the facts. That's what the Bible teaches. See? 11-5 Now, we here see plainly the spiritual plan of God's planning for His future home with His future Bride comes into view now. If a man marries a sex queen, you see what he's looking for for the future. If a man marries a woman that won't stay home, you see what he's looking for in the future. And I, one time... This sounds awful, and I--I just feel to say it, and I--I... Usually if I feel to say the thing, I ought to say it, and it--it's usually God's way. I--I used to go with a rancher that I worked with to buy cattle. And I noticed the old fellow always looking right in the face of a heifer before he went to bidding. Then he turned her head and looked back and forth. I followed him along and watched him, and he looked her up and down. And if she looked all right in statue, then he'd turn and look her in the face, and sometime he'd shake his head and walk away. I said, "Jeff, I want to ask you something." He said, "Say on, Bill." And I said, "Why do you always look that cow in the face?" I said, "She looks all right, a good--a good heavy cow." He said, "I want to tell you, boy; you got a lot to learn." And I--I realized it after he told me. Said, "I don't care how she's made up; she might be beef plumb to the hoof; but if she's got that wild stare in her face, don't you never buy her." I said, "Why so, Jeff?" "Well," said, "the first thing is," said, "she'll never stay put." And he said, "The next thing is, she'll never be a mammy to her calf." And said, "They put her in a pen now, the reason that she's fat. You turn her loose with that wild stare, she'd run herself to death." And I said, "You know, I kind of learned something. I believe that applies to women too."...?... That wild, starey, Ricketta look, better stay away from her, boy. All that there blue stuff over the top of her eyes, and I didn't--I wouldn't want that; I don't think that's becoming to a Christian. I don't care how much the television and paper says it's pretty; it's the most horrible looking, hideous sight that I ever seen in my life. 12-4 When I first seen that here at Clifton's Cafeteria one morning at a breakfast, I seen some of them young ladies come up. Brother Arganbright had just come in and I. And he'd went downstairs. And I looked, and I--that girl come in. I thought, "Well, I--I don't know." I never seen it before. It was some kind of... Oh, it looked like she was cankered, You know, just kind of a funny looking... I--I'm not saying that to be funny. I'm--I'm saying it to... You know, I've seen leprosy. I'm a missionary. I've seen all kinds of freaks, you know, of how diseases... And I was going to walk up to the young lady and tell her, "I'm--I'm a minister; I--I pray for the sick. Would you like for me to pray for you?" And I--I'd never seen anything like that. And then here come two or three more in, and I kind of stepped back then and waited. And Brother Arganbright come by...?... I said, "Brother Arganbright (He may be here)," I said, "what's the matter with the woman?" And he said, "That's--that's paint." I said, "Well, my, my." See? I thought they ought to have her in a pesthouse somewhere, you know, to keep it from breaking out all over other women. 13-2 But you know, you have to plan, and look, and pray when you're choosing. For we see by this, the Word of promise, she, the bride that a man would choose is going to reflect his character. It reflects what's in him. Now, could you imagine a man filled with the Holy Ghost take something like that to be a wife? I--I just don't see it, brother. Now, maybe I'm just an old crank, but you know, I--I just can't understand that. See? Notice, for it's going to reflect what is in him. She's going to help him make his future home. Now, then when we change back now for a moment to the spiritual side, and when you see a church that's in the world, acts like the world, anticipating in the world, partaking of the world, counting God's commandments as if He never had wrote them, then you--you can just imagine Christ ain't going to take a Bride like that. Could you imagine taking the modern church today for a Bride? Not my Lord. I don't--I could hardly see that. No. 13-4 Remember now, a man and his wife are one. Would you join yourself to a person like that? If you would, it would certainly kinda disappoint my faith in you. And then how about God joining Himself to something like that, a regular denominational prostitute? You think that He would do it? "Having a form of godliness but denying the power thereof." He would never do it. She must have His character in her. The real true borned again church must have the--the character that was in Christ, because the husband and wife are one. And if Jesus did only that which pleased God, kept His Word and manifested His Word, His Bride will have to be of the same kind of character. She could not by no means be a denomination, because then no matter how much you want to say "No," she's controlled by a board somewhere that tells her what to do and what she can't do, and many times a million miles off the true Word. 14-2 It's too bad that we ever got away from the real Leader that God left us to lead the church. He never sent state presbyters. He never sent a bishop, cardinals, priest, popes. He sent the Holy Ghost for the church to lead the church. "When He, the Holy Ghost is come, He will lead you into all Truth, reveal these things to you that I've told you, bring them to your remembrance, and will show you things that is to come." The Holy Spirit was to do that. Now, the modern church hates that. They don't like it. So how could she be the Bride of Christ? The people of today, choosing a modern denomination, what it does, it only reflects their poor understanding of the Word. I don't mean to hurt, but I mean to let it go deep enough till that you'll look at it. 14-4 I've married many couples, but I--always reminds me of Christ and His Bride. One of the weddings that I performed here some time ago, it--it was quite an outstanding thing in my life. It's been several years ago when I was just a young minister. My brother was working on the--the P. W. A. I don't know where anybody ever remembers that yet or not, anybody as old as me. And that was a project that the government had, and my brother worked up about thirty miles. They were digging out some lakes, a project for the conservation. And there was a boy that worked up there with him from Indianapolis, about, oh, about a hundred miles above Jeffersonville where I--I live, or lived. And there was a... He said to my brother one day; he said, "Doc," he said, "I--I want--I'm going to get married if I can just have enough money to pay the preacher." He said, "I--I got enough money to get my licenses," but said, "I haven't got enough money to pay the preacher." Doc said, "Well, my brother's a preacher, and--and he--he may marry you." He said, "He never charges people for things like that." He said, "Will you ask him if he'll marry me?" 15-1 Well, that night my brother asked me. And I said, "If he's never been married before, either one of them, and they're--everything's all right." He said... Well, he will ask him. And I said, "If it is, tell him to come on down." So when Saturday come along and the boy came down... It's been a great thing for me to always look back upon this. I'd... Rainy afternoon, and an old Chevrolet car with the headlights wired on with baling wire, that drove up out front. It was just awhile after I'd lost my wife, and I was batching, two little rooms. And--and Doc was up there with me waiting for them. And--and the boy got out of the car, and he certainly didn't look like a groom to me or would to anybody, I guess. Yet I could barely--buy a pretty good pair of shoes for a dollar and a half, and he had on a pair was run over, and his trousers was real baggy. And he'd on one of these old moleskin jackets. I don't guess some of you older people would remember. It looked like it'd been run through a washing machine without being rinsed, and it was streaked, and tied up like this, and the corner up. 15-4 And a little lady got out on the side with a little, oh, some of them little checked looking dress... I don't know. I made a mistake on calling that kind of goods one time. Gingham, I believed it's called. And so it was a... I said it wrong again. I--I always do that. And I said... She got out of the car, and they come up the steps, and--and when they walked in, the poor little thing, she... I guess she just, about all she had on was a skirt. And she didn't have no shoes hardly on. She'd hitch-hiked from Indianapolis down, had a little hair hanging down back in long kind of plaits down her back, looked very young. And I said to her, "Are you old enough to get married?" She said, "Yes, sir." And she said, "I have my written permission from my father and mother." She said, "I had to show it to--to the court here to get my license." I said, "All right." I said, "I'd like to talk to you a little bit before we perform this wedding." They set down. The boy kept looking around the room. He needed a haircut real bad. And he kept looking around the room. He wasn't listening to me. I said, "Son, I want you to listen to what I'm saying." Said, "Yes, sir." And I said, "You love this girl?" And he said, "Yes, sir, I do." I said, "You love him?" "Yes, sir, I do." I said, "Now, have you got a place to take her after you're married?" Said, "Yes, sir." I said, "All right. Now," I said, "I want to ask you something. I understand that you are working up here on this P. W. A." And he said, "Yes, sir." (That's about twelve dollars a week.) And I said, "You think that you can make a living for her?" He said, "I'll do all I can do." And I said, "Well, that's all right." And I said, "Now, what if he gets out of... What if he loses his job, sister? What are you going to do, going to run back up home to mama and papa?" She said, "No, sir, I'm going to stay with him." And I said, "What, sir, if you have three or four children and nothing to feed them, and you haven't got any work, what are you going to do? Send her away?" He said, "No, sir, I'll struggle right on. We'll make it some way." I felt little, and I seen that he really loved her, and they loved one another. I married them. 17-2 And then I wondered where he taken her. A few days I asked my brother Doc, "Where it is?" Said, "Go down to New Albany (a little city below us)." And down on the river where I had some tin laying up, where I went everyday when I was--I was a lineman, so when the rest of the fellows, they all set around and told jokes and things, I'd get in the truck and run down on the river and pray during that...?... or read my Bible under a big piece of tin where an old ironworks used to be. There's a bunch of old boxcars setting down there. And this fellow had went down there and got one of them boxcars and sawed him a door in it, and had taken newspaper and tacky buttons... How many knows what a tacky button is? Then there is no Kentuckians then. You take a piece of cardboard, put a thumbtack in it, a little sprig, and then push it in the... That's a tacky button. 17-3 So they had put it all over. And he'd went up there to the ironworks, and got him some stuff, and made a step. They come up, then got some old boxes and had him a table. And I thought one day, "I'll go down and see how they're getting along." About six months before that, I'd married E. V. Knight's daughter to E. T. Slider's son. E. V. Knight is one of the richest men there is on the Ohio River. And he runs a great factories through there making these prefab houses and so forth. And--and Slider, Mr. E. T. Slider is a sand and gravel company, millionaires' children. And I had married them. And I went back in a place, practiced it for about two weeks, and going back in a booth and kneeling on a pillow, and all the pomp and everything I ever went through nearly, had to go through to marry that couple. And when they come out, why, they was... This other little couple just stood there in a little old room where we had a little couch and a folding bed, but they both was married by the same ceremony. 17-6 And then one day, I thought I'd go down and visit this rich couple. They didn't have to work; their fathers were millionaires. They'd built them a nice home. Frankly, this E. V. Knight up here on the hill, his doorknobs are fourteen carat on his big palace, so now, you can imagine what kind of home they lived in. They didn't have to work. They'd had a nice Cadillac give to them every year, and just only children. And they had just everything they wanted. I walked up one day... Now, how I got acquainted with them, one of their friends was a good friend of mine; we all kind of chummed together. That's how I got acquainted when they wanted me to marry them. So I went up to visit them. And I got outside, my old Ford outside, walked up the steps. And--and I got up a little bit too close, and I heard them. 18-2 And they were really fussing. They were jealous of one another. They'd been to a dance. She was a very pretty girl, and she was kind of one of these beauty queens. She took many prizes around there, and won some cars and things for being beauty queen. And I looked at them, and one was setting in one corner and one the other, fussing about some boy that she'd danced with or some girl or something. When I come up, they jumped up real quick and grabbed one another across the floor, their--their hands across the floor, come walking over towards the door. Said, "Why, hello there, Brother Branham. How are you getting along?" I said, "All right. How are you all getting along?" And "Oh," he said, "I--I... We're very happy, aren't we, honey?" And she said, "Yes, dear." See? 18-4 Now, see, you're putting on something that isn't real. Now, you can't get warm by a painted fire. Like some of these churches try to paint Pentecost of something that happened a thousand years ago or two thousand years ago. You can't get warmed by a painted fire. Pentecost is just as real today as it was then. See? It is. The fire's still falling. It ain't a painted fire; it's a real fire. So they--there they was. See? I--I wouldn't want to live like that. 18-5 "Well," I thought, "You know just down over the cliff there and over on the river, there's where this other couple wound up." I thought one Saturday afternoon I'd slip down there and see how they was getting along. So I, dirty on the face and dirty overalls on, and my tools on. I thought I'd slip up on them. And I slipped on like I was watching for insulators being cracked by the lightening or something and--as I walked along by the side of the telephone wire--the electric cable along the river. And the old Chevrolet was setting out front; was about a year later after I'd married them, and there was a... The door was open, and I could hear them talking. So this sounds--sounds like a hypocrite, but I walked up close enough that I could listen, see what they was saying, stood there; and I just wanted to know for myself. I like to find out and be sure I know what I'm talking about. That's the way I do about God's Word. Is it the Truth, or is it the Truth? Will He keep His Word, or doesn't He keep His Word? If He doesn't keep His Word, then He's not God. See? If He does keep His Word, He's God. See? 19-2 And so, I wanted to see how they was getting along, and I slipped along the side real easy. I heard him say, "Well, honey, I wanted to get that for you so bad." She said, "Now, look, sweetheart," she said, "this dress is all right." She said, "Why, this is just fine." Said, "I appreciate that, but you see..." I slipped around so I could look in through the crack where the door had been shoved open there in the boxcar. And there he was setting in there, and her on his lap, and his arm around her, and her arm around him. And he had one of these old slouch hats and had put a little hole, and mashed it down in the top, and poured out his paycheck in that. He--he was laying it out on the table. He said, "So much for groceries, and so much for insurance, and so much on the car," and they couldn't make their ends meet. Come to find out, he'd seen a little dress up there in a window; he'd been looking at it for a couple of weeks, that cost a dollar and something. He wanted to get it. He said, "Why, honey, you'd look so pretty in it." And he said... She said, "But, honey, I--I got a dress. I--I don't really need it." See? 19-5 And that little queen... And I backed off and looked up. I could see the--the steeple on the top of the other house, and I stood there and looked a few minutes. I thought, "Who is the rich man?" I thought, "If... Bill Branham, if you want to take which place, where would you go?" For me, I'd take, not the--that pretty thing up on top of the hill, but I's take this character down here that is a real homemaker, somebody that loved me and stayed with me, somebody that tried to make a home without bleeding you for everything for fineries, and somebody that was with you--part of you. 20-1 That's always stuck with me of how that was. One chose a beautiful girl; the other one chose character. Now, that's the only way you can choose. First look for character, and then if you love her, fine. Notice, God's first Adam didn't have any choice for his wife. He didn't get a choice. God just made him one, and he didn't get to choose her. So we find out that she led him astray from God's Word. He didn't get to pray over the matter. He--he--he isn't like you or I. He didn't get a choice. And again, by doing that, she led him from his rightly position as being a son of God, and she did it by showing him a more modern way of living--something that they really shouldn't have done, but the character of her showed that she was wrong; her motives and objectives were simply wrong--and persuaded him by her reasoning that the modern new light that she'd found, which was contrary to God's Word, was a better way to live. 20-3 And how many women today, and vice versa, men, that could pull a good woman away from God, or pull a good man away from God by trying to tell him this religion (you Pentecostal boys)... "That religion," they say, "oh, that is old fashion; it is old fogy. Don't you believe that." You'd better pray hard before you marry that girl. I don't care how pretty she is: same thing to a man. She persuaded him out of the will of God and caused him to do something that he should not have done, and by it caused death to the whole human race. That's why the Bible forbids her to teach, or to preach, or to handle God's Word in any manner. I know, sisters, many of you say, "The Lord called me to preach." Now, I'm not going to argue with you. But I'm going to tell you; the Word says you're not to do it. "She shall not teach or usurp any authority, but to be in silence." "Well," you say, "the Lord told me to do it." I don't doubt that one bit. Did you hear my message the other night about Balaam? Balaam got the first straight cut decision of God, "Don't do it." But he kept on fooling around till finally God told him to go do it. God might permit you to preach. I don't say He didn't. But it's not according to His original Word and plan, for she's to be under obedience as also saith the law. True. Therefore, she's not supposed to do it. 21-1 Now, notice again how the natural bride types the spiritual. The Word says that she was made for man and not man made for her. Now, I'm going to speak on why in a few minutes on the Bride of Christ, but I'm trying to show you the background of it. Woman was made for man and not man for woman. That's the reason under the old laws that polygamy was legal. Look at David setting down there with five hundred wives. And the Bible said he was a man after God's Own heart with five hundred wives, and Solomon with a thousand, but not one of them women could have another husband. 21-4 You get my tape on "Marriage and Divorce" that up on top of the mountain at Tucson, here not long ago, I was up there praying about it. They dismissed the school to watch that Pillar of Fire circling the mountain and going in a funnel back and forth, up and down. People right here knows it: there and saw it. And it... When He told me the truth of this marriage and divorce questions... If there's one side going this way, and one going that way, there's got to be a truth somewhere. And after those seven seals, He showed what was the truth of it. 21-5 Notice now, she could not have but one husband, because woman was made for man and not man for woman. That whole five hundred women was just David's wife. It was a type--when Christ sets on the throne in the millennium, His Bride will be not one person, but it'll be tens of thousands, the Bride, all in one. And David had many wives as individuals but only--all of them together was his wife. Like the whole body of believers is the Bride of Christ. Because it was she, the woman; He was the man. Now, we were made for Christ; Christ wasn't made for us. That's what we try to do today in our text books, is try to make the Word, which is Christ, suit us, instead of us trying to make ourselves to suit the Word. That's the difference. 22-1 When a man chooses a certain girl out of a family, he must not rely upon beauty, for beauty is deceiving, and beauty, modern worldly beauty is of the devil. Oh, I hear someone say out there, "Be careful here, preacher." I say that these things on this earth that's called beautiful is absolutely of the devil. I'll prove it to you. Then in the light of this remark, let's search God's holy Word to see if it's right or not. And some of you women wants to be so pretty, see where it comes from. In the beginning we find that Satan was so beautiful till he deceived angels, and he was the most beautiful angel of all of them. Shows it lays in the devil. Proverbs said... Solomon said, "Beauty is vain." That's right. Sin is beautiful. Certainly it is; it's attractive. 22-3 I want to ask you and say something here to you, and I want you to notice in a few minutes. Of all of the species in the world (birds, animals), we find that on the animal life, all besides humans, it's the male that's pretty and not the female. Why that? Look at the--look at the deer--the--the beautiful big buck with his horns and the little muley doe. Look at the--the hen, the little speckled hen and the big beautiful feathered rooster. There's nothing, no female, besides a woman could be immoral. You call a dog a slut; you call a hog a sow; but morally they got more morals than half of the movie stars there is out here. They cannot be nothing else but moral. And the woman was the one that was changed over for the perversion. That's right. See where the beauty takes her to? Now, that's why that today we find that women is on the increase of beauty. 22-5 You take Pearl Bryan. Did you ever see her picture, was supposed to be America's great beauty? There isn't a school kid out of any school but what would have her in a back row. Did you know it's suppose to be that way? Did you know the Bible speaks that that's the way it's going to be? Do you know the fall came by women at the beginning? And fall... The end is going to wind up the same way, women coming into authority and ruling over men, and so forth. Do you know the Scripture says that? You know the day that she puts on man's clothes and bobs her hair, all of those things are contrary to God's Word and... You know she represents the church? When, you watch what women are doing, and you'll see what the church is doing. That's exactly right. 23-1 Now, now, that's just as true as the Word of God is true. No other female is made that can stoop like a woman can. And yet, through that, being made an off... She was not in the original creation. All other females is in the original creation: bird, male and female; animals, male and female. But in human life, God only made a man. And He took from him. And a woman is a byproduct of a man, because God did not institute such a thing. Search the Scriptures. It's exactly right. God... No, sir. In His original creation she was put out there, but if she can hold herself right, what a greater reward she has than man. She's put on a testing ground. Through her come death. She's guilty of all death. But then God turned around and used one to bring Life back again: brought His Son through the woman, an obedient one. But a bad one is the--the worse there is. There's nothing that can be as low. 23-3 Cain, Satan's son, thought that God accepted beauty. He does today. Cain was Satan's son. "Well, now..." you say. We won't go into details on that, but just let me settle it for you. The Bible said that he was of that evil one; so that settles it. All right. Now, he was Satan's son, and he thought that bringing in an altar and making it real pretty for worship, that's what God would respect. They think--think the same thing today. Certainly, just... "We build a great building; we'll have great denominations; we'll make the biggest building and the finest dressed people, the most cultured clergymen." Sometimes God's ten million miles from it. That's right. 23-5 Yet it's the church though... If--if God just respects worship, sincerity, sacrifice, Cain was just as just as Abel. But it was by revelation that he understood that it was not apples that his parents eat. I'm going to say something here that don't sound good for a minister, but I'm going to say it anyhow. I hear these other ones saying things, so I--saying little jokes. Now, I don't mean it. I say this though: If eating apples caused the women to realize they were naked, we had better pass the apples again. That's right. Forgive me for that. But just so that it'd change... I've got you tied up here and talking about the women and so forth; I--I want to relax you a minute for what next is to come. 24-1 Now, notice, you--it was not apples. We know that. The church has become in these days with its achievement like all other manmade achievements; it's becoming scientific. They're trying to make a scientific church by the attraction of pictures and great steeples. And it's too bad that the Pentecostal got into that rut. You'd be better off with a tambourine down on the corner and the Spirit of God around you...?... But you're trying to compare with the rest of them, because you're denominated. That's what did it. See? Churches are trying to be scientifically. And remember, as man achieves progress by science, he's killing himself everyday. When he invented gunpowder, look what it done. When he invented the automobile, it kills more than the gunpowder does. Now, he's got himself a hydrogen bomb. Wonder what he's going to do with that? Right. 24-3 And so is the church. As it tries to achieve by science, by manmade schemes, it's taking you farther away from God and into death more than it was in the first place. That's right. Don't choose your church the same way you did your wife. See? What science did for her was a marvel, but you'd better keep away from the church on that. He made paints, powders, and all these other things. Choose the character of His Word. Now, let us compare the natural bride of today with the so-called church bride of today. Compare a woman going to get married today... Now, just look what science has done for her. She comes out first with her hair chopped off, with one of these Jacqueline Kennedy hairdos (See?), or something like that. And you know what the Bible says? The Bible actually gives a man, if he wants to, the right to put her away in divorcement if she does that. She's a dishonorable woman that'll cut her hair. The Bible said so. That's right. Didn't know that, huh? Oh, yeah, I preached too much in California for you not to know that. That's right. No. What good does it do me? They do it anyhow. You can't take the pig and change his--make him a lamb. 24-5 Notice. You're going to hate me after this, but you're going to know the truth. See? Let's--let's compare it. Here she comes up with a whole lot of paint, something that she's not, a modern bride. Wash her face and you'd run from her, maybe: scare you to death, take all that stuff off of her. And so is the church with the big painted front, a complete theological Max Factor. Both has a beautiful false face on: manmade beauty, and not God-made beauty, not much character in either one. Notice, just like Satan, enough to deceive by. Compare the modern bride now with her: wears shorts, wears paint, cuts off her hair, wears clothes that look like men, and listen to a pastor that told her that was all right. He's a deceiver. He'll suffer for it in the regions beyond. That's right. Doing that to deceive, to be something that she's not. 25-2 That's the way the church does: gets big D.D., Ph.D., L.L.D. so you can say, "Our pastor's this, that, and the other." Maybe know no more about God that a Hottentot knows about an Egyptian night. That's right. Some theological seminary experience out there, and knows no more about God than nothing. Modern church and their theological paint, have their women all with their glory shaved off by their some Ricky added pastor that they got, like a Jezebel if there ever was one: bobbed-hair, shorts, paint, and all fixed up in a theological taste. That's the way the church stands. That's right. But her spiritual character is far from that being the homemaker that Jesus Christ is coming to receive. 25-4 If any Christian would marry a woman like that, it shows he's fallen from grace. His taste of God and his taste of a home (what a home ought to be) is far when he choose a woman like that. No, sir, she sure wouldn't fit a Christian's taste. Her spiritual character is the lowest ebb: dead in denominational beauty and lust of the world. That's exactly where the church stands today. Sold her Word-given character to Satan for a scientific manmade religion, when she had the right as the church of God to stay with the Word of God, and have the Holy Spirit working among, welding the body together with the Word and love of God. Instead of that, she sold out her birthright like Esau and took a denomination that'd let her do anything she wanted to (That's right.), just to be popular like her mother did at Nicaea Rome. God's Word... Oh, how it's entered into our Pentecostal realm. It's too bad, but it did it. 26-1 Notice just a minute, a nun in a Catholic church. That woman to become a nun, and take that last veil, she is absolutely sold out to that church. She's soul, body, and spirit property of that church. She has no mind of her own. She can't have when she takes that last veil: no mind of her own; no will of her own. See out here that Satan makes them his bogus like the true. The true church of Christ, the Bride, is so sold out to Him and His promised Word, till the very mind that's in Christ is in you. What a difference. And we find today that the modern church, the modern world church, the modern world church and also that the spiritual church are both pregnated to give birth to sons. One of them, a denominational birth is going to be give one of day--these days at the World Council of Churches, which will produce to the world the antichrist through a denomination. That's exactly the truth. I may not live to see it. I believe I will. But you young people remember that you heard a minister say that, that it'll finally wind up that that is the mark of the Beast. When she forms that World Council of Churches, and she'll give birth to her son the antichrist. 26-4 The other is pregnated by the Word of God and will bring forth the Body, the finished Body of Jesus Christ, which is the Bride. The Body of Christ isn't finished yet. How many knows that? A man and woman is one. And Christ is one Body, the Word. The Bride will have to be the rest of that body, and the two together makes the one body again, like Adam was at the beginning. Man and his wife are one. Now, She, the true Bride, so sold out to Him that She use no mind of Her own. His mind, of course, is His will, and His will is His Word. 26-6 Now, look at the so-called bride chosen by man, and compare the spiritual to the natural of today: a modern Jezebel bewitched by her Ahab, Max-Factor beauties and everything. Look at the church, the same way, but a prostitute to the Word of the living God: big denominations, big buildings, big money, big salaries, all sold out. Men standing in the pulpit endorsing that that's all right and let them get by with it. Just deceit, that's all. Truly a blind Laodicean church age just exactly what the Bible said would be. Said, "I am rich; I set as a queen; I have need of nothing; and knowest thou not that you're poor, miserable, blind, wretched, and naked, and don't know it." If that isn't THUS SAITH THE LORD of Revelations 3, I've never read it. That's what she is and don't know it. Think of it. 27-2 If a--you'd tell a man or woman on the street that was stark naked, and tell them they were naked, and they say, "Tend to your own business," why, there's a mental deficiency there somewhere; there's something went wrong with their mind. And when you can read the Word of God how that people should do, and the baptism of the Holy Ghost that we have today, and people... Why, they look at you as if you were crazy. You tell them you got--they got to be born again; they got to believe the Bible. They say, "That was a Jewish fable for years ago. Our church has the way." Wretched, miserable, blind, naked, and don't even know it. What a... 27-3 And the Bible said that--that's the condition that they'd get into. How could a true prophet ever miss seeing it? I don't know. Drifting right into all of our churches everywhere. Just look at it. Just in a modern trend. The old whore and daughters of Revelations 17 giving to the poor, blind, miserable people her doctrine of theology contrary to the Word of God. And they found in her the souls of slaves and men and women of--of everywhere. Instead of attracting the people... Christ vindicates His Word which attracts the people. He don't attract the people of churches that are attracted by big denominations, and big doings, and great big carry-ons, and fancy things, but the Word of God attracts the Bride of Christ. 27-5 Now, notice, it's interesting to--to notice how that the church tries to attract the attention of the people by fine robes, and dressed choirs, and bobbed-haired women, and painted faces, and they think they can sing like an angel, lie like a devil, run around all night to a dance like the--think nothing about it. And that's what they think is all right. That's beautiful. But you see, that's false made. That's is not the Word of God. While the true Bride attracts the attention of God by keeping His Word. 28-1 Now, notice. Now let us notice Christ. You say, "Well, now wait a minute, what about this beauty you're talking about? The Bible said in Isaiah 53:2 that when Jesus come there was no beauty of Him that we should desire Him. Is that right? There's no beauty. If He would've come in the worldly beauty as Satan is today, the people would've run around Him and accepted Him the way they do the church today. They would've believed Him and received Him as they do Satan today. Certainly they would. But He didn't come in that kind of a beauty, but He always comes in the beauty of character. There... Christ wasn't a beautiful, great, strong, stout Man. God doesn't choose that kind. 28-2 I remember one time a prophet went up to--to take a king, to make a king out of Jesse's sons to take another king's place: Saul. And so Jesse brought him out, and he was a great, big, fine boy and said, "The crown will look right on his head." And the prophet went to pour the oil on him; he said, "God's refused him." And He refused every one of them till he come to a little old stoop-shouldered, ruddy looking fellow, and he poured the oil upon him, and he said, "God chose him." See, we choose by sight. God choose by character. Character, there never was a Character like Jesus Christ. It lives in Him, manifests in. We see it true. It's not worldly beauty of Him that attracts His Bride; it is His character, the character of the church that Jesus looks for; not whether it's big buildings; whether it's great denominations; whether it's big membership. He promised to meet with wherever two or three are gathered together. Truly. That's where the true believer rests his hopes, is upon that Word of God being vindicated in truth, what it is. Choose by His Word. Not a worldly loving group, they hate that. No wonder she is divorced from Him, because she's missed His revelation, and she don't have it. He cares not for her, the way she acts and does, and how much of this worldly stuff she has; He's looking for her character, the character of Christ. 29-1 Now, just a moment now; that's it. He chooses a Bride to reflect His character, to which the modern churches of today certainly misses His--His program here a million miles, 'cause they deny this to be the truth. So how could it be? Now, He's looking for the day for that Bride to be formed (Hebrews 13:8) just exactly like it was--like He was. It's got to be His same flesh, same bones, same Spirit, same everything, just exactly built up, and them two then become one. Until the church becomes that, they're not one. The character of Him, the Word for this age, must be molded... She must be molded like He is. Now, in closing I want to say the reason that I've said these things, and I'll--I'll close. 29-2 The other night about three o'clock in the morning, I was awakened up. Now, I take any of you to answer this: Have I ever told you anything in the Name of the Lord but what it was right? It's always been right. So help me; God knows that is true. There is no one nowhere in the world, of the thousands of things that's been told, that He has ever missed one word of it. Always been perfectly come to pass, even to when I was at Phoenix the other day (or about a year ago it was) and told you that about that message on--on "What Time Is It, Sirs," and told you seven angels would meet out there, and it'd be the opening of these seals and what... And there the--the "Life" magazine packed the article of it, this great flame going up into the air thirty miles high, twenty-seven miles across, and they said they couldn't make out what is was, don't know yet. And men setting right here in this building tonight was standing right there with me when it happened, just exactly the way it said. 29-3 He told me of the things was coming to pass, and it happened just exactly; how each of those Seals opened and told the mysteries that'd been hid down through them ages of the reformers and so forth, just perfectly; how I was standing upon top of the hill--men, three or four of them standing right here present now; yes, more than that. Going up the hill, the Holy Spirit said, "Pick up that rock." (We were hunting.) He said, "Throw it up in the air, and say, 'THUS SAITH THE LORD.'" I did. Down from there come a little funnel of wind. I said, "Within twenty-four hours, you will see the hand of God." Men setting right here present now, the next day about ten o'clock, standing there, I said, "Get ready; get under the car there" (a veteran); I said, "something's fixing to happen." It was a clear sky, right up in a big canyon; and down come a whirling fire from heaven just as hard as it could scream, hit the walls like that. I was standing right under it. I just took off my hat, held my head, and it come about three feet or four feet above me, and cut a ditch plumb around that wall like that, and blasted, and went back up in the air, and whirled around again and come down three times, even cut the tops of the mesquite bushes out for two hundred yards. 30-1 Hear them fellows saying, "Amen"? They were there when it happened. See? And it made three blasts. When they got out from under the cars, and everything, and come back over, said, "If that'd hit you, there wouldn't been a greasy spot." I said, "It wasn't... It was Him. He was talking to me." God speaks by a whirlwind. See? And there was that same Pillar of Fire that you see on the pictures standing there. And when it went up, they said, "What is it?" I said, "Judgment is striking the west coast." Second day from that, Alaska like to have sunk. See, it struck once there, the first blow where the... You have to do something to symbolize it. Like a man put some salt in a cruse, and throwed it in the water, and said, "THUS SAITH THE LORD, let there be sweet water." And another one, Jesus picked up water, and poured it into a jug, and--and made wine out of it. You have to have something to symbolize it, and that's what that was that went up in the air and come down; that started that little whirlwind. 30-5 Within twenty-four hours it'd shook that mountain till it had cut a ridge around it. Reverend Mr. Blair, setting here looking right at me now, he was up there and picked up some of the pieces of it and so forth. Here's Terry Sothmann and them standing here, and Billy Paul and brother, some... Many of these others setting in here that was right there to see it happen when it tore it out. That's not fiction; that's the truth. That wasn't back in the Bible days; that's now. See? That same God that's always showed me these things, and they've come to pass exactly to the letter, never have they failed one time; now, I'm bragging on Him. 31-1 A few weeks ago I was in a vision, and I was standing upon a--a high place, and I was to see the preview of the church. And I noticed coming from my... I was standing more like this way, facing the west, and coming this way was a--the lovely bunch of women, real nice dressed, long hair fixed nice in the back, sleeves, and skirts down neatly, and they were all in a marching tune, like "Onward Christian soldiers marching as to war, with the cross of Jesus going on before." And as they passed by, I stood, and there's something there, some Spirit was God, and He said, "There is the Bride." And I looked and my heart was happy. And she went around this way, and passed around behind me. After while when She come back this a-way, It said, "Now, the modern church will come into preview." And here come the Asian church up. I never seen such a filthy bunch. Here come the other churches up of the different nations. They looked horrible. 31-3 And I--I say this because I am duty bound to tell the truth before God. And when He said, "Here comes the church of America now to be previewed," if I ever seen a bunch of devils, it was that. Them women were stripped naked with a old gray looking thing like a color of an elephant's hide, and they was holding it in front of them with no upper part on it at all, and they were doing this kind of stuff that these--these dances that these kids do out here, that twist and stuff and that kind of music going on. And when I seen Miss U.S.A. come up, I almost fainted. Now, this is THUS SAITH THE LORD. If you believe me to be His servant, you believe me now. I wouldn't say that for nothing in the world; there's not enough money in all the world to get me to say that if it wasn't true. And when she come by, that was the filthiest looking thing I ever seen. I thought, "God, as hard as preachers and we brethren have labored to get You a Bride, and that's the best we could do." She was twisting, holding this in front of her like one of these hula skirts of a thing, holding it in front of her parts, her lower parts like this, dancing and twisting like these kids do out here on the--on these vulgar shows that they have, twisting. That was Miss Christianity of America. 31-5 So help me, by the help of God, that's what it looks like in His face. I--I just... I start... I could've fainted. I thought of all the trying, and the preaching, and the persuading: every one of them with bobbed hair, and they were twisting and carrying on, holding this in front. They come around where I was standing there with this supernatural Being. I couldn't see Him. I could hear Him talking to me. He was right around me. But when they turned this way, they hold... they was just twisting and laughing and going on, carrying on like that, holding this in front of them. Now, me standing in His Presence there, and His servant, and of all I'd tried, that's the best I could do. I thought, "God, what good did it do me? What good did it do? All the crying, and begging, and persuading, and the great signs and wonders and miracles that You showed. And how I stood there and go home and cry after preaching to them and things, and what good did it do me? And then I have to present something like that for You for a Bride." 32-1 And as I stood there looking, she passed on by, and you can imagine the back part of her with nothing on, holding this in front of her as she went shimmying by like that to this twist, throwing her limbs out like that in her... Oh, it was vulgar how she was carrying on, her body shaking around like that. Now, I... You say, "What does it mean, Brother Branham?" I don't know. I'm just telling you what I seen. And when she passed by like that, I looked at her, and oh, I just got real faint. And I just turned around. I thought, "God, then I--I'm condemned. There's--there's no need of me trying any how. I just might as well quit." Mrs. Carl Williams, if you're setting here, and that dream that you told me about awhile ago that you had the other night that's been bothering you; there it is. The steering wheel is taken from my hand. 32-4 Then I just thought I--I just might as well forget it; I was gone. Then all at once, I heard them coming again, and coming upon this side come the same Bride that went around this a-way. Here come them little ladies again, and each one of them was dressed in their national garb from where they come from, like Switzerland, Germany and so forth, each one wearing that kind of garb, all long haired, just exactly like the one at the first. And here they was coming, walking, "Onward Christian soldiers marching as to war..." And when they had passed by the preview stand where we were standing, you just all at once every eye went that way, and then they turned back, and on they went marching. And just as they started to going right up into the skies, this other one went up to a brink of a hill and went down like that. These started marching right up into the skies. And when they went to marching, I noticed a couple of little girls from the back (looked like they might be of some foreign girl, like Sweden or Switzerland, or somewhere's,) they started looking around and got... I said, "Don't do that. Don't get out of that step." And as I screamed like that, I come to in the vision, standing there with my hand out like that. I thought, "Well..." 33-1 That's the reason I've said what I have tonight. I want to ask you a question: Is it later that we think? Could she already be called, and chosen, sealed away? There won't be one extra one, you know. Could it be possible? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Remember what I said the other day at the breakfast? In the pollen of breeding male and female, there's a million germs goes forth, million eggs goes forth, but there's only one of them live, and yet they're every one just alike: one out of a million. Every one of them the same egg and the same kind of germ, one of them lives; the rest of them dies. No one can tell which is the one that's the ripe egg and what about it. God has to decide that. Whether it's going to be a boy or girl, blond or brunette, or whatever it's going to be; God decides that. Not the first one meets, but the first one God's decided. Maybe one come up here, and one... If you ever noticed in a test tube to see them come together. I've watched it. God has to decide that. One... Every one of them just alike, but by election. The natural birth is by election. God takes one out of the million. 33-2 When Israel left Egypt on their road to the promised land, there were approximately two million people. Every one of them was under the same sacrificial lamb, or they wouldn't have lived. Every one of them listened to Moses the prophet. Every one of them was baptized to him in the Red Sea. Every one of them danced, the women with Miriam up and down the side of the--when the seashore when God destroyed the enemy. Every one of them stood with Moses, and he heard him sing in the Spirit. They every one eat manna out of the wilderness that dropped down from heaven: new manna every night, which is a type of the message. Every one of them eat from it. But out of the two million, how many made it? Two: one out of a million. There's approximately five hundred million Christians in the world tonight counting Catholic and all: five hundred million so-called believers in the world. If the rapture come tonight, that would mean, if one out of a million was a count (I don't say it is.) but if it was, five hundred people in the next twenty-four hours would be missing. You'd never even hear of it. There'll be that many missing anyhow that can't even be counted for. 34-2 Then it could be--happen to us, friends, like it did when John the Baptist came. Even the disciples said, "Why did the Scriptures say, why did the--the apostles, or the prophets say, why does it say that Elias must first come and restore all things?" He said, "I say unto you, that Elias has already come, and you didn't know it." One of these days we could be left setting here. "What about the rapture before the tribulation sets in?" "It's already come and you didn't know it." 34-3 All the body is sealed in, just keeping it in step. I ain't saying it's that way; I hope it isn't that way. But, friend, when you let... If we've got a feel in our heart tonight that we should straighten up our lives, and the things that we have done, let me advise you as a minister brother... And I'm going to say this for my first time over the pulpit. I've stretched out farther tonight on this than I have on anything else anytime anyhow before the public, because I've had a great freedom in--in these meetings. If you believe me to be God's prophet, you listen to what I've told you. If there's one little tinkle of feeling in your heart, you go to God right now. You do it. 34-4 Stop just a minute, men. Look at your--your creeds that you serve. Look in your churches. Is it just exactly with the word of God? Have you met every qualification? Say, "I'm a good man." So was Nicodemus, and so was all the rest. They--they were fine. See, that don't have nothing to do with it. And women, I want you to look in the mirror, and look what God requires a woman to do, and see in God's mirror, not in your church mirror now, in God's mirror, and see if you could qualify in your life the spiritual Bride of Jesus Christ. Ministers, think the same. Do you cut corners here to save somebody's feelings over yonder? Would you do this if it wasn't--if they would put you out of the church? If you are feeling that way, my dear brother, let me warn you in the Name of Jesus Christ, flee from that right now. And lady, if you can't measure up to the qualification of a Christian, not as a nominal Christian, but in your heart and your life is patterned exactly like God's marriage certificate here says it has to be... And church member, if your church isn't like that can measure up to God's qualification of His Word, get out of it, and get into Christ. 35-3 That's solemn warning. We don't know what time. And you don't know what time that this city one day is going to be laying out here in the bottom of this ocean. "O, Capernaum," said Jesus, "thou who exalted into heaven will be brought down into hell, for if the mighty works had been done in Sodom and Gomorrah, it'd have been standing till this day." And Sodom and Gomorrah lays at the bottom of the Dead Sea, and Capernaum's in the bottom of the sea. Thou city, who claims to be the city of the Angels, who's exalted yourself into heaven and sent all the dirty filthy things of fashions and things, till even the foreign countries come here to pick up our filth and send it away, with your fine churches and steeples, and so forth the way you do; remember, one day you'll be laying in the bottom of this sea. You're great honeycomb under you right now. The wrath of God is belching right beneath you. How much longer He'll hold this sandbar hanging over that, when that ocean out yonder a mile deep will slide in there plumb back to the Salton Sea. It'll be worse than the last day of Pompeii. Repent, Los Angeles. Repent the rest of you and turn to God. The hour of His wrath is upon the earth. Flee while there's time to flee and come into Christ." Let us pray. 35-6 Dear God, when in my spirit is shaking, my heart is dropping teardrops of warning, grant, O God, that men and women will not think of what I've said as a joke, and the church people will not think of it as something that was prejudice or against them. May they see, Lord, it's in love. Thou barest me record, Almighty God, that up and down this coast I went, year after year, proclaiming Your Word. Bear me record, O God, if it would happen tonight, I've told the truth. Thou knowest this vision of the Bride is the truth. I've took Your Name by it, Lord, and said it was, THUS SAITH THE LORD, and I feel that I'm conscious, Lord, of what I'm doing. So I pray Thee, Lord, in Jesus' Name, let people shake themselves tonight and flee from the wrath that is to come, for the--Ichabod is wrote over the doors and over the nation. A black check mark is come across it; the Spirit of God is grieved away from it; and they're weighed in the balances and found wanting. The feast of King Nebuchadnezzar has repeated again with drunken parties and half-dressed women calling themselves Christians. 36-2 O God of heaven, have mercy upon a sinful world and a sinful people, Lord, as we are tonight. God, I'm trying to stand in the breach and ask for Divine mercy that You'll speak into this crowd tonight and call Your Bride to attention, Lord, to march not by the sign of any creed, but by the sound of the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. Grant it, O God. Let it be known this night, that Thou art God, and--and Thy Word is Truth. While solemnly in the face of this people, we call them to attention of Thy Word. In the Name of Jesus Christ, I pray for them, Lord. They have seen You beyond any shadow of a doubt move across the crowds and tell them what's in their heart. And Thou knowest, Lord, that right now what's going on. Thou knowest that to be truth, O God. And I pray Thee in Jesus' Name, let the Holy Spirit intercede again, Lord, and pull from this audience, Lord, those who are written in the Lamb's Book of Life. Grant it, O God, I pray it with all my heart. These people, naturally, Lord, would give me the last penny they had to support the message. They'd do anything that they could, but O God, when it comes to coping with it and coming into it, I pray, God, that this will be the night that You'll reward them and pour down Your Holy Spirit upon this convention. And may there not be a frolic or jumping around, but a weeping, and a crying, and a repenting, holding on to the horns of the altar while we see judgment rolling beneath us tonight. Grant it, God. I pray as sincerely as I know how, in the Name of Jesus Christ. 37-1 My brother, sister, I don't know what more to say. If I've found grace in your sight by the power of God, if you believe me to be His prophet... This is the first time in public I've ever said that, but I feel a strange warning of some sort. I'm not prone to this. You know I'm not. I don't act like this. I hesitated to speak that message and say those things. I run sideways and everything else to keep from doing it, but it's been said, and it'll stand at the day of the judgment as a witness that I've told the truth. That's THUS SAITH THE LORD GOD. Oh, Pentecost, run for your life. Flee to the horns of the altar and cry out before it is too late, for the hour will come when you can cry and it'll do no good. For Esau sought to find the place of his birthright and couldn't find it. I commit you, oh, California, oh, convention of the Full Gospel Business Men, who I love, who I've left and strung to with all my heart, I commit you to Jesus Christ tonight. Flee to Him. Don't let the devil ever cool you off from this. Stay right with it until you're every one filled with the Holy Ghost insomuch that it'll make you come to this Word, that'll make you women straighten up, that'll make you men straighten up. If you say you've got the Holy Ghost and won't cope with the Word, it's another spirit in you. God's Spirit is on His Word. The Messiahic, the anointed Word... The Bride must be a Messiah-ette, the anointed Word. 37-2 Let us stand to our feet in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ. If you never hear my voice again... If God willing, I'm sailing to Africa in a few hours; I may never return. I don't know. But I tell you with all my heart; I've told you the truth. I haven't shunned to declare to you everything that God has told me to say, and I've said it in the Name of the Lord. It's a solemn moment. I don't know how to express it. I've tried to leave the pulpit three or four times, and I can't do it. This is a solemn hour. Don't you never forget it. This is a time that maybe God may be making His last call. I don't know. He'll make His last call someday. When? I don't know. But I'm telling you, according to that vision, it looks like that that Bride's about finished. Look at the nominal churches coming in. When the sleeping virgin come for oil, she failed to get it. The Bride went in. The rapture went up. While they went to buy oil, the Bridegroom come. Are you asleep? Wake up quickly, and come to yourself, and let us pray each one like we were dying at this minute, in the Name of the Lord. Let's each one pray in your own way. 38-1 God Almighty, have mercy upon us, Lord. Have mercy on me. Have mercy upon us all. What good does it do, no matter what we do, if we fail in these things. I stand and ask for mercy, O God, before this great city sinks beneath the sea and judgments of God sweep this coast; I pray, God, that You'll call Your Bride. I commit them to You now in the Name of Jesus Christ. Amen.