Godhead #9
Words and God’s Word; God Is Living Word
Be Transfigured Through Your Mind
Brother Lee Vayle
April 1, 2000

Heavenly Father, we recall Bro. Branham saying to the people many times, “I feel a welcoming spirit in this building,” and it meant so much to him to know that he was received so the ministry could be received, and You, Lord, could be glorified. And we trust tonight, Heavenly Father, that we have a welcoming spirit toward You, and also, not just a welcoming spirit, which so many people would be so happy to have You there, but a believing spirit, Lord, where we receive You exactly as You are, the living Word; exactly the One You are and none other, so that we worship You in spirit and in truth—we that people definitely separated unto You, who do worship You in spirit and in truth, the apple of Your eye.

We trust we are a part of that Bride, a part of Zion, ready to take our place with those who have gone before. And we’re glad, Lord, that we have grounds to stand on—vindication, that we believe as others around us cannot believe. Not that we exclude anybody, Lord, for we have no right excluding anybody, because all that have been given to Jesus will come unto him, and unto You through him, and none will be lost. And so, we’re just taking our place with those who are believers and in the Bride. And we would give You glory tonight in Jesus’ Name. Amen.

You may be seated.

1. Now, before we get into a message here on “Godhead,” I want to… Maybe you have read this: it’s either the Newsweek or the US News & World Report. But, in there they had a large article on Jesus because of the pope’s visit to Jerusalem. And, of course, it was a travesty, a mockery. They paid a lot of money to repave the ascent to Golgotha, so he’d just feel a few bumps, you know. And anyway, it was a shame.

But, in there they had a rabbi, and they asked him about Jesus. And he said, “Well, if I met Jesus, we’d just have a little conversation, and I’d say, ‘Well, you know, Jesus, you can go your way and have your thoughts and your dreams and your visions and what you feel and this and that and the other, but I have the Torah.’”

After 2000 years the serpent seed hasn’t changed one iota.

“We have Moses and the prophets,” said they to Jesus.

And he said, “Search and see, for in them you think you have eternal life, and they are they that testify of me.”

But they wouldn’t do it.

And they forgot it was their fathers who said to Moses: “Moses, listen. You go up there to God, and you tell God, ‘Don’t You ever face us again. We don’t want to face God. We don’t want to hear God. We don’t want to have anything to do with Him. You go up there, and you have everything to do with God, Moses; and then, you have everything to do with us. You be the mediator, and that’ll be fine.’”

And God said, “They have well spoken. That’s exactly how it will be.”

And then, He added Numbers 12; and He said, “When I speak to a prophet, I speak to him in visions and signs.” But He said, “My servant Moses is not so; I speak to him even apparently.” In other words face-to-face, so that Moses would know that God was absolutely there. See, they’ve got the same spirit.

2. Now, listen to me. Let’s get this—and I’ve said it before. Let’s just say there were four million people in Israel at that time. How many were not serpent seed? He said, “You are of your father the devil.” They were serpent seed. Do you think out of, maybe… I believe there’s about 15 million Jews today. I can’t believe there’s any less. There might be six million; but, oh brother, I still can’t believe there’s hardly less than just millions and millions. Has it changed? No. One hundred and forty-four thousand will be born into the kingdom in one day. And, if there are six million, nine million, fifteen million, if they are outside the ark of safety, and 144,000 in it, there’s no more, and no less. See, God is meticulous. When He said 144,000, twelve from each tribe, He meant It exactly as He said.

3. So, you see, you’ve got the same today spirit again, but I’m not going to fault the Jews. I’m not worried about them, because, as Bro. Branham said, “God was obligated to do for the Gentiles what He did for the Jews.” And the ministry of Christ returned to this earth, through the Holy Ghost, by the Holy Ghost, working through a prophet; the Gentiles crucified to themselves the Son of God afresh and put him to an open shame. And what does it mean now? There’s not one of them that can repent. The Trinitarians will go on being Trinitarians; Jesus-Only, Jesus-Only; Hindus, Hindus; Taoists, Taoists; Muslims, Muslims.

4. And, if six billion people… Let’s get this flat, and I say it to all the Branhamites that get this tape: don’t try to change me and suggest by your figuring that out of six billion people, 5,999,999,992 will be in the ark and eight people outside. If Bro. Branham said, “They say there are ten thousand that believe this message—too many—got to shake them off,” I’m not going to deny it. Bro. Branham’s vindicated. I don’t stand with vindication just to be a mean person. I’m not interested in being mean. It’s not going to get me anywhere. I’ve learned that what I sow, I reap. Leave things to the Lord.

5. We’re right back to vindication. No one but us has vindication. I speak of the Bride now, because the rest don’t believe in vindication.

You say, “Oh, Bro. Vayle, they’re dying such beautiful deaths, and they’re so happy in the Lord.”

Well, if the devil led you astray and made you happy, that’s all right by me. I mean, I’m not going to fuss about it. No, no. Vindication, brother. Yeah, v-i—and I am there—in the v-i-n. Put an ‘e’ on it, and that’s the ‘vine’. I’m in the vine, and the vine’s vindicated.

6. Now the other day, I was picking up one of my articles. And in there they were talking about this dear saintly old pope, just about ready to die or resign. One way or another, he’d be taken off of this world, or he’d resign; and they were mulling over who would be perhaps a contender amongst the cardinals. And they said, though Cardinal Law of Boston had been a favorite, he was now so ill that there was hardly any chance that he would be the pope.

So, here’s an article that Denis’ sister sent up to me from “The National Examiner.” I haven’t read one of those for a long, long time. It’s not as authentic a paper as some; but, on the other hand, this man would certainly have access to anybody in Chicago, whether he is low in the hierarchy or very high in the hierarchy. Now, about the highest you get are the cardinals. They’re above the bishops and archbishops.

7. Now here’s what this man, Bob Cane, says:

“Vatican City. Whispers are swirling around the Vatican; they’re waiting for the smoke to come up the chimney. Pope John Paul II will soon resign and be replaced by a headstrong American priest from Chicago. Insiders say Cardinal Francis George, 63, is the top candidate to take over as head of the Catholic Church. He is the shining light of the American cardinals, said John Allen, Vatican editor of the National Catholic Reporter, tells the Examiner. See, this guy’s gone to the horse’s mouth, and he’s got some stuff. He’s an intellectual who is very well liked by the College of Cardinals. He is the one to watch. Although the retiring pope officially is silent on any successor, Vatican insiders say George, who has written most Vatican documents during John Paul II’s reign, is the Pontiff’s personal choice. The rumors have sent ultra-conservative Catholics reeling. It’ll be the first time in 704 years, and only the second time in history, that a pope has resigned. Sources say the aging Pontiff is suffering grave health problems and written a letter of resignation, which would be issued, should he become incapacitated.”

Of course, you know, he also has Parkinson’s disease.

8. “Secondly, the choice of successors is shocking. Cardinal George takes boldness to a new level by publicly referring to God as ‘her’, and he’s not apologetic about it.”

Now, why would this not be a minus in the sight of the pope? Because he is all for Marianna. Everything is Marianna; everything is Mary. In fact, Mary is co-redemptrix, and it would be nothing at all to go the full length of the gnostics, who in the time of Paul said, “A voice from heaven, a female voice, shouted and uttered down and said, ‘Shut up, I’m the one that created you and gave you your position.’” So, it wouldn’t be at all unlikely that this man could be rejected by calling God a female” on the very grounds that, what would be the difference, if you called God female or you put Mary along side of God or Jesus there as redeemer?

9. “By calling God ‘her’, women have some kind of representation in the divinity.”

You know… See, that’s the same kind of junk that you got from down in Florida, where they’re making a female Holy Spirit. Where do you get that the Spirit of God is either male or female concerning sexuality? He’s life. In the resurrection there is neither male nor female, and the created part, the spirit of Adam and Eve, were male and female. But, when God breathed into Adam the breath of lives, they were already separated as to being male and female. And this was the life of God coming into them, making them the children of God. And God is referred to as a male. Because why? The life is in the male.

10. “Women ordained as priests, say the experts, may not be too far fetched, and it may happen sooner than you think. Lack of enough males who answer the call to the Vatican has forced many churches to go without priests and name a woman as their spiritual administrator. Although Pope John II wrote a general letter in ’94 banning further talk of the matter, many religious females” (yeah–religious females–you know, the Venuses and the rest of them) “are hoping the new regime will overturn the decision. If present trends continue, the chances are that their spiritual director would be a woman are seventy percent, says Emory University provost Rebecca Chop.”

Today, half the Christian religious branches, plus reformed and conservative Judaism, ordain women. That’s true. Where do they get it? But you can’t, you know, more or less feel that Judaism has gone off track in the sense that it just now went off track. It has been off track since they went into Babylon. Remember, they went into Babylon with a temple, priesthood, and the Torah. They came out with the synagogue, a rabbinical order, and a Talmud. Right. So, you know, it had to happen. If I had a bunch of snakes in a pit, and they’re all mating, you know, I wouldn’t be surprised if we had a bunch of cross-eyed snakes and heaven knows what in there.

11. And George may be the one to make the mind-boggling change for the Catholics. Actually, listen. Let’s face it. This is the Catholic spirit of the congregation. Do you know the spirit of the hierarchy, or the elders, the pastors, or what have you, gets on the people. But many times, there comes a time when a democratic spirit rises amongst the people, and then they throw off the spirit of whoever’s in charge. So, how many women in the Catholic Church don’t practice birth control and don’t have abortions when they really want them?

Now, they’ll say, “Popey, old boy, we really think you’re the voice of God, but, in this case, you sure ain’t. Because we’re the voice of humanity; and what we like… And we’re going to practice birth control and have abortions if we see fit. So, just drop out.”

Now, if the Catholic Church, which has been losing for years, should suddenly face the proposition of being dissolved because of women, they will have women in authority; because already, they have the false prophetess Jezebel, a woman, as their head, whether they know it or not. And they’ve got Mary-olatry instead of God.

So, why shouldn’t the Catholic people have what they want? They’re having it covertly anyway. Women right today are acting as priests. They’re leading the church, and the Catholics are the same old Catholics fighting the Protestants. They’ll say they aren’t, but they are. And boy, they’re steaming and stewing mad down in South America, where millions are turning to what? Neo-Pentecostalism, neo-Catholicism, talking in tongues, having a great time. The whole thing is jeopardized. We’re just waiting for the strong man to come. So, the church is crashing. The money market’s smashing. Hallelujah, let her go.

12. “He is a man of intellectual courage.”

What is the old saying? Cour-age—that’s the Frenchman courage; yeah, courage my children; courage mon enfant. Get your courage up my little child. Oh, he’s got intellectual courage. Man, he isn’t afraid to take a minority position. Oh well, hogwash—the majority is moving right with him. And so on, down the line.

13. He’s not without challengers here. There are other papal candidates, Cardinal Carol Maria Martin of Milan, Italy.” (Of course, that’s a man, Maria; I guess it is, Carol Maria.)

“A favorite of progressives but considered too liberal, Cardinal Thomas Winning of Scotland, an outspoken but considered to be a loose cannon. Cardinal Camillio Ruini, Vicar of Rome, considered one of the pope’s favorites, although he’s not very well liked outside of Italy. Cardinal Noberto Rivera Carerra of Mexico City is a real comer; however, he may be too young.” (He’s only 50-some. Nobody in the Church wants another 20 year Papacy; so they’re going to likely pick an old boy up there.) “Cardinal Francis Arenze of Ethiopia, he’s a chance to become the first black pope. He needs to moderate his conservative position; the church does not want to go too far right. And this man was born in Chicago, January 16, 1937.” (And they give his history here.)

14. So, all right. That’s some news I wanted to get across, though, that we’re a little more hopeful now that this pope is coming out of America. I won’t have to write a scathing letter to the Catholic hierarchy and say, ‘Just a minute, you birds; I want this pope out of America.” See, I’m not interested in what the pope knows about Fatima. But, that Fatima hogwash, you know, there’s something in there, and this guy that died… What was his name? You know, Martin, yeah Martin, Malachi Martin. He knows what Fatima left in this note. And the pope knows, and the pope’s scrambling to get the good pope to follow him. You better believe when he scrambles to get the good one, he’s going to get the bad one, because the devil knows how to have a shell game. And, as soon as the pope figures the pea is under the right shell, (He’s got the right pope.) he’s going to find there’s a black button there. So, we… Well, I’m just going to have to tell them to look: “Hey, I want this next pope to come out of America, or I’m going to have to try to do something about it. I’ll start a movement over here to let you know that we people in America are unjustly abused, and we want our man.” “We want your man to be our man,” so to speak; you know, that’s how it is.

15. There’s another thing I want you to notice here that there’s always this cover up concerning the center for the prevention of diseases and so on, down in Atlanta. This fellow, I forget his name now, he’s a big-shot again, he messed things up with the AIDS program by lying; and I would say, if he lied once, he’ll still likely be lying. But this article we had on Africa where there were thirteen million orphans, really, and the number of people, they said, infected with AIDS, so many million. Now, those nations are without recourse to good statisticians and pollsters. In America here, we have recourse to the best, and that’s none too good, of course, because we don’t like them, that is, how they take their polls.

But anyway, recently it was found that in Dayton, the number of people that actually had AIDS, as far as they knew, (In other words they had their names listed.) turned out to be only one-third of what actually have AIDS today. My point is: if it can be so well-documented here, and so well-hidden, what is it like in the open? You know, in the sense that there’s nothing, there’s so much there, everywhere, and they don’t even have pollsters. It’s just a guestimate; where we are doing our best to be very, very accurate. Wouldn’t you say, then, that there’s only thirteen million, or only sixty million? I’d say there are many, many more. And then, remember, at the same time, all of these people with AIDS… And remember, one sexual intercourse outside of marriage hooks you into two hundred people. Right? Remember the statistics, I read them—two hundred.

All right, then, in Dayton, let’s say there’s not three hundred. You bet your life there’s not three hundred. There’s a whole lot more than that. But the number of priests that had it, you better believe the congregation’s got a lot too. Not saying they’re messing with the congregation; but, if they’re promiscuous, you’d better believe the congregation is too. See? The same spirit gets on the congregation. So, all right now. And the Jews, they’re bad too. That’s where it started to begin with.

And they said, “Well, H-m-o-s-x-u-a-lity comes from these Yentls, you know, these Jewish mommas that are just running everything.”

And now they’ve actually found that’s it’s in the genes. Why certainly it is. There’s no doubt about it. You’ve come to the place now where like breeds like, and it’s just a situation. So anyway, looking at this situation, then, if there’s a couple of thousand here in Dayton, let’s say, you multiply that by two hundred. See? Your situation is very, very tragic. Okay. That’s enough statistics.

16. I want to go to the Word, and we want to talk about the Godhead. And when I talk tonight, I’m going to do my very best to introduce you to an understanding, an illumination perhaps. I don’t know that I can do it because, myself, I’m just coming in to it, but I want to discuss it with you. I’ve neglected to read Scripture so much, because I just start in talking to you, and then, I use Scripture. But, we’ll just go to Scripture here, and we go to the Gospel of John.

17. John 1:1:

(1) In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

(2) The same was in the beginning with God.

Now you’ll notice that there’s a repetition there; exactly why, I don’t know. It just may be that of all the beginnings you’re looking at, God was there; and God was not just privy to it, but God did it. And so, there are different beginnings. And, for instance, when God revealed Himself through certain events, it was the one God that did it. And, maybe He did it one way, and then, He did it another way. In fact, He did when He became Jehovah-Jireh, the provider; it was providing the ram for the sacrifice for Abraham. When He became Jehovah-Raphah, “I Am the Lord That Healeth Thee,” it was down there where the waters were bitter. And they cut down the tree and cast it into bitter waters, and the waters were made sweet. And so, all down the line, you have beginnings—becomings in the sense of God ‘becoming’ to the people what He already was in essentiality, but now bestowing it upon the people graciously, so that He could be to them, “God.” That’s your Jehovah-complexes. And right on down the line.

18. (3) And all things were made by Him; without Him was not anything made that was made.

(4) In Him was life; the life was the light of men. And so on.

And, then, It says: [Jn 1:14]

(14) And the word became (wasn’t made) flesh (the word became, the becoming God), and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.

And, then, in Jn 1:18:

(18) No man hath seen God anytime, the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared Him, or led Him forth by words…

In other words, even when Jesus said, “He that has seen me has seen the father,” or, “Believest thou not that I am in the father and the father in me, and he doeth the works,” and, “I only say what He tells me to say,” God many times speaking through him, that in itself is highly insufficient and means nothing, unless it is explained.

19. Believe me, phenomenon or phenomena, singular or plural, heaped upon heap, row upon row, until you’re dazzled out of your mind by the panoply of God’s great artistry and power and what He’s doing; and, if there were ten million people there, there’d ten million ideas, and not one of them right. Always It must be explained. That’s why, when Jesus explained, they killed him. And that’s why, when Bro. Branham explained, they sandbagged him and threw him out.

20. So, all right. We find here that, in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. And from what I’ve already said, that if explanation—words—came forth and caused God to be hated, then God would have to be the Word, because you have to reject God; but you can’t reject God, until you reject the Word. That’s why at the end time, in Hebrews 6, you find that the people cannot repent. And there’s no such thing as repentance without illumination; in other words a critical analysis and explanation of the events, which are dazzling your mind. Of course, some people’s minds cannot be dazzled. They’re already dead—and so dead you cannot do a thing with them.

21. So, all right. We’re going to look at the fact that “In the beginning was the Word”—‘word’. Now ‘word’ is a unit of oral or written language. In other words every single word is a unit. It means something. And every word should be a little different from every other word so that, even if it does say the same thing, it could actually say the same thing in a more explicit manner and in a manner which pertains more to the subject. But oral or written, every word is a unit of language. And without it, there is no communication or ability to learn except by personal experiences, which in turn, would have caused the human race to have already vanished, because the human race does not work by instinct.

A little baby seeing a fire would toddle toward it and fall in and die. Picking up a sword which is double-edged, a person wouldn’t know by looking at it. You’d have to see people stabbing and killing each other; so that without language, the human race would have ceased. So therefore, word or language, which defines mammals from mammals, (And the humans are mammals.) speaks of an intelligence and an ability to comprehend by use of words and, thereby, learn vicariously; and, thereby, through your own usage of words and experience, you add to what you have learned. Language is everything, and language is measurement. A horse is not a cow; a cow is not a pig; a rat is not a dog. Measurement defines. All definition is a measurement.

22. Now a ‘word’, though, is not real. You can hear it, but you’re not really hearing a ‘word’. You’re hearing a sound. When it’s written you can see it, but you’re not really seeing it. You’re seeing some forms there that spell out things. So, though a word is not real in itself, it is based on a reality that exists somewhere, or it is not a word. Simple as A-B-C. A word, though real in itself, is based on a reality somewhere. No reality means no word. But, if there is a reality, there has to be a word. There’s got to be. So, reality equals word, and word means there is reality somewhere. So, when you say ‘cart’, or whatever, there’s got to be a cart there.

23. Now, notice very carefully. Words are substitutes for reality. They are substitutes. Words are truth and should never be used out of the context of their reality. Never. Otherwise a lie is there by perverting the truth. When you pervert meanings you have a problem. That’s what Satan did. It is an act of iniquity.

24. But, notice how words are used. Take, for instance, the word ‘barn’. Instantly we know it is a structure. It could be of wood, could be of sod, could be of bricks, could be of poles. It could be tin; it could be anything. But what you know about that barn is: it houses animals, it houses feed, and it could... Well, livestock; and feed is what a barn usually holds. Then, you say the word ‘house’. Identical material but of a different structure, because it houses people and what pertains to them. Then, if you take the word ‘barnhouse’, you come up with a place in Germany. There’s a barn, and the cattle are down below, and upstairs the people are living. I don’t like that situation, but there it is. Well, that’s a barn-house.

Now you say, “Well, now, there’s no such thing as a ‘barnhouse’.”

Oh, yes there is. There’s also a man’s name called ‘Barnhouse’. He was one of the finest theologians that ever lived—a Presbyterian from either Pittsburgh or Philadelphia.

25. So, you see, when you use the word ‘barn’, it’s a substitute for the reality, and you don’t have to experience that particular object, because you know what a barn is. So, if the man said to the hired man, and he’s out in the yard, “Hey, run into the barn, and you get a bucket of oats.” You think for one minute he’d run in the house and bring out a bucket of donuts? Well, not unless he was some little fellow that liked to joke and was hungry for donuts. But, you see, you can use words to absolutely convey, perfectly, what you want.

We’re talking now about definition. ‘Barn’ is a ‘barn’, ‘garage’ is a ‘garage’, ‘house’ is a ‘house’, ‘pigpen’ is a ‘pigpen’, ‘cote’ is a ‘cote’ (c-o-t-e), ‘sty’ (s-t-y) is a ‘sty’, go right down the line: ‘field’, ‘garden’, etc, etc. You can define a reality; and through the words which substitute the reality, you can convey perfectly what you want to tell the person. In other words it’s just the same as if that thing were there. You don’t have to go and see it and do anything about it.

26. Now, think of words and their meanings, like ‘places’, ‘things’, ‘color’, ‘height’, ‘depth’, ‘feelings’, ‘joy’, ‘hate’, ‘anger’, ‘depression’, ‘euphoria’, ‘mad people’, ‘happy people’, ‘mean people’, ‘killers’, ‘marauders’, ‘rapists’, ‘assaulters’, ‘pedophiles’. You’ve got a picture right there of reality. And not one of us had to bring forth anything that I said, but instantly you got the picture. You had a perfect substitute for it. You ‘created’ a picture, an event, a circumstance, an emotion, or whatever you created.

27. Everything physical and spiritual and mental has a word that names all of those things that accrue to that object, like: “This is a woman. She has blond hair. She has blue eyes.” Just right down the line. You’ll know now, and you don’t have to go through experience, because every ‘barn’ is a barn, every ‘house’ is a house; and well, it used to be every ‘woman’ is a woman, but there are lesbians now. My God. I’ve got to take that back. Forget about women and men. But up to this point, a ‘horse’ is a horse, and a ‘dog’ is a dog, and a ‘pig’ is a pig, a ‘corral’ is a corral, a ‘fence’ is a fence, a ‘sty’ is a sty, a ‘cote’ is a cote, and a ‘beaver’ is a beaver, whatever—and what accrues to it.

28. Now conversation, or words used in a certain way can impart such a perfect knowledge that another person can grasp, practically perfectly, the location, the color of the thing, the events taking place, the feelings of the people, the end results of whatever was there, and even draw conclusions and form a mental process, so that you can begin to think about it. Now that’s true. I’m telling you everything that’s true. I go through this every day, and you go through it every day.

29. Now, notice how radio broadcasters can make you a part of an event hundreds of miles away. Remember when you were young? Not many of you can remember. You’re not that old. Our ears were glued to the radio. And I used to love hockey. Of course, I couldn’t play worth a plug nickel. That didn’t matter, I liked it anyway. And I loved baseball. I couldn’t play that either, but I liked it anyway. And boy, when the radio came on for a ball game or a hockey game, I could see that puck going right down there. I could see that guy shooting, and that guy’s voice was so excited, I could just enter right in. He’d carry me right along. I was right at the ball game, as much as I could be. And I enjoyed it. In fact, there were times that, literally, he was so good at what he was saying, and so carried away, you were better to just stay home and listen to him than going to the hockey game. That’s the truth.

30. What I’m trying to show you is, words; words work. There’s power in words. That’s a tragic thing. There’s power in words. That’s why Michener said, “When language loses it’s meaning, the nation is gone.”

Now, what do morals mean? No longer a code; no longer a definition. It’s what you want merely relative; and the moment defines it.

It’s like I said to my boy one day, when he was in high school: I said, “Grae, tell me. What is liberty?”

“Well,” he said, “It’s the freedom to do what you want.”

“Well,” I said, “Now just a minute. I’ve got the freedom, then, to do what I want.”

He said, “Yeah.”

Then, I said, “What if my freedom to do what I want interferes with your freedom to do what you want?”

He said, “I never thought of that.”

Freedom is not the ability to do what you want, but to do what is right.

You say, “Prove it.”

I’ll prove it. The Son shall set you free, and he that’s free from sin need not live any longer therein. See? So, all right.

31. But the word in the Greek, ‘logos,’ that’s the word we use here. “In the beginning was the Word.” That’s Logos. It is far beyond just a word as a unit of language—far beyond. The meaning of ‘logos’ is not just the idea that a word expresses a thought, but signifies both the outward form by which the inward thing is expressed and the outward form itself. It’s reality.

32. So, all right. I say the word ‘barn’. You know right away a ‘barn’ and what’s in it, logically. You know that. You even know if I said ‘pigpen’, you’d even begin to smell it. You’d know right away what a pigpen smells like. You may, right away, know of the muck and the sewage. When you hear of the pigpens down in the Carolinas where the hurricane came and the rains, and the great big pools of sewage ran over, you don’t even need to see anything in pictures, or later, on the television screen or in a magazine. You know right now by words what that sewage is doing. You know by reading without seeing how the people are getting blisters on their skin and diseases are coming. You know by words. But you haven’t entered into the real thing, because that’s simply a substitute for reality—a description that takes you there without being there. It makes you a part by knowledge, and consequently, you can realize what the event meant to those Carolineans.

But when you get to ‘logos’, it is not a substitute for reality. Reality lies within it. You follow me? So, ‘logos’ is not simply a thought expressed, (Because ‘logos’ means ‘word’. ‘Rhema’ is another type of a word, simply written or mechanical.) but ‘logos’ goes far beyond the word as a unit of language, oral or written. It actually opens up the area combining with what I have said; and it does, because it’s word expression, brings forth the understanding. But there is a reality there, and it is not a substitute. You can define and even know in a measure the ‘inner’ from the ‘outer’ or the ‘seed life’ by the form.

33. “In the beginning was the Word, the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” So, we don’t only have an expression, but the expression must contain what is to be expressed itself.

Now, as I said a while ago, talking about a word, let’s bring it as close as we can to a ‘logos’. Oh, I was going to bring a potato, and I forgot. And I was going to hold a potato up so you could see it, and I would say, “That is a potato.” Now this particular potato, which is not here now, I leave to your imagination; and, if you like the Netted Gems, you’ll see a potato, something like this. (I’m making my hands elliptical—kind of like an oval.) And it’ll be brown. And, if you like the little Irish potatoes that are red in your stew and your what have you—well, they’ll be a little red potatoes. And, if you like, there’s a purple potato; and there’s a potato that’s kind of green; and there’s a potato that’s called the Golden Yukon.

Now, the thing is, I say now, “This is a potato.” And it is a potato. Now, what you and I see is actually not the potato, per se. It is the manifestation of what is in there that is the potato that made what you and I see and eat. And I hold my potato up, and I say I’ll prove it. And I say, “Hey, see this tuber here? That’s a potato; belongs to the Nightshade family.” So, all right. Here’s my potato. I say notice these eyes here. “Yeah, what about them?” Well, I’ll tell you what I’m going to do. I’m going to cut this spud up. It’s got six eyes. I’m going to plant each piece of the spud that’s got an eye and, in no time, in the earth, you’re going to see roots come out, you’re going to see leaves come up, and then, you’re going to see little potatoes form.

“Well, how about that!”

What did it? A life did it. A life did it!

Now then, that potato that we call a potato has now expressed itself in a form that is definitely potato. And I can produce other potatoes, because there’s a life there. So therefore, the expression is expressed by the expresser. [End of side one of the first audio tape.]

34. I’ll take my little potato recipe to the Bible. It’s simple. In Deuteronomy It says, It’s God—if the man comes in the Name of the Lord, and the thing he says comes to pass, that’s God. The thing said comes to pass, that’s God. Well, who else could it be?

We’re getting close to Logos now. See?

35. Now, for the outward expression of the inner thought to be a product of the inner thought, the inner thought must have the ability and intelligence of itself to produce that outer expression or manifestation. Hence, the inward thought is not simply a thought, but a life of intelligence empowered. It’s a life of intelligence empowered to bring about a body or capsule perfectly commensurate with the empowered intelligence; in this case, God Himself, or Logos, as in Jn 1:1.

36. Now Bro. Branham met an atheist, and the atheist said, “Well, I don’t believe in God.”

And Bro. Branham said, “Well, that’s your privilege, every man to his own taste.” He said, “Do you mind if I have an apple off the ground here?”

“Sure,” he said, “the hornets will get them anyway.” And, as they talked, he said, “You know something funny happened the other day.” He said, “I heard the awfullest screaming over across the road there.” He said, “That woman was lying dying of cancer, she was so bad they used a draw sheet to change her, and she was dying. They took her into a little place over here in Kentucky and you know, I’ll tell you what, that woman the next day was up there eating as though she never was sick.” He said, “I can’t figure that. They said some preacher prayed for her.

Bro. Branham said, “Oh, is that so?”

Now, he said, “I can’t figure that.”

Bro. Branham kept on eating his apple.

So, he said, “So, there’s no God, heh? Look at,” he said. “Notice,” he said, “Sir, how these trees have dropped its apples and the leaves have dropped off?” He said, “You know what it is?” He said, “In the fall the sap goes down in the roots, and,” he said, “In the spring time the sap goes up from the roots to the leaves and the trees, and they bear the leaves, and fruit comes on,” and so on. But he said, “You know, it’s strange; if I were to put a bucket of water on a fence post, it wouldn’t go down, and it wouldn’t come up.”

And the man said, “Yeah, that’s so.”

He said, “Can you explain that?”

He said, “No.”

He said, “Can you explain how the water from the … comes down in the ground and the tree and the sap go up?”

He said, “No.”

Well, he said, “I’ll tell you, when you can explain that, I’ll tell you how that woman got healed last night.”

And he said, “You weren’t that preacher were you?”

He said, “I certainly was.”

37. Now, look at me. Deuteronomy 18; it’s got to be God, and it’s based on Word. Never mind the manifestation. That has to come, because it’s got to project the inner; and there’s got to be an inner, before there’s an outer. There cannot be a ‘barn’ unless there is a barn. There cannot be a squirrel, as a word, unless there’s a squirrel—black squirrel, brown squirrel, red squirrel, fox squirrel, heaven knows; fifty other kinds for all I know. But those are the ones I’ve seen. The black ones the prettiest of all.

38. So, there is actually a life that is really empowered intelligence. What intelligence did that tree have to send the sap down and bring it up? It was an intelligence—innate—that God put in there in that tree, because that is a life, and every life has to manifest.

“Where’d you get that from?”

Bro. Branham said, “Every seed has to manifest.” And there isn’t anything without a seed.

39. All right. Thus, we see what is manifested is of the manifester, so that this manifestation, or expression, is with God, and God being enfolded in it. So, if it’s with Him, it’s with Him, encircled, in union. So, God says, “I’m expressing myself;” and the way in which He expresses It, we call Logos. As the word reveals, the thought expresses it. And there’s where Bro. Branham stopped, and most theologians stop; although they do go a little further. I’m trying to get to the heart of it, as I understand this. And I’m going to nature the same as Bro. Branham did.

40. So thus, we see what is manifested is of, or produced by, the manifester, so that this manifestation, or expression, is with God. Isn’t the potato with the potato life? The expression, doesn’t it contain it? And God being enfolded in It, It is the Word. It, the Word, or Expression, is God. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” The same was every time there was a beginning. It’s always God. And, when there’s going to be a new Millennium, it’s going to be God bringing us out of the ground. It’s going to be God taking us up. It’s going to be God incarnating Himself. It’s going to be God doing it. Isn’t it, or is it?

41. Now we go down, [Jn 1:14]: “And the word became flesh and dwelt among us, (And we beheld his glory, the glory as of the Only-begotten of the Father.) full of grace and truth.” And It tells you right here that Jesus is not the Word, that God is the Word, because God is expressing Himself what He wanted to be, His expression physically. That’s why He created sperm and egg and wrapped Himself in it! So, It could come up with all the attributes that God wanted: this indeed, this is the Son of God and God dwelling in him.

Then again, [Jn 1:18] no man has seen God at any time; the Only-begotten, the Uniquely-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, hath brought Him forth by words.” Why? Because he was a prophet. No prophet can manifest anything, but God doing it through him; and no prophet can do anything whatever, unless the purpose of the manifestation is explained. You don’t know what God is doing or why. As I said, even the Catholics know that. The book I read by the priests that wrote on Fatima, the author said, “What would God do?’ He said, “This sign that God did, this great omen, phenomenon, this great thing was meant: shut up and sit down and listen!” Now those are my words; I’m paraphrasing his. I like mine better than his. Mine have an urgency that he never heard of. The priest said quite nicely that any phenomenon by God is to attract your attention, so that you listen to what God wants to tell you.

42. Okay, let’s go to 1 John. Here’s what It says here:

(1) That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon and our hands have handled of the word of life;

(2) (For the life was manifested and we have seen it…

Now, how does life manifest? It takes the chemicals, the chemistry as Bro. Branham called it, and works out its own pattern, its own genes; so that was the genes of God that brought forth that body that the son took over. All right.

“For the life was manifested”—how? It put a garment on it. It put something on it.

(2) …and bear witness, and show unto you that eternal life which was with the father and was manifested unto us;)

Now right here, I want to think of something and show you something that perhaps Bro. Branham never thought of, and perhaps nobody else thought of, and perhaps I’m entirely wrong. Who knows? All right, the life of the Son, S-o-n, and the life of many sons, the life of millions of sons, comes from one person called God. He is the Father. And at the same time, he has his own life [the Son]. Now, if that life that God gave to Jesus, the same life He gave to Adam to propagate and bring down here, is not a part of God or wasn’t with the Father, tell me what was.

So, that very life that was with the Father bringing forth this Son, the Only-begotten, now in flesh as he brought all of us forth at the same time, that was with the Father, as being in the Father but separate, though it’s the same life, on the grounds that that was predestinated to bring forth all of these, but the rest of the life didn’t. The fountain itself didn’t; just a part of that fountain did. That’s why you could say here that life was with the Father. And just the same as I can say that the life that came from me, injected into my wife to bring forth the children, is of my life and was certainly with me. It wasn’t with somebody else.

43. I could be wrong on my thesis or premise. I don’t believe I am, but I’m not expecting or demanding you to believe it. I’m just telling you what I see on the grounds of nature and what we are talking about. Because, when you say ‘with’, you are talking of a co-union, not simply something which is near and around. Because you cannot make it God and my words to you on the basis of what I said. Did not Bro. Branham say, “Each of us is a part of God?” Does that part go back to God? No, He gave it to us. Was it with Him? Yes, with Him. Was it in Him? Yes, in Him. But that which He passed on to us, under no grounds or authority or whatsoever, gave us any position in Him in the Godhead. The position was sonship.

44. So, what I see, I see. What you might not see is fine by me. I can only preach and tell you what I’m trying to get to in this message tonight.

As long as the outward expression contains what is there to be expressed, that expression or substance is identified as the expresser or who he is or of what life. So there; we go on.

(3) That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, (Now there’s a declaring, leading forth by words) that you may have fellowship with us and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ.

(4) These things write we unto you, that your joy may be full.

(5) This then, is the message which we have heard of him and declare unto you that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all.

(6) If we say we have fellowship with Him and walk in darkness, we lie and do not the truth.

(7) But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another and the blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, cleanses us from all sin.

And this is exactly Jn 3:16-18, condemnation without the word—justification only by the Word. See?

45. So, all right. As long as the outward expression contains what is there to be expressed, that expression or substance is identified as the expresser, or who it is, what it is, life. So, we see a principle, whatever expresses the expresser is certainly the expresser manifested; the expression is what it is. So, all right. Whatever expresses that portion that expresses what is to be expressed… I’m saying that whatever expresses the expresser is certainly the expresser itself, manifested. The expression is what it is; for instance, a potato. Expressor and expression is not only ‘one’, but the ‘expression’ is the expressor.

46. But now, take a sweet potato; and, if you could have a microscope sufficiently strong to see life, you would find that the sweet potato life is different from the ordinary potato. Now, take thousands of butterflies; butterfly life, but every single one is different.

Now, just think for a minute: when God told Adam to name all the animals... And they’re not all named even yet. What if he’d a got around to the birds? Hey, he blew it before he got anywhere even past the animals. Yeah, he got through the animals—whatever God wanted him to know anyway. Today we haven’t got them numbered. He never got to the birds. See? The devil came in, camouflaging who he was and turning the truth of God into a lie.

47. So, all right. The expression is what it is. So therefore, are we wrong to understand, then, “In the beginning was the Word,” that which was expressed, and, since the Expresser was God, then the Expression is God?

“Show us the Father, and it suffices us!”

“He that has seen me has seen the Father.”

Can you follow? Well, wasn’t it the truth? Wasn’t Jesus the expression of the Father, and did not God express himself through the expression? Wasn’t Jesus the icon or the image of God? Certainly he was. And, isn’t it true that to touch the image and the spirit in the image was what made it real? Isn’t that true of even witchcraft and voodoo? Bro. Branham said so. So then, when you touch Jesus, whom did you touch? You touched God, because the Expression had to be God. “The beginning was the Word, the Word was with God, and the Word was God, the same was in the beginning with God.” Right down the line, every time; it’s God’s method of doing It.

48. God has expressed or manifested Himself. What God became in doing this is not mentioned very often, but we do know He appeared in a Pillar of Fire, appeared in a cloud, spoke in a whirlwind, and was called a rock, etc. So therefore, Jn 1:1, “In the beginning was the Word, the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and the Word became flesh.” After being a Pillar of Fire, after being in a rock, after being in a whirlwind, after being in a cloud, after being in this, after being in that, He became flesh.

49. Now, when you ‘become’, it means, positively, that there is an evolution going on within you. Put it better—a transfiguration, a transformation—becoming God.

And the Word, now, became flesh. Why? Because God never changes. As I’ve said before, if God spoke through a brass doorknob or a mule, that’s God. Well, some just can’t believe that. It seems sacrilegious, but it isn’t. It’s making the point.

“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” In other words God put on a human garment, His Son’s body, and He literally dwelt among us for three and a half years, and we beheld His glory. And He tells you, here’s the analogy, here’s the description: He was in the Son manifesting Himself, and what a glory that was manifested. People have never seen it. Why? It’s never been known before that the eyes of a man born blind received his sight.

And they said, “That’s true. That’s got to be God. No man can do these things; it’s got to be God.”

“Why, it’s just a man.”

I don’t care if it’s just a man; it’s God doing it.

50. God expressed Himself, and the expression was in this human body and through that body, and the glory fell upon Jesus, because they marveled at him, because God manifested Himself through him; yet they saw only the man called Jesus. So therefore, God glorified His Son, but His Son wasn’t puffed up by what was going on in the sense that this was the greatest thing. He said, “Glorify me with thine self, the same honor and glory I had before the foundation of the world.” And He said, “I’ve done it, I’m doing it now, and I’ll do it even greater.” What’s it going to be like at the Wedding Supper? What’s it going to be like down the road? Why God even takes turns manifesting Himself in and through us, because we’re the Bride. See?

51. Now God has expressed or manifested Himself. What God became in doing this is not mentioned very often, but as I said: He was a cloud, He was a rock, He was this, He was that, and the other thing. But, now, even as It says in Hebrews, God in diverse times and various ways, in the prophets came to the people, but now in His Son. And He said, “This is my beloved Son in whom I am pleased to dwell.” Now let’s get this flat: that’s not in the Bible. It says, “This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.” But now, just a minute, perhaps the Greek does really say, “This is my beloved Son in whom I am pleased to be in.” So, Bro. Branham is one hundred percent right. And, if he wasn’t pleased to be in him, He would’ve gone out of him. So, you see how it is? You just believe the prophet, and God helps you.

52. Now we want to go further in our understanding: God is the Word. To do so, I will start with man, which happens to be you and me. Over here in 1 Th 5:23, It says:

(23) And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

And, of course, God is faithful to do it. So, we find here that man is body, soul and spirit; or, as Bro. Branham said, “body, spirit, and soul.” And, if you go to the book of Luke, which we will later, you’re going to find that to be true.

53. Now Jesus said, “Into thy hands I commend my spirit.” And that’s what happened: his spirit went. The spirit goes; the soul lingers. The next thing the Bible said, “Thou will not leave my soul in hell.” So, his soul went down to Hades. And my body will not lay in the ground and corrupt. So, Jesus was tri-partite, the same as you and I are. He was actually body, spirit and soul.

54. Now, let’s go to Luke 16, and we look at what we are finding here.

(19) There was a certain rich man clothed in purple and fine linen, fared sumptuously everyday.

(20) And there was a certain beggar, Lazarus, full of sores,

(21) (He got the crumbs of the table; ate what the dogs ate.)

(22) Came to pass that the beggar died, (went) to Abraham’s bosom (up in upper Sheol); the rich man also died and (went to …)

(23) hell (lower Sheol,) he lift up his eyes, being in torment (He had feelings.) (He) sees Abraham afar off, (He could see.)

(24) And he cried unto father Abraham, have mercy on me, (He was repenting.) and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue. (He was in torment; he was hot; he felt a lot of things there.)

(25) But Abraham said, Son, remember thou in thy lifetime received good things, likewise Lazarus evil: but now he’s comforted and you’re tormented.

(26) Besides all this, there is a great gulf fixed: (you can’t pass over here, he can’t pass over there.)

(27) He said, Well, lord, I pray, father, you’d send him to my brother’s house.’

(28) He said, for I’ve got five brothers there, testify to them (that they don’t come into torture.)

Now, do you notice in here, this man had all his senses. He even had love. He could repent. He had remorse. He wanted to do good. What was it? It had to be his soul, because the soul goes there. The Bible says Jesus’ soul went there. Of course, it went to upper Hades. But the soul goes to upper or lower. So, here you are; here’s the soul, full of all these qualities.

55. So, what’s the real person? The real person’s the soul. What’s the spirit for? The spirit is there to receive the body; and until the spirit goes in, there is a body there that’s kicking muscles and nerves, because there’s a soul there. But, what does the spirit do? It connects the body, the mind, the brain, the physical, with all the senses and attributes to what is down there in the soul.

Now you’ve got the entire connection. That’s why the baby is not alive in the ultimate sense until it draws its breath—the spirit comes in. And that spirit, by the way, is likened to simple wind. But, when God breathed into Adam the breath of lives, Bro. Branham categorically said, “That was not simply a breath of air;” it was a resuscitation.

Although I’m using the word resuscitation, he didn’t. He said, “It was the Holy Ghost.” And at that time, when the Holy Ghost came in, he became a living soul, because the breath of lives came into him, and that meant, positively, he would be the conveyor of souls.

56. That’s why the life is in the male. And that’s why the life came from the male, even male and female; He separated them. And, when He put them in body in order to propagate, the male, therefore then, had the soul, that seed from God; for Bro. Branham said, “You were in God, you were in your father, and Levi was in the loins of his great-great-great-grandfather, and he was in the loins of Adam and Adam came from God.” Now, do you understand seed? Because you are seed, God has sent forth His Spirit into your heart whereby you cry “my father”—recognition. Now get the thing in proper connection.

57. Now man, therefore, is spirit and body; is he not? The two elements out of the three; soul and spirit, are spirit, vague, indefinite, incomprehensible, and literally unknown; but they’re there. And they’re more real than the body. Because the spirit lives on, though it goes back to God; and God does what He wants with it. And the soul goes to some special place and lives on until God either glorifies it with the glorified body or destroys it in the Lake of Fire. But the body simply goes to the ground and dies and can only come back in a resurrection immortal, if you’re true seed of God. And, if you’re not, you’ll have a body commensurate to the Lake of Fire until God wants to dissolve it. When that is, I don’t know.

58. So therefore, the body is now reduced to two things. Do you know what they are? Can you guess? Spirit and tissue, t-i-s-s-u-e. Your hair is tissue. Your bones are tissue. Your blood is tissue. You are nothing but tissue. Two parts of you, elements of life—two kinds of life. One which was not created, which is eternal. Therefore, you come to the time when you realize you always were saved; it was your body that sinned. That spirit created goes back to God. He does what He wants. So, you are spirit and tissue. I’m speaking to ‘wheat-seed sheep’ only.

59. Now what’s the tissue? It is the manifestation of the life of the soul. Your body primarily is the body of the soul. The spirit comes in, as I said, to connect your mind and your brain all together, so you become a unit. That’s why when the Mormon fellow said to Bro. Branham, “My little baby was stillborn,” he said, “You will see that little child in heaven.”

Well, just a minute. The baby is kicking muscles and nerves, twitching and moving. He’s not alive. No, the baby’s not sensate to the things of the world, until the spirit comes in. And that spirit is allowed of God but not of God. The soul is not only allowed of God; it is directed of God, because it is of God. That, my brother/sister, is the foreknowledge, election and predestination we’re talking about. That’s your soul. And God puts it in a body—the kind of a person He wants a child to be.

60. So therefore, the true man is the soul. Now in 1 Corinthians 15, we find there is a natural body; there is a spiritual body. There’s a spirit body. Well, isn’t that true from Genesis: there was a spirit body, male and female in one? And then, there was a physical body for Adam and Eve, and God took one spirit part out and put it into another physical body. And, isn’t it true, when you die, you go to a spirit body, which is a Word body, which you bypassed? Certainly—2 Corinthians 5.

61. So, the real man is the soul. And the soul, we found, was in Luke 16, the real man. And Bro. Branham went to and saw Luke 16. And what was there? Beautiful young people, and they could hug each other, and they had no sexual feelings; nothing in there but pure love and joy. Everything was love and beauty. And he said, “Don’t, don’t, don’t, don’t miss it.”

Well, how in the world we going to get it unless we’re predestinated to it? But they couldn’t eat. They couldn’t drink. They’re waiting for their glorified bodies to come.

So, the real man is the soul that came from God. He’s a God-man; he’s a child of God. She’s a child of God. And in Christ there is neither male nor female; it’s the life that counts. That’s why men should treat their wives as sisters as well as wives, and women should treat their husbands as brothers.

62. Now man was made in God’s image, and God is a Spirit. Now here is the problem. We cannot see spirit, and it cannot be quantified, except that it has strength to live and be perceived in a physical way. Spirit perception is not human. Perception lies in the spirit realm. Perception does not lie simply in your five senses and in your brain. It takes the spirit to link it all up. Revelation.

So therefore, here’s the problem. We cannot see spirit, and it can’t be quantified, except that it has strength to live, and it has form to live by. In other words it is not simply a life; it is a discerning and discriminating type of life. Therefore, perception defines life, even as a born babe is only jerking muscles and nerves. See? It’s not really living as an entity as it should be.

63. So, we put the spirit along with the soul. They go together. And you have true life, because the spirit connects the tissue and all its marvelous attributes to the senses and the brain to the soul. The spirit received is the linkage between the soul and the flesh. Thus, the true human being is intelligent life, and the intelligence is dominant, or the men could be simply carrot life or potato life; perhaps even pig life, or monkey life. Not so! True human beings are God life. If they were animal life, they would not have true perception; they would have instinct. And, driven by instinct, you’d be nothing more or less than the animals of the jungle. He is not so.

64. The spirit in him, listen, is the candle of the Lord searching the innermost parts of the belly. Now, isn’t that something? What is the spirit got to do with my belly? Now, how many of you people have heard me teach in the last thirty years? How many? Well, there are a few. Okay. Do you remember that I told you that the philosophers, the ancient philosophers, have always referred to the solar plexus mind, that there’s a mind or a brain here apart from this brain? Science has just proven it one hundred percent to be so. There is a brain here joined tandem with the brain here, but they’re both separate. So, the candle of the Lord, now, searches down here where your gut feelings are, that feeling in there. Now that’s from a discerning soul without a doubt.

I taught on this, and I showed you how it is with many people are nervous. And they’re nervous because their nerve energy’s down, the energy down here in this brain. It can’t operate; it begins to throw it wrong signals. And many times it is because the energy is wrong. Wrong food will do it. Wrong living. Wrong everything. But, when it is just this problem here, where you simply have nerves, you can learn to say to your nerves, “Shut up and lie down.” In your mind you just walk away, and you watch how that peace begins to flood your soul.

Listen, you know something; science is wonderful—when it’s true science; but most of the time it’s hogwash. I just read that the other day. Always this Message is vindicated, and my teaching is vindicated with it, because much of my teaching is based upon Bro. Branham, especially where we found that Eve is the mother of all living—didn’t say he was the father of all—proves there are two fathers and one mother.

65. The spirit in him is a candle of the Lord searching the inward parts of the belly. The Holy Spirit reveals the Word and the Will of God, and that is to the brain. So, one there is to relieve you of your feelings and bring your feelings and motives into line—your brain to line up—you’re baptized with the Holy Ghost—to be in coordination. So, the whole body is now sanctified by the Holy Ghost. The Word is a light and a lamp for the path of life. “The Word,” Bro. Branham said, “is a conduit of the Holy Spirit.” The Word is man’s necessary meat far more than his daily meat. He is feasting on the living bread; he is feasting on the Lord Jesus Christ—Body Word.

66. See, I’m bringing it all together. You cannot separate the Word from Life. The minute you say Word—and you bring It right into the fact of the Word of God, Word manifests Itself—you come right to the place where It is God, the Word, doing It, because a word in itself cannot do it. A word in itself cannot do it. When you’re talking about a unit of language, forget it. I can say healing is a word; but, when I associate in faith to God my healer, I can be healed. Oh, yeah. Now, let that sit a while.

67. We go to God, Elohim, the self-existent Spirit God, Who is the “Strong One Bound by an Oath.” Therefore, God has circumvented or bound Himself by His Own Word. God interposes Himself with His Word. And this is something that God has nothing to do about, because being God, that’s what It is: the “Strong One Bound by an Oath.” So therefore, you do not have a panoply or a great production of power. You have a production of the Word, because of the strength in the Word. Remember Jesus: my Word is Spirit and Life. Don’t ever forget that. So, we get to God, Elohim, the self-existent God, Who is the Strong One Bound by an Oath.

68. God is totally subject in His power and authority to His Word. In fact, His Word really is His power; otherwise He could not be God. The Word is the conduit of the Holy Ghost or wherein God moves. That is why we have so much trouble today. People will not operate the Word within the framework of the Word. They will take the Word and, then, not let God have His rightful place in It, because people always use the Word. But remember, It is God in you willing and doing of His good pleasure, and His good pleasure is His Word. And It is God in His Word doing His pleasure. Learn to get out of the way.

“Man hath not seen nor ear heard.” He doesn’t know the capabilities of the power of God within him, when God uses that power within you. That’s why Bro. Branham said, “I do not dare use a gift of myself. You people use the gift in me. I don’t dare launch out and say a thing, unless I know it’s from God.” And then, when this becomes true in our lives, the Word of God takes preeminence only because God is in His Word to make It so. The Word that He gave us is like the rain and the dew and the snow. When He sows It, It cannot return unto Him void without being fulfilled, because no Word of God is void of power. And “in vain do you worship me.” Why? “By having the traditions of men rather than the doctrine of God.” “They that worship me, must worship me in spirit and in truth.” And remember, there are two spirits. That One is a Spirit of truth, and the other is a spirit of error.

So therefore, the Spirit of God is only in His Word rightly revealed, because He reveals It, and thereby, He is revealed. So, He is the Word. Thus, we see God is living Word. He is living, self-fulfilling Word. God’s power is ruled by the Word of authority. No Word is void of power. It accomplishes whereunto It was sent. Therefore, God is the Word. As It says in Scripture, God sent His Word and healed them. “He sent His Word and healed them.” Now what was that? That was there at the bitter waters when the tree was cut down. He sent His Word.

69. Now here is where we have to let our thinking go. This is the tough part. I don’t know how far we can go, because I don’t know how far I’ve gone myself. I’m just getting there. But I always preach the thing that I believe I’m right on, and as time goes on...for I am not a prophet. Remember, it’s precept upon precept, line upon line, here a little, there a little. That’s my ministry. I teach doctrine. From doctrine I go to line-to-line. Then we go Word-to-Word. And by that time, we’re piling Word upon Word until the Holy Ghost can move in and through us.

And that’s the trouble: we are not believing that Word as we should. As I tried to show you the other day, there are two things Bro. Branham said, “If you only believed who I am, you’d all be healed.” [Key #1: See “If You Only Knew Who I Am,” Lee Vayle, 11/30/85.] If you believe the virgin birth as he taught it, you’d be healed. No more cancers; no more bad eyesight. All healed. [Key #2: See “Godhead #2,” Lee Vayle, 10/3/99.] Now, John said, “And this is the confidence we have in him; if we ask anything concerning his will, we know that He hears us, and if we know that He hears us, we know we have the petition we desired of Him.” [Key #3: See “Godhead #8,” Lee Vayle, 3/5/00.] Now the thing is, does He hear us? The Bible distinctly says, he that turneth away his ear from hearing my Word, I will turn my ear away from hearing his prayer. If we have not turned our ear away from hearing His Word, there’s got to come a time when healing comes naturally to every one of you people sitting there. Begin to believe it! I’m trying to show you where this works. And I’m impotent; I’m not God. I’m 85½ years old. I’ve got problems. So, I’m not standing here for fun, and you’re not either, or you wouldn’t listen to me preach this way.

70. Now listen, God is Spirit. Here you’ve got to let your thinking go. God is Spirit. No way can we in natural bodies and minds plumb the Spirit. In 1 Cor 1:17, It says:

(17) For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel: not with wisdom of words lest the cross of Christ be made of none effect.

Now right in there, you have a manifestation of the words, ‘Christ upon Calvary’. And he fulfilled those words. He was there. Even as John the Baptist: “I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness. I am Isaiah 40:1-3. I am the Word of God manifest in human flesh.” Absolutely. See? So, it even comes down to the prophet. It comes down to you and me. We are the Word of God, because we’re part of God. He is the Word; we are the Word manifested in human flesh. Paul said, You’re living epistles read and known of all men,” but you’re flesh. See? Now:

(17) …Lest the cross of Christ be made of none effect.

(18) For the preaching of the cross to them that perish foolishness; but unto us who saved it is the power of God.

(19) For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.

(20) Where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the disputer of this world? Hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?

(21) For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching that saved them that believe.

(22) For the Jews require a sign, the Greeks seek after wisdom: (That’s why John was able to say “the Logos” and talk about God; and Paul was able to say, “I will reveal to you the God that you don’t know and you’re trying to worship.”)

(23) But we preach Christ crucified, to the Jews a stumbling block, unto the Greeks foolishness.

(24) But unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God. (Notice, he is called the wisdom of God and he is the manifester of God. So the wisdom of God is being manifested, and that is God. You come right down to the Word.)

(25) Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than men. (That tells you God can be foolish in the eyes of men.)

(26) For you see your calling, brethren, not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty or noble, are called.

(27) But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; God hath the chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things that are mighty;

(28) And base things of the world, and things which are despised, has God chosen, and things which are not to bring to nothing the things that are,

(29) That no flesh should glory in his presence.

(30) But of Him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption.

(31) That according as it is written, He that glories, let him glory in the Lord.

Now that’s absolute grace right there; God’s in it all. That’s grace. Grace is the fact that: #1 we’re here as children of God. Grace #2 is we’re redeemed back. Grace #3 is where we have this redeemer, this mediator, intercessor standing there for us right now and now on the throne and God putting everything under his feet that we may be in a rapture, out of the graves and glorified at the Wedding Supper. That’s grace.

71. [1 Corinthians 2]

(1) And I, brethren, when I came to you, came not with excellency of speech or of wisdom… (And he said, verse 4:)

(4) And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man’s wisdom, but in demonstration of the spirit and of power: (That, that was… He came and he proved that his word was of God. This is a sign of the prophet, Deuteronomy 18.)

(5) That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.

Now you notice in there, not the wisdom of men, but the wisdom of God and the power of God. You cannot separate Word and power, and Word and power is God. That’s omniscience and omnipotence; you can’t do it. Now here’s where your thinking has got to go, and we’ll get to it, just keep listening. Now:

(6) Howbeit we speak the wisdom among them that are perfect: yet not the wisdom of this world, nor the prince of this world, that come to nothing:

(7) But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world unto our glory. (Nobody can get it but the Bride.)

(8) Which none of the princes of the world knew: for had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.

Now the Jews and Catholics are fighting right now over who killed Jesus. The Bible said that the Jews both crucified and killed the Lord Jesus Christ; so, forget about the Catholics. I don’t care if a Roman soldier did it. It was the Jews that did it, because they said, “Crucify him!” It wasn’t the Romans that said it; they tried to save him. Oh, the whole bunch are wrong.

The pope going up the Via della Rosa on a nice sidewalk, thump, little thump on his feet, give him a little thump. Oh, God. You know, oh, it just don’t… Just don’t mind me. I’m sarcastic, and I’m just sick in my stomach at this kind of stuff. You know why? Because I’m sick at myself. If I can condemn myself standing in the way of God wanting to use my life, then no wonder I’m bitey when it comes to these other things.

(9) But as it is written, Eye hath seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man, the thing that God hath prepared for them that love Him.

(10) But God hath revealed it unto us by the Spirit: for the Spirit searches all things, yea, the deep things of God.

(11) For what man knows the things of man, save the spirit of man that is within him? (See, there it is. I told you. What man knows the things of man save the spirit of man that’s in him? See, I told you where the connection was between the senses and down in there, and I forgot that till now.) even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the spirit of God. (So, we’ve been given it in baptism to feed our souls, the part of God.)

(12) Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit, which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given unto us of God.

(13) Which things also we speak not in the words which man’s wisdom teaches, but the Holy ghost teaches; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.

Now It tells you right there that you’ve got to leave your own thinking, your spirit that connects the tissue and all of its wonder: fearfully and wonderfully made…oh, tremendous mystery, powerful—connecting down into the soul. You can’t get It that way. Your spirit’s out of the picture now. Your thinking is gone. You can’t get It. God’s Spirit alone can give It. “Comparing spiritual to spiritual…” And that’s what I’m doing, you noticed?

Now the life of the carrot is not the life of a dog, and the life of the dog is not the life of the Son of God. But they’re all lives. The life in the acorn is not the life in the gnat. The life in the gnat is not the life in the fruit fly; but it’s life. And out there are spirits. There are voices.

72. Now watch:

(13) Which things also we speak, not in words which man’s wisdom teaches, but the Holy Ghost teaches; comparing spiritual things to spiritual.

(14) But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.

In other words now you’re caught between a rock and a hard place. You’ve got a spirit that knows things. You know it by nature. You know it by experience. You know it by being taught. You know it by doing things—experimentation. We experiment, and we experience, because there’s a great difference between experiment and experience—being experiential. Experiential means to experience the thing; experiment is to see if it works. But we’ve got all this against us.

Now It says, look, you’ve got to get out of the way, if you’re going to understand, if you’re going to get spiritual truth—revelation. And who can know God. We only know Him on the grounds of the Spirit revealing It to us; which means you cannot put any interpolations or reasonings into revelation by the Holy Spirit if it’s truly of God. And only God can do it—give it to you. God Himself makes the connection. Sovereignty!

73. So, what we read here tells us of God’s foolishness as well as His wisdom. And foolishness of God according to man is the Blood sacrifice of His Son. When God said in His Word, you shall not offer your children as a sacrifice or make them go through the fire unto Molech, they took that to mean that God did not have the right to do what He did in Isaiah 53. And so, as the rabbi today said, “I’ll just smile and say, ‘Well Jesus, you go your way with your dreams and visions and have a nice day.’ I have the Torah.”

What about Isaiah 53? What about Messiah? What about the Resurrection? What about the Gentiles coming in? Huh? Well, they have it all figured out. They have it figured out that, when they take over as a nation, they’re going to bring us in finally. They’re going to really jubilate—have a jubilee. They’re got it all wrong.

When Christ comes back to rule with a rod of iron, it’s to destroy this earth. And we’re coming back with him to take over. And then, we will sit for the Millennium. We shall have kingdom worship; we set up the temple around the Lamb; every man with his own household; every man with his own tree, his own arbor, his own grapevine, and so on and so forth. They don’t understand. They read in the Torah, but they are like Cain; they wrongly divide it. Their doctrine is wrong.

74. Now listen, there is a way to enter in to the spirit of God, or God’s mind of understanding. Now we’re going to find it here in Romans 12, because that’s exactly where it is. And I’ll go my way as I’m reading It, and I’ll tell you what I think it is, and you can disagree if you want.

(1) I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, (That means get rid of your body. Give it over to your soul, because your spirit’s got to do what it’s supposed to do in that body. Which, when it becomes a living sacrifice, the temple of the Holy Ghost, the Holy Ghost now takes charge of the spirit and the flesh, so you don’t have to walk in the flesh anymore, but you can walk in the Spirit. And walking in the Spirit is walking in the mind of God. And you have the mind of God according to the same Book of Romans, if you’re full of the Holy Ghost. That’s Romans 8. Now It says:) which is your reasonable sacrifice. (In other words we have a sacrifice here. We have to give up ourselves on the altar.)

(2) And be not conformed to the world. (To conform to something means you go in its pattern. So, that means you’ve got to go against the pattern which is naturally in the world as Paul spoke of over here in 1 Corinthians 2. The world doesn’t have it. And your spirit, without the baptism with the Holy Ghost, is bound to take on what all flesh has taken on, which is experience and sense knowledge. But this won’t do it. You simply cannot do it. So, what are you going to do? Negative, do not be conformed to this world, and we explained that in 1 Corinthians. But what?)

(2) Be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind. (Now, in here, the word ‘transformed’ is wrong. It means ‘to be transfigured’. And the Mount of Transfiguration is where Jesus was shown to be completely out of the flesh of man and in the flesh of God under the complete control of the Holy Spirit. And on the Mount of Transfiguration, Bro. Branham said “When God spoke and said, “This is my beloved son in whom I pleased to dwell in,” he said, “That was the adoption.” So now, It says here:) don’t be conformed to the world, but come into the adoption. (Come into the place where you are thoroughly trained by the Holy Spirit to show that you are truly a child of God.)

75. So, we go to Hebrews 12. I’m not going to go to Galatians. I’m going to Hebrews, because that’s the Book I believe we should look at. And It says here in Heb 12:3-6: (3) “For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself.”

Now, if he would not have endured the contradiction of sinners against himself, which was saying, “No, you are not Messiah. No you are not the prophet. No, you are not the Son of God. No, no way does God reside in you. No way does God do these works through you. No way do you have a correct understanding of Scripture. We are coming against you, because you are taking your stand with that Word; that you say that you have the correct understanding.” Now remember, he’s vindicated. Your stand is with vindication. Your stand is with every contradiction that comes against you.

“Oh, you bunch of idiots down there in Grace Gospel Church. You think you’re the only ones.”

No, we don’t think that at all.

“You believe you’re the only ones that know it all.”

No, we don’t believe that at all. We don’t believe anything they say, because we don’t. We’re standing on a vindicated Word that is far beyond our own belief or anything we’ve got to do with, with history, or anything else. We have a vindicated Word.

See, I told you vindication stands out. If you don’t believe in vindication, you’re not in the adoption, I’ll tell you that flat, forget it. Why? Because you don’t want to come under the Word. Why? Because the Holy Ghost is in the Word. In vain do you worship me, having for your doctrine the traditions of men. You can’t take what man says, what the congregation says, what the theologians say. You can’t do it.

76. Now listen: God has anointed teachers, perfect with the Word. God has anointed pastors, perfect with the Word, evangelists and pastors and apostles. But, when you’ve got a Word prophet, all of those five-fold, the prophet and all, are under the revealed Word of Almighty God by a prophet that’s vindicated. So, here we are. Look at It.

[Hebrews 3] “Consider him that endured the contradictions,” the pointing of the finger, the ultimate degradation, crucifixion and death, by those that said, “We can’t stand what you say about the Word. We’re the ones that have it, and you’re wrong.” Now Bro. Branham positively preached a sermon on “Ashamed of Him,” and it ended up being ashamed of the Word. So, “Consider him that endured the contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds.”

77. Now listen, “fainting in your minds.” “Be you transfigured.” Be you an adopted son through your minds. Go back to Romans 12 again, so we know what we’re talking about. That’s why I took this chapter. [Rom 12:2-6]

(2) But be ye not conformed to the world, but be you transfigured by the renewing of your mind. (And the mind and the spirit deals primarily with the senses with your former education, with everything you think you know with all of that which can be produced humanly; God is against it. And you’ve got to get rid of it. I said, you’ve got to get rid of it. And you’ve got to come to grips where you admit that God is right, every man’s word is a lie, but God is right. Heb 12:6:)

(3) Consider him, (Make him your example. Now, watch:) lest you be weary and faint in your minds. (Now, don’t let your minds faint; let them be renewed. You can get in the adoption now.)

(4) Ye have not yet resisted unto blood striving against sin. (He did; he sweat drops of Blood. And he even died, and his Blood was shed.)

(5) Have you forgotten the exhortation which was spoken unto to you as unto children, My son, do not despise the correcting of the Lord, nor faint when you are reproved of Him.

(6) For whom the Lord loves He chastens, and scourges every son whom He receiveth.

78. Now, in the Greek tradition, the word ‘teaching’ and ‘scourging’ is pretty well the same word. You learn by suffering. Existentialism says that we are here to suffer. The Bible says we suffer with Him to be glorified with Him. And, where is that actual suffering? It’s in the mind. It’s starts there; the mind must be renewed. You’ve had some renewing already, because you finally begin to understand that you have a part of God, that your soul is a part of God, that you are seed.

The thing that they fought most I’ve found out… A man bitter against me said, “We are not seed. We are not seed. We become seed.” Later on, he had to admit he was wrong. Did he apologize? By no means; he never apologized. I told him to get out of my hair, out of my face. In fact, he was the birdbrain that invited himself to a dinner to which he was not even invited.

The devil was not invited to the Garden of Eden, either—to Adam and his dinner party. You let that bird in, and you’ll see what happens. Don’t have any time with that kind of stuff. Just kiss them goodbye and say, “Thank you. You’re not seed; I am, goodbye, goodbye, goodbye.” I take a tough stand. You want to tell me something; don’t try to tell me anything unless you know what I know, or you can help me with something.

You say, “Well, Bro. Vayle, Bro. Branham said so and so.”

Fine, tell me where he said. Let’s get the context. The guy that used the quote of Bro. Branham, Bro. Branham said, you’d all … prayed and read the Bible, God would not have had to send a prophet. Then, where did Malachi 4 come from? Give me the context. Why did Bro. Branham say it? Under what circumstances? The same man called Bro. Branham a shark. He doesn’t have a clue to vindication. Do you have a clue to vindication? Huh?

Let me tell you right now, except for vindication, I’d be gone. I wouldn’t have a leg to stand on. I’d have nothing to say. I’d have nowhere to hide. I wouldn’t know anything.

79. But have you forgotten? [Rom 12:6] “Whom the Lord loveth He chaseneth; scourges every son He receives.” If you endure chastening, if you endure this that starts in the mind now, and you take the Word of God absolutely as It says, and don’t try to figure It. In the first place, you haven’t got what it takes to figure It, and I don’t have what it takes to figure It. I’ve got to have the Holy Ghost take what Bro. Branham said and reveal It to me and take It back and forth to the Scripture to settle it there in order to teach It. And, believe me, I’d better partake of what I’m teaching, and I want to partake of It. I want to be a partaker of It, because the husband is to be first partaker of the field and the fruit before he gives to anybody else. So, I’m going along here teaching the best I can to understand these things and know wherein we stand.

Now, if you are without chastisement, correction, and He corrects you in such a way that you will not forget, so that you will pause, like he that suffers in the flesh ceases from sin. When you’re brought up short by God, like I’ve been so many times, you say, “Okay, okay, okay, we’ll go that way.” Remember, He does not make you go against your will, He just makes you willing to go. When we pray, we don’t twist His arm; He twists our arm.

80. Now furthermore, He said:

(8) If you won’t partake of this training of God, you’re bastards and not sons.

(9) Furthermore, we have had fathers of our flesh who have corrected us, we gave them reverence: shall we not much rather be in subjection unto the father of spirits, and live? (And isn’t our spirit of Him, our soul?)

(10) For they verily, for a few days, chastened after their own pleasure, but He for our profit, that we might be partakers of His holiness.

So, we’re getting into the adoption, and it starts in the mind. The greatest battle ever fought is in the mind. It’s where you take that mind and bring it under control of the Holy Ghost so that the Spirit now can take every thing that is here, the Word, the reality, and put it down into our souls so that it now comes back and influences our spirit. When Bro. Branham said, “The soul’s the nature of the spirit,” he said, “giving it an influence through an atmosphere.” The soul is not a non-entity. It’s not an aura, and it is not an atmosphere. It is a true entity that gives the atmosphere to the spirit. Otherwise, the spirit is all of the world.

81. Now, with that soul, with the Holy Ghost down there working with the spirit, It can take every thing and bring it backward. And, when It does, the revealed Word begins to renew your mind. So now, through the renewed mind, which is the mind of God, which is the truly revealed Word, the interplay back and forth will put you in the adoption and bring you into the transfiguration, which you must have in order to be in the Rapture. “Piling Word upon Word upon Word.”

(11) Now, no chastening for the present seems joyous, (It’s a tough battle.) but grievous: (It’s hard on us.) nevertheless afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them that are exercised thereby.

So, now we’re fighting this great spiritual battle; not the physical, it’s the spiritual. And it’s in between the soul and the brain where the spirit is.

82. Now, who’s going to lead us? Are we going to say, “Okay, now…” And here’s where, you see, I’m so strong on vindication. I say, what does it matter what I think? What does it matter what I see? What does it matter what experiences I’ve had? Here’s “THUS SAITH THE LORD!” I’m going to go by that. And you come to the place, where as I’ve said, it’s no longer a matter of anything, but it is the Word. Why? Because, when God came and did it all, it was for one purpose—the Word! Then, shut up, sit down, listen; and shut up some more, listen some more—and receive It. But you can’t unless it’s given to you from above, because this is not horse food or monkey food or carrot fertilizer. It’s the Word of the living God.

83. Now, since you understand what I’m saying, God is Spirit—we are nothing but spirit and tissue. And, when it all blows over, we are nothing but soul and tissue, because the real ‘we’ is the soul. The spirit, only allowed of God (temporarily), is given to bring vitality to the body and the soul in a union, so brain and all these attributes and wonderful things in us can function. But you’ve got to put it to one side when the Holy Spirit comes, because it’s not useful. And that great battle means you bring every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ, Who is the Word. See? We’re getting there now. All right.

84. This is what I’m saying: refuse your own thinking or reasoning for the Word. No more comparisons or theories. Understand once for all that spirit is real—absolutely real. My reality is not my flesh that bleeds, my flesh that feels, my temperament that gets out of way, my angers, my frustrations. None of those things is the real person. The real person is that little spark of God, that little soul in there that is a part of God. That’s the real me.

I’m surrounded now in flesh that can be tempted, is tempted, and falls—to backslide a thousand times a day; to sin a thousand times a day. Frustrations are there on every hand. And there is only one way out: for the Holy Ghost to work, because the Word is the conduit. God is in His Word; He is not in His Church. I don’t care what they teach north of us and south and any place else. Forget it. And I don’t care if they take Jn 1:1 and quote Bro. Branham word for word, then turn around and make Jesus the Word. What else could Jesus be but Word, if His Father is Word? A horse’s baby is a horse, because it comes from a horse. Then, if God is Word, His children are Word. Oh God, have pity on these people. Sit here for years and years and years, and they won’t listen to anything, because they’re so puffed up with their degrees and everything else. God knows they can’t listen. Give me some humble person and a little store front for a church. Maybe, we can talk.

See, I don’t have any background. You might think I do, because I’ve got an almost marvelous use of words. They’re daggers, and they’re pointed, and they go right to the truth. And I express what I want to express. That doesn’t mean anything. It doesn’t mean a thing. I struggle the same as you do. I have to sit and listen. What comes to me I’ve got to analyze and lay out and say “What is it Lord? What is there in there?” See? So, I have to do what you do.

None of your own thinking or reasoning… It’s gone, because I’ve got the revelation. No more comparison or theories. No more experiences. What good are they? I can’t compete with God.

Well, you say, “I’m competing with Bro. Branham.”

Are you a supernatural idiot? You are sick. Bro. Branham doesn’t have any competition. You’re competing with God. That is of the devil. Yes, of the devil—Satan competing with God. That may sound tough, but I speak the truth, and I lie not.

85. Understand once for all that spirit is real. But, since it is another dimension, another thing entirely from us, we have to accept what God says about Himself as to His Own essentiality, His Spirit. But what kind? What life? What does He say? What kind of a spirit? Well, it’s Holy Spirit, of course. But he says His Word is spirit and life. And the Word is He Himself as life—signifies power and ability. The very word ‘life’ signifies motion. If you talk, say, “What is alive?” It is that which has motion, which eats and drinks. It gives off waste. It reproduces itself. God is life, but He’s not that kind. Created life is not God’s Own Life.

But God being life does reproduce Himself. He has children. The Only-begotten is the first one—the Uniquely-begotten one. Absolutely it is life. It’s life that is of God. And it’s not this kind of life, because we cannot take His life within us and reproduce it. Only God can reproduce it through us, because it’s all one common lump of clay now, and nobody knows where the life is in one individual, and where it’s going to come forth. Where the foundation of God standeth sure: the Lord knoweth them which are His, and nobody else knows.

86. So, you say, “What is that spirit?” That is the Spirit of God that we are dealing with. And, since God is in His Word, and His Spirit and His Word are life… Now listen. Here’s where you got to watch. Can you now, at this point, put everything else out of your mind and come to the conclusion that Bro. Branham came to and constantly said “God is the Word”?

Now right away you’re going to balk: “Well, just a minute. Word is a unit of communication. Word is a unit of language. Unit is a lifeless thing that talks about something else. This…”

Do you see? That’s not so. This Word is Logos, the life in It expressing. Go to your Bible. You’ll see almost every place where Paul speaks that It’s Logos, not Rhema. He’s telling you no Word of God is void of power; every Word is alive and life-giving and produces Itself into whatever It is sent forth to do. God does It. Bro. Branham said, “God is not in His Church; God is in His Word.” The conduit of the Holy Spirit is the Word.

So therefore, if the mantle of God is the Word, the conduit, then what is in the conduit? God. And He’s identified by what? Word. So therefore, I can say without hesitation, like Bro. Branham, God is the Word. Does it bother me? Certainly it bothers me, because I’m human-minded. Does it give me problems? Certainly, because I’m inferior, just like you. But I’ll admit it; and you might not want to, because you’re fearful people. Sure it bothers you. You have a job with it, don’t you? Let’s be honest. But we’re dealing with the Spirit. We’re dealing with God. We’re dealing with the dimension we don’t know one thing about. And we haven’t got any one way of knowing it unless a prophet tells us, and he’s vindicated to do it. Then, God waters it.

87. So, when Bro. Branham said, “The world would be judged by one Christ Jesus, and He’s the Word,” he is not talking about a man holding a book that is the word. He’s talking about a man who is the Word. Now he’s not talking about Jesus, because God’s on the White Throne. God is the Word. God is that One Who came down here, and He showed Himself in existence through a prophet, and He let us know it was He, Himself, and it was according to supernatural dimension, God’s Own limitations, God’s Own definition. Huh? Wasn’t it? It certainly was. And, how did He come forth? He came forth by Word, perfectly seen, really understood.

88. Now here’s what I’m working on; and I’m telling you, I have to work on it. And I’m leaving you with this thought tonight, because there’s nothing else I can leave with you. My thought is: that we have to learn that spirit is a dimension that we are not familiar with. We have to be told. And, if we are children of God, we will believe it. As Bro. Branham said, “How can you say you’re a child of God and full of the Holy Ghost and not say ‘Amen’ to every single Word?” And that’s where that rabbi is tonight: the same serpent seed that crucified Jesus Christ. And the same serpent seed is in Christianity crucifying the Son of God afresh today, because they will not say what the vindicated Word said. They will not believe in a vindicated prophet. Even though it’s one hundred percent Scripture, and you rub their noses in It, there’s no way they can see It. They’ve got an answer for It.

I remember my nephew, when I gave him Deuteronomy 18, and being one of the Armstrong Church of God brethren type, he went immediately to Deuteronomy 13. Yeah, his mother believes, but he doesn’t. Where is he today? Who knows? That’s his business, not mine. My children don’t believe. That’s their business, not mine. When I get there, my family will be you that believe. And we’ll see our real paternity and our real maternity. Our paternity’s God and our maternity’s the New Jerusalem, of which we are a segment this very hour.

89. Bro. Branham said, “Holy Spirit, God, is the Word.” Not as man sees It or uses It, but as It is told us by God Himself. As Paul uses Logos almost exclusively as referring to the Word, God, not Rhema. No. It’s used there some, but not much. We must alter our thinking and accept the fact that He is the Word, until It becomes natural to us; to think One is to think the Other. They are One.

90. At this point I can take every doctrine that I’ve understood and taught you here, and immediately, when anything comes up, and you talk about Rapture, I have the three phases down pat. I have the Shout as I wonder if any other teacher is teaching it; because, when Bro. Branham said it, and my spirit said, “That’s going too far; you can’t receive it,” my soul answered back, “When was he ever wrong?” And I said, “The Shout is the Message.” And I can take you now to 1 Corinthians 15 and show you absolutely “The Shout is the Message, the Word of God putting a church in order, correcting every error as the seals did, and now we are ready for the Rapture,” “piling Word upon Word,” into the transfiguration going on now. And it cannot go on without this Word.

Remember, it was said in Deuteronomy concerning the entrance into the Canaan land, and they said people in that land will say “Oh, what a great Word these people have.” And the people will wonder, and they say “Oh, what a great Word”—meaning God is His Own Word. He is the Word, and what He did, according to His Own desire of grace for you and me, we go marching in as the Seventh Church Age, never having going down into the ground. Some of you here will be standing here immortalized. What more could you want? How could you doubt that He is not the Word? See? It is a renewed mind and the thinking thereof. So, we must use It, and understanding will come as we go along. The spirit life in the spirit Word is transforming us—the outer man perishing and the inner renewing—transfigured.

And that Word, as God, is in our behalf, because God is Jehovah, the life of the saint or the child of God. So, when we refer to Jehovah-Elohim, we remember the relationship of God to the individual, the “Strong One Bound by an Oath,” He reveals Himself, wherein lies that Oath which is that Word, and He is His Own Oath. The Bible said so: because God could swear by no greater, He swore by Himself and stood there openly as the surety—God Himself, His Word.

You take the Word of God, you’ve got God. You defy the Word of God, you defy God. You deny the Word of God, you deny God. You disbelieve the Word, you disbelieve God. Isn’t that the truth? What else do you know about God? Where are you coming from? See?

91. All right. Every attribute of Jehovah: Redeemer, Peace, Sanctifier, Righteousness, Presence, Shepherd, Provider, Healer, Banner, every one; all these Word attributes for God have come forth as manifesting Himself to us in all of this exactly according to the Word.

Now, what is God? He’s Jehovah-Redeemer. Well, isn’t He? Isn’t that His Name? Then, isn’t He that Word? Tell me, if He’s not Jehovah-Redeemer, tell me what He is. Would you know except outside of Word? Would you know except God cloaked Himself in the form to be Redeemer? Would you know anything about healing, He’s the Healer? He’s the Provider. He’s everything. And in the Jehovah-complex, there’s nine of them—the three threes, which make perhaps the absolute perfection as to what God is in His essentiality, and what He does for us every single time. How would you know? You cannot know God apart from His Word, period.

92. Now you know me according to looking at me, because I am in here. Then, if you cannot know God apart from God’s Word, you are looking at God—and that is God—when you have His Word. Well, is He in it, or is He not? What does Logos mean? It means that God is the vitalizer, the progenitor, the perfecter, the birther, the originator, whatever you want to call it, of what you see, what is there.

Now what is there? What have you seen? You’ve only seen the Word. God is in His Word. And as I said, when the Bible said, “He sent His Word to heal them,” you tell me… A word… Does ‘barn’ word make a barn? Does ‘cow’ make a cow? Only if God said it. Then how can there be healing in a word, unless God is in the Word, and therefore then, God is the Word? Because He is the Healer; God came.

93. And now you’ve got the fact that Jesus is also the Word. What Word is he? Bro. Branham said, “The prophets were part of the Word,” and Jesus was all of the Word. So, he is all of that Word that’s here from Genesis to Revelation that God spoke of, the one in flesh, the Son of God manifested. Sure. Joseph waited. Ps 105:17-19:

(17) He sent a man before them, even Joseph, who was sold a servant.

(18) Whose feet they hurt with fetters, he was laid in iron:

(19) Until the time that his word came, the Word of the Lord tried him.

I want to ask you a question: didn’t I read in the Book of Hebrews that God tried you? This says the Word tries you.

94. Now, look. We must come to the place where we accept that He is the Word even as Bro. Branham said. This is going to take time to get rid of the cobwebs. Get rid of the time to say am I associating It right. It doesn’t matter what you think. The thing is: say It. Believe It and know It and wait for God to open It up as the complete revelation as It was to Bro. Branham.

95. Here is where we are missing reality. But reality is ours on the grounds that we can reach out and apprehend It, providing it was given us from above to receive It, for no man can receive unless given him from above. As Bro. Branham once said, “The faith that you and I use to come to Jesus is a common faith like hyssop.” But, on the other hand, let’s remember this: as many as were ordained, and only those ordained, believed. So that common faith is only common to the saints, even as the Bible says the common faith. Then, you get a supernatural faith born into you. In 2 Peter 1: add to your faith virtue, and so on down the line—the stature of a perfect man.

96. Now, listen. God has manifested His Word attributes to us in all of this exactly according to the Word, Jehovah-Redeemer, Jehovah-Shepherd, etc, etc. He is the Word. So, we take up the Spirit of God’s Own understanding that He gave us, the “Strong One Bound by an Oath.” He is, therefore, irrevocable and unchanging, the living Word that positively manifests and accomplishes what only God can accomplish, because He is His Word. God equals Word—living Word.

97. Now, understand where I’m coming from, also. I’m giving you the understanding that, positively, Word in Itself would be ineffective. Word must be living. Word must be vitalized. Word must be not only pronounced but carried out. And believe me, when God pronounces something, It is carried out by God. And you are not, therefore, maximizing the power; you are maximizing the Word. And, when I say maximizing the Word in contrast to maximizing the power, everybody wants to maximize God as power instead of maximizing as the Word. In other words, referring to His power rather than the Word, by which the power is bound. So, the essentiality of God is what? Word, which must manifest and come to pass. For no Word of God is without power, and no Word will return to Him unfulfilled. How could it? How could it be otherwise? We are Word. We’ll return to Him fulfilled.

98. Now these thoughts are going to be strange. I am not William Branham. I am not other men. But I know that He is the Word. And there is no uncertainty about it. There is no deceit. There are no illusions. It is the truth. Can I, therefore, realize that since It is the truth, It is my truth? I am a part of It, and I must make myself come under obedience to It that He is that Word. And thereby, in renewing my mind, I will become transfigured. I will “become” in the adoption. I will be a part of this Resurrection and this great extraordinary process and culmination of immortality, wherein the Bible said, they are there at the end time who will not see death, but they’ll be changed in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump, that the trumpet will sound, that the dead in Christ shall rise first, then we which remain alive will be changed, and God will be their Lord. [1 Corinthians 15] Notice, I said “becoming;” that is the seed “coming” to maturity—fulfilling its destiny in us.

These are the things that are absolutely essential, because the Bible said they shall know their God. And Bro. Branham said, “The great end time revelation—one God”—must be baptized in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ. And my question is: what God do you have in mind? What God? He is that Word. He is that one at every stage and every place, manifested, haven taken that covering; and He became it, or rather manifested Himself in fulfilling that Word or Himself. Even as Bro. Branham said, “This is God in print.”

99. So, in this I say: the understanding we have, we struggle with the mind here. We struggle because of our senses, because of our preconceived notion and ideas, because you can not apprehend that two and two make four, until you understand that one and one make two and four is one and one—that’s two and two more ones—one, two, three, four. In other words you go from what you know.

Now, if you knew tonight that you had deadly bacteria in your body and there was a way to get rid of it, and you’d be healthy, you’d do it. That’s the way it is with the Word of God tonight. He is the Word, and I know that He Is. In my understanding, It is coming clearer and a bigger part of me. But I have to bring every thought into captivity to It. I don’t want to be like Bro. Branham. I just want to believe the way Bro. Branham believed as a child of God, because he was merely the partaker of the first fruits that he gave to us. Moses ate the same manna he gave to the people. I’m going to have the same food that Bro. Branham had. You and I are going to have the same identical food with the same spiritual nutrition as is required for our maximum spiritual health. He is our Healer.

100. And that’s my thought tonight. And we will grow in this thing, because I know I am not satisfied with it, and I’m sure you are not satisfied yet. But, the point is, He is the Word, and It is not simply a phrase or a unit. We’re dealing with a reality.

Shall we pray?

Heavenly Father, we come to You tonight, as we go to the communion of the Lord table, asking You for Your help to understand what we have talked about tonight, because we know there is something in here that is a great mystery, Lord. And it’s just like we took the shout to be the Message, and now It is so absolutely clear, every single Word, because we believed It.

And, as we believed it, Lord, you gave us the uncomplicated truth, and we are so happy that we know that we know. And we know tonight also that our prophet, Bro. Branham was vindicated. He was God to us. You manifested in and through him, and he always said, “The world will be judged by one Christ Jesus, and He is the Word.” And we know that is absolutely the truth. We know that he said, “The messenger and the message is one.” We know that is the truth. We know he said, “The prophet is the living Word of God manifested.” We know that that is the truth, right down the line.

And, Lord, we know that You are the Word, and we know, Father, that though they were not obligated to make it perfectly clear to us, we believe that it is in Your Will to be made perfectly clear to us, until It becomes that beautiful tie-post as all these others have become to us; and we praise You for it, Lord, that You should allow us to glimpse Yourself and to know You, perhaps as no other generation has known. I hope that’s not true, but I hope, Lord, that we will know You, and we must know You according to what this generation will know.

And unto thee, Lord, we’ll give the glory. How beautiful it will be to rest in the hallowed sanctity of that revelation. Unto thee we give glory. May the peace of God abide in our hearts and minds. In Jesus Christ we pray. Amen.

[Bro. Vayle continues with the Communion service.]