E-1 I was just in with the pastor. I said…I asked him yesterday to call me. And I come to find out, I just…All day long, there was no calls, and I thought, “Well, wonder what’s wrong? Something is…Everything is so peaceful.” And after a while, Sister Wood come up with a handful of calls. My phone had went out, so, if any of you had called. The phone rang, but it wouldn’t echo in there, so the trouble was down at the switchboard. They fixed it about eight o’clock last night, or maybe a little before that, and, the phone, the calls are coming through now.
E-2 We’re happy to be in the service this morning. I got an awful cold, that usually I get when I come home. Wade around in snow up to your waist, and sleep out at night. Never think of it away from here, but just cross that hill there at New Albany, is all you have to do, to get in this valley, then I got a bad cold. And it’s a…I don’t know, there’s something right in the valley here that keeps it down. And it’s low, and it just don’t agree with me at all.
E-3 Now, we are happy to be at the church, as I’ve said, and to be hearing our dear good pastor offer his word of petition for us, and to the Lord Jesus. And—and to hear, sad to hear so many sick and needy, and how the devil is on the rampage of making everybody sick.
E-4 And a little lady raise up about her sister back there, and I know Sister Sauer’s down there was with her. The doctor sent her home to die now. And she still believes she is going to be healed. And she’s in a serious, very serious condition. My mother-in-law, the same way, seventy years old now. She is in a very bad condition. And certainly a lot of sickness around the country. And then there is a Holy Spirit around the country, see, that heals our sickness, if we can only find favor with Him.
E-5 And now, being that my throat is sore, not sore, but it’s raw. And I’m not going to try to preach, but just speak to you a while from the Word, and then go into praying for the sick, which I promised to do. But just before doing this, I would like to announce some more meetings. I…
E-6 In my services I have had kind of a little opposition of…not opposition, but just a little misunderstandings. And many times, I—I don’t have the outlets to my service, as—as many of the other brothers on the field have, such as radio and television, and magazines and so forth. And in doing so, why, someone would say, “Brother Branham is to be here.” Now I’m advertised in three places for this week, just today, three different places. One down in Kentucky, two in California, that I know of. And there’s nothing you can do about it, ’cause I haven’t got any other official outlet, so it makes it kind of hard.
E-7 And, yeah, if there happen to be someone from down around Madisonville, Kentucky, here. I was announced to be down there last week, and I didn’t know nothing about it. And I come home, and—and they had announced it; and the brother that did it, by the name of Epply’s. Or, I believe that was his name. With all good faith, he did it. He called me and asked if we could just drop down to—to be a blessing and get a blessing from his people. And he called. I told him to ask Brother Moore. Well, then, I had to leave. I told him I had to leave the same day. Well, Brother Moore failed to let anyone know. And when, or let me know, or let my wife know. So I was up in Idaho, and just come back, and the meeting was on.
E-8 So, and so I seen, during that, it can’t make arrangements in Louisiana for things that’s going on here. So, I just took over the arrangements myself, to make my own arrangement for the meetings, until my meetings has…I just kind of…Oh, I don’t know, I think confession is good for the soul. Don’t you think so? [Congregation says, “Amen.”—Ed.] I just been too dilatory about these things. And just letting anyone, anywhere, just haphazardly let it go. And I find out, it doesn’t pay. After a long time, you put…You have to have some system to it. And now I am trying to make the arrangements.
E-9 And I—and I’m going to see Mrs. Arnold. I…There’s a man here in Louisville that’s been very good, when I was having meetings here, and his name is Brother Burgum. And he wanted a—a night or two, service. I’m going to see her little Teddy, I believe, Teddy Arnold. For some time this week.
E-10 And then the coming Saturday and Sunday, if I can, the Lord willing, I want to be down at Madisonville. They had twenty-five, thirty ministers out there. All of them sitting there, come for some…One was six, seven hundred miles. Well, no one there, so wasn’t there, and no fault of my own, but I just…but just through misunderstanding, or neglecting to call him. And I’ll try to be down there next weekend, the Lord willing.
E-11 Then, on the fifth to the sixth, I in Brooklyn, New York. And then from then, on the fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth, in Parkersburg, West Virginia. Just made those two arrangements last night and this morning. Now, Charlotte, South Carolina, is just on the list, but I don’t know. Then, the holidays come on.
E-12 Then we go over to the West Coast, which they’re fixing a—a big auditorium meeting. Now these are—are little meetings like in high schools and things like that. The one over there on the West Coast, is going to be a—a two cities, a joint city meeting, of Oakland and San Francisco.
E-13 And then the Phoenix delegation, being that Brother Roberts can’t be there this year, I’m to kind of take his place down at Phoenix, in the—in the whole Maricopa region meeting. That’s a union effort.
E-14 And pray for me because I—I need it. And I realize that every time faith sets itself up, the devil turns every gun in hell right on it, like that, you see, so it makes it pretty hard.
E-15 So, this morning, to pray for the sick. I want to read some of God’s Eternal Word, and speak just a few moments from the Scriptures, and then have prayer for the sick. Oh, how I love to talk about Him! Don’t you? I just love to talk about Him.
E-16 Now I want to read out of the Bible, Second Kings the 2nd chapter, the 12th verse, a portion of it.
And Elijah saw it, and…cried, My father, my father, the chariots of Israel, and the horsemen thereof.
E-17 And now for a way of a—a text, or a subject, I want to speak on: A Secondhanded Robe. So may the Lord add His blessings as we talk to you this morning. And you be in prayer for us.
E-18 During this time of the reign of Israel in the land. Israel was a nation, and it was a mighty nation, and it was kind of a peaceful time among the military part of it. But in the—the spiritual part of it, it was a kind of a—a time of—of impersonation. And if we look back into the Old Testament, we can always find examples of what’s going on today. Always, in the Bible, the things that are now, are just the antitypes of what was at the beginning.
E-19 Now, the Book of Genesis produces everything that’s in the world today. There’s nothing in the world but what didn’t begin in Genesis, for it is the beginning. In there, started every ism. In Genesis, started everything that started. And the true Church started in Genesis. And the false believer started in Genesis. And the indifference started in Genesis. Genesis was the beginning.
E-20 And now during the reign of Elijah, or the pilgrimage of Elijah here on earth, which was God’s prophet for the hour.
E-21 And God has never left Hisself on the earth without a witness. God has always, somewhere, some place, had a person that He could put His hands on and would stand for a witness. So if He has did that, down since Genesis, the beginning, surely, somewhere, God has a man that He can lay His hand on now. For He—He’s more than one man now, He has many men that He can lay His hand on, because we’re coming down to the—the gathering time, the harvest time.
E-22 Genesis was the planting of the seed, and these six thousand years has been the maturing of the harvest. And now the seed has become a seed itself. It’s went back to the blossom, and from the blossom to the—to the fruit. And it’s the gathering time now, harvest time, all the great things that started. The true Church that started in Genesis has come down to the fruit time, the fruit of the Spirit. And the antichrist that started in Genesis has come down to its fruit. And we’re just in the closing time of this world’s entire dispensation, the…of the mortal being. And we’re…It’s the greatest time that anyone, or any at any age, ever lived, is this time. It’s a shaking time. It’s a troublesome time for sinners, but it’s a marvelous time for Christians, because we know that we are—are packing up, or gathering the last little efforts together, to go Home and meet the Lord.
E-23 Now people, today, as you look around and see the great trouble and distress facing the nation. Where, a few nights ago, I was talking to someone, was one of these here lookout agents that watches. And they said, “Brother Branham, we were just instructed by the government never to advise people anymore to lay down by…away from the window on the floor, if the bomb hits, or never to go into a basement, because this new bomb that they could radio guide from Moscow to Fourth Street in Louisville, and hit right on the street. Shoot it up. It’s got tar-…things in it, explosives, and takes it so many thousands, so many thousands. Guided by the stars and radar, and drop it exactly on Fourth Street in Louisville, from Moscow, Russia. And when it would hit there…Don’t have to use a plane nor nothing. Just scoot it off here, and it’ll land right there. And it will blow a hole in the ground, of an area, the depth of a hundred and seventy-five feet for fifteen square miles either way it goes, fifteen square miles. There ain’t nothing to do but get ready to take a flight upstairs, is the only thing to do when them times come.
E-24 Just think, they can shoot fifty of them, or a hundred of them, at one time, if they wanted to. It’ll all be over, within the space of…I believe it’s a sixty or eighty minutes, or something, or seconds—seconds, rather, from there to here, to the entire annihilation of the whole thing would take place. There wouldn’t be nothing left between Louisville and Henryville, and between Louisville and—and Bardstown, or down in there, but one hole in the ground with a bunch of dust laying in it. That is all would be left, besides the areas it would go out, and burn for miles and miles and miles beyond that. And while one is a dropping there, another one is dropping over somewhere else, to meet with it.
E-25 I’m so glad that we have a Shelter. “The Name of the Lord is a mighty Tower, the righteous run into It and are safe.” No matter how many bombs or how many anything else that…We’re safe There. So, the world and the sinner, not having this Shelter, or this safety Place, it’s a shaking time. I believe, if I wasn’t a Christian, I’d go crazy, to thinking of what might happen at any time. And with a house full of little kiddies, and everything, I wouldn’t know what to do. But I’m so glad that I can stand in my house and introduce to them a Shelter that no bomb could ever touch, or nothing else, under the protecting Wings of the Lord Jesus. “Not by power, not by might, but by My Spirit,” saith the Lord. See? That is our protection.
E-26 And what a great, glorious time it is, to know that all sin and struggles and trials of life will soon be over. It’ll all finish one of these days, and we’ll go Home to be with the Lord. Now, what’s left, is a time to preach the Gospel and to bring into this great Tower as much, as many as we can.
E-27 And then, as we see the pattern of our lesson today, of Elijah, during his reign, he…or, his pilgrimage on earth, why, he was a great, mighty man. God was using him in mighty ways, with mighty power. And we find out that during this time, there was a group of impersonators who tried to impersonate Elijah, who tried to do the same things Elijah done.
E-28 And so we find the same thing today; impersonation of Christianity, people who try to act like Christian, who try to make themselves Christian. You can’t do that. God has to do that. He’s the only One Who can do it.
E-29 So they formed a school, and called it, “the school of the prophets.” And they all went up to the school of the prophets, and they educated them. And I can imagine all those preachers up there, wearing the same kind of coat that Elijah wore. I can imagine trying to impersonate him on his voice, the way he spoke. And—and way he presented himself, everyone trying to do the same thing, because Elijah was a great man used of God.
E-30 And we find the same thing today. I was listening to a radio broadcast, not long ago. They got Billy Graham’s all over this country, since Billy was in Louisville. Everybody trying to impersonate the same thing, almost comb their hair the same way, and—and wear the same thing, and the same kind of voice, and so forth. But you can’t do that. You’ve just got to be who you are and what God made you to be. That’s right. And so we find how that, perhaps, in them days the same thing took place.
E-31 Now, God, seeing, foreseeing that Elijah’s days were numbered, that he had so long he could stay here on earth, as everyone has. So, He was going to have a successor to Elijah. And when He did, God called this man. He wasn’t in no seminary when He called him. He was plowing in a field, with a yoke of ox, doing the service, or taking care of his mother and father. And God called him to be the successor of Elisha, or Elijah.
E-32 Perhaps many up at the school thought they were sure they were going to be his successor, they was going to wear his robe as soon as he was finished with it.
E-33 But, God does the calling. God does the choosing. God does the electing. God does the setting in order. “God hath set in the Church: some, apostles; some, prophets; some, teachers; some, evangelists; and pastors.” God does that, Himself. We cannot make one hair black or white, neither can we add one thing to our stature by taking thought. God, in His infinite grace, and by His election and His foreknowledge, sets these things in order, and every wheel works just right. I like that.
E-34 I would be a discouraged man, this morning, if I didn’t believe in the election and calling of God. If I thought that this world was left to the outcome of it, by the power of man, and by the wisdom of man, and by “the big four’s,” and the U.N.’s, and who never even mention God’s Name. I’d be a discouraged person. But I’m not looking to that for the outcome.
E-35 I look down in the pages of this old Book here, where God wrote It out, and everything will come just exactly the way He said it, and that’s all. So, the only thing for me to do is not line up with them, but line up with Calvary. Line up with God, line up with His Word, stay in His Word. No matter how much it looks like it’s going to be that way; it’s going to be the way God intends it to be. It can’t be nothing else. For, Him being infinite, knowed the end from the beginning, and He makes everything come to His praises. That’s right.
E-36 “All things will have to work together.” Everything will have to shape right up to its place. My! If that wouldn’t make the courage in a Christian! Nothing can go wrong. After all, it’s not our battle; it’s His. It’s not our wisdom; it’s His. The only one thing we had to do is put our faith and trust there, and set still and see the glory of God, see how It moves around to Its place, and every wheel moving. It may be scattered from side to side, but It’ll move right into Its right place when God speaks the Word.
E-37 He knew the end from the beginning. He knew he was going to choose. He knew Elisha would take Elijah’s place, before the world was ever formed. Everything has to work just exactly right.
E-38 And we are worried about our loved ones, and so forth, “Will they ever come in?” Their names, if they were written in the Lamb’s Book of Life, before the foundation of the world, they’ll work right in there. That’s the only thing he can do. We give witness and shine the Light. God does, the One that brings It to them.
E-39 Now notice, in Elijah, then, after he threw his robe on him, and tried it on him. In other words, Elijah the prophet, who had the mantle of God on his shoulders, he came down and laid it across Elisha, the farmer, to see if it would fit him. And it taken about ten years to get altered, to fit that mantle.
E-40 You know, God usually puts us in the shop and trims us up. Now, He didn’t alter his robe to fit Elisha; He ordered Elisha to fit the robe. And that’s what He does today. He alters us to fit the robe, not the robe to fit us. Sometimes we want to make the robe fit us, but we can’t do that. You’ve got to (let) be altered, yourself, for the robe. It’s God’s robe, and He made it perfect. And we’ve got…He has got to bring us into that realm, to make the robe fit us.
E-41 So, we can’t be perfect, ourself. We know we can’t. There’s no way for us to be, and, yet, He said for us to be. So, but, what He did, He made a propitiation for us; the Lord Jesus Christ and His righteousness. That’s where the perfection comes; of ignoring our own holiness, of which we have none; and our own thoughts, which ought not to be. But we rest solemnly upon the finished work of the Lord Jesus. God sent Him to the earth, and it was in Him that we rest.
E-42 Notice, all these years, as far as we know, he just had that one baptism of the robe going over him. But through the years, God had molded the man’s character into a place to where, after his call, that he would fit into the robe and be the servant of the Lord.
E-43 And then when Elijah passed through and throwed it on him, and they started up towards Gilgal and many of the other places they went, on to the school of prophets, on their road, journeying on. And, finally, Elijah was trying to get Elisha to turn back. Did you notice it? Trying to get him to turn back. Said, “I…” Otherwise, “Maybe the road is a little too steep for you, son. Maybe it’s a little too narrow for you to walk.”
E-44 You know, where Elijah was, was straightness. And wherever God’s true servant preaches the Gospel, it’s a straight, unadulterated Gospel where It’s preached.
E-45 Why, one day, he went up there to the school of the prophets, to visit them, and they asked him to leave. They said, “It’s too straight around here, for us.”
E-46 What we need today is some more straight, Gospel preaching that’ll separate the wheat from the chaff, or the right from the wrong. Make what’s right is “right,” and what’s wrong is “wrong.”
E-47 All these fellows with their experience, and all that they were! They sent out to get something to eat, and one of them got a wild vine, and gathered some wild gourds, and cooked up some death in their ecclesiastical pot. And, the first thing you know, they cried out, “There’s death in the pot!”
E-48 But Elijah, with a double portion, knowed what to do, so he put a handful of meal in the pot. Said, “Now go right ahead and eat it.” In other words, they…
E-49 Today, a type, I would think, that we’ve got a lot of Methodist, Baptist, Presbyterian, Lutheran, Pentecostals, and everything else, all mixed together, and one fighting against the other. And we don’t need to oust the whole thing and do away with it. We need another handful of Meal. Keep the same church.
E-50 The meal was from the house of the school there, which was the meal offering that the people had brought in, and the firstfruits of the harvest which was ground with a certain burr that made every grain of meal the same. And then when…
E-51 This meal, being the same, was a type of Christ. Meal is life. And when the type of Christ, the meal, being ground up the same; meaning, “Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today, and forever.” And the meal in the meal offering, and when they put this meal into there, putting Christ into death brought Life. That’s what makes the difference in our dead form, in our differences, in our ecclesiastical arguments and everything. If we would just bring Christ into it, it would change death, and separation, into Life, if we would just do it.
E-52 There is nineteen million Baptists in America. There is thirteen million Methodists in America. There is eleven million Lutherans in America. And ten million Presbyterians in America. And God only knows how many Catholics, which outdo any of the denominations. But, in all of it, what do we need? A handful of Meal. We need to bring Life to the church. And Christ is the Life. He came to bring us Life.
E-53 So, they had their disputes, and their schools, and their theo-…theologies, and so forth.
E-54 And then Elijah told Elisha, “You better turn back, because the way may be a little hard.” But a man of God who has once faced it, or been throwed across his shoulder the robe of God’s righteousness and power, it’s not too easy to turn back.
E-55 When I heard the pastor say, this morning, that our… “Many are becoming discouraged.” What we need, brother, is take courage! What we need is to be encouraged. It’s right. Trials may come. We never was promised to be immune from them, but He’ll give grace to go through them. If the mountain is too high to go over, too deep to go under, too wide to go around it, He’ll give grace to go through it. That’s right. Just don’t worry, but keep your eyes on Christ, for He’s the only One that can take us through.
E-56 Now, we see them as they journey on, come to the school. And he said, “You stay here now. Be here, and settle down and be a good teacher of theology, and so forth. And you probably, someday, may become the dean of the college here. But I’ve got to go on down a little farther.”
E-57 Could you imagine a man of God being satisfied to be a dean of a college, when the Power of God laid right around where he was standing? No, sir. He said, “As the Lord liveth and your soul liveth, I’ll not leave you.” I like that.
E-58 Stay with it, no matter how much discourage, even it comes from your mother, your papa, or from your pastor. Stay with Him.
E-59 On to the Jordan they went. They crossed over. And Elijah said, “Now, what will you that I do for you?”
E-60 He said, “A double portion of your spirit to come upon me.” He knowed he had a work to do. He said, “A double portion.” Not just a good warm experience, not just a good handshake, or a good fellowship with the rest of the church. But, “What I want is a double portion of what’s the best now.”
E-61 I tell you, when God sets a man for a world task, he has got to have something better than the world has got. He has got to have something better than the church has got. He has got to go for a double portion.
E-62 And if there ever was a time that a double portion is needed, it’s today, in the realms of the people; something better, something higher. I can’t…I think beans and cornbread is very good, but sometimes I have to reach up a little higher. And we do that; we’ve got to. We’ve got to keep climbing. Israel was backsliding if it kept staying on the same ground. She has got to be moving on or moving back. And that’s the way the church is.
E-63 So, as they went along, it wasn’t but a few minutes until he said, “You’ve asked a great thing, but, nevertheless, if you see me when I go, you can have what you asked for.”
E-64 Now, that has to be singleness of motive, singleness of heart, singleness of eye, keeping your eye on the promise. Hum! If you’re sick this morning, if you’re afflicted, there is one great promise; not by Elijah, but by God Himself. “If thou canst believe, when you pray, believe that you get what you ask for, and you shall receive it.” No matter what the doctor says, how much this goes or that goes; keep single on the promise.
E-65 Elijah give him a commission, “If you see me when I go, it’ll come on you.”
E-66 There’s a promise, “If thou canst believe, all things are possible to them that believe.”
E-67 Sometimes I look at myself, and think, “I’ve been such a jellyfish in my life. I have waited, and missed many thousands of souls, into the Kingdom, because I’ve waited and said, “God…” Depended too much on a spiritual gift. And said, “Lord, if You will just show me, if You’ll give me a vision what to do.” And God gives a vision, then I’ll turn around and let somebody talk me into something else.
E-68 And, oh, I have never come to the spot, yet, until I…like I have at this time, that I feel it’s a faith, that we must step out there, because it’s a promise. And the things that He has done, and the healings that He has performed, and the miracles; insomuch, has come down and had His picture taken by the side of us, and so forth, which has never been known since the world begin. And then stand around like a jellyfish? It even makes me discouraged with myself. It’s time to keep your eye on the promise.
E-69 And that’s what, by God’s grace, I aim to do. And I realize that every devil of hell will shoot at it. But, by God’s grace, I aim to keep my eye on the promise.
E-70 Elijah said, “If you…” Elijah said, “If you see me when I go, you’ll have what you ask for.” That’s right. You got to keep your eye on it; watch the promise. Like, what if some of the school, if he turn back, and say, “Hey, boys, how am I doing now, following right along behind the prophet?” He would have failed, maybe. But he didn’t care what the school thought, or what all the teachers thought. He didn’t care what the neighbors thought, or the houses, or who looked at him. He kept his faith in the promise.
E-71 What we need today is faith in the promise of God, and don’t pay no attention to what this one says or that one says.
E-72 As a brother said, a minister had two girls that were mute, and that the criticism on Divine healing, that, “The children could not be healed.”
E-73 Don’t pay no attention to the critics. Keep your faith on the promise. God said so! “The prayer of faith shall save the sick, and God shall raise them up.” If He can make one deaf mute to hear, He can make another deaf mute to hear. We know, by infallible proofs, that He does that. Keep our faith on the promise. Our eyes single; our ears single; our hearts single; and, one thing, on Jesus Christ, and He is able to perform that which He has promised. Oh, when we think of that, it changes the whole scene when we get that. God made the promise. God was the One that said it.
E-74 Now, here was God’s representative said it, and now God Himself has said it. Then what can we do? Nothing but keep our mind on that. Said, “If you see me when I go away, you can have the promise.” Elisha kept his eyes on Elijah. No matter what hollered from each side, what taken place on each side, what taken place before that, he never even looked at it. He kept his eyes on the promise. There you are, your eyes on the promise.
E-75 I think of the lady that we visited the other night, Sister Sauer. And the doctor telling her how bad she was. And I never told her; told the loved one. And how impossible it would be for her to ever get well. Now, brother, her son-in-law asked me about it. I said, “If she can keep her eyes on the promise.” No matter what takes place, keep your eyes on the promise.
E-76 A few weeks ago, Sister Wood here, and Brother Wood, two bosom friends of ours here at the church. I was in Michigan with my friends, Leo and Gene. We had left the Chicago meeting and went with some of their people, to…for two days, to go deer hunting with bows and arrows. And on my road back, my wife had got a hold of me, and she said, “Pray for Mrs. Wood’s mother. A cancer has eating off her face.” And said, “I never seen Sister Wood so alarmed. She is weeping.” Sister Wood has always been a hero of faith, since God healed her boy of a crippled leg, and healed her with TB, and so forth. But she had given down.
E-77 There at the room, that night, we prayed. Coming in, Mrs. Wood said, “Brother Branham, we’ll go over.” And we went to her mother, which was in Louisville. And she had had a cancer on the side of her nose, and the doctor had tampered with it, scattered it; till just a little ring the side of her nose, and up just about an eighth of an inch from her eye, just the bone laying there. Done eaten it just as fast as it could eat away.
E-78 Go into the room, and I knelt down. I said, “I want to speak to her alone.” And I goes into the room to pray with the woman. And while in the room, I thought, “O God, if You’ll just show me a vision of what’s going to happen to the woman.” Mr. and Mrs. Wood sitting on the outside, waiting to see what the vision would say.
E-79 But while I was there, I got condemned. I was condemned by waiting for a vision. Seemed like Something referred back, wasn’t the calling. “What you need a vision, when the promise is already been said?” So I knelt down and prayed. And while praying, something just anchored on the inside, the faith of the promise.
E-80 Come back out. And Mrs. Wood, when I told her about it, she said, “Did you see anything, Brother Branham?”
E-81 I said, “I never exactly seen anything, but I felt Something that told me that His promise was true and He was going to do it. And I believe that He’s going to do it.”
E-82 And in less than twenty-four hours, the end of that cancer begin to break away and a scab form over it. Cancers don’t scab, as you know, unless it’s dead. So there it was now. And the woman is healed, and home. What a wonderful Christ! By keeping our eyes on the promise! God said so!
E-83 But when we are prayed for, sometimes, we go off and say, “Well, it wasn’t done just immediately, so maybe we better go back again.” Oh, no.
E-84 Keep your eye on the promise. God said so, that settles it. That’s all of it. If God said so, God is able to keep His promise, or He would never make it.
E-85 Abraham called those things, which were not, as though they were. And, for twenty-five years, stood on the impossible, because he counted God was able to perform what He had promised. Amen. And we are the children of Abraham, by faith.
E-86 Certainly, Elijah kept his eyes on…or Elisha on Elijah, and as they went on. And after a while, the chariot come and parted them, one to one side and the other, and then it picked up Elijah. Upon…He stepped on the chariot and went up, and put his robe off his shoulders and threw it back to Elisha. Because, Elisha had growed into it, you know, so it fit him right. And could you imagine…
E-87 Oh, I want you to give me your undivided attention, as I feel my throat tickling. I want to ask you something.
E-88 Could you imagine how Elisha felt when he picked up this robe, placed it upon his own shoulder? Oh, what a feeling!
E-89 I don’t mean this to be personal, but about ten years ago, from the pulpit here, I preached on a sermon; David, the warrior with a sling in his hand, and Goliath before him. In them days there were no healing campaigns on the field, nowhere, as we knew of. And, oh, how critical people were on Divine healing! But there was something, after meeting with a Being. And the pastors told me that I was losing my mind, that it couldn’t be so. But, from this same box here, I spoke on David. Said, “Do you mean to tell me that this, the armies of the living God, will let that uncircumcised Philistine defy this army?”
E-90 A little old stoop-shouldered, curly-haired boy with a sheepskin coat on, and a slingshot in his hand; with a whole army of Israel standing, backed up. And he, alone, walked out. With a man, with a—with a spear some nineteen feet long, and the thing on the end of it weighed several shelkun, maybe twenty pounds of steel, sharpened; a nineteen-foot spear. With fingers fourteen inches long. And David probably weighed ninety pounds, and stood, bouncing up-and-down, like a little banty rooster, saying—saying, “You mean to tell me, oh, my, that you’ll let that uncircumcised Philistine…” [Brother Branham knocks on the pulpit four times—Ed.] “If he stays in his place, let him stay. But he is defying the armies of the living God.” Oh, my, what a hero! “And all of you are afraid to go fight it?” Said, “Let me have him.” Oh, my! He said, “The God of Heaven let me kill a lion with a slingshot. He let me kill a bear with a slingshot. And how much more will He deliver that uncircumcised Philistine into my hand!” Certainly.
E-91 And when the first victory was won, and Goliath was downed, the whole armies of Israel followed David. And they chopped heads and beat, Israel…or beat the Philistines plumb into their own land. They backed them into the corners, and slaughtered them, and took their cities, and everything, and had the victory.
E-92 Brother and sister, the same thing has been done in the realms of the supernatural, when they said, “Divine healing cannot work. The days of miracles is past.” If the days of miracles is past, the days of God is past. The church that don’t believe in supernatural will finally die, and God will leave the church. Has to! And God gave the promise, and God’s promises is Eternal.
E-93 Here sometime ago when some girls was fooling with radium, and would dip it, and paint the radium hands on the watches. I have some on this one. And a girl made a mistake and took the brush and stuck it in her mouth. It killed her. And years and years later, they took a microscope and put it on the skull of that girl, and they could still hear that radium going on, “Burr-burr-burr.” It’s endless. It keeps working, on and on. There is no stopping to it.
E-94 And, oh, brother, if radium has that kind of an effect in us, how much more will the endless, Eternal, supernatural, all-powerful, all-infinite, Almighty God! He has to have the same effect as He started. He has to have it all through, or He’s not the Almighty, all-powerful God. He is still waiting for somebody with a burly faith, that’ll step out and challenge the enemy on the basis of His Word and say that It’s so.
E-95 And now what happened, as soon as the great healing campaign started? Then thousands of soldiers, of God’s men, who laid back in little churches, like Oral Roberts, Tommy Hicks, and many of the other outstanding men on the field, pulled their Sword and away they went. This Sword that cuts both coming and going, up and down, and in and out, “a Discerner of the thoughts, even to the marrow of the bone.” They pulled their Bibles, their Sword, and walked out, when they seen that it could be done. And we’ve beat the enemy, by the grace of God, till the whole world has had a healing revival. It can be done. Little pastors who had little two-by-four churches, and so forth, caught fire and seen the vision, jerked the Sword and went forth, and defied the enemy.
E-96 How do you know there is? There is great men, Congressman Upshaw, King George of England, and many great men who laid sick and afflicted, are healed by the Power of Almighty God. So they can’t say nothing about it now. It’s done. Certainly! He was…
E-97 Then went Elijah. After…His whole heart’s desire was to get that promise. He wanted the promise. That was his motives. That was his all. That was his life. That was his intent, everything. All, everything, hung on getting that promise.
E-98 I’m persuaded to believe that we’re not sincere about this thing that we’re talking about. If your whole motive, this morning, rests upon, “Giving God praise for my healing. I’m determined to be healed by the Power of God. I’m determined to live a Christian life. I’m determined to walk in peace with God. I’m determined to do it. I don’t care what mother says, what church says, what pastor says, what anybody else says, what the world says. I’m determined. That’s the singleness of my heart.” You’re going to get somewhere then.
E-99 Then, when Elijah saw that he was determined to get it. Elijah, Elijah saw that Elisha was determined, he gave him the promise. Now, the promise was, “If thou can see me when I go! If you can see me when I leave!” Now it’s left up to Elisha. He wanted to hear the promise, so he got the promise. Now there’s an “if” in it. “If you can see me when I go!”
E-100 Now, if you are sick this morning, and you want to be healed, I can prove to you Christ gave you the promise. The promise is yours, “If thou canst believe! If thou canst believe!” Don’t be defeated.
E-101 Now Elisha wrapped in the robe of Elijah, the prophet. What a conqueror’s march! How he walked, treading to Heaven, as a conqueror! He had heard the promise. He felt the power. He was walking like a warrior, right down to Jordan.
E-102 Praise be to God, friend! Every believer, this morning, that’s robed in the righteousness of Christ, is walking towards the Jordan road. That’s right.
E-103 Let atomic bombs come; let her, however way. We’re robed and walking, the conqueror. Amen. I… “Fear not. I have overcome the world.” Yes, sir! Remember what? “I have overcome the world.” [Brother Branham claps his hands together two times—Ed.] Christ said that. [Brother Branham knocks on the pulpit two times—Ed.]
E-104 Elijah was walking with a secondhanded robe on, even like a conqueror, correctly, coming to the Jordan.
E-105 Brother, let me say this in respect to you. Don’t you put on somebody else’s robe that’s all moth eaten with doubts, where all these defeats and superstitions and ups-and-downs has put holes in it, and they’re leaking all through. You put on the robe of the Conqueror, Christ. Don’t trust in your church who once taught salvation by the baptism, the Holy Spirit, who once taught Divine healing and now deny It, all eat up with the moths of doubt and everything else. Put on the robe of Him that never lost a battle, for you’re on your road to Jordan. Amen.
E-106 Now, he had on a secondhanded robe, that’s true. And many of the people this morning have secondhanded robes on. But when he come to the Jordan, he realized that the robe alone wouldn’t do the work. That’s right. And the church, the Methodist, the Baptist, the Pentecostal, the Presbyterian, “Oh, we have schools! To…My, we have all the ethics, of the Bible, down pat. We’ve got all the woven robe all right, the promises. We’ve got it all. Oh, we are baptized, go down. And we’re very apostolic. We have on the apostolic faith. We believe in Divine healing. We believe in God. We believe in the Powers of God. We’ve baptized, in the Bible, the way the Bible said. We’ve received the Holy Ghost. We’ve spoke in tongues. We do all that.” But, brother, if that’s the only thing you need, you’ll find your lack, too, when you come to Jordan.
E-107 Oh, you may be taught. You may be smart. You may have a D.D., Doctor of Divinity. You may have a Ph.D., a Doctor of Philosophy. You may have a LL.D., Doctor of Latin. You may have all kinds of degrees. You may have the robe of the Methodist church on you. You may have the robe of Pentecostal church on you. You may have the robe of Assemblies on you, or the Oneness, or the Trinitarians, or whatever it might be. It’s only a secondhanded robe, to begin with, that’s right, of some man-made dogmas, been thought up, so forth like that; and even if you have been a Christian, and the church has been a Christian, and robed correctly.
E-108 But when Elijah, standing up, conspicuous, to a whole bank lined full of prophets and critics, seeing what he would do. And here he come, walking with Elijah’s robe on. Oh, my! Hallelujah! He is schooled, otherwise. He is educated. He is submitted. He believes. There’s nothing wrong with him. He’s coming down to the Jordan. The world is a watching him.
E-109 O God, how we need that today! With many a schooled and educated scholars; with many men who can tear that Bible apart and set It together, in mathematics; many men who can do great things in the ways of teaching; who knows Bible history to the very moment, who can tell you the hour the candle was lit, and the hour it went out. They can tell you all these things. And they’re…They’ve got the water baptism. They’ve got the spiritual baptism, as they call it, the robe. They’ve got everything just set in order.
E-110 So did Elijah. But when he come down to the Jordan, to face the critical world, what did he cry? “Where is the God of Elijah?” It wasn’t the robe of Elijah that done it. It was the Power of the God of Elijah, that done it.
E-111 And the thing the world needs this morning is the Power of the God of Elijah. You might have spoke with tongues and shouted, and run over the floor. But what we need is the Power of the God of Pentecost, to produce the lives and things that was lived in that day, in the apostolic power.
E-112 A secondhanded robe was all right, but he needed a fresh call in his heart from God. He needed a fresh anointing from God. He wore a secondhanded robe when he come to the river, but he needed a brand-new firsthanded call from God, a firsthanded Power from God, to perform the miracle.
E-113 And, my brother, don’t you be afraid to ask God anything. You must demand God, or ask God, for anything that He has promised. For, if I am introducing a God that’s omnipotent and all powerful, and if I be a servant of God, I must do the works of God. And if I do the work of God, I must demand of God to bring these things to pass, because He is demanding of me to produce the impossible. I have to ask Him. I have to call upon Him, and stand there and say, “God, You promised it.” So do you, every person.
E-114 “You shall receive power,” Acts 1:8, “after the Holy Spirit is come upon you.” After the Holy Spirit is come upon you! After you’re robed as a Christian, after your faith has set in Christ, then you shall receive power. There you are. Yes.
E-115 And, brother, sister, every one of you, this morning, may I say this before praying for the sick! May I say this! By God’s help, you pray for me. As I stood, ten years ago, at this platform, preaching on David and Goliath. Now, it isn’t a Goliath that’s hindered me. God has slayed him before me. But the thing that’s hindered me, is a lack of faith, the lack of something that I knowed was around.
E-116 And this morning, before this little tabernacle again, I’m screaming: where is the God who gave this promise? Where is the God who met me with this, yonder? Come forward, God, and give me a courage. Give me a strength. Give me a determined mind, regardless of what comes or goes. Whether it looks dark, or whether it looks…Whatever it looks like, move on. The promise is true.
E-117 Brother, sister, one of these days, to you sinner friends here this morning, and to you people who are trying to impersonate Christianity. You may belong to church. That’s very fine. I have nothing to say against that. Nothing against your fine scholarly education, or against your theology. I have nothing against that. But, oh, where is the God?
E-118 It wasn’t Elijah, after all. It wasn’t Elijah who opened up that river. It wasn’t his robe. Elisha took it from his shoulder. He folded it just the same way that Elijah did. But when he begin to try to wave it, there was no Power there. Then he cried, knowing that God was somewhere, “Where is that God? Where is He?” Then something must have struck the prophet, for he waved that robe and struck the water, and she opened hither to thither. And before the clergy of that day, before the critics of that day, he walked across the Jordan, just like Elijah did before him.
E-119 We don’t need the teachings; we have that. But we need the God of Elijah. We need the Power of the God of Elijah, back in our church. The power to make it hold there, and call God’s Word, “Right,” regardless.
E-120 And we’re, everyone here this morning, as human beings, on our road to Jordan. “And when he came to Jordan.” You’re going to arrive there, one of these mornings or one of these nights.
E-121 When he came to Jordan, he was walking as a conqueror. But, when he came to Jordan, that was the difference. He had a secondhanded robe on. Another man had wore it. But it was a good robe, and he knew what the man was that wore the robe.
E-122 Brother, sister, one of these mornings, I got to come down to Jordan.
E-123 Was thinking. This afternoon, we’re going down to Brother and Sister Wright’s. Don’t forget them. This is their golden wedding anniversary. I believe, the church, they’re going to have a—a dinner with them. I was thinking, the other day: fifty years! And I see them both, well aged and stricken down. I thought, “Yes, I’m forty-seven years old.” They was just married three years before I was born.
E-124 Forty-seven! I’m walking towards Jordan. I’ve got to come down. I’ve got to get there. I’m going to arrive there. It may be in an accident on the road. I may drop from the air, in a plane. I may be shot through, with a devil’s dart somewhere, and die. I don’t know how I’m going. But, there’s one thing I know, I’m going, and I’m walking towards Jordan.
E-125 But when I get there, I want to know one thing, that I got a secondhanded robe on, too. I ain’t trusting in mine, ’cause it’s no good. For, as soon as Elijah picked up Elisha’s robe, he tore his into pieces and threw it down. And that’s the way it was when I found Christ. I tore my ownself up, my own ideas, my own nonsense, my little petty thing. I thought, when I was a little, Baptist preacher, I was just about as…I was somebody. But, I tore it out; I put on His robe. And when I come to Jordan, I want to find myself wrapped in His robe. He’ll follow that. And we’ll arrive there one day.
But let us pray just a moment.
E-126 Heavenly Father, as we’re on our Jordan march this morning, as conquerors, and someday, we got to present something to the Jordan, that’s, to death. And, oh, what a horrible thing it’ll be, a separation from God. We can’t cross over. No. But, Elijah, when he got there, he had on Elisha’s robe…Elijah’s robe. And when he took off the robe…of the Elijah, the man who had been well-pleasing in Your sight, and You have accepted him and brought him up into Heaven with You. And Elisha was wearing his robe, so he presented to the Jordan, death, the robe of Elijah. And it was accepted, and the Jordan opened, and he walked across.
E-127 Dear God, someday, we got to come down. We can’t present our good works; we have none. We can’t present anything in the world. I don’t even desire anything, to try to present, but I trust wholly in the merits of Jesus. You accepted Him, and raised Him from the dead, and He was brought into the Presence of God and there will abide forever. And, God, I want to present that to You, that I believe on Him, and I love Him. And, by His grace, He has clothed us with His robe. And I pray, Father, that You’ll help us now in the days of battle. And where the men of God must do the works of God, I pray that You’ll let us take the robe of Christ, the power of the Holy Spirit, and call for the God who lived in Him. Grant it. In Christ’s Name we ask it.
E-128 And while we have our heads bowed. I’m just wondering, here this morning, if there’s a person who is trying to walk down to Jordan, without this robe on. If there’s a person who has not the robe of Jesus Christ on you, and though it was wore one time by the Son of God. I wonder, if you don’t have that on this morning, if you’d raise your hands to God and say, “Dear God, this hour, I now want to accept it.”
E-129 God bless you, lady. Would someone else, would raise your hand? God bless you, son. Someone else, would just raise up your hand? God bless you, little boy. God bless you, young man. Someone else would raise their hand? God bless you, back there, sir.
E-130 Just say it, “By God’s help, this morning, I want to forsake my self-righteousness, my own ideas, and my thoughts of pleasures and big time, and sin that I’ve lived in. And I want Christ to put His robe on me, this morning, that I’ll use His robe. I know It’s a perfect one.” God bless you, son. Someone else say, “And I’ll just raise…”
E-131 You raise your hand, say, “I now want to accept the Holy Spirit in my life. I want to be robed in His righteous. When I get there that day, I won’t present myself and say, ‘Well, now, You know I bought somebody some coal. I done this.’” That’s nice, that’s very nice, but that…Something had to die, for you to live, and only through the act of that can you be saved. Will you raise your hand? Say, “Christ, I now forsake my own way. I accept Your way. I want You to have mercy on me when I come to the end of the road?” All right. God bless you, lady. God bless you. All right.
Now we’re going to have prayer.
E-132 Now, Righteous, Heavenly Father, some seven, eight, ten hands has went up. I do not know their status. Thou knowest all about them. I do not know. But they are in need today. And they realize that they’re in need, and they’re willing to come and accept help in a time of trouble; to see that, the great hour that’s at hand now, the atomic bombs, the great things that’s waiting for us.
E-133 And I pray, Heavenly Father, that You will bless these people, and today lay Your hand upon them and take away all their iniquity and doubt. And may they throw away their old moth-eaten robe of self-righteousness, where the canker worms and the crickets, and the moths of superstitions and churchanity, have eat holes through it, and (they) it won’t hold any longer. May they just throw it away, and reach over and get the robe of the Lord Jesus. Say, “I trust in Him. I wrap myself, not in my righteousness, nor on my own thoughts. But, from this hour on, I’m trusting You.” Grant that they’ll receive it, Father, for we ask it in Christ’s Name. Amen.