Christ is the Mystery no 205
Review no 28 Twins - Definitions part 2
Last Sunday we examined the first definition
concerning Twins, and that is the definition of the word Twins.
Twins is defined as Two
children given birth from the same mother. And Br. Branham said, "every revival produces twins, one who is spiritual and one who is carnal."
Last week we pointed out in the Bible in that Cain and
Abel, Esau and Jacob, Balaam and Moses,
Judas and Jesus, Simon the Sorcerer and Simon Peter, etc. were twins.
This evening we will continue with our examination of
three more words and their definitions. we'll look at Foreknowledge,
Predestination and Election. Unless you understand these three Bible doctrines,
you won't understand the Bible doctrine of Twins.
In order to place foreknowledge. election and predestination
in their proper place, we must first know the definitions of each. Therefore,
since most people think fore-knowledge is the preeminent principle behind
election, we'll start with this point first.
Foreknowledge:
What is it? The word foreknowledge is made up of two words. "Fore"
being a prefix meaning "beforehand," and "knowledge" meaning "to know",
hence "to know beforehand". We find this in Scripture
in the following verses.
I Peter 1:2 Elect according to the foreknowledge of God
the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling
of the blood of Jesus Christ: Grace unto you, and peace, be multiplied.
The Greek word here is prognosis {prog'-no-sis} 1) foreknowledge 2)
forethought, pre-arrangement. This last definition of
foreknowledge is the best because in order to knw
before hand the end you must prearrange the end.
Now, the word foreknowledge is very confusing to a lot
of people.
So let's open our Bibles to Ephesians 1:3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who
hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ: 4 According as he hath
chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy
and without blame before him in love: 5 Having predestinated
us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according
to the good pleasure of his will, 6 To the
praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the
beloved.
Notice how Foreknowledge works together with election
and predestination. Before the foundations of the world God knew who would and
who wouldn't because he elected you and predestined in you the attributes to hear, recognize and act upon His Word.
Listen as brother Branham reads these verses and
explains them to us.
Questions and Answers 59-1223 496-123 Grace be unto you, and peace, from God our
Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed be the God and
Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
who has blessed with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ. 70 Oh, my. Wouldn't you like
to set in on some of that? Well, we are. Sure. Same Holy
Spirit. He said now, as you're setting together in heavenly places in
Christ Jesus, God has blessed us with all spiritual blessings, ... All right. Now: Blessed be the God of our, ... Father of Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with all
spiritual blessings, all spirit, in heavenly places... (Let's see if I'm
reading that--quoting that right.) Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has
blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ Jesus: (Assembled together now in heavenly
places in Christ Jesus.) According as he... (Now, listen. Are you all ready?)... According as he has
chosen us in him before... (I preached to you.)... before the foundation of the world,... Before there was a world you were in God's thoughts to give you
the Holy Ghost, because He knew that you'd be wanting
It; and He chose you Himself because you desired... He chose you
in Christ before you or Jesus, any of you, was on the earth. And He sent
Jesus to die to prepare the way to send the Holy Ghost, to bring you to
Himself. Oh, that's just... I know I may... This is the church, so I'm at home
now. See? Oh, that is so rich to me. To think it's not what I wanted; it wasn't my desires; it wasn't my will; it
wasn't my choosing; I had not one thing to do with it.
But before the world ever started, God saw us and put our name on the Lamb's
Book of Life before there even was a world. Talk about God. Whew.
Therefore, the foreknowledge he's talking about is what
God saw in his own mind before he even created the worlds for us to
live on.
This is
where people make their mistake in understanding the foreknowledge of God. They
think God time travels and traveled into the future see who would make it, and who
would not by seeing the end, then God returns to the beginning, and then and
only then He can know who will finish because He has seen the end from the
beginning.
Now, What kind of a God do
you think He is. If that is all the respect people have for God is to think he
is a time traveler, and therefore he knows the end from the beginning because
he sees the end, then he ain't God!!!
That would just make him no different than Satan.
Satan was a time traveler. The Bible says so, and so does William Branham. He
took Jesus and showed him all the kingdoms the world that would ever be. So he knew every kingdom and when it would be.
Things that are to be 65-1205 P:38 This world, every government... We don't
want to believe that, but the Bible plainly states it, that every government,
every kingdom of the earth is owned by the devil and ruled by the devil. Jesus was
taken by Satan up and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world that was, would
be, whatmore; and Satan claimed them
his, and Jesus never argued with him, because he is the god of this world.
See? And he said, "I'll give them to you if you'll fall down and worship
me." See, he was trying to give them over to Jesus without sacrifice. See?
Questions and answers COD 59-0628E P:44 How many people here understand that the
devil controls every nation under heaven? The devil controls the
Therefore, Foreknowledge is not being able to go out
into the future and know who would and who wouldn't, and then predestine it
according to what you saw? God isn't dependent on what you do,
He's dependent on His Election and His Predestinating.
Paul said, 4 According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the
world, that we should be holy and without blame before
him in love:
"That we should be", in other words, he chose, He elected us that we should
be, "holy", that we
should be "without blame". So after He chose us to
be that way, he had to make a way for us to turn out the way he chose us to be.
It's not about us, what we do, what choices we make. It's all about Him, and
the choices he already made for us, and to make sure we make those choices He
predestinated our journey to those conclusions. He placed in the gene seed a
roadmap, a pathway for us to obtain these things that he chose for us.
That is why brother Branham said, To think it's not what I wanted; it wasn't my desires; it wasn't my will; it
wasn't my choosing; I had not one thing to do with it.
But before the world ever started, God saw us and put our name on the Lamb's
Book of Life before there even was a world. Talk about God. Whew.
And Paul tells us this path in verse 5 Having predestinated us unto the adoption of
children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his
will,...
Notice, he says, "Having" (past tense) "predestinated us" (past tense) unto
the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will,...
It's
not about your will, it's all about His Will. It's not
about doing what you think is right, it's about doing what he says is right. Proverbs
Things that are to be 65-1205 P:60 The foreknowledge of God could
predestinate, make everything work to His honor. When that predestinated
seed that you was to be, and God called you, and that little eagle of a
seed in there heard the Word of God, it will build on top, one word on top the
other one, on top the other one, on top the other one; it'll not mix
with any creeds.
Notice
he said that predestinated seed is made to add word upon word upon word. Before
the foundations of the world God made you to be that way, and God predestined
that seed to have every attribute in it to see you to that end.
Lean not unto thy own understanding 65-0120 P:9
So you see, if you
were in the foreknowledge of God, then you are becoming a part of God. And the
only way you can be a son of God or a daughter of God, you had to be a part of
God, and God isn't complete without you. Has to
be. That's right, 'cause there is One, only one resource of Eternal
Life, and that is God, and Him alone has Eternal Life. See? Now, and you
were a part of Him, insomuch that you're an attribute, or in His thinking in
the beginning. And that, because He thought of you in
the beginning, it gives that little tug towards Him. That's what has
to be quickened. Some of them will never be quickened; they just don't have
it; that's all. Just like if you would put a grain of corn in the ground,
didn't have... Ever how pretty it was, if it didn't have the germ of life in
it, it can never be quickened. But the germ of life has to be there first.
So
it doesn't matter how religious you might be, or what
kind of life you can manage to live, if that germ of God was not in you to begin
with, you will never make it to the end. That my brothers and
sisters is the foreknowledge of God.
So
basically understand this. The foreknowledge of God is that you were in God's
thoughts before anything took place. Before hand. You
were in the knowing of God, the knowledge of God, before hand because you were an
attribute of His thoughts. And "as a man thinketh so is he."
God's
Foreknowledge is God's Knowledge before hand. Before he created or did
anything, it is what was in His mind back then and only that which can come to
life. Now, brother Branham did not like to use the word predestination before people
who were untrained in the Word of God, because they often were confused by it,
so he stuck mostly with Foreknowledge. But it seems to me this word "Foreknowledge"
can be even more confusing to people because they think God somehow travels
into the future to see the end and therefore could predestinate the end. But
that makes him powerless over his entire plan, and his purpose and plan are in
His Election which we will get into shortly.
Questions and answers COD 59-1223 P:67 103. Now, the first thing, I want to say this, that "predestination" is a bad word for a
minister to use before
an untrained congregation. See? It is. I don't use it. Sometimes here at the church... But out in
the audiences, out in the big... Where everything's piled in from everything, I watch that
word. I always use the word foreknowledge, because predestination is only the
foreknowledge of God. God being infinite, by foreknowledge He knew everything, or He isn't
infinite. See, see? He knew what would happen. So by foreknowledge He could
predestinate.
Notice
he says, predestination is only a bad word to an
untrained people. But that does not make it a bad word, because God placed it
in the Bible to be understood. But as The Apostle Paul said, "if they wish to stay ignorant then let them stay ignorant."
Harvest time 64-1212 P:47 Now, you see, God scattered His Word out,
'cause He could, He's infinite, and He's omnipresent, omniscient, therefore He
knows all things. He can't be present everywhere. By being omniscient, knowing all
things, then He can be present everywhere. Because that's the way He
predestinates us by foreknowledge, not because He desired that this person
should be saved and this one lost. But He knew who would be lost and who would
be saved. See? Therefore, by His foreknowledge He can predestinate. And
He makes everything work to His glory. That's what His attributes are doing,
displaying to His glory. One vessel of honor and one of dishonor, but it's God that maketh it. "Not
him that willeth or him that runneth,
but God that showeth mercy." See?
Now the next word we will look at is the word
Election.
1 Peter 1:2 Elect according to the foreknowledge of God
the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling
of the blood of Jesus Christ: Grace unto you, and peace, be multiplied.
This
word Elect Peter used here comes from the Greek word eklektos and
it means selected ones; by
implication it means, favorites, chosen ones, elect.
And the word Election in the English language
means: To Select out, to choose, to appoint,
hence to make a choice, and to choose involves a process of
previewing or showing forth, then an assessment is made, an
opinion given, or judgment expressed and the selection is made based
upon an assessment, opinion or judgment. That's the DOXA.
Therefore when we see this word used in Scripture it
has to do with God choosing us, and not us choosing Him. Then
according to the definition of the word "elect"
we find The elected ones are those whom God has Chosen, the elected one
are those that God has selected out, the elected ones are the ones that God has
made his favorites.
John 15:16 Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you,
and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your
fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he
may give it you.
Romans
John
1:12 But as many as received him, to them gave he
power to become the sons of God, even to them
that believe on his name: 13 Which
were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man,
but of God.
Notice it says "But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become..."
Now, this ability to receive him is not of them Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor
of the will of man, but of God.
So you see it does not have anything to do with your
natural birth, nor your will or any human abilities, but it has to do with that
gene seed that God places in you in through His foreknowledge and election that
predestined you to be able to receive Him, and believe Him. In order that you
might be able to make the right decision to become what you were ordained to
become.
When John said, to them
gave he power to become the sons of God, he was not saying you were given
power to go from one specie to another, from hog to son of God. The word power
that John used here is not dunamis which is miracle
working power, but it is exousia which means the authority or ability to make a right decision.
That is why this same John
could say in I John 3:2 Beloved, now
are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we
know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as
he is.
God who is rich in mercy 65-0119 P:18 ...Now, we are a part of God. You always was. You don't remember it, because you were only an
attribute in God. You were only in His thinking. Your very name, if it ever was
on the Book of Life, it was put there before the foundation of the world. He
knew what you were. I'm only saying
this, not to mix up doctrine, but to straighten it out, that we might get away
from this fear and scare: you don't know who you are. You are not going to be,
but now you are the
sons of God. See, you
always were the sons of God. See? For when God had you in His thinking at
the beginning, you have to be, some part of you, your Life that's in you
now, had to be with God before there... Well, when you, before you even
become material here on earth, before there was anything, but God, you were
one of His attributes. He knowed what your name would be. He knowed the
color of hair you'd have. He knowed all about you.
Isaiah 42:1 ¶ Behold my servant, whom
I uphold; mine elect, in whom my soul delighteth;
I have put my spirit
upon him: he shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles.
In
John chapters six and eight we see a depiction of the Two Vines. Ones
predestinated to Glory and others ordained to condemnation.
John
John
38 I speak that which I have seen with my Father: and ye do that
which ye have seen with your father. In other words the Law of Life, Genesis
39 They answered and said unto him, Abraham is our
father. Jesus saith unto them, If ye were Abraham's
children, ye would do the works of Abraham. YOU would have his
nature.
Remember
last weeks sermon on Amos 3, the nature of the lion, and nature of the bird, and the nature of God, and the nature of
God's prophets? And I think
with this logic it would not be rash to say that what Jesus is telling them is
if they truly were legitimate children of righteous Abraham, then they would
have the same nature Abraham had and they would believe what God told them as
Abraham did. But he says, because you don't believe the Word, you have not the
nature of Abraham, but another nature, the serpent.
He says, 40 But now ye seek to
kill me, a man that hath told you the truth, which I have heard of
God: this did not Abraham. This is not the nature of Abraham. Then
Jesus tells them whose nature this is.
41 Ye do the deeds of your father. Then said they to him, We be not born of
fornication; (we're not serpent
seed?) we have one Father, even
God. 42 Jesus
said unto them, If God were your Father, ye would love
me: for I proceeded forth and came from God; neither came I of myself, but he
sent me.
Notice
again he says, if God were your father you would be
believers, and you would receive me because he sent me.
In fact that is the evidence that you are of God, is
that you believe those whom God sends.
John 6:29 Jesus
answered and said unto them, This is the work of God,
that ye believe on him whom he hath sent.
And
if God sends anyone he promised to go with them.
1 John Chapter 4:5 They are
of the world: therefore speak they of the world, and the world heareth them. 6 We are of
God: he that knoweth God heareth us; he
that is not of God heareth not us. Hereby know we the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error.
1 John 5:9 If we receive the witness of men, the
witness of God is greater: for this is the witness of God which he hath
testified of his Son. 10 He that believeth
on the Son of God hath the witness in himself: he that believeth not God
hath made him a liar; because he believeth not the record that God gave of
his Son. 11 And this is the
record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. 12 He that hath (echos) the Son hath (echos) life; and he that hath (echos) not the Son of God hath (echos) not life. 13 These things have I written unto you that believe
on the name of the Son of God; that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and
that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God. 14 And this
is the confidence that we have in him, that, if we ask any thing according to
his will, he heareth us:
Notice the confidence we have is that when we ask he
answers. But if you regard iniquity in your heart the
Lord will not here your prayers.
Psalms Chapter 66
Verse 18 If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord
will not hear me:
Behold a greater than Solomon is here
62-0721 P:86 He that will confess his
sin..."But if I regard iniquity in my heart, then
God will not hear my prayer," said David. What is iniquity? Iniquity
is something that you know that you're doing that you ought not to do and still
won't repent of it. If I regard iniquity in my heart, knowing that I should
do it, and don't do it, then God promised, the Bible promises that God will
not hear your prayer, if you know you should do it and won't do it. That
right, brethren? That right, brother ministers? It's true, if you regard
iniquity...
And
if John
John
Notice
the nature of those who have the same nature as Jesus, they hear his word. But notice
the nature of those who do not have the same nature, they cannot hear His word, they can not understand it.
That's
1 Corinthians 2: 14 But the
natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are
foolishness unto him: neither can he know them,
because they are spiritually discerned.
Notice in John
Now,
this argument still goes on today. But it all comes down to one thing, "if you are of God you will hear and recognize God's Word no
matter what channel God chooses to send it through. It matters not
whether it is a Vindicated prophet, or a vindicated five fold minister. God's
Word is God's Word no matter who says it. And God doesn't vindicate the man, he
vindicates His Word in the vessel whether prophet or five fold or Christian or
believer, who ever it is. But if God sends someone, he promised to go with them
and verify that He's sent them, and if you turn that down you turn down God.
And it shows what seed you have in you. For Jesus said, 47 He that is of God heareth God's words: ye therefore hear them not,
because ye are not of God.
And we read in 1 John 4: 6 We are of God: he that knoweth God heareth
us; he that is not of God heareth not us. Hereby
know we the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error.
Oh,
John, you are boasting. You don't have a right to say we should listen to you? You're
not a vindicated prophet? No, many be he wasn't a vindicated prophet, but he
was an a vindicated apostle, and God's
Presence with him showed God backed him up.
Psalms 65:4 Blessed is the
man whom thou chooses, and causes to approach
unto thee, that he may dwell in thy courts: we shall be satisfied with the
goodness of thy house, even of thy holy temple. Not bless is the man whom the laity chooses, or the church
chooses, But blessed is the man that God chooses
and causes to approach unto thee.
Now,
in closing we will look at one more definition, predestination
which comes from the root word predestine or predestinate.
Predestinate..(greek) Proorizo = predetermine, determine before ordain, predestinate, to limit
in advance.
Romans 8:29 For those whom He has known beforehand He has also pre-destined
to bear the likeness of His Son, that He might be the Eldest in a vast family
of brothers; 8:30 and those whom He has pre-destined He also has called;
and those whom He has called He has also declared free from guilt; and those
whom He has declared free from guilt He has also crowned with glory.
Ephesians 1:5 ¶
5 Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by
Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will,
The word predestinate is a compound word
and is made up of two words, Pre a
suffix meaning before hand, and the word Destinate meaning
destiny. To Pre-determine beforehand.
Pre-destiny.
Again we see that to pre-determine means
to mark out and determine beforehand. Therefore, chance is
negated altogether. Design becomes supreme. Choosing beforehand
is essential and indispensable. The word
determine not only implies influence but the power
necessary to control or enforce the outcome desired.
We can see by all these words that a Design, and thus
a Designer is evident. Nothing is left to chance, which would be chaos theory. Nothing
is left to coincidence, nothing is left to your own will,
nothing is left to the strength of the pre-destined, nothing
is left up to the abilities of the predestined ones, but all is determined by a great
design that is planned out and backed by a power to ensure it through it's final outcome. Hence all is under a
continual enforcement and control of the One doing the
predestinating. Therefore, a plan is involved, and the destiny is set in stone.
Therefore in John
God said in Isaiah 55:8 10 For as the rain cometh down, and the snow from heaven, and
returneth not thither, but watereth
the earth, and maketh it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower, and bread to the eater: 11 So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me
void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the
thing whereto I sent it.
Then knowing we have a God Who is Sovereign, One Who changes not, and Who chooses right
(Shall
not the Judge of all the earth do right?) One Whose Word is Eternal and immutable, One whose first choice is His best
choice, then it is This One
Who has Chosen. It is this One Who has planned out and determined our destiny. And it
is this one who predestined us to the adoption of sons, it is this one who predestined us to be
conformed to the image of the first born son. It is this one who predestined
us to the manifestation
of the sons of God.
Therefore if God made these
promises to us, then he had to make a way for them to come to pass. And we find
our answer in John
Let's look at those promises. 5 Having predestinated us unto the adoption of
children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure
of his will,
Romans
Romans
Now, how can you fulfill those promises? There has got
to be a way for you to be conformed, and manifested as a son as He was. There
must be a path into
these promises?
And
Paul tells us in Romans
And
in Galatians
I believe that John
Think about it. There can be
no conforming to the image without knowing what the image was? There can be no
adoption without being conformed to the Image, There
can be no manifestation of the sons of God without knowing what that
manifestation of the son of God was? And it is all given to us in the
instruction manual of John
14:12.
He said, "The things that I do, you shall also do also" (His speech, His actions, the way he
thought, the life he lived, the works that he did) he said, you shall do also, the same speaking, the same acting, the
same walking, the same talking, the same mind that was in Christ is in you.
Thus John
And without John
Let us pray.