Christ is the Mystery no. 45

Christ Jesus the Pattern for all sons
December 2, 2012
Brian Kocourek

Romans 11:33  O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out! 34  For who hath known the mind of the Lord? or who hath been his counsellor? 35  Or who hath first given to him, and it shall be recompensed unto him again? 36  For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen.

 

Acts 17:28  For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring. 29  Forasmuch then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and man's device.

 

In other words understanding the Godhead is not a theology, something made up by men, but it is the reality of a living and breathing God living in your very person.

 

Philippians 2:13 For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.

 

Let us pray…

 

Dear Father we come humbly and reverently into Thy presence with thanksgiving in our hearts knowing that you are indeed our God and our Father. And knowing this we ask that you would help us as we continue to read from the Words spoken by Your prophet William Branham that Your very words which are seeds might come alive in us by the Holy Ghost quickening them to us. Come live in us Father as you lived in your Son Jesus and had the preeminence in Him to live His life for Him. We invite your Divine Presence, your Divine Life, to come and inhabit our flesh and blood that me might manifest Christ in these bodies, for we ask it in Jesus Christ’s name, amen.

 

This morning we will begin reading from paragraph 99 of Brother Branham’s sermon Christ is the Mystery of God Revealed, which in your books will be paragraph 185 and we will read through paragraph 120 which in your books will be paragraph 234. Now, I know that is a lot of ground to cover in one day, but the same theme folds throughout these 21 paragraphs, and as you will see brother Branham is talking here about the very Life of Christ and how it manifested itself in men throughout the Old Testament in their very lives. Christ was expressed in the things they did, and the ways that they chose, or in the way they lived their lives. But these men did not know what was happening, or why they did what they did. They did not know it was God working in them to will and to do. But it was in a measure showing in a type Christ. Or as the Apostle Paul said these things were shadows of things to come.

 

Hear ye Him 57-0310E P:22 In the Old Testament there's patterns and types and shadows; all the Old Testament was kind of a shadow of the New Testament. And all that was in both Testaments is a shadow of this day.

 

Therefore as we read, let us look at the lives of these examples brother Branham gives us here and let us see how that it was these men in their lives were types and shadows of the very Life of Jesus Christ when he came here on earth and as brother Branham said, they are the very shadow of this hour when God is working in us to will and to do.

 

Now, let’s begin reading from Paragraph 99 or 185 in the booklet.

 

99 Now, you see the secret? What to? To restore fallen Eve, as she was a free figure of the church. And now notice, as God opened up the side of Adam and took out Eve by his own flesh and blood, and divided his spirit from masculine and feminish, to feminish and put it in Eve, took the rib from under his side and made Eve out of it; so God did the same thing, taking out of the side of Christ the Blood and the water (and Christ is the Word), and taking the Word and making up His Church, Eve (See?), back to Himself again redeemed by the Blood that was come from His Body. You see it now? God's great mystery being unfolded that's been hid since the foundation of the world, but prefigured it all the way down through. Now, watch. We find that He did that. And here in Ephesians and many other places... But that'll give you enough to...


100   Now, down through the ages He has been slowly unfolding this mystery. Can you see now? Now, down through the... how that He... What happened in the prefigure now? He opened Adam's side and took part of his flesh, which was Adam, to make Eve. The Bride has to be the Word, for He is the Word. She cannot stand on creeds; She cannot stand on denomination; She cannot stand on good behavior; She has to stand alone on the Word, because She's part of It; She was taken from Christ. See?


101 And to be sure that the whole Rapture now... Luther was a part; Wesley was a part; the prophets was a part. If they aren't a part... just in the revelation that they was making up the Body: feet, toes, arms and so forth until the Head (which we get to that in a few minutes, see?) that makes the entire rapture. It's the Body of the Word, which is Christ. Amen. Outside of that, you're lost. I don't care how good you are, or what your relationship is, or what your fellowship is, or what your organization is; you're lost outside of that Word being in you.


102 "If ye abide in Me (the Word), My Word abide in you, then you ask what you will." because you and the Word are the same. He has the preeminence. He's got the rulership. You're a prisoner to Him. The world is dead. You have nothing more... You see the rest of the people living the way they do, but yet you do not do it. You're a prisoner; you're yoked with Him. "My yoke is easy." (Yoked with Christ, with His Word.) "I do that only which pleases the Father. And if you can't believe that I am He, then believe the Word." So perfect...

103 Notice. Notice now, down through the ages, He's been gradually letting this out, slowly unfolding the mystery through the prophets and through the types. Now, we can just go on to that... and expressing Himself. He expressed Himself in Moses. Look at Moses: born in a time of persecution of the children. He was born to be a deliverer. He was hid in the bulrushes just like Jesus was taken down into Egypt. He came out; he went up on the mountain, come back with the Commandments. Jesus went up to the mountain, His first sermon (Sermon on the Mount), come back down with the Commandments: "You've heard them say them old times, 'Thou shalt not commit adultery.' I say to you, whoever look upon a woman to lust after her has committed adultery." Law-giver; Priest; King; Leader, just exactly.

104   He expressed Himself in Joseph: born amongst denomination, his brethren. They hated him without a cause because he was spiritual. He saw visions; God was with him; he could interpret dreams, and his brothers hated him. He was sold by his brethren by almost thirty pieces of silver just exactly like He was sold by Judas Iscariot, one of His brethren, by thirty pieces of silver. He was thrown into a ditch and supposed to been dead. That's right. The father and them was told that be was dead. And thrown into this ditch, taken up and went to the right hand of Pharaoh. In the dungeon how he suffered there, and there was two saved, the butler and the baker: one of them lost and one of them saved, rather. And the butler... One of them was lost and the other one was saved. Just as on the cross, when He was in His prison house, a tacked to the cross for our sins (we become a prisoner), one thief was lost and one was saved (See?), just exactly.

105   Then he become at the right hand of Pharaoh, the king, that he dreamed and had the vision that he would set at the king's feet, and all authority in Egypt was given to him. His vision had to come to pass. He might've studied of it many times while he was in that prison down there, his whiskers growing out, and so forth, but he studied that someday his vision had to come to pass. Though it linger, it's got to happen (as I spoke last night, or night before, Wednesday night here at the service). See? It has to happen. When God says so, it's got to happen. It's a vindicated prophet, and it has to come to pass, 'cause it's God's Word, and the Word comes only to the prophets. The word prophet means a revealer of the Divine written Word, as same as it does a forth-teller (See?), a seer.


106   Notice in the seer how that when, you know, he's coming forth, he's divinely a-vindicated by foreseeing and it comes to pass. "If there be one who's a prophet, will speak to you and tell you certain things that's going to happen, and if it don't happen, don't listen to him. But if it does happen, then I'm with Him. You better fear him, because I am with him.” See? That's exactly. There's the a-vindication. There, where you know whether it's the truth or whether it isn't. God is speaking back through His Word to His people, by people. See, God only speaks through man. "I am the vine; ye are the branches.” The vine doesn't bear fruit. The branches bears the fruit of the vine. Notice, it's always been that way.

107   Now, we find Joseph then, that when... No man could touch or come to Pharaoh without first seeing Joseph. No man can come to the Father only by the Son. And when Joseph left the throne, they sound the trumpets; every knee bowed. "Joseph is coming forth." Glory. Someday every knee will bow and every tongue will confess, when He leaves the throne of His Father (See?) to come forth. Everybody will bear witness that He's the Son of God. You either... It was too late then; do it now.

108   Now, we notice that through the types... We can take even David (as I spoke of awhile ago) going off his throne, rejected by his own people, going up the same mountain (Mount of Olives) as he was going over to his prison. He was going to his prison house because he was rejected of his brethren and of his own people. He went up weeping. That was the Spirit of Christ in him to be rejected as he looked up over Jerusalem and wept and said, "Jerusalem, how oft would..." A rejected king. Eight hundred years later, the Son of David stood on Jerusalem, up there above Jerusalem, rejected, and wept over Jerusalem and said, "Now, your hour has come." That's right. See?

109   All those things typed Him (just in type), but yet the mystery was hid. Them men didn't know what they were doing. They only knew that they were led by the Spirit to do something. Now, holding it back in the last days for the great revelation, but expressing it... Express Himself in Moses, and David, and Joseph, and Elijah and on down through. Wwe could take each one of those prophets and bring their lives out and show it expressed Jesus Christ perfectly, exactly, yet never giving His secret in full, waiting for to make it known in the last days as He promised, waiting for it to be fully comprehended (See?) before He could express it. If He told the whole thing... Because the Bible's written in mysteries; Jesus thanked the Father for it (See?), that It was wrote in mysteries.

110   Now, the coming of the Lord is in mystery. We don't know when He's coming, how He's coming, but we know He's coming, See? And so was all the mysteries of God waiting for this last day. After it's already been completed then He reveals, He shows what He's done. Oh, my. Never gave His mystery in full...It's just like this, comparing the Seven Seals. Now, when God used Martin Luther for the coming out, for that first church (that church age), and when He used John Wesley, and He gradually brought them out and was revealing in them that church age. When anyone goes back through the Bible now and find out... But in the last days...

111   The reason that was such a tremendous thing, that He spoke of it here and showed those Seven Thunders and "Look" and "Life" my "Life" magazine there, packed that circle of cloud and light there that they could not understand and don't know it yet, but here telling, "Go there and wait for these mysteries to be revealed" and here months before it happened; and then it happened, and exactly the way He said it would do. Did you notice in that picture even that Angel on the right when He was being materialized, coming down, with His wings back and His head setting sideways? There it is right there in the picture just exactly: months before it happened, told here that He's going to bring the Body of believers together to reveal, take up them lost ends.

112   Here come Luther through. He only preached justification, just pounded away in that age. He didn't know what the age was. Here come Wesley through. He pounded his age through. See? Lot of our false come from it. The other churches raising up. And here come Pentecost, pounding away. They organized and went right back into death again (as we'll get to it in a few minutes), right back into death. And then, comes the revelation of the mysteries to reveal what it's all been about, where these little doctrines, like Luther brought out catechism and everything else; and Wesley brought this, that, and the other, and these other things; and Pentecost brought organization just the same, and "Father, Son, and Holy Ghost" baptism and things, not knowing any different, 'cause... Then come back in the last days and pick up all these mysteries and clearly explain it, reveal it. Why? It's all the last days when this great mystery that God had in His heart is being revealed.

113   Do you get it? If you fail, come back to this tape again. I don't know how much longer I'll be with you. Remember, this is the Truth of THUS SAITH THE LORD. It's the Truth. It's the Scripture. Like the seven mysteries of the Seven last Seals, the mysteries of them... The Seals had done been broken; every age had come down, and there they left a lot of scattering. And God, not willing that it should be scattered, He comes back and picks up those things, those doctrines they started, and brought it on out and revealed the whole thing, same thing He's doing now in revealing the mystery of Christ, how He was God's threefold purpose for the Church. Oh, my. Letting them out, reveal...

114   "Reveal," Webster says, is "to make known, make known, and especially," Webster said, in Divine truth"--that means Revelation, it is Christ's way of making Himself known to His Church. Now, we're going to say... "Now, Brother Branham, you're just saying this..." Now, we won't say... just say this. Now, notice, He made Himself known to Peter... Now, if you want to mark this down, and if you want to read it, we'll read it, if you want to: in Saint Matthew 16:15 and 17. I'll quote it. When He come from the Mount Transfiguration He say, "Who does man say I the Son of man am?" "Some says, 'Oh, they think You're Elijah,' and some says 'You're one of the prophets, Jeremiah or some of them.'"

115   But that wasn't what He asked. He said, "Who do you think that I am, now?" Now, there's the church He's talking to. See? "What does man think that I am?" Today: "He's a philosopher" this social religion. "He's a good man. We believe His teaching's right. It's a subject to be lived by. I think it'd make us all better if we did. We ought to have our churches, our so forth." That's a Santa Claus, like a Santa Claus story. It's not expression of some church that we should express something. It's a life that you don't live yourself, but He comes in you and lives by Himself, and you become a prisoner to any human intellectual being at all. You're led by the Spirit. And how do you know?

116   Now, you say, "I might know I was losing my mind. Maybe a man that loses his mind does that." But if you have the mind of Christ, Christ expresses Himself through you. Shows that it's Him and you've not lost your mind. Some people under illusions of things goes out and becomes insane. Well, We know that's wrong. That's the devil trying to impersonate the real thing before it gets here. See? There's always a bogus. See? But a real man is a lose his own thoughts and his own thinking, not come up blindly like that. No, sir. You come up with your right senses and Christ takes you over and expresses Himself. And now, to the world you're an insane person. Now, if you're insane, you're actually insane, then there's nothing... The devil can't take you in complete control. He will make you do everything contrary to this Word, but when Christ takes you over, He will express that Word right through, because it's Him. He is the Word. See? And then you can see the expression of Christ, not some illusion of some sort, but a real genuine Christ, expressing Himself right through you. How beautiful.

117   Now, watch. He said, "Who do you say I am?" He's asking the Church, His twelve. Out of the millions of that day, He asked twelve, His Church. In the millions in the days of Noah, He asked eight. See? And He said, "As it was in the days of Noah, so will it be in the coming of the Son of man (See?), where eight souls were saved." I don't say going to be eight saved now; now don't get that all wrong. I never said that. I don't know how many's going to be saved in that last moment to rapture that little group. It'll be a small group; I'll tell you that. "For strait is the gate and narrow is the way, but few there'll be that'll find it."

118   But when the great ransomed Body through all ages comes up, then, that's going to be a great throng there. Revelations 7 express it: "a great number which no man could number" through all the ages that's come up, them that's walked in the Light of the Bible as far as It was revealed to them. And now, we know that Wesley had more Light then Luther did. We know Pentecost outshined Wesley. See? Certainly it does, because it just gradually let loose as it did down through the prophets and so forth till it was perfectly made known, the Godhead bodily in Christ. And now, the Christ in the Church is just being made known. The whole thing is the revelation of God to take Eve back to her right position again with her husband (notice), and God is the Husband of the Church, and the Church is His Bride.

119   Now, Peter, when he called, said, "Thou are the Christ, the Son of the living God." Now, watch, "Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-jona (that which means son of Jona. See?)--blessed art thou, for flesh and blood never revealed this to you (You never learned it from some school.), but My Father which is in heaven has revealed it to you." Notice, what He said to him: "Upon this rock..." That's Peter, the predestinated seed of God that had received this Light and given the keys to the Kingdom. "Upon this rock of revelation of Who Jesus Christ is..." He's the full manifested God. "Upon this rock..." Not of Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and Him being the second person... "Upon this rock I'll build My Church, and the gates of hell will never shake it down--never prevail against it. (See?) I'll build My Church upon this rock," a revelation of Jesus Christ.

120   Look, Christ in you makes Him the center of Life of the revelation. See? Christ's Life in you makes Him the center of the revelation. Christ in the Bible, makes the Bible a complete revelation of Christ. Christ in you makes you the complete revelation of the whole thing. See, what God's trying to do? What is the new birth then? You say, "Well, Brother Branham, what is the new birth?" It is the revelation of Jesus Christ personally to you. Amen. See? Not you joined a church, you shook a hand; you done something different; you said a creed; you promised to live by a code of rules; but Christ, the Bible... He is the Word that was revealed to you. And no matter what anybody says, what takes place, it's Christ. Pastor, priest, whatever it might be... It's Christ in you. That is the revelation that the Church was built upon.

And that is what I have been trying to get across to the brethren for the past 30 years, it’s not doctrine, The doctrine of Christ is not just another doctrine, it is the very Life of Christ living itself out in you, just as it did in Jesus Christ, Paul and William Branham.

 

And when I told that to Br. Billy Paul the other day, he said, brother “That is the Great revelation of this hour”. And then we got people who say Billy Paul doesn’t even believe the Message? Who are they fooling. A fool is known by the multitude of his words. They are only fooling themselves because they think the Message is a theology. Well, let me tell you something brothers, The only man living who has seen the angel of the Lord is who they are rebuffing because he doesn’t walk in their camp. That’s what it’s all about.

No one in this Message has taught the doctrine of Christ in as many countries and to as many ministers as I’ve done over the past 12 years. Now, I don’t say this to boast, I say this as fact. Show me anyone on else who’ve gone out and taught the doctrine of Christ in as many countries and to as many ministers as I’ve done. And I didn’t even want to do it, but I saw no one else going to help their brothers around the world, so I said, Lord if you want me to go, I will but you will have to open the door because I don’t want to go where you do not wish for me to go. I hate traveling, and anyone who has done considerable travel knows it is not easy and it is not a pleasant thing to travel.

 

Br. Ron and br. Peter Gatchell probably know best what I’m talking about. Young people think it’s neat. They think it’s exciting. Well, let me tell you when bombs go off where you were supposed to be it’s not a pleasant thing. When your car is being rocked to turn it over it’s not a pleasant thing. When you sit at a police station, or in long lines in customs waiting to enter a country it’s not a pleasant thing. When you drive across several African countries in a broken down jalopy and have to change tires in the middle of the night in Lion country with only a little flashlight, it’s not a pleasant experience.

 

When you sleep at night with your notes over your face under several blankets just to keep the mosquitoes off your face with your shoes on because you see lizards running the walls and mice gnawing your bed posts, it might be exciting, but not in a pleasant way for sure. When you  drive the roads and every to 20 miles you are stopped by machine gun toting men it is not a pleasant thing. And if you had a stretch of road that was smooth and not filled with car eating potholes, then it might be ok, but you won’t find them  where I’ve been.

 

So I know what I am talking about when I say that to teach from a theology verses teaching from the reality and relationship of God with His son, makes all the difference in the world. I’ve seen the changes in the lives of men as a result of changing my mode of teaching. And my biggest disappointment has been those brothers who heard me in the early years teach the doctrine of Christ from a theology basis, and they didn’t turn the corner when I began to teach it from a relationship standpoint.  And today some of them turned to organization around the doctrine. And I am very sad for them.

 

I tried to warn them in 2007 but they didn’t take the warning. As brother Branham said in the Seven Church Age book, Church Age Book  Chapter 3 - The Ephesian Church Age P:64 But as usual people don't heed God's warning. That revival fire built upon the sacred Word is so wonderful, and the manifestation of the Spirit so blessed, that a little fear creeps in and a whisper in the heart says, "How can we protect this truth we have? What can we do to see this revival goes on?" That is when the "antichrist spirit" comes in and whispers, "Look, you have the truth now, see that it doesn't get lost. Organize and set up your creed of what you believe. Put it all in a church manual." And they do it. They organize. They add to the Word. And they die just like Eve did for taking One wrong word. It's God's Word that brings life. And it's not what we say about the Word that counts, but it's what God said.

 

The Doctrine of Christ is a reality of the God-Life coming alive in the bride in the same way as it came alive in Christ Jesus and William Branham.

 

And I know the real success in our meetings came when I changed from teaching the doctrine of Christ from a theological basis and began to teach it from the relationship that God had with his son Jesus Christ. God living, God alive in His son Jesus Christ. The obedient son living his life to the glory of His Father.

 

When you teach from theology, those that oppose you have their theology too and they want to argue, but when you present the Doctrineof Christ from the relationship that Jesus had with His Father, and show them the promise is for us and our children, men’s souls hunger for that relationship and that reality.

 

And when we began to present the Doctrine of Christ in that way, then God began to really bless the meetings, He blessed the brothers by opening that relationship to them, and He confirmed what was taught by signs and wonders and He manifested His Presence among us in very supernatural ways changing weather and coming down in a very visible way. Now, I did not get to see that, but hundreds of others did. And when I got back brother Vayle told me to not take lightly what God had done, so I don’t. And if anyone has a right to claim the experience of  watching the effects of the Doctrine come alive in the brethren, and seeing firsthand the effects it has in the lives of the brethren when taught from a relationship verses the theological perspective I think I can say I have that experience and firsthand knowledge. But I also know firsthand that teaching the doctrine as a theology sure brings out the warfare, but I am not the only one who knows that. I think every brother who has taught the doctrine from that perspective knows what I am talking about. But real teaching positionally places the brethren according to brother Branham’s definition, and when you begin to positionally show the brethren their own place in the family as obedient sons, it changes men, it brings such a rest and peace, and with it an assurance they never had before. An it brings a real true love for the Father and the brethren, and the result is the brethren want only one thing and that is to please The Father. And you talk about unity, the doctrine of Christ taught as a relationship brings unity, but I also saw how that teaching it as a theology brought division.

 

Theology will never do anything except cause a fuss and stir things up. But knowing our relationship with the Father and our eldest brother and the way they so harmoniously worked together as though it were just one person doing the work, because after all it was just one person doing the work. The son died to himself and the son acknowledged that he of himself could do nothing, and when we acknowledge that of our own self we can do nothing, then God is free to use your surrendered body for his own purpose and plan.

 

The son Jesus had so well learned to simply die to himself that God might use his body, and that is what our Father wants with you and I, for us to just let him have the full preeminence in our soul and Spirit that we will totally surrender our flesh to him to do his great pleasure.

 

That is the great mystery that has been hidden, but we saw it in this hour in William Branham, and he showed us the parallel between what God was doing in his life and what God did in the life of his eldest brother Jesus. And that is what God wants for all of his sons and daughters. He wants for us to be led by His spirit just like Adam was led by God and fellowshipped with him before the fall where he walked with God and he talked with God in the peace of the garden of Eden.   

Now, next week we are going to examine more in detail what brother Branham said here in paragraph 120 which is paragraph 234 in your booklets. And I want you to pray all week about this thought here from brother Branham. Dwell on it, eat with it, sleep with it, until it becomes a reality to you.

 

In closing let’s read it one more time before we dismiss. “Look, Christ in you makes Him the center of Life of the revelation. See? Christ's Life in you makes Him the center of the revelation. Christ in the Bible, makes the Bible a complete revelation of Christ. Christ in you makes you the complete revelation of the whole thing. See, what God's trying to do? What is the new birth then? You say, "Well, Brother Branham, what is the new birth?" It is the revelation of Jesus Christ personally to you. Amen. See? Not you joined a church, you shook a hand; you done something different; you said a creed; you promised to live by a code of rules; but Christ, the Bible... He is the Word that was revealed to you. And no matter what anybody says, what takes place, it's Christ. Pastor, priest, whatever it might be... It's Christ in you. That is the revelation that the Church was built upon.

Let us pray…