Preparation #46 (The
Appearing)
Brian Kocourek
I TIMOTHY 3:16 And
without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the
flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles,
believed on in the world, received up into glory.
Brother Branham
called it the Appearing which takes place before the coming. He said in
End-time Evangelism,
MARK
REVELATION 10:7 But in the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when
he shall begin to sound, the mystery of God should be finished, as he hath
declared to his servants the prophets.
STANDING IN THE GAP 63-0623M 129 I never crossed up the oneness and the
trinity. I stood between them
THE END TIME EVANGELISM
TITUS
Now, who does this tell us will Appear? Who is it Paul
is speaking of here? Let's read it together again. TITUS
It is the great God who is savior that Paul is speaking
of.
ISAIAH 43:10 Ye [are] my witnesses, saith the LORD, and my servant whom I have
chosen: that ye may know and believe me, and understand that I [am] he: before
me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me. 11 I, [even] I, [am] the LORD; and beside me [there
is] no savior. 12 I have
declared, and have saved, and I have shewed, when [there was] no strange [god]
among you: therefore ye [are] my witnesses, saith the LORD, that I [am] God.
Now the question then is in what fashion will this God
Who is the Only savior come? For almost two thousand years men have
looked upon this scripture and have presumed that this glorious Appearing and
His Second coming were one and the same event. But in this last hour God
promised to "restore" and reveal all the mysteries. Brother Branham rightly divided this
Appearing from the second Coming and in doing so established it as doctrinal
truth and allowed us to see that The Appearing of the Lord comes before the
actual 2nd Coming of the Lord.
FROM THAT TIME
pp. 225
Then. In the next breath he goes on to say "This is
my ministry, see, to declare Him, that He's here." Now the
question then remains, Who is here. God,
or the Son of God? Which Jesus is here.
Brother Branham used 1 Thessalonians 4:16 for his text
when He preached the Rapture message, and he told us that the Message is the
Shout. I THESSALONIANS 4:16 For the Lord himself shall descend
from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump
of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: 17
Then we which are alive [and] remain shall be caught up together with
them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever
be with the Lord. 18 Wherefore comfort one another with these
words.
RAPTURE THE
65-1204 082 He
ordained these things to be, and He must send this. The first thing come when
He starts descending from the heaven, there's a shout. What is it? It's a
Message to get the people together. A Message comes forth first. Now, "Lamp trimming time. Rise and trim your
lamps." What watch was that? The seventh, not the sixth,
the seventh. "Behold the Bridegroom cometh. Rise and trim your
lamps." And they did. Some of them found they didn't even have any oil in
their lamp. See? But it's lamp trimming time. It's
Malachi 4 time when you come... It's Luke 17. It's--it's Isaiah... All those prophecies that it can--perfectly
set in order for this day in the Scriptures, we see it living right there.
Now the question still remains, Who
came down with a Shout. Paul calls Him Lord in this verse. He says, for The Lord Himself shall
descend with a shout which brother Branham told us is the Message. But is this Lord God? Or is it the Son of
God? So which Lord comes down? You say which Lord, what are you talking about, there is only one Lord. What then will you do with PSALMS 110:1 ¶ The LORD said unto my Lord, Sit thou at
my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool.
Well you say that is a mistake, and I say is it? You
say, well, The old and new testament speak of only One
Lord, and that may be true, but how does it speak of One Lord. Let's just
examine what the Scripture speaks concerning One God and One Lord.
DEUTERONOMY 6:4 ¶ Hear, O
The next time we see in scripture where it tells us
that there shall be One Lord, we see it in ZECHARIAH 14:6 And it shall come to pass in that day, [that]
the light shall not be clear, [nor] dark:
7 But it shall be one day which
shall be known to the LORD, not day, nor night: but it shall come to pass,
[that] at evening time it shall be light.
8 ¶ And it shall be in that day, [that]
living waters shall go out from
Now what is this a picture of
here. It is of the new
Jerusalem, right?
Now, there are five times total in the Scripture where
we hear the words ONE LORD used together, so let's go to the next verse which
we will find Jesus Himself speaking in MARK 12:28 ¶ And one of the scribes came, and
having heard them reasoning together, and perceiving that he had answered them
well, asked him, Which is the first commandment of all? 29
And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments [is], Hear, O
Now, notice how specific Jesus answer was…. The
Lord our God is one Lord… In other words, He spoke of God as being One Lord in
contradistinction to being more than one.
He was speaking of God being
ONE, and the Word LORD that He used here is the Greek Word kurios, which means
master or ruler.
We next see this ONE LORD used by the Apostle Paul in I
CORINTHIANS 8:4 ¶ As concerning
therefore the eating of those things that are offered in sacrifice unto idols,
we know that an idol [is] nothing in the world, and that [there is] none
other God but one. 5 For
though there be that are called gods, whether in heaven or in earth, (as there
be gods many, and lords many,)That word LORD is also kurios which is master 6
But to us [there is but] one God, ( and notice the title Paul
gives to this ONE GOD!) the Father, of whom [are] all things, and we in him; and one
Lord Jesus Christ, by whom [are] all things, and we by him. 7 ¶ Howbeit [there is] not in every man that
knowledge: He tells us to us who are
believers, there is but one God and there is one Kurios or master, and that is
Our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things… in other words this one He is
speaking of is the Creator.
Now, finally we will come to the 5th time
this word phrase is used in God's Holy Word. Paul again is the speaker, in the
book of EPHESIANS 4:4 where he says, [There is] one body, and one
Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling; 5 One Lord, (ONE KURIOS OR MASTER) one
faith, one baptism, THEN NOTICE VERSE 6 One
God Who is Father of all, Who [is] above all, and through all, and in you
all.
Now, first of all this ought to tell us that if there
is ONE GOD Who is the Father and He is in you all, then the Holy Ghost is none
other than that part of God the Father which has come into you. And what part of any Father comes into his
children? His Life! in JOHN
Now the question we must have then is this. If there
is but One God who is Father, then Who is the Son. And
how does He differ from the Father? Because the Scripture tells us that He is
called the Son of God, He is never called in scripture, "God the
Son".
Did you know the Pharisees were also bothered by this
question because they really did not understand Who
the Messiah would be, and they did not understand His relationship to the
Father. Jesus said to them, ye do always
err in your hearts because you do not understand, neither do you know the
scriptures.
In MATTHEW
Brother Branham taught us that the only difference between the Father
and the Son is that the Son had a beginning.
From HEBREWS CHAPTER 7 PT.1 57-0915E 062 that same
Melchisedec that met Abraham coming from the slaughter of the kings. Certainly. The God of heaven, the Elohim, the
Great I AM, not the I was, the I AM (present tense). "And He blessed
him." Listen here just a little
further, so we can get the lesson a little closer together. Now, the 4th
verse... Now consider how great this man was,... (I
just think that too.)... consider how great this man
was,... He's beyond the Son of God. The Son of God had father and mother; He
didn't. The Son of God had a beginning of time and an ending of time; He
didn't. Who was that? That was the Father of the Son. That's Who it was.
HEBREWS CHAPTER. 7 PT.2 57-0922 035 And this
Melchisedec was not Jesus, for He was God. And what made Jesus and God
different, that... Jesus was the Tabernacle that God dwelt in. See? Now,
Melchisedec... Jesus had both father and mother, and
this Man never had father or mother. Jesus had a beginning of life and He had a end of life. This Man had no father, no mother, no
beginning of days, or ending of life. But It was the self same Person; it was
Melchisedec and Jesus was One; but Jesus was the earthly body, borned and
fashioned after sin: God's own body, His own Son, borned and fashioned after
sin to take the sting out of death, to pay the ransom, and to receive sons and
daughters unto Himself. You get it? That's the reason that He had--He had a
beginning; He had an ending.
HEBREWS CHAPTER 7 PT.2 57-0922 036 But this perfect body, in commemoration
as a--as the earnest of our resurrection, God would not suffer that holy body
to see corruption, because He created it Himself, and brought it forth, and
resurrected it, and set it at His right hand. And today, the Holy Spirit that
raised that body up is here in the Church (Blessed be the Name of the Lord.)
and showing forth the same miracles and power. And someday this Holy Spirit,
that's in the Church, will scream, and will lift up, and will receive Itself
into this body form that's setting at the right hand of the Majesty of God, to
make intercessions for we sinners, and by there we're perfectly kept from sin.
Not that we don't sin, but kept from sin in the Presence of God; 'cause there's
a bloody Sacrifice standing between me and God, and between you and God. That's
the reason He said, "A man that's born of God, does not commit sin. He
can't sin. For if you're borned again, the very Holy Spirit that lived in that
Body, lives in you, and It can't sin. The sacrifice is
laying before Him. Then if you willfully do it, shows
that it's impossible for you to be into that Body. Amen. That's the Gospel.
There it is.
Show us the Father 096 Now, my
parents and my both--before me were Catholic. But brother, you see there's not
much Catholic left in me as the triune beings. That's right. Yes, sir. They
believed in the Eternal Sonship, or there's three actual individual being: God
the Father, an old man with long white beard; God, the Son, a middle age man;
and the Holy Ghost was a mascot boy like. There's no such
things. There's only one God. And I different agree with the
organization of Pentecost that calls the Oneness like your finger is one.
That's wrong. Absolutely, it's wrong. God... Jesus couldn't have been His
Own Father, and if God is a Man, then Jesus was born sexual desire and not
virgin birth. That settles the whole thing. You see? If
He's one like your finger's one, then what? Then He was His Own
daddy. How could He have been? That's wrong. He had a Father, Jesus did.
JEHOVAH JIREH 56-0429 053 He said, "For My..." That's the
reason people couldn't understand Him. Sometime it was Christ speaking... or
was the Son speaking. Other times it was the Father speaking. He was a dual
Person. He was one Man, the Son. God was in, which was tabernacling in Him. But
what did He do? Did He go around saying, "I'm the Healer."
Very contrary, He said, "I'm not the Healer." He said, "It isn't
Me that doth the works; it's My Father that dwelleth
in Me."
Now, notice how brother Branham lays out the
difference between the father and the Son. And if there is a difference, then
they are different. But you will w\find
that the only difference is that a Son has a beginning, and God does not. Then
the Son is not God, but He is the Son of God. Yet we know that God dwelled in
Him, and anointed Him with His Holy Life, His Holy Presence, His
Holy Spirit.
In the Book of ACTS 2:29 we read, Men [and]
brethren, let me freely speak unto you of the patriarch David, that he is both
dead and buried, and his sepulcher is with us unto this day. 30
Therefore being a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath
to him, that of the fruit of his loins, according to the flesh, he would raise
up Christ to sit on his throne; 31 He seeing this before spake of the
resurrection of Christ, that his soul was not left in hell, neither his flesh
did see corruption. 32 This Jesus hath God raised up, Now, let's just stop here for a moment…
Notice he says, This Jesus hath God raised up,… Now this tells you that God is not Jesus, for if God was Jesus then He
would have raised up Himself.
This Jesus hath God raised up, whereof
we all are witnesses. 33 Therefore being by the right hand of God
exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, ( Now let's examine this here. Notice, he says, that
Jesus The Son of God had to receive the Holy Ghost
Himself… Now if He had to receive the Holy Ghost, then where was it.
This Jesus hath God raised up, whereof
we all are witnesses. 33 Therefore being by the right hand of God
exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he hath shed forth
this, which ye now see and hear. 34 For David is not
ascended into the heavens: but he saith himself, The LORD said unto my Lord, Sit
thou on my right hand, 35 Until I make thy foes thy footstool. 36
Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly, that God hath
made that same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both Lord and Christ. Now, then… How did
Jesus become Lord? God made Him Lord! And How did god
make Him Lord? By indwelling Him. God hath made this Jesus both Lord and
Christ! The fact is that God made
Him Lord when He made Him Christ. And the Word Christ is the word Christos
which means the anointed One. Now, I would like to ask this question, How could he be the anointed One unless He had been
anointed. And Who anointed Him? If He was God then why
would He need to be anointed, and recognized as The Anointed One?
In the Book of ACTS 10:38, we read, How God
anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power: who went
about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed
of the devil; for God was with him.
39 And we are witnesses of all
things which he did both in the land of the Jews, and in Jerusalem; whom they
slew and hanged on a tree: 40 Him God raised up the third day, and
shewed him openly;
Now, if God had to anoint Him and Show Himself to be
with Him and even raise Him up, then was this one that was raised up God? The answer is quite apparent. The Son of God
is not God the Son, but Paul clears up the relationship that the Son had with
the Father in II CORINTHIANS 5:19 To wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling
the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath
committed unto us the word of reconciliation.
Now notice what Paul tells us here, God was in Christ… and that is what
made Him deity.
Now, we have already established that it was God that
raised up Jesus From the dead. And We
know by scripture that it was God that anointed Jesus With the Holy Spirit. And
we know that brother Branham taught us that the Spirit of God entered Him at
His baptism, and left Him in the Garden of Gethsemane.
JESUS CHRIST THE SAME 55-0806 You got to come back to the Bible, back to the truth.
And when Jesus, a carpenter's Son, physically speaking, when He come to the
earth here that's all He was known of, and the day that when John baptized Him,
God a vindicated Him. God spoke from the heavens. John saw Him coming in the form
a dove, and said, "This is My beloved Son in Whom
I'm pleased to dwell." The right translation there is, "In whom I am
pleased to dwell in." Jesus immediately anointed with God, He was just a
man till that time, but now He becomes the God-man. Someone telling me here not
long ago, as I many times referred to it in this shiftless day, that He was
just a prophet, He was a good man. He was more than that. He was the anointed
God. The Bible said, "God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself." God in Christ. Amen.
QUEEN OF SHEBA 60-0110 075 Then after He was baptized in water, John
saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and going on Him, a Voice saying,
"This is My beloved Son (correctly like this) in Whom I am pleased to
dwell in." God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself.
Jesus said, "It's not Me that doeth these things;
it's My Father. The Son can do nothing in Himself but what He sees the Father
doing." And then God was with us, God above us, God with us in Christ,
Emmanuel, God with us.
FORMER AND LATTER RAIN 60-0303 014 And now, the
sun has come across giving a dismal light because of the denseness of the faith
of people. Jesus was the Son of God, as we was talking
today. He was the Son of God as much as He was a man. At thirty years... We
have no record of Him doing anything till He was thirty years old. When He was
baptized in Jordan by John, then the Holy Ghost came upon Him without measure.
In Him dwelled the Fullness of the Godhead bodily. He was Emmanuel. God was in Him.
Why was God in Him? Because He was sinless born and because that He had a way
that He could yield Hisself to God, and in Him dwelt all of God. Now, you and I
could have no more God in us than what we can yield ourself. As
much as we abide... As much Bill Branham as I can get out of the way,
God will come in. But as long as William Branham's in there, then God has no
way of getting in. And the same with you. It's getting
ourself out of the way, not looking the way we think, not doing the way that we
think, but letting Him do our thinking. Let Him do our looking, listening to
the Holy Spirit.
WHY 61-0413 E-85 God the Father
is a Spirit, The Son of God is a Man Who the Spirit of God dwelt in. RISING OF THE SUN 65-0418M 34-5 When
God looked down upon the body... (The Spirit left Him in the
LETTING OFF THE PRESSURE PP. 96 6-9-62 “But
if you can beat all that away from you, say, "Lord God, I believe just exactly what your word says,
and I believe [ as we preached last night ] that the Appearing of the Lord
comes before the Coming of the Lord," for it's just two different words
altogether, see. Now's the appearing, as He promised in the last days that
He'd be with us.”
BE NOT AFRAID, IT IS I
II TIM 4:1 "I
charge the therefore before God, and the Lord Jesus Chris, Who shall judge the
quick and the dead at His APPEARING and His kingdom." … II
TIM 4:8 "Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of
righteousness, which the Lord, the Righteous Judge, shall give me at that day:
and not to me only, but unto all them that also love His APPEARING."
END TIME EVANGELISM
pp. 186 6-3-62 "I've kept the faith, and henceforth there's a
crown of righteousness laid up for me, that the righteous Lord will give me in
that day; not only me, but all those that love His Appearing.' Not believes
His Appearing; but loves His Appearing,..."
In II THES 2:10-11 those who did not love the
Truth on the other hand are sent a strong delusion. It is during the time of
the Presence of Christ that the false anointed ones bring forth their lying
wonders. But unto those that Love His Appearing He shall give us a crown of
Right - Wise -
No matter how
well you lay out this great revelation of Christ's Presence to the people they
still refuse it and say that it is a false doctrine while they themselves hold to their false
teachings that are solely based upon denominational understanding. They have
not yet learned to question everything they were taught under their
denominational system and to bring it into focus with the Word as revealed by
God's Servant and Prophet.
JEHOVAH JIREH PART II 7-6-62 "This is the close of the Royal Seed's waiting. He's
here, the APPEARING of Christ. Did you ever try to DIVIDE?...
There's a place in the Bible, you know, I ain't got time to go into it, says
"the APPEARING of Christ," and then "the Coming of Christ."
That's two different things, altogether, the "APPEARING" and the
"Coming." He's APPEARING now, working with us in the form of the Holy
Spirit, making it just perfect, the Church, It has to."
SPIRITUALFOOD IN DUE SEASON 65-0718E 066 Now, He appeared here as a physical body,
looked just exactly like Hofmann's Head of Christ at Thirty-three, and blood
running out of His hand, and so forth, nail scars all over Him, I wouldn't
accept it. No, no, no, no. When He comes, Hisself,
"Every eye shall see Him, every tongue shall confess Him; and as the
lightning cometh from the east unto the west, so shall it be." See?
We don't believe these cults and clans. We believe God is the Word. But He
embodies Himself, taking your body and my body, and gives you gifts, gives me
gifts, and through these gifts He makes Hisself known. That's the secret Food.
No matter how much He'd make Hisself known by me, you've got to believe it;
you've got to have a gift of faith too to believe it. You believe that? And now
if He will manifest Himself in that manner, will you believe Him with all your
heart? You'll believe Him? Oh, how wonderful, just waiting on Him, just waiting
to see what He says.
HAVE FAITH IN GOD 54-0900 017 Jesus is risen from the dead. He's just doing
all kinds of things to get people to believe it, but we're just so loose. We
let it slip through. He could come here tonight, walk out on a platform,
visible in a body with nail scarred hands and return. He's here in the form of
Spirit, but not in the form of flesh. When He brings His body back with Him,
well, it'll be the second coming. It'll all be over then.
THE GREATEST NEWS FLASH IN HISTORY
If He APPEARS to His Elected only, then what is the
delusion that causes the others to miss His APPEARING? They can not rightly
divide the difference between the Baptism of the Holy Ghost and the Person of
the Holy Ghost Himself. Didn't brother Branham in referring to Matthew 7 tell
us that these people who had gifts of the Spirit were told, "Depart from
me for I never Knew you." Did he not also teach
us that when the church denomination goes for the oil it's all over. Why? Because they think they are receiving Him and
they aren't.
He never knew them, yet they were baptized in the
Spirit even as the tares received the same rain as the wheat. He also taught us
that you can be baptized in your spirit with the Holy Ghost every hour of your
life and still go to hell, unless you have the seed gene. And any time God
sends forth a new Message it is preceded by healing. So, if the Message is a
new Message and not the same old worn out Pentecostal message of the baptism of
the Holy Ghost, you can see that their old understanding becomes a deluding
influence and points the people away from the very presence of the Baptizer
Himself. They say, what do we need a prophet for when
we already have God! "Why, I know he's here because He's in my heart.
Don't you realize that the Baptist's and Pentecostal's all say the same thing?
It's to late an hour to be ignorant of the difference between an anointing in
the flesh and the Presence of the Anointed Christ Himself. So they will keep on
looking for the an evidence in their flesh that they
have been baptized in the Spirit.
WE WOULD SEE
JESUS pp. 170
THE TRIAL
SOULS IN PRISON pg. 21 pp. 4 11-10-63 "Notice. The same spiritual sign Jesus done
has reoccurred on the earth in the last days...the very same spiritual sign
that He identified Himself as Messiah, has identified Him today! He's still
Messiah! The same material sign has APPEARED on the earth that APPEARED about
what He was...the same Pillar of Fire that St. Paul saw, the same One. And all
that has reoccurred with the same nature in it, doing the same thing."
DECEIVED CHURCH BY THE WORLD pp. 83 6-28-59 "But as Israel was
bound by their kings, that they could not follow the real King; and the real
King, when He came, they didn't recognize Him. So is it today, Oh Lord, The
king of Glory has APPEARED in the form of the Holy Ghost, and , Lord, they
don't know it. They don't recognize it. They're so organized so tight, that
they do not understand it, because it's not in their organization. Lord, this is
the work of the Devil that's done this to the people."
WHERE IS HE KING OF THE JEWS pp. 99 12-21-58 "Yet in
all of our theology and our great churches, and so forth today, when the great
light of God has begin to SHINE, the church knows nothing about it."
HEBREWS CHAPTERS 5 & 5 PT. 1 pp. 170 9-8-57 "Friends, let us go on to perfection. We're with out
excuse today. We have no excuse at all. The God of heaven has APPEARED in these
last days and is doing the very same things that He did then, when He was here
before, when He was on earth. He's proved. As we are coming through this Bible,
and you class, know this; that we have taken miracle by miracle and sign by
sign and wonder by wonder that He did
with the children in the wilderness, the things and signs that He did.
The things that He done when He was here on earth, manifest in the flesh, and
the very same things are taking place today, right here among us. Here's the
Word to Vindicate it. Here's the thing to say It's
right, to make it right. Here's the Spirit of God to do the same thing, so
we're without excuse."
WHAT THINK YE OF CHRIST 57-0303E 031 What kind
of people ought we to be? How should we conduct ourselves? We are sons and
daughters of a King, not a king, but the King: Jesus Christ the Son of the
living God Who is the King of kings.
II PETER 3:9 ¶ The Lord is not slack concerning his
promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not
willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. 10
But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which
the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt
with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be
burned up. 11 ¶ [Seeing] then [that] all these things shall be
dissolved, what manner [of persons] ought ye to be in [all] holy conversation
and godliness, 12 Looking for and hasting unto the coming( Parousia-Presence) of the day of God, wherein the heavens being on
fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat?
HEBREWS pp. 235 CHAPTER 4
INVISIBLE
THINKING MAN'S FILTER pp. 34
WHEN THEIR EYES WERE OPEN