- 2 months ago
John and John McKinnon expose the heart of William Branham’s “seed doctrine,” showing how Branham twisted the words of Genesis and John 1:1 to claim humans pre-existed as eternal “thoughts” of God and were merely manifested in the flesh. They explain how this teaching diminished the divinity of Christ, altered the meaning of salvation, and opened the door to the later Manifested Sons of God movement and the New Apostolic Reformation. Drawing on quotes from Branham’s own sermons and early message ministers, they show how Branham’s focus on supernatural signs, visions, and experiences replaced the authority of Scripture and contradicted Paul’s gospel. This episode invites listeners to examine whether Branham’s message was truly biblical or an imitation of the serpent’s deception in Eden.
00:00 Introduction
01:01 The Origin of the Manifested Sons of God
02:12 Branham’s Seed Doctrine and Twisting of Genesis
05:02 The Supernatural Obsession in Branham’s Ministry
09:01 Signs, Wonders, and False Validation
11:45 Rejecting Sound Theology and the Rise of Anti-Intellectualism
13:36 The “Little Gods” Doctrine and Creation Misinterpretation
16:21 Experience Over Scripture: The Foundation of Apostasy
19:00 How Seed Theology Diminishes the Cross
21:01 Jesus as “Attribute” Instead of God
23:02 Denying the Divinity of Christ
25:04 Replacing Paul’s Gospel with Branham’s
30:00 How Branham’s Theology Infected Later Movements
32:00 Replacing Scripture with “The Spoken Word”
36:00 The Serpent’s Lie Revisited: “You Shall Be as Gods”
40:00 Legalism, Control, and Cultic Behavior
43:00 Paul’s Warning Against False Teachers
46:00 Jesus Reduced to a Thought: The Core of the Heresy
51:00 The “Thought Expressed” Theology and Self-Deification
58:00 The Theophany Twist: How Christ Was “Created”
1:02:01 The Diminishing of Repentance and True Salvation______________________
Weaponized Religion: From Christian Identity to the NAR:
Paperback: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1735160962
Kindle: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DCGGZX3K
______________________
– Support the channel: https://www.patreon.com/branham
– Subscribe to the channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBSpezVG15TVG-lOYMRXuyQ
– Visit the website: https://william-branham.org
– Follow on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/WilliamBranhamOrg
– Follow on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@william.m.branham
– Follow on Twitter: https://twitter.com/wmbhr
– Buy the books: https://william-branham.org/site/books
00:00 Introduction
01:01 The Origin of the Manifested Sons of God
02:12 Branham’s Seed Doctrine and Twisting of Genesis
05:02 The Supernatural Obsession in Branham’s Ministry
09:01 Signs, Wonders, and False Validation
11:45 Rejecting Sound Theology and the Rise of Anti-Intellectualism
13:36 The “Little Gods” Doctrine and Creation Misinterpretation
16:21 Experience Over Scripture: The Foundation of Apostasy
19:00 How Seed Theology Diminishes the Cross
21:01 Jesus as “Attribute” Instead of God
23:02 Denying the Divinity of Christ
25:04 Replacing Paul’s Gospel with Branham’s
30:00 How Branham’s Theology Infected Later Movements
32:00 Replacing Scripture with “The Spoken Word”
36:00 The Serpent’s Lie Revisited: “You Shall Be as Gods”
40:00 Legalism, Control, and Cultic Behavior
43:00 Paul’s Warning Against False Teachers
46:00 Jesus Reduced to a Thought: The Core of the Heresy
51:00 The “Thought Expressed” Theology and Self-Deification
58:00 The Theophany Twist: How Christ Was “Created”
1:02:01 The Diminishing of Repentance and True Salvation______________________
Weaponized Religion: From Christian Identity to the NAR:
Paperback: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1735160962
Kindle: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DCGGZX3K
______________________
– Support the channel: https://www.patreon.com/branham
– Subscribe to the channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBSpezVG15TVG-lOYMRXuyQ
– Visit the website: https://william-branham.org
– Follow on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/WilliamBranhamOrg
– Follow on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@william.m.branham
– Follow on Twitter: https://twitter.com/wmbhr
– Buy the books: https://william-branham.org/site/books
Category
📚
LearningTranscript
00:00:30Hello, and welcome to another episode of the William Branham Historical Research Podcast.
00:00:36I'm your host, John Collins, the author and founder of William Branham Historical Research
00:00:41at william-branham.org.
00:00:43And with me, I have my co-host, researcher, and friend, John McKinnon, author of The Persuasive
00:00:49Preacher, The Gifted Prophet, and The Noble Politician.
00:00:53John, it's good to be back and to talk about, I guess you would call this the foundation
00:00:59or the origin story of the manifested sons of God as it developed into what became the
00:01:05New Apostolic Reformation today.
00:01:07There are so many themes of – John McKinnon would call this the convergence of apostasy.
00:01:15There are so many different themes of apostasy and purely heretical teachings that came together
00:01:22in William Branham's theme that he started to introduce whenever he laid the groundwork
00:01:27for what would develop into the manifested sons of God.
00:01:32And he really wrapped it up in what we'll – you'll call it the seed doctrine.
00:01:37There's other different names that are used for it.
00:01:39But if you really understand that William Branham took the words of Genesis and twisted them
00:01:47just a little bit to make them sound scriptural but to add things to it that weren't written
00:01:53in the text.
00:01:54And then understand that when he got that part wrong, he literally changed and altered the
00:02:00course of what would become the theology for his creation.
00:02:04His creation story and literally the story for every human being that is represented by
00:02:12the numbers of people who were in his cult.
00:02:14But I won't go too far with it yet.
00:02:17We'll get into it as we go.
00:02:18But there was the – well, Genesis clearly says in Genesis 1 that male and female humans
00:02:25were created by God.
00:02:27But what William Branham did is he twisted this just a little bit to say that you were in existence
00:02:34prior to this, and he would say things like, how can you be – how can you have eternal
00:02:39life if you had a starting point, if you had an origin?
00:02:42And he really didn't understand the concept of what Christ did on the cross for salvation.
00:02:50And if you read the Gospels, he gets into teaching how we were a thought that was conceived,
00:02:57and therefore we must have always existed.
00:02:59And very subtly, if you understand that logic and follow it to its conclusion, it changes
00:03:06the nature of salvation itself.
00:03:08You are already saved to begin with.
00:03:10You are already part of this thing that he is inventing.
00:03:15And therefore, there's really no work that Christ needed to do on the cross.
00:03:19You just have to accept it, and you have to take pride in your preexistence, I guess.
00:03:24So, with that, we'll get into it, but this is going to be an interesting one.
00:03:29Darrell Bock Welcome again, John, and here we are
00:03:32in another episode to talk about this subject of adoption, and we're going to talk about
00:03:38the seed doctrine again, and what is the seed doctrine, and this is about the seeds of adoption
00:03:44doctrine that William Branham preached, and this is episode two.
00:03:48So, I'm looking forward to today's episode, John, as we explore the seed doctrine of William
00:03:54Branham's.
00:03:55You know, just to get started, and to get us started off here, I want to read a quote here
00:03:59that I read last time as we ended, you know, the episode.
00:04:03So, let me bring that up.
00:04:06It was in 1964, December the 12th, called Harvest Time, and here's what he said.
00:04:13Was he just, was just he alone, see?
00:04:17So, if we have eternal life, we were with God right then, a part of God.
00:04:22We were his attribute, and I want you to remember that.
00:04:25We are now his attribute, and because in the beginning was the word, and a word is a thought
00:04:32expressed.
00:04:33So, we were his thoughts, then expressed into word and become what we are.
00:04:38That's a very important quote as we get into this, because there's a lot there, and there's
00:04:44a lot there to the undiscerning person that really doesn't understand, you know, what William
00:04:49Branham was talking about here.
00:04:51It could sound very biblical, and it could sound very scriptural, but we're going to find
00:04:56out how far off it is.
00:04:58And to begin with, I'm just enjoying getting into the subject matter, because it's really
00:05:03at the very heart, you know, of what William Branham taught, and it may even be key inside
00:05:08information, or the teaching of the message that he believed he was sent to deliver, you
00:05:13know, out of all the things that he taught, you know, this could be the key message that
00:05:17he was trying to bring.
00:05:19William Branham's ministry was centered around convincing people of what he believed was truth,
00:05:24and Gordon Lindsay said this in one of his publications.
00:05:28He said, William Branham believed he was a teacher of truth.
00:05:33So I can break down his truth very quickly, but to grasp it really has taken me a long
00:05:38time, so we're not going to rush this.
00:05:40And I may repeat some things, but it all helps in our understanding.
00:05:43I know this is not the usual for your podcast, so feel free to take it where you think it
00:05:48should go as well, John.
00:05:49Every time I begin to look into one thing about this, you know, subject, something else just
00:05:55pops up, and I realize more of William Branham's purposes or motives.
00:05:59He was all about the supernatural, for one thing, and because his ministry was built on
00:06:04doing things that seemed supernatural, it was all wrapped up in himself, because we've
00:06:10shown that things he said, that he vindicated him, say, by newspapers, what was in the newspapers
00:06:16about him, or by the clouds, or by prophecies, just did not happen.
00:06:21Even I would say that all of the miracles of healing that were very public, none of them
00:06:26really proved anything about himself, but he was a very unusual person, we would have
00:06:31to say, and could somehow have a strong influence upon people, and even you, if you let yourself
00:06:38be drawn into it.
00:06:39But he built everything in his ministry, the church, everything on supernatural manifestations,
00:06:44which is a large part of this as what was becoming a manifested son of God, and his teaching
00:06:50of the manifest sons of God.
00:06:53In 63, I want to read this quote from Christ is the Mystery of God Revealed on July the 28th.
00:07:00He said, what is it?
00:07:02It's Christ being revealed, and he is the Word.
00:07:06And when the Word is revealed, it expresses itself.
00:07:09So I want you to keep that in mind as we talk about who Jesus is, because I think that's the
00:07:13very crux of the matter as we get into this.
00:07:16It's who Jesus is, who you are, and he's talking about attributes here.
00:07:22Now, as we go into this, we'll see that he is putting Christ as an attribute of God, the
00:07:27same as you.
00:07:29And I want you to keep that in mind as you hear some of these quotes here.
00:07:33And then the attributes are thoughts, and then the thoughts have to be expressed as Word
00:07:38to become real, or to become in manifestation, in other words.
00:07:42So he said, and when the Word is revealed, it expresses itself.
00:07:46See, that's God's purpose for Jesus Christ, was to express himself, to take his own laws
00:07:52and live by his laws, and fulfill his law by death.
00:07:57And Christ, God died in flesh in order to condemn sin in the flesh, that he might bring
00:08:02to himself a glorious bride, redeemed back, that will believe only the Word of God, only
00:08:07in the Word of God, and not swap it, like Eve did, for intellectual conceptions of man.
00:08:12You see it?
00:08:12That's Christ's idea.
00:08:14That's God's idea.
00:08:16He said, the new birth reveals this.
00:08:20So, and notice how he says this next statement here along the same lines, the very next sentence.
00:08:26He said, and this shows you how he depended upon the supernatural, or how he said that that's
00:08:32how you recognize, one of the ways you recognize that you're believing the Word for your day.
00:08:37He said, and if a man says he's born again, and try to place these promises of Christ,
00:08:42which most of those were the scriptures surrounding his ministry, he said, in this last days, to
00:08:46some other age, making him Christ yesterday, but not today, like Christ the miracle worker
00:08:53yesterday, but not today, then that man or that person has been in a delusion by Satan.
00:08:58And if that man says he believes that, and it doesn't manifest itself through him, Jesus
00:09:05said in Mark 16, these signs shall follow them that believe, and to all the world, and
00:09:09to every age, casting out devils, speaking with tongues, and all these great manifestations
00:09:13of gifts that would follow, that they shall, not they may be, they ought to, they will, and
00:09:20heavens and earth will pass away, but his word won't.
00:09:23So, you see, he was very highly cognizant of supernatural workings, and that's what he
00:09:31was wanting to see, and that's what he said the church had to manifest.
00:09:34So, he's forcing the people of God into something.
00:09:38That may or may not even be what God's will is.
00:09:42So, in another one, he continued on the same message here, he said, being filled with his
00:09:47spirit, him having the preeminences, that was God's achievement, that's God's purpose
00:09:52to do that, that he might be in Christ, and Christ in us, and all of us together, one.
00:09:58The Holy Spirit, same thing, it revealed it to Christ, reveals it here, the supernatural,
00:10:05creative power.
00:10:07So, you see, all these quotes here, he's all about the supernatural, and he's talking about
00:10:12supernatural creative power, and this is after he had so-called spoken those squirrels into
00:10:17existence, and things we've talked about in previous podcasts, and so, here's another
00:10:23thing.
00:10:24So, with this one quote from a really famous sermon he preached, he's focusing on signs
00:10:28and wonders, I guess we could say, and he condemns and downplays other Christians who
00:10:33are not focusing on it, and warns people to stay away from those who've even studied
00:10:38the Word, and he called them intellectuals.
00:10:40Darrell Bock Well, if you're wondering, how can you tell
00:10:42when somebody is not a sound Bible teacher, well, there are many different ways, the easiest
00:10:46of which is just simply to read your Bible.
00:10:49But one of the more obvious ways is if you have a Bible teacher who's telling you quite
00:10:55literally that if you study the Bible, or if you listen to someone else who has studied
00:11:00the Bible, especially if they have gone to a school to study the Bible, don't listen
00:11:05to those people.
00:11:07Well, usually you're listening to somebody who is in full disagreement with sound Bible
00:11:11theology, and that's exactly what William Branham was.
00:11:15Yet at the same time, he would say things like, I don't know the book real well, but I know
00:11:19the author.
00:11:20Referring to the Bible, he's saying, literally, I don't understand the Bible, but I know Jesus,
00:11:25and so it doesn't matter that I'm teaching you all of this doctrine, and the question
00:11:30always remains, how can you teach if you don't understand the book?
00:11:34But that's exactly what he's doing, and it defies large sections of Scripture.
00:11:40In the Old Testament, they're very, very clear about the nature of God and the relationship
00:11:46between God and man.
00:11:48Isaiah, I think it's 40, says, before me, this is God speaking, before me, God, there was
00:11:54no God formed, nor shall there be any after me.
00:11:58Yet this manifested Sons of God theology, large portions of the Word of Faith movement teach
00:12:04that we are little gods, not fully understanding the literary styles for that phrase, did the
00:12:13Bible not say ye are gods?
00:12:15They simply do not understand sound Bible theology, and so those two passages can't go together.
00:12:22You can't have God saying, there are no other gods, and a group of people who are defying
00:12:27sound theology saying, yes, God, I disagree with you.
00:12:30There were gods, and I'm one of them, which is essentially what they're doing.
00:12:34The most obvious contradiction is John, the first chapter of John, when it says, in the
00:12:41beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
00:12:44Quite interestingly, this was often quoted by William Branham, but he seldom took it to the
00:12:50next phrase, which said, all things were made through him.
00:12:55So, in other words, we weren't these thoughts conceived, etc.
00:12:59We weren't a substance that was to be reborn or manifested, but that's what was being taught
00:13:05here.
00:13:06We were in existence from the beginning of time, and we were manifested.
00:13:09So, where the Bible teaches a clear point of creation for humans, William Branham and literally
00:13:16the foundation that developed into the manifested sons of God today is teaching that every Bible
00:13:22passage talking about creation has been incorrectly written in the Bible, and we must ignore it.
00:13:29You know, William Branham believed and caused others to believe that his ministry made the
00:13:32Bible come to life, mostly in miracles and signs, which was of great interest, you know,
00:13:37through the Pentecostal people.
00:13:39Even Gordon Lindsay said in the book, you know, Man Sent from God, that it was written
00:13:43very early on in the ministry before Gordon Lindsay, you know, left William Branham, he
00:13:48said, Bible days are here again.
00:13:50So, people looking for power and influence, and those who are even sincere flock to these
00:13:57things, and we saw it in the 1950s healing and revival.
00:14:00It was a great big noise that attracted them, but it just took a few years for them to realize
00:14:05that they were being hoodwinked, or in cases where healing was pronounced, you know, even
00:14:09as thus saith the Lord, and given a divine gift of healing, ministered by an angel as
00:14:14it was spoken, and then the person die, even after that.
00:14:18So, but the supernatural was all that really William Branham had going for him, and all
00:14:24of his made-up stories that he would create out of his mind, and made-up prophecies even,
00:14:29like the bridge vision that he claimed he saw, great meetings that he would exaggerate
00:14:35about, or having a vision of killing a brown bear, or great tent meetings where something
00:14:42was going to happen in there that related to his third pull, or use a natural phenomenon
00:14:47even, you know, like ceiling lights in the Houston Coliseum, or to say that was a pillar
00:14:52of fire, or clouds that was made by blown-up rockets, you know, to say that it was supernatural.
00:14:58And to get people really believe in it, you know, he was able to do that.
00:15:02That's how his ministry was built, basically, was on these things that were not credible,
00:15:08but he would claim that they were supernatural, and he got people to believe that.
00:15:12Darrell Bock He did, and it just goes back to the question you and I have been asking for
00:15:15several episodes now.
00:15:17If you're basing your entire theology on experiences, which is exactly what William Branham
00:15:23is doing, and many men and women who came after him, who were in these apostolic networks
00:15:29that developed into the NAR, they're building their ministries on the experiences of those
00:15:34that came before them.
00:15:36That's why there are books like God's Generals, and these pathways of supernatural influence
00:15:42that these people are claiming is a movement by God.
00:15:45Well, when you study the origin stories of many of these trails of this so-called movement
00:15:50by God, you find that, yes, it's built on top of these experiences, but many times the
00:15:55experiences are in themselves anti-scriptural.
00:16:00And more than that, some of the experiences, like we've discussed, are just outright fiction.
00:16:05So if this is a movement by God, why is it built on fiction?
00:16:08And the question then raised is, are these people serving a real God, or are they serving
00:16:13a fictional God?
00:16:14And it all comes down to the root question that we're going to get to in this podcast.
00:16:19If you're understanding that the creation story written in Genesis is incorrect, and that
00:16:26we were instead this foreknowledge, the seed thought, or whatever you want to call this,
00:16:31if you're believing a different version of the creation story, are you even believing the
00:16:36same Bible?
00:16:37So for me, this is the biggest question that I think needs to be asked.
00:16:40So I could go on and on about all these things, there's so many things, but getting back to
00:16:44the subject here, you know, William Branham believed that the elect people, or the people
00:16:48that believe in this message, were a thought of God in the beginning, and dwelled with God.
00:16:53So if you can imagine this, in God's mind, they were a real thought.
00:16:58And although God has blinded, he would say God has blinded you to that prior existence that
00:17:05you was in God, but because you were a thought, then you could be expressed down here on earth
00:17:10as a word of God.
00:17:11But see, he puts not only Christians in that category as being the word of God expressed,
00:17:18he actually puts Jesus in that category.
00:17:19And I think that's what we're going to see through this podcast today is where it is really
00:17:24dangerous because he said, because you're a word of God, that makes you a little God.
00:17:29See, the problem with this, as I see, is you have to put Jesus in the same category as
00:17:35another son of God, just like he believed Christians were, because he even said Jesus was a thought
00:17:42that came forth as a word, because a word is a thought expressed, right?
00:17:46So the same way you were a thought, and then when you came to earth and was born, you became
00:17:51a thought expressed, and you are the word.
00:17:54So it gets pretty hairy when you get into this.
00:17:58So if Jesus was God, then you were God to the extent that God is manifesting himself in
00:18:04you as well.
00:18:05The heart of this doctrine promotes the people to Godship with actual God-like authority on
00:18:11earth at some point, you know, whether like the NAR proclaims it'll be during this lifetime,
00:18:17or as the message proclaimed, it'll be during the millennium.
00:18:20And there's a lot of quotes that we can go through this, and we will, and also use material
00:18:25from message ministers.
00:18:26I've got one today, in fact, a couple of them, to back this up.
00:18:30And I do think it will become clear to everyone listening here.
00:18:33So we just want to take our time and be patient with this, and be patient as we explain this.
00:18:39And this will be episode two, for those who are following the line of thinking here.
00:18:43And go back and hear number one if you hadn't yet heard that.
00:18:46There's a lot of dimensions to this teaching, too, I'll have to say.
00:18:49There's bits and pieces of it that are taken, you know, by other charismatic church world
00:18:53ministries, and especially in the prosperity doctrine preachers.
00:18:57And these teachings will take you all the way back to prior, if anything existing, where
00:19:03only God existing in his being.
00:19:06You know, William Brandham heavily focused on trying to tell people that they were literally
00:19:09gods, or so much a part of God in the beginning that they always had eternal life sometimes.
00:19:15So I hear people say that a lot of times.
00:19:17They were just fallen as they came forth, and bypassed their word body, and born in these
00:19:25sinful flesh beings, but all they needed was the light to cross their path.
00:19:31It's a lot different than what Christianity teaches about being truly repentant over your
00:19:36depravity, and you should be mourning over your sin, and realizing you're nothing, and you're
00:19:42bankrupt before God, and needing him.
00:19:46And in the message, you tend to believe that you come from God as a thought, so you really
00:19:51always were, and that's what made you elect, and all you had to do was see a manifestation
00:19:56of Christ, say in William Brandham, doing miracles, and then you just come to life.
00:20:01Well, that's how a lot of people believe it.
00:20:03But what I feel these teachings do is make Jesus' work on the cross really diminished.
00:20:08You know, the most important thing, the most important act in history that God ever did
00:20:13was allow himself to come down and live in a body of flesh as the Son of God, and then
00:20:23allow himself to be killed by people so that he could shed his blood.
00:20:29But that's the most important thing in history, and they tend to downplay that, if you'll notice
00:20:36as you study this.
00:20:38But they put the emphasis on people believing that they're literally God's substance from
00:20:42the beginning, which puts them on kind of an equal standing with Jesus Christ, or God
00:20:47himself, because you're a part of that that makes up God, or makes up the being of God.
00:20:54And I'll show this in a quote here shortly.
00:20:56But this doctrine starts with the concept of a seed, and that human beings who are the
00:21:02true elite Christians, those that are believing, you know, William Brandham's message, were
00:21:06literal seeds or thoughts in God's mind, and that's what William Brandham calls the eternal
00:21:11thoughts, and who were eventually spoken to the earth.
00:21:14So they put Jesus Christ on the same level, though.
00:21:17That's the problem with this, and that he was a thought of God expressed in the same manner
00:21:22as these elite Christians were, but he was the firstborn, as it were.
00:21:26Darrell Bock Exactly.
00:21:27And there's one point that I want to stress that you brought up that I don't think people
00:21:32really realize and recognize.
00:21:34Under William Brandham's theological framework, for you to be this manifestation of God, he
00:21:41had to change and alter the understanding of the scriptures that talk about God, especially
00:21:47in the New Testament.
00:21:48And the reason why he did this was, whenever he was talking about Jesus, he wanted to point
00:21:54to Jesus as the ultimate manifestation of God.
00:21:58To this point in time, throughout history, from the creation story all the way to Jesus,
00:22:03there was only God the Father.
00:22:05And then what he wanted to say is, God the Father manifested himself in Christ Jesus in
00:22:12the same way that we would be manifested gods in the end of the world, Christ would return
00:22:17to earth through this manifestation.
00:22:20And what you have to do to do this, since he's talking about we are humans and we're
00:22:24to become like God, well then, by default, Christ was also a human, and the human Christ
00:22:31had to become God.
00:22:32And he would often say things like this.
00:22:35He would say Jesus could perform no miracles unless he first saw a vision from the Father.
00:22:40And what he was saying there is, Jesus was not divine, Jesus was not God, therefore you
00:22:45too can become God.
00:22:46And that's exactly what he was doing through this theological framework.
00:22:50The deeper you get into this, the more sick it makes you to your stomach, because what
00:22:54he is doing is, he is actually rejecting the idea that God sent his only son, and that
00:23:00his son, Christ Jesus, was divine.
00:23:02If you're a Christian, this is the most insulting thing that can ever happen in a sermon.
00:23:07And, you know, people should have just got up and walked out.
00:23:11But as you said before, they weren't focused on the doctrine.
00:23:14They were instead focused on the experiences.
00:23:17And that really turns out to be the root of all of this mess that we're in today.
00:23:22So yeah, John, this is going to be a whirlwind of a trip here as we dive into this.
00:23:26We're just going to take our time with these concepts, because it will take some time to
00:23:30develop the thought.
00:23:31And I'm sure you can show how these things that we're talking about are weaved into the
00:23:36movements that you're discussing in your podcast, such as the NAR and the charismatic world.
00:23:42So we'll take some time to develop these thoughts and go through all the twists and turns about
00:23:46it.
00:23:46It's a difficult subject to speak about, because there are beliefs on either side, and the
00:23:51church is really divided over trinity versus oneness over these things.
00:23:55So I won't be trying to prove a doctrine or anything else or try to present a doctrine and
00:24:01say this is definitive, other than because I think most of the disagreements that we have
00:24:06over trinity versus oneness are just semantics, except when they try to diminish who Christ was.
00:24:13So some of the oneness doctrines that was preached way back when, and this is some of
00:24:19the things that's even carried into the message, they diminish Christ.
00:24:23And that's what it tends to do.
00:24:25It tends to put Christ as a lesser being or a created being, even.
00:24:31And so that's certainly not the case, because Christ existed, or Jesus as the Son, existed
00:24:38with the Father from the very beginning.
00:24:40He didn't, he wasn't a thought of God, he was God.
00:24:44So it's just something I see that's happened here that, you know, the diminishing of Christ
00:24:51is a big deal, and we cannot do that.
00:24:54And we'll show this as we go through this.
00:24:57So the first major deviation from Christian doctrine, you know, found within the seat
00:25:01of God concept is how Christ is presented.
00:25:04And what I see in William Branham's teaching is a departure from the gospel, you know, in
00:25:08more ways than one.
00:25:10And Paul warned us about leaving the gospel that he preached from the very beginning,
00:25:14and that deviating from it, you know, does cause a curse to come to you.
00:25:20And so William Branham's ministers have an excuse for teaching something different than
00:25:24Paul, because they've exalted William Branham up to on par with Paul, as a man called of
00:25:30God.
00:25:30So in their minds, William Branham is essentially writing new scripture, anything he says, even
00:25:37if it deviates from the Bible, becomes new scripture or inspired word.
00:25:41You know, Paul's teaching then gets put to the sidelines, as they'll say, that was Paul's
00:25:48day, but this is our day.
00:25:49And even William Branham said on probably two occasions that we have something different,
00:25:54because the gospel that Paul preached will not work in this day.
00:25:58So that's a very dangerous statement to make.
00:26:01And that's why, can you imagine that these people are preaching today, they've brought a
00:26:06curse on themselves because they believe this stuff.
00:26:09So once they make that leap, they no longer try to search out the scriptures and try to
00:26:14get a good foundation on what Paul and the other apostles were saying to the church.
00:26:19They begin to use scriptures just to back up what William Branham taught.
00:26:23But then they end up having to twist the plain meaning.
00:26:25I know we've brought out that in other podcasts that we've done recently with the 70 disciples
00:26:30and also with Acts 19.
00:26:33So here we have another quote from William Branham in 1964, March the 4th, called Sirs,
00:26:39We Would See Jesus.
00:26:40He says,
00:26:41He was the eternal, just the eternal one.
00:26:44He's speaking about God there.
00:26:46There was no moon, no stars, no angels, no nothing.
00:26:49But in this being that we call God our Father was attributes.
00:26:53There we are again.
00:26:55In him was attribute to be a father.
00:26:57In him was attribute to be God.
00:26:59And here's another important one.
00:27:01In him was attribute to be a son.
00:27:04In him was attribute to be Savior.
00:27:07In him was attribute to be a healer.
00:27:10All these things that we see now is just displaying his attributes or thoughts.
00:27:15And he didn't say it in this quote, but he also means the same thing for the bride.
00:27:21The bride was in him was to be a bride.
00:27:24And we're going to see this in a quote from a well-known minister that's passed on now.
00:27:27But I did highly respect him.
00:27:30And he taught on the Godhead.
00:27:33And we'll hear what he says about these attributes.
00:27:35And I'll point that out later on.
00:27:39So in this quote, we see how he diminishes the person of Jesus Christ by calling him an attribute.
00:27:44You know, instead of a person of God, instead of being God himself, he's just one of the attributes of God.
00:27:49Places Jesus has the attribute, not as the person.
00:27:52So being an attribute, then you are a thought.
00:27:56And that's the same as God's other thoughts.
00:27:58He did say thoughts are attributes, as we saw earlier in the quote we just read.
00:28:03So when we speak of, say, the triune God, Father, Son, Holy Spirit, existing from eternity past,
00:28:09all three being the person of God and all being co-equal, no matter how God chooses to act,
00:28:14if he acts as the Holy Spirit or as the Son or as the Father, they are all co-equal and they are fully God.
00:28:21They're not just attributes being part of God.
00:28:25They are fully God, no matter which one is doing the manifesting.
00:28:29So Christianity would say that when the Son came down into the baby Jesus, it was fully God then.
00:28:34But in William Branham's doctrine, he would say Jesus only became fully God when the Holy Spirit came down at the River Jordan at his baptism.
00:28:43Now, I know that's a lot to digest there, but that's really the truth of what he's saying.
00:28:49But he speaks to so many different groups.
00:28:52If you read through the message or if you study it, you're not going to find it every time he says that,
00:28:56but that's really the core of the doctrine.
00:28:58Because sometimes he will say to other groups, you know, he would believe Jesus was God and he would say that.
00:29:05But deep down and when he's speaking to other groups, he would not confess that.
00:29:10So you just have to read through and discern.
00:29:14So William Branham would say that God dwelled in Christ, but Jesus was not all fully God by himself.
00:29:19Now, I'll read another quote from a different minister who's also passed on,
00:29:23but he was one of the people that William Branham called the theologian of the message.
00:29:28So he knew and him and William Branham conferred very closely together.
00:29:34So he knew what William Branham thought.
00:29:36It's very interesting to hear what his statements are.
00:29:39So in the same message, Christ is the mystery of God revealed July 28th again in 63.
00:29:46He said,
00:29:46So here he's saying, he's modified the scripture a little bit because the scripture doesn't say I'm pleased to dwell in.
00:30:03It said in whom I'm pleased to dwell.
00:30:04So by saying whom I'm pleased to dwell in, you're putting the son as being a different person than God.
00:30:15He's not God until God comes to dwell in him.
00:30:18He said, this is my son whom I'm pleased to dwell in.
00:30:21I'm just pleased to dwell in him.
00:30:23God had to come and dwell in Christ in order to be God.
00:30:27So, and he said, that's God and man becoming one.
00:30:30But see, Jesus was God all by himself, you know, prior to even the Holy Spirit coming upon him at the River Jordan.
00:30:39He was born Christ the Lord.
00:30:41He was fully God even as a baby.
00:30:44He was fully God all the way through until his death on the cross.
00:30:49And that's the big difference.
00:30:50And that's where they diminished Jesus by not making him fully God from the time he was a baby to the time he died on the cross.
00:30:56Have you ever wondered how the Pentecostal movement started, or how the progression of modern Pentecostalism transitioned through the latter reign, charismatic, and other fringe movements into the New Apostolic Reformation?
00:31:10You can learn this and more on William Branham Historical Research's website, william-branham.org.
00:31:17On the books page of the website, you can find the compiled research of John Collins, Charles Paisley, Stephen Montgomery, John McKinnon, and others, with links to the paper, audio, and digital versions of each book.
00:31:32You can also find resources and documentation on various people and topics related to those movements.
00:31:38If you want to contribute to the cause, you can support the podcast by clicking the Contribute button at the top.
00:31:45And as always, be sure to like and subscribe to the audio or video version that you're listening to or watching.
00:31:52On behalf of William Branham Historical Research, we want to thank you for your support.
00:31:56You know, John, when I was leaving the message cult following of William Branham,
00:32:01one of the things that I did was I started reading the Bible over and over and over again to try to wash all of this nonsense out of my head.
00:32:08And it was actually fairly difficult because I started to learn that we had a lot of loaded language that in some cases was a loaded language Bible verse
00:32:20that meant a huge path of theology for us that was programmed into our heads that was not actually from the Bible.
00:32:27And William Branham would often, you know, when he's programming the heads of the people who are listening,
00:32:35he's often taking one verse and adding words to it or taking words away from it or sometimes even taking two different verses
00:32:43and blending them together to create a new Bible verse that doesn't exist.
00:32:47And then he'll say things like the Bible says, and he'll mention this new thing that he has created of his own invention.
00:32:55Sadly, there were not too many people sitting in the audience who actually went back to their Bibles to see,
00:33:01is this thing that he said really in the Bible?
00:33:04And those who did, you know, they probably thought, well, he just messed this up.
00:33:08But when you understand that he built entire theologies based on his additions and retractions of Scripture or combinations of Scripture,
00:33:17this turns into a huge problem.
00:33:19And one of the phrases that really hit me was he added the words, even in you.
00:33:25He said, the Bible says, I will be with you, even in you until the end of the world.
00:33:31And, you know, to a normal Christian who's listening, they think, well, that's not so bad.
00:33:36God said he would send the Holy Spirit.
00:33:38Maybe he's talking about the Holy Spirit.
00:33:40But no, he's specifically talking about exactly what we're talking about today.
00:33:44He's talking about this manifestation of God.
00:33:47God will be even in you.
00:33:49And he will add this.
00:33:50He adds this phrase.
00:33:51There were some that were just really absurd.
00:33:54He took two passages, and I can't remember exactly.
00:33:59I think they're both from Psalms.
00:34:01But he would say that the Bible says we're born in sin, shapen in iniquity, come into the world, speaking lies.
00:34:08And it sounds good.
00:34:09It sounds like a Bible verse.
00:34:10And it sounds like everybody can freely tell things that aren't true.
00:34:14But that's not really what the Bible says.
00:34:17The Bible has a verse that's talking about born in, you know, brought forth in iniquity from the mother and desiring truth, I think, is one passage from the Bible.
00:34:27I think it's Psalms, maybe 51.
00:34:30And then in Psalms 58, he says the wicked are the ones who come.
00:34:35The Bible says the wicked are the ones who come to the world speaking lies.
00:34:38So he's literally taking two passages of Scripture, one talking about the wicked, one talking about the godly, mixes them together and says, you are this thing that I have invented, this Bible verse that I've invented.
00:34:50And really, when it comes down to it, the whole framework of Branham's theology was this hodgepodge of mixing passages, taking words and phrases out of context, actually altering Bible text and programming it into the minds of the people to make them believe this new thing that he's created.
00:35:12In essence, it's a new Bible.
00:35:13And he was very open about this.
00:35:16He said, today we believe the spoken word.
00:35:18And that was literally the recordings of William Branham, which was to replace the written word, which was the Bible.
00:35:25So this whole mess that we're in today literally comes down to this is a person who's not only telling you, don't go listen to the theologians or people who actually know sound theology.
00:35:36Listen to me because I will invent new Bible verses and you will listen to these new Bible verses and be become gods.
00:35:44You'll become just like God.
00:35:45So the same way God's other children are born as Jesus was, they become God in the same manner because God is pleased to dwell in them as well.
00:35:55So this teaching lines up perfectly well with the serpent seed doctrines and believing that a certain group of people were the seed of God, thoughts of God in the beginning, while others were not on account of election, predestination, and even Noah's sons, which brings in the racial element to this.
00:36:15So to be fair, you know, not all message ministers will stay on the racial element, but some do.
00:36:22And those who don't stay on that racial element still believe in the seeds or thoughts of God coming to earth in their time, but admit the seed can come through any race at this time.
00:36:35I know this is very deep teaching we're going on here, but we're zeroing in on the foundations.
00:36:41And I hope this is really helpful.
00:36:43But going on, you know, William Branham said he only followed what Paul preached, but we've already shown many places where he really didn't preach what Paul preached.
00:36:53But then he also said Paul's gospel won't work in this day.
00:36:56Now, that's such a contradiction.
00:36:59I don't think you can have it both ways, of course.
00:37:01You can either stick with Paul or you can make up your own gospel, which is what I believe, you know, message ministers have done and William Branham has done.
00:37:09And it's really all shameful.
00:37:11So if you're not convinced of what I'm saying, I want you to listen to this quote here.
00:37:17This is in the Messiah in 1961, January the 17th.
00:37:21William Branham said,
00:37:22Man was made to be a God.
00:37:25God was made to be man.
00:37:27Oh, Messiah, the great Jehovah dwelt in a human body.
00:37:31He made that body like his so he could be a human body, a Messiah-et, to govern his earth and control it.
00:37:38Amen.
00:37:38The works that I do shall they do also.
00:37:40Oh, I like that.
00:37:42Jehovah walks back and forth over his throne, says,
00:37:44This is my, them is my eaglets.
00:37:46They are, they are flesh of my flesh and bone of my bone.
00:37:49They are born of my spirit and washed in my blood.
00:37:52Amen.
00:37:53They're mine.
00:37:53They're mine.
00:37:54Anything I tell them, they believe it.
00:37:56Why?
00:37:56They're eagles.
00:37:57That's what they are.
00:37:58They're eagles just the same as I'm an eagle.
00:38:00They're little gods where I'm a big God.
00:38:04That's right.
00:38:04I'm Jehovah Papa and they're my children.
00:38:06There you are.
00:38:07So, you see, in this very quote here, he's declaring that God, in these thoughts, in these attributes, these people were God from the beginning.
00:38:18All that happened is, is they became expressed on earth, and then Jehovah God, in the form of the Holy Spirit, came and dwelt in them, and now they're Messiah-ets.
00:38:26Now they're little gods.
00:38:28And that's, he puts Jesus on the same level as that, because he said, you know, I wanted to dwell in a human body called Jesus Christ so I could, you know, die for them.
00:38:39Well, it's a little different than that.
00:38:41See, Jesus was fully God.
00:38:44You know, yeah, the Holy Spirit came down and anointed him, but that was a sign to John the Baptist that this was the Messiah.
00:38:51But see, he was fully God when he was born as a baby, because the Bible said he was born Christ, the Lord.
00:38:58He was already God in flesh.
00:39:01Remember, let's see, in the message, why, in 1961, January 28th, William Branham says this,
00:39:08Remember when a man is saved, this much, like this button here, becomes eternal life in your heart.
00:39:14That's God.
00:39:15As you're able to push out all the roots of bitterness, then God begins to spread in you.
00:39:20And see, that's a little bit of works, doctrine put in there.
00:39:24He said, then you become a son of God.
00:39:26He said, a man was made to be God, to be a God.
00:39:30Do you know that?
00:39:31He's in the image of God.
00:39:33He's a son of God.
00:39:34He's like him.
00:39:36He was given a domain, dominion over the whole earth.
00:39:38That's right.
00:39:39He ruled the earth.
00:39:40He ruled the animal kingdom and all the other kingdoms.
00:39:43But all the kingdoms of God above, all but the kingdom of God above.
00:39:49He was God.
00:39:50He was an amateur God.
00:39:51Now, I can say that Adam was a son of God.
00:39:55And Adam had powers probably that we don't possess today.
00:40:00But to say he was God, you know, in the way William Branham is describing it, you know, it's a leap.
00:40:07And I'm not surprised when I see people go into some strange practices, you know, in this message and condone many things that should not be in the church because here he's telling you you're a God.
00:40:19So if I'm my own God, which is what Satan told Eve in the beginning, that you're going to be like gods, knowing good and evil, you know, when you think you're a God, you begin to think that you're invincible.
00:40:30And we've seen what happens to these groups, you know, what continues to happen even today when they've embraced teachings like this.
00:40:38You know, men obtain absolute power over the congregation.
00:40:42Their teachings put the people in bondage instead of Christian liberty.
00:40:45And the people don't even realize it.
00:40:47You know, some of the most extreme groups, you know, eventually result in death of their members, whether it's withholding medical treatment or starving themselves that we've seen recently, or even committing mass suicide.
00:41:01You know, people within these groups see rules that they live by as safe spaces.
00:41:06And their consciences have been trained for many years to stay within certain boundaries.
00:41:10They perceive any departure from the rules as defilement, such as having Christmas trees, or some condemn giving presents, or having a small slit in their skirt, they're condemned by it, trimming the hair, having a beard, having a TV in the home.
00:41:26All these things we've seen in any one or more message churches.
00:41:30All these rules work on the outside of the person instead of the heart.
00:41:35And if a person gets out of line, you know, the peer pressure is so strong to push people back in line.
00:41:41Ministers tend to hide this fact before the public as new people come into the church.
00:41:46But these new people quickly find out what they're allowed to do and what they're not to do, what's acceptable and what's not acceptable, generally after the first service.
00:41:56And those who don't measure up, you know, they'll feel embarrassed and eventually probably leave, which is what core members really want to have happen.
00:42:03You know, they would rather see people leave and who won't comply with their rules than really caring for their souls and really find out if they really know and believe the gospel.
00:42:15Because they don't preach the gospel in these churches.
00:42:17They just preach rules.
00:42:19These outward things they push for extreme holiness standards have nothing to do with the gospel.
00:42:24Because the gospel is simple as faith in Jesus Christ and his work on the cross, John.
00:42:28As I said, whenever I was going through the process of deprogramming all of this nonsense from my head, and I was reading the Bible over and over, there were things that stuck out to me.
00:42:39Some of them was the loaded language, the phrases that I mentioned before.
00:42:43But other things were letters written from Paul or things written in the prophets that were a clear contradiction of the very foundation that William Branham's ministry was based upon.
00:42:54One of them, like you mentioned here, was the works doctrine.
00:42:59This is exactly in contradiction to the things that Paul was correcting the church for.
00:43:04And one of the passages that really hit me hard was Colossians 2.
00:43:09Towards the end of the passage, there's a place where, you know, people are familiar with talking about the food sacrificed to idols, the drink.
00:43:18And if you're a literalist, you apply that in a literal way.
00:43:22Literally, now I could go drink drinks that were—or eat food that was sacrificed to idols.
00:43:28But where are you going to find this today?
00:43:30You have to really apply it to the things that Paul is saying fundamentally, not just the literal phrasing.
00:43:37But if you read it in some of the modern translations that is very, very much easier to understand, it gets into asceticism, which is literally trying to deny yourself the things that you would rather enjoy just to make yourself feel and become as though you're more holy.
00:43:56Paul says this is of no value in several places.
00:43:59But Colossians 2, it's very clear.
00:44:02He says that, let no one disqualify you, insisting on asceticism and worship of angels, going on in detail about visions, puffed up without reason by his own sensuous mind.
00:44:15And, I mean, that phrase just hit me really hard because we were focused on demons.
00:44:20We were listening to people who were really puffed up, who were really boastful.
00:44:24They were filled with pride.
00:44:26And I started examining myself, and I, too, was in that same category, believe it or not.
00:44:32So I'm sitting here thinking this, Paul is writing this as a correction to the church, yet this is exactly what the message was built upon.
00:44:40Then I left the message.
00:44:42I started examining all of the churches that really kind of developed from this, and I noticed that they're all following that same pattern.
00:44:50They're all doing exactly what Paul would be preaching against.
00:44:52So, again, it come down, you know, for me, I'm looking at this thinking, it's not even really the same Bible they're reading.
00:44:59Yes, it is physically the same Bible, but they have been taught to read it in such a way that they're ignoring the commandments and the advice that's given by Paul.
00:45:09And in doing so, they're turning it into a different religion altogether.
00:45:12So, in William Branham's teaching, you know, Jesus Christ, the man, is also not seen as eternally existing, you know, with the Father, as Father, Son, Holy Spirit.
00:45:23This is in the message, Water Baptism in 1961, January the 20th.
00:45:28He said, it's just like the Catholics say, eternal sonship, the eternal sonship of Christ.
00:45:33How can the word make sense?
00:45:35How can he be eternal and be a son?
00:45:38Son that was born off of, eternal, had no beginning or end.
00:45:42He also said, and the word became flesh, 1954, October the 3rd, in the morning.
00:45:48He said, for if he was the Son of God, he had to have a beginning of time.
00:45:54Now, that's very interesting that he said that, you know, he had to be born off of it, he said, to be a son.
00:45:59Is that right?
00:46:00If he was the Son of God.
00:46:02So, that's what we're going to see that he believed here.
00:46:05In the beginning, he believed that Jesus had to have a beginning.
00:46:09The Son had to have a beginning.
00:46:12And we'll see that in these two ministers' teaching as we bring it out.
00:46:17Now, that's so dangerous of a teaching because now you've diminished Christ.
00:46:22You've taken him.
00:46:23Yeah, God dwelt in him.
00:46:24And you could say, well, he was God because God dwelt in Christ and because God manifested himself in this Son that came out from God.
00:46:32But what you do is you take the Son away from God in the beginning.
00:46:37You don't have them dwelling together in the beginning.
00:46:40And so, therefore, you can say Jesus is not God.
00:46:43And I've got a quote here where the minister actually said Jesus was not God.
00:46:48Now, here's another quote.
00:46:491954, in October the 3rd, the same one, word became flesh.
00:46:54He said, I'll send forth my Son, Christ Jesus.
00:46:58There was the word.
00:46:59He said, in the beginning, before it was a word, it was a thought.
00:47:04So, right here is what I've been saying all along.
00:47:07He believed Jesus was an attribute of God but not very God.
00:47:10Just like he puts us in the same category, be it an attribute of God.
00:47:15And, therefore, we can become God because as Jesus became God, we do the same thing.
00:47:20He said, in the beginning, before it was a word expressed from a thought, it was a thought.
00:47:26And notice how he often does this for self-deification.
00:47:30A lot of times it's not really so much that the follower, the person who's a rank and file member sitting out in the seat, can become this manifestation of God.
00:47:39He wants to make sure that his manifestation, as William Branham, is far greater than their manifestation, which is just the rank and file member.
00:47:46You can never become as powerful or as having as great of a manifestation, I guess I'll call it, as what William Branham claimed to have.
00:47:56And he would say, like the thing that I mentioned earlier, he says that no miracle could be performed by Jesus unless he first saw a vision from the Father.
00:48:05And then he proceeds to tell the people about all of his visions that he had received from God.
00:48:11So he's comparing himself to Jesus in those cases.
00:48:14And in some cases, he outright claimed that the Elijah of today, which he's referring to himself, is the Lord Jesus Christ.
00:48:22He's literally saying that he, William Branham, is Jesus in the same way that Jesus was Jesus.
00:48:27They were both manifestations of God.
00:48:30And you, too, can become a manifestation of God, just not as much of a manifestation as me, William Branham.
00:48:37So here's another quote.
00:48:39Word became flesh, same one.
00:48:41He said, God's word is eternal.
00:48:42In the beginning was the word.
00:48:44And the word was with God.
00:48:45And the word was God.
00:48:47I want to take that.
00:48:48That's John 1.1.
00:48:49Now, I'll tell you, this minister that I'm going to quote from in this podcast here today, he stumbled over this, over John 1.1.
00:49:00It's so funny.
00:49:01In his messages on the Godhead, he would stumble over that.
00:49:05And he has a quote from William Branham even saying, you can't make the word being in the beginning with God before when God existed eternally alone as a self-existing one.
00:49:17Because he said, you'll have three gods.
00:49:21But see, the word always existed.
00:49:23Always existed with God in the beginning.
00:49:26It was Father, Word, and Holy Spirit.
00:49:28Now, the word was the Son.
00:49:30But they were in there in the beginning, even before anything was created.
00:49:35So he said, I'll carry on here in his quote.
00:49:37He said, God in the beginning, back there when he's seen the world, he's seen you and I here this morning.
00:49:44He's seen my baby sitting back there yonder.
00:49:46He's seen every hungry person in India.
00:49:48He's seen every preacher in the pulpit.
00:49:50He's seen every hypocrite walking.
00:49:51He's seen the whole thing.
00:49:53The infinite mind of God foresaw it.
00:49:55And he said, now to redeem that falling race, I'll send forth my Son, Christ Jesus.
00:50:00There was the word.
00:50:01In the beginning, before it was a word.
00:50:03So before he was a word, it was a thought.
00:50:06So he's saying Jesus was a thought before he became a word.
00:50:10He said, before it was a thought, it was expressed in a word.
00:50:16Before, okay, here he goes.
00:50:19Before it was a thought, it was expressed in a word.
00:50:23And the word became material and dwelt among us.
00:50:26The word became flesh.
00:50:27So you see how he's got Jesus coming down?
00:50:30Jesus was an attribute.
00:50:32Then God spoke the word and Jesus was born.
00:50:37Now, he used that word to bring that word down in the flesh and then he dwelt in that body.
00:50:43God himself came down and dwelt in the body.
00:50:46That's the only thing that made him God, according to William Branham's doctrine.
00:50:50But William Branham, in front of various audiences, would never let on to the people what he really taught.
00:50:55Or he would have lost a lot of supporters to begin with.
00:50:57He always taught that sons have beginnings, though.
00:51:01So Jesus was not eternal with the Father because he had a beginning.
00:51:04Jesus was the word, which is a thought in his teaching.
00:51:09He would say the thought of God is eternal.
00:51:12But when you get down to it, the thought is part of God, but not fully God.
00:51:16Because we were thoughts of God according to him.
00:51:18But then we're not fully God, right?
00:51:21I could be in agreement that the son, being that we're talking only about the flesh of Jesus,
00:51:26was not in manifestation in the beginning until Christ was born in the manger.
00:51:31I could go along with that.
00:51:33But this does not mean that the son, being called the word, was just a thought of God
00:51:37and not really God from eternity past.
00:51:40You know, the Bible teaches that Father, Son, and Holy Spirit all existed in eternity past.
00:51:44One or more of them were not just thoughts of God.
00:51:47But these three were God himself and what makes up the person of God.
00:51:51Now, if you looked at God, of course, you wouldn't be able to see a distinguishing feature of
00:51:57Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
00:51:58He's spirit, but yet it was there.
00:52:01All of these three made up the one true God and all were in existence together from eternity
00:52:06past, you know, prior to anything else.
00:52:09Jesus didn't just come into existence as a thought expressed.
00:52:13So I'll be able to show that William Brown did not believe, you know, this, as I just said,
00:52:18as we'll see as we go through this.
00:52:20But the root of this teaching is in the teaching about God's attributes or God's thoughts.
00:52:24You know, materialization, as God's thoughts became real, is called logos, expressed in
00:52:31word form.
00:52:32In William Brown's teaching, all the elite bride Christian were in God's thoughts.
00:52:36In the beginning, they were eternal.
00:52:38William Brown's teaching does not include other denominations in this group, however.
00:52:43Somehow, though, according to him, those other denominations other than his group will
00:52:48be saved.
00:52:49But they were not God's thoughts, because if you were in God's thoughts, you were the
00:52:54bride.
00:52:55Exactly.
00:52:56An us versus them mentality.
00:52:58One of the things that also hit me, I mentioned as I was reading the Bible, Romans 16, I think,
00:53:03it talks about those who would come and create divisions in the church.
00:53:08And that's exactly, if you understand what he's saying, that is exactly what he's doing
00:53:11here.
00:53:12We're creating a dividing line in the sand.
00:53:14There are those Christians who don't believe me and accept me, William Branham, as God's
00:53:19prophet.
00:53:19And then there are us.
00:53:21So we have a dividing line.
00:53:23And Paul to the Romans said, avoid those who create such divisions.
00:53:27He said, they don't serve the Lord Jesus Christ, but their own appetites.
00:53:32And he says, through smooth talk and flattery, they deceive the hearts of the naive.
00:53:36So if you understand what William Branham is doing here, and understand what Paul is saying,
00:53:42the two cannot coexist.
00:53:44And like you said, William Branham would often say, I'm preaching the same message that Paul
00:53:48preached.
00:53:49Well, William Branham is preaching division, and Paul is preaching to avoid those who are
00:53:54creating divisions.
00:53:55Okay, this is Serpent's Seed, 1958, September 28th.
00:54:02Now, this is a message.
00:54:05After he preached this, he lost a lot of supporters.
00:54:07So listen to this.
00:54:08God hid it from the eyes of the wise and prudent and promised to reveal it to the sons of God
00:54:12in the last days, when the sons of God will be made manifest, when God's sons that rejoiced
00:54:18ever before the foundation of the world, when the great revelation of the Godhead and things
00:54:23would be brought down in the last days, he would manifest these things through the sons
00:54:28of God.
00:54:29You know, the scriptures teach that, and here we are.
00:54:32That's the reason God is opening these things to us.
00:54:35God is bringing his sons into manifestation.
00:54:38So you see what he's saying there.
00:54:39He is going beyond the limitations of any human knowledge, way into the spiritual revelations
00:54:46to bring it down.
00:54:47Haven't we been teaching in this Bible, here is to him as wisdom, not that he learned in some
00:54:53seminary, but what he learned on his knees before God, what pleased God to give him.
00:54:57Sons of God may manifest.
00:55:00So now I'm going to go into this video here we have from the minister.
00:55:05I won't name his name, but he's passed on, but it'll be explaining some of the things that
00:55:10we've been talking about.
00:55:12In this invisible God were these manifold attributes.
00:55:16And since he is Jehovah God that wants to unveil himself, then we find that this unveiling has
00:55:23to take place.
00:55:24It's been going on for thousands of years.
00:55:26So this invisible God making a way for manifestations such as judge and redeemer and healer and guide
00:55:34and comforter, all these various attributes.
00:55:36God has laid out a plan through which he can unveil himself.
00:55:43Now, this invisible God, these attributes are in the invisible God.
00:55:48So we're going to shrink the invisible God back because that's not what we're interested in.
00:55:52We're trying to show the manifestation of the invisible God.
00:55:56So this invisible God recedes back and is not the one that we're interested in.
00:56:02We're interested in this manifestation.
00:56:04So out of the invisible God comes a form called a theophany and the biblical term, excuse me,
00:56:12a theological term, which means a word, form, body.
00:56:17And so this theological form now comes out from God because God is going to declare himself.
00:56:23So this is the beginning now of the declaration of the thoughts of God, the attributes of God,
00:56:29which is in him.
00:56:30So now this invisible God begins to pour himself and his attributes into this theophonic form,
00:56:37which we'll find, and we showed you last time, that this form is Christ.
00:56:41Before he ever came to flesh, it's Christ, the very power through which all of heaven and earth was created.
00:56:47So all that God was now, he pours into this Christ form.
00:56:52And now this is a body form as the invisible God is moving from the invisible down eventually to meet his creation in flesh as a savior.
00:57:03So he's moving from the invisible down, down, down in dimension wise, coming closer and closer down to us.
00:57:09So it doesn't finish when God actually pours his attributes into him, that God himself steps into this tabernacle.
00:57:17And then now this is the son of God in a prefigure.
00:57:21As you see, this minister of the message, who I have a lot of respect for, but he was never able to see this error because he fully believed it.
00:57:29It starts with this concept of God's attributes.
00:57:32He's very articulate, you know, in these beliefs of the message.
00:57:35So I use this material to help us understand, you know, what the message believes.
00:57:41And I want you to notice as he was going over the attributes or the thoughts of God in the beginning, you know, he skipped over the word family.
00:57:49The word family is there, but he skips over it.
00:57:52He doesn't say a lot about it because he's just beginning to bring this out.
00:57:55He doesn't want to let on what he's talking about.
00:57:57But the family represents Christians who were thoughts of God, as well as Jesus being in God, representing a thought of God.
00:58:06And then the thought was expressed and became a son in a prefigure.
00:58:09You saw how he explained that, how the thought came out from God.
00:58:13And that was like the son of God in a prefigure as a theophany.
00:58:18And then he said God stepped into that and that made him God.
00:58:22When he came out from God, it really wasn't fully God.
00:58:24And see, that's to me, that's error because the son was in God from the beginning, fully God.
00:58:31He wasn't just a thought of God or an attribute.
00:58:33He was fully God, just the same as the Holy Spirit was, same as the father is.
00:58:39So this gets to the root of the teaching and really lets you know what they think about the son of God.
00:58:43There's more to come on that, lots more.
00:58:45But for now, you know, God to them in the beginning is not just father, son, or word and the Holy Spirit,
00:58:53who is what the church has decided to use as terms for the persons of the Godhead is what makes up the person of God.
00:59:00But God to them is full of thoughts, you know, with the son being one of those thoughts, but not really all of God.
00:59:06That's the difference in the Orthodox Christianity and the message.
00:59:10That's the huge difference.
00:59:11The word didn't really dwell with God from eternity past in the way William Brennan preaches it.
00:59:17The word or Christ came into existence, and you saw when the minister showed how it came out from God,
00:59:23came into existence, but only as a thought in the beginning, not as a person.
00:59:29And certainly could not be called God at that time.
00:59:32You know, Orthodox Christianity has always said the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit dwelt together in eternity past.
00:59:38They were all the full attribute of God.
00:59:41They were all fully God, but they were not the same.
00:59:46All were the person of God except they're not the same, but all have the same mind and will.
00:59:52So some of what this minister does say, though, as he goes through, will sound very Orthodox,
00:59:56as William Brennan did at times, and scriptures will be used to describe, you know, what he's talking about.
01:00:01I want you to listen to this quote, too, in 1950, in August 15th, when he preached a sermon called Who is God?
01:00:10He said, so he first was God, Jehovah.
01:00:13And you can picture this as a spirit.
01:00:15And out of him, let's see coming out of space where there's nothing.
01:00:18Let's make it a little white light, like a mystic light, like a halo.
01:00:22And that was the Logos that went out of God in the beginning.
01:00:27That was the Son of God that came out of the bosom of the Father.
01:00:31That was what was in the beginning was the Word.
01:00:34And the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us.
01:00:38In the beginning was God.
01:00:40And then out of God came the Logos, a part of God that went out of God.
01:00:45Listen to that.
01:00:46A part of God, just a part of God that went out of God, not fully God.
01:00:50Now we see this is like a child playing before the door.
01:00:54It was the Son of God, the Logos.
01:00:57But you see, William Branham's teaching, before it could be the Logos, which is a word, it had to be a thought.
01:01:03Because this other minister I just played the video of, he'll say this again.
01:01:07He'll say, keep this in mind through this whole series, a word is a thought expressed.
01:01:13It's such a twisting.
01:01:15And if you understand what he's trying to do with 1 John,
01:01:18He's trying to say, in the beginning was a thought expressed.
01:01:22And the thought expressed was in God, and the thought expressed was God.
01:01:26You too can become a God, because you are also a thought in God's mind.
01:01:31You are this thought expressed.
01:01:33It's just a subtle twisting of what the Bible says.
01:01:37And it reminds you very much of what, you know, actually exactly what the serpent was doing in the Garden of Eden.
01:01:44You too can become just like God.
01:01:45You can know this knowledge between good and evil.
01:01:48William Branham was bringing that as literally his framework of his entire message.
01:01:54You can know the secret mystery.
01:01:56You can know more.
01:01:57And you can become just like God.
01:01:59So, in effect, he is not teaching the same message as Paul.
01:02:03He's teaching the same message as the serpent from the Garden of Eden.
01:02:06I'll say a few more words here about these teachings.
01:02:09But the teaching begins, you know, with Christ being born out of God.
01:02:13You know, we've seen that.
01:02:14Not that he was God in the beginning as the Son with the Father and the Holy Spirit,
01:02:19but that Jesus was just a thought of God which came out of God.
01:02:23And then that being God being family, one of the attributes being family, the same as with you and me.
01:02:28So, this puts us on a somewhat equality with Jesus Christ.
01:02:33Jesus is just another Son of God like you and me, although he's a much greater Son, but he's still just a Son.
01:02:41Jesus is only God to the extent that God dwelt in Christ, you know, on earth.
01:02:47That's what made him God on earth was when Christ came down at the River Jordan, according to the teaching.
01:02:52Jesus then became a manifestation of God, and that is how William Branham's teaching makes that leap of him being God,
01:03:00or you being God, or on an equality with God, and being able to do these miraculous things that he says is going to come to the church.
01:03:08And this just exalts human beings and leads believers to say things like,
01:03:12well, I always was a Son of God, or I always had eternal life.
01:03:15So, then the human becomes less destitute, and he really always was God from the beginning,
01:03:23because he was made to be a God, right?
01:03:27So, by him teaching this and allowing people to believe that,
01:03:33then they don't realize how destitute they really are.
01:03:36They never come to that realization of total depravity and repentance that should be there.
01:03:43It only takes William Branham's light to strike the seed for you to come to life instead of a life of real repentance.
01:03:52So, the light is the message of the hour, or the signs and wonders being done through the ministry of William Branham.
01:03:58That is all that is needed to water the seed to make it come to life, according to the teaching.
01:04:04And so, that's how it's all explained and taught.
01:04:06You know, the beginnings of his teaching starts with how they teach that a person becomes a child of God.
01:04:11You know, William Branham's movement believes that they were a child of God from the very beginning of the existence in the mind of God,
01:04:18and his thoughts or attributes just as, and they were just as eternal as God is, since God's thoughts are eternal.
01:04:24But, you know, God did have the predestinated ones in his mind, of course.
01:04:30Of course, he knew the end from the beginning.
01:04:33He knew what was going to happen, and he had to ordain it.
01:04:36But, it was God choosing those that he wanted to save.
01:04:41People are born on the same basis.
01:04:44Everyone has a choice to make.
01:04:46But people are born with the same depraved nature as anybody else, through any human being, any race of people.
01:04:54But they need the gospel.
01:04:56You know, and that's how we become sons of God, by believing the gospel.
01:05:00Not because we were always a son of God, in God's mind from the beginning, as a thought that came down here as a seed.
01:05:07But because we're a seed of God, because he put his word in us through the new birth.
01:05:13So, John, I've really enjoyed getting into the subject matter, because I think it's at the very core of the belief system.
01:05:19I think what we're hitting at is the very core, especially of the message of William Branham.
01:05:23And parts of it, of course, let you weave it in to how it's migrated into the NAR.
01:05:28There's just so many angles to focus on.
01:05:30I've got to try to keep this simple as possible to avoid getting lost in the weeds and confusing anybody.
01:05:37You know, William Branham managed to weave all this together.
01:05:39And I'll have to say, as confusing as his teaching is, and scattered like it is, if you take the time to put it together,
01:05:45there is a picture that he's creating with it.
01:05:48But it is far off the word, I believe, and I've already shown in prior episodes how he takes passages of Scripture
01:05:54and then takes his own interpretation of it to fit his belief system, to try to weave it into there.
01:06:01And that's not the right thing to do.
01:06:03At some point, we'll bring out how he thought God meant for us to reproduce, even,
01:06:08instead of by sex in the beginning, how he was thinking we could reproduce just by spoken word of God.
01:06:14And he even weaves that into the belief that the bride was eternal with God in the beginning,
01:06:20just like Jesus was, but we just bypassed our original word body we were supposed to be in
01:06:26by having children through the spoken word.
01:06:29And that's going to be something we'll get into when it comes up at some point.
01:06:32I don't know how many episodes it'll take to get there.
01:06:35But we've got a lot more to cover on this subject, and we just need to stop here and pick it up the next time, John.
01:06:40Sounds good.
01:06:41Well, if you've enjoyed our show and you want more information, you can check us out on the web.
01:06:44You can find us at william-branham.org.
01:06:47For more about Roy Davis and William Branham, you can read The Persuasive Preacher, The Gifted Prophet, and The Noble Politician.
01:06:54And for more about the dark side of the New Apostolic Reformation, you can read Weaponized Religion,
01:06:59From Christian Identity to the NAR, available on Amazon, Kindle, and Audible.
01:07:14And for more about the New Apostolic Reformation, you can read Weaponized Religion.
01:07:18He's a visual editor of the New Apostolic Reformation.
01:07:19If you've enjoyed our show, you can read Weaponizedassador and get to know you.
01:07:21And we're going to read The Persuasive Preacher, the New Apostolic Reformation.
01:07:22And when you're watching, you can read Weaponized Religion.
01:07:24And you can read The Persuasive Preacher and The Loan of the Way, and you can read The Persuasive Preacher.
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