Ewald Frank

1985-02-03, 10:00 AM, Krefeld, Germany

broadcasted on 2024-12-15

Subject: We have to stay within the boundaries of the Word of God!

We not only have felt his presence, we have experienced his power. And I'm sure that testimonies will remain of that what God has done.

Our longing, our desire becomes stronger and stronger, deeper and deeper that God manifests himself in his might and glory.

When we sing, "The right hand of the Lord upholds the victory and it remains exalted."

And then on the other hand, so much trouble, knowing and hearing of it. Then one could ask himself, do we fool ourselves or is God right?

God is right.

When we search the Holy Scriptures, then we could start with Abel, who became the first sacrifice, continuing with all prophets who had to give their lives.

And then it was still testified: "The right hand of the Lord is exalted and the right hand of the Lord upholds the victory."

And if we then come to John the Baptist, who was beheaded, and then we can still say, "The right hand of the Lord upholds the victory."

And then coming to Christ our Lord, who was disgraced, nailed to the cross, and then it still says, "The right hand of the Lord upholds the victory."

And then if we go through the series to the martyrs of the early church, one after the other gave his life, and then it still says, "The right hand of the Lord upholds the victory."

This means not to look to the visible, but to the invisible, and to recognize that also all this is part of God's plan.

And that we don't argue with God or quarrel, but submitting to him, saying, "Thy will be done."

Last night we had such a wonderful meeting. But during the night a sister fell out of the bed. She is now in hospital. She has hit her head very badly, a laceration.

And one could ask oneself, "Why had this to be?" Yes?

And then say, "The right hand of the Lord upholds the victory." It's not so easy. You need faith, you need courage, to speak it out and also to be convinced of it, that it is so.

We will find it out at the latest on the day when the Lord calls his own home, that the right hand of the Lord upholded the victory.

In all the defeats, God has also a reason and purpose. He forms us. He shapes us. He molds us so that we don't walk on as we are, but that we become still in his presence.

With everything what God permits in our lives, He pursues a certain purpose, but we must pay attention to it and recognize that God speaks with us.

Early today I received a phone call from a medical institution and my heart was touched. Recently we spoke with a young lady. Satan always said to her, "You blasphemed the Holy Ghost." And it always went round like a disc.

And I said to her at least five times, if not ten times, I explained to her what the blaspheming of the Spirit means from the Scripture and that she absolutely cannot have done it.

But she always started anew.

And I didn't know, and I even don't know now, whether she has already experienced the Lord, whether she is a believer. I didn't know her.

But I said to her one thing, "Dear lady, if you don't believe what I say in the name of the Lord," I literally used the term, "then you end up in the nuthouse."

And exactly this happened. And this morning the doctor phoned me. And it touched my heart so much.

People don't understand that God uses lips and anoints them to speak with them. They think if God wants to speak with us, then it comes somehow from heaven.

It comes from heaven, but through the mouth of men, through God's Word, through God's spirit. And this the people must understand.

If this doesn't take place, then we cannot later on blame God for it.

We time and again experienced it in the ministry of Brother Branham. There were people who just thought that he is against denominations, that he wants to rebuke the women, he criticizes, he bashes on them.

And also such a phone call I had a couple of days ago. And the lady said to me, "I must come to the conclusion that Branham was a woman hater."

The people don't understand it. They don't know how well God means with them. As our brother Schmidt has read, "know that I have given you good statutes, sound regulations and statutes," of course not to enslave us, but to place us into "the glorious liberty of the children of God." [Rm 8:21]

We all notice how much we need God, how much we depend on Him and how we want to be led by the Spirit of God.

This applies to us who we have to stand here in the front.

I use this word on purpose, who we "must" stand here. I would rather that I could say I could sit there and not have to stand here. But God makes all decisions on which we have no influence and we submit to all these decisions.

One thing is sure, that we, as children of God, have to become aware of the mighty task and that all that is against each other and all the confusion must stop and that we united, shoulder by shoulder, fight against the powers of Satan and withdraw totally from his influence and that we are totally under the divine influence.

And this may not only be in words or in thoughts, but it must be so in the deed and in the truth.

And to it may God help me and all of us, so that we can fight the last battle and thus stand our ground before God and men.

As it says of Jacob, "You have wrestled with God and with men, and you won the victory." [Gn 32:28]

The life of a believer is a battle.

Without battle, no victory.

Without victory, no crown.

Paul writes, "Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of eternal life, which God, the righteous judge, shall give me on that day, and not to me only, but unto all them who love his appearing." [2Tm 4:8]

May we long for his appearing with all our hearts and may we love it.

I still want to extend the greetings from Brother Pesal. He greets all of us and he wishes us all God's blessing.

I couldn't arrange it differently this time, I have to, before the afternoon meeting, I have to leave for the airport, so I'm only here this morning.

But I wish you God's blessing with all my heart and his presence, his speaking and his working. And may he also give it to us this morning by his grace that we look at every meeting as a gift from God and every observation of his Word as grace that he still speaks with us.

May he open the hearts and anoint the eyes and give us all the right understanding for his Word and for that what he's doing now.

We have read in Deuteronomy in chapter 4 this many times emphasized word.

"Ye shall not add unto the word which I command you, neither shall ye diminish ought from it, that ye may keep the commandments of the Lord your God, which I command you."

Also the parallel scripture to it from Revelation 22 verse 19.

Many times it was said to us and it is always quoted in the sermons of brother Branham time and again.

It says in Revelation 22 verse 19:

"And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book."

But before that it is written in verse 18:

"For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, if any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book."

No one of us may expect that we add something to the completed testimony of the Holy Scripture and be it under the title "the seven mysterious voices of the seven thunders."

It cannot be and it will not be. Also the voices of the seven thunders must be a part of the Word of God and of the program of God. To the completed testimony of the Holy Scripture nothing can be added.

Therefore God has led us from the very beginning in such a way to not go beyond the testimony of the Holy Scripture but to remain within the limits of His word and to wait until it pleases Him to do the things which are still outstanding.

And then it will be early enough that we praise Him for it, for we know He will bring everything to pass what He has intended to do. But one after the other, as He placed it in an order, not as we want to hear or see it, but as He has planned it from eternity.

On the 6th of May 1946, when the angel came to him from the presence of God and said, "'As Moses was given two signs, so also you are given two signs.'"

And the angel said, "'When they will not hearken to the first, then they will have to hearken to the second.'"

As Moses received the two signs, first the rod and then the hand which he put into his bosom, so it was here, the hand on one side, when brother Branham took the hand of the patients into his hand and on his hand appeared the illness of that for whom he should pray. [Ex 4:3] And he could tell to each one hundreds and thousands, he told them what they suffered from, and they themselves could see their sickness on his hand.

And he commanded them even, "'Don't close your eyes, but look, look here now.'" Here it was, the first sign.

And then the second sign, the sign of the Messiah, that even the secrets and thoughts of the hearts would be revealed.

And this we heard time and again on the tapes and we read it in the sermons. And we came to know that in an unfallible way God revealed himself in this generation.

Brother Branham could say, "'If among the thousands of thousands of cases which God revealed to me is just one single case where something was not correct, then I want to be called a false prophet.'"

God was with him and therefore was that what he said the truth.

A man cannot do this by himself. Did you notice it in the film? He stood there helpless and he dares to say, "'I'm just as helpless as you are. You know on whom I'm waiting for. I wait for the presence of God. I wait for the angel of the Lord.'"

And suddenly even for him a surprise. Did you notice it on the film? He was himself surprised. And then he says, "Now he is here." And then it happened. He couldn't just come up with something like that.

He was not a man who had a remedy for every problem. He had to wait. And this shows us the status of a man of God. The dependency on God.

He could do nothing.

And what does our Lord say when he had the ministry as the Son of man on earth?

John 5 verse 19: "The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he sees the Father do."

This dependency from God. Don't you see that God wants to bring us into his total dependency and when he almost must force us into it, he wants to bring us into the full and total dependency to himself so that we don't have any own program but that we are placed into the program of God.

We may not add anything to his Words and woe unto us if we take something away from it. And to it belong also the promises and the word of prophecy for our days. It is not of our choosing that God gave promises for the first coming of the Lord and promises for the second coming of the Lord. We are grateful for it and recognize that God fulfills everything what he has said in his Word.

I still would like to read some scriptures which shall strengthen us in the faith from Philippians chapter 2. Philippians chapter 2 here it says from verse 13:

"For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure."

Not our willing, not our doing, but "God works both to will and to do." He starts, he continues, and he completes.

To it comes this remark that "you are well pleasing to him."

We cannot please God with that what we are doing. We can only please him with that what he can do through us. All our own works will only lead us into self-righteousness.

But if we may experience it, that God speaks through us, that God works through us, that God loves through us, that God can reveal himself through us, then everything becomes different, then God's well-pleasing rests on us and we notice that He who started, he continues, and he will finish it so that we please him.

In verse 14 it says:

"Do all things without murmurings and disputings: that ye may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world."

Also this is a word which we have to take to heart: "Do all things without murmurings and without doubting."

One can murmur, one can doubt, but all this doesn't bring us any further. The people of Israel doubted and didn't believe God, and they started to murmur, and God said, "I regret."

And he could not lead them in. "They died in the wilderness," and only the new-born generation then entered into the promised land.

"We shall do all things without murmurings and without doubting, that we may be blameless and harmless, being children of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation."

That mankind and this world is wrong and crooked, this we all know.

But we must be careful that we are not dragged into the crookedness and perversion, but that God gives us the grace to be separated, that our thoughts, our words, our deeds are different from what is going on in this crooked and perverse mankind, and that we prove ourselves to be the children of God.

That it's not just words, but that it could be manifested, not in a suit or in a dress, not with an outward appearance, with long hair or with nice dresses. This is outward.

No, the inner man shall be decorated with that what is precious in the sight of God.

Outwardly we can all do it. Inwardly only God can do it. And therefore we come here.

If we would come here outwardly as a beggar, it wouldn't matter. But when we as children of the King walk out from here with gifts from God, then everything was worthwhile.

"We shall be children of God without rebuke, blameless."

Earthly speaking we could only blame us and others and we probably would not find anything what could be shown as good. And here I think on a word which somebody said to the Lord with a form of address "Good Master". [Lk 18:18]

And our Lord in the form of a servant as the Son of Man corrected him and said "What do you call me good? Nobody is good but God alone"."

What do you say to it? Do you think you are good?

If our Lord, my Redeemer in the form of a servant as Man in his humiliation gives the instruction "Nobody is good but God alone" and rebukes the people, who are we that we would think of ourselves that we are good? Then firstly correct the Lord and then others and in the end yourself.

No, we have to humble ourselves deeply and wholeheartedly. We have to humble ourselves under the mighty hand of our God.

Humanly seen nothing good is on anyone, on no one of us.

This Paul said in Romans 7 of truth and faithfully: "in me (that is, in my flesh) dwells nothing good."

He knew who and what he is.

But then in Romans 8 he could say: that "we have been justified through faith and that in them and on them who don't walk after the flesh but after the spirit that nothing condemnable is on them anymore." [Röm 8:1]

To the intellect it's almost a contradiction. No, it's not like this: He could just discern human and divine things.

And this we also must learn to serve the Lord "without murmurings, without disputings, without doubting, to show us blameless as children of God, without rebuke in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation…" [Phil 2:15]

Now it says, "… among whom ye shine as lights in the world."

Stars don't shine on daylight. They shine at night. It is dark on earth. "Darkness is covering the earth and gross darkness the people." [Is 60:2]

But we shall bring light into this darkness. We shall shine. We shall radiate.

Could God work it in us?

To use here a direct example, when Moses was in the presence of God, his own face began to shine, and the Israelites saw the brightness of God on him who came into the presence of God, literally on his face. [Ex 34:29]

What do the people see on you and on me?

What do they hear from you and from me?

What kind of testimony we can bring to them?

May we be a blessing to them.

Here it says: "Among whom ye shine as lights in the world, holding forth the word of life, that I may rejoice in the day of Christ, that I have not run in vain, neither laboured in vain."

Paul not only wanted to serve the church, he wanted to see her again in glory. He didn't want anything undone that was spiritually necessary for the build-up and for the advancement in the faith to follow the Lord.

Then we read in Timothy a special word, which also refers to the doctrine and thus our abiding in Christ, for whoever goes beyond the word, he leaves God.

1 Timothy 6, verse 3:

"If any man teach otherwise and consent not to wholesome words of our Lord Jesus Christ and to the doctrine which is according to godliness, 

he is proud, knowing nothing, but doting about questions and strives of words, whereof cometh envy, strife, railings, evil surmisings, 

perverse disputings of men of corrupt minds and destitute of the truth, supposing that gain is godliness: from such withdraw thyself."

What kind of serious words and thoughts are expressed here?

One can have the truth and one can also lose it. That's how we just read it here. One can have received the revelation and one can lose it.

And Paul says "it would be better for such people that they would have never come to the knowledge of the truth." [2Pt 2:21] [Hebr 6:4]

If God has revealed himself to us and his Word was given to us as the truth, then let us keep this divine truth in a fine and good heart, not misusing God's Word, that envy and strife and railings come forth, but that it would be for our teaching. For thus we have read it here as an admonition: "He is proud, knowing nothing…"

One can think to understand everything, to know everything, to explain everything, but it doesn't have to be so. Pride can still blind and then in reality one sees nothing, but is sick with addiction, addicted to strifes of words.

If this does not apply to this time, then I don't know. Sick and convulsive, seeking here and seeking there, wanting to find something and then to teach it.

It is so sick, "doting about questions and strifes of words."

Instead, as Paul said then, "to proclaim the whole counsel of God." [Apg 20:27], special things are evoked and emphasized and already the strife starts, already comes confusion, evil surmisings come up.

And it says of "men of corrupt minds and who lost the truth."

He who keeps the truth, keeps the whole truth, he will not specialize on this or on that, but will find the balance in the truth of God. And until today and throughout eternity the truth remains God's Word.

Jesus our Lord said [Joh 17:17], "Father, sanctify them in thy truth, thy word is the truth."

That what I call the truth does not need to be the truth and can sanctify no one, but that what God's Word testifies to be the truth, this is divine truth in which we can be sanctified and in which we must be kept, 

So divine truth will be a blessing for us and we need no strife about this or that. We just need to wait until it pleases God to do what he promised by his grace.

I personally want that God comes to the fulfiment of his right, that we don't put our hands into our bosom and say, "We have been called out and all the others are left behind…", but that our hearts would beat for a world which lies in wickedness, which never has heard the truth and therefore it does not know the difference and does not even know what God wants.

They all, from birth to death, were kept in religions without that the counsel of God was ever preached to them.

We, as believers, as saved ones, feel a deep pain about this.

And what would we wish more that God would shake once more heaven and earth? [Hebr 12:26] And if it were up to me, then I would rather see it that thousands get believers instead of hundreds. And even better that millions instead of thousands.

What God will do, I don't know, but in my heart is the love of God, of which it is written [Joh 3:16], "For God so much loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, so that all who believe on Him should not perish but have eternal life."

The harvest is still outside. May God give grace that it can be brought in. And who wants to hinder God that it can be sown and harvested at the same time?

How was it in the early church?

Did God need a long time to first sow and then after years to harvest?

There was Pentecost and the proclamation of the original word.

By this the divine seed was laid into the hearts, and the Spirit of God came upon them, and they got saved. They were added to the Lord. Everything happened on one day.

Or did the people receive long teachings?

Sure, but not from God, but from the scribes.

In that moment where "the teaching went forth from Jerusalem and the word from Mount Zion," and believe me, we were on Mount Zion, even today there is the upper room where the Holy Ghost fell and where the first crowd was gathered to hear the Word of God.

Can God not do the same now at the end?

Can He not pour out His Spirit, giving the early and latter rain, for my sake, on the same day, in the morning and evening?

Can He not at the same time, at noonday?

With our God, all things are possible!

Can He not in the same meeting accomplish the same word for what He has sent it for?

Can He not save when salvation is preached?

Can He not heal when healing is preached?

How much time does He need for it? No time at all.

It is just up to us that we believe what we hear so that He can confirm His word on us.

You will find out, later on, after Pentecost, a similar time set in as we had it now in the course of church history. Already in Samaria it was different, in Ephesus it was different, everywhere it was already different than in the early church.

Right at the beginning God was present and overwhelmed the people who came together by the thousands with His word, with His grace, with His salvation, with His Spirit, everything on one day.

"Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of your sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit." [Acts 2:38]

If we later on look at the revival in Samaria, Philip goes down, great signs and wonders happen, people become believers, but there it ends already, there it ends, the rest is missing. Peter and John must come from Jerusalem to take care for that the thing doesn't stop half way, but as at the beginning is carried out so that God comes to the full fulfilemt of His right.

We time and again see, only in that case, when God wanted to show the Gentiles, or to express it precisely, when God wanted to show the Jews that He doesn't make a difference with the Gentiles, it happened, when Peter spoke in the house of Cornelius, that "the Holy Ghost fell on all while he was still speaking." [Acts 10:44]

There God has given the same thing to the Gentiles in Jerusalem.

We believe that God is still the same today. We believe that at the end it will be the same as it was at the beginning. One day we will look back and be grateful that we could walk through all these stages.

Sometimes it was difficult, we got into trouble, into inner trouble, and we didn't know how it will go on, but God, who knew the end before the beginning, he time and again gave us new strength, revealing his Word and his will. And he lays into us the longing for that what he has prepared for us.

Even here we cannot look on that what is before our eyes, but to that what God promised in his Word.

Could Abraham look on his withered body? No, he had to look to God, otherwise the promise would not have been fulfilled.

Also we must look away from us and look on him who started and who will finish, on him who still today is at work on us, through his Word and through his Holy Spirit.

In 2nd Timothy, in chapter 2 the admonition is given, 2nd Timothy chapter 2, verse 14 and 15:

"Of these things put them in remembrance, charging them before the Lord, that they strive not about words to no profit, but to the subverting of the hearers.

Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the Word of truth."

Maybe you can read the rest yourself, time and again the admonition, to be gathered in the presence of God, and to take the admonitions of the word seriously. Teaching comes from the word, but not only that, in the Word of God is everything, also food.

"Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word which proceedeth from the mouth of God." [Mt 4:4]

And when we pass on the word, carrying it on, which has come forth from the mouth of God, then it remains God's Word. Although it is preached by the mouth of men, it remains God's Word. And therefore also Paul writes, I think to the Thessalonians [1Th 2:13], "The word which we preached unto you, ye didn't receive it as the word of men, but as the Word of God, what it also actually is."

I wished that I could find it quickly, but it's not necessary, you all know all these scriptures.

The word was carried on by human lips, but it remained the same Word of God and has even today the same power, if we recognize that it was not Moses who had to say something.

Who was Moses?

Moses was a shepherd "who was feeding the sheep of his father-in-law Jethro."

Who was Jacob? Who were they? Men of nature, but suddenly, God came into their lives and then there came a purpose into their lives, then there came a meaning in their life, then there came divine determination in their life.

Who are we? Who were we?

The one here, the other there. Everyone was walking on his way. Suddenly, God addressed us and with that moment, our life received a divine content and purpose. With that moment, God's Word means for us that what it meant for them who heard it for the first time then.

Or not?

Every time when we read the Word of God, the spirit of God makes it alive unto us. It burns in our soul.

God speaks with us.

Beloved, we may not harden our hearts. We must tune in on our inside when the word is preached. We must understand what kind of grace it is that God speaks with us.

And the time might come, of which the prophet Amos also speaks, that "from one sea to the other sea one will walk to hear the Word of God or to find it and it will no more be found." [Am 8:12]

Today is the day of salvation. Today is the time of grace. Today God speaks with us, but he wants that we go with with all our hearts. That we believe with all our hearts.

He doesn't want that one teaches the other. He wants that we are all taught by God.

That's how it is written.

"Not one brother will say to the other: get to know the Lord now."

No, the holy scripture says: "They all shall be taught by God." [Jer 31:34] And then it is coherent, then we are in conformity with God, with God's Word and with one another. Then it is no more a knowledge which is precious to us which we want to show like in a showcase.

No, every knowledge which we want to still display, with which we want to come up, we can forget it.

One thing is necessary to come humbly into the presence of God and to say: "Lord I know nothing, I can nothing, I am useless. Help me, speak, teach me, reveal thy word to me. Let me see the things as you see them, judging them as you judge them."

And you will see that God will walk forward with us.

Then "we don't know anyone after the flesh" but after the spirit and we are glad for every brother and for every sister whom God pardoned. [2Kor 5:16]

With some there might be difficulties of this kind, with the other problems of that kind. But no one will walk through life without any problems as a believer, not one. It may just be different with the one and with the other.

But even the difficulties and problems are for the purpose that we don't stumble over them and not fall over them, but that we are taken by the hand of the Lord and are kept and that all these stumbling blocks, that we could make them steps by faith on which we could walk up to come closer to God.

You all know, our Lord is for some the "rock of offense" and the stone over which they stumbled. For the others He became the "precious cornerstone" upon which they could be established. [1Pt 2:8] It didn't become the rock of offense, but the rock of salvation of which a songwriter sings, "Rock of ages, cleft for me, let me hide myself in thee."

Beloved, if we at this place do not mention the prophet hundred times in a sermon and not always mention His name, then not because that we bypassed what God said to us through Him. This is far from us, as far as the east is from the west. And we proved it many times by the publication of all the sermons as it was in our might and as it was possible in terms of time. And everybody can read them and hear them.

I believe one thing, that God has not ordained us to sit on a chair of a prophet as then the scribes sat on the seat of Moses, but to recognize what God had to say to us. [Mt 23:2]

Every scribe could repeat it. They could even come to the Lord and say, "Moses said this and Moses said that." And here the Lord stood, who spoke with Moses and looked at them. What kind of pain must he have felt when he had to say [Joh 5:46] [5Mo 18:15], "You did not recognize what Moses said. If you would have recognized it, then you would know what Moses said, "A prophet like unto me God will raise from among you, and him ye shall hear."

And they even said, "We are children of Abraham."

And then the Lord became angry and said, "You are of your father the devil." And this he said to Jews, to the kindred, which he himself has chosen.

But their eyes were blinded.

Beloved, let us be careful.

It's not the repetition of that what was said, or mentioning the names, "Paul said, Paul said," or "Peter said, Peter said," or "Brother Branham said…", but to summarize what God said through all the prophets, what he spoke through all the apostles, to set forth the counsel of God, so that everybody gets an overall view.

For this purpose, Brother Branham was sent, as Paul at the beginning of the New Testament church could say [Eph 3:5], "what was hidden to the past generations of mankind, this God has now revealed to his holy servants."

The same, Brother Branham could say, "What was hidden throughout all the church ages, this God has now revealed to his servants, the prophets."

That's how it is written, [Am 3:7]: "God does nothing unless he reveals his secret unto his servants, the prophets."

Brother Branham was a prophet of God, in my opinion the greatest. But may God decide on that. Who are we that we should classify?

But one thing is certain, God has sent him to give us an overall teaching by his grace to lead us back to the word so that it actually could be rebuilt.

That's why everything unbiblical had to be exposed so that it can be cleaned up as in the days of Zerubbabel. All the rubble which remained from the temple had to be first removed. The foundation had to be excavated and only then the build-up started.

All these things have of course a meaning.

They didn't just build here and there amidst all the broken down debris. No, first there was a clean-up until they found the foundation walls and then they built anew upon it, the same God did in these days.

Everything what collapsed upon the foundation, all this had to be taken away. The clear foundation had to be excavated so that we can rebuild anew upon it. And it was not a man who began to build, but he who has said [Mt 16:18]: "I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it."

How often the church of the living God was shattered. Time and again it raised and collapsed, raised and collapsed. Now, at the end of days, it pleased God to make a new beginning. But this new beginning must lead us now at the end back to the original beginning.

Jesus Christ is "the first and the last." [Rev 1:17] He builds his church. He wants that everything is removed, so that the clear foundation can become visible.

Why did Paul say [1Cor 3:10], "I have laid the foundation with you. Another foundation no one can lay as that which was laid"?

And this foundation is Jesus Christ our Lord.

What is it all about? Just about a knowledge about which can be argued? About a doctrine over which one can have different opinions?

No, it is about the calling out, about the rebuilding of the temple of the Lord as the church of the living God, as God's habitation in the Spirit, so that God can manifest Himself here on earth before time runs out.

For this reason God has sent us His Word, not that we are scattered, walking then in many different directions, but taking one direction, namely the divine direction.

I hope that God gives me and to all of us grace to be ready on the inside to walk on this way of God.

Let me close with a comparison from the Old Testament. It says [Jdg 21:25]:

"At the time of the judges, everyone did what seemed to be right in his own eyes."

At the time of judges, everyone did what seemed to be right in his own eyes. As long as we still judge one another, we will do everything rightly inasmuch as we can judge it in our own eyes.

But then God sent a king. He gave instructions which were binding for all.

God didn't make judges out of us, but "a people of kings and priests." [1Pt 2:9]

And you will notice it. Maybe I'm allowed to say this. It is written in the Word of God:

"With what you judge your brother, with that you condemn yourself." [Rm 2:1]

Things which we judge on others can come upon ourselves without that we want it. It's a law of God! It is God's law! And therefore, we should be very slow, as it is written, "Everybody shall be quick to hear, but slow to anger. For the anger of a man does not what is right before God." [Jam 1:19]

How well does God mean with us. Through every teaching, through every word which He lets go forth to us. He speaks today to all of us: "Submit under My mighty hand." Then we also submit to one another.

Sometimes people may say, "You must submit to me."

Listen: Yes, if have that spirit which that one has who sits there… Yes, before that one all must submit [pope] – but not so before you and not before me. All of us, we have to submit to God. To know Him as Lord.

How often we have the thought, "Oh, that brother or that sister, they must submit." My God, forget all this! Everybody, I, you, all of us, we all need to submit to God and if we have all submitted to God, then everything is in order. Then God has His right fulfilled and only then we can resist together the devil!

For thus it is written, "Submit under the mighty hand of God, and resist the devil, and he flees from you." [Jam 4:7]

Only then, when we all have submitted under the mighty hand of God and together resist the devil, that we like a chain, link after link, are joined in the divine love, which cannot be broken, standing together.

If this happens, then the devil can no more break in. Then he cannot cause any damage anymore. Then all of us will be blessed by God.

There are rules also in the kingdom of God. And these divine statutes we have to keep, if we want to receive the divine blessing in a full measure, as it was promised to us.

And as God wants to manifest it, have you an inner agreement to the Word of God? Do you notice that the Lord, like a father, speaks with us as his children? He doesn't leave us without chastisement. He corrects us.

If a father has to give up chastising, and when he knows beating doesn't help anymore, words don't help anymore, no chastisement helps anymore. Oh, this is the day on which the father has to say to himself, "I have lost my son" or "I have lost my daughter".

But as long as we hear, as long as we hear as the children of God, as sons and daughters of God hearing, we are not yet lost. We want to be children of God who cling to the Lord and who count with his help but who keep the divine rules.

If he corrects us, if he exhorts us, then only because we are still children, because we are still sons and daughters.

And the Lord says it himself through Paul in Hebrews: "If we would be without chastising, then we would be," as one translation says, "bastards" or whatever. [Hebr 12:8]

If we are children of God, then we will accept the admonitions of the Lord thankfully and knowing that he means well with us.

Blessed and praised be his holy name.

Let us persevere in faith. Although you would sometimes almost say, "I can't anymore. It doesn't work anymore."

Do you think God doesn't know in which situations we are? God also knows your torn heart. God knows of your needs and your problems.

Let it be said to you, right to you he promised [Isa 43:2]:

"I will be with you. And when you go through the water, it will not drown you. And if you go through the fire, it will not burn you. I, the Lord, will be with you."

Take it with you today, precious sister, dear brother. Take it with you today, whether it goes through the water or through the fire, whatever the trials are. Take it with you: The Lord will be with us until we come from believing unto seeing.

Blessed and praised be his holy name.

Amen.

Let us stand up and pray.

… we lay before you ourselves and all your redeemed people.

Dear Savior, a lot of time has passed, which we redeemed. May your time have come and your hour, which you could make use of among your people to have your right fulfilled and to let the result of the proclamation be manifested for the praise and for the glory of your name.

It won't be by might nor by power, but by my Spirit, saith the Lord.

Hallelujah! Oh God!

Lord, I believe on the deep inside of my heart that you will bring your church back to the beginning and that the same things will happen at the direct end as they happened directly at the beginning.

For you are the same, the mighty God. You are risen, you are alive and you won the victory.

"The right hand of the Lord is exalted and upholds the victory."

We will forget all our own defeats and glorify your victory. Hallelujah! Praise, honor and glory and worship to your wonderful name.

Faithful Lord, your blood-bought multitude is the people of the New Covenant, gathered in your holy presence to hear the words and promises of the New Covenant, to believe it and to receive it.

Lord, we thank you for it and we praise you.

You stand to your word.

Glory, praise and honor be to you from eternity to eternity.

Hallelujah! In Jesus' name.

Amen.