God’s Secret Mystery Now Revealed Colossians 1:15-19, “And he is before all things, and by Him all things consist.” (verse 17) Now, Gods secret mystery He had before the world began... Now, back in the back part of Gods mind, there was something that He was trying and was going to achieve, and He had a motive in doing it, in order to let Himself be expressed. Because first, there wasnt even a moon, star, atom, molecule, or anything; He was God. But He exactly wasnt God at that time, because God is an object of worship, and there wasnt nothing to worship Him. So in His great mind He wanted these attributes to be expressed. And in Him was love; in Him was to be Father; in Him was to be Son; in Him was to be a Saviour; in Him was to be a Healer. And all these great attributes that we see already expressed, they were in God. So my opinion, the first thing that He made was Angels (Isaiah 14:12-14). And then they worshipped Him and that made Him God. And He started from there. And now, then when Angels began to worship Him, that was before there was even a molecule in the earth; there was nothing. It was all darkness; there wasnt no sun, or no moon, no stars, no nothing; then He was God. As He asked Job, Where were you when I laid the foundations of the world? when the morning stars sang together, the sons of God shouted for joy? Where were you? (Job 38:1-7). That was way back before the earth. Now, God had a purpose and a hidden mystery. He had in His mind before the world ever began and how that its unfolded itself right down to this present hour that were living. See? Then you will understand clearly then on, I believe, what is being done. Gods great mystery of how... Its a secret. He kept it a secret. Nobody knowed nothing about it; even the Angels didnt understand it. See? He didnt reveal it. Thats the reason under our seventh mystery, when the seventh seal was opened, there was silence (Rev. 8:1). Jesus, when He was on earth, they wanted to know when He would come. He said, Its not... Even the Son Himself doesnt know when its going to happen. (Matt. 24:36; Acts 1:7). See, God has this all to Himself. Its a secret. And thats the reason there was silence in heaven for a space of a half hour. And Seven Thunders uttered their voices, and John was even forbidden to write it --the coming of the Lord (Rev. 10:1-4). Thats one thing He hasnt revealed yet, of how He will come, and when He will come. Its a good thing that He doesnt. No. He has showed or revealed it in every type thats in the Bible. Therefore, the entire Bible is the revelation of Gods mystery in Christ. The entire Bible is an expression of one goal that God had, one purpose He wanted to achieve in the entire Bible, and all the acts of the believers in the Bible have been in type and expressing what Gods great goal is. And now in this last day He has revealed it and shows it (Rev. 10:7). And Gods help, well see it right here: what the Lord has had in His mind all along and has expressed it. The Bible is a prophetic Book; Its a historical Book; Its a Book of love. Its a Book of songs; Its a Book of Life, and in there you find Christ. He was in the prophets; He was in the Psalms; He was in the history; and He also in the Bible is the things that is to come. So He was before and for after. What does that make Him then? The same yesterday, today, and forever (Hebrews 13:8). And, you inject something in there that doesnt make Him the same yesterday, today, and forever, where do you go to? You got an awful picture there. For He was the history, and He is the Prophet; He is the Psalms; He is everything. And if you cant make Him everything and the same, whats your picture look like? Do you see it? All right. He is the same. He was the prophets; He was in them; He was in the Psalms; He was in the history; and He is the things to come, the same yesterday, today, and forever (Hebrews 13:8). If thats what He is, and we believe it, dont we? Then if He is that, then He should be the principal theme of our talking, of our thinking, of our singing, of our walks; He should be the principal theme of our life. If Hes the principal theme of the Bible, and the Bible is in us, then He should be the principal theme of everything that we do, say, or think, should be Christ. Is that right? All right. Since we think this, since Hes been made the Head of all things to us... (Col. 1:16-18). The Colossians said so here. Hes the Head of all things to us for He was made for us, which we are considered all things. You say, What about the sinner? He was made to be the Judge of the sinner, if he doesnt accept it. He was made the Glory for the believer who does accept it. So there thing... All things were made by Him and for Him (Rom. 11:36). And it takes the night to express the glory of the day. It takes the vessel of dishonor to express the love and care for the vessel of the honored (Rom. 9:14-23). It takes an evil woman that would wear immoral clothes and sell her morals to express the virtue of a decent genuine lady. See? It takes the crook and a thief in a man to express the genuineness of a real believer, a real Christian. It takes the hypocrite to show up the believer, what he is. So all things were made by Him. And since He was made all things for all of us (II Cor. 4:15); all things were made for--by Him, then since that is true, our identification should be with Him. We should be identified, ourselves, with Him, because He has identified Himself with us. We should be identified with Him. How? By living for Him (Rom. 14:7-8), not just a confession. Notice, God has had a threefold purpose in this great mystery secret. God, in His great mystery secret that He had before the world began, Hes got a threefold purpose in it. And now, what we want to go upon is: What is that threefold purpose? See? Now, I believe by the help of God, Whos present, and Hell show it to us. We want to find out what is this threefold purpose. The first thing was that God wanted to reveal Himself to the people. He couldnt do it as a great Jehovah God Who covered all space, time, and eternity. He could not. Hes too great to ever be revealed to people, because it would be too mysterious. How could that great Being that never did begin, that after you went beyond the cycle of a hundreds of billions and trillions and trillions of years of light space, and on out into the infinite, into the eternity, and a great Creature that was all that, and still is... But what He wanted to do, He loved Fatherhood, for He was a Father. And the only way that He could express it was to become a Son of man. Thats the reason Jesus kept saying, The Son of man. (Matt. 8:20; 18:11). See, they didnt know what He was talking about, many of them. But now you get it? He wanted to express Himself. That was His, one of His great threefold purposes, was to express Himself, identify Himself with human beings, to reveal Himself in Christ (Col. 2:9-10). Secondly: to have the preeminence in His body of believers, that is, His Bride, that He might live in people (Col. 1:18). Now, He could do that in Adam and Eve, but sin separated them, so now there had to be some way to get it back again. Oh, my. Oh, this is rich to me, just to even think of it! See? See what Gods purpose was? Now, why didnt He just keep Adam and Eve like that? Then He would have never been able to express His Fullness, His full attribute, because... He could been a Father there; thats true, but also Hes a Saviour. You say, How do you know He was? He is, cause Ive had the experience. See, see? He is a Saviour, and He had to express that, and how could He do it? Only through Christ. How could He be a Son? Only through Christ. How could He be a Healer? Only through Christ. See, all things are wound up in that one Person Jesus Christ. Oh, my. And when I think of it, I just see denominations pass off the scene, everything else just going. See? When I see Gods great purpose: revealing Himself, and having... First, to reveal Himself in Christ, the Fullness of the Godhead bodily (Col. 1:19; I Tim. 3:16), and then to bring that Fullness of Godhead bodily into a people that He could have the preeminences, the oversight, the leading... First, to express Hisself completely: God in Christ. Second, to have the preeminences by this in His Church (which is His Body, Bride) to... He could have the preeminence to express Himself through them. And thirdly, to restore the Kingdom to its rightly position that fell by sin by the first Adam, back to where He walked in the cool of the evening with His people, talked with them, fellowshipped with them (Gen. 3:8). And now sin and death had separated them from His Presence and His entire expression. Before the foundation of the world to express all of His attributes, what He was... God, expressed in Jesus Christ, Who was both Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, the Fullness of the Godhead bodily. Now, the complete Fullness of the Godhead bodily dwells in His Church, the preeminences. All that God was, He poured into Christ; all Christ was is poured into the Church, the believer, not denomination. Now, notice, again. Now, whats the threefold purpose? Manifest Hisself in Jesus Christ; to come into the Body by Jesus Christ to have the preeminence to what? Restore back Eden, bring back that which lost. That was the only thing out of order. All the rest of His things was in order. And now, the Christ in the Church is just being made known. The whole thing is the revelation of God to take Eve back to her right position again with her husband, and God is the Husband of the Church, and the Church is His Bride. Look, Christ in you makes Him the center of Life of the revelation. See? Christs Life in you makes Him the center of the revelation. Christ in the Bible, makes the Bible a complete revelation of Christ. Christ in you makes you the complete revelation of the whole thing. See what Gods trying to do? What is the new birth then? You say, Well, Brother Branham, what is the new birth? It is the revelation of Jesus Christ personally to you. Amen. See? Not you joined a church, you shook a hand; you done something different; you said a creed; you promised to live by a code of rules; but Christ, the Bible... He is the Word that was revealed to you. And no matter what anybody says, what takes place, its Christ. Pastor, priest, whatever it might be... Its Christ in you (Col. 1:26-29). That is the revelation that the Church was built upon. [1] Now, He reveals these things by His foreknowledge to those who He has ordained to these things; otherwise they dont see it. Stand right there looking right at it and cant see it (Matt. 13:10-12; Eph. 1:4-10). How many ever seen that picture of a cow in the bush, that you just have to look and look? Did you ever see that? Or, seen the picture of Christ in a bush, or in the sky, or clouds? See, that painter has got that so fixed up till you have to look at it just a certain way. Well, then, when you once see it, you cant see nothing else but that. Every time you look, there it is. How manys seen those pictures? Well, sure you have. Well, thats the way Christ is Himself, the Gospel, the message is. When you once see the message of the hour, theres nothing else you can see but that. Thats all. Everything else is gone; the rest of its just a filler, when you once see the message. That was in Noahs time. When Noah and his group saw the message, nothing else mattered. When Moses group saw it, nothing else mattered. When Johns group saw it, nothing else mattered. When Jesus group saw it, nothing else mattered. When the apostles group saw it, nothing else mattered. When Luthers group saw it, Wesleys group saw it, Pentecostal group saw it, nothing else mattered; they pulled away from everything. Why? By His foreknowledge He predestinated these things to happen. [2] He is the principal Theme of the entire Bible. If you read the Bible and dont see Christ in every verse of It, go back and read It again. See? If you cant see Christ in every verse of the Bible, then you read It again, because youve missed something. The Bible is Christ. He is the Word. When you read, In the beginning God created... theres Christ. See? From that to the Amen in Revelations is every Word testifying of Jesus Christ. [1] Look. All of Israel, of the tens of thousands that there was in them days (around four million)... And there was a hundred and twenty heard His voice, out of four million. If the rapture would come today, it would be scary if Id tell you what I think would happen. Its true. Theres a lot of so-called Christianity bloomed all over the earth. Its only a filler in a garden pointing to a statue. The statues the thing to look at. Christ is that Image. Right. And the true borned again church is what He will take with Him. The rest of its filler. Thats right. [3] Gods great secret has always blinded the wisdom of the world (I Cor. 2:6-10). They cant get it. They just dont understand it. Satan doesnt understand it. None of the rest of them understands it, but just those who are predestinated to understand it, how God and Christ are One. Theyll make Him three every time. See? They certainly will. Notice. Next--secondly, the manifested Christ in you, the hope of glory. That great manifested God in Christ, now Christ manifested in you. Look. What was once Gods great secret, great mysterious secret in His mind, is now put in the hearts of the believer, that is the Body of Christ. What was Gods once great secret in His mind before the foundation of the world is now made manifest. Think of it, friends. Oh, Im sure we dont get it. Well, I cant see it the way I ought to, and Im sure you dont. But Gods great mystery, what the eternal God had as a mystery, has now been unfolded in Jesus Christ, then was given out down to His Church. What was once in Gods mind is now in the Body of Christ, Jesus making love to the Church, His Bride, whispering secrets to Her. You know how you tell your wife things, you know, the little girl youre going to marry. You love her so much, you just tell her the secrets, and get her up next to you, and love you and everything. You know how it is? Thats what Christ is doing to the Church. See? Hes letting Her know the secrets--just the secrets. Not these flirters; I mean His Wife. See? All right. Look it. Having the revelation of this secret made known to them by His grace. Look, when this great revelation--revealed mystery is made known to you, then you denounce all the things of the world.
Posted on: Sat, 25 Oct 2014 14:24:16 +0000