Public ministry From accounts by William Branhams family, it is evident that he had been conducting healing campaigns at least as early as 1941 when he conducted a two-week revival in Milltown, [16] and his 1945 tract I Was Not Disobedient Unto the Heavenly Vision [17] shows that his faith healing ministry was well established by this time. On May 7, 1946, William Branham claimed to have received an angelic visitation, commissioning his worldwide ministry of evangelism and faith healing . [18] His first meetings as a full time evangelist were held in St Louis, Missouri in June 1946. Professor Allan Anderson of the University of Birmingham, has written that “Branham’s sensational healing services, which began in 1946, are well documented and he was the pacesetter for those who followed”. [19] Referring to the St Louis meetings, Krapohl & Lippy have commented: Historians generally mark this turn in Branham’s ministry as inaugurating the modern healing revival. [20] During the mid-1940s William Branham was conducting healing campaigns almost exclusively with Oneness Pentecostal groups. [21] The broadening of Branhams ministry to the wider Pentecostal community came as a result of his introduction to Gordon Lindsay in 1947, who soon became his primary manager and promoter. [22] Around this time several other prominent Pentecostals joined his ministry team including Ern Baxter and F. F. Bosworth. [23] Gordon Lindsay proved to be an able publicist for Branham, founding The Voice of Healing [1] magazine in 1948 which was originally aimed at reporting on Branhams healing campaigns. [24] In June 1947, the Evening Sun newspaper of Jonesboro, Arkansas reported that Residents of at least 25 States and Mexico have visited Jonesboro since Rev. Branham opened the camp meeting, June 1. The total attendance for the services is likely to surpass the 20,000 mark. Several newspapers carried reports of healings in the meetings [25] His success took him to countries around the world. According to a Pentecostal historian, Branham filled the largest stadiums and meeting halls in the world. [26] In Durban, South Africa in 1951 he addressed meetings sponsored by the Apostolic Faith Mission, the Assemblies of God, the Pentecostal Holiness Church, and the Full Gospel Church of God. Meetings were conducted in eleven cities, with a combined attendance of a half million people. On the final day of the Durban meetings, held at the Greyville Racecourse, an estimated 45,000 people attended and thousands more were turned away at the gates. [27] Many healings were reported in the local newspapers. [28] U.S. Congressman William Upshaw, crippled for sixty-six years, publicly proclaimed his miraculous healing in a Branham meeting in a leaflet called Im Standing on the Promises. [29] Branham claimed that Gods miraculous intervention healed King George VI of England through his prayers. [30] Branham also claimed to have witnessed a young boy raised from the dead in Finland in April 1950, which he said was the fulfilment of a vision he had told audiences during his campaign meetings [31] From the mid-1950s onwards Branham began to publicly teach that neither Oneness theology nor Trinitarianism was correct, but that God was the same Person in three different offices – in the same way that a husband can also be a father and a grandfather. [32] As he began to speak more openly about doctrine, such as the Godhead and serpent seed , the popularity of his ministry began to decline. [33]
Posted on: Mon, 21 Oct 2013 03:25:09 +0000
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