Heeding the Voice of Christ and Laboring in His Work

Good afternoon, beloved friends and brethren present, ministers, fellow workers and other people present; and also those who are in different nations, Missionary Miguel Bermúdez Marín there in Nicaragua, and everyone over there, ministers too, and fellow workers, and those in different countries. May the blessings of Christ, the Angel of the Covenant, be upon all of you and upon me as well. In the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

It is a great privilege for me to be with you on this occasion. They tell me that it has been quite a few days since I have been with you, and they say: “four years.” They go by… years fly by; and such is the time here on Earth.

We are sent by God to Earth for a period of time, to be in the Divine Program, hearing His Voice and laboring in His Work at the time in which we have been given to live, as it was for those who came to this Earth before us. The important thing is knowing what we are here on Earth for.

Let’s read Revelation chapter 1, verse 8 and on, which says:

“I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, saith the Lord, which is, and which was, and which is to come, the Almighty.

I John, who also am your brother, and companion in tribulation, and in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ, was in the isle that is called Patmos, for the word of God, and for the testimony of Jesus Christ.

I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day, and heard behind me a great voice, as of a trumpet,

Saying, I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last: and, What thou seest, write in a book, and send it unto the seven churches which are in Asia; unto Ephesus, and unto Smyrna, and unto Pergamos, and unto Thyatira, and unto Sardis, and unto Philadelphia, and unto Laodicea.

And I turned to see the voice that spake with me. And being turned, I saw seven golden candlesticks;

And in the midst of the seven candlesticks one like unto the Son of man, clothed with a garment down to the foot, and girt about the paps with a golden girdle.

His head and his hairs were white like wool, as white as snow; and his eyes were as a flame of fire;

And his feet like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace; and his voice as the sound of many waters.

And he had in his right hand seven stars: and out of his mouth went a sharp twoedged sword: and his countenance was as the sun shineth in his strength.

And when I saw him, I fell at his feet as dead. And he laid his right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not; I am the first and the last:

I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.”

May God bless our souls with His Word and allow us to understand It.

“HEEDING THE VOICE OF CHRIST AND LABORING IN HIS WORK.” That is our subject for this occasion, the first Saturday of the month of April. Saturday, April 5, 2014.

“HEEDING THE VOICE OF CHRIST AND LABORING IN HIS WORK.”

Of all the things that the human being heeds in his life, the most important thing is the Voice of God, the Voice of Christ: heeding His Voice, heeding His Word relevant to the time in which he is given to live, in the way in which it is established for that Word of God to come to the people.

And since we have the book of The Ages here… on page 261 [p. 241 in Eng.] of the book The Seven Church Ages, of Reverend William Branham, it says (the second to last paragraph says):

“As we have already stated, Jesus identifies Himself with the messengers of each age. They receive from Him the revelation on the Word for each period. This Word revelation brings the elect of God out of the world and into full union with Jesus Christ.”

What brings the children of God out of the world and into the Kingdom of Christ, into union with Christ? The Word of God relevant to the time in which the person is living.

And now, how does that Word come? He says that Christ identifies Himself with the messenger relevant to each age, to whom comes the Word of Christ for that time; and that Word is what they proclaim, they preach, and It reaches the heart of those who are written in Heaven, in the Lamb’s Book of Life, they directly receive the call of Christ in their soul then, and they are gathered at that time.

“This Word revelation brings the elect of God out of the world and into full union with Jesus Christ.”

It brings them into the Mystical Body of Christ, into full union with Christ; because the Mystical Body of Christ, which is His Church, is His Mystical Body of believers, It is His spiritual Temple, Christ and His Church are one; just like man and his wife are one flesh before God.

“These messengers are called stars because they shine with a borrowed or reflected light of the Son, even Jesus. They are also called stars because they are ‘holders of light’ at night. Thus in the darkness of sin, they bring the light of God to His people.”

We have seen how God’s revelation comes to the messenger of each age, and then he passes it to the people, he speaks that revelation to the people; and that Word, that Message, brings the elect out of the world and into full union with Christ, into the Kingdom of Christ. That is the way all that happens.

Let’s look at another place where he speaks to us, so that we know how God’s call comes to God’s sons and daughters. On pages 168 and 169 [pp. 155-156 in Eng.] of the book of The Ages, Reverend William Branham says, anointed by the Spirit of God, he says:

“Now we have been constantly saying that the true evidence of being baptized with the Holy Ghost is for the believer to receive the Word for the age in which he lives. Let me show you most clearly.

The Seven Ages as set forth in Revelation chapters 2 and 3 take in the whole span of the Fulness of the Gentiles, or the whole time in which God is dealing with the Gentiles unto salvation. In every single age, bar none, it says the very same thing in opening and closing the message to each age. ‘Unto the messenger of (Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamos, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, Laodicea) write; These things saith He…’ etcetera, etcetera. ‘He that hath an ear, let him (singular) hear what the Spirit saith to the churches.’”

Now notice the way that God, that Christ speaks to His Church. And that is the Voice that we must hear at the time in which we are given to live: the Voice of Christ.

“Notice here that Jesus (by the Spirit) in EVERY age addresses Himself to ONLY ONE person relative to the Word for that age. Only ONE messenger for each age receives what the Spirit has to say to that age…”

Only one messenger receives from Christ what Christ has to say to His Church at that time, one man: The messenger relevant to each age is the one who receives the Word, the Message of God for the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ, what He has to say to His Church.

“… and that ONE MESSENGER is the messenger to the true church. He speaks for God by revelation to the ‘churches,’ both true and false. The message is then broadcast to all. But though it is broadcast for all who come within range of the message, that message is received individually by only a certain qualified group in a certain way. Each individual of that group is one who has the ability to hear what the Spirit is saying by way of the messenger.”

In other words, they have ears to hear (to hear what?) what the Spirit says through the messenger to the Church for each age, which is through the messenger of each age. That is what the Holy Spirit says to His Church for each time; He puts it in the lips of the messenger relevant to each time.

“Each individual of that group is one who has the ability to hear what the (Holy) Spirit is saying by way of the messenger. Those who hear are not getting their own private revelation, nor is a group getting their collective revelation, BUT EACH PERSON IS HEARING AND RECEIVING WHAT THE MESSENGER HAS ALREADY RECEIVED FROM GOD.”

First the messenger receives it, then he speaks it to the people; and that is the Voice of Christ through His Spirit to His people. That is how it has been in each stage of the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Then on page 169 [p. 156 in Eng.], the second paragraph says:

“In every age we have exactly the same pattern. That is why the light comes through some God-given messenger in a certain area, and then from that messenger there spreads the light through the ministry of others who have been faithfully taught. But of course all those who go out don’t always learn how necessary it is to speak ONLY what the messenger has spoken. (Remember, Paul warned the people to say only what he said, I Corinthians 14:37, ‘If any man think himself to be a prophet, or spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things that I write unto you are the COMMANDMENTS OF THE LORD.’ ‘What? Came the Word of God out from you? or came it unto you only?’) They add here, or take away there, and soon the message is no longer pure, and the revival dies down.”

Notice how every revival in every age dies down: because they take away or add to It, and the Message is no longer pure, and therefore, the Holy Spirit then leaves that age. Therefore, the Message must be kept pure in the age in which the person is living.

“How careful we must be to hear ONE voice, for the Spirit has but one voice which is the voice of God. Paul warned them to say what he said, even as Peter did likewise. He warned them that EVEN HE (PAUL) could not change one word of what he had given by revelation. Oh, how important it is to hear the voice of God by way of His messengers, and then say what has been given them to say to the churches.”

We have seen the importance of hearing one Voice: the Voice of Christ, the Voice of the Holy Spirit, through His messengers. Each person, at the time in which he is given to live, is given to hear the Voice of Christ through the messenger of God for that time.

And if that is how it was in past times, it continues to be that way for our time as well. In each time, the messenger is known by the Message that he brings from God, and the elect are known because they follow the Message of God and hear the Voice of Christ through that messenger.

On page 227, it says (paragraph 180) [The Ages, p. 209 in Eng.]:

“Now since each of these messages is directed to the ‘angel’ — (human messenger) a very great responsibility as well as a wonderful privilege is his lot. To these men God makes special promises, as in the case of the twelve apostles sitting on twelve thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel. Then, remember Paul was given a special promise: that of presenting the people of the bride in his day to Jesus.”

And each messenger is to present to Christ the Bride-Church of his time, because each messenger in each age is sent to Her; because through that messenger, the Holy Spirit brings His Word, the Voice of Christ to His Church, in the age in which people are living: in the first, second, third, and so on; and God doesn’t change His way, the way He acts.

Therefore, the Scripture says: “If today you hear His Voice, harden not your heart.”¹ It is the Voice of Christ always through the Holy Spirit in the midst of His Church, speaking to Her through a man, a human messenger.

Notice, in Zechariah, chapter 7, a Scripture that we already know very well. Chapter 7, verses 11 to 12, of Zechariah, says:

“But they refused to hearken, and pulled away the shoulder, and stopped their ears, that they should not hear.

Yea, they made their hearts as an adamant stone, lest they should hear the law, and the words which the Lord of hosts hath sent in his spirit by the former prophets: therefore came a great wrath from the Lord of hosts.”

How did the Word of God come to the people? God sent It through His Spirit, which is the Angel of the Covenant, through the prophets.

That is why in the Scriptures you find that the prophets said that God told them such-and-such a thing, and to say it to the people. That is the Divine order, thus comes the Divine teaching for His people of the Old Covenant, of the Old Testament, and also of the New Testament. The Hebrew people were under the Old Covenant, Old Testament, and the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ is under the New Covenant, the New Testament.

The same one who gave the Hebrew people the Old Testament (God through His Spirit, God through the Angel of the Covenant), is the same One who has given the people of God the New Covenant.

That is why Christ, in the last Passover or last Supper with His disciples, it says in Saint Matthew, chapter 26, verse 26 and on:

“And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and blessed it, and brake it, and gave it to the disciples, and said, Take, eat; this is my body.

And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, Drink ye all of it;

For this is my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins.”

And now, the Blood of the New Covenant isn’t the blood of animals; it is the Blood of Christ, the Lamb of God, which was typified, represented, in those animal sacrifices, like the sacrifice of the paschal lamb and also like the sacrifice – the blood of the sacrifice of the paschal lamb, which was applied on the lintel and doorposts of the Hebrew homes there in Egypt, to preserve the life of the firstborn;² such is the Blood of Christ as well, to preserve the life of the firstborn written in heaven, in the Lamb’s Book of Life.

And Christ is the door; and where was the blood back then? On the door, on the lintel and posts of the door. Likewise, Christ being the door through which the elect enter into the Mystical Body of Christ to become part of that Mystical Body, and to be inside eating the Lamb of God, hearing Christ and eating His Word: they are secure there with Eternal Life, to preserve Life.

In His Church is where the Holy Spirit would be, as Christ said: “I will be with you (not with the world, ‘with you’) always, even unto the end of the world.” Saint Matthew, chapter 28, verse 20.

And in Saint Matthew 18, verse 20, it says: “Where two or three are gathered together in My Name, I will be there.”

How would He be? Well, in Holy Spirit, speaking to His Church, His people; that is why it says: “He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches.”³

Just as He spoke to the Hebrew people by His Spirit through the prophets, He speaks to His Church by His Spirit through the messengers of each age.

Notice the way to hear the Voice of Christ for the time in which each person is given to live.

It is important to heed the Voice of Christ, to pay attention to It, to be attentive to what Christ through His Holy Spirit says to His Church in the age in which each person is given to live.

We can say: “I know that God spoke through Saint Paul.” The believers of that time had to be attentive to what Christ in Holy Spirit was speaking through Saint Paul. And likewise, in each age: they had to be attentive to the messenger of each age. And in the seventh age they needed to be attentive to what the Holy Spirit was speaking through the messenger of the seventh age or stage of the Church, without adding to it nor taking away from it, so that the revival would remain in the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Reverend William Branham says: “We’re not in the Pentecostal Age anymore,” that is: “We’re not in the seventh age of the Church anymore.”⁴

Therefore, we have to know the promises of God for our time, in order to be listening to the Voice of Christ, the Voice of the Holy Spirit in our time: the Voice of the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, of Jesus Christ, the first and the last.

Throughout the Scripture we also find that He says: “I Jesus have sent My Angel to testify unto you these things in the churches.” That is in chapter 22 of Revelation; and it says… It says:

“I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify unto you these things in the churches. I am the root and the offspring of David, and the bright and morning star.

And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.”

In other words, the Church will be saying the same thing that Christ already said through the messenger for the time in which the Church is hearing the Voice of Christ, the Church going through different stages.

Revelation 22, verse 6, says:

“And he said unto me, These sayings are faithful and true: and the Lord God of the holy prophets sent his angel to shew unto his servants the things which must shortly be done.”

The things which must be done are made known by Christ through the messenger speaking to His Church. The Holy Spirit speaking to His Church is the One who makes known the things which must be done, but He always uses a human messenger.

Reverend William Branham, referring to that Angel, says it is a spirit of a prophet; because God is the God of the holy prophets, and the spirits of the prophets are incarnated from time to time; and when God makes them flesh, He speaks to His people through that spirit of a prophet made flesh among the people.

Reverend William Branham said: “It might be Elijah – it might have been Elijah or one of the prophets.” That is around page 41 and page 94 of the book of Quotations,⁵ you will find that around there.

Everything that God will speak through the Holy Spirit, through Christ, He does so in His Church, which is the One who is in the Covenant that is in effect, the New Covenant. It’s in the midst of His Church that Christ said: “I am with you always, even unto the end of the world.” “Where two or three are gathered together in my Name, I will be there.” Those are the promises of Christ for His Church; promises that have not failed and that will not fail at this time either.

It is a great blessing and privilege to be heeding the Voice of Christ in our time, which is the Voice of the Scripture, the Voice of the Word relevant to the end time; also having all the Word that was already spoken in past ages; because we have the Word here: from Genesis to Revelation.

Therefore, He will be quickening the promised Word for our time; that is, bringing It to life, making It a reality. And we will be hearing the Voice of Christ speaking to us directly to our soul, to our heart, and making known to us all these things which must be done at this end time, all these things which are the Divine Program for the time in which we are living. That is why we always want to listen to the Voice of Christ in the midst of His Church.

It tells us in Habakkuk chapter 2, verse 20:

“But the Lord is in his holy temple: let all the earth keep silence before him.”

Just as He was in the temple or tabernacle that Moses built, and just as He was in the temple that King Solomon built: He is in the Temple which is the Mystical Body of Christ, His Church, under the New Covenant.

Saint Paul said: “Don’t you know that you are temples of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?” And he shows that each believer as an individual is a temple for God to dwell in, and also that the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ is a spiritual Temple.

For example, in Ephesians chapter 2, verse 19 and on, it says:

“Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the household of God…”

Members of the Household of God as sons and daughters of God, born into the Family of God through the new birth; because unless a man is born again, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God, as Christ says to Nicodemus. Except a man be born of Water (the Word) and of the Holy Spirit.

“… And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone;

In whom all the building…”

Notice, “all the building” refers to the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ as a spiritual Temple made up of living stones, human beings.

“… And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone;

In whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord…”

See? Here it shows us that all the believers in Christ, as living stones, form that spiritual Temple, which is the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ as Mystical Body of believers.

“… in whom ye also are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit.”

And the individual believer in Christ, who forms part of the spiritual Temple of Christ, he is also a spiritual temple as an individual, for God to dwell here in the soul. The soul is the most holy place in every person as a spiritual temple. And the soul, as the most holy place, is the Age of the Cornerstone in the Mystical Body of Christ; that is the soul of the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ, where all the promises of God relevant to the end time will be fulfilled, and where He will be speaking to His Church in this end time.

He will no longer be speaking to Her in the first age. He spoke in the first age through Saint Paul, He spoke in the second through the messenger of the second, in the third age through the messenger of the third age, in the fourth age through the messenger of the fourth age, in the fifth age through the messenger of the fifth age, in the sixth age through the messenger of the sixth age, in the seventh age through the messenger of the seventh age, which was Reverend William Branham, and so on.

What is left? Our age. That is where He will speak everything that we must know at this end time. That is where He will reveal to us what the Seven Thunders spoke and which John was forbidden to write, which contains the revelation of the Seventh Seal, the revelation of the Second Coming of Christ, the revelation that will give us the faith to be transformed and taken with Christ to the Marriage Supper of the Lamb.

Therefore, we are and will be heeding the Voice of Christ at this end time, in the age or stage in which we have been given to live, and in which He is to speak to His Church. And we will not be standing around with our arms crossed, rather, He will be speaking and working, and we will be listening and working, laboring in the Work of the Lord, in what is relevant to our time.

We are not going to be making a literal ark, because that was for the time of Noah; but that literal ark cannot not withstand the… or the fire that will come. It will no longer be a flood of water, but of fire.

Therefore, let’s keep ourselves listening to the Voice of Christ in our time, in order to receive the faith to be transformed and taken with Christ to the Marriage Supper of the Lamb. And let’s keep ourselves working, laboring in the Program of God relevant to our time.

“HEEDING THE VOICE OF CHRIST AND LABORING IN HIS WORK,” at this end time.

Tomorrow we will continue with the relevant subject, which is: “THE ANGEL OF THE LORD JESUS CHRIST SEEKING THE VERY LAST OF THE ELECT.”

And in the afternoon, well, we will be at the activity; after lunch, we will be at the next service that has been announced, which will be one and a half to two hours from now. Yes, Juan was already looking at me… it must be around 2:00 already. It is one to two hours after finishing this morning’s service.

Well, may God bless you and keep you, those who are present and who are in other nations, ministers, and fellow workers; and you as well, Missionary Miguel Bermúdez Marín: may God bless you greatly; and all the ministers and fellow workers and other brethren present here, and in all nations.

Continue having a happy evening, filled with the blessings of Christ our Savior.

I leave Reverend Juan Ramos with us again.

“HEEDING THE VOICE OF CHRIST AND LABORING IN HIS WORK.”