God veiled in Jesus.
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God veiled in Jesus.
William Branham.Read the full account in...
The Unveiling Of God.Now, my subject this morning is to reveal, or, unveil that God. God has always, in every age, has hid behind a veil, all ages, but He's been God all the time, see. But He's kept Himself hid from the world, and reveals Himself to his elected, like the apostles at that day. Now, that was God speaking in Christ.
Moses one time desired to see God, and God told him to stand on the rock. And, on the rock, Moses stood and he seen God pass by, and his back looked like the back of a man. God was in a whirlwind, and God... while Moses standing on the rock. I guess you all seen the picture out there the other day, we stood by that same rock. And here's that light, the Angel of the Lord right there where it clapped. Standing.... It's right on the bulletin board there now again.
Notice, Jehovah of the Old Testament is Jesus of the New Testament. See? He's the same God, just changing his form.
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God changed Himself, changed His form. If you notice here in Philippians, He said, “Not thinking it robbery, but took the form of man.” Now, the Greek word there for that form, I've been looking at it all day yesterday, trying to think out what it was, I find, come with this word of “en morphe.” It's spelled e-n m-o-r-p-h-e. Looking in the Greek to find out what en morphe was.... I may pronounce that wrong, but ... reason I spell it, when if the tape is released, the people will (scholars will) know what I mean by it. He.... When the en morphe.... That means that He changed Himself. He come down. Now, the Greek word there means that something that could not be seen, yet it's there, and then it's changed and the eye can catch it. See?----
And that's God. He changed Himself from a Pillar of Fire, to become a man. Then changed Himself from that back in the Spirit again, that He might dwell in man. God acting in man what He really was. Jesus Christ was God acting in Man, in a Man, in a Man. That's what He was. He changed from the Pillar of Fire, and then had come in, which was a veil in the wilderness that hid God from Israel. Moses seen the shape of his body, but really He was hid all the time behind this Pillar of Fire, which was the Logos that went from God. Now we find here, now since Pentecost, God is not acting in man, or act ... now He's acting through man, see. He was acting in a Man then, Jesus. Now He's acting through men that He has chosen for this purpose. God in the form of man, he changed Himself from the form of God to a form of man.----
Notice now as He came, He had to come as Son of man because the Holy Scripture said that He would, God would raise up a prophet to them. So He could not come calling Himself the Son of God, because it wasn't that dispensation. He was the Son of man prophesying, to fulfill, and revealing to them all the things that had been done, and typed what He was. Then He was on earth as Son of man.----
God, in man, had emptied Himself. Joel 2:28, we find out, He said, “I will pour out, in the last days, My Spirit.” Now, if you notice the word there, Greek word... I may have this wrong, but the one I could find.... You have to watch the word. The English sometime means double meanings. Just like the word, we say, “God.” God created the heavens and earth, Genesis 1. But, now, in the Bible, it said, “In the beginning Elohim.” Now, Elohim.... The English calls “God,” but it really wasn't Elohim. Anything could be god, to the word god; you can make an idol a god; you can make that piano a god; you can make anything a god. But it isn't so in the word Elohim, it means “the self-existing One.” See? That piano cannot be self-existent, nothing else can be self-existent. So the word Elohim means “He that always existed.” God can mean anything. See the difference in the word?Now, when it said here that He emptied Himself, or poured out, now, we'd think like this, that, He “vomit up,” the English word of emptied or poured out from Him, see, something went out of Him that was different from Him. But the word “kenos,” in the Greek, does not mean that He “vomit up,” or some ... his arm went off, or his eye went out, another person.
And, that is, He changed Himself, He “poured Himself into,' (Amen!), into another mask, into another form. Not another person went out of Him, called the Holy Spirit, but it was He Himself. Do you get it? he Himself poured Himself into the people. Christ in you! How beautiful, how wonderful, to think, God pouring Himself into the human being, into the believer. Pour out! It was a part of his drama, to do so. God, all the fullness, all the Godhead bodily was in this person, Jesus Christ. He was God, and God alone. Not a third person or a second person or a first person; but the person, God veiled in human flesh.
I Timothy 3:16; “Without controversy great is the mystery of godliness; for G-o-d, Elohim....” Capital G-o-d, in the Bible, refer it back, anybody it refers to in the original, it said, “Elohim. In the beginning, Elohim.” See? “And Elohim.... Without controversy great is the mystery of Elohim; for Elohim was made flesh, and we handled Him.” Elohim veiled in human flesh! The great Jehovah that covered all space, time, and everywhere, was made man. We handled Him, Elohim. “In the beginning, Elohim. And Elohim was made flesh, dwelt among us.”
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Who is this great unseen Person? Who is this that Abraham seen in visions? Right at last, though He was manifested in flesh, before the son came, God Himself came to Abraham in the form of a man, at the end time. Manifested! He saw Him in a little Light one time, he saw Him in visions, he heard His voice, many revelations; but just before the promised son, He saw Him in the form of a man, and talked to Him, and fed Him meat and drink, see. Notice, God Himself veiled in human flesh.This was a part of His way. This is the way He manifests Himself to us, manifests the eternal Word, God, Jehovah made flesh. Like in St. John 1, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the.... In the beginning was Elohim, and Elohim became the Word, and the Word was Elohim. And the Word was made Elohim.” See? It's the same thing, just unfolding. Like the attribute, see, it is in God. An attribute is your thought. God in the beginning, the Eternal, He wasn't even a God. He was the Eternal. He wasn't even God, God is an object of worship, or something. See? So He wasn't even that. He was Elohim, the Eternal. But in Him was thoughts, He wanted to become material. And what did He do? Then He spoke a word, and the Word was materialized. That's the whole picture from Genesis to Revelation. There's nothing wrong. It's Elohim materializing so He can be touched, felt. And in the millennium there's Elohim sitting on the throne, that's right, with all of His subjects around Him, that He predestinated before the foundation of the world.
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Notice, through the ages, the same way, by His prophets, He has revealed Himself. Them wasn't exactly prophets, they were gods. He said so. For, what they spoke was God's Word. They were the flesh that God was veiled in. They were gods. Jesus said, Himself, said, “How can you condemn Me when I say I'm the Son of God, and your own law says that them who the Word of the Lord came to was gods?” See? So it was God formed in a man called a prophet, see. And the Word of the Lord came to this man, so it wasn't the prophet, the prophet was the veil, but the Word was God. The man's word won't act like that. See what I mean? It cannot act in that manner. But potentially it was God. See, He was the word of God in the form of a man, called “a man.” Notice, He never changed his nature, only his form. Hebrews 13:8, said, “He's the same yesterday, today, and forever.” So He did not change His nature when He come. He is always that prophet, all down through the age, same thing, the Word, the Word, the Word, the Word, see. He cannot change his nature, but He changed His form. Hebrews 13:8, said, “He's the same yesterday, today, and forever.” He just changed his mask.----
God veiled in Jesus, to do the work of redemption at the cross. God could not die, as a Spirit, He's Eternal. But He had to put on a mask and act the part of death. He did die, but He couldn't do it in his God form. He had to do it in Son form, as Son of man, on earth. See? He had to be Son form. Then when He returned on Pentecost, He was Son of God again. You see what I mean? Get the idea? He was....----
He's veiled in a man, as He always was veiled. But He was veiled unto them, He was in His human temple. God was in a human temple. Be real careful, now he's the same yesterday, today, and forever. See, God veiled, hiding Himself from the world, veiled in human being. See? Here was God! Those Greeks saying “we would see Him,” and Jesus said, “A corn of wheat has to fall and die!” You have to die to all your ideas. You have to get out of your own thoughts. Like those disciples was, they couldn't explain about eating His body and drinking His blood, but, see, they had done died to those things. They were dead to a principle, they were dead to Christ. No matter what it is, how much defeat looked like he had, they still believed it anyhow, see. They could see in that man... a man that eat, drank, fished, slept, everything else, was born here on the earth, and walked with them, talked with them, wore clothes like the rest of them, but that was God.----
In the Old Testament, God was hid when He was on his mercy seat. On the mercy seat, by a veil! In the Old Testament, God was in His temple. But the people come in and worship like this, but, remember, there was a veil, amen, that hid God. They knowed God was there. They couldn't see Him. That pillar of fire never appeared anymore there. Did you notice? There's not one time in the Scripture, from the time that Pillar of Fire went in behind that veil, that it ever showed again till it come from Jesus Christ? God was veiled! When He stood on earth, He said, “I come from God and I go to God.” Then Paul, after his death, burial, and resurrection, on his road to Damascus, there was that Pillar of Fire again. What was it? Out from behind the veil! Glory to God!He was from behind the veil. Now, He was behind what? Skin veil. See, “badger skins,” behind the veil. And when that veil was rent on the day of crucifixion, the veil that He was wrapped in was rent on the day of the crucifixion, the whole mercy seat came into view. Now, the Jews cannot understand how that God could have mercy upon a sinful, foul people like we are. But they couldn't see this one who was giving mercy, because He was hid. He was behind the mercy seat, on the inside, with badger skins hanging down, covering Him. Before, if...
Before, if any man walked in behind that veil, it was sudden death. (Oh, we're going to get a lesson here in a minute, amen, if you can receive it.) To walk behind them skins, even one of the priest's sons tried to do it one time and died. Don't go behind that veil. the man that walked behind.... Why? There was no redemption yet in that. It was potentially, it was just potential; and anything potential is not the real thing yet, see, just potentially. It was redemption.... Sin was covered, not omitted... remitted, rather, not remitted. Remitted is “divorced and put away.” And so the blood of sheep and goats could not do that, so Jehovah was hid behind a veil. Now, back behind this veil where He was hid, to enter into that, a man dropped dead to try to enter into it.
But since Pentecost, since the crucifixion, when that veil was rent from the top to the bottom, for that generation... Jesus was that God, veiled. And when He died at Calvary, God sent fire and lightning and ripped that veil from top to the bottom, that the whole mercy seat was in plain view. But they were too blind to see it. As Moses said here, Paul said, reading of Moses, “When Moses is read, yet, that veil is still on their heart.” Oh, brother, sister, that's what the Jews did when the veil was rent and brought God into plain view, hanging on the cross. He was in plain view, but they couldn't see it.
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The unveiled God, plain view, they should have seen Him standing there. Yet He was too common, He was an ordinary man. They couldn't see it. See, there stood a man. “Well,” they said, “this guy, what school did He come from?” But, remember, when that spear stuck His body, that Spirit left Him, the temple... the sacrifice blocks turned over, and the lightning whipped down through the temple and rent the veil. What was it? There was their God hanging on Calvary, and they were too blind to see it. Brought Him in open view, and still they don't see it! They're blind. God, veiled in a human being!Read the full account in...
The Unveiling Of God.
