Prophetic word for today
Georgia (Part 8)

First posted: October 7, 2017
E-mailed: May 17, 2012
Word received by: Tracey

This is a continuation of a prophetic word posted earlier ...

Click here to view the original text of the prophetic word sent to us on 17 May 2012.

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The iniquity of American William

As we shared in the previous posting, a man named William Williamson played a big role in destroying John Wesley's ministry in America. It is no coincidence that the name "William" appears twice inside his full name, given that it speaks of a son of William (a "Williamson") continuing to carry the name (i.e. the nature) of his father ("William") in his actions. Hence, it correlates with the generational transmission of iniquity that we had studied in the previous posting. Because of this, it became evident that the Lord was declaring that the name "William" was the name of a spirit of iniquity that has been in America from the country's founding, and which has worked to hinder God's New-Covenant work in the land.

As I wondered what the name "William" could represent, the prophet of God spoke to me and said that the name "William" is strongly related to the evangelistic ministry in America and to how it has consistently been misused. Consider, for example, the latest famous American "William", the one named "William Jefferson Clinton", a man who used his evangelistic, heart-winning ability in order to woo and defile multiple women and to lie to the American voters that were willing to be convinced by him. There is also "William Franklin Graham", a man revered by the matriarchal Church who, on the surface, has done a "great deal" for the Lord, but who, in truth, has done little more than birth a large generation of Ammonite believers that have filled up the ranks of matriarchal churches across America and the world, profoundly hindering God's latter-day work on Earth.

As the Lord has declared, we are to judge others by their fruits, meaning that we are to evaluate a person's spiritual results by the effect that they produce on the spiritual atmosphere, an effect that eventually seeps down into the natural realm. Therefore, we must consider what Willie Graham's full effect on the spiritual atmosphere has been, especially towards the end of his public ministry.

Billy Graham, the last Protestant pope

As we shared over 12 years ago, when Willie Graham held the last crusade of his "storied career", in New York City's Central Park, the local news channels (or at least the one that I was watching at the time), began their evening newscast with coverage of the "historic crusade" and a reporter on the ground in Central Park who was describing the atmosphere whilst heaving nothing but praises on Graham's "remarkable" ministry. Considering how left-leaning and God-hating the local media in New York can be (especially the network that the local channel I was watching belonged to), one would be tempted to see this as evidence of how "righteously impactful" Graham's ministry was, given that it was "effective" enough to pierce through the anti-Christian bias of the liberal reporters' hearts and force them to acknowledge the "goodness" of his life. However, once their story on Graham's last crusade had ended, the very next story was an excited and upbeat report on the homosexual arrogance parade that had been held in New York on the same day as the crusade! In other words, the very anchors and reporters who were so glowingly and sincerely praising Graham and his ministerial work were able to immediately turn around and pronounce glowing and sincere praises on flagrant, in-your-face homosexuality, all without flinching. This means that Graham's effect on the newscasters, and on the world in general, was so inconsequential that it did not prompt the slightest sense of repentance in them. Instead of stirring the fear of God in the city, Graham's presence and his "historic last crusade" left the city as excited about their homosexual arrogance parade as they were before Graham showed up, if not more. All of this reveals how Graham was able to garner earthly influence and "ministerial success" by constantly placating and succumbing to the world's view of things. This is why, despite being a frequent visitor to the White House during Willie Clinton's terms, he did little to influence Clinton's lechery and lack of character. Every time that he began to agitate opposition against him and his reputation, Graham would always back down and offer a bramble branch of compromise and earthly reconciliation, all as part of a deliberate tactic to not imperil his earthly success or risk alienating resources that he deemed useful. Contrast this with the effect that Yeshua's public ministry had everywhere He would go. Instead of fostering "happy thoughts" and "harmony", Yeshua's Presence always fostered deep, open, and uncompromising hatred from those that opposed God's purposes, and the evil spirits surrounding Him would manifest themselves, clamouring for Him to go away and let them be. Consider also how Paul's visits to a city would always stir up "trouble" and "strife". Once and again, those who opposed God would be stirred up in deep hatred against him, attacking him physically and harassing him emotionally.

When your works have had a true impact on the spiritual atmosphere around you, you will become a threat to God's enemies and stir up their hatred against you, and that hatred will only end when he has been completely obliterated. When God's enemies are so comfortable with your presence that they are happy to extol your praises, then you are more a soldier of the enemy than a soldier of God. Obviously, it is possible for the enemy to utter a word of praise towards you, even if you are producing lasting damage on him, but those rare praises will take one of two tones: they will either reflect an enemy that admires how formidable an opponent you are, all whilst working towards your downfall, or they will reflect an enemy that is succumbing to the work you have done, aware that peace with you can only be achieved if he yields to God's will. The enemy may invite you before his presence a few times, intrigued by what you are and what you stand for, but he will eventually have to decide where he wants to stand: with God or against God. If he chooses to stand with God, he will throw up the flag of surrender and embrace both God and you. If he chooses to stand against God, his hatred against you will be rekindled and both of you will be unable to stand in the same room without one of you perishing or leaving. This is why it is clear to this writer that Willie Graham's ministry was, at the end of the day, a spiritual failure, despite its apparent success. Instead of raising an army of mighty men and women that would conquer the world around them unto God, Graham raised up an army of religious churchgoers who may have exhibited a basic level of moral repentance and correctness (at least in some cases) but who never achieved any significant measure of spiritual growth, becoming nothing more than "good citizens" financing a stale, matriarchal religious system with their tithes and offerings, strengthening the matriarchy's stranglehold on the Earth and stifling God's latter-day revival.

Even now, as these words are being written, Graham is refusing to sacrifice his temporal life to truly transform the world around him. Twelve years after God forced him to shut down his "public religious practice", and even as his health continues to deteriorate, Graham continues to cling to life, like a sailor gasping for every last breath whilst floating in the middle of the sea. Instead of glorifying God by surrendering his life (the way that an already fallen Achan did - Judges 7:19), Graham the Girgashite hangs on, convinced that reaching the century mark will somehow certify the greatness of his work on Earth. Yes, the man who constantly preached about how foolish it was to cling to the things of this world and who emphasised the reality of a life after this life is, with his last breaths, showing how much he values his natural life and how little interest he has in experiencing the after-life he preached about once and again. It seems that this effort to cling to life is heightened by a belief that he deserves to be around for the imaginary "rapture" that he and the rest of the matriarchal Church are so anxiously awaiting.

In a sense, it is spiritually fitting that the ecumenical Graham has turned, in his last days, into the spitting image of the last catholic pope, little john paul 2. Yes, dear reader, jp2 was the catholic Church's last pope. Everyone in the Vatican toilet "throne" since then has been nothing more than an earthly "head of state" with no spiritual clout. First, it was a well-meaning but limited man in Ratzinger and then an insufferable but irrelevant buzzing mosquito in the current version (Ratzinger was a God-appointed man intended to serve as a transition into righteousness for catholics, but the Church's delay of the revival sadly prevented him entering into the fullness of his role).

As we also shared 12 years ago, the same year as Graham's last crusade, john paul 2, a man who also started well, slowly degraded into a world-pleasing role until he became an outright enemy of God and a formidable obstacle to His latter-day manifestation. As this writer (and surely some others) pummelled this man with death judgements, jp2 clung to life with every fibre of his being. Instead of glorifying God in his death, jp2 defiantly stared up at God (with the eyes of his soul) and said to God, "I dare you to kill me". Even with the soulish, prayerful support of millions of fans around the world, the fervent prayers of a few remnant believers continued to take a toll on him, forcing him to literally bend down more and more and more, with his facial expression becoming more and more satanic, all until he was finally pummelled into the ground, dying a spiritually shameful death. In the same way, willie graham has been declining physically with each passing day, with a satanic stare beginning to form in his face just as was the case with jp2.

Twelve years ago, as jp2 clung to life, he and the people around him were predicting how he would make it to his 86th birthday. They did not realise, however, that the dye had been cast. This is why it was prophesied by God's soldiers that he would die before that date, and he did, dying 46 days short. In the same way, willie graham will have his life snatched before his 100th birthday, even as the people around him keep "prophesying" that he will make it to 100. And, to emphasise his spiritual fall, his age at the time of his physical death will be 2 years short of 100. Just like with jp2, willie graham's face is showing an increasingly satanic look as he defiantly clings to his natural life, but he and the millions of soulish prayers supporting him will not be able to overcome God's decree against him. Had he died around the age of 87 or 88, some 11 or 12 years ago, he would have been able to spare much of the eternal legacy that he had accumulated (for he had done some good during his life). Despite his stubborn refusal to embrace the prophetic and his willingness to make soulish compromises to achieve pseudo-spiritual goals, God would have provided him a measure of eternal reward for his work. However, since he chose to cling to a useless temporal existence all the way to an age of 100 (to prove to himself that he fulfilled 100% of his calling and had not held anything back from God), graham has had his legacy eroded on a persistent basis over these 11-12 years and has been left with just about nothing. He is now an enemy of God whose presence actively works against God's latter-day purposes. Therefore, just like with the world-beloved jp2, the world-beloved willie graham deserves to be prayerfully judged to death, in the same way that any other staunch enemy of God does.

Billy Sunday, herald of the simple, moral Gospel

Another major bearer of the evangelistic "William" name in America was Billy Sunday. As some of you may know, Billy Sunday was an ex-baseball player who played for the Chicago White Stockings (later known as the Cubs), the Pittsburgh Alleghenys, and the Philadelphia Phillies in the 1880s. After his baseball career ended, he became a full-time preacher. As indicated on Wikipedia, it is believed that the total attendance for all the evangelistic meetings held by Billy Sunday was around 100 million people, which is an impressive number, especially if you consider that it was in the "pre-microphone" and "pre-broadcast" era. It is also estimated that around 1 million people responded to the "salvation invitation" in those meetings, another quite impressive number for the pre-television era.

When this writer meditates on the deeds of Billy Sunday, it is difficult to pinpoint any glaring weakness other than his over-emphasis on "keeping the Gospel simple" and on maintaining a simplistic, tradition-bound understanding of what constituted "holy living". It is apparent, however, that there was a strong prophetic component to Billy Sunday, which must have worked in a strong way to counter the negative effects of the overly-simple, tradition-centric message that he preached. There was also an active element of apostolic righteousness in his life, for his actions generally revealed a tendency towards doing the "right thing" and not simply the most "profitable" thing (even if he became wealthy as a result of his ministry, which is not, in and of itself, an indication of valuing profit over truth). Despite this, it seems as if Billy Sunday was never willing to set time apart to ask God if there was more to being a Christian and to Scripture than what he understood. Once he found a "groove that worked", he stuck with it and never had any hunger for more. Even though he was willing to sacrifice himself (and his family) physically and emotionally to do God's work, he never surrendered that one thing that the Spirit of God would whisper to him about in the stillness of the night: his simple understanding of Christianity and his almost mechanical approach to carrying out the evangelistic ministry. As a result, God mercifully forced him into what could be considered an "early retirement" after World War I as his ministry quickly lost the vibrancy and popularity that it had enjoyed during its first decade. Despite this, Billy Sunday refused to heed the 4th commandment and meditate on the Lord. Instead, he soldiered on, forcing God to judge him harshly over the last 15 years of his life.

As mentioned on Wikipedia, Sunday's 3 sons led less than exemplary moral lives, forcing him and his wife to pay blackmail to several women in order to keep their scandals out of the public eye. Three years before his own death, his daughter died around the age of 42, in 1932, apparently as a result of multiple sclerosis. His 3 sons also died premature deaths. His oldest son George, whom he and his wife had rescued from financial ruin, committed suicide the next year by jumping from a hotel window around the age of 41, apparently after being arrested for drunkenness and auto theft. His 2nd son Billy Jr. also died around the age of 40, in an auto crash whilst driving home drunk after a party, and his son Paul crashed an airplane and also died an early death.

Some in the traditional, legalistic matriarchal Church attribute the above calamities to Sunday and his wife not focusing on their family, with special blame being placed on his wife for not being the devoted "stay-at-home, evangelical mum" that legalists envision. And to those who dare to make such simplistic judgements shall go eternal judgement and shame (a judgement and shame that shall also befall the spiritual children that they spawn). The self-righteous fools who espouse such nonsense suffer from the same spiritual disease that crippled Sunday's life: the spirit of excessive simplicity in their understanding of true holiness. The explanation for what befell Sunday and his family goes much deeper than a misguided and matriarchal "family-first" explanation. In fact, Sunday did much more with his life than all his simplistic critics combined. Ironically, it is because of this that God judged him so harshly towards the end of his life. It is as if he was forced to pay a heavy price in this lifetime in order to prevent losing much of the eternal fruit that he had accumulated, a fruit that was imperilled by his refusal to move away from the simple formulae that made him "successful" at the beginning.

Billy Sunday was given ample time by God to prepare America for the black-horse 1920s. He had ample time to prepare so that he could warn America about a simplistic life paradigm of external morality (i.e. Prohibition) and a practical life of hard work and external prosperity. Had he been willing to go "green-horse", he would have shaken the passive, simplistic culture of the "roaring 20s", a culture dominated by externally proper yet metaphysically empty men like Calvin Coolidge, a culture that slowly degenerated as a result of its empty core, leading to the stock market crash of 1929, the Great Depression of the 1930s, and the introduction of destructive government programmes like the New Deal that have led to today's 20 trillion dollar debt and bloated, cancer-infested government. God allowed Billy Sunday to live 6 years into the Great Depression in order to witness what he had been called to prevent, and he was forced to experience the full emotional weight of that Depression by having his children killed off during those 6 years.

William Branham

Besides willie graham and Billy Sunday, it could be argued that the most influential American evangelist of the 20th century was William Marion Branham. He is arguably the person most responsible for the post World-War II healing revival in America, initiating the movement of evangelistic revivals centred around supernatural healings (as indicated on Wikipedia). Unlike graham and Sunday, whose ministerial lives are relatively straightforward to evaluate, Branham's is more complex because he was, in essence, a more "complicated" man than them. This is due to his willingness to believe that there was more to God's Gospel than what the traditionalistic, religious mind could see. Unlike Girgashite and prophetically-lazy graham, Branham promptly embraced the supernatural and its importance in God's spiritual work. He was also aware that God was intending to launch a new spiritual era on Earth and that that era required the actions of "special agents" on Earth, so to speak, meaning that it was not a matter of just waiting for God to do everything for His useless, spiritually-crippled Perizzite people. Previously unbeknownst to this writer, many who lived through his ministry, especially those who reviled him, saw him as the individual most responsible for (or guilty of) spreading the concepts of a "latter rain revival", the "manifested sons of God" and "Joel's army", even when he was not the one who reintroduced these concepts in modern times (those who truly embraced these concepts from him ended up in Canada).

The main problem with Branham, however, was that, even though many of his revelations were valid, he had a tendency to take some of them too literally, which would normally lead to tragic distortions that were, at face value, utter falsehoods that would then serve as excuses by the enemies within the Church to reject the hidden, core truths that God was promoting through him. This inability to separate the literal, Old-Covenant things from the spiritual, New-Covenant things also affected his prophesying, leading to prophecies and predictions that were spiritually valid but were utterly false in the natural realm, as when he prophesied (as indicated on Wikipedia) that Los Angeles would sink into the Pacific Ocean and that a 1500-mile-long, 3-to-4-miles-wide, and 40-mile-deep stretch of land would break loose, causing waves that would reach all the way to Kentucky. Spiritually, his prophecies were absolutely true. The Pacific Ocean represented the ocean of left-wing thinking, and Los Angeles and California have indeed become so out of touch that it is almost as if they have broken off from the rest of the United States and become a separate nation inundated by ludicrously insane liberalism (hence, the recent talk in California about secession). The rubbish of California liberalism, combined with its full embrace of the corrupt, third-world hispanic culture has indeed triggered a wave from the left-wing "Pacific Ocean" that has contaminated the entire nation, with its waves indeed reaching into the heart of "Kentucky", i.e. middle America which was once dominated by white Americans and was once impervious to contamination from the outside world. It can also be said that this wave of contamination has been greatly spurred by left-wing Hollywood (i.e. "Los Angeles"), which has used its film and television exports to submit much of America to its radical doctrine. Unfortunately, when Branham prophesied these things about Los Angeles and California in 1964, he did not see with the eyes of his spirit that God was talking about all these things, which were much more relevant than a literal chunk of land breaking off into the ocean. As a parenthesis, the "1500 miles" in length refers to Hosea 3:2 and the redemptive 15 pieces of silver that will have to be paid in order to rescue the harlot California from her life of harlotry; the 3 to 4 miles in width refers to the black- and green-horse riders (i.e. 3rd- and 4th-seal riders) that will be required to pay this price; and the 40 miles of depth refers to the 40th-year, Joshua-anointing dispensation and generation during which this will happen (in other words, Old-Covenant, 38-year believers and half-way-between-Old-and-New, 39th-year believers will be unable and unwilling to pay this price).

We could go into detailed examples of false prophecies by Branham that were true in their core but utterly false (and useless) in their natural interpretation. However, that would be beyond the scope of this posting. Suffice it to say that practically all of his false prophecies and few misguided doctrines manifest the same pattern of interpreting New-Covenant word from God with an Old-Covenant mind.

Another unfortunate characteristic in Braham's ministry was the strong legalism embedded within it, which once again reveals that he was attempting to achieve New-Covenant results with Old-Covenant methods. Even though he intuitively understood that the manifestation of God's purposes in the latter days involved embracing His judgements, Branham was never able to explicitly understand this, and he was unable to distinguish between well-meaning but Jebusite judgements and spiritual judgements. He was also unable to perceive how God's judgements are to be released into the Earth by spirit-centric agents so that God's desires may be made a reality on Earth. These judgements go much deeper than the forging of an external morality and "proper behaviour". They go to the root of fundamental soul paradigms that are so subtle that they are embraced and defended even by well-meaning but misguided "children of God".

As indicated on Wikipedia and livingwordbroadcast.com, Branham suffered a very tragic death on xmas eve 1965, at the age of 56. Six days earlier, on 18 December, he, his wife, and one of his daughters (Sarah) were driving in one car, and his son Billy Jr. was following in a second car. They were driving eastward from their new hometown of Tucson, Arizona to their old hometown of Jeffersonville, Indiana to celebrate xmas. They were 70 miles from Amarillo, Texas when they were hit by a drunk driver heading west on the eastbound lane. Branham survived the crash, but his head had suffered so much damage that he died in an Amarillo hospital 6 days later. His wife, daughter, and son survived the crash and were able to live past the incident.

As we shared in a previous posting (regarding an accident in Canada), this speaks of how dangerous it is to attempt green-horse work (i.e. "heading east") whilst still in a black-horse (i.e. "western") mindset, just as when Napoleon headed east to conquer Russia, thereby terminating his empire. The fact that the accident happened in Amarillo and that he actually died there also has spiritual significance. As indicated on Wikipedia, the town of Amarillo apparently derives its name from the yellow wildflowers that were plentiful in the area during the spring and summer, which, as we have shared before, points to the green-horse vulnerability that green-horse riders must embrace as they descend into death and Sheol. Thus, during his 6 days of unconsciousness, Branham was made to live through a Sheol experience consistent with green-horse Death. This writer believes that God allowed Branham to go through this out of love for him so that he could finally go through the stage that he had refused to walk in (probably out of deliberate self-deception). During those 6 days, the Lord finally had Branham's full and submissive attention, and that is when he began to be told of the latter-day doctrine that he had begun to mangle with a Girgashite understanding, as when he became convinced that he had revealed the true meaning of the 7 Seals of the Apocalypse (during those 6 days, he must have been given a true introduction into the seals' true meaning, including the meaning of the seal he was going through at that time, the 4th seal).

{You may want to go to an article on believethesign.com for more understanding on Branham's death and the prophecies that were made to warn him of his impending doom. However, this writer would recommend that you be cautious of the article's analysis of the prophecies, for it is written from a well-meaning perspective that intends to be objective but is, at the end of the day, Girgashite in its nature, without a willingness to go to the Holy Spirit and ask Him what He thought was right or wrong. This is what happens when Girgashite teachers attempt to dissect prophecy without embracing the prophetic endowment themselves first. It is also worth commenting that the article points out an arrogant statement by one of the men who prophesied about Branham's death, the statement being that Branham's error was that he was trying to be a teacher when he was not one and that he should instead leave teaching to the "teachers" and dedicate himself to "preaching" with supernatural manifestations. This reveals the matriarchal Church's complete lack of understanding about God's power, always seeing it as a sideshow that can be used to win over converts that can then be brought into their "fold" in order to be taught their stale doctrines. The matriarchal Church has never understood that their doctrine is incomplete in the best of days and utterly corrupt the rest of the time. There was a void for deep doctrine that Branham was perceiving, a void that needed to be filled somehow in order to further God's purposes. The problem was that he tried to fill that void with the wrong spiritual material, meaning that his work began to cause way more harm to the Body of Christ than good, for which reason the Lord took him away.}

William the withholder

The prophet of God also declared that, in a negative sense, the name William also speaks of people who have the ability to do a good for others but deliberately hold back and refuse to do it. In the case of willie clinton, this withholding can be seen in how he could have served as a tool of God to stem the rise of radical left-wing liberalism in America. After showing that a "compassionate" President could operate under Republican principles of restrained spending and government help laced with personal accountability (when he yielded to Gingrich), he could have dealt a death blow to the radical wing of the Democrat party that believes in magical handouts and in indiscriminately blaming the European white for all the problems in the world. As a man beloved by the left, he could have spoken to them about the need to face the realities of life and end the chasing of fictitious windmills from the 1960s. Everything was placed in his hand to do a great deal of good to his own party and to the country in general. Unfortunately, he withheld on this opportunity, choosing instead to ride on the wave of his temporary success to further himself and his political allies. And, naturally, willie graham was so busy planting his lips on Clinton's "presidential" sphinxter to correct him and warn him of the great evil that he was doing then (and had done in the past).

Speaking of willie graham, his "Williamite withholding" can be seen in how he had the opportunity to influence the traditionalistic churches that respected him to prompt them to move out of their religiosity and into a legitimate move of the Spirit. He could have served as a lightning rod to draw in criticism from the legalistic churches that refused to recognise the spiritual validity of "Pentecostal" manifestations. As a man with a reputation for being "proper" and "non-radical", he could have served as a sign to the legalistic churches that embracing the moves of the Spirit does not constitute a descent into "lunacy". With the access he had to American Presidents, he could have served as a true moral voice that confronted iniquity in the White House, exposing it to the public if necessary in order to work change, even if that meant losing his "White House visitation privileges". However, willie graham chose to be a selfish coward, and he will soon go to his grave having deliberately squandered the opportunity to do good that he was given, and he will do so with absolutely no sense of remorse or regret over his misdeed. Even Judas felt shame and remorse over what he did; willie graham will not, and, even when confronted by God as he stands before Him, his first reaction will be to make his case, defiantly complaining with bitterness to God about "this unforeseen turn of events". The matriarchal Church's last pope will surely make a sorry and shameful spectacle of himself on that day.

As we already shared above, Billy Sunday had the opportunity to do good by preparing America for the black-horse 1920s by warning the land about the danger of a simplistic life paradigm of external morality and external prosperity through practical, hard work. Instead, he chose to remain within his simple paradigms. And, even when God forced him into semi-retirement after World War I, he never stopped to listen to God's deeper voice, choosing instead to double down on the ways he knew. Why? Because it was easier, it was safer, and it was more comfortable. He had the chance to enter into a "green-horse" relationship with God and produce great blessing for an entire generation, but he withheld that sacrifice. That is why God had to put him through a bitter last few years as his biological genealogy was wiped off the face of the Earth. This writer believes, however, that the final judgement for Billy Sunday was much more honourable than the one willie graham will experience, for, despite his stubbornness and selfishness, Billy Sunday was much more willing to bow his head in shame and say to the Lord God of Israel, "Yes, I have sinned. Please forgive me for what I have done. Praised be the Lord God who loved me and gave Himself for me.".

Unlike with willie graham and Billy Sunday, William Branham's withholding is much subtler and more difficult to discern. This writer believes that his flaw lay in believing exclusivity over the latter-day revelations that were needed to forge His manifestation. Branham's apostolic endowment was sorely underdeveloped, and, on various occasions, the Lord tried to warn him about this. However, the hubris of his prophetic prowess got the better of him, and he began to believe that the prophetic endowment itself was enough to unleash the necessary revelations. Instead of admitting his limitation (privately and publicly) and waiting for someone else to come along (or at least for God to develop the apostolic elements that were missing in him), he chose to forge ahead on his own, just as he did on that fateful day that he was driving east as a westbound car was racing towards him. He thought that he could drive on the apostolic, right side of the road (which is what he was literally doing on that fateful day), but he was, in truth, driving like an out-of-control drunkard on the left side of the road (like the driver that hit him).

It is worth emphasising that the above is different from the matriarchals' warning to him that he should "not teach because he was not a teacher" and that he should dedicate himself to running the sideshow of supernatural healings. His problem was not that he was not a teacher (this writer believes that he was). His problem was that his apostolic side was sorely underdeveloped, and he needed to admit this in order to receive the help that he needed and be more than the "healing sideshow" that the matriarchals had restricted him to be. Unfortunately, satan seized on the subtle difference between what the matriarchals were saying and what God was saying in order to blur the two into the "same" message. Therefore, as he rejected the matriarchals' false message, he ended up rejecting God's as well. As much as the enemy is to blame for this deception (and he will be punished accordingly), all of us as believers are ultimately responsible for discerning such subtle deceptions, for we have been given the mind of Christ. Had he been willing to embrace his deficiency, God would have certainly sent him "apostolic support" through people with that anointing, and he would have, in turn, imparted his strong prophetic anointing to those who operated in the apostolic but were lacking in the prophetic. In doing so, he would have built a spiritual home for God's remnant in the latter days, a place of safety that would be a great blessing to those among the remnant who are currently going through so much heartache and limitation. Instead, he let the enemy steal that home away, which manifested itself in his son Billy Jr.'s actions around the time of his death. According to this link, Branham's son, Billy Jr., who survived the horrific crash of 18 December 1965, refused to donate blood for him despite the fact that Branham's blood type was so rare. Apparently, Billy Jr. was not in a hurry to save his father because, a few days earlier, he had wiped out his father's bank account by going to the bank and using the fact that he shared his father's name to fool the bank into transferring his father's balance to a personal account. This name similarity correlates with how satan was able to use the similarity between the matriarchals' deceptive message (about "leaving teaching to the teachers") and God's message (about realising that his prophetic endowment was not enough and required apostolic support that he had to humbly and patiently await). And Billy Jr.'s plundering correlates with how the shelter that he was to build for future remnant sons and daughters was ravaged by a false son, a "real" son in the literal but a bastard in the spiritual (which, in turn, correlates with his literal interpretations of spiritual realities).

William Seymour and William Durham

As you may know, William Seymour was the man used by God to lead the Azusa Revival that started in April 1906 in Los Angeles and led to the outbreak of Pentecostalism around the world. A meditation on Seymour's life leaves very little room for criticism. Unlike the self-centred, bombastic, and greedy Pentecostal preachers of today, Seymour was a very humble man, a man truly committed to a legitimate move of the Spirit of God without sacrificing holiness. After 3 and a half years, the mighty revival that started in Azusa began to wane. Instead of trying to artificially extend his stint in the sunlight or benefit financially from it, Seymour was willing to slowly recede back into anonymity, dying in relative poverty, at least when one considers the spiritual magnitude of his work. Despite his crucial role in unleashing the power of God in the 20th century, he was never given the credit and honour that he deserved, and being black did not help him in receiving the acknowledgement that he should have received in his lifetime.

Despite his many virtues, there was a minor element that did him in, and it all came to a head when another "William", William Durham, crossed paths with him in 1912, some 3 years after the revival in Azusa had begun to subside. As indicated on Wikipedia, Durham was initially hesitant about the Pentecostal manifestations being reported from Azusa, but he eventually yielded to them, recognising them as coming from God. And, not only did he yield to them, he fully embraced them and became one of their biggest proselytisers, working out of a congregation in Chicago. As mentioned on Wikipedia and a book ("The Azusa Street Mission and Revival" by Cecil Robeck), Durham was on a visit to Los Angeles in 1911 when he decided to drop by the Azusa mission where he had experienced his full conversion to Pentecostalism. At the time, Seymour was not at Azusa, being on one of his revival tours. Recognised by the brethren at Azusa from his visit years earlier, he was invited to preach, and he used the opportunity to preach a message that was contrary to Seymour's belief system. Having been raised in the "Wesleyan tradition", Seymour believed (along with many others of his time) that, in every believer's life, there was an event separate from the "born-again" salvation event. This separate event was a transformative one in which the believer would became entirely sanctified unto God, entering into a state where he was, for all intents and purposes, free from the grip of sin, capable of living a sinless life if he so willed. It was after this "sanctification" event that the believer would then be open to the "3rd main event" of his life, the baptism of the Holy Spirit. Durham, on the contrary, came to believe after some meditation that the "sanctification event" happened immediately upon salvation and that sanctification, in a wider sense, was a lifelong process. Wesleyans also believed this, but they mainly differed in when the initial "sanctification event" would occur (as well as the external magnitude of that event).

Seymour (along with other believers of a similar thinking) disliked Durham's "unification" of "salvation" and "sanctification" because he deemed it important for believers to strive for a sanctification breakthrough, after which they would be so given over to holiness that they would be free to wage war for the Gospel without having to worry about a never-ending internal struggle within them. In fact, Seymour's interest in preserving a separate "sanctification" event was so strong that he immediately returned to Azusa when he was notified of what Durham was preaching. According to a book (mentioned above), Seymour sat at the services to listen to what Durham had to say. As Durham preached, the crowds became larger and larger, and the fire that had begun to wane at Azusa was rekindled. Seymour tried to convince Durham that his doctrine was wrong, but Durham doubled down and continued to preach his "finished work" doctrine. Seeing that Seymour would not budge either, Durham began to poll the believers from the pulpit, asking them to raise their hand if they wanted him to lead Azusa in place of Seymour. To Seymour's dismay, the crowds fervently sided with Durham, and a change in leadership seemed imminent. Seeing this, Azusa's elders padlocked the church to prevent Durham preaching any longer. Incensed, Durham began to preach at a different congregation in Los Angeles, drawing very large crowds as he did. Desiring to explain in detail the specifics of his doctrine, Durham planned to put it in writing, and he began to do so, but he was unable to complete his drafts. He died shortly after his conflict with Seymour, in 1912, in Los Angeles, at the age of 39. His doctrine took hold, however, and is, as far as this writer can discern, the current "law of the land" in the vast majority of the Pentecostal world (at least in the sense that the 3-stage Wesleyan view is no longer the popular view).

Weakened (at least in the natural) by the Durham incident and by another incident involving a preacher named Florence Crawford (who stole a mailing list from him with the help of a Clara Lum), Seymour's ministry in Azusa never regained its initial fervour. He died 10 years after Durham, in 1922, at the age of 52, suffering two massive heart attacks and dying after the second one in his wife's arms. As indicated on christianitytoday.com, she continued as pastor of the Azusa church and died some 14 years later, in 1936. The church was later sold for unpaid taxes and demolished. Today (and this writer is a physical witness of this on 14 April 2012) the area around the Azusa church is now part of Los Angeles' Little Tokyo, and there is a Japanese cultural centre in the area where the church once stood.

Some could argue that Seymour was wrong not to submit to Durham, whilst others could argue that Seymour was an innocent victim of Durham's evil antics. In truth, an objective analysis reveals that both men were to blame (one more than the other), for which reason both were taken home at such a young age. This writer has always found doctrinal debates over minutiae to be a big waste of time. It is frustrating to see believers quarrel over technical doctrinal details whilst they seem to ignore the big, fundamental flaws that are never corrected. Having said this (and without the intention of getting into a futile doctrinal debate), it is worth taking a "side" in the debate between Seymour and Durham in order to discern who was wrong where. Just as Durham discovered when he studied the Scriptures, there is no justification for believing that there is a separate "sanctification" event in people's lives. Wesley developed this incorrect doctrine from his personal experience. After the banishment from Georgia that he experienced, Wesley had a transformative "sanctification event" at Aldersgate, England on 24 May 1738 (as mentioned on Wikipedia). It seems as if he took his personal experience and generalised it into a doctrine for all. In a sense, Wesley was both right and wrong. He was wrong in that we truly are sanctified the moment we are born again, at which time we are immediately endowed with a new, last-Adam nature and have the ability to walk in total obedience to God if we choose to do so (mind you, this is not the same as "perfection"). The problem is that we usually give in to the old-Adamic nature and wilfully fall into bondage again, thereby falling out of our "sanctification". After this, it becomes necessary to sanctify ourselves again, leading to various transformative "sanctification events" throughout our lives. This writer would even argue that, even whilst in a state of total obedience, the believer will have to experience various "milestone, sanctification events" in which he crosses from one dimension of his spiritual walk to another.

This writer prays that, as you read this, you will realise how pointless the doctrinal debate over a separate sanctification event really was. Even when Durham was technically "right" about sanctification happening from the beginning, Seymour was also "right" about the need for believers to experience one or more "sanctification events" after conversion in order to enter into new dimensions of their spiritual walk. Having said this, Seymour was still wrong for not seeing the potentially liberating reality of what Durham was preaching, but he was blinded by a sincere weakness in his understanding. Therefore, when Durham began to impose his doctrine on Seymour, demanding that "he yield or else", he was sinning as per Romans 14, forcing Seymour to go against his weaker conscience, which was preventing him accepting an "instant, upon-conversion sanctification". Instead of allowing the Holy Spirit to do His work in Seymour's humble heart, he tried to carry out a nasty, latin-american-style coup against Seymour. It was despicable for Willie Durham to put Azusa's leadership up to a popular vote, publicly shaming the very man who was allowing him the time to speak and who had helped him enter into a new revelation of the Holy Spirit a few years earlier. Even if he was technically right and Seymour was technically wrong, Durham was expected (by the God of Israel) to show respect to a man who was of a humble disposition and who was never honoured by his contemporaries in the way that he should have. To make matters worse, after he was locked out of Azusa, Durham began a very public assault against Seymour, basically declaring him unfit to minister anywhere. Therefore, despite Durham's more "correct" doctrine, and despite the power and liberty that he was releasing, he became a popular Korah and Seymour became a weak Moses. This is why God struck Durham down shortly after his attack on Seymour; Durham died of pneumonia the following year, whilst still in Los Angeles, in 1912. Interestingly enough, the word "pneumonia" is derived from the Greek word pneuma meaning "spirit". In other words, Durham's death by pneumonia spoke of how he abused the power of the Spirit that God had made available to him, and the fact that he was killed by small, invisible organisms reflects how he triggered his own death by ganging up on an already weak man who was already fading into public oblivion.

Having said all of the above, Seymour is not without blame. God allowed the revival manifestations in Azusa through Durham's preaching in order to show Seymour that he was missing something, urging him to go beyond the protective isolation he was wrapping himself in after all the betrayals he had experience (by a man named Parham and by co-labourers Florence Crawford and Clara Lum). It is as if these betrayals became the justification in Seymour's mind of why the Azusa revival was fading. Even though these evil betrayals had a negative impact on Azusa, they were not the root cause of the decline. Otherwise, God would have continued to support His servant, keeping the Azusa fire aflame and proving to everyone that He was with Seymour, not his traitors. Seymour failed to understand all of this, going further and further into a Girgashite lockdown of his ministry, i.e. using natural, legal means to fight the battle, including changing Azusa's ministry charter to exclude non-blacks from the top 3 leadership positions (since, as a black man, Seymour feared whites' constant, and, at times, very real attempts to take over the congregation).

What, then, was wrong with Seymour and Azusa? The answer lies in Durham's temporary rekindling of the Azusa fire during his coup attempt. Durham had a stronger inclination than Seymour towards analysing Scripture and discerning truth directly from it. This means that Durham had an apostolic endowment, as evidenced by the fact that he was interested in laying down his "finished work" doctrine in detail and with clear Scriptural backing before the Lord judged him to death. This correlates with the apostolic endowment, since apostles are wisdom- and law-and-judgement-oriented, and Durham wanted to "lay down the law", so to speak, on believers' "sanctification"; and he wanted the wisdom in his "law" to be backed by Scripture, the ultimate source of righteous judgements.

Thus, when Durham arrived in Azusa, he arrived with a new apostolic wisdom revelation that began to release something that had been bound up in Azusa. The believers present immediately perceived the new freedom that they were being released into, and they responded to it, allowing a new move of the Spirit in the congregation. In other words, Azusa, as much as it had been on fire, was lacking in apostolic wisdom and was trying to run on the raw fuels of a "completed sanctification" and the prophetic fire and gifts of the Holy Spirit. On top of this, most, if not all, of Azusa's members were operating under the notion of a magical rapture, many of which believed would be happening very, very soon. Hence, Azusa was under a spiritual environment where there was no more growth to go through. After the fire of Pentecost fell on them, there was nothing left for them to do but stay in the "sanctified" mode (that they had already achieved prior to the Holy Spirit baptism) and continue operating in the pneumatikos of the Spirit. After a while, the only thing that can keep such a fire alive is raw emotion, and emotion eventually wears out.

The opportunity lost at Azusa

In a sense, one can argue that William Seymour forgot that the Azusa revival started on an apostolic wisdom revelation that many prior to 1906 were rejecting: the idea that the baptism of the Holy Spirit had as its evidence the speaking of tongues. Said another way, the apostolic revelation that Azusa and Seymour built on was that the baptism of the Holy Spirit would lead to supernatural manifestations that defied human understanding and logic. This baptism was more than a "gooey feeling" in the pit of your stomach or an obscure event that you may have experienced without "realising it". Instead, it came with power, and not only power, supernatural power, and not only supernatural power but manifestations that resembled lunacy to the religious understanding. Said yet another way, Seymour and Azusa built on the apostolic revelation that the believer needed a breakthrough that would agitate him and the spiritual atmosphere around him. This is why the mighty San Francisco earthquake of 1906, one of the most significant earthquakes of all time, happened some 5 weeks after the Azusa outbreak began. As indicated on Wikipedia, the San Francisco earthquake of 1906 caused a "southward shift" in California. Before the earthquake, San Francisco was the largest and most important city in the West; after the quake, industry, finance, and population were diverted south to Los Angeles (i.e. Azusa's city), and Los Angeles became the largest and most important city in the American West. Artistic relevance was also shifted southwards, from San Francisco down to Carmel-by-the-Sea, where San Francisco's leading poets and writers moved to, placing them a quarter of the way to Los Angeles.

Since the focus in Azusa became power and the "sheer will" to be sanctified, Seymour lost sight of the fact that all the work had started on an apostolic revelation. Also, since sanctification became more of an "event" than a process, there was little else to mature in once you had been imbued with the baptism of the Holy Spirit. God, however, was trying to tell Seymour that what happened between 1906 and 1909 was only the beginning. There was a great deal more apostolic wisdom to enter into and walk in, but Seymour was unable to understand it. Some of the wisdom he was to enter into was the understanding of God's Dominion over the Earth, i.e. claiming literal territory around the congregation. This is why, as a sign that he had not established God's dominion over the area around Azusa and over the city of Los Angeles in general, the Azusa congregation lost the building they congregated in a mere 25 years after the revival had started, and the area is now occupied by descendants of a land strongly linked with the Moabite spirit (i.e. Japan).

Seymour was also to walk away from the matriarchal understanding of the Rapture and into God's view of it. Had he done this, he and those gathering in Azusa would have gone beyond the mere "secret-chamber" mentality of "sanctifying themselves" and "saving as many souls as possible" before a rapture that they deemed was imminent but never occurred (and will never occur). Because he failed to enter into this understanding, God allowed the Azusa congregation to be run by Seymour's wife after his death, thereby symbolising the fact that the "female" soul had not been fully overcome by the "male" spirit at Azusa. Despite her good intentions, Seymour's wife ran the congregation into the ground, and the Azusa ministry ended with a whimper, in debt and losing their building.

Another wisdom that Seymour was to enter into was the basic understanding of the difference between the soul and the spirit, which would have included a basic understanding of how matriarchal the Church system was. Having a Wesleyan background that recognised "typologies" in Scripture, and having a basic desire to search the Scriptures and seek confirmation of his actions there, all of this wisdom was within his reach, but the understanding required to pursue that wisdom never developed in his heart.

Unfortunately, people like Charles Parham and William Durham who had the opportunity to guide him in that direction not only betrayed him but attacked him because they wanted to take human control over what had happened in Azusa. Despite these traitors, God would have allowed Seymour to enter into this missing understanding if he had only been willing to shut off the "power mode" long enough to listen to God. Seymour's last opportunity came when Durham showed up at Azusa in 1911. God showed him that a basic new apostolic revelation was reigniting a fire that had died down. And, had he been willing to listen, he would have been able to look beyond Durham's evil actions and see that Durham had an endowment that he was lacking in. Even if he would have had to distance himself from Durham anyway, the seed would have been sown in his heart, and God would have provided other means to help him. Unfortunately, satan used Parham's and Durham's evil to rapture (harpazo - Matthew 13:19) that seed out of his heart. As a result, Seymour and Azusa never matured apostolically, despite the fact that the Azusa congregation's official name was "Apostolic Faith Mission".

The squandered grace period for both William brothers

William Durham had around 18 months after his time at Azusa to reflect on what had happened, but he simply dismissed and smeared William Seymour and assumed the role of "new leader of the Pentecostal movement". Had Durham asked God for understanding, he would have realised that God was waiting on him to give Seymour some time to realise where he was going wrong. He would have then been able to break through to the then-paranoid Seymour, who was otherwise humble and meek, and both he and Seymour would have entered into a new spiritual dimension.

Durham had the opportunity to do much good to Azusa by lovingly and patiently imparting to Seymour the apostolic inclination that he was so lacking in. Instead, Durham chose to use the opportunity to attempt a takeover of Azusa and the Pentecostal movement, even if it meant destroying a man that he himself had described years earlier as incredibly "humble" and "meek". On the other hand, William Seymour had the opportunity do much good to his brethren at Azusa and Pentecostals in general by recognising that a "sanctification event" and spiritual power were not enough to fulfil God's purposes, but he chose instead to hold on for dear life to his earthly control of the Azusa congregation, thinking that his "revival formula" was complete and that his role was to protect the ground gained rather than conquer new ground (just like the American football coaches who stupidly and stubbornly decide to play "prevent defence" when they are ahead late in the game, only to lose the game because of that).

It is interesting to consider that both Williams died at early ages, Durham at the age of 39 in 1912 and Seymour at the age of 52 in 1922. Some may have also noticed that both ages are multiples of 13, with 39 being 13 times 3 and 52 being 13 times 4. This means that both ages combined would add up to 91, which is 13 times 7 (7 = 3 + 4). The reason why the Lord did this is to illustrate how both Williams were meant to complement each other to reach perfection (represented by the number "7"). The number 13 in this context refers to two things. On the one hand, as we have shared before, the number "13" speaks of rebellion, meaning that both Williams were supposed to act as an apostolic-prophetic force of rebellion against the ways of natural, religious man on Earth. On the other hand, the number "13" points to the number of turns that Joshua's army made around Jericho before conquering it (1 turn per day on the first 6 days and 7 times on the 7th day: 6x1 + 1x7 = 13). Both Williams were supposed to conquer and destroy a spiritual Jericho on Earth, but, due to the fact that both held back from the good that was in their power to do, their work was left incomplete and the Jericho they were to tear down was left standing at the end of their lives.

The fact that Seymour was allowed to live 13 years longer than Durham is the Lord's way of vindicating him versus Durham. Seymour's sin was one of omission that was enabled by rubbish brethren who constantly betrayed him (instead of helping him). By contrast, Durham's sin was one of deliberate, malicious action despite having no pressure from any traitors to do so. Said another way, Seymour committed a sin out of weakness, and Durham committed a transgression out of outright iniquity. This is why God allowed Seymour to outlive Durham by 10 calendar years (1922 - 1912), even when Seymour was, for all intents and purposes, done spiritually and had little else (if anything) to contribute after he missed the lesson of Durham's mini-revival of Azusa in 1911. Even so, God took him early to show that Seymour was also in the wrong, and He did so through 2 heart attacks, representing the 2 "works of grace" that Seymour stubbornly clung to in his doctrinal understanding of sanctification.

As a final note, the fact that the place where the Azusa mission used to stand is now part of "Little Tokyo" in Los Angeles, with a "Japanese Cultural Centre" in the immediate area (either where the building stood or right next to it) has spiritual significance. As we have shared before, Japan speaks of the Moabite spirit that refuses to admit its wrongdoing, even when all the incriminating evidence is standing right before everyone's eyes. This is the spirit that gripped both William Seymour and William Durham. William Seymour was unwilling to admit that there was something missing in him, even as he beheld the revival the God was producing through Durham, and Durham's followers were unwilling to admit that there was something wrong with Durham even after God killed him off in such a short time after his Korah-ite actions against Seymour. Because of this, Pentecostalism quickly descended into one of the things that Seymour so feared when he heard Durham's "finished work" doctrine: Since sanctification was a given from the moment of conversion, there was no longer an incentive (artificial as it may have been) to seek a sanctification event before seeking the baptism of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, believers began to seek the baptism only to obtain the benefits of its power, with no interest whatsoever in any type of consecration to God and His will for their lives. This sad result is the consequence of two Williams who were both wrong, stubbornly holding on to their point of view in Moabite pride.

According to 312azusa.com, the site where the Azusa mission once stood used to be a fruit orchard. In 2004, the last remaining tree from that orchard, which was 125 years old, was accidentally killed with hot cooking oil. The fact that the tree was 125 years old means that it was a silent "witness" to the entire Azusa revival. The fact that it was killed with hot cooking oil speaks of how Seymour and those at Azusa allowed the revival to extinguish by overusing the oil of the prophetic anointing, thinking that all that was needed was to heat that prophetic oil with "sanctified fervour". This writer is puzzled by how someone could have accidentally killed a tree in the middle of a city with hot cooking oil; my guess is that a lady of Japanese ascent was on her lunch break and sat under the tree to eat some Japanese food, and, after she finished, she had a significant amount of excess oil from her food that she disposed of by spilling it at the root of the tree, thinking that the soil would simply absorb the oil. Regardless of how it happened, the fact that it happened certifies that it was the Lord's doing, with a strong prophetic message behind it. The fact that it happened in 2004 also has strong spiritual significance, but this writer does not feel at liberty to share that significance here.

There is more to say regarding this word, but we shall do so in a future posting, God willing...