“This message will introduce Jesus Christ to the world.”

William Marion Branham

For all his failures, William Marion Branham was a prophet from God, accredited with signs, wonders, and mighty miracles.  His simple faith and demonstration of Jesus Christ the same, Yesterday, Today, and Forever through God’s healing power is still looked at today as one of the greatest, most powerful displays of God’s supernatural power in the modern world.  While it is still my belief that he was taken home early because he had forsaken his primary call of praying for the sick and that he was spreading doctrinal confusion by his teaching, the message of Mr. Branham still rings clear.

Of particular note, is his “Third Pull”, or his third pull vision.  Many people have claimed that this was his teaching ministry.  Since it was so controversial, many have claimed that this was the work that would never be duplicated and would not be a public show.  However, let us take another look.

One retelling of the vision of the Third Pull can be reviewed here.

As precursors to this phase of his ministry, there were five notable events that even William Branham regarded as the vindication of the Third Pull:

1. A small fish was resurrected when William Branham spoke to it, after it had had its insides ripped out by removing a swallowed hook.
2. A Squirrel was created when he spoke it into existence.
3. Hattie Wright’s boys were saved by the word at William Branham’s command.
4. On the mountain, a massive snow storm  was stilled instantly by a word.
5. William Branham was told concerning his wife that however he spoke about her situation, that was how it would be.  He decreed that before the doctor could touch her, Jesus would visit her and she would be healed.  By his words, before the doctor could touch her, God healed her.

Many people point to the time at Sunset mountain where William Branham received the “sword of the King”.  This of course is the “word of the Lord” which Ephesians 6:17 and Hebrews 4:12 talk about, which says that the sword of the Spirit is the word of God.  Here is where I believe followers of his message, eager to clear Mr. Branham from all wrong, have errantly presumed on the understanding of what the nature of the Third Pull was by attributing it to his “teaching” ministry.

In the vision of the third pull, with the small wooden room representing the tabernacle of Moses, with the outer white canvas all around for the outer courts, the voice speaking to William Branham said “I will meet you in there”.  This is the exact same phrase given to Moses regarding the place with the mercy seat and the cherubim (See Exodus 25:22).  The predicted demonstration of this pull in the telling of the vision was a lady being pushed through on a stretcher and being instantly, dramatically, and mysteriously healed.  It must be noted that the effect of the third pull was the same as that of the first two, physical healing, although the scale is apparently much more dramatic and profound.  There is a great deal of mystery in this (in the way that God hides mysteries in plain sight), and there should be to a point, but the effect of the Third Pull was healing, plain and simple.

Now, remember correctly, that William Branham was very upset with the culture of sign-seekers, and those looking at the signpost.  He was very grieved in his spirit over the tent crusades because the people were only seeing the miracles. They were seeking the display rather than the source.

One way of looking at this is that if we only see the miracles we are absolutely carnal.  Remember Jesus’ words that unless one is born of the Spirit, they cannot see the Kingdom of Heaven (John 3:3).  Any unsaved sinner can see the miracles.  But, the signs, the miracles, point to, well they point to something else.  You see, they point to the Kingdom, which cannot be seen!  Unless one learns to see this Kingdom, and let the signs only confirm that you are headed in the right direction, you have grossly, completely, and utterly missed the point.  To seek primarily natural ends with supernatural graces is perverse.  This is why Jesus says that a wicked and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and yet He Himself did them (Matthew 12:39).

The problem is not the signs, in themselves.  The problem is being blinded by the flesh so that one is guided to the signs themselves, failing to see the greatness of the God and the Kingdom bringing them; it is seeing only the carnal.

This is what grieved William Branham.  A generation of people were becoming more and more cultured to see the display of the miraculous, rather than to let the signs point to the invisible Kingdom, which is only visible by faith.  To only see the works of God and not His ways, and then to seek only after the miraculous is adultery compared to knowing and loving God Himself who brings them.  Instead of letting the demonstration that God was really in their midst point to the Giver of those blessings, they chose to be led forth only by what they could see. They were entertained by a show, rather than coming into the maturity of a true spiritual relationship with the God of the universe.

But, William Branham left the conference/preaching circuit.  Whether this was correct or not, I do not know, but as his own words attest, his original commission was to pray for the sick, and this was what he needed to stick to.

So what of the third pull?

His own words point to this.  Whether it was fulfilled in private, off the platform, or elsewhere, I still do not know.  He was told it would not be a public show.  But, consider two events from the life of Jesus.

In John 4:48, Jesus told a centurion that unless he saw signs, he would not believe.  “Believe what?” one might ask.  If you see the sign, it means you believed, right?  If the sign was to help people who would not believe otherwise, then to what was Jesus desiring that they believe?  What was He referring to? Obviously, it was NOT that Jesus wanted them to believe in the sign itself!  That was done WITHOUT their faith, and they would not have believed without it, which means AFTER the sign was already done!  To what was He referring wanted the centurion to believe, that he would not until after he had seen this sign?

This is my supposition onto the ministry of Jesus based on the observable signs in the life of William Branham, but it would bear true with both accounts.  Jesus looked at the man, and probably in much a similar fashion to William Branham’s operation by vision, he told the Roman that his son would recover.  By my supposition, he saw it in a vision, and proclaimed it so, just as William Branham did countless times, without fail.

But, consider again, now, another instance in the life of Jesus.  In John 5:6, Jesus asked a man who had been sick for 38 years, “Do you want to be made well?”  Again, by my supposition, Jesus was doing what William Branham did often, as he called it, contacting his spirit.  He was establishing communication, and opening that realm of dynamics that we all take for granted whenever we dialogue with anyone.  This is the same reason Paul, in 1 Corinthians 5:11, says not to eat with a sexually immoral person who calls themselves a brother.  There are certain dynamics that happen when you talk with someone, let alone sit and eat with them.

But, in this case, Jesus did not pronounce that which he had seen in a vision.  Instead, Jesus said in John 5:8 to “Rise, pick up your bed, and walk.”  Here, not by vision, but by the spoken word, Jesus commanded by the Spirit.  By the creative, spoken word, Jesus commanded healing.

This was a new level.  This was a higher level.  When God formed the world, He did so by His spoken word.  He said, “Light Be”, and Light came into existance (Genesis 1:3).

Some people try to claim that the “teaching” ministry of William Branham accomplished the third pull.  Far from it.  This was to have been a part, under proper adherence to the written Word, and would have helped to bring in the fullness of the harvest at some point, but it clearly could not have been the Pull in question.  William Branham’s teaching ministry never healed anyone!

What was/is the third pull?  The spoken word.  The power of the creative word.  The sword of the King.  The very method Jesus used and instructed his apostles in.  The power to say unto a mountain, be removed, and it was done for them.  Not by discernment, not by vision, not necessarily even by the laying on of hands, but by the Spoken Word of God!  Not a teaching word, but, “In the name of Jesus, I say unto you, Rise Up And Walk!”

That is power.  And that is the message that will bring in the “rapture faith” that William Branham talked about.

Yet, that secret that was shared only with Branham, the secret of the little wooden room, wasn’t told to us, yet it was displayed for all who chose to listen.  What was it that William Branham was told in that little box?

Why on earth should anyone tell you?  Go to Jesus and be so obnoxious that He tells you Himself (Luke 11:8).  If you were told, you would most likely just make a public show of it, start a new generation of sign seekers who had little inkling to find the God of Abraham.  And, in the end, be told, away from me, you worker of iniquity (Matthew 7:23).  But, if you start with the Word, the 1/8″ end of the string with the cannon of scripture as the metal clasp to keep the thread from fraying, so that we can all agree, then as you pull that faith through you little, itty-bitty little eye-let, eventually, you’ll have the whole 1″ one in there, and you’ll see the angels, and no one will have to tell you what it means.

God will have revealed it to you, and in the mean time He will have humbled you sufficiently to walk in it without messing everything up.

One this is for certain.  When that power is displayed, and it will, for God’s word will never return void, it will never be duplicated.  When you speak to a dead man, he either gets up or he doesn’t, there can be no imitators, nor any excuses except that the man of God really wasn’t one.  And, as always, it will never be a public show.  There may be many people who operate in it, but it will only be those with real faith.  No counterfeits will ever produce the demonstrations of God’s power that are encompassed in the Third Pull.  Though there may be hundreds who use it, it will be genuine all the way.  Besides, no one would believe you anyway if you went on blabbing it.  They would trample it under foot, and then rend you to pieces..  Better to keep your mouth shut like Jesus and say, “Boys, you just can’t take it.  Get on with the Holy Ghost and He’ll tell ya!”  God has His ways of preparing a man before He anoints him.

This is in no way to dishonor a true man of God, but in any area William Branham or anyone may have missed it, it is our job to pick up that torch today, and finish where he left off.  Who knows, but that perhaps his faith is only made complete in ours, to prove we are all of the same faith as Abraham.  Only let us not be like those who only swallowed the lure that was the same size as us, thinking it is all about the words of a message and not the faith and spirit of that message.  And, let us who are in the boat already speak to that fish that was gutted, and say “Live”, that we might usher in and prepare the way for the coming of the King.