Ewald Frank

9. 6. 1973, 7:30 pm, Krefeld, Germany
broadcast on 29. 3. 2023

Topic: Psalm 66: How wonderful is your rule!

Brother Russ:

We read a Word of God before we pray from Psalm 99 and we stand up to it.

"The Lord reigneth, let the people tremble; He sitteth between the cherubims, let the earth be moved.

The Lord is great in Zion, and He is high above all the people; let them praise Thy great and terrible name, for it is holy.

The King's strength also loveth judgment; Thou dost establish equity, Thou executest judgment and righteousness in Jacob.

Exalt ye the Lord our God, and worship at His footstool, for He is holy.

Moses and Aaron were among His priests, and Samuel among them that call upon His name;

they called upon the Lord, and He answered them.

He spake unto them in the cloudy pillar; they kept His testimonies, and the ordinance that He gave them.

Thou answerest them, O Lord our God; Thou wast a God that forgavest them, though Thou tookest vengeance of their inventions.

Exalt the Lord our God, and worship at His holy hill, for the Lord our God is holy."

Up to here this precious and wonderful Word of God. Let us pray together.

Holy Father, we thank You for this hour of grace. We thank You for this gathering, and we thank You for this place. And indeed, Lord, we will exalt Your name, for Your name is holy. Your name is holy among Your people.

Lord, not only in those days, but also in our days, You are wonderful and glorious. Lord, to You we bring glory, and to You we bring worship in this hour. We thank You, Lord, and we are so glad, Lord, that we know to whom we pray, Lord, and we know who is on our side.

Lord our God, You heard Your people in those days, and You have also heard us in these days. Therefore, we bring glory to You. Hallelujah. Lord, we may dwell under Your glory. We may walk, Lord, where You walk, Lord. We may walk in the way that You have walked. Hallelujah. Praise, honor and glory.

Lord, bless with us Your people.

Bless us tonight. Continue to bless Your word, that we will hear, Lord. Thanks be to You for everything. In Jesus' name. Amen.

[singing]

Brother Frank

Praise and thanks be to the Lord for His grace.

I'm sure we are all glad about what we have already heard, and especially because it is not too often that I'm granted to hear, and that is why I'm happy about every sentence, every thought that is spoken. And I may certainly say it, I have really been richly blessed by the Word we have heard, by the many thoughts that have been expressed.

We hope that God will give some more thoughts from his Word.

I was thinking of Hebrews chapter 10 in that context. Hebrews chapter 10. It says here from verse 37,

"Cast not away therefore your confidence, which has great recompense of reward.

For ye have need of patience, that after ye have done the will of God, ye might receive the promise.

For yet a little while, and he that shall come will come, and will not tarry."

Maybe up to here, this precious and holy Word of God.

"For ye have need of patience, that after ye have done the will of God, ye might receive the promise."

We know one thing, the will of God cannot be done by ourselves. It must be done through the Holy Spirit.

We cannot help ourselves. We cannot do the will of God by ourselves. But one thing that God has given us grace to do is to put our will into His will.

And this has become already great to us from what we have already heard. People have obscured and covered up God's plan of salvation with their statutes and doctrines, but God, through prophetic revelation, has again and again brought all things to light and revealed them, so that those who were to see could see.

And the same has happened in our time. May people pass it by and perhaps not assess it and not comprehend it, but all those to whom it has happened, they know, I would almost say, the day and the hour when it fell like scales from their eyes, when the veil was taken off them, that they could see what God is up to in this time.

We know that if we only talk about what God has done in the past millennia, it is all so far away.

At the moment we come in contact with the present work of God, everything from the past is also transferred into the present and it stands vividly before our eyes. Otherwise it is only an object lesson. We have theory and perhaps philosophy about it, without having any direct part in it.

Often enough it has been said: the presence of God is always revealed in what he is presently doing, not what we talk about or interpret him to be doing. The presence of God is revealed in what God is presently doing.

What was at the time of Moses?

Did Moses only speak of Abraham or did God make himself known in his time as the present, as the »I am« [Ex 3:14], as the revealing God?

That is what it is all about.

Every theologian can speak of God in his own way as he pleases, but the moment God does something in the plan of salvation, he gives the revelation of his spirit and his will, and this not to the one who wants it, but to the one whom he has ordained.

And there is no man who can say, "So Lord, now use me, I am ready to be your mouthpiece."

God knows the day, he knows the hour, he knows whom he has prepared to have his Word proclaimed from a cold mouth in authority.

Therefore we can say that we have not followed cunningly devised fables, but the power and glory of our God, which he has revealed in this time as mightily as ever. [2Pt1:16] We have remained behind with nothing, but God has revealed himself as the present and as the same in this time.

When we read the gospels and the book of Acts and notice what the Lord did among his disciples at that time, then we think from our hearts that we should have been granted to take part in all this, to go with him wherever he went, to hear his speech wherever he spoke.

But just be honest, has God not given us the grace to speak his language, to proclaim only what his holy mouth has proclaimed, to pass on only what he has handed down, to remain within the boundaries he has set for us?

We have no interest in any interpretation and you all know, when you go into the study room of a theologian, then you can take out books and one of them will be the interpretation of the gospel of Luke, the other will be the interpretation on the gospel of John and then from this writer and from that writer, so you can take everything from the shelves.

But there is one thing you can't get and that is the revelation of the living God. You can't just take that and then put it on the table and then look into it.

You can't.

You can read what this one or that one said, thought and put together, but not the revelation of the living God. The revelation of the Lord comes to everyone who can wholeheartedly believe what God promised at the appointed time and fulfilled at that time.

This is the justification we have before the face of the living God.

We bring this up again and again and will continue to do so in the radio broadcasts. He who acquits himself is not justified before God. He is justified before God who believes what he has said. According to the scripture, "Abraham believed God and this was accounted to him for righteousness." [Gal 3:6] He did not believe what he wanted, he believed the promise of Almighty God and thereby he was justified.

Today everyone believes what he wants and justifies himself as he wants. And you all know, when you talk to people, everyone justifies himself in his own way.

No one can stand his ground before God with that. No one.

We will only stand our ground before God when we have been justified by him. And we will only be justified by him if we believe what he has promised.

And many say they believe and are children of Abraham [Mt 3:9] and children of God and they do not believe the promises for this time. And in doing so they have closed the door on themselves and they have not entered in and they hinder others from entering in. [Lk 11:52]

But thanks be to the Lord who calls out a people for himself in this time, a people who hear his voice, a people who have been given the revelation of his spirit.

We cannot explain everything.

I rejoiced in the one statement from 1 John 5 verse 20 where it says of Christ, "He is the true God and eternal life."

Now if someone should explain that, that on the one hand he has prayed to God and on the other hand he himself is the true God… Call some theologians, let them explain this.

No one is able to do this. Neither can I.

But we can all believe it!

And why? Because the holy mouth of the Lord has spoken it.

We don't need people to come here and say, "Well, this means that and that means this."

It all means exactly what it says.

And when the holy scripture says, "He is the true God and eternal life," more we don't really need than the true God and eternal life. With that we have everything we need for time and for eternity. It is all in Jesus Christ our Lord.

A theologian might say, "Oh, I guess John went a little far on that one."

No one has gone far. The Holy Spirit spoke and the men who were driven and led by the Holy Spirit wrote as fast as the Spirit inspired them. [2Pt 1:21] No one went further than God himself had gone. Each one wrote only what the holy mouth of the Lord spoke by grace.

It says here, "For ye have need of patience." [Heb 10:36] One must persevere in expectation of the fulfillment of the promise.

If we have no promise in sight, there is no perseverance. But the moment we have a promise before us, we persevere in faith until that promise is fulfilled.

And you all know that when the Lord Jesus was about to go back into glory, he gave his disciples the promise, "Wait in Jerusalem until ye are endued with power from on high." [Lk 24:49]

They persevered in faith and the day came when the promise became reality. The hour came when their faith and perseverance were rewarded.

Dear brothers and sisters, this is about the coming of the Lord. It is literally written, "For yet a little while, and he that shall come will come and will not tarry." [Heb 10:37]

We can say this with all certainty, "For yet a little while, and he that shall come will come and will not tarry."

Now we must persevere and hold fast in faith to all the promises that still have to be fulfilled until the return of Jesus Christ – to persevere and believe, the holy mouth of the Lord has spoken and he watches over his Word to fulfill it. [Jer 1:12]

The thought came to me that not only is God watching over us and over his Word, but we too are awake when the word of the Lord is preached. No one needs to nudge the other one to not fall asleep, but we hear the Word of the living God, we are seized by it in the depth of our hearts. We are not struggling here to not fall asleep, but we rejoice in the presence of the living God and are absorbed in the spiritual things that have become precious to us all.

Otherwise, you know very well, if things did not interest us, it could happen that one nods without wanting to nod.

But at the moment when God's Word speaks to us, when we delve ourselves in it, realize it, at that moment everything is alive in us. Then the most tired person can become awake.

When people fall asleep under the precious preaching of the holy Word, then we can stop preaching! That's right. Then we can stop preaching.

This is the place to wake up. This is the place to become enlightened. This is the place where we want to have an encounter with God.

And you know very well, the Word of the Lord has taken hold of all of us. We have simply been seized and we know and we have understood what this time is all about.

In Luke 24, verse 50 it says, "And he laid them out as far as to Bethany, and he lifted up his hands and blessed them.

And it came to pass, while he blessed them, he was parted from them and carried up into heaven."

The disciples of Jesus at that time had the privilege of experiencing all this with the Lord. They saw him in the last hours of his earthly existence, of his walk on earth. They saw him as he raised his hands and blessed them.

We can imagine what an overwhelming feeling came over them. We can imagine the thoughts and what might have gone through their minds. The Lord blessed his own and ascended to heaven.

The same Lord will come again in the same way as he ascended into heaven. [Acts 1:11]

He is a God who blesses, who speaks, who reveals himself. He does not change. [Mal 3:6]

At that time he was everywhere among his disciples – once here, once there, wherever they came together, he was among them. He spoke with them. He revealed himself to them. He opened their understanding for the scriptures. [Lk 24:44-45] He began to speak of Moses and of all the prophets of what had been fulfilled then.

Jesus is the same.

He is risen. He is alive. He talks with his own. He opens our understanding for the scriptures. And he begins with Moses and all the prophets and says, "All things had to be fulfilled as they are written in the law of Moses, in the Psalms and in the prophets." [Lk 24:44-45] It had to be fulfilled in this time what God said by the mouth of his servants and prophets. It had to be fulfilled that he would send his prophet before the great and terrible day of the Lord came. The scriptures cannot be broken.

People may break them. God does not break it. We can rely on that.

People pass it by because they do not see it. God never passes by his Word. He watches over it to fulfill it. [Jer 1:12] And then he draws the attention of his people to his precious and holy Word. And our hearts rejoice because he has spoken to us.

The counsel of our God is no longer a sealed book to us. It is no longer something that is veiled. It has been revealed in these last days. We have been allowed to look into it and rejoice because God has spoken in such a clear way.

Could anyone have made it any clearer than God has? It is all clear but only through the revelation of the Holy Spirit.

All others will take offense at this and that. This is not right for them and that is not right for them and this is not correct and that not.

For the elect everything God has done is right. For them everything God has said is right whether they can understand it or not. But for them it is right. They say yes and amen to the Word of God.

Everyone else, you could give it to them mathematically. Even then they still would not see it. Because spiritual things can only be put together and revealed by the Spirit of God.

Jesus opened unto them the understanding for the scriptures. He has done the same with us in this time.

I would like to recall the statement of brother Branham. He said, "What does it help a man who is freezing to death to be shown a picture on which a fire has been painted? What use would a fire artificially before him be to him? He would scoff at it and think to himself, I need the real fire to get warm and not the mockery of a painted fire."

Brothers and sisters, dear friends, we need the real fire of the Holy Spirit.

We need the real power of the Almighty to reveal himself anew among his people, nothing painted, nothing forgotten in the past, but a present God who responds with fire and who speaks as he has ever spoken.

And the good news is, God is the same. He is present.

And we have seen that in many things.

We have already heard the comment, "The Lord has also spoken in this time from the pillar of cloud and fire."

How many people come and say, "Listen, brother Frank, do you really think that this can be easily believed?

They just have trouble. It's too powerful for them. It's not that maybe out of criticism. I don't want to impute it to anyone, but they can't believe that the Lord God has done such things in this time."

Brothers and sisters, this only proves that the Lord is the same, because he revealed himself in the same way.

People of course are quick to have the words at their disposal. They say, "Where does it say in the Bible that God would do that in this time?

Where was it written in the Bible that God would speak to Moses out of the burning bush? [Ex 3:2] Can someone show me where that was written in the Bible before it happened? Can someone show me all the other supernatural things?

Where was it written that the living God would answer with fire on Mount Carmel? [1Kngs 18:36-38]

Where was it written that an Elijah would go up to heaven? [2Kngs 2:11]

Where was it written that an Enoch would be caught up? [Gn 5:24]

Where were all these things written?

I can tell you where it was written, in the book of Almighty God. And he did it when the time came. He didn't ask any scribe or pharisee. He revealed himself in his power and his glory. And all the unbelievers he left behind, disappointed, because they did not believe his revelation.

Surely one cannot come to God and say, "Lord, why did you do such and such?

Was it written that the three wise men would see the star and then come all the way to Jerusalem? [Mt 2:1-2]

What more do we want from God anyway? Is he supposed to introduce himself to each one and say, "I'm sorry, I didn't have this written down before"?

Our God does what is good in his sight and he says, "Blessed is he who does not take offense at me" [Mt 11:6] – but who can believe from the heart."

Do you know what the strange thing is?

He who is full of criticism and full of distrust deprives himself of the blessings of Almighty God.

But he who can believe from the heart and say, "Lord, I thank thee that thou hast revealed thyself in my time as at the time of Moses. Verily thou art the »I Am«." – you will see what is happening– the heart is opened, the understanding for the scriptures is unlocked and from Moses to Revelation everything is illuminated in the divine light and the children of God rejoice.

Everybody else says, "Oh, listen, we feel sorry for you because you believe a thing."

We don't believe »a thing«, we believe God's Word."

This has to be said plainly once and for all: It's not a thing that we represent. It is the Word of Almighty God and the promises that he has given in it. And to whom it is given to grasp this, let him grasp it and thank God and not be angry but rejoice that God has done such things in our time.

Who are we human beings anyway?

I remember a doctor so and so. He wrote to me one day and he said, "Dear Preacher Frank, unless you separate yourself from the Branham writings, otherwise a conversation is not possible at all."

And you know what that means to me. One floor down in some slanted writing and then the case is settled.

"Unless you separate yourself from the Branham writings, otherwise a conversation is not even possible."

We can do without such a conversation. For good.

We are not concerned with a conversation that talks past God!

We are concerned with a conversation that reveals the instruction of Almighty God among his people!

And if all talk past God, but prophets never talked past God, for they spoke in the name of the Lord, or rather God spoke through them by grace. And this we have acknowledged, nothing more.

Whether God took a Moses, an Abraham, an Elijah, a Paul or a Peter, they were all people like us. And of Elijah it is written, "He was a man like us." [Jam 5:17] He ate and drank. He was a man, but he was a prophet of God. He was a servant of the Lord.

It is the same with Brother Branham. We are not exalting him. We only give God the glory that he has been faithful and remembered his Word and promises [Mal 4:5-6] and has sent a word of prophetic revelation and instruction among his people in this last time.

That is all we claim – only that God has sent us

And I would like to speak for myself now: God has given me the grace to come out of all my own ideas and to let myself be laid by the grace of God into what the Lord had to say and reveal to his people in this time.

Do you think it was the will of God for anyone to go out and say, "Today I am reading from the gospel so and so, and now I want to say something to you about it"?

Not what we have to say about it. Children of God proclaim the whole counsel of our God! They don't just prepare a sermon, but their sermon is already prepared. It is in the Word of God. They only need to pass on what God has already given, and then we are all helped. Then we receive instruction through the Spirit of God, because we have nothing of our own but what God has given us by grace.

There was another psalm that I wanted to touch on briefly, Psalm 66, and with that I come to a close. It says here from verse 3, Psalm 66, from verse 3,

"Say unto God, 'How awesome are thou in thy works!'"

"Say unto God…" ! Not to the people!

"Say unto God, How awesome are thou in thy works!"

We could bring this before the face of God tonight as a choral prayer.

By the way, if you read the newspaper today, you will have noticed that even Willy Brandt read some verses from the psalm in Jerusalem, and let me tell you, he found the right psalm and read out the right verses and was not ashamed of it. That is fabulous.

Then surely we have the same right to read some psalm verses here. And if it is written here, "Say unto God, 'How wonderful is your rule!'"

Do you know who can say this? He who has understood God's rule as being marvelous. A person who has understood that God's rule takes place in the first place.

Because if we only talk about God's rule in Moses' time, we miss the point.

But the ruling of God in our time affects us. It does not pass us by. And whoever has grasped the rule of God now is grasped by all the rule of God from the whole past, and he can lose himself in God and give thanks from the bottom of his heart for his rule.

But whoever passes by God's rule, which allows to take place in this time, he may talk about his work in the past. Basically, he has passed by God, and God has passed by him. For whoever passes by God, God will also pass by him.

But whoever recognizes his work will understand what it means, say unto God, "How wonderful are thou in thy works!"

Here our hearts are overflowing. We feel praise when we think about the fact that we can meet our God, the Almighty God, in prayer, and say, "Lord, how marvelous is your rule!"

This can only be said by those over whom the grace of God truly rules and who have understood the work of their God.

"Through the greatness of thy power shall thine enemies submit themselves unto thee; all the earth shall worship thee; they shall sing to thy name."

"All the earth shall worship thee, and shall sing to thy name."

All nations. Why not also the people of God?

The people of God called out from all peoples, tongues, and nations who were carried away by the work of God, involved in the work of God. That is the right people to sing praises to the Lord. They know why they sing psalms.

Imagine if David had not experienced anything at all with God and then sat down or stood up and started singing psalms.

No one would have wanted to hear it.

David, he sang from his experience with God.

We are not here to pray theoretically. We are here to raise our voices out of gratitude and thankfulness to the Almighty God for His work and rule.

Not to do anything, but because we have been seized by the work of God, we can thank the Lord for it.

It then continues,

"Come and see the works of God."

The man had something to report. It was not a theory.

He could say, "Come and see the great works of my God, and then you will know why I sing such psalms. That is the reason."

Not that we get offended about something and then start something. But the point here is, the man of God had experienced God. His psalms had a foundation, the revelation of Almighty God. He could rightly sing. Then it goes on to say, "He turned the sea into dry land."

Already he enumerates what God has done. That was the reason for his joy. That was the reason for his poetry, the reason of his singing and his praying.

The same is true for us in this time.

We are not just singing what God has done in the past. We say, "Come and see the works of our God."

Understand how he has revealed the plan of salvation, prophetically announced the seven church-age messages, opened the seven seals. [Rev 5:5] People of God, understand, this is the reason for our praise – come and see the works of our God and sing praises to his name for wonderful things he has done among his people.

That is what this time is all about.

If you tried to get people to think of anything that they haven't even experienced, that they haven't even understood, they would get bored with it. They wouldn't know how to tune in.

But when we have experienced it ourselves and have seen the working of our God, then it will not be difficult for us to thank the Lord.

It goes on to say,

"They went through the flood on foot; there did we rejoice in him. Therefore let us rejoice."

What was their joy about? At the working of their God in their midst. About that, what was the Lord God did when he confirmed his Word and fulfilled his promise that he had made to Abraham, "After four hundred years I will bring out your descendants with a strong hand" [Gn 15:13-14]

This was the reason for David's praise to God, even in the Psalms.

But David also had a share in what God was doing in his time. And therefore he could also sing of God's work from the past in the present.

And the same is true for us.

"He ruleth by his power forever. His eyes behold the nations. Let not the rebellious exalt themselves. O bless our God, ye people, and make the voice of his praise to be heard. Who holdeth our soul in life, and suffereth not our feet to be moved. For thou, O God, hast proved us, thou hast tried us, as silver is tried."

The Lord God has brought all this upon us for one purpose only, that our faith may be found more precious than gold, which is perishable, but is refined in the fire. [1Pt 1:7]

The ruling of our God in our time is the reason for our worship, the reason for our praise.

It is that what fills us. It is that what moves our hearts.

Our God is true to his Word, has fulfilled his promises, has gathered his people and revealed himself to them in this time. And for this we want to offer him thanks and worship with all our hearts.

"Say to God, how wonderful is your work."

Amen. We rise for prayer.

Hallelujah.

Heavenly Father, we thank you with all our hearts for your grace. We have no words to express it, for you rule in the midst of your people. There you have set up your throne of rulership. There your word goes forth for your church. You walk, you speak, you reveal yourself.

Hallelujah.

You are not the I was, you are the I am, the ever-present, the ever-revealing one who rules in the midst of his people.

Hallelujah.

Your presence has filled this room and your work has taken hold of us.

Hallelujah.

Praise and thanks, honor, glory and worship to your name.

My God, if your rule is still unknown to any man, make yourself known to him so that he may know what fills our hearts.

Hallelujah.

Lord, we do not want a dead service, a living service before the living God for you have revealed yourself to us as the living one, as the same.

Your rule is wonderful among your people. We confess this unreservedly. Hallelujah.

Praise and honor, glory and worship to your holy name.

Amen.