Questions & Answers
Questions 141 (COD Page 607)
Brother Branham, in the First Corinthians, Corinthian, chapter the 14th, verse 34th and 35th, says, “Let your women keep silent in churches for it is not permitted unto them to speak.” 35th, “For it is a shame for women to speak in church.” Now, if a woman with short hair speak–speaks in tongues in–in churches, in church, is it the Spirit of–of the Holy Ghost that speaks through her or is it a false spirit?
60 Now, you are...And this is a real hard question, and I can only answer it the best that I know how, see. Now, I could not judge, because I was not sent to judge. But I think there’s so many times...I got another question down here somewhere that goes right along with that. But if a person is speaking in tongues, they are anointed of God. See? They may be out of order, that may be true, and they may be doing something that’s not right, but I wouldn’t want to say that it wasn’t the Holy Spirit, because I wouldn’t know. See?
61 And now there’s many times that this...that people misjudge one another. And it is a bad thing to do. You say, “Why, she’s got short hair, she’s wearing her dresses too short, that–that–that’s not the Holy Spirit upon her.” Don’t do that! Don’t do that, that’s not right. You don’t know what’s in that woman’s heart. You don’t know nothing about it. You know that the Holy Spirit would make her conduct herself a little better, now, that may be true. But I’ll tell you, as you and I, let God do the judging of that, and let’s you and I just pray for that person that God will show them the Light.
62 Here sometime ago a man met me out here, aside. And I had a pianist here that had a little, short, little skirt, and wasn’t just exactly, I guess, just right. And the lady had short hair, and she was just a babe in this Way, and she was playing the piano. And a man met me out there and just tearing me to pieces, he said, “And you’re a pentecostal preacher, and let that woman set up there! That short hair!” And just going on like everything.
63 “Well,” I said, “I think the woman has a good spirit in her. I certainly do not agree with that, you know, the skirt part up here, the two pieces.”
64 One of them is down here and one kind up here, it’s a shirt like they wear. And so it’s real thin and shows that underneath garment that they have around there. I don’t think that–that should be done. I–I don’t like that, I really don’t. I–I can’t...They–they might be just as Spirit-filled as anybody else, I don’t know; God knows that. But I wouldn’t condemn that woman and say that she was going to hell, by the sight.
65 This same person had in his church a lady who had long hair and wore long dresses, and had a temper enough to fight a buzz saw, and just as mean as she could be. Now, long hair and long skirts don’t take you to Heaven. No, sir! It’s the Spirit that’s in you takes you to Heaven. But if you as a Christian...
66 Then you should remember that many times pastors don’t mention those things and the people just automatically go on, think it’s all right. But a pastor should really tear into that. And–and–and then the sisters of the church, those sisters who are in character standing, wearing their clothes neatly, they should be examples of sweetness, and–and motherly and sisterly-like.
67 And I think that any woman that’s motherly and godly and sisterly ought to go to such a person, and with sweetness of the Spirit, just sit down and talk to that lady. And if she is of God, the Holy Spirit will understand those things, and she’ll correct herself. But when you real quickly condemn her and drive her away, you might harm that young, born baby. See? So I–I wouldn’t condemn the person.
68 Now, the person speaking with tongues.
69 Now, I–I have to say something here that may be just a little strange, and if you don’t agree with me, that’s okay. You see, we misjudge these things so many times. Let’s always try to think the very best of anybody who’s trying to do what’s right. Let’s express our very best to them. Oh, they’re trying. We don’t know their heart, unless you have a discernment. And if they’re wrong, then if you got...The Bible said, “If a brother be overtaken in a fault, let them which are spiritual go to that brother in a spirit of meekness, considering your ownself lest you be tempted, and see if you can’t reconcile that person, see, back to God.” Don’t say that they haven’t got the right spirit, ’cause...
70 Listen, now I’m going to say something that’s going to really stab you for a minute, so just sit still just a minute. The Holy Spirit can speak through a hypocrite. Exactly! I’ve seen it done, and I can prove you by the Scriptures that that’s right. I can prove to you by the Scriptures that demon powers take up those spirits and use them, sure, they take up those gifts and use them. I’ve stood right...and seen devils speak in tongues and interpret it. And I’ve seen hypocrites take the genuine Holy Spirit and speak with it. That’s the reason you can’t say that speaking in tongues is the only evidence of the Holy Ghost.
71 Now, sometime ago when I was first brought into Pentecost, I went to Mishawaka to Brother Rowe’s tabernacle. There they were having a convention, it was a Jesus Name people. Now, I did not agree with the Jesus Name people. They... not–not...They’re my brothers, but the reason I’d...
72 They baptize for regeneration, in the Name of Jesus Christ; I do not believe that. I do not believe that water saves you from sin. I believe it’s the Blood of Jesus Christ is regeneration. But the Oneness people baptize unto regeneration. The Name of Jesus, just “Baptized in Jesus Name, and that’s there’re saved, because he said ‘Repent, and be baptized in the Name of Jesus Christ for the remission of your sins.’”
73 But what comes first? Repentance, godly sorrow for your sins, then turn away. Then be baptized in the Name of Jesus Christ, it’s all right. You’ve done all of this for remission of sins.
74 Now, and in there, there was several thousand people. In them days they had segregation in the North here, or in the South, and they had to have up here because many colored brothers was coming to this convention. It was the P.A. of W. and the P.A. of G...J.C. before the emerging. And they was at Mishawaka, colored and white, all together, they couldn’t have it in the South at that time. Well, I seen two white men sitting on the seat. I had never heard anything of these messages before in my life. And there those men would raise up and one speak in tongues and the other one give the interpretation, and tell the people right in the meeting what was wrong with them, tell the people what they had done. Then this one would speak and the other one interpret. I thought, “My, I’ve dropped down here amongst angels.” Never heard of such a thing!
75 All night, in the cornfield, I prayed. For since a little baby, I believed gifts and callings are without repentance, I’ve always been able to see visions. And the next morning they asked me to speak, and I did. Outside there was many people who came to me and invited me to their meetings, yet I was a Missionary Baptist. So I–I just went ahead and let it go like that. After a while I was anxious to get a hold of these two angel-men. I never heard any...
76 They’d turn white around the mouth, and raise up and speak with tongues. And the other one stand right up and say, “THUS SAITH THE LORD, ‘Jones over here, he did a certain thing, day before yesterday. When you walked around the house you picked up that pocketbook that belongs to this man, this man lost over here.’ THUS SAITH THE LORD, ‘Take it back!’”
77 “God, have mercy on me, here it is.”
78 See, truth, just say such as that, tell the people right out, I thought, “Oh, my, isn’t that wonderful!” So, then I thought, “This is God!”
79 Well, then I got to one of those men, and while I was talking to him, I prayed, “God let me have that, ever what It is.” I didn’t know what to call It, visions, I didn’t know what to call It. And when that man come before me, and I caught his attention, just kept speaking to him till I caught his spirit, just like the woman did at the...Jesus did, the woman at the well. Just kept talking till I caught his spirit. And he was a Christian, a real, genuine saint of God. I thought, “Blessed be the Name of the Lord!”
80 I met–met the next man coming around the corner, about a half hour later, and I talked with him. And if I ever talked to a hypocrite, he was one of them. His wife was black-headed, and he was living with a blond and had two children by her; and yet speaking with the same Spirit this man was speaking with, and giving the same interpretation, just exactly right. Then I knew.
81 Before my conversion, I had an experience to one time going into a witch camp with Indians. They’re devil-dancers. Take a snake and wrap it around them, and do the corn dance, and speak in tongues and interpret it, and tell exactly the truth what’s sitting amongst the people. And seen a witch take a–a pencil and lay it down, and see that pencil rise up and write in unknown tongues, and interpret it and tell the people exactly what was going on out through there. In a spiritualist’s meeting!
82 So I said, you see, “I’ve got amongst devils,” and I left the whole thing go.
83 So one day up at Green’s Mill, I had been up there praying in my cave, not for that, and I come out and laid my Bible down. I...It was musty back in the cave and I wanted some sunlight, and it was in the afternoon, and I come out and laid my Bible down. I was going to read a little while, out on a log that lays kind of down the hill. And I just laid the Bible down, and I started reading. And the wind blowed, and blowed It over to Hebrews the 6th chapter. I thought, “Maybe the Lord wants me to read that.” I read it.
84 “We which were once enlightened, made partakers of the Holy Ghost, seeing we fall away...to renew ourselves again unto repentance. The rain bringeth forth the...earth bringeth forth fruits and the rain is sent to water it, and thorns and thistles which is nigh unto rejecting, whose end is to be burned.” Something on that order.
85 Well, I read it and I thought, “Well, praise the Lord.” Turned it over to another one, I thought, “Well, I’ll just read somewhere over in here somewhere else.” Laid it down like that, wiped my eyes, the wind blowed it back to Hebrews 6 again. Well, that happened three or four times, as many as three, anyhow. I thought, “I don’t see nothing wrong with that. What’s in there?”
86 Just let me, you can...You’ve read it many times, Hebrews 6, “Thorns and thistles. The rain cometh oft upon the earth to water it, to dress it, see, for its fruit. But thorns and thistles which is nigh unto rejection, whose end is to be burned, be gathered and burned.”
87 I couldn’t get nothing out of that. Thought, “Well, thorns and thistles to be burned, God takes His Wheat to the garner, that settles it. So I don’t see nothing about that.”
88 I was sitting there, I was looking out like that, and a vision came before me. And I seen a world turning like this, and it was all disked up ready to be planted. And a man with a white robe on, head bent down into a feed sack, or a seed sack, rather, he was going along. And I don’t know whether any of you remember the old broadcast system, how you...I seen papa do it. Throw it with his hands like that, and they’d just fall on the grounds, the seeds like that. Well, this man was throwing seeds like that. And as soon as he went along, up behind him come wheat coming up.
89 Well, as soon as he went around the curvature of the earth, I seen a black something coming up, like a black moon. And I looked, and he got closer, it was a–a man, solid black, dressed in black. He was slipping along, looking like this. And he had a seed sack, only, in there, he had weeds. And he was sowing them amongst this wheat like that, throwing it first one way and the other. And behind him come up weeds, thistles, thorns, briers, and everything.
90 Well, I thought, “That is a shame for that man to do a thing like that.” In a vision, I wasn’t thinking of it being Scriptural, see. And I said, “That man’s sowing them weeds in that man’s wheat field.”
91 Then it got real hot. The little wheat held its head over and going “huh, huh, huh” like that, just panting like this for breath. The little weed had his head over, “huh, huh, huh,” he was panting for water, too. Everybody prayed for the rain.
92 Afterwhile it got...A great thunder clouds come up and just rained all down, and when it did, the rain struck the earth. And the little wheat begin to jump up and down, hollering, “Hallelujah! Praise the Lord! Hallelujah! Praise the Lord!” And the little weeds hollering, “Praise the Lord,” straightened right up, the life come to the weed just same to the wheat.
93 And then the Scripture comes, “The rain falls on the just and the unjust.” There I caught it. See?
94 This, if a person is sitting in a congregation, a spirit can fall upon that person, and yet you know that they are wrong and they don’t live the right kind of life, be careful what you say about that spirit, it might be the Holy Spirit. Don’t judge the–the spirit by the person. The person may be wrong but, now, does not the Bible say, “The rain falls on the just and the unjust”? Did not Jesus say, when the fields was planted, “Let them all grow up together, the tares and the wheat, together. Don’t you try to pull up the tares. Don’t you try to judge them, just let them grow together. And at that day the angels will be sent forth and will take all the tares and burn them, and the Wheat will be gathered into the garner”? But by their fruits we know them. You can know in your heart. Keep trying to deal with that person.
95 Don’t say that this woman, if she’s immmorally dressed or...How did it read? “Let’s say that the Holy Ghost will visit...” Let’s see. No, I got the wrong one here, somehow. Oh, here it is, yes.
The women speaking in tongues. Now, if a woman with short hair speaks in tongues in the church, it is the spirit...Let’s see. Is it the Spirit of the Holy Ghost that speaks through her or is it a false spirit?
96 You see, I wouldn’t say nothing. And if you thought the woman wasn’t just exactly right by having short hair...(I believe that was the subject)...yeah, “short hair,” why not you, brother, if you’re a married man and this is a married woman, why–why don’t you take your wife or get your wife to sweetly talk to this little lady? Let’s believe she has got the Holy Ghost. If she’s in this church, I’m–I’m going to believe that she has. And then, just say, maybe she’s a...
97 Did you know, once in a while, we might examine and find out we might have a little something wrong, too. You know, that–that–that’s kind of right, you know. So somebody might have to tell us something. Lot of times people has told me a lot of things was wrong, that I was doing wrong, I appreciate it.
98 But now let’s say that...let’s believe that whatever it is, let’s believe this, if the woman is not exactly a Christian, if she’s just putting on, God will judge her for that. That’s right. But...And if she’s dressed immoral, and the things that she’s doing is not right, God will take care of that. But let’s believe that that Spirit on that woman is the Holy Spirit. See, because we don’t know.
99 Now, if the interpretation of that holy spirit gives something, a curse to Christ... “No man speaking by the Spirit calleth Christ accursed.” If that woman is speaking in tongues and the interpretation comes that “Christ is accursed,” then you know that’s an evil spirit on the woman. But as long as it’s blessing and edifying Christ, then believe that Spirit. See? Amen. I hope that doesn’t confuse. I hope that gives a little light on it, anyhow.