William Branham's 1933 Baptism Service

Hello and welcome to another episode of the William Branham Historical Research Podcast. I'm John Collins, the author and the founder of William Branham Historical Research at William-Branham.org, and with me I have my co-host, researcher, minister, and friend Charles Paisley, the founder of Christian Gospel Church.org. And together we're examining the history and the intersections in history between William Branham and other key figures that either influenced or were influenced by the post-World War II healing revivals.

Charles, we spoke last night and you said that you were really excited about this episode, probably the most excited, but there's one thing that I didn't tell you last night, from my perspective, this is for me one of the topics that is the most embarrassing to me.

There is a logic flaw with William Branham's story for this topic that we're about to get into, which I'll describe later in the episode, but I consider myself to be fairly smart man. You know, I'm not going to say that I'm the smartest, but I like to think of myself as logical and thinking clearly, but whenever I suddenly was faced with the logic flaw with this one particular topic, I just, I came unglued. I was like, I can't believe that I fell for this. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, yeah. And I know what you mean, too, this story is a very important story. This

is the reason our message church exists, the story that we're talking about today, where I come from our pastor actually converted into the message up on hearing this story. Yeah, Raymond Jackson came into the message upon hearing this story that we're going to talk about today. Yeah, and so I am very excited to look at this. I think this might be my most favorite episode up to this point. I guess we'll see when it's done and we go back and watch it, right? So far, everyone that we record has been my favorite. So I expect this to be no less. This is very

interesting. Yeah, so today, we're going to talk about a very famous event in William Branham's ministry, the 1933 baptism. And this event, it's critical. It's a critical element of faith for all message believers. This is the point in time when we believe it was revealed that William Branham was supernaturally declared.

they are to have the Elijah anointing. And it's really the first big supernatural event of his ministry in terms of his supposedly had all kinds of witnesses and evidence. And yeah, in my church, John, we'll get to this later.

In my church, we knew multiple witnesses who were at this baptism, if this is that. Wow. And so we'll be able to talk about that as we go along. But maybe before we talk about the baptism itself, maybe we can set the table by talking about what was going on in William Brannum's ministry around this time and leading up to the baptism and also talk about who was sponsoring this tent meeting, which are details no one ever tells us when we're in the message, right, John?

Yes, and some new information that we actually have just as of this week about who was participating in these revivals. Right. Now, according to William Brannum's official biography, you know, the ones you can get like this.

And I'm innocent from God. Yeah, according to that one, William Brannum had met Roy Davis in 1931 and been ordained a minister about six months later. Right. And of course, we've already looked at some pretty strong evidence that William Brannum had already been working with Roy Davis since the 1920s.

And we highlighted some of that in our last episode. But either way, William Brannum was definitely working with Roy Davis by this point in his ministry. And he had been doing that in the years leading up to 1933 and become a leader in Roy Davis's Jeffersonville Church.

And John, I thought maybe we could talk a little bit about what Roy Davis was up to in Louisville and Jeffersonville in these years of time when William Brannum was even officially with him in his Jeffersonville Church as assistant pastor and a leader in his church.

Yeah, I think that's a good idea because really to truly understand the story, you have to understand what is going on during these years, during this time. And honestly, like you say, this is fundamental to the message cult philosophy and theology.

You have to understand this story because so much is built on top of this story. But before we could get into this story, we had to give some of the background leading up to this story to even begin to explain the history that went with this.

So at this point in time, we're talking about June of 1933. We have Roy Davis, who was the official spokesperson for the Ku Klux Klan. He was when the clan was basically splintered. And a lot of the leadership was ousted.

Davis was ousted with those leaders. He and William Joseph Simmons, the founder of the 1915 clan, had started a new white supremacy group. called the Knights of the Flaming Sword, which also disbanded, and Davis moved, as we talked about in the previous episodes, through Nashville, Tennessee, and into Louisville, Kentucky, as he's building his Pentecostal Baptist Church of God's sect.

And there's strong evidence that suggests that William Brannum was fundamental in the creation of that sect. And Davis got into Louisville. He had a long string of criminal activity that followed him, this trail that followed him everywhere he went, and Louisville was no exception to this rule.

He was identified as having this trail of criminal history. In Louisville, during the years William Brannum was in this area, involved in the church in Louisville. Right before last evening, I just went back and did a quick look, John, and I was able to identify at least six times that Roy Davis was arrested while he was in Louisville in Jeffersonville.

And in the period of the time, he was officially working with William Brannum, according to his biography, and I just printed off just a smattering. I mean, this is just six of dozens and dozens of newspaper articles where Roy Davis was arrested during the time William Brannum was working with him in Louisville in Jeffersonville.

This was not something that went on behind the scenes. These were very public arrests. They made some of them even made front page news because here's this minister claiming to be, you know, God's gift to mankind.

And he's arrested for sex crimes, fraud, stealing the whole bit, right? He was running like a fake mission and defrauding people out of the nations. Just thing after thing, he defrauded a widow out of, or when a woman died, defrauded the kids out of their inheritance just on and on and on it went all the stuff he did.

And kind of the ultimate one for me, John, and we mentioned this in the last one is when Roy Davis was arrested off the platform from his church in Jeffersonville, mid service while, and it was during the worship service, he was allowed to finish his song and then the police carted him off to jail.

And the newspaper articles tell us William Brannum was his worship leader when this happened. And in charge of the pray service. Yep. And all of this is just a few months before the baptism service, right?

Right. Right. So we're leading up to the most fundamental element of what people call the message. It was literally this event that William Brannum claimed was God telling the people that he was sending the messenger of the age, if you will.

And this whole string of criminal activity leads up to William Brannum being involved in probably the biggest religious scandal in this area at that time. I mean, I've read many papers and I can't find anything even close to as significant of a scandal as this.

Right. It's crazy what was going on in Roy Davis' ministry and with the men around him. Because Roy Davis wasn't the only one in these newspaper articles getting in trouble with the stuff going on.

And I have a question. Do you think John, it is possible that, is it possible that William Branham did not know that this stuff was going on? That was a very early question for me when I started to realize this evidence was true.

Is there any way that William Branham could not have known what he was connected to? And for me, I'll let you answer this. For me, this newspaper article where Roy Davis was arrested off the platform in front of him, you know, tells me that there's just no way he could not have known.

Right. I actually had the same question and initially I thought maybe he didn't know because he was from Jeffersonville in Jeffersonville. He talked about living on the outskirts of Jeffersonville and the Jeffersonville newspapers until it just exploded in whatever...

I can't remember what year exactly that was. He was arrested off the platform. I thought maybe he didn't know leading up to the arrest. However, when Roy Davis was arrested off the platform in Jeffersonville, there's no possible way Branham could not have known.

But when we started piecing the timeline together, even by William Branham's own words, he in some sermons gives how many years prior to the revival at hand that he's working with Davis, and it places William Branham in Louisville with Roy Davis during the heat of the scandal.

So not only would he not have known, he would have had to have been involved with defending Roy Davis against the scandal because he's part of the ministry. For a minister in this position, you only have one of two choices. Either you defend the person who is being accused and criminally prosecuted or you leave.

There's only two options. So he had to have known. And when you read the newspaper articles, there's even newspaper articles about the trials where in the hearings and stuff where Davis was before the judges.

The articles would talk about a significant sized group of people from Roy Davis's church, where William Branham was assistant pastor, being at the trials and all speaking in defense of Roy Davis and just doing things in his defense at these trials.

So it just seems impossible that William Branham was not there in that number of people knowing that the prominent position he held in the congregation at the time even. And that kind of gives me another question, John, and this is one that still, I believe I know the answer, but I'll ask you to you, do you think that William Brownham could have personally been involved in any of this criminal stuff, you know, any of the defrauding, any of the financial crimes, any of this stuff that was going on with Roy Davis at this time?

Even he was arrested six times, at least, just in this three-year space of time that William Brownham was working so closely with him. You know, the sex scandals, I have to separate because I have no evidence that William Brownham was sleeping with underage women.

But there are also some racketeering charges, I don't know if you've caught that in the newspapers, but Roy Davis was accused and I think even indicted for what was considered to be religious racketeering.

He had doctrinal positions that were designed such that they were bringing in revenue. William Brownham, as a leader in this organization, this Pentecostal Baptist Church of God sect, would have had the same doctrines and would have had the same potential, not potential, but literally the same involvement in bringing in this revenue.

So he was at minimum involved with the racketeering scandal. The other scandals, the fraud, et cetera, he was involved basically by defending, but we don't know what level involved in participating. The church fund, for example, they had a scandal where they were basically presenting themselves improperly as though they were one of the more popular churches in Louisville, collecting money for the Bethel fund, I think is what they called it.

When Brownham was with Davis at this time, he was a part of the church, he was a leader, he was involved with the praise and worship service. If they were collecting money during the service, which it appears they were, William Brownham was also involved with that fraud of defrauding the Bethel mission.

It's hard for me to imagine a scenario where William Brownham did not have some level of involvement in this criminal activity, especially when you look at the nature of the financial crimes and the way Roy Davis had it organized through his church there in Jeffersonville where William Brownham held a prominent position.

So it's very likely that William Brownham, at the very least, was complicit in what was going on if not an active participant in it. As you think about this, Roy Davis has been arrested all of these times, the laws narrowing down on him in this area.

for you, which is a pattern that's repeated everywhere Roy Davis is when wears out his welcome after shorts, you know, three, four, five years, he's got a band in that town and move on. And so that's what's starting to happen here. And we know by 1934, Roy Davis beats it out of this area, right, to go find the next town to be his chief victims.

Yeah. This is like burning the towns as you pass through them, right? And so like, like everywhere else, though, of course, he's no doubt wants to leave behind a church, a footprint, something he can, you know, hold on to. And so he's doing something in this area. Obviously, before he leaves in order to have something set up after he's gone, enter, enter the 1933 tent meetings of William Branagh. Right. And how, and so obviously, you know, you think back to the beginning of William Branagh's ministry, it only makes sense. Someone had to be sponsor in this tent meeting, right? Because where do you get the money for a big

tent that can suit, see a lot of people and do this kind of a revival thing? That's not a cheap thing to do. Where did all the money come from for this? Who was sponsoring this?

And that kind of leads us into maybe the next part of our discussion. And that is that William Branagh's 1933 tent meetings that started his ministry in his famous way was sponsored by Roy Davis and his white supremacist people. That is who was sponsoring the 1933 tent meetings.

And keep in mind, Roy Davis was not just the head of a Jeffersonville church. He was a church planter. He was building a church. He was growing a denomination that he wanted to basically compete with the other Pentecostal denominations, the other Baptist denominations, and pull people out of those religions into his own. It was, it was like this big sponge that was absorbing members of other churches. Right. And he's, he's literally setting up William Branagh to be a leader in his sect. Exactly. Exactly. And I have, we know Roy Davis was the one sponsoring his meetings. I'm just going to, you know, share a couple of the newspaper clips

there. But we have multiple articles where Roy Davis is in the newspaper advertising the tent meetings that that William Branagh are going to end up headlining in the month of June. He, he's running advertisements in the month of May for it. Talking about that he's got a tent and there's going to be a revival and further announcements to come. And so that's the lead-up.

When no Roy Davis was sponsoring the tent meetings in 1933. And then maybe we could talk just a little bit about that site where the tent meeting was held, John, because the The tent meeting was held at 8th and Pratt Street, according to the newspaper articles.

The 33 meetings was held at 8th and Pratt Street. And if you look on a map, so the tabernacle is at 8th and Penn Street. And the site of these 1933 tent meetings at 8th and Pratt, this would be like the parking lot of the Brannum tabernacle today.

It was not where the tabernacle building is, but it would be the parking lot of it. And that site had actually been the location of other tent meetings in just recent prior months to this that had also been connected to ministers associated with Roy Davis and his white supremacy groups, right John?

Yes, and there's some newspaper articles that when I first discovered the 8th and Pratt tent meeting, because it's on the same lot. I mean, literally, if you look at the Brannum tabernacle today, you see the big red brick building.

The doors are facing Penn Street. Then behind this is a parking lot. And the parking lot is on the Pratt Street side. So this entire city block goes from Pratt Street to Penn Street, where it borders 8th Street.

And when I first saw the Pratt Street address, I just kind of discounted it because, you know, it could have been that Pratt Street was the address and that the building was sitting here.

Because only found, you know, the tent meeting and, you know, if you had the tabernacle and the tent was behind it, this would make sense. However, we recently found one article that's also called this tent thing, his tabernacle.

The deed to the church was 1936. William Brannum says that he dedicated his church in 1933. And we have articles all the way up to 1934 where they were holding tent meetings on Pratt Street.

And the final question that I had to answer was, did Penn Street even exist? Because if Penn Street didn't exist, then Pratt Street could have been the address. But we also found articles stating that Penn Street did exist at that time.

So the church building that sits today, the doors are on Penn Street. If the newspapers reported the Brannum tabernacle, they would have reported it at Penn Street, not on Pratt. So this is significant when you think about the later versions of the life story where he's bearing these alleged seven prophecies in a tabernacle on Penn Street, this tabernacle did not exist in 1933.

Right, and in our next episode, John, I know we're gonna try to deep dive into the, when the tabernacle got started and built and all that. But certainly, like you said, the, there was a tent according to the newspapers.

He had a tent in 33 at 8th and Pratt. So at the parking lot and of the current Brannum tabernacle. And you know, it kind of makes, sense when you think about it, because in the Bible, the tabernacle is a tent.

And so when he called it the brand of tabernacle, it almost makes sense that it was initially a tent, because that is what a tabernacle, biblical tabernacle is. And so it seems like this tent that they put up there was, was what William Brandham called the star of the brand of tabernacle, which we'll talk about more in the next episode.

So, but this, this tent, we just want to point out it is, it's on the same property, the parking lot where the tabernacle is in 1933 was where they put it there. And it's the same site and likely even the same tent that other white supremacist preachers connected to Roy Davis has been preaching at in just the month's prior to, to this June, this June revival, there's, there's newspaper articles for that as well, connecting them to Roy Davis and what they had done.

And I think the man, was it a Reverend Earl's John? Correct me if I got that name wrong. Yeah. So this, I actually just found this this week and only by accident because I was looking through newspaper articles, I went down to the, I went down to the Louisville public library.

They have all of the Louisville archived newspapers. And I was digging through it. And we'll, we'll get into the results of that digging through those articles later. But I noticed something odd. There was an evangelist Reverend Robert Eurles.

And he was also immediately prior to William Brannum's series of revivals. He had been holding revivals leading up to William Brannum's revivals. Right. His revivals had been in April and May, William Brannum is in June.

Exactly. So this was a, you have to remember back then revivals were very popular and they weren't just a Saturday and a Saturday, Sunday weekend event. They went on sometimes for weeks, sometimes months, they went on.

So we have Roy Davis announcing a big evangelist that's coming. We have a Reverend Robert Eurles, who is holding the beginning of these revivals. And I just noticed that there are some strange coincidences with Reverend Robert Eurles. He was a United Brethren minister.

When Roy E. Davis was in the Chattanooga location for his building of the Pentecostal Baptist Church, and when he was leading the Knights of the Flaming Sword, white supremacist organization, and when he was, yeah, basically, he was the royal ambassador for the Knights of the Flaming Sword.

Well, who's in town in Chattanooga, but the Reverend Robert Eurles and he's described as evangelist at large. In other words, he has no set location. you just chose to camp out in Chattanooga with Roy Davis. When Davis left Chattanooga and went to Nashville, who shows up in Nashville? The Reverend Robert Earls.

And in Nashville, right, Roy Davis is utilizing the United Brethren Church to hold his meetings even, right, John? Even so much that there was outrage in Nashville by other United Methodist ministers because Davis is advertising his meetings as we're having revivals at the United Brethren Church. And the other Brethren minister in Nashville were like, this guy is not a Brethren minister, but Davis is utilizing that. So Davis then goes to Louisville, get at fleas from the law to Jeffersonville, who shows up in Jeffersonville, go wherever in Robert Earls. Right, they're clearly working together. And the same thing,

we can find kind of advertisements related to that meeting connected to Roy Davis as well, here in the Jeffersonville newspaper articles. So these people are working together. And this man is having his tent meetings in the same spot, and almost certainly the same tent, just a few weeks, a space maybe a two weeks from William Brannum's meetings.

Yeah. Also, there's a strange coincidence. Robert Earls, I did a bit of research on him just to get some background. And on the video version of this podcast, I'll show the newspaper article, but Reverend Robert Earls in Nashville in 1934, which is right after this meeting, this set of revivals with William Brannum. He describes himself as an evangelist, and I'll just read the entire quote. For 27 years, he has held the flaming sword of the Lord High.

So, here's Robert Earls, who's been in Chattanooga when Roy Davis was starting the nights of the flaming sword, and he's advertising himself as a person who has held the sword, the flaming sword of the Lord High. I've heard ministers say, I'm carrying the sword of the Lord, and they're talking about the Bible, right? You don't usually find a minister who says I'm holding the flaming sword of the Lord. Yeah, that's, that's kind of a dead ranger giveaway that he was part of Roy Davis's flaming sword, white supremacist group, right?

Yes. It's like a code word. Exactly. He's appealing to members of that who are sympathetic. Hey, everybody, come join the flaming sword revival. It's right over here. Yeah. Right. So, yeah, so, so this is, so now we're, we're within a space of a couple of weeks of William Brannum's revival meeting, right? There's just been a white supremacist revival with connected Roy Davis at the exact same spot, the exact same place.

And now Roy Davis, according to the newspapers, is sponsoring another revival meeting at the same spot, the same tent. And lo and behold, it turns out to be William Brannum's 1933 tent meeting. And we have that, you know, according to all his official biographies, we have newspaper accounts that confirm it.

And I want to maybe start by reading a quote of what William Brannum says about this tent meeting. And then maybe we can kind of talk about what did happen there. But he says, this is from 1955, January 17th, he said, I was baptizing down on the river.

My first converts, pause. My first converts, that's important. My first converts at the Ohio River and the 17th person, again, he's very consistent every time he tells this person, the 17th person. And the 17th person I was baptizing, as I started to baptize him, I said, father, as I baptize him with the water, you baptize him with the Holy Spirit.

And I'll just pause there. Notice that isn't the message baptismal formula. He said, I started to put him under the water. And just then a whirl came from the heavens above and here come that light shining down, hundreds and hundreds of people on the bank, right at two o'clock in the afternoon in June.

And at hung right over where I was, a voice spoke from there and said, as John the Baptist was sent for the forerunner of the first coming of Christ, you've got a, have a message that will bring forth the forerunning of the second coming of Christ.

And it light scared me to death. And here is where my face starts to turn red. Yes, okay. So this is fundamental to our belief in the message. This light, this angel, this pillar fire came down, the voice said from heaven on the banks of the river with hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of witnesses that William Brownham had been sent with the message to forerun the second coming of Christ, just like John the Baptist, right.

And so this for us, that's everything in motion. And so like I said, John, I know people who were there, we have newspaper articles, I have stories to share, but so that's a pretty dramatic story though, John.

I mean, if that happened, that'd be pretty wonderful. I mean, that would be, that'd be amazing. I'm, you can probably see it in the video, the people watching the video, my face is turning red because this is embarrassing.

I'm going to take a few minutes, I'm going to rant. So I'll, I'll let you take your rant before we get to the newspaper articles. I was not a quiet message believer. I believed it hook line and sinker.

I believe this I taught. You know, I wasn't like a teacher in a church, but when I would encounter people at work or friends, if I was at a ballgame, if I was at playing basketball, I was telling people about William Branham, you know, why would I not?

The world is ending, I want to save their lives. I was actually concerned for the souls of the people around me and everyone. I don't care who they are, I don't care what they've done, I don't care what kind of person they are.

I want to save them, right? That's what Jesus would want to do. And I'm a logical person, I've told this story. I've told people, did you know that there was a man in Jeffersonville, Indiana who was baptizing people and a light shone from the heavens and a voice spoke through the clouds and announced his arrival on earth?

And their first question is always, really? You mean this happened and we don't know about it? And there's a huge logic problem, right? If this actually happened and there were that many witnesses, in some cases he says there's hundreds of witnesses including newspaper reporters.

Yeah, one place he says over 10,000 people were there. Absolutely, picture this, 10,000 people, first off, if there were 10,000 people gathered at the river, that would have made national news, just the fact that there were 10,000 people here, right?

Because that was about the entire population of Jeffersonville at the time, probably more. So 10,000 witnesses and this voice of God booming from the heavens, it would make every newspaper, they would actually stop the print.

This spot is literally right across the river from downtown Louisville, Kentucky, John. I mean, this is the center of the biggest urban thing within hundreds of miles here, right? This is where it's at, is a hugely visible place.

10,000 would be a small number of people. They would have sent reporters from every city in every state to go learn more about this God voice that spoke to the heavens. I mean, picture today, CNN, you've got all these reporters.

I'm live on the scene and I'm here where a voice of God just spoke through the heavens. So at minimum, it's gonna be bigger than one little tiny section of the newspaper in Jeffersonville.

Because Jeffersonville just had God visit them. Whenever searching for vindication.com, when the administrators of that website were looking for articles of William Brannum in the Jeffersonville Library, they almost missed the article. I actually spoke with them and they said, we were scanning through and we almost missed it because it's just this little tiny section doesn't mention anything about God speaking our lights.

What does it say, Charles? Right, well, and maybe before I read it, just for our readers, no, William Brannum told us that the newspapers packed this article from all over the country and it went into can- he told us even the names of the newspapers that that it was in. He said he even read us the headline of the newspaper Mystic Light appears over evangelist at the river. He told us all of this stuff. Yes. That it was in the newspapers, you know, and the whole thing. But the thing is, John, it's not in any of the

newspapers that he may have said it was in, which we have went and looked at. And we even you even verified some again this week. And I looked at the copies as well. It's not in any of the newspapers that he actually said it was in. But it is the only newspaper it is in is in the Jeffersonville evening news. So the Jeffersonville local newspaper. And here is a copy of just a part of it. You might be able to show the whole newspaper article. But this is it.

And this right here is it. This is the only newspaper article about these baptisms right here. And I have a a blowed up copy of it, John. And this is from June the second 1933. And so first I just want to focus on that date. So he said he was baptizing his first converts. And it was in June. This is June the second. And so this is either reporting yesterday's news June the first or maybe something that's happened earlier in this day, June the second. So this has to be his first converts right here. For our audio listeners, the title of

this, remember William Brandham said his 17th convert, the 17th person when the light came down. The title of this article is 14 converted. So there were only 14 conversions reported, not even 17. Right. And so so apparently, you know, there was three invisible converts that got baptized. And then after that, this happened. I don't know, right? Like it boy, it, it, it, when you read this, right? And this is all you got after what William Brandham told us, you know, we're expecting a headline, Mystic Light appears over Baptist. And you were supposed to read all about it. And this is what

we see 14 converts and literally four line article. So I'm going to briefly continue my rant. And then I'm going to stop my rant. And you see my, my face is fully blushed because I'm embarrassed that I believe this stuff in the Louisville Public Library. When you go downtown, they have this really big section of archives. And I'm talking rows and rows of filing cabinets. Each filing cabinet has a drawer filled with thousands upon thousands of newspaper articles from every newspaper that has existed in Louisville through time. William Brandham gave us the name of the first newspaper that he said printed it. He said it was in the

Louisville Herald. At the time that William Brannum said it was in the Louisville Herald, that paper was bankrupt and did not exist. So his audience actually could not go and get these newspaper articles. As of today, we're in the year 2022. As of today, all of those newspaper articles that did exist have been captured put onto microfish and you can just go read through all the microfish.

Well, we know his exact date of the revival. He told us it was June the 16th. However, according to the timeline that is now documented and established, it was June 2nd when he had his first conversions. Well, I just went to the Louisville Public Library and I started digging through a found the Louisville Herald articles and not just for June, but I went through the entire month of June and the month of May and I'm holding it up here, but I will for the video, I'm going to make it much clearer, much better. I've got the headlines for every one of the dates that could potentially

be the one that was his revival and I went through every single one of them. It would take roles and roles of film for me to publish every single page, but you can go to the library yourself and you can pull these and look at them for free. They will even let you print these pages out of the Louisville Public Library for free. Not a single page from not a single issue from not a single May, May through June month has even a single mention of William Brannum's tiny little revival.

I've got, I'll share some of the front, you know, front page headlines, but there's also in these newspapers, I'm going to hold this one up and I'll make it better for the video, but it says the week's news. Not only did this newspaper print the big headlines for the day, for the week, they also, in each one of the episodes, they would, or each one of the issues, they would publish the highlights of the week's news and they would go through and tell you these are the stories that you may have missed in the other issues of this paper. Not a single one of the this week's news

contains a single mention of William Brannum or his revivals. However, there are several other crazy interesting stories and revivals that have got out of these. They were interested in the New Albany, Jeffersonville, Louisville, surrounding areas, religious communities. They publish revivals for other ministers, not William Brannum, and they had Some crazy, fascinating stories, such as two ministers went rogue and they started preaching that it was God's divine plan to join a nudist colony.

They had some crazy, interesting stories, but not a single mention of William Branham. And I'm going to ask again as I close my rant, if a voice boomed from the heavens in front of 10,000 people.

It said, this is the guy, go listen to him. Don't you think that the newspaper would have at least a mention of his name? It's incredible, John. It's incredible. Now, I mentioned before that at faith assembly where I was the assistant pastor, the second oldest continuously operated message church in the world, and perhaps the closest, perhaps other than the Branham Tabernacle itself to the actual sight of these events.

We knew multiple eyewitnesses who were there at those meetings that day, John. And so I want to talk just a little bit about them and the, their eyewitnesses accounts, which were handed down to us and known to the people at our church.

And the three eyewitnesses are Fanny Wilson. She's a resident of Jeffersonville. She died about 1978, Doc Branham or Edgar Branham, William Branham's brother, who was a periodic attendee at faith assembly church up until he passed away, he and his family.

And then the last one, Graham Snelling, who was assistant pastor of the Branham Tabernacle in the 1950s, who was in Roy Davis's church with William Branham, and who was also present at these 1933 baptism.

So those are three people that are known to us who were at that baptism. And I'll say this, they are the only people who were known to us, who were at that baptism, who were still in the message by the time you get into William Branham's, you know, the 1950s, 1960s, every other person who might have been at them was no longer in the message by that point.

So these are the only three people that we know of that were at these 1933 revival meetings and continued on into the message past the 1950s. Graham Snelling actually left in the mid-50s. So if you could say only two of them made it into the 60s of all of them.

And two of those three had strong ties to William Branham and had basically a stake in the interest in this thing. Exactly. And so I just want to talk about them, and I'm not going to go through all the details of each of their stories, but the summary of it all is, is that nobody, at the river saw a light that day?

Nobody, not one of them. And none of them saw or heard, rather, none of them heard, a voice speak at the river. None of them. None of the three witnesses that we know were there that day heard a voice or saw a light descend from heaven.

And here's the thing, Fannie Wilson is actually referenced by William Brandham on tape at one point as a witness to those things, right? Like he calls her out from the platform and here a witness to this, why don't you Fannie Wilson?

Fannie Wilson never heard a voice. Fannie Wilson never saw a light, right? And we know that she told that to people that she never heard a voice or saw a light. But the only thing that they say happened that day was there was some kind of a loud explosive noise.

And when it happened, the people all kind of jumped or screamed or covered their heads. There's some kind of a really loud bang that happened. We can guess all about that, right? Well, there's two things I want to mention here.

Number one, the loud bang. That could be anything. Could be. I live in Jeffersonville. You know, I'm not far from the church. I'm only just a few miles from the church. And every so often, I conduct my business from here.

I'll be talking to business executives and other states from here through video conference. And every once in a while, there'll be this low in my office because in Jeffersonville, actually closer towards the church, there is a big quarry where they blast with dynamite.

Right. It shakes my house, it shakes my walls, my windows. When we moved in this house, they did not tell us that there were going to be explosions. So we moved in with no clue that this is happening.

And the first time that it happened, I thought the city was under attack, man. And it's right down on the river because they can load all the gravel and stuff right onto the barges there and easily ship it up and down the river.

Yeah. But the second point, you know, this story became fundamental to the message that God spoke through the heavens and the way he describes it is not an explosion, it's an audible voice. And in fact, he, it's so strongly tied to his Elijah version of the stage persona that the voice had words talking about his being Elijah, right?

But if you look at the timeline and look at the original versions of the story Charles, the voice did not exist in the earlier versions. I know, I know. And I don't know. I don't know.

In your part of the message that it was this way, but in the sect that I came from, we actually openly admitted William Brannum is the only person who saw the light or heard the voice.

And it was because we had witnesses, you know, to these things in our, in that had been connected to our sect. So it was publicly, we publicly believed there was a light and there was a voice.

But we would always say, but William Brannum is the only one who heard. saw it right and if you listen to like period green sermons he found the same thing like he admits the same thing William Brownams the only person who was a witness to this and if you listen to William Brownams telling of these stories right he actually says that the people who were at the baptism confronted him telling him he imagined the whole thing like you can actually go back his stories tell that and and I want to throw I want to throw in the story of Graham's snowing too

because that's a really a notable takeaway before we jump to yeah the when the voice he started talking about the voice because it's actually connected to this William Brownams never started talking about a voice at the river the first time he mentioned a voice at the river was 1952 yes in every single telling of that story whether you go to a man sent from God whether you go to the earlier references on tape whether you go to the references where he talked about an voice of healing magazine every time he talked about this event before 1952 he never

mentioned a voice speaking from heaven it was just a light descending right but in 1952 is when he started to add in a voice spoke to him and said you're going to for run with the message well 1952 so Graham's snowing was the assistant pastor of the tabernacle at that time and Graham's snowing confronted William Brannum over exaggerating the baptism story okay in the in the 50s and you can find other there's other witnesses that all you know can confirm I'm telling you the truth I got this from six different people right so I know this is

the absolute truth and I think John you've even been in contact with some of Graham's Nellings family in the recent past as well so Graham's snowing confronted William Brannum over exaggerating this story while he was still assistant pastor of the Brannum Tabernacle okay so he knew it wasn't true he was confronting William Brannum over it and within just a very short space of time William Brannum has a vision and Graham's snowing has been committing adultery in his vision and Graham's snowing is ran out of the Brannum Tabernacle right just after this happens right that's that's how Graham's snowing's term as assistant pastor the Brannum Tabernacle ended you

know in case our listeners are wondering he confronted William Brannum over making the story up of exaggerating the baptism story and William Brannum then has a vision that he's committing adultery and has to be you know ran out of the Tabernacle it's incredible John so I have two mini-rants they're not going to do and let me and Graham's snowing was there when it happened right yeah Graham's snowing was there so I have two mini-rants number one say that you lived in I don't know South Carolina and the end of the world is coming and God wants to prepare every

Christian on the globe lobe, not just in the United States, for the arrival of Jesus Christ and to announce His coming. And a voice speaks from the heavens and says, this is the guy, go listen to this guy.

Yet in this crowd of 10,000 people, only William Brannum could hear the voice. The voice that is being announced by God. It doesn't make sense. There's also a logical flaw here. If God is speaking to prepare a church, to prepare Christians, to listen to this man, God's not going to secretly talk to just this, only just this man, he's going to tell everyone.

So that's problem number one. Problem number two, I have spoken with Grand Snelling Son right before he died. And picture this, you have a large number of people who would have been here, would have heard literally the voice of God if this thing happened.

You could not for anything in the world change their mind to decide that this wasn't the man because the God just spoke through the heavens. I know. Why didn't all these 10,000 people stay in the message for the rest of their life?

It don't make any sense. I mean, this would be 10,000 people. The little tiny building in Jeffersonville could not hold the number of people that would have been converted, had a voice actually spoke from the heavens.

How can it be that only three of these 10,000 people was still in the message 20 years later? It don't make no sense John. Not only that, according to Grand Snelling Son, there were many, many reasons why they decided to break ties with William Brannum.

We know some of these reasons, which we'll get into later. The one that was the straw that broke their camels back, according to Grand Snelling Son. William Brannum had a church filled with very poor people, especially after the 1937 flood.

Everybody had lost everything. House is decimated. These people were destitute. William Brannum would take their tithes and offerings, even though he claimed he did not take a single offering. He would fund his expensive hunting trips, even during those early years when his church were literally starving.

There were children who had no food to eat, and William Brannum would take the parent's money and go on a vacation on a hunting trip, while there were children in his church starving. When he first said this, I didn't believe it, but I started going back to the newspapers and sure enough, there are articles in the early years talking about his hunting trophies.

So, Grand Snelling and his son were telling the truth, plus we have photographs of all these hunting trips, but here's the point I'm driving up to. A voice from heaven spoke and announced the coming of the prophet, or this messenger for the age.

Graham Snelling, who was there and had the voice spoke, would have heard the voice, hopefully, unless we have a God who is some narcissistic God that's just going to tell one person and then slaughter the rest of the 10,000 people.

Graham Snelling would have heard the voice and you could not change his mind for anything. William Brannum could have done whatever it was that he wanted to do and Graham Snelling would have followed him to the day he died.

But no, he left the message. He left William Brannum and said that guy basically is a scoundrel. Graham Snelling, right. You know, in our part of the message because we openly admitted he was the only one who saw and heard it.

We had some mental gymnastics we did to explain all that, John. We said it was kind of like the Apostle Paul on the Damascus Road and the other men, you know, in that one, but everyone heard the voice on the Damascus Road.

Not everyone saw it. Everyone heard the voice. Or then they would go back to an account by Jesus where God spoke from heaven. This is, I can't remember the exact quote, but God more or less speaks from heaven.

I have and I'll do it again is more or less the paraphrase of what God says. And some people instead of here in the word said, well, we heard thunder, okay? And so we would, they take that verse, well, it's like that.

That spoke William Brannum is the only one who heard it and other people said it was like thunder. But even that day with Jesus, other people heard besides Jesus, what God spoke from heaven.

That's how God wrote down in the Bible, right? Well, if God is speaking to his people, he's going to make his voice heard. Exactly. He's not going to be silent. Nobody else, but nobody else heard God speak from heaven this day.

Right. And so it's bizarre. It's a bizarre story that, I mean, I think we can conclude that it's just a made up story at the end of the day. And so I think some key takeaways, John, no one, no one, no one saw a light or heard a voice of the river that day, except supposedly William Brannum.

None of the witnesses that we knew that were there saw it or heard it. One of the newspapers that William Brannum told us reported it, actually reported it. None of it. None of it that he said is there.

And like I said, we looked at the, you looked at you and I have looked at specifically the newspapers William Brannum cited. You just held up the Louisville Herald. That's the one William Brannum said it was in.

It is not there. And the other thing, John, which we talked a little about is before 1952, William Brannum never even mentioned this voice at the river speaking. It's only 1952 when he started to make up this story or add that element to the story, 1952.

It's left out of even like this biography, a man sent from God. And I just want to read, just read what it actually says in here, that way our people know that we're our listeners, no, we're not just making it up.

But it says here that after his conversion and called the ministry, they began a happy period of his life when God's blessings rested on the young man and everything seemed to go just right.

He began a tent meeting in his own hometown in Jeffersonville and for a young preacher of 24 years of age just entering the ministry, the campaign was remarkably successful. It was estimated that as many as 3000 attended a single service and large numbers were converted.

At the baptismal service which followed the revival, some 130 persons were baptized in water. It was at this time a heavenly light appeared above him as he was to baptize the 17th person. This was witnessed by the vast congregation that stood on the banks of the Ohio River.

And that's the end of the account. But notice, there's no voice. How many conversions did he have again? 130, he was baptized in number 17, right? Yeah. And he had 14 conversions. 14, so but notice there, there's no, there's no mention of a light.

This is from 1950. This is from still before he had added the story about the voice talking. I just want to pause and say to people who are still in this message called, if you're on the fence and you're questioning, you know, don't take our word for it.

I went to a lot of work. I went into these libraries. I dug through the microfiche, but today you don't have to do that. William Brandham said that newspapers printed this all the way up into Canada.

In other words, he is saying literally the associated press picked up the story and it's a national story now. It should be in all the associated press accounts nationwide. Get a free. You get 30 days free.

Go to newspaperarchive.com or go to newspapers.com, get 30 days free, do a search for William Brandham and see, you know, we have the exact date. It was June the second when all of this happened.

We have the day, go look through every newspaper in the world for this date for June to 1933. You will find not one single article, not one of William Brandham even being mentioned in these papers.

Coming back to this voice thing, this last point I try to make before we close out John is that when William Brandham in 1950, like when this book came out, he was still in his Moses persona, primarily, like if you read this book, it's all about comparing him actually to Moses.

As Moses was given two signs. Right. And as you go through here, it gives just comparison after comparison. That's even what the pillar of fire was was part of his Moses persona, because you know, the pillar of fire was with Moses through the wilderness.

And so William Brandham did not start talking about the voice at the river until he started introduce and bring to the forefront his new Elijah persona which started in about 1952 right and as it's when he decides that he's going to start presenting himself as an Elijah figure that is when he goes back and he adds the voice saying as John the Baptist was sent so you're sent with a message to forward on the second coming of Christ it was at that point when he started presenting himself as Elijah that he went back and added that detail to this

story that's why every story where he told this before 1952 so we're talking the space of nearly 20 years from this baptism right 20 years later he adds in this detail that there was a voice at the river right which also coincides with Graham's snelling confronting him for exaggerating the story so just want to make that very last key detail John in there to real clear to our audiences and I think for me I think any reasonable person that would look at these facts would have to admit there's absolutely no evidence that what William Brown have told us happened at that river that day actually happened and in

fact there is overwhelming evidence that he made up that story yeah and also think about the stage personas themselves so there's also a logical problem with his versions of stage personas I mean they're several but the biggest ones he when he is creating his Moses stage persona remember this is the Pensacosto Baptist Church of God their mission is to suck people like a sponge out of other churches and during this phase of his ministry he is presenting himself as being commissioned by God to be given symbolically links to Moses as Moses was given to sign so you'll be given two signs he gets

the number of signs wrong there are three he said too but to those people for that stage persona he was quote the Moses that led God's people out he was staging an exodus from mainstream Christianity into his cult to build and grow his cult once he did this all of these people that are in this sect viewed him as this Moses character then he introduces his Elijah stage persona and he's got a new commission as Elijah was behold as John the Baptist who was you know and biblically the the spirit of Elijah was on John the Baptist as John the

Baptist was sent so where you sent William Brannum so here's a second commission which is also a logical problem right if God is commissioning you to do something and he gives you these signs which are supposed to lead people to you know to prepare them for the coming of Christ or whatever.

You don't need a second commission. All you need is the one. You know, the first one should be good enough, right? But those people would remember his Moses stage persona. So he has to transition slowly over time and you'll find mixtures of these personas as they shift.

They shift from Moses to Elijah and then where it gets really problematic for me. During the last years, during the last few years of his ministry, he starts bringing in the son of man stage persona.

That's right. That's when he starts setting himself up as being God incarnate, being the return of Jesus Christ. Yeah, he's very problematic. He started setting that up mid 60s, late 60s and came in really strong towards the last two years of his ministry.

And so maybe as we wrap up, I'll just hold up one last thing. Here's the man who was in the background of the 1933 baptism. Here's the man who is sponsoring the 1933 baptism services.

Here's the man who paid for the tent. Here's the man who ordained William Brannum, organized the tent meeting. Here's the man in the shadows that no one ever told us about who was involved at this point in William Brannum's ministry.

Here's the man. In the Marvel universe, here is the kingpin, Roy E. Davis, who is orchestrating everything. So this was exciting. Next week is even better Charles. We're getting into some really deep message history, some fundamental elements of what is called today, the message.

So stay tuned, everybody. The next episode, the Billy Brannum Pentecostal Tabernacle. If you've enjoyed our show and you want more information, you can check us out on the web. You can find us at William-Branum.org and Christian-GospelChurch.org.

For an overview of the historical research of William Brannum and the healing revivals, read preacher behind the white hoods, a critical examination of William Brannum in his message. It's available on Amazon, Kindle, and Audible.

Join us again next week. We have a great episode coming. Are you still following it? Yes. You