Sid: I have on the telephone a man that’s spent 30 years archiving all of the records he could find and videos and audio cassettes of the greatest miracle ministries the world has known. And he has the most expensive collection of archives of these materials….As I said to you John in another broadcast my favorite is Branham. The way that he would look at complete strangers; he would actually see lights over people’s heads.
John: Hmm hm.
Sid: And would you explain that?
John: Well it’s just what the Bible talks about a wonder it makes you wonder.
Sid: A sign and a wonder.
John: Signs, wonders and miracles and God demonstrated that in this tremendous move of the Voice of Health Ministers in the 40’s and 50’s there. And Braham was just a unique guy some of his early messages we have I was looking at one prior to getting on this interview. And there was just a simple message called “Paradox.” He talks about how Joshua says to the son “Be still.” Well that’s a wonder you see and that makes you wonder and he talks about a person who is born again one of the greatest miracles in the world is when a person is born again and received Christ in his heart he’s a transformed person. And again I have my whole life that people couldn’t believe that I was saved you know this was the guy who was drinking and cussing and carrying on and being bad and now he’s a you know a goody goody. It makes you wonder what has happening in that person’s life. Branham has such a power and a walk with God that I don’t think the half has really been told about his ministry his early ministry. I know that I’ve met his daughter did an interview on her I’ve been in his home. I saw where he studied at, I’ve been to the place up in the mountains where the angel visited him and not that I was looking for any kind of experience but this was for getting a feel for the man. My thinking is like this “What was in the mind of say General Robert E Lee at Gettysburg what was he trying to achieve.” What was AA Allen trying to achieve, what was Branham trying to achieve? They all had a commission from God to achieve something to get something done in a time and space world here and some of them completed it and some of them didn’t.
Sid: Okay tell me what the mission assignments from God for the 3 were.
John: First of all they were to be a witness to this generation with signs, wonders and miracles. Secondly they were to perpetuate that ministry through other people. And third to preserve, if you please, the integrity of the ministry and the closes person that came to that was Allen.
Sid: You know looking at them or even reading about people in the Bible was they…why couldn’t they have done this? Why couldn’t they have been better but it is a tough road to have a miracle ministry and walk in humility.
John: Walking in humility is not easy thing. When you have the decree…let’s stop and think for a minute you’ve got to and the audience you’ve got to…what if you had in your hand creative power to change the lives of people and the environment around you? Let me tell you something there are very few humble people walking around.
Sid: Is it true that Branham was offered very exorbitant sums of money and just turned it down?
John: I have talked to 26 Voice of Healing preachers, 26 of them personally, and everyone that I’ve talked to said “William Branham was the most humblest man that they have ever met. Now when you’ve got 26 people testify to your credibility that’s something.
Sid: Tell me what affect it’s had studying all of the lives of all of these great men and women of God what affect does it have on you?
John: Well it gives me a deep appreciation for the mercy and the grace of God in people lives because first of all if I’d been God I wouldn’t had picked any of them.
Sid: I mean say take Kathryn Kuhlman for example.
John: Hmm hm.
Sid: She used to actually say she was not God’s first choice.
John: I believe that.
Sid: But God did not want a woman that spoke in that affective manner just… but He chose a lot of other people but according to her these men turned God down. How does a man turn God down for a miracle ministry?
John: Well it’s done actually William Branham did and he ended up losing his family in that great flood in that Ohio River.
Sid: That’s right I read about that.
John: Such heartache brought him to a place of surrender. Now I personally had to have to go through something like that I’d be scared to death to cross God not that God’s standing up there with a big hammer ready to belt us in the head because His grace is sufficient. I’ve lost God in my own life in 30 years of pasturing deal with people to get them into their ministry. I’ve talked to I can’t tell you how many people that I know that God’s called them to a particular field of endeavors.
Sid: And why does someone turn God down knowing that’s what they’re created to do?
John: Well fear and selfishness are probably the 2 culprits that I would say that would grab a hold of a person’s heart not willing to pay the price. I thought it to…I can’t tell you men that are ministering that would say “I am not going to go into a larger base ministry like saying going on to a radio or television knowing that they had the ability to go and the means to go but they didn’t want that kind of exposure they didn’t want their family to be…you know look at the travel time that some of the ministers that have put in today. Just hypothetical look at Benny Hinn look at the travel that he must have to do and how much time can he possibly have with his family?
Sid: As you said many times this week there’s a price to pay.
John: There is a price yes sir.
Sid: What about you? Tell me after having studied all of these men and women with the best archives imaginable?
John: Hmm hm.
Sid: How has God used you?
John: Well He’s using me just like He said that He would be using me with those pictures where tumors disappeared and blind eyes opened and the lame walked and all of that I’ve seen that in my own ministry 100’s of times.
Sid: Have you see these things in the United States a lot of people see these things outside of the US what about you?
John: I don’t have a problem ministering in the United States. I mean I’ve only been out to Mexico and I actually seen more here in this country than I did see in Mexico.
Sid: Tell me what to you was the most vivid most exciting one miracle of a physical nature that you’ve seen.
John: There was a lady and I don’t think I’m going to say this right but her head was laying on her shoulder and her back was twisted, scoliosis, and she was probably 60 – 65 years of age. And it was a very powerful service and this would be probably had to understand for some folks but there is an energy that comes on you a power that comes on you and you don’t even think about what you’re doing. And when she came up and says “I want prayer for my back.” And I just picked her head up off her shoulder and I just straightened her up and she became straight and walked away. Blind eyes one of the first miracles that I’ve ever saw in my life in my own ministry was a man who had a long white cane with you know with 5 or 5 inches of red on the bottom of it and he was healed in the first revival I had ever had.
Sid: That’s got to be forget the first just to see someone’s that’s blind get their sight back I mean it’s…
John: Yeah.
Sid: …that’s the way that it’s supposed to be but in most services that we go to for miracles we don’t see the blind and the deaf.
John: Well here Sir is an example of what we talked about pre getting onto this interview and that is “How do you know what God wants to do in a service?” Because there are services where He doesn’t heal them.
Sid: And you may want something but that’s not what God’s after.
John: That’s right and most people where a lot of these ministers got in trouble because they were labeled as a healing….what if you went to a Benny Hinn Meeting and there was no healings take place and because he said that God wanted to just have a prayer meeting you see.
Sid: I had a meeting recently…
John: Uh huh.
Sid: Where I had come off a string of services with major types of miracles and I just flat expected it. And what God wanted it was a tremendous outpouring of God’s Spirit for repentance but I was after the physical miracles.
John: And I’ve made that mistake.
Sid: And I missed it.
John: Yeah and I have to and a lot of other preachers have missed it. Now in that when I told you about the man that was blind my first meeting was that I had a visitation of an angel and I went into a vision and I saw the scripture that I was going to preach. Now you’ve got to remember this was 30 some years ago I was a no novice I knew nothing and I saw the scripture that I was to minister on, how to minister…
Sid: How far ahead of the meeting did this happen?
John: This happened about a week before the meeting.
Sid: Okay go ahead.
John: And I saw the people that would be in the meeting and when I got there it was exactly how He showed me.
Sid: You don’t have to work up your faith when you see that.
John: No you don’t know you don’t! And it just gives you a confidence that you would otherwise not have and that’s the importance of following the anointing. Now I liken in following the anointing as when the cloud lifted when Moses was in the wilderness with the Israelites and when the cloud was over the tabernacle. When it lifted that’s when they got the signal to get up and move and when it stopped that’s when they made camp. And we have got to be sensitive not that we’re looking for visions and all of this sort of stuff.
Sid: Listen we’re coming into times right now forget the healing ministry, we’re coming into times right now if we can’t hear God it can cost us our life.
John: Absolutely. And I’ve had experiences like that to where I hadn’t listened to God and it almost cost me my children’s life.
Sid: We’re out of time…
