Rodney Howard Browne

Jesus came to earth as a human being. He was born of a

virgin and lived a sinless life. He went to the cross of Calvary

and paid the price for our sin. Then He rose from the dead, sat

down at the right hand of the Father, and sent the Holy Ghost

to live in the hearts of those who believe. So now you and I can

come and simply surrender our lives to Him, and the Holy

Ghost can come into our hearts and give us a new life.

 

I thank God for the reality of the risen, resurrected Lord Jesus Christ.

If you want to see Jesus clearly, take your Bible or go

to the back of this book and read through the gospels of

Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Underline everything He did and

everything He said. Put yourself in every verse. I’ve been at the

pool of Bethesda. “When did you go there?” you might ask. I

went there in the pages of the Word of God!

 

Now there is at Jerusalem by the sheep market a pool,

which is called in the Hebrew tongue Bethesda, having

five porches.

 

In these lay a great multitude of impotent folk, of blind,

halt, withered, waiting for the moving of the water.

JOHN 5:2-3

 

I’ve been there. I’ve seen it in the Spirit! When you walk

through the pages of the Word of God, Jesus will walk right off

the pages of the Gospel and into your heart. The living reality of

the resurrected Lord will walk up and down in your heart. The

Bible says, Blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have

believed (John 20:29). I haven’t seen, but I believe. I haven’t

seen with my natural eye, but I’ve seen Him with the eye of my

spirit in the pages of the Word of God.

 

The Word says, Lo, I come in the volume of the book

(Hebrews 10:7). We must see Him as He really is — not through

the eyes of religious tradition, but through the eyes of the Holy

Spirit and God’s Word.

 

Jesus was not a barefoot, scrawny, weak-kneed individual with a

lamb under His arm who spoke in Elizabethan English, “For yea, as

thou hast gathered here this day.” That’s not Jesus, that is religion

and tradition. If you read the Bible, you’ll see that the reputation Jesus

had among the religious people was that of a gluttonous man and

a winebibber, because He hung around with the sinners. Religious

people don’t want to be around sinners, and they didn’t like Jesus

because He convicted them of their hard-heartedness.

 

And Delilah said unto Samson, Hitherto thou hast

mocked me, and told me lies: tell me wherewith thou

mightest be bound. And he said unto her, If thou

weavest the seven locks of my head with the web.

Judges 16:13

 

I want you to see that Samson had begun to touch

the very key to his anointing. He had played the other

three times but now he was starting to touch the covering

of the anointing of God on his life. He even mentioned

part of the secret which was his hair.

 

He didn’t tell them to shave him, but he told them

to make seven locks of his hair and then to bind it up and

fasten it. This is what Delilah did.

 

There were a lot of weavers in those days. They

would weave carpets and clothing and all kinds of things.

That’s what Samson was saying. “Weave all my seven

locks into the weaver’s beam. Then I’ll be weak.” He

didn’t give the secret, but he was touching the very source

of the anointing on his life.

 

And she fastened it with the pin, and said unto him,

The Philistines be upon thee, Samson. And he awaked

out of his sleep, and went away with the pin of the

beam, and with the web.

 

And she said unto him, How canst thou say, I love

thee, when thine heart is not with me? Thou hast

mocked me these three times, and hast not told me

wherein thy great strength lieth.

 

And it came to pass, when she pressed him daily with

her words, and urged him, so that his soul was vexed

unto death.

Judges 16:14-16

 

She did what only a woman could do. It must

have been hell on earth. Nag, nag, nag, nag, nag.

Morning, noon, and night. “You don’t love me.”

It was so bad that his soul was vexed unto death.

Samson wanted to die. That’s how bad it was. This

woman went on and on and on so that he wanted to die.

 

He said, “My soul is vexed to death.” Some women have

that ability. She bugged him and bugged him, until he

told her all his heart.

 

That’s what the enemy wants to do. He wants to

get you to a place where you open your heart and

compromise the very deep things of God and lose your

effectiveness for the Lord Jesus Christ.