<TITLE>14. Par 41-45</TITLE>L-41 And when the sheep was marked... Here's the beautiful part. "Oh," you say, "that's all right, preacher, but how about all these marks then?" All right. Everybody we're marked. One marks this way, and one marked the other way, one Orthodox and the other one Episcopalian and this. But wait a minute, the shepherd bore the mark of his sheep in his hand. If you want to know what sheep that that... See, the shepherd's got the mark on his hand also.
And how appropriate that is tonight of our great Shepherd marked. He said, "A woman might forget her--mother might forget her little suckling babe, but never will I forget you 'cause your names are written in My hand." Marked, the shepherd carries the mark of his sheep. "I know My sheep and My sheep know Me." They mark the same mark.

L-42 Then His Church has got the same mark. What kind of a mark did He have? Spiritually speaking, when He was here on earth He was despised and rejected, a Man of sorrow, acquainted with grief. But God was with Him, signs and wonders accompanying Him everywhere He went. He could discern the thoughts of their heart. He said, "I do as the Father shows Me." The sick was healed; the dead was raised up; the poor had the Gospel preached.
And tonight the Church of the living God bears the mark of the living God. "These things that I do shall you also." Saint John 7:12 said, "He that believeth on Me, the works that I do shall he also; and greater works than this will he do, for I go unto My Father," branded. Amen.

L-43 You may have to be called a fanatic. You may have to be called holy-roller. You might have to take any kind of a ecclesiastical mark of scorn and brand, but as long as your Shepherd was branded with the same thing... He was despised and rejected of men. People hated Him. Why? Because He did right, because He did good.
Stephen the first martyr died because he told them that they were stiffnecked, uncircumcised in the heart and ears; they was resisting the Holy Ghost. Branded with the same brand the Shepherd died on...
Yes, sheep raising, branding, getting together. Aren't you glad tonight that you can... Well, the apostle said, "They returned rejoicing, because they--that they were counted worthy to bear the reproach of His Name." How happy ought we to be nineteen hundred years later to see the same Holy Ghost working in the same kind of a people, and causing the same results from the outside to point a scornful finger, and also the same results on the inside for a resurrected Lord Jesus stretching forth His hands to do signs and wonders that He did at the beginning.
Shepherds and sheep... I'm so happy tonight that our Shepherd bore those marks in His body.

L-44 Not long ago in the orient when I was traveling with a friend in a jeep, we crossed over a place, and I heard brakes a squeaking, and the jeeps a stopping, and cars a squealing, and I thought, "What taken place down there?" He stood outside the jeep and raised up, and looked down, and said, "Oh, it's a shepherd."
"A shepherd?"
"Oh, yes." Said, "In this country the shepherd is the highest respected man in the country." Amen. Highest respected... Today, preacher brother, Christian, you leaders of the flock, you might be scorned and laughed at for this is the day of man. But when the day of the Lord comes, it'll be different.

L-45 One time in New Albany, Indiana, when our late President Roosevelt was coming down to make a speech, and he came down by the train, and they stopped down at the river, I tell you, every place was filled up. And two or three of us preachers, little, what we call Holy Ghost preachers... I tell you, talking about a back number, we was. They wouldn't even let us get nowhere. So we had to stand way back up somewhere. But I thought, "Yeah, this is the day of man. But wait till the day of the Lord comes." Amen.


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