Polygamy in the Message

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William Branham stated publicly that "the nation in a whole would be better off if it practiced polygamy." He also stated that he would rather stand before God as a polygamist with "five married women standing by my side", than to be found committing adultery. Given these and other statements he made we have to ask whether William Branham actually understood the New Testament concept of marriage?

Some African Ministers believe William Branham taught that polygamy was acceptable

Because of William Branham's statements, some ministers in Africa see polygamy as being acceptable to those who follow the message.

Patrick Kimera of Uganda claims the message preached by William Branham titled "Marriage and Divorce" caused him to understand why he loved his wife.....yet he longed to marry another. He claims the message of William Branham gave him the revelation of POLYGAMY.

From a news article in DAILY MONITOR of July 16, 2013:

While many may have heard of the pastor with many wives, not many have heard of his End Times Gospel Message church.

The transition to polygamy with a growing church to explain it to was helped along a little, by another preacher who had gained popularity in the 50s and 60s and is seen as extremely anointed and controversial in equal measure. William Marrion Branham. Kimera is full of praise for Branham who was known for his extreme views on modest dressing for women and immorality.

“I had received his word, read his work and was impressed. I decided to model my church and teachings on his. His message on marriage and divorce was the first time a preacher helped me understand why I still loved one wife and wanted another one,” he says.

But despite the background and Branham’s teaching, the pastor still didn’t make the leap into polygamy immediately.

It was in 2001 when he moved from theory to practice. According to him, he and his wife had a small disagreement. “It was a scuffle really, she wanted to travel for some time and I told her if she left me alone, I would marry another wife. His first wife in a burst of defiance told him to go ahead and left the country.

Pastor Kimera kept his promise but not before sharing with the church his intentions. “I preached the marriage and divorce message and they clapped and cheered when I told them I would marry another wife,” he says.

Kimera met Christine, then a university student and proudly introduced her to his members thinking they would cheer him on. They did not. They left in droves and Kimera found himself with only a handful of church members. Some of those who left went to court in an attempt to get their pastor to vacate the church property hence the long drawn lawsuit.

While his first wife stayed away for three years indignant at him marrying a second and then a third, she eventually came back to the fold.

“She apologised and said I was right, and also refuted allegations that I had divorced her to marry other wives,” he says. The pastor of many wives says he divorced one wife due to infidelity, one of the few allowed grounds for divorce in the Bible.

“Of the four I have, only three are active,” he says cheekily. His eldest wife who was on a visit to the US at the time of our interview is relieved of some wifely duties which the other three all below 35 pick up. “Margaret is my wife, but she is almost my age, she will cook for me, spend time with me but I do not disturb her very much,” says the pastor.

I am most curious about the living arrangement, how Kimera is able to divide his time between the different homes. He thinks nothing of it saying casually, “I manage, I respond to the one who needs me, and the wives know it. I am there for whoever needs me, even if it is in the middle of the night, I will go. I just let the one I am with know I am needed elsewhere.” Sometimes this avid reader needs his space, and then he withdraws to one of the homes where he can be alone, summoning one wife to take care of him from time to time.

He is not about to stop either marrying or preaching the polygamy gospel. “Why should I? Fathers are jostling to give me their daughters,” he says.

Text of letter to Voice of God Recordings

(undated but assumed to be sometime in April 2018)

The Amazing Grace Tabernacle Ngong Hills P.O. Box 8638-00300 Nairobi Email:njirubon@yahoo.com

Dear Richard Sutton richard@branham.org vogr@branham.org kenya@vgroffice.org

RE: CLOSURE OF THE VOICE OF GOD RECORDINGS , NAIROBI

Greetings to you in the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ who is our Kinsman Redeemer and Saviour. Let there be an abundance of Blessings to you, to your family and to the Bride of Christ from Him Which was, Him Which is and Him Which is yet to come.

My names are Boniface Njiru a Message Believer of 42 years standing and a Pastor of a little Message Congregation in the outskirts of Nairobi, one of those numerous little, insignificant Message Assemblies sprawled all over the country, unknown yet beloved of Christ (God Hidden in Simplicity paragraph 153) My Congregation is one of the consumers of Voice of God Recordings materials and services.

It is therefore with quite some disappointment that we were notified that the VOGR has closed its Nairobi offices and all inquiries about the closure were to be directed to you. No reasons have been given, no explanations and no apologies offered either. This is a bit unfortunate since the Nairobi VOGR office is the earliest or one of the earliest offices to be opened. I recall that I was one of the ministers who attended the inauguration meeting of the VOGR office held at the Nairobi Intercontinental Hotel in the year 1983 when Joseph Branham and Billy Paul invited us in order to brief us about the Libraries Project. We received the new undertaking by the VOGR towards operation of Message Libraries with a lot of appreciation. I am grateful that this project has worked so well over the years and the Malachi 4 Message has reached nearly every part of the globe. God bless you. May the Lord keep the VOGR in that same step but also desist the temptation to send ministers or missionaries from America to the world. The Ministry in the Message ought in my view to remain charismatic and local based (God- called Man 1958).

Dear Br Sutton you don’t have to tell us why the VOGR has closed up the Nairobi office. We live here and we are quite well acquainted with the sex scandals that have bedevilled your VOGR office here affecting also some countryside libraries. We know them, The conduct is reprehensible, shameful embarrassing and disgusting. It make us Message Believers look much worse than the denominations that we left. It is worse when such acts are associated with Message Ministers accredited by VOGR to man and guide the VOGR products and the numerous libraries in the countryside. Even more embarrassing is the fact that those who engage in such heinous conducts of sexual immorality claim to be Christians and more so to be ministers of Christ. Scripture condemns such conduct in the strongest possible language,

“But Fornication and all uncleanness or covetousness let it not be once mentioned among you as becometh saints, neither filthiness nor foolish talking nor jesting which are not convenient but rather giving of thanks. For this you know no whoremonger, nor unclean person, nor covetous man who is an idolater has any inheritance in the Kingdom of Christ and of God”

However it is important to point out that the VOGR has persistedly followed a policy of discrimination against African brethren who believe and practice polygamy by refusing to appoint us as Librarians, subjecting us to humiliation, rejection, insults , derision, and denying us a smooth flow of Branham’s books and tapes. We literary have to grovel and beg to receive even a token of the VOGR services that you offer, all because we dared believe the Prophet’s Revelation of MARRIAGE AND DIVORCE (65-0221M). The VOGR holds that African Brothers who believe and practice polygamy are a depraved lot, immoral and are on lower rung of godliness. I myself have been called awful names by fellow Message Believers some which are too awful to be printed here. I cant forget the hurt I felt when the Chairman of the Voice of God Recordings Joseph Branham issued a newsletter some years back and equated polygamy with sodomy. I still smart at the slur because I believe in true holiness and godliness among God’s people and honour the institution of marriage even a polygamous unions. I hope and pray Joseph Branham will find room to repent before the Coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. The Prophet said,

“I'd rather stand before God with three married women, or five married women standing by my side, than to stand there with one wife, and running with another man's... Yes, sir. I'd have a better chance before God”. (Abraham restored 61-2-11)

Dear Br Sutton I don’t know how you intend to sort out this terrible sex scandal that is now associated with the VOGR, but I would suggest that just closing the Office here is not sufficient. In most international organizations matters of sexual impropriety in workplace are dealt with very severely and I think you should conduct a careful investigation, identify the victims and their families and make restitution. The investigation should not be confined only at the VOGR offices but also be extended at local libraries some of which we hear awful reports of sexual immorality. I understand in the VOGR system each individual library has a direct contract with the VOGR so you also bear direct responsibilty.

In Africa sex is a taboo not openly discussed and some families may choose to suffer in silence rather than be disgraced by the open exposure of the plight of their children. However they should be persuaded to discuss these issues otherwise I shudder to imagine what will happen to the children of those families some years to come? They will hate and despise the Message of our Prophet and anyone associated with it. I think the VOGR should simply own up to it and accept responsibility towards the victims especially where a victim has become a mother (as I hear that there is a child in one case!). It is not fair that you leave the responsibility of the victim and child to the official who committed the act . I think the VOGR should step in to make amends and give financial support to the victim and the child.

All said and done I hope your organization has at least learnt that sexual aberrations are not confined to polygamy believers but monogamists too suffer the same weaknesses!

The prophet said,

“And that's what God told us to do. Not one time was we ever commissioned to discern the-- man's group. But we was constrained and commanded by God to discern the spirit in the man, what he's trying to do, what the spirit in his life is trying to lead him to. And then if we can find out that he's trying to lead the people (not to break them up, but to bring them together) and to bring the church of the living God, not all to one denomination, but to a understanding, a fellowship, a unity of spirit. Then if he is former rain or latter rain, or whatever it is, his spirit and his purpose is right. And the spirit that's in him, no matter what move he belongs to, the Spirit that's in him is trying to point the people to Calvary, away from himself or away from anything else, but his only achievement he has is to point them to Calvary. He doesn't care whether he's even knowed or not. He doesn't care whether even his own movement... which is fine (See?), it's good, if he is a Methodist, or a Presbyterian, or a Roman Catholic, or whatever he wants to be by denomination. (Discernment of spirit)

Otherwise May God bless you

“See you in the Rapture, see you in the Rapture, yes I will see you in the Rapture some sweet day”

Yours in Christ

For the Little Barefoot Cousin (Sixth Seal paragraph 80-101)

Br Boniface Njiru

Nairobi

Quotes of William Branham

Speaking to someone the other day about polygamy. I said the nation in a whole would be better off if it practiced polygamy. It would. We’re the highest-rated nation in the world with divorces, marrying and intermarrying, marrying and intermarrying. Because we try to make the men of the world outside coincide with Christian doctrine, and you can’t put the nature of a lamb in a pig. Polygamy would be better off for him. You may not believe it but God would look at polygamy and excuse it a lot quicker than what He would. Now, you remember, don’t you say that I believe in polygamy; I don’t. I remember what God said, Moses said, or, the Pharisee said to Jesus, said, “Why did Moses suffer a writing of divorcement?” Said, “He did it because the hardness of your heart.” Right. But it wasn’t so from the beginning, never will be. God did it because of the hardness of their heart. But in the nations where they have polygamy the divorce courts are at ebb, low. But in here where we’re trying to make and govern this country as a nation, because being a Christian nation, but the name of Christian nation doesn’t make it a Christian nation. And you cannot govern the world by the rules of God. You can’t. I have no—nothing against a sinner drinking. I have nothing against a sinner committing adultery, nothing against the sinner doing this. But what I’m talking about is these people who are supposed to be Christians and then doing that.

This nation would be better off if it had—if it had a… I better not say that. All right. But anyhow it’d be better to have three or four wives than… I’d rather stand before God with three married women, or five married women standing by my side, than to stand there with one wife, and running with another man’s… Yes, sir. I’d have a better chance before God. You can’t force sinners to take a Christian’s duty and do that; they can’t do it until they’re borned again. That’s right. We’re a long ways from being a Christian nation.

In the nations where they have polygamy, it’s a thousand times better. And, yet, polygamy is wrong, we know. But, just show how degraded we are.

Then when the double covenant was made by man and woman, through sex, another covenant altogether (not the original covenant, but another covenant), now what’s introduced? Polygamy, in all. Then, after the beginning, polygamy was introduced both in man and in beasts; after the beginning, the fall. God now, secondarily, sets a new nature again, by sex. God created the first without sex. Do you believe that? [Congregation says, “Amen.”—Ed.] Now it’s another covenant with nature, He sets it in another order, by sex. Second covenant: one male, many females; one buck deer, a whole harem of does. Is that right? One bull, a whole herd of cattle, cows; one rooster, a yardful of hens. Is that right? One David, after His Own heart, with five hundred wives; with a hundred children born to him, in one year, of different women, a man after God’s Own heart. One Solomon, with a thousand wives. But notice now, it wasn’t so at the beginning, but now it’s “after” the beginning. The woman has done this, then she just becomes what she is now. See?

Now you notice in First Corinthians 7:10, notice, Paul commands the wife that is, that divorces her husband, to remain single or be reconciled, not to remarry. She must remain single, or to be reconciled back to her husband. She cannot remarry. She must remain single, but, notice, he never said about the man. See, you can’t make the Word lie. “From the beginning,” the sex law by polygamy. Now, the Word of God runs true with nature of God, runs in to continuity.

But she is designed to be a sex act, and no other animal is designed like that. No other creature on the earth is designed like that. That’s the reason you see polygamy, because of that. That’s what brought it in.

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