BelieveTheSign

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===Diagnosing the opposition===
===Diagnosing the opposition===


The fourth is a habit of explaining away disagreement by diagnosing the disagreer. Critics, atheists, former members, "these little morons" who "found flaws" are consistently described as being driven by a "carnal nature" that "hates God" and "can't understand the things of God." Their objections are not answered. They are demonized.
The fourth is a habit of explaining away disagreement by diagnosing the disagreer. Critics, atheists, former members, "these little morons" who "found flaws" are consistently described as being driven by a "carnal nature" that "hates God" and "can't understand the things of God." Their objections are not answered. They are pathologized and demonized.


Those four themes recur across all four sermons in different clothing.  
Those four themes recur across all four sermons in different clothing.  
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His recurring themes contain some REALLY bad arguments.
His recurring themes contain some REALLY bad arguments.


== The motte and bailey at the center of it all ==
== Motte and bailey at the center of it all ==
Medieval castles were often built with a "motte," a small fortified tower on a hill that was easier to defend, and a "bailey," the larger, more comfortable settlement around its base that was harder to defend. When under attack, you retreat from the bailey to the motte. Philosophers use this as a name for a common argumentative trick: stake out a bold, sweeping claim, and when challenged, retreat to a much smaller, much more defensible claim, then reoccupy the bold one the moment the pressure is off.
Medieval castles were often built with a "motte," a small fortified tower on a hill that was easier to defend, and a "bailey," the larger, more comfortable settlement around its base that was harder to defend. When under attack, you retreat from the bailey to the motte. Philosophers use this as a name for a common argumentative trick: stake out a bold, sweeping claim, and when challenged, retreat to a much smaller, much more defensible claim, then reoccupy the bold one the moment the pressure is off.


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This is not a minor rhetorical quirk. It is the foundation of his sermons, and I suspect of the Manhattan Project. I would encourage anyone still inside the message to watch for it, because once you see it in Courchaine's preaching, you will start seeing it everywhere in Message literature, including in Branham's own sermons.
This is not a minor rhetorical quirk. It is the foundation of his sermons, and I suspect of the Manhattan Project. I would encourage anyone still inside the message to watch for it, because once you see it in Courchaine's preaching, you will start seeing it everywhere in Message literature, including in Branham's own sermons.
=== Violating the law of non-contradiction ===
One of Courcaine's core claims is that you cannot use reasoning or evidence to establish spiritual truth. Such truth is grasped only by faith and revelation. The moment you allow reasoning to have a vote, you've already surrendered to the enemy.
And the HUGE problem with this is that it is [[Logic and the Message#Self-refutation|self-refuting]]. '''He spends his sermons reasoning and citing evidence to convince you of that.''' He gives definitions, walks through history, cites Greek and Hebrew, compares proof texts, and weighs Calvinism against Arminianism. Every one of those is an appeal to your reason. A claim that "reason cannot establish truth" cannot itself be established by reason without refuting itself, and it cannot be established by revelation without simply asking you to take his word for it.
The law of non-contradiction isn't a hostile skeptic's tool; it's the precondition for meaning in any statement at all. When Courchaine says "intellectual consistency is not truth," he needs that statement itself to be intellectually consistent and true, or there's no reason to accept it. The sentence eats its own tail.
This is another foundation to Courchaine's arguments. If it falls, then the whole "''you can't question the Message''" apparatus falls with it. While it should be obvious to those in the Message, cognitive dissonance will prevent them from seeing it. But those outside feel the sleight of hand even before they can name it: ''he told me not to reason, and then reasoned with me the whole time.''


== Two fallacies combined into one argument ==
== Two fallacies combined into one argument ==
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He tells the story of Israel's four-hundred-year sojourn promised to Abraham in Genesis 15:13, compared with the four hundred and thirty years actually recorded in Exodus 12:40. "The logic doesn't line up," he says. "Looks like it's wrong. Oh, well, God made a mistake... And the skeptic loves, 'oh, you're making it unfalsifiable.' Yes. Because we believe by faith." He treats this as an example of something you simply have to accept without explanation, a contradiction faith must absorb.
He tells the story of Israel's four-hundred-year sojourn promised to Abraham in Genesis 15:13, compared with the four hundred and thirty years actually recorded in Exodus 12:40. "The logic doesn't line up," he says. "Looks like it's wrong. Oh, well, God made a mistake... And the skeptic loves, 'oh, you're making it unfalsifiable.' Yes. Because we believe by faith." He treats this as an example of something you simply have to accept without explanation, a contradiction faith must absorb.
This is also the textbook red herring (throw the Bible under the bus) tactic that was used by [[Red Herring Arguments|Voice of God Recordings (click here to see our video on the subject)]].


Except it isn't a contradiction that needs faith to absorb it. '''It's a solved problem.''' Galatians 3:17 tells us plainly that the four hundred and thirty years run "from the covenant that was confirmed before of God in Christ" to Moses, meaning from the promise made to Abram, not from the birth of Isaac. Genesis 15:13's four hundred years is the shorter span of actual affliction in Egypt, counted from around the birth of Isaac. Two different starting points, two different but compatible numbers, no mistake and no mystery.  
Except it isn't a contradiction that needs faith to absorb it. '''It's a solved problem.''' Galatians 3:17 tells us plainly that the four hundred and thirty years run "from the covenant that was confirmed before of God in Christ" to Moses, meaning from the promise made to Abram, not from the birth of Isaac. Genesis 15:13's four hundred years is the shorter span of actual affliction in Egypt, counted from around the birth of Isaac. Two different starting points, two different but compatible numbers, no mistake and no mystery.  


Any decent study Bible will walk you through it. David Courchaine had a straightforward exegetical answer sitting one search away, but because he has his head in the Branham's sermons instead of the Bible, he reached for "we believe by faith it's unfalsifiable," which is precisely the move he mocks the atheist for making about naturalism a few minutes later.  
Any decent study Bible will walk you through it. David Courchaine had a straightforward exegetical answer sitting one search away, but because he has his head in the Branham's sermons instead of the Bible, he reached for "we believe by faith it's unfalsifiable," which is precisely the move he mocks the atheist for making about naturalism a few minutes later.


If unfalsifiability is a mark against a belief system when an atheist uses it, it's a mark against a belief system when he uses it too. You don't get to disqualify the tool for your opponent and then pick it back up for yourself.
If unfalsifiability is a mark against a belief system when an atheist uses it, it's a mark against a belief system when he uses it too. You don't get to disqualify the tool for your opponent and then pick it back up for yourself.


His double standard shows up again when he insists that belief in God is "not a rational belief... not reasonable by definition," only to quote 1 Peter 3:15 a few minutes later, a verse whose entire point is that Christians should "be ready always to give an answer... with meekness and fear" for the hope that is in them. Peter is telling us faith is reasonable enough to defend with reasons. David Courchaine wants the verse and its opposite in the same sermon.
His double standard shows up again when he insists that belief in God is "not a rational belief... not reasonable by definition," only to quote 1 Peter 3:15 a few minutes later, a verse whose entire point is that Christians should "be ready always to give an answer... with meekness and fear" for the hope that is in them. Peter is telling us faith is reasonable enough to defend with reasons. David Courchaine wants the verse and its opposite in the same sermon.
The deeper issue is the principle he draws from it: ''nothing can counter what I believe.'' A belief that no possible evidence could ever disconfirm isn't a strong belief. It's an empty one, in the sense that it's no longer making a claim about reality that reality could confirm or deny.
'''This exact reasoning would equally protect Joseph Smith, the Watchtower, or any group Courchaine himself rejects.''' He rejects Mormonism on the grounds that Joseph Smith "pointed people to himself, not the truth." But that's an evidential, historical judgment, the very kind of reasoning he just told us we can't trust. He wants falsifiability when judging Joseph Smith and unfalsifiability when defending Branham. '''You can't have it both ways.'''


== [[Logic and the Message#The Ad Hoc Rescue|The Ad Hoc Rescue]] - Turning errors into evidence ==
== [[Logic and the Message#The Ad Hoc Rescue|The Ad Hoc Rescue]] - Turning errors into evidence ==
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In ''What Is the Message'', Brother Courchaine says: "We are led by one of two spirits. Outward man is self. That's Satan, the serpent seed." In ''Why Are People So Tossed About'', describing Cain: "he wasn't the bride. He was the son of Satan."
In ''What Is the Message'', Brother Courchaine says: "We are led by one of two spirits. Outward man is self. That's Satan, the serpent seed." In ''Why Are People So Tossed About'', describing Cain: "he wasn't the bride. He was the son of Satan."


We completely debunk Branham's doctrine of [[The Serpent's Seed|The Serpent's Seed in our article on the subject (click here). The Old Testament treats Cain as anything other than fully human, fully a son of Adam, whose sin is explained in purely moral terms two verses later: "sin lieth at the door... unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him" (Genesis 4:7). That is a warning about choice, not a comment on bloodline. Cain's problem was not his ancestry. It was his heart, and God tells him so directly.
We completely debunk Branham's doctrine of [[The Serpent's Seed|The Serpent's Seed in our article on the subject (click here)]]. The Old Testament never treats Cain as anything other than fully human, fully a son of Adam, whose sin is explained in purely moral terms two verses later: "sin lieth at the door... unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him" (Genesis 4:7). That is a warning about choice, not a comment on bloodline. Cain's problem was not his ancestry. It was his heart, and God tells him so directly.


This matters beyond a single verse, because the doctrine threads through Courchaine's sermons. It divides humanity into two lineages before anyone has done anything, quietly reintroducing the very kind of unconditional, ancestry-based predestination the sermons spend so much time criticizing Calvinism for. You cannot fault Calvinism for making salvation about who God arbitrarily chose before you existed, and then teach that half of humanity is disqualified from ever being the bride based on which spiritual father conceived their ancestor. That is the same shape of problem wearing a different name.
This matters beyond a single verse, because the doctrine threads through Courchaine's sermons. It divides humanity into two lineages before anyone has done anything, quietly reintroducing the very kind of unconditional, ancestry-based predestination the sermons spend so much time criticizing Calvinism for. You cannot fault Calvinism for making salvation about who God arbitrarily chose before you existed, and then teach that half of humanity is disqualified from ever being the bride based on which spiritual father conceived their ancestor. That is the same shape of problem wearing a different name.
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This is classic '''confirmation bias.''' Our brains naturally search for, interpret, and remember information in a way that confirms our preexisting beliefs, while completely discarding evidence that contradicts them.
This is classic '''confirmation bias.''' Our brains naturally search for, interpret, and remember information in a way that confirms our preexisting beliefs, while completely discarding evidence that contradicts them.


== There really is a true answer ==
=== An internal contradiction he doesn't notice ===
David Courchaine is right about one thing more than any other: there really does have to be a true answer somewhere. I agree with him completely. Where I part ways with him is in how you find it.
Courchained argues that the Nicolaitan spirit, the "image of the beast," is precisely the impulse to "settle disputes" by declaring who's right, elevating a teaching authority over the people, and "casting out those who would not agree." Councils, creeds, votes = the beast.


If there really is a true answer somewhere, and I believe there is, it is not going to be found only inside the very source whose claims are in question. It's found by testing that source against something outside itself: the biblical text in its own context, the historical record, and the honest testimony of people who lived through the same events and remember them differently.
But the Message does exactly this, and Branham did it in the sharpest possible terms. Branham didn't merely offer a view; he said those who believe the Trinity are "possessed by the devil" and "you're lost," and he called the denominations the mark of the beast. That is the most extreme possible "casting out of those who won't agree." Courchaine praises Branham's tolerance ("find that brother and go to his church") while standing inside a system whose founder consigned Trinitarians to damnation. By Courchaine's own definition of the beast, the Message qualifies. He's applied the test to everyone except the one group it most obviously indicts, which is the very thing he warned against: "question everything except the person telling you to question everything."


You don't find it by declaring your conclusion beyond debate and then, when challenged, retreating to "we're all just doing our best." You don't find it by relabeling every documented error as evidence of authenticity. You don't find it by treating a coincidence you were primed to notice as proof, while calling the same reasoning a fallacy when an atheist tries it. And you certainly don't find it by deciding in advance that anyone who disagrees with you must be running on a "carnal nature" rather than an honest reading of the same Bible you're both holding.
=== The Pragmatic Fallacy: ''It brought millions to Jesus, therefore it's true'' ===
His climactic proof is testimonial and pragmatic: the Message introduced him to Jesus, it's brought millions to Christ, and that is "beyond dispute" and "THUS SAITH THE LORD."


You find it the way scripture actually tells you to: test everything, hold fast to what is good (1 Thessalonians 5:21), and be ready to give a reasoned defense, not because faith is unreasonable, but because it isn't. Jesus never asked anyone to stop thinking in order to follow Him. He asked hard questions of the people who came to Him, and He answered hard questions honestly, in public, where they could be checked. That is still the better model. It was true before William Branham was born, and it will still be true long after every sermon about him has been forgotten.
Two problems. First, even granting the sincerity, this is a textbook pragmatic fallacy - "it works, therefore it is true."
----
Results are never a guarantee of truth. Whether something works and whether it is true are two very different issues.  
== What is the Message? - Part 5 - Why Me? - All Things - 2026-04-22 ==


David appears to be warm, self-deprecating, repeatedly generous toward Calvinists, Arminians, Catholics, and even atheists ("some of my best conversations have come from people who don't believe in God at all"). This is certainly at odds with him calling us liars.
Anytime someone says... ''Try Jesus 'cause it works,'' he has committed a fallacy. Plenty of movements produce changed lives and sincere devotion, including ones Courchaine would call false. I am personally aware of:


This sermon may be where the idea of the Manhattan Project started. In many of the videos he deleted, he talked about epistemology, the study of the nature, origin, scope, and limits of human knowledge. In this sermon, he appears to be retreating to higher ground, attempting to build an '''epistemological fortress''', a theory of knowledge designed so that no evidence could ever counter the Message.  
* A Muslim man who claims Islam is true because he was miraculously delivered from drug addiction.
* A Mormon man who knows that the LDS religion is true because he experienced a "burning in his bosom."
* A Roman Catholic man who was an alcoholic but was delivered instantaneously from his addiction through the power of Jesus.


=== His core claim ===
Based on the above, Courchaine would have to accept that Islam, Mormonism and Catholicism are all the truth.


His core claim is that you cannot use reasoning or evidence to establish spiritual truth. Such truth is grasped only by faith and revelation. The moment you allow reasoning to have a vote, you've already surrendered to the enemy.
Fruit in the sense of transformed affections is not the same as a true prophetic claim. Branham's claim wasn't "I'll introduce you to Jesus." It was "I am the prophet of Malachi 4:5, the angel of Revelation 10:7, and to reject my message is the mark of the beast." That claim is either true or false on the evidence, and no number of testimonies settles it.


And the HUGE problem with this is that it is [[Logic and the Message#Self-refutation|self-refuting]]. '''He spends 45 minutes reasoning and citing evidence to convince you of that.''' He gives definitions, walks through history, cites Greek and Hebrew, compares proof texts, and weighs Calvinism against Arminianism. Every one of those is an appeal to your reason. A claim that "reason cannot establish truth" cannot itself be established by reason without refuting itself, and it cannot be established by revelation without simply asking you to take his word for it.
Second, notice the quiet substitution. The thing that's "beyond dispute" (that the Message meant something to him personally) is smuggled in to vouch for the thing that is very much in dispute (that Branham was who he said he was). Those are two different claims. Conceding the first costs the critic nothing and proves nothing about the second.


The law of non-contradiction isn't a hostile skeptic's tool; it's the precondition for meaning in any statement at all. When Courchaine says "intellectual consistency is not truth," he needs that statement itself to be intellectually consistent and true, or there's no reason to accept it. The sentence eats its own tail.
= There really is a true answer =
 
David Courchaine is right about one thing more than any other: there really does have to be a true answer somewhere. I agree with him completely. Where I part ways with him is in how you find it.
This is the load-bearing wall of Courchaine's argument. If it falls, then the whole "''you can't question the Message''" apparatus falls with it. While it should be obvious to those in the Message, cognitive dissonance will prevent them from seeing it. But those outside feel the sleight of hand even before they can name it: ''he told me not to reason, and then reasoned with me for an hour.''


=== A false dilemma dressed up as humility ===
== A false dilemma dressed up as humility ==
Courchaine repeatedly offers exactly two options:  
Courchaine repeatedly offers exactly two options:  
#either you believe by pure faith/revelation, or  
#either you believe by pure faith/revelation, or  
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There is no third door in his telling.
There is no third door in his telling.


But there obviously is one, and it's the historic Christian position. The faulty dilemma is one of the favorite ways to make a Christian squirm.  
===The option he refuses to consider===
 
There is an obvious alternative that he never considers and it is the one we constantly point to... the historic Christian position. The faulty dilemma is one of the favorite ways to make a Christian squirm.  


Here is the alternative he never considers: ''faith grounded in evidence.'' True faith is a confidence based on reliable evidence, resting on an overwhelming amount of reliable evidence from God's words and God's works, not some blind hope apart from any evidence.  
The alternative he never considers? ''Faith grounded in evidence.'' True faith is a confidence based on reliable evidence, resting on an overwhelming amount of reliable evidence from God's words and God's works, not some [["Blind Faith"|blind hope]] apart from any evidence.  


What he doesn't recognize is that this third alternative is firmly grounded in scripture. There was a person in the Bible who thought that Jesus was the messiah, but later on, he began to doubt.
He also doesn't recognize that this third alternative is firmly grounded in scripture. There was a person in the Bible who thought that Jesus was the messiah, but later on, he began to doubt.


How did Jesus deal with this man's doubt?
How did Jesus deal with this man's doubt?
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Here is the story about John the Baptist from Luke 7:18- 23:
Here is the story about John the Baptist from Luke 7:18- 23:


:''John’s disciples told him about all these things.  Calling two of them, 19 he sent them to the Lord to ask, “Are you the one who is to come, or should we expect someone else?”  When the men came to Jesus, they said, “John the Baptist sent us to you to ask, ‘Are you the one who is to come, or should we expect someone else?’ ”  At that very time Jesus cured many who had diseases, sicknesses and evil spirits, and gave sight to many who were blind.  So he replied to the messengers, “Go back and report to John what you have seen and heard: The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is proclaimed to the poor.  Blessed is anyone who does not stumble on account of me.” <ref>The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), Lk 7:18–23.</ref>
<blockquote>''John’s disciples told him about all these things.  Calling two of them, 19 he sent them to the Lord to ask, “Are you the one who is to come, or should we expect someone else?”  When the men came to Jesus, they said, “John the Baptist sent us to you to ask, ‘Are you the one who is to come, or should we expect someone else?’ ”  At that very time Jesus cured many who had diseases, sicknesses and evil spirits, and gave sight to many who were blind.  So he replied to the messengers, “Go back and report to John what you have seen and heard: The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is proclaimed to the poor.  Blessed is anyone who does not stumble on account of me.” <ref>The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), Lk 7:18–23.</ref></blockquote>


Jesus did not say, "How could you doubt me, John? Can't you just believe?"  He did not condemn John for asking a very hard question. What he did was point to the evidence and to tell John's followers to go back to him and tell John the Baptist what they saw... to relate the evidence to him.
Jesus did not say, "How could you doubt me, John? Can't you just believe?"  He did not condemn John for asking a very hard question. What he did was point to the evidence and to tell John's followers to go back to him and tell John the Baptist what they saw... to relate the evidence to him.
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Notice what Courchaine's false dilemma accomplishes. It quietly relabels all critical examination as satanic. Once "questioning" equals "the enemy," looking at the failed prophecies and visions, the plagiarism from Larkin and Russell, all of it can be dismissed without being examined, because the act of examining has been ruled out of bounds in advance. That's not a defense of the Message. It's a false wall built around it.
Notice what Courchaine's false dilemma accomplishes. It quietly relabels all critical examination as satanic. Once "questioning" equals "the enemy," looking at the failed prophecies and visions, the plagiarism from Larkin and Russell, all of it can be dismissed without being examined, because the act of examining has been ruled out of bounds in advance. That's not a defense of the Message. It's a false wall built around it.


=== Textbook unfalsifiability admitted and celebrated ===
If there really is a true answer somewhere, and I believe there is, it is not going to be found only inside the very source whose claims are in question. It's found by testing that source against something outside itself: the biblical text in its own context, the historical record, and the honest testimony of people who lived through the same events and remember them differently.
Courchaine raises the skeptic's objection himself: "Oh, you're making it unfalsifiable. It can't be proven false." His answer is essentially "Yes."


He uses the 400/430 year "discrepancy" (Genesis 15:13 vs. Exodus 12:40) to argue that even apparent contradictions in Scripture don't count against it, because "if intellectual consistency were truth, God isn't God."
You don't find it by declaring your conclusion beyond debate and then, when challenged, retreating to "we're all just doing our best." You don't find it by relabeling every documented error as evidence of authenticity. You don't find it by treating a coincidence you were primed to notice as proof, while calling the same reasoning a fallacy when an atheist tries it. And you certainly don't find it by deciding in advance that anyone who disagrees with you must be running on a "carnal nature" rather than an honest reading of the same Bible you're both holding.


This is a textbook red herring (throw the Bible under the bus) tactic that was used by [[Red Herring Arguments|Voice of God Recordings (click here to see our video on the subject)]].
You find it the way scripture actually tells you to: test everything, hold fast to what is good (1 Thessalonians 5:21), and be ready to give a reasoned defense, not because faith is unreasonable, but because it isn't. Jesus never asked anyone to stop thinking in order to follow Him. He asked hard questions of the people who came to Him, and He answered hard questions honestly, in public, where they could be checked. That is still the better model. It was true before William Branham was born, and it will still be true long after every sermon about him has been forgotten.
----


Set aside the fact that the 400/430 figures have a straightforward harmonization that Christian apologists have offered for centuries (did he intentionally ignorant this?), so it's a weak example to hang the point on. The deeper issue is the principle he draws from it: ''nothing can counter what I believe.'' A belief that no possible evidence could ever disconfirm isn't a strong belief. It's an empty one, in the sense that it's no longer making a claim about reality that reality could confirm or deny.


'''This exact reasoning would equally protect Joseph Smith, the Watchtower, or any group Courchaine himself rejects.''' He rejects Mormonism a few minutes later on the grounds that Joseph Smith "pointed people to himself, not the truth." But that's an evidential, historical judgment, the very kind of reasoning he just told us we can't trust. He wants falsifiability when judging Joseph Smith and unfalsifiability when defending Branham. '''You can't have it both ways.'''


=== The Pragmatic Fallacy: ''It brought millions to Jesus, therefore it's true'' ===
His climactic proof is testimonial and pragmatic: the Message introduced him to Jesus, it's brought millions to Christ, and that is "beyond dispute" and "THUS SAITH THE LORD."


Two problems. First, even granting the sincerity, this is a textbook pragmatic fallacy - "it works, therefore it is true."
Results are never a guarantee of truth. Whether something works and whether it is true are two very different issues.


Anytime someone says... ''Try Jesus 'cause it works,'' he has committed a fallacy. Plenty of movements produce changed lives and sincere devotion, including ones Courchaine would call false. I am personally aware of:
* A Muslim man who claims Islam is true because he was miraculously delivered from drug addiction.
* A Mormon man who knows that the LDS religion is true because he experienced a "burning in his bosom."
* A Roman Catholic man who was an alcoholic but was delivered instantaneously from his addiction through the power of Jesus.
Based on the above, Courchaine would have to accept that Islam, Mormonism and Catholicism are all the truth.
Fruit in the sense of transformed affections is not the same as a true prophetic claim. Branham's claim wasn't "I'll introduce you to Jesus." It was "I am the prophet of Malachi 4:5, the angel of Revelation 10:7, and to reject my message is the mark of the beast." That claim is either true or false on the evidence, and no number of testimonies settles it.
Second, notice the quiet substitution. The thing that's "beyond dispute" (that the Message meant something to him personally) is smuggled in to vouch for the thing that is very much in dispute (that Branham was who he said he was). Those are two different claims. Conceding the first costs the critic nothing and proves nothing about the second.
=== The Malachi / Revelation 10:7 word-chain ===
Courchaine repeats the familiar Message move: ''Malachi'' = "my messenger," ''mal'ak'' = "messenger" = "angel," Revelation 10:7 speaks of the seventh "angel," therefore the threads tie together into a single end-time Gentile prophet.
We dismantled the substance of this argument in ''Under the Halo.'' It's an equivocation (a term shifting meaning mid-argument). "Angel/messenger" is made to carry Branham across from Malachi to Revelation 10 by treating a translation overlap as if it were an identity of referents. But we show in ''Under The Halo'', the Greek of Revelation 10:7 ties the seventh angel to the seventh ''trumpet'' (Rev. 11:15), and Branham's own claim that the text says "the message angel, not the trumpet angel" is simply not what the Greek says, a point confirmed by the ESV, HCSB, and NLT renderings of the passage. Courchaine inherits the conclusion without re-examining the exegesis. He's building the roof on a foundation we've already shown to be unsound.
Courchaine asserts Malachi 4 "happened" and that Branham fulfilled it, but his ''only'' stated evidence is, again, personal, "the message of Brother Branham definitively brought my heart back to him." That's the pragmatic fallacy doing the exegetical work that the text can't.
=== An internal contradiction he doesn't notice ===
This one is worth pointing out because it's his own words turning on him. He argues that the Nicolaitan spirit, the "image of the beast," is precisely the impulse to "settle disputes" by declaring who's right, elevating a teaching authority over the people, and "casting out those who would not agree." Councils, creeds, votes: beast.
But the Message does exactly this, and Branham did it in the sharpest possible terms. Branham didn't merely offer a view; he said those who believe the Trinity are "possessed by the devil" and "you're lost," and he called the denominations the mark of the beast. That is the most extreme possible "casting out of those who won't agree." Courchaine praises Branham's tolerance ("find that brother and go to his church") while standing inside a system whose founder consigned Trinitarians to damnation. By Courchaine's own definition of the beast, the Message qualifies. He's applied the test to everyone except the one group it most obviously indicts, which is the very thing he warned against: "question everything except the person telling you to question everything."
==== Smaller but real problems ====
A few things that don't deserve full sections but are worth noting for accuracy:
* '''"Faith is evidence because evidence is not conclusive."''' He's leaning on the KJV of Hebrews 11:1 ("evidence of things not seen") to argue that faith replaces evidence. But the Greek (''elenchos'') means something closer to "proof" or "conviction," and Christians for centuries have read the verse as faith being ''well-grounded confidence'', not a substitute for grounds. He's turned a verse about assurance into a verse against inquiry.
* '''"Worship means to surrender."''' Stated flatly (32:37). The main biblical words for worship (''shachah'', ''proskuneō'') center on bowing down / paying homage. Surrender is a fair devotional application, but it's presented as a definition, and it isn't one.
* '''Attributing the sinless-logic argument to "Satan knew he was intellectually wrong" from Ezekiel 28.''' Ezekiel 28 is addressed to the king of Tyre, and its application to Satan is an interpretive tradition, not a plain reading. Building a theory of skepticism-as-satanic on it is a lot of weight for a contested text.
* '''He never actually answers his own question.''' The sermon is titled "Why me / All things" and promises to explain "all things" (Romans 8:28) and "why me." He reads the texts at the start and then never returns to exposit them; the "why me" answer (God foresaw my free choice) is asserted in two sentences and dropped. The structure promises exposition and delivers a mood.


=God and logic=
=God and logic=
:Main articles: [[God and the rules of logic]] and [[Logic and the Message]]
God serves as the foundation of all logic, having created the reality in which we discover the rules of laws.


We speak about logic in our discussion above. If you want more detail on how logic applies in theological issues, please read our separate articles on [[God and the rules of logic]] and [[Logic and the Message]].


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[[Category:Unfinished articles]]
[[Category:Unfinished articles]]
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