Book excerpt: William Branham was a influential Pentecostal ministers of the mid 20th century who began a cult following known as The Message. While many biographies of William Branham have been published, this is the first book on the history of The Message movement. Written by the former associate pastor of the second oldest Message church in the world, this book explores The Message community and the origins of its ideology. The Message did not appear in a vacuum. The ideology of The Message is merely a continuation and evolution belief systems which came before. What was that system? Where did the ideology come from? Are the sources reputable? How did the early Message community form? This first volume of the history of The Message will begin to shed light on these questions.