This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors.

Bibleline Bibleline, here God’s Word on Bibleline, everywhere, every time. Here God’s truth on Bibleline. Welcome to Bibleline with Dr. Ralph Yankee Arnold, pastor of Calvary Community Church in Tampa, Florida. Clearly declaring the gospel of Jesus Christ through the radio and the internet. Your regular prayers and monthly support make it possible for Bibleline to continue on the air. You can reach us toll free at 1-800-576-3771. Online donations may be made through the Bibleline website at calvaryoftampa.org. We pray that you will enjoy our commitment to the clear gospel of Jesus Christ and that today’s message will be a blessing to you and your family.

So here in the Bible, I want you to look there in the book of 2 Corinthians in chapter 12. Look there in verse 13. I want you to know that the devil is alive and he is working. And believe it or not, he has a message that he wants you to hear. The devil, the devil has a message he wants you to hear. Now we know that Christ when he was here says, going to all world priests to the gospel.

Well the devil goes into all the world and he preaches a message too. And he’s got everything that the Lord’s got. He doesn’t have the power of God but there is the power of the devil. And so he’s working on your minds. little that you may understand that you may wind up believing just like the devil. In 2 Corinthians in chapter 11 verse 13 says, for such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ. Now notice certain thing here.

There’s the word apostles and workers transformed lives. All wonderful things? No, but this is of the devil. The devil has people that he has transformed, transformed in such a way that you can’t tell the difference to deceive you. He says, and no more before Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light. Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers, Satan’s ministers, also be transformed as the ministers of righteousness whose inshale be according to their works. So the point number one is I want to know that the devil does have a message and the message of the devil is man’s righteousness.

They are ministers of righteousness. See the devil doesn’t always want you to do bad things. He wants you to do good things. The devil wants you to do good things to go to heaven. After you have trusted Christ as your Savior, he wants you to do bad things because that really messes up your life. That causes people to call you a hypocrite. You say you’re going to heaven, but he’ll get you to live like the devil so that people won’t listen to what you have to say.

ButDenver, you can be smarter than the devil. And the only way you can be smarter than the devil is you listen to what God says about the devil so you can discern. This is the devil’s method. In verse 3 says, “‘But I fear less by any means as the servant beguile eat through his subtlety so your mind should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. Did you know that going to heaven is simple? And even serving the Lord after your trusted Christ is Savior, it’s simple.

The Christian life isn’t hard and complicated. The devil tells you it is. The devil tells you that it’s so hard to get to heaven and that you have to live right and do right all your life. And it’s so hard. And you have trials and temptations and testings of all kind and it’s so hard to be faithful. So it’s so hard. Well, why do it? Just quit and give up. And so you do. And many people do. They say it’s just been a hypocrite.

And if I’m going to go to hell, I might as well have me a ball before I get down there. Well, I agree with them. Because see the devil’s message is a false message. He always tell you how hard it is. Well, the Lord says it’s simple, but he has a goal by any means to corrupt your minds from the simplicity that’s in Christ. But did you know that this verse is not written to the lost people? This verse is written to believers.

This verse is written to those who already know the Lord because Paul said, I fear less the devil. Get ahold of your mind and corrupt your minds. You see, if you and I who know Christ is our Savior, we allow the devil to deceive us to corrupt our minds, then And we won’t live the way we should live. We won’t give the clear gospel message because our minds will be corrupted from the simplicity and we think there’s more to it than there really is.

The next statement I want you to look there is the devil’s method, the devil’s man. Second Peter chapter 2, I want you to turn there and look at this verse. This is awesome when you really begin to see what the Lord is saying. And he warns us, in the words you’re not supposed to believe everything you hear. And you need to believe what you believe because it’s the book and it’s right. And you check it with your Bible because you’re going to have to give an account someday for the things that you heard and what you’ve done as a result of what you heard.

2 Peter 2, look in verse 1. Verse 1, he says, but there were false teachers or false prophets also among the people. The Lord tells you that they’re there. He doesn’t remove them all, but he says, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privately shall bring in, and here’s that word, dandevo doctrines, dandevo heresies. In the words heresies that condemn your soul. It’s a terrible thing. Or even for a believer, teachings that will bring judgment upon you for not obeying God.

Now, for example, I’ve trusted Christ as my Savior. Satan cannot get my soul and send me to hell. I can’t go to hell. I have eternal life. I’m God’s child. But since he can’t get my soul, he wants to get my life. And he hasn’t cared what he has to do as long as he ruins my life, ruin my testimony. He don’t care how He destroys you, your home, your kids, the church, the country, the devil wants to destroy.

Look what else He says there in verse 2. Many shall follow their pernicious ways by reasons of whom the way of truth shall be evil spoke of many. Many people are going to listen to false teaching, so understand that. It’s the truth. But they don’t know that it’s the devil they’re listening to. They don’t know it’s the false teachers and false prophets. They just think it sounds reasonable, sounds logical. It makes sense to me. And so they lose everything.

They quit serving God and justify it. They can quit their wife or their husband, justify it. Do everything you want. You can always justify anything that you really want to do, even if it’s wrong. But now I want you to understand there is a consequence, a penalty has to be paid. But first of all, look in verse 3, through covetousness shall they with vain words make merchandise of you whose judgment now a long time, lender if not, and their damn nation slumber if not.

So then he uses an illustration. In verse four, God didn’t spare the angels that sand against him, he judged them. And then down in verse five, he didn’t spare the old world, the world that was there. When Noah was there, God judged those people, but he saved Noah and Mrs. Noah and three sons and their wives, but he brought judgment. There was Sodom and Gomorrah, looked on there in verse six, turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, condemned them with an overthrow, making them an example onto those that should afterwards live ungodly.

So that you know homosexuality. That’s wicked. God said so. It’s wicked, it’s ungod. That’s not like God. That’s not how God wants it to be. Sex between two men or sex between two women, that is sinful, that is wrong, that is wicked. Sex outside of marriage is wrong. You cannot justify it. Don’t do it. If you’re guilty, stop. Clean up, stop. It’s wrong. I’ve had a man tell me, well, I love her. I said, if you love her, marry her.

Marior, give her your name. Make your promise and keep your word. But stop bad hopping. That ain’t right. That’s wicked. That’s sinful. He says down here in verse seven, and delivered just slot vexed with the filthy behavior of the wicked. That’s what God calls it. And for that righteous man dwil it among them and seeing and hearing Bex’s right to soul from day to day with their unlawful deeds. You can’t make it lawful just because people pass laws and say, well, it’s okay.

I think a marriage is between man and a woman, and that’s the way the home ought to be. I just believe that. I don’t believe God made him in the very beginning, Adam and Steve. Was Adam and Eve? In verse 9, the Lord knoweth how to deliver the Godly out of temptation and to reserve the unjust onto the day of judgment to be what? They are going to be punished whether we like it or not. Whether they like to hear it or not that doesn’t matter.

The book is true and not to believe what God says is a wrong thing. That means they’re believing some teaching that didn’t come from God. So Satan’s job is to make sure that people don’t believe what God says. So they teach a different message and and causes people to believe it. The devil believes there’s one God, and it trembles. Some people don’t believe any more than what the devil believes. You believe there’s one God? Well, so does the devil.

The devil can quote scripture. Maybe you can. The devil believes Jesus, son of God. The devil believes in a future judgment. The devil believes Jesus cast out demons. Does that mean the devil is going to heaven? No. It’s the devil saved. No. But the devil believed all this. Yes. You might believe just like the devil and as lost as you can be. Now look at this. In that little statement, if you believe only what the devil believes, you have no more faith than the devil.

The next statement, the devil’s delusion. He desaves people. Number one, I know I’m saved. Now, these statements that I’ve mentioned here are statements. Believe it or not, people have given to me. Because sometimes I’d ask them. says, have you been saved? Yes. Well, tell me about it. I was driving my car and was going to wreck and I cried out, God saved me and He did. So therefore I know I’m saved. Now is that your definition of what it means to be saved?

No. That’s not salvation. But I had a person tell me I know I’m saved because see I cried and God heard and He saved me from being wrecked. Well, he might have kept you from wrecking, but that doesn’t mean that you’re saved from hell. Next statement, I was sick in the hospital and I thought I was going to die. So I prayed and God saved me. He healed me. Therefore I’ve been saved. That’s not what the Bible is talking about being saved from hell.

That doesn’t get you into heaven. That doesn’t get you a little pinkies one inch close to the pearly gates. The next statement, I went to war. I must be saved to survive a war. And because I went over and I was in the foxholes and it was shooting into people dying all around. I had to be saved for God to take care of me like that. Does that mean you’re saved because of that? No. That they don’t get it.

But they think I’m saved. No. Save means I’m not going to hell. Save means that I’m going to heaven. Save means that I’m now God’s child and I have eternal life. That’s being saved means. The love you say, well, I’ve been saved. They don’t know where they go and they die. Didn’t they don’t understand it? They’ve overlied you. Look at the little statement that’s next there. Number two, I know I’m saved because God has been so good to me.

Look there, I want you to see this verse in the book of Romans in chapter 2. The book of Romans and chapter 2. God is a good God. He is good to his creation. He’s met all of our needs before we were ever born. He met our needs before we were ever saved. If whoever trusts the Lord, our needs have been met. But look what he says here. I think it’s very important to see this. Here in the book of Romans in chapter two, let’s just start to first of all in verse two.

But we are sure that the judgment of God is according to truth. Verse three, thank you, style this, oh man, that judges them which do such things and do it the same, that thou shall escape the judgment of God. Is there anybody in here that thinks you are going to escape the judgment of God after all the bad things you’ve done and you’re going to escape his judgment. There’s only one way to escape it. If you haven’t done that one thing, you cannot escape.

You will not escape. Look at the next statement in verse 4, or despises thou the riches of his goodness and forbearance and long-term, not knowing that the goodness of God leadeth the to repentance. The goodness of God is not repentance, but the goodness of God leadeth the man the changes mind and trust the Lord. In other words, God is good to all of us. God was good to me before I ever trusted him as my Savior. God gave me a good body before I ever knew the Lord.

He gave me air, debris, he gave me food, he ate, I closed my back, my knees were me. God was good to me. God is good to all of us. The goodness of God is what causes a man to rethink his position. When you hear the gospel and you hear how good God has been, God has done wonderful things for us. And it’s the goodness of God that should motivate a man to understand I want to be with that good God for all eternity.

But lo and behold, if you make God mad, you don’t want to make God mad. One year I preached a sermon on don’t make Melanie mad. Some of y’all may remember. Don’t make Melanie mad. She’s my little granddaughter. She was about four years old. And lo and behold, Michael, one day he made her mad. And it was not in Pueblo. And I was over there at the house. and they were over at the church and they were riding the bicycles and she had on this little bicycle and she had a foot kept slipping off and she’s running out of the ride and she got mad.

She got so mad she took that bike and she threw a thing on the ground and she let out some words. I will stand across the road and I said, Melanie what did you say? And Michael who was right there, he said, she said, I really didn’t want him to repeat it. So I fresh the message one day on don’t make Melanie mad. Well better than that is don’t make God mad because he’s the judge and he’s going to punish.

He’s going to punish wickedness, ungodliness. So if you do not accept Christ as your Savior from that judgment, there is no escape from that judgment. He gave us food to eat. He gave us water to drink. He gave us clothes to wear. The goodness of God is to lead us to salvation, but the goodness of God is not salvation. You’re not saved just because God is good. There’s also the wrath of God. There’s the love of God. But if you don’t accept the love of God, of God, you will receive the wrath of God.”

The next statement, I know I’m saved because look what I’ve done. Boy, look what I’ve done. He’s saying nobody’s going to say that. They know that they can’t get to heaven by the good worth. Let me show you what he says. Turn in your Bible all the way over there to the welcome Matthew, chapter 7, Matthew and chapter 7. There are several things that are mentioned here that’s very important for you to see. more important to see what he said instead of look what I’ve done.

When people leave this world, the Bible says Jesus is the authority and Jesus said many will say unto me something that is going to ring their bell is going to be a chakra. Here in the first note, not everyone is is going to be saved. Not everyone’s going to be saved. So that you know right now God who created the heavens in the earth, he made heaven, made hell, made the world, created us, he says not everyone’s going to be saved.

You see what I mean? Not everybody is going to escape hell. Not everybody’s going to escape. Look in verse 13 and 14. Enter ye in at the straight gate for why does the gate brought us the way that lead to destruction and many there be which go in there at. So there is a place and some are going there. Look at verse 14, because straight is the gate and narrow is the way which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.

So there’s some going to one place and there’s some going to another place, yes or no? Yes. But not everybody is going to the same place. Not everyone is going to be lost. So not everybody is going to be lost, some will go to heaven. Not everybody is going to be saved, but some will. More people will be lost and saved. You say, how do you know more people are gonna be lost and saved? what didn’t he just say right there?

Many in verse 13, many there be which go in there at many will go in their way of destruction. Many is gonna be lost. Many expecting to be saved will be lost. Many that are expecting to be saved will be lost. Look in verse 21. Not everyone, not everyone that sayeth unto me, Lord, Lord shall enter into the kingdom of heaven, but he that doeth the will of my father, which is in heaven. And when he says, not everyone means that some will, but some won’t.

Some will say, Lord, Lord, and they will get in, but not everyone. So some will and some won’t. Well, what’s he gonna use as the criteria? Don’t you think you ought to know? Don’t you think this is important? This is very important. How do you know that you’re not one of those? He says, you ain’t going. Well, what I thought I was, I thought I’ve been a Christian all my life. Well, maybe you’re not. Because he said a lot of people can say Lord Lord, you hear a lot of people say, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, wonderful Lord, Jesus.

And all these wonderful things about Jesus, that means just because they say that, they’re going to heaven, no, no. I need you to see this in verse 22. Many, many, many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name, Then they named them many cast out devils, and then they named them many wonderful works. The ones that don’t get to go, he says, not all, let’s say Lord, Lord, we’ll go. And here’s why.

Many will say this. And these many that are saying this are saying, look what we have done. Look what we did. We cast out devils in your name. We prophesy in your name. We done many wonderful work. many wonderful work in your name, he says, they’re not going. He says, well, why? Because, see, they’re trusting their works for salvation. They’re trusting in their good, look what we have done. Nobody gets to heaven because of what they’ve done. You do not go to heaven because you joined a church, you were baptized in water, or because you promised to live right, and because you quit all of your sins, and you promise to live for the Lord only, you can make all the promises and pledges in the world.

You’re not safe because of that. You don’t go to heaven because you promise God you’re gonna quit some bad deeds in your life and because you promise that you’re gonna start living better and go to church and give money and pray and all these wonderful things, God doesn’t save anybody because of that. He doesn’t save anybody who’s trying to save themselves or it depends upon their changed life. Your works have absolute zero in this matter. You cannot save yourself.

And so he says, they’re those who are trying to do just that. Look at the next statement. Let her eat, no one will be saved after death. No one will be saved after death. Is you a how do you know that? because of what he said. He says that you’re going to stand before him one day and and Minnie’s going to say Lord Lord and he’s going to say no no and he also says something else in verse 23.

There’s two statements that he makes. When he makes the statement I never knew you. Look at this whole verse verse 23 and then will I on to them. You see, they professed but didn’t possess. He said, I’m going to profess something. What I say, I never knew you. What do they mean? It means they were never saved. I never knew them. Not they were saved and then they lost their salvation. If a man gets saved and then can lose their salvation, then he can’t say I never knew yet.

He said, well, I knew you once, but then you lost your salvation And so that cost you. He said, I never knew you. There is no such thing in the Bible as anybody ever getting saved twice. Nobody’s ever been saved twice. You cannot get saved today, lose it the next day and get saved the next day. Can’t do it. Because when you get saved once, you’re saved for how long? Forever. And if it’s forever, you can never get lost.

He can never tell a true child of God, I never knew you. So these people that are talking about their works, he says, I never knew you, means they were never saved. But then he makes this statement, depart from me. Well, he doesn’t do that in your life. He does it at death. When you die and leave this world, depart from me, ye that work iniquity, you workers of iniquity, depart from me. What does that mean? Means that in the future you never will be saved.

You never have been, you never will be. Isn’t that a very difficult thing to have to accept as a fact? I never have been and I never will be. But you know he was talking to people that were alive at this moment. Means right now you can be. But if you wait till then, you will never be. One thing to say, I know the Lord. It’s another thing for God to say, I know you. And once you trust Him as your Savior, God’s as you’re born into His family, He is your Father.

He knows every child He fathered. I am God’s child, He fat. This moment could be your last opportunity to be saved. Christ was speaking to people who were still alive and still had a chance to be saved. This was a warning to them. Many people are finding the broad way because they listen to the wrong message. There is few that find the truth. And what’s the difference between true Christianity and all the religions of the world? it’s by Christ alone, it’s grace.

If you have anything to do with it, it works. And God says, for by grace Christ are you saved, and that not of yourselves, that would be works. It is the gift of God not of works lest any man should boast. So any person who depends upon themselves can always lose their salvation. Check it out. Anybody who teaches you can lose it is because their salvation depends upon their works. That’s them. That’s works. If I depend upon Him, that’s grace.

I’m saved by grace. Christ. You don’t earn it. You don’t work for it. For by grace are you saved through faith that none of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not of works lest any man should boast. Salvation is the gift of God. He makes a statement, but he that doeth the will of my Father. What’s the will of the Father? The will of the Father is mentioned in the book of John when he says, this is the Father’s will that you believe on®, whom He hath sent.

You must trust Jesus Christ whom He hath sent. If you accept Him, God will save you, give you eternal life, and you’ll go to heaven on what He did for you. Now look up here. This hand represents you and me and the walla represents sin. Now God says that He loves us but He hates our sin but we’ve all sinned. So we’re all sinners. Everybody’s the same in God’s eyes. Now we look at people and we think people are better than others and so forth, and so we kind of make some judgments based upon how they live and so forth.

But in God’s eyes, he goes by perfection and missing perfection. Perfection and coming short of perfection. He says, all we have sinned and comes short of the glory of God’s short of God’s perfection. So we’re all sinners. And the wages of sin that we’ve done is death. So that’s why I’m not a sin. everybody dies because everybody sins. And the wages and the eternal separation from God in hell. So God wants us to go to heaven to go to heaven.

We have to be perfect as righteous as God. And none of us are perfect. None of us are righteous. We’re all sinners. But God loves us, wants us to go to heaven. But He says, you cannot save yourself. There’s nothing you need to do. It’s impossible, impossible for a man to save himself. But with God, all things are possible. It’s possible only this way. This is Jesus Christ, God in the flesh. He came into the world because He loves you and me, but He hates our sin.

He didn’t have any. He didn’t have to die. So He took our sins because they separated from them. So He took the sins of the whole world, paid for them on the cross, came back from the dead. So the only way that any of us in this whole world can ever get to heaven is that we must except Him and Him only, Him alone, is our only hope of getting to heaven. God says that if you try to earn it, you can’t have it.

If you try to earn it, you can’t have it. I don’t care how sincere you may be. You can promise God that you’re gonna live for Him, you can promise Him that I’m gonna commit my life to Christ, I’m gonna make Him the Lord and master of my life. That’s a joke. That’s not the Bible. Preachers that teach that are false teachers. There’s nothing that you have to do. No promises you have to make about how you’re going to live.

There’s no sin that you have to promise God, you will stop. Not a one, not one. You don’t turn from sin to be saved. You don’t promise how you’re gonna live to be saved. You simply, Lord, I am a sinner. I cannot save myself. I deserve to go to hell. This is what I’ve done. I’ve earned these wages. And Jesus Christ, who loves you, paid for all of your sins. If you accept what he did for you, He gives you as a free gift, eternal life, and you go to heaven on what He did.

You did nothing. And God saves you, gives you eternal life, and you go to heaven on what He did for you. And you can know that you’re going to heaven whenever you die. Best news in all the world. For God so loved the world. That He gave His only begotten Son. Whosoever, believe it in Him, believe that He paid for their sins. You believe He did it to you. He puts this payment to your account, and you shall not perish, means you can’t go to heaven.

But have everlasting life you go to heaven, you go to heaven on what he did for you. You’ve been listening to Bibleline, a teaching ministry of Calvary Community Church in Tampa, Florida with Dr. Ralph Arnold. We pray that you were blessed by today’s message. If you have enjoyed our commitment to the clear gospel of Jesus Christ, you can reach Bibleline and pledge your support to keep us on the air in your area by dialing toll-free 1-800-576-3771. That’s 1-800-576-3771. If you wish to hear today’s program again or would like to download a free MP3 of today’s or any previous Bibleline program, go to BibleLineMinistries.org and click on the spinning globe in the upper right corner of our homepage.

If you’re in the area, we welcome you to visit us. The address for Calvary Community Church is 4811 George Road, Tampa, Florida, 33634. Our Sunday morning services begin at 1030 and at 6 o’clock on Sunday evening. Life broadcast of our services may be seen by going to our church website, calvaryoftampa.org. Thanks for joining us on Bibleline and now a closing thought from Pastor Art. Friends, one day it will happen. The trumpet will sound. We will be changed. Hot up to meet the Lord in the air.

So live today and every day. Believing that the Lord is coming soon, just keep looking up.