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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.

Take your Bible and turn to the book of Acts in chapter two. In the Christian realm, there’s many prophetic words that you will hear. And so prophetic survey is a tremendous tool that God gives to us because He says He planned the ages in the book of Hebrews in chapter 11. So if He planned the ages means He outlined the different periods of time, different dispensations, in which God deals with man. Now all of the Word of God is for us, but not all of the Word of God is to us.

Many of the things that are written in the New Testament are written to us. And so we can study the Old Testament because the Bible says there’s admonition that we can have for ourselves. We can learn from it. You have first of all the death, burial and resurrection of Christ because everything starts with history. History is history. So we always go back to Christ. Every time you write a check you put His date on it. His history is the history of what God has done and what God is doing.

All of this has to do with what God is doing with man, what God did with the angels, what God is going to do with the earth. Whether it’s the tribulation period is what God’s going to do to this earth and the people, the thousand year reign, that’s what God’s going to do. Everything deals with what God is going to do. Now God has told us things to do and if we don’t obey their consequences, so at the end of each one of these is a judgment.

In other words, how God judges mankind. So if you and I are wise, we’re supposed to learn from these things. But to start with the death, burial and resurrection of Christ, that is what makes the gospel possible. In other words, the gospel is good news. But you see a lot of people, a lot of religions believe in the death of the Berlin resurrection of Christ, but they don’t have the good news. Many people say, well, the death of the Berlin resurrection, that is the gospel.

Now that’s what makes the gospel possible because without the death of the Berlin resurrection, there would not be a good news. The good news is he did that for me. He did it, but if I don’t don’t know he did it for me so that I don’t have to try to earn my salvation, then I don’t see it as good news. That’s just a historical fact. He did that. But does it mean you’re going to heaven because you believe he did that?

You must personally believe he did it for you that he paid for your sins and you’re trusting him and him alone as your only hope of going to heaven. And once you do, you have eternal life. Now, here in the book of Acts in chapter 2 and verse 1, and when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. Pentecost means 50 days, 50 days from the resurrection of Christ. So Christ came back from the dead, ascended into heaven, and then the Bible says that there was a time limit.

There was also a time limit from the time that He actually ascended into heaven from the Mount of Olives. But see, Pentecost means 50 days, and when that day was fully come, something happened on that day. That’s the day the Holy Spirit came. Remember this, When Jesus was here preaching, He told him, He says, that I’m going to baptize you with the Holy Spirit. But the people didn’t understand everything that was said. John the Baptist says, I baptize you with water, but He that cometh after me, He shall baptize you with the Holy Spirit.

But during Christ’s lifetime, He never baptized anybody with the Holy Spirit. It hadn’t taken place yet. So on the day of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit came, the Bible says, and clothing tongues is a fire, the Bible says, those believers were baptized, they were already believers. They were baptized into the body of Christ. This is the beginning of the church. It is the birth of the church. This one, the church began. And Christ said, I will build my church.

And so the church is made up a body of believers. So when you trusted Christ as your Savior, the Holy Spirit places you and I into the body of Christ. That’s the baptism of the Holy Spirit. It is not a feeling that you have. You never had an experience, so as you can recall, that that’s when it happened. The very moment you trusted Christ as your Savior, you were born spiritually. You were placed into the body of Christ spiritually.

It’s not something you saw or felt, but it’s something that happened because God said so. That’s when the church began. The church age goes from pinty cost until the rapture. That is the period of time that you and I live in. So we are now waiting for the rapture to take place. Now, turning your Bible to 1 Thessalonians, chapter 4. 1 Thessalonians and chapter 4. 1 Thessalonians, chapter 4, the Bible tells us, love ones are going to die. It means they will not be here when the rapture take place.

So some of the people that were there, When Christ was there who believed all of this began to die and so as people began to die the question came up well Where are they and the longer Jesus Christ? Terries the more people are going to die So he has tarried for almost 2000 years and because of that many people have died Well, what happens to those people? The Bible says that if you were to die, you will be absentmouse the body present with the Lord.

So when you die, you are present with the Lord in heaven. Your body goes to the grave. rongh the Lord says that when He comes back, He’s going to bring those people who have already died with Him. So He brings them with Him and the Bible says the bodies are in the graves are going to be resurrected and they will be a reunion and we that are alive at this time will be caught up, to meet the Lord in the air and so shall we ever be with the Lord.”

Now look Bundy Package says in verse 13, but I would not have you to be ignorant brethren because there are so many ignorant brethren. It doesn’t want you to be ignorant. He says this, concerning them which are asleep, those who have already died, that you sorrow not even as others which have no hope. In other words, you can’t see the389 it. We don’t sorrow like those who have no hope. We know we are going to see them again. We know where they are.

To be absent from the body. President Lord God says they’re with Him. So don’t you worry about it. We know somebody who’s on the other side and he’s told us everything we need to know. All you and I need to know he’s told us. You don’t need to know anything if it’s not revealed in the book. But what you do need to know and understand it’s in there, understand and know what God did say and don’t worry about anything he did not reveal.

Look at verse 14, for if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring what? With him he’s going to bring them with him. He can’t bring them with him if they’re not with him, but they are. Then he says this in verse 15, for this we say unto you by the word of the Lord that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep or go before them which are asleep.

The Lord says he’s going to come back. So there’s going to be some people who have died, some people who are going to be alive when it takes place. And the Lord says that we are going to be alive when he returns and then the Bible says something is going to take place. In verse 16, for the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout with a voice of the Archangel and with the Trump of God and the dead in Christ shall rise first.

that’s the bodies that are in the graves. Verse 17, then we which are alive and remain when he comes back shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord where? In the air. So shall we ever be with the Lord. It means we that are alive when this takes place won’t die. We will not all die. In the book of 1 Corinthians in chapter 15 says we shall not all die. This is a mystery, but we shall all be changed in a moment in the twinkling of an eye for the corruptible must put on in corruption and mortal subject to die.

Those are still alive. We’ll put on immortality. So this moment is coming. You go to the Judgement Seed of Christ. Now I want you to look at these verses. These are very important verses. Look there in the book of Romans and chapter 14. Romans and chapter 14. This is what the Lord’s Word says, see I can’t make anybody clean up their life. I can’t make you serve the Lord. I can’t make you want to honor Him or please Him.

I wish I could, but I can’t. All I’m supposed to do is tell you what the book says. You can do it whatever you want because you can’t make me serve God and I can’t make you. I can’t make you faithful. You can’t make me faithful. But truth, the Bible says we’ll set you free. Free to serve God. But if you don’t know the truth, you’re not going to be free to serve him. Now, I know what he says here in the book of Romans in chapter 14.

Look there in verse 10. But why does thou judge thy brother? Oh, why does thou set it not thy brother? For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. For it is written, as I live, saith the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, every tongue shall confess to God. So then every one of us shall give account of himself to God. Is that true? That is true. The judgment see to Christ is what takes place the moment the raptured happens and we’re caught up to meet the Lord in the air.

The Bible says we will disappear here and we will appear at the judgment see to Christ. The judgment see to Christ is a rewarding stand. That is where God is going to reward you for what you have done for Him. If you don’t do anything for him, you will still be there. You’ll be ashamed before him at his coming. And your whole life that you got to live can be a total waste. You could have used your life and done nothing more than bring forth briars and thorns and weeds.

Or you could have invested your life for the Lord. That’s why down here, so you can brag about your money you make and where you work and all the possessions that you have, all of that is zero there. Here God’s only going to reward you, not for the amount of possessions you were able to accumulate. What did you do for Him? What did you do for the Lord? That’s what God is going to reward you for. That’s why God is watching every decision you make, every deed that you have done, every thought, every word.

And God is going to reward you when you get at the judgment, seat of Christ. Now look there in 1 Corinthians chapter 3. Just turn to your right, a couple pages, 1 Corinthians and chapter 3. 1 Corinthians chapter 3, look there in verse 8, in verse 8. Now he that planet and he that waterth are one and every man shall receive his own reward according to his own labor. One of the things that you need to understand down here is that life isn’t fair.

Have you found that out yet? Life is not fair, right? But God said that he’s going to reward every man according to his own work. So that means that whatever you do for the Lord, it will be fair, it will be right. Because he is the righteous judge. He knows every sacrifice you made, everything that you’ve given up, everything that you’ve done. And if you did it for him, you can’t lose. But if you did it for people, oh yeah, they may not appreciate anything you do.

You can do all the right you know to do and nobody appreciated it. You’re done. You can go out in the garden and eat worms. No. Because if you did it for God, He ain’t lost anything. So you don’t put your hopes in people, they’re not gonna be your judge. The Lord is. Now look what He says there in verse 12. Now if any man build upon this foundation which is Christ, gold, silver, precious stones, would, hey and stubble two different kinds.

Every man’s work shall be made manifest. For the day, the jump into the Christ, shall declare it because it shall be revealed by fire and the fire shall try every man’s work of what sort it is. Whether it’s gold, silver and precious stones or would, hey and stubble. If any man’s work abide, which he had built there upon, he shall receive what? Reward, remember this, look up here. Rewards are earned. Salvation is free. Salvation and rewards are not the same thing.

Going to heaven is free, that’s a gift. That’s what he did for us. He paid our way. So I’m going to heaven because of what Christ did for me. What I have when I get to heaven, Rewards are earned. That’s why I want to study the Bible to find everything I’m supposed to do and try to eliminate all the things I’m not supposed to do because I want, when I stand there, I want God to bless me. I want him to reward me.

I don’t know what they all might be. It doesn’t matter. God said it will be worth it all. Didn’t somebody just sing a song about that? It will be worth it all when we see Christ. Now look what he says here in verse 15. If any man’s work shall be burned, he shall suffer lost, but he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire.” Now look up here. Some people tell you this. You get saved, and if you don’t live right, well, you’re going to hell.

That’s not true. You can get saved and not live right. You can live like a dirty bird. You can live like the devil. Still be a child of God. You’ll stand at the judgments of the Christ, and God says, your works are going to be burned up. And what you could have had, you won’t get. God wanted to reward you, but He couldn’t reward you. But He Himself shall be saved, but He’s lost reward that He could have had.

So you see, it’s up to you. Nobody can make you do this. But if you decide to serve a Lord and be faithful, nobody can stop you. Isn’t that great to know? It’s all an individual thing. That’s why I try to tell people what the Word of God says. I can’t make people respond to it. I can’t make people be a soul winner. I can’t make you carry a track. I can’t make you come to Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night, Sunday night.

I can’t make anybody do anything. But if you really want that and you believe that’s the most important thing in your life, because that’s where we’re headed. And if you really believe it will be worth it, you’ll sacrifice everything down here to put God first and get your priorities straight and do what you know you need to do, why you can. But if you don’t think that’s important, devil fool with your mind. I got a lot of time. I’ll serve God when I’m old.

Oh great. When you’re 90 years old and one foot’s in the grave, one’s on the banana peel, oh I’m gonna serve the Lord. You know how much you’re gonna get done now? Serve the Lord in the days of life. Youth. Why you young? That’s when you reveal how wise you are. You’re not wise because you know you should serve God. You’re wise if you do. You’re a fool if you don’t. This is the decision every individual has to make for themselves.

Now 2 Corinthians chapter 5, look at it very quickly, 2 Corinthians. chapter 5. And notice they’re in verse 10. Second Corinthians chapter 5 and verse 10. This is a very important verse for you to see. And verse 10, for we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ. Remember, this isn’t in order to bring up all of our sins that we’ve done. Now this is a rewarding stand. They call it a beam of seat. It’s kind of like the Olympics after you’ve done running the races and you stand up there and you get your crowns.

God says we’re going to stand the judgments of the Christ and be rewarded. Now look what He says that everyone may receive the things done in His body. In other words, done in His body means during your lifetime. While you’re in this body, it means the decisions that you make today, the things that you do tomorrow, the places you go, the profanity that you use, the filth that you want, everything about you is affecting eternity like it or not.

So what I didn’t ask to be born, nobody did. That’s the way it is though. That’s the truth. Now you can let this knowledge affect your life and you can control yourself if you choose to do so or you can live like the devil. That’s a personal decision nobody can make you do anything. Now look what he says, according to that he hath done whether it be good or bad means truthful or unfruitful. You’re going to stand at the Judgement City of Christ.

True, true. Is it the Bible? It’s the Bible. It’s coming. It’s going to happen and you’re going to appear there and appear there means you’ll disappear here. Change in a moment twitting of it not gone. Meet the Lord in the air and phew, we’re going to the Judgement City of Christ. An awesome period of time. Take your Bible look in the book of 2 Corinthians and chapter 11. 2 Corinthians and chapter 11. One of the things that the Apostle Paul wanted to do with the people that he’d won the Christ, the various churches scattered throughout Macedonia and all the places in the Galatians, and Listeron, Derby and so on, he says in 2nd, 2nd, chapter 11, look in verse 1, he said, would the God ye could bear with me a little in my folly?

And indeed bear with me, he says, this is how I feel. For I am jealous over you with Godly jealousy. For I have espoused you to one husband that I may present you as a chase virgin to Christ.” In other words, in the Old Testament time, when a man says he wanted to marry a woman and a woman says she wants to marry a man, well, they would have about a year. And during that year, she had to prove her faithfulness and he had to prove his faithfulness.

They were considered looked upon as though they were husband and wife, but he can’t touch her until she’s actually his. This is the same story that happened with Joseph and with Mary. In the word, because he was going to put her away. Well, he hadn’t even married her yet, but he was a spouse to her. In other words, it would look upon as that’s his wife. Because he found out she was going to have a child. And according to the law, he has to put her away.

He has to squeal on her, but he didn’t want to do nothing. He just got to just walk away from this thing. And the angel had to come in and say, don’t be afraid to take on the Mary thy wife. So they had about a year-long engagement period. And during that time she was to prove her faithfulness to her husband, to be. With Christ, the body was born on this day, the birth of the church. The body has been building for 2,000 years.

You and I are part of the body. We are going to be the bride of Christ. So he says, I want to espouse you in a sense that whenever you meet the Savior, you’re a virgin. a virgin. And not, I don’t think too many people even today know what a virgin is anymore. Never been touched. And to be presented to the Lord so that God wants to take all of us as believers and we’re going to stand there and we’re going to be rewarded and our attire that all of us as individuals are going to wear.

To the wedding, the Bible says they are dressed in the righteous acts of the saints. It means that the righteous acts that we do in the body we are rewarded for and we are going to wear. Our honor, our glory, our crowns, our rewards, whatever it is, God says that we are going to be dressed in the righteous acts of the saints. And the bride had made herself ready for the marriage. That’s where we’re going. Look there in verse 2.

For I have espoused you to one husband that I may present you as a chase virgin to Christ. So we are the bride of Christ. Now take your Bible and turn to the book of Revelation chapter 19. Revelation and chapter 19. Now look in verse 7, in verse 7. This is on page 1348 in the old scopher reference Bible. Let us be glad and rejoice because the day is arrived. Give honor to him for the marriage of the Lamb is come, the Lamb is Christ and Christ is going to get married.

Look up here very quickly. God the Father Jehovah took a woman Israel as his wife. So when you read the Old Testament, God, Jehovah, and Israel were like married. Well, they had a child. They had a child. Their child was the son Jesus Christ who came into the world. He was rejected by the mom. The mom rejected her child. But what the Father has been doing is finding a bride for his son. And so the son is one day going to get married.

But the Father finds the bride for the son. And that’s why all that the Father gives me shall come to me. So that’s in the book of John chapter 6. It means that all those who go to the Father, through the Son, the Father gives all of those to the Son as the bride. And we become the bride of Christ. He went to the cross and died there in order to bring many sons into glory so that we could have eternal life and be with God.

See, God, being God, is a God of love. God wanted somebody to love him back. So God allowed everything that happened, the way that it has, with all the sin, the devil, the hell, everything that’s ever taken place that you and I might learn to love God. And God says, you have no idea what I’m gonna do for all those that love me. If you would only learn, love the Lord with all thine heart because God says, see God doesn’t wanna be alone.

He’s God, he can create all the angels, he can create the earth, he can create all the world. But one thing he wants more than anything else is he wants you and I to love him. And some of that desire he placed within you, that’s why you like to be loved. That’s why you even wanted to get married one day because you love somebody and love can make you do the strangest thing, the craziest thing. Have you ever heard love is blind?

I get married, it’s what you wake up. Look at your eyesight back. But notice what he says here and down in verse eight. And to her was granted that she should be a raid in fine linen, clean and white, for the fine linen is the righteousness of saints. In other words, this is not the righteousness of God that He gave to us to get to heaven on. The righteousness of the saints is the works that you have done for the Lord while in the body.

Now the Bible says in verse nine, and He said unto me, right, blessed are they, which are called unto the marriage supper of the Lamb. Now the marriage supper of the Lamb, we are going to be the bride, but I believe it’s the Old Testament saints are going to be the guest at the wedding. And you’ll read that in the book of Matthew in chapter 25 when it talks about the 10 virgins, Five wise and five foolish, some days go back and read that.

Some ready and some not ready, some get to go to their wedding. Now look up here. This is the great white throne judgment. You and I are not gonna stand there and be judged. This is a judgment for all the people who have never trusted Christ as their savior. You see, you and I don’t stand there because you see, Christ took our judgment for our sins. This is not a judgment in the sense it is a rewarding stand where God rewards you for what you’ve done.

We then will go to the marriage feast of the Lamb. And then as the bride, we come back to this earth and power and great glory, and we will rule and reign with Christ over the earth for 1,000 years. Then there will be the great white throne judgment for all the people that have rejected Jesus Christ as their Savior. And the Bible says they will be cast into the lake of fire. This is the final helm. Someday we’ll get into all of that.

You’ll notice, the word pre-ational position. It means look up here. Pre-tribulation means pre-before. It means that we believe that Jesus Christ is comingrecy back before the tribulation. If we say mid-trib position, that means that we believe Christ is coming back in the middle of the tribulation. If we say post-trib means we believe that Christ is coming back at the end of the tribulation. But for you and I, He is coming back pre-trib. for his saints. He’s coming for us before the tribulation so that we don’t go into the tribulation period upon the earth.

If you believe it’s mid-trib then you believe you’re going into parts of it. And if you believe that he comes back for us here then you believe you go through the whole seven years of it. You see the difference? But the Lord says he’s coming back to deliver us from the wrath to come. You and I will not be here during the tribulation period upon the earth talking about this great worldwide tribulation the worst time that the world has ever known.

Now when we talk about pre-millennial and post-millennial and all-millennial we say what do the living mean? All right, look at that. When you say pre-millennial means you believe Christ is coming back to the earth to rule and reign with His saints. Here He comes for us, here He comes with us and pre-millennial means He is coming back before the millennium, thousand years. Premillennial is when Christ comes back before the millennium, which is what I believe, and I believe the Bible teaches that.

That is the correct position. Postmillennial is the wrong position. Then there’s those who believe a millennial. A is the A before a word in the Greek means no. So there’s no millennial, no millennium. This hand represents you and me and the wallet represents sin. We all have sin upon us. God loves us, hates our sin. And for you and me to pay for this sin is eternal separation from God in hell. Now God loves us and wants us to go to heaven and to go to heaven we have to be as righteous as God.

We have to be perfect and none of us are perfect. And so the Bible says you cannot save yourself. You cannot earn eternal life. We need a Savior. This hand represents Jesus Christ, God in the flesh. He came into the world because he loves us, he hates our sin, because our sin separates us from the Lord. So Christ paid for our sins on the cross, came back from the dead. Said if we would believe that what he did was for us, he would save us, save us from hell, give us eternal life, and we’d go to heaven on what he did for us.

That’s the gospel, that’s the good news. You can have eternal life, you can go to heaven, it’s free. You don’t have to promise God anything, you don’t have to stop anything, you don’t have to join anything, because going to heaven is what he did for us. He made it free. So all you have to do is trust Christ as your Savior. Once you trust Christ as your Savior, your God’s child. Now as a child of God, you may be obedient, you may be disobedient, but you’re still his child.

I found out long time ago, life is a lot more fun, a lot easier, serve in the Lord, do in right. And I want you to do the same thing. Let’s pray, shall we? 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 six o’clock on Sunday evening. Live broadcast of our services may be seen going to our church website, calvaryoftampa.org.

Thanks for joining us on Bibleline and now a closing thought from Pastor Arden. Friend, 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.