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.

Can I practice homosexual go to heaven? On the loaded questions? If a man is really saved, will he really do those things if he’s a real Christian? Because you and I know that good people are supposed to go to heaven and we know that bad people are supposed to go to hell. So if you are bad and you live bad, then you ought to go where the bad people are supposed to go. Only the good people are supposed to go to heaven.

We’ve heard that all our lives. You have to be good. You’ve got to do right. You’ve got to live right. And if you live wrong, you don’t get to go. Everybody’s heard that. But now I want you to look Shinzo your Bible in the book of Romans in chapter 11 and verse Sounders. And if by grace, then is it no more ofribune. Otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then is it no more grace, otherwise work is no more work.

In other words, it’s either by grace or by works. It says if it’s by grace, then it can’t be by works. But if it is by works, then it cannot be by grace. Which is the stronger motivation for a person to do right? a man tell people that there is a heaven and that there is a hell and that if you live wrong and if you do a lot of these sins that are wicked, you are going to hell.

So if you want to go to heaven, you have to stop doing those bad things. Wouldn’t that be a great restraint upon individuals? not to do those things if they knew they were going to hell if they do these bad things so therefore because we don’t want people to do these bad things because if they do they’re going to hell that if they knew this well then they’ll live right because they don’t want to go to hell but a problem is this most of the world already believes that.

Most of the world believes that if you’re bad you’re going to hell. So if they know that why aren’t they being good? True? If it’s true why aren’t they living right? If you have to be good to go to heaven then why isn’t everybody living good? They get there. Either they don’t really believe it or they think it’s impossible for them. Or if you are going to go to hell Why not carry it to its extreme? If I’m going to hell anyway, I might as well live like I please.

True? If I’m going to go to hell. Why not just go ahead and commit as many sins as I possibly can do whatever I want because I’m going there anyway? Because I’ve had people tell me this. If you’re a Christian and you have eternal life and you’re going to heaven, If you tell people that you can go to heaven and still do things wrong, they’re gonna live like they please anyway So it seems like whether you’re going to heaven or hell people are gonna live like they want If I know I’m going to hell, I’m gonna live like I please If I know I’m going to heaven, I’m gonna live like I please So I don’t look like either one is a restraint upon a person’s life if it was Why are people doing what they’re doing?

The world is in a mess People are living in adultery, murders everywhere, living in sin, trash, fill all over the world Well telling people they’re going to go to hell Doesn’t seem to be working You seem like people are so consumed with themselves, they really don’t care what God said. They don’t care for the heaven, they don’t care for the hell, they go do what they want to do anyway. Why should we waste our time trying to change people when they don’t want to be changed?

It is not my job to make people straighten up and fly right. I can’t make people live godly. I can’t make people stop their sin in it. God’s Word, don’t work, nothing will work. So I’m just going to tell it the way I truly understand it. Can a man, and I hope that people that are listening by way of radio will not turn off the dial, but listen to my answer, can a Christian be a practicing homosexual and still go to heaven when he dies?

Yes. Can a person be a practicing murder, a serial killer and still go to heaven? Yes. Can a person, a Christian be a practicing adulterer and still go to heaven? Yes. Don’t he have to keep getting forgiveness for those things? No. And still go to heaven. Yes. I don’t care how bad you can materialize in your mind about how wicked an individual can be. Can a Christian do all those things and still go to heaven? Yes, he can. Most preachers will not tell you that.

But the fact of the matter is yes he can. And I’ll also throw this in. I don’t care how righteous a man may live. The most righteous man that you know. They can read his Bible and go to church and pray do all the good. Give to charity all the good things he can possibly do. And when that man dies if he hasn’t done that one thing, trust Christ to say, he still goes to hell. true. Reg Because of how righteous he may be he goes to hell If he hasn’t trusted Lord But if the most wicked man because of how he lives if he has trusted Christ to save it he goes to heaven since it’s not fair I didn’t say anything about being fair.

I’m not God. I’m not the judge The Bible says that God so loved the world every person in the world every wicked individual in the world understand I I am not advocating anybody living sin just because I don’t tell a person that if you do these bad things you’re gonna go to hell. Doesn’t mean that I want bad people to do these bad things. No, I don’t want them to do that. But that’s not the reason they go to hell.

That would be it lying to them. So no, I don’t tell people you’re gonna go to hell because you do all these bad things. That’s not true. Neither am I going to tell people if you do these good things you’ll go to have me because that’s not true. You see a person’s destination is not dependent upon how a man lives. Always keep that in mind. How a man lives has nothing to do with his destination. Yet I heard that all my life.

If you live good you go to heaven, if you live bad you go to hell and yet it’s not true. God says if it’s by grace it cannot be by works. But if it is by work, it cannot be by grace. It’s one way or the other. Grace means unmerited. It means you don’t merit it. You don’t deserve it. You mean you can go and don’t deserve. That’s what grace is. Works means that you have to do good works to get it.

One way or the other. Salvation either has to be a true gift or it’s not a gift, either to gift or it’s not, or it has to be because you earned it. Now which way is it? Take your Bible and turn there to the book of Ephesians and chapter 2. The Bible says here in the book of Ephesians and chapter 2 and verse 8, make sure you are clear on this one point. I’m Nancy to say by grace or by works, but it can’t be saved by both, but what does he say?

He says they’re in verse 8, 4 by what? Grace, are you saved? You’re saved by grace. Grace means you did not earn it. You did not deserve it. Not one person sitting here in this room that is saved, was saved because you deserved it. No person in this room or listening by radio or anywhere in the world has ever been saved because they’ve been good. No man has ever been saved because they deserved it. They’re not saved because they joined the church.

They did any good deed. God never saved anybody because of that. Nobody ever will be saved because of that. Salvation is the gift of God. say it by grace. What is grace? On the merited favor, getting something from God you don’t deserve. Now, out of all the people in all the world, the Bible says all the world is guilty before God. All have sinned and come short of God’s perfection. In God’s eyes He says, there is no difference between Jew and Gentile.

They have all sinned. All have sinned and come short of the glory of God, everybody. And the wages of sin is death. So death passed upon all men for they all have sinned. Here in the book of Ephesians chapter 2 verse 8, 4, by grace are you saved through faith because of what you believe. And that not of your self, not of yourself, it is the gift of God. It’s not of yourself, it is a gift. It’s not because you did any good works.

Then he says in verse 9, these three were very important, not of works. Why? Because it’s not of yourself. It’s not by what you and I do that saves us. You are not saved because you lived a certain way. Titus chapter three, look at this very quickly, page 1284. Here in Titus in chapter three, look there in verse five. The Bible says this, not by works of righteousness which we have done, But according to his mercy, he saved us, saved his past tense.

And because you have been saved, it was not because of some past works that you did. But what he said, not by works of righteousness, which we have done. You were not saved because of what you have done. Salvation is a gift, totally free. When Christ died on the cross, He paid the debt for how many of our sins. He died on the cross and paid for my sins from the time that I was born to the time that I die.

All of my sins are all paid. Man is saved by what? Grace. If I still got to heaven, that will still be what? Grace, because I didn’t deserve it. If a man committed serial murders, if he is saved, he’s still a child of God. He still goes to heaven when he dies. Am I advocating that? No, I am not because sin is wickedness and God says for his children to depart from iniquity. Be separate to live godly. Be ye holy for I am holy.

All those things, but the conflict is never to be held. For example, if you were to jump off the Empire State Building and on the way down you realize the era of your ways. And you at that moment trusted Jesus Christ as your Savior. In mid-air will God forgive you of your sins and save you? Yes he will. Will trusting Christ as your Savior do away with you hitting the ground bow? No. You still are going to suffer the consequences but it will not be hell.

There are still consequences to sin in our life that we must account for and will have to pay for. The law of so and in reaping is still in effect. An alcoholic who ruins his kidneys is still going to have to suffer the consequences. The man who cuts off his arm and says, Lord I shouldn’t have done that, still has to live with his arm chopped off. off. Just because God forgives you of all of your sin doesn’t mean that your next-door neighbor will forgive you for running off with his wife.

He may want to put a bullet right between your eyes and I hope he does. When you steal something, God will forgive you, but I hope that the government don’t and put you behind bars for the rest of your life. You see, there’s still other results of sin, but the penalty of health will never be placed against you. No a Christian cannot ever go to hell in the future because when you trusted Christ as your Savior, you received the gift of eternal life and you have eternal security.

You are secure for eternity. Then if you’re not eternally secure, you are not secure. It’s either by grace or by works. Well, what motivates people? What is that restraint upon an individual that make them live right? Tell him a man he’s going to go to hell if he lives bad, doesn’t make him live good, does it? No. And don’t blame the gospel and the truth of the gospel upon why some Christians don’t live right just because they’re never going to have to go to hell to pay for their sins.

Now if something else is missing, something else that should challenge and motivate us. You see, as a child of God, when you are born into God’s family, you become his child that moment, born into his family, and you’re going to heaven whenever you die. And that can never be changed, never be taken away from you. Now, I want you to take your Bible and turn over there to the book of Romans. The book of Romans and chapter 4. Once you look there in verse 5, says in verse 5 of chapter 4, but to him, that work it not, but believe it, the only way to do it is to be able to do it.

on him that justifyeth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness. You’re saved because you took God at his word and you believed that by trusting him and him alone as you’re only hope to get to heaven, God said he will save you based upon that one deed alone, nothing else. And God says that by trusting Christ that it not considered a word because it says to to Him that work it, not but believe it. So you can believe and not work.

That is contrary to our human nature. That does not seem right, it doesn’t seem fair. Doesn’t seem like that’s the way it all will be. But you and I did not design salvation. God did. This is the way God says it is. And every preacher in every church throughout the world that’s telling people they have to live a certain way to get to heaven. They’re not of God. They are false teachers. You’re either saved by grace or not saved at all.

You are saved forever or not saved at all. Am I advocating people to live in sin? Anybody that darkened these doors and listens to me long enough knows that I do not advocate people, God’s children, to live in sin. Ain’t that true? I’ll do anything I can to challenge and motivate people to live right, but not to get to heaven. And I’m not going to lie to people and say, you’re going to go to hell if you don’t straight up and fly right because it’s not true.

Man goes to hell because of unbelief. He that believer on him is not condemned. But he that believer not is condemned already because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. He that believer on the Son hath everlasting life. that he that believeeth not the wrath of God abided upon him. He didn’t believe it, he didn’t believe it. He that believeeth on me hath, present tense, right now everlasting life. If it’s everlasting life, how long would it last, last forever?

And that means all my sins are paid. I can’t go to hell in the future. Well, I’ve had people say, well, if you tell people that, they’re just gonna go out here and live like the devil. I’ve believed this for 35 years and I haven’t done it. That’s not the reason why people do it. As a child of God, the Bible says this, and I want you to see it, look there in Romans in chapter six and verse one.

If what I’m saying is true, and a man can’t lose his salvation, and yet he commits a lot of sins, you name it, and the Christian can commit it. Yes, even practice it. Live in it. He’s still going to go to heaven. Yes, He will. If works could not save you, bad works can’t take it away. In Romans and chapters, say, what shall we say then? Shall we, what, continue in sin that grace may abound? Look up here, just a moment.

If I commit 10 sins, God’s wonderful grace can cover my sins. Grace, that is, what’s the name of that song? Grace that is greater than our sins. Grace that’s greater than our sins. And it’s true. If I commit 50 sins, God has enough grace to cover my sins. If I commit a thousand sins, God’s grace is sufficient to cover a thousand sins.

I don’t care how many, because God’s grace is enough. The pain and cover it all. To wipe it away is what never happened. grace that is greater than our sins. Because that’s true. The last part of that verse says, shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Should I commit more sin so that I can get more grace? The answer, no. God forbid. Well, then why shouldn’t I live in sin? Because, see, there’s other penalties beside hell. Just because I’m not going to hell, there’s no reason that I live in sin because the Bible says there are consequences to me as a Christian.

Well what sin will do to me as a Christian? Take your Bible now and look there in the book of 2nd Corinthians in chapter 5. You see lie in the people, don’t work because you can tell a person don’t do all these sins. That doesn’t work. Threaten them with hell. That doesn’t work. Tell a Christian that once you’re saved, if you live in these sins and you commit somebody’s sins, you’re still going to go to hell. You got to get saved again.

That doesn’t work. Why don’t just tell them the truth? Once you’re saved, you’re saved. You have eternal life. You’re a child of God. You’re going to heaven when you die. Not not you’re a child of God. Because you are a child of God, the Bible says love is a greater power than the desire of God. If we can just get people to fall in love with the Lord. All the rules and laws and regulations will never make a man always do the things that he’s supposed to do.

But love will reach further than that. Look at verse 14. For the love of Christ constraineth, that means to motivate us. What motivates me? Love is to motivate me. Tellin’ a person that if you don’t live right, you’re gonna lose your salvation, that’s a lie. That’s not the truth. Christian can’t lose his salvation because salvation is not in his hands. When you trusted Jesus Christ as your savior, you were trusting Christ to take you to heaven. And if he takes you to heaven, you can’t go to hell unless he loses you.

And he said, I’ll never cast you out. He said, I’ll never lose you. I will never forsake you. He’s the one who justified you. He’s the one who paid for all of your sins. He’s not gonna do it to you. If he doesn’t cast you out and he won’t lose you, well, who in the world is going to? There is nobody else. You can’t do it to yourself because you trusted him. You’re trusting the Lord to take you to heaven.

And once you do, you’re in his hands. Not all state, you’re in God’s hands. And he’ll never fail and never leave you. And so he says here for the love of Christ constrain with us because we thus judge no other we think like this. Here’s how we should think. Not everybody thinks this way. So therefore they won’t have the same results in their life because we thus judge that if one died for all, then we’re all dead that he died for all that they which live of those that believe on Christ and receive eternal life should not henceforth.

That means from now on should not. What you should do, what you have to do is two different things. I should live for God, but I don’t have to. And it will not affect my salvation, not one eye-o-one. It will not affect my destination. That can never be altered, can never be changed by me or God. But see, there’s more than just getting to heaven. There’s more than just being alive here upon this planet. I want more than just to be saved.

I want God’s blessings upon me here now. I want God’s rewards when I get to heaven. I want to be used by God. I love God. And the Bible says if a man loves God the same shall be known of him. You’re known by what you do with your life, what you really love. If I love the Lord, then I know that me living in sin hurts him. And so therefore I try to correct areas in my life that I know that are not right.

You have to control the way you think. And he says, should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them and rose again. I should live for the one who died for me. You see, my motivation is not, well, I got to do this to so I don’t go to hell. No, I can’t go to hell. That’s not even an issue. I’m a child of God and I’m going to heaven. But what if a man, a Christian does do these bad things?

A practicing homosexual. I can’t think of anything worse than that. God says there’s no difference. the difference between practicing homosexual or practicing a daughter? What about some Christians that are practicing liars? I know some Christians that are practicing gossipers. I know some that are practicing drinking. I know some Christians are just practicing bad mouth. I know Christians that share with me because they have to try to see how to get things right in their life practicing lustful thoughts. But people can’t see those.

They’re just as wicked in God’s eyes. You see what I would never do that? All those stuck, yeah, but you might be guilty of these other things and you know it and won’t live right. Won’t live right. But if you’re God’s child, how should you live? God says that we should. For sake things, we should live godly. We should live Holy. But see, we’re not doing it to get to heaven. If I don’t do it because I am a child of God, I know that my heavenly Father, no, he can’t send me to hell.

But he will chasten me. He’ll discipline me. Some he may take home early. The Bible says that some of his children are sick, weak, and dead, taken home because of their rebellion. She’s better to just tell the truth and believe that he’s not a child. truth and if this truth will motivate and help a person to straighten up their life and find. But the other way is simply a deception. It’s a lie. People trying to live right because they’re afraid that if they don’t they’ll go to help.

That’s because they don’t know the truth. That’s ignorance. That’s somebody who’s deceiving people. And I made up my mind years ago either I’m gonna preach the book, live out of the book, or get out of the pulpit. But I believe that a preacher ought to practice what he preaches. I believe that a preacher ought to try to live righteous and godly and holy. Not because he has to, but because he wants to. It’s a right thing to do. Maybe leaving that once you’re saved, always saved.

I’ve had so many people, well that’s just given people a license to sin. No, it’s given them a freedom to serve without fear. Serving the Lord because of what he’s done for you. Because you judge in your mind if he did this for me. Why shouldn’t I do this for him? He saved me from hell and he wants to blast smile like why shouldn’t I let him blast me? He wants to reward me when I get to heaven. Why shouldn’t I let him?

But when you as a child of God will not serve the Lord, you’re saying God don’t bless me. I want you to chase in me. When you won’t serve Him, you’re saying, Lord, when I get to heaven, I don’t want none of your stinking rewards. You wouldn’t say that verbally to Him probably, but the way you live tells it, either you believe the book or you don’t believe the book. The gods word is true or not true for those that are listed by way of radio that asked this question, can a Christian commit these bad things and still go to heaven?

I want you to make sure you understand me. Yes, you can. God will never cast you out, God will never lose you. You have eternal life and we should as a of God that live as righteous as God wants. But if we don’t, we don’t. We don’t have peace and power out of you. That’s freestyle. You’ve been… 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 Dye-Link 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 and we will be changed. Caught 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.