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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 Bible-lined 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.

But anyway, let’s go back to the book of Galatians. Galatians and chapter 3. Galatians chapter 3. He says they’re in verse 1, oh foolish Galatians. Now remember, he’s talking to believers. Talking to believers. Talking to people that he had led to Christ when he first came there. And he’d lead people to Christ and he’d move on and make a circle and come back again. And so he says, oh foolish Galatians, who hath bewitched you? It’s like somebody has got you in a trance or something.

How come you can’t see? What was the great error that they believed? Well somebody had told them they had to keep the law to be saved, and you had to be circumcised and so forth to stay saved. So they were putting them back under the law, your works. not to just be saved, but to stay saved, you’re going to have to live right. If you don’t live a certain way, then you lose your… you’ll have to forfeit your salvation.

So they would be convinced that they weren’t yet justified, so they were seeking to be justified. So the Apostle Paul is a little upset and writes a very stern, hard rebuke to these Christians. But they were believers. But they had to leave wrong. He says, I marvel that you’re so soon removed from hand that called into the grace of Christ into another gospel, which is not another. He says, there’s only one gospel, one truth, and if any man preached unto you, any other gospel than that which we have delivered unto you, then let him be a curse.

So he says here in verse 1, that ye should not obey the truth. Now remember, any Christian that does not obey the truth and lives the way he should live is because he believes air. Don’t brag about how much Bible you know if you don’t serve the Lord is because you believe something that’s not true. You have justified rebellion. When you don’t want to go to church, when you don’t want to give like you should. When you don’t want to witness, you don’t want to read your Bible.

It’s because you believe something that’s not true, but you’re going to justify why you can’t or you don’t. Every person that knows Christ is Savior would serve the Lord with all their heart, unless they believe something wrong. You will live your real theology. What you really believe, you’re going to live it. And if you don’t really live it, you’ll really believe it. You really believe that the most important thing in your life is to serve the Lord and that you’re going to be chasteened and it will be worth serving God.

And if you don’t serve the Lord, the be whoop is not going to be very kind and very nice and very wonderful. And you’re going to regret it and you’re going to be grief. You really believe that? Then don’t you have enough common sense to make the right decision? And if you don’t, why not? Because you believe something in the air. Oh, foolish Galatians, who have bewitched you to get a hold of your mind and trouble you as he says during the first chapter?

He says, before whose eyes Jesus Christ has been evidently set forth crucified among you. That means whenever you believe that Jesus Christ out on the cross paid for your sins, it’s like Christ was crucified among because you believe he did it for you. You see, I trust that Christ is my Savior and Athens, Georgia. Now he was crucified over there in Israel, Jerusalem. But it’s where I was. It’s when I trusted Christ as my Savior. So I graduated from Florida Bible College, went to Colorado and a lot of people trust the Lord.

So I could say Christ was crucified among you. You saw it, you heard it, you understood, you believed on them. Now what in the world has so changed you? What got a hold of your mind and messed you with? So he asked a simple little question. He said, are you so foolish? Did you receive the Holy Spirit by the works of the law or by the hearing of faith? Look what he says there in verse two. This only what I learn of you, receive you the Spirit by the works of the law or by the hearing of faith.

You did not get saved, you did not receive the Holy Spirit by your works. But because of you heard and you understood the God and you believed, you trusted Jesus Christ, you were not saved by your works, you didn’t receive the Holy Spirit by your work. Are you now made perfect by your flesh? It wasn’t good enough to get you saved. It’s not good enough to keep you saved. You were saved by grace and you kept saved by grace.

So he says, you’re in the last part of verse three. He says, are you now made perfect by the flesh? And sometimes you can take that word perfect and it means the word mature. Are you now made mature in the Lord by the works of the law? No. He says, as you have received Christ Jesus the Lord. So what? Walk ye in Him. Where’s that found? Where’s that found? Colossians chapter 2 verse 6, 7, 8, 9, 10. No, it’s Colossians chapter 2 verse 6.

As you have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walking in. How did you receive Him by faith? How are you supposed to walk? By faith, taking God at his word, not that you’re trying to save yourself or keep yourself saved. I don’t go to church to go to heaven. I go, I’m going to heaven. If I’m going to live in heaven with God’s people, I might as well get to know a few of you while I’m down here. Maybe that’s why people don’t.

Never mind, I can look in verse four. He says, have you suffered so many things in vain if it be yet in vain. Whereas you trusted Christ as your Savior, you dedicated your life to the Lord. You decided to serve the Lord and you suffered a lot of consequences because you committed yourself to living by faith and doing what God wants you to do with your life. But you don’t do that and strive and so forth in order to keep the law.

Look there in the book of Hebrews in chapter 10. in. Hebrews chapter 10, look at this very quickly. A lot of similarities between these scriptures. And you’ll notice what he says here. Look there in verse 33. Excuse me, let’s just start in verse 32. He’s doing the same thing to him here. He says in verse 32, but call to remembrance. He’s getting him to how to go back in time and remember whenever first came to you, he said, but called to remember the former days in which after you were illuminated, he endured a great fight of afflictions.

Partly, while you were made a gazing stock both by reproaches and afflictions, and partly while you became companions of them that were so used. In other words, because you were associated with Paul and they persecuted Paul, they persecute you. Have you ever suffered consequences by the very fact that you come to Calvary Community Church or you were a friend with Hank Lindstrom? If you do it long enough and you start acting like Hank Lindstrom does, you just allow it to get some of the same persecution because what others have gone through.

So it’s because of who you hang around. And I would like to think that if anything happens to me, it happens to you too. I asked a little Bruce, Bruce says he’s going to be in my bodyguard and he says, I’ll take that bullet. I said, you’re not big enough. I need somebody big, you know, like Peter Amato. I mean, I can hide completely behind him. But anyway. Okay. Look at what he says in verse 34. He says in verse 34, “‘Ye had compassion of me in my bonds, “‘took joyfully the spoiling of your goods, “‘knowing in yourselves that ye have in heaven “‘a better and enduring substance, “‘cast not a way therefore your confidence, “‘which hath great recompense of reward.'”

So he wants them to serve the Lord and remember how you started I’ve seen a lot of Christians men they trust Christ as Savior and they start serving the Lord and men They’re just like a rocker and Then they’re just like a fallen star They come down just as fast as they went up God wants us to stay faithful Keep serving the Lord, you know 10 years and 20 years and 30 years and 40 years and 50 years as long as God gives you.

Just stay faithful. Keep serving the Lord. You don’t have to mess up your life. You don’t have to quit. Just keep serving the Lord. God ain’t changed. What He promised us that hadn’t changed. There are a lot of things that just, that hasn’t changed. What times are changed? Well, some things don’t change. I got a sermon on preaching on that too. Things that change and things that don’t change. But look what He says. He says in verse 30, for ye have need of patience that get this after you have done the will of God.

You might receive the promise. In other words, you do the work and then you get your paycheck. Payday for the Christian hasn’t come yet. But we do what we do because we believe it will be worth it all. Well, it doesn’t have to be worth it all now. I’m supposed to be faithful now and pay days coming. So payday someday. I preached a sermon years ago called payday someday. But that day hasn’t shown up yet. But there’s a day coming when God’s going to pay you for what you’ve done.

It will be worth it. Now if you can believe it 10 years ago or 20 years ago, keep believing it. Truth is truth. And so he says here in verse 37, for yet a little while and he that shall come will come. will come. You ought to underline those two words. Will come and will not tear you. Now in verse 38, now the just, those who trust the Christ of Savior shall live, I’m going to live by the law.

Oh, oh, by faith. I’m sorry. I’m misquoted. Now the just shall live by faith. And then he gives you the whole 11th chapter to know what he’s talking about when he talks about living by faith. It means doing what God says to do, obeying the Lord, living by faith as a Christian is obeying what God says to do. But we don’t do it to get to heaven. Now it becomes legalism when you have to do that in order to get there.

No. Look what else he says in verse 38. Now the just shall live by faith and if any man draw back.” Now a lot of people like to talk about well backslide, backslide, which is a term usually means for the nation of Israel and you can’t backslide unless you’ve gone forward for enough to backslide. A lot of people just never backslide because they never got anywhere anyway. When you trust Christ as Savior and you draw back from serving the Lord.

Look what he says. My soul shall have no pleasure in him because he lost his salvation, now he’s going to hell. No, look what he’s, look at the last part. Verse 13, but we are not of them who draw back unto perdition or destruction, but of them that believe to the saving of the soul. So even if you don’t serve the Lord and you draw back from your responsibility And you cast away your confidence that you have in the Lord, and you don’t sacrifice like you used to, and you don’t endure the affliction like you used to.

So there’s a lot of Christians not living like they ought to, but still saved because we believe to the saving of the soul. And so many God may have to take home before that time. Now we’ll go back to the good Galatians in chapter 3. But we say, is there in verse 5, if therefore, he therefore that minister to you the spirit and work with miracles among you, which he did, do he it by the work of the law or by the hearing of faith?

He said, when I came to you and I did all these things, he says, that I try to get you to keep the law to be saved or just to hear the message of what Christ did for you and you trusted him as your savior. That’s why Paul made the statement in the book of Corinthians in chapter 2. He says this only what I’ve learned, he says, I talked about Christ and Him crucified. He was more about concerned about that.

Do you understand and you trust in him and him alone as your Savior? So then he explains what he means. He said, now let’s go back. They are trying to put you under the law. He said, let me tell you something. Abraham lived 430 years before the law. How was Abraham saved? Let’s see there in chapter three. Look in verse 17. He says, for this I say that the covenant that was confirmed before of God in Christ, the law which was 430 years after, cannot what?

Disanal that it should make the promise of none effect. For if the inheritance be of the law, it is no more of promise. God gave it to Abraham by promise. Abraham didn’t have to keep the law because the law wasn’t even given when Abraham had that statement said he believed God and it was counted in the him for righteousness. So how was Abraham saved? By faith. He believed the promise of God. What was the promise? Look there in verse 8 of chapter 3 and the scripture foreseen that that God would justify the heathen through faith.

That’s a promise. Justify the lost man by faith. That’s the best definition I believe there is of the gospel. The other is the explanation and without the death, burial and resurrection of Christ, there can’t be any good news. And the good news is that a lost man can be justified by faith. Not by the law, but by faith, just by believing. Without doing one, I owe it of any works whatsoever. Now and until the day he dies, no works.

Why would I have to trust the Lord without works, but I have to do it afterwards in order to be saved? No, it’s grace all the way. That’s the only way you can know that you’re going to heaven because it’s free if it was by works. You would never know if you’d burned it. Or done enough, you have to wait till you die. So that means that you’re not yet saved. Because if you’re seeking to be justified, it means you’re not justified now.

So here in Galatians, in chapter 3, look at verse 6, even as Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him for righteousness. means God takes His righteousness and puts it to your account. Now if God gave you His righteousness that would make you as righteous as God and that’s why you can go to heaven on His righteousness, not yours but on His. And get what He says here. And verse 7, no ye therefore that they which are of faith the same are the children of Abraham.

In other were children by faith just like everybody else went. Abraham was a child by faith, Isaac was a child by faith, Jacob was a child by faith, David was a child of God by faith. I am a child of God by faith. So we’re all the children just like of Abraham because we all believe it’s by faith. And so these Judaizers were trying to put them under the law and say, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.

We came from Father Abraham and Abraham didn’t keep the law because there was no law for 430 years. Now, just look at what David said and David lived under the law. This is about 500 years after Moses and about a thousand years before Christ. But look there in Romans in chapter 4. Romans in chapter 4. You’ll see this verse, it’s a very, very good. Look at verse 5. Verse 5 says, but to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifyeth the ungodly.

So if I believe on him who justifies the ungodly, which I’m the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness, just like Abraham was. And look what he says in verseront. Now he refers to David who lived under the law. Even as David also described the blessings of the man on doom. Now notice that word blessings toolitan blessed by God as you’ll find in the book of Galatians in chapter three is referenced to salvation and the whole world shall be blessed.

All the families of the earth shall be blessed. It’s a reference to salvation by faith and faith alone.” Look what he said. Even as David also described the blessedness of the man or the salvation of the man, under whom God get this imputed righteousness without what? Without work. David said that in Psalms. So that means that if I am going to have God’s righteousness imputed into my account without work, then evidently David did not believe in keeping the law to be saved.

And yet he lived under the law, but he didn’t believe in keeping the law in order to be saved or to be justified David believed and he wrote in Psalms 22 About the death Berlin resurrection of Jesus Christ Psalm 16 talks about Now will not leave my soul in hell in a reference to Jesus Christ That he will not see corruption and that the body the resurrection all that’s in the Old Testament read Isaiah. They understood the death, barrel, and a resurrection of the Messiah.

Now, they just couldn’t figure out exactly when it was going to happen, just like, do we believe there’s a rapture coming? And we still are trying to figure out the exact day, week, month. And many people believe it or not, can you believe it could be this fall? Can you believe that? Well, that means if it’s going to What happens September or October? Does that mean he can’t come today? Well, we don’t have to worry about it. We got a few more months to play around, do whatever we want to do.

But Bo, when he gets close to September, I’m really going to dedicate my life. And he says, he come at when you look not for him? But we’re not going to look for him now because he knows he’s coming in October or September. See, I’m going to talk with me, look at that. In Romans in chapter four, look what he says. In verse seven, saying, this is what he said, blessed are they who, iniquities are forgiven. See, when you have your sins forgiven, that’s the eternal salvation.

To have your sins forgiven. That’s why he says, going to all of them, priestly, forgiveness of sins. If Christ forgave me of all my sins, that’s eternal salvation. Eternal security is taught in the Old Testament. That’s not sermon, but look at that. He says, and who sins are covered in verse eight. Look at this, verse eight. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord, and you ought to underline these two words, will not, will not impuse him. In other words, what if I commit a sin after I’m saved?

He can’t commit that sin or impute that sin to me. It’s imputed to Christ. Christ paid for it. Now there’s a whole sermon in here somewhere. Well, if that’s true, I can just go out here and live like I please and still go to heaven when I die. Well, of course you can. You mean somebody would say, no, well, you don’t deserve that. That’s why it’s by grace. You don’t deserve it. Go to man one day, I said, let’s just pretend I trust Christ.

That’s my Savior. And let’s just pretend He paid for all of us. And let’s just pretend He gives me eternal life. And let’s just pretend I live like the devil. And let’s pretend that I die. And let’s pretend that I went to heaven. that would be grace, wouldn’t it? He knew I was the one, he didn’t like that. But do I advocate people living their lives in sin? No. I want people to know the truth, but that once you trust Christ to save it, you’re saved forever.

None of us have ever deserved it. But now that we have trusted Christ to save it, the book of Galatians, sure, it’s the foundational a very walk of our clear gospel on justification by faith, but it also teaches the Christian how to live. We are to live by faith. And so it’s good. Go back there to the book of Galatians, back to Galatians. And notice what he says here. In verse 8, and we’ll finish with verse 8 here, 9.

And the scripture foreseen, that means in advance, and the scripture refers to the Old Testament that God would justify the hidden through faith preached before the gospel under Abraham. Now I believe that God preached the gospel of Abraham. I believe that Jesus Christ preached the gospel to Paul. It is an amazing that God preached to one, Paul preached to the other one and both of them had the same message. Well of course. That makes sense? It should be the same message and it is the same message.

So you can refer to Abraham and what happened to Paul and lo and behold, same message. And he says, forcing that God would justify the heathen through faith preached before the gospel under Abraham, saying, in thee shall all nations be blessed. Now, you and I would read a verse like, and these shall all families of the earth be blessed, as it says in the book of Genesis in chapter 12.

You and I might not see, that’s what that verse means. That the loss will be justified by faith, but that’s what it means. And to be blessed of God is to be saved. Let me just show you real quick. Look there in verse 14. Verse 14. that the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through what? Faith. Remember, he says, oh, holy scolations, who hath bewitched you?

Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law or by faith? Well, here, you know, you’re by faith and faith alone that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith. Now, I want you to see that this blessing, the blessing of Abrahampluginbleacher might come on the gentile. This is talking about the justification by faith, a reference to salvation, and talk about that believing on him in the seed. See that on there, there in verse 16, not to Abraham and his seed were the promises made.

He said, if not in the seeds as of many, but as of one, and to thy seed, which is Christ. So he knew that it was a reference to Jesus, And Jesus Christ Abraham knew that, that Christ would die on the cross to pay for the sins of the world so that people could be justified or saved by faith alone. We don’t have a different gospel in the New Testament than what they had in the Old Testament. It’s the same gospel.

They had to trust Christ, we have to trust Christ. They look forward to the cross, we look back to the cross, but there’s only one gospel by which a man is saved. Oh, that’s good. Good to do relucta. Let’s pray, shout it.ast. Our Father, we do thank you so much for the clarity that’s in your word. Have as we read and steady it, to truly understand this simplicity by which you have given us this wonderful man.

WRITE so much for this church and these people. National Blessings of the Gives of the Good Service and the Father of Christ name. 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 play 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 home page. 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 by going to our church website, calvaryoftampa.org.

Thanks for joining us on Bible Live. And now a closing thought from Pastor Arnold. Friend, one day it will happen, the trumpet will sound, 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 and just keep looking up.