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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 a Bibleline to continue on the air. You can reach us toll-free at 1-800-576-3771. Online donations may be made by clicking on the donations link on the Bibleignindustries.org homepage.

We pray that you will enjoy our commitment to the clear gospel of Jesus Christ, and that today’s concluding message of this teaching will be a blessing to you and your family. Almost all of our problems are spiritual problems of how you handle it. And if you’re spiritually strong, you can face anything. It’s just that problems reveal how weak we are sometimes. And missionaries on the foreign field, they got to go through the same thing. But sometimes they can’t huddle around with all the people who know and understand what they’re going through because they’re on the foreign field.

And sometimes they don’t have the friendships or the fellowship with other people that are to get a deep knowledge of God’s Word and can really be a blessing to them. So that’s why little notes and things like that can always help them and to pray for them. So it’s a very important thing. The other thing is weariness. Now we know nobody here gets weary. I mean these are not things we would apply ourselves, right? But weariness. They get bogged down doing petty things, little things.

Now this used to just irritate me to no end. Because I would rather, rather, just my wallet in my hand and preach the gospel all the time. But it’s, that’s not reality. You still gotta do all these other things. Your car still breaks down. You gotta go get gas. I hate getting gas. I despise stopping and getting gas. I feel like that’s the biggest waste of my time. But then I realize if I don’t get gas in this car, this car is not gonna go and get car, don’t go.

I don’t go. So I gotta do that. I really know, I do enjoy eating, but I hate stopping and taking the time for eating, but I do it because I know I gotta eat or I die. And I don’t wanna die yet. And I tell Betty, I says, honey, it’s a shame to have to take a bath. I’m just gonna, I’m just gonna get dirty again. I hate shaving. I don’t like to shave. And I gotta shave every, I said, honey, I don’t wanna shave this.

She says, you’re the preacher, honey, but I don’t want to shave. She says, it’s your image. Oh, this image. And I got to shave. And sometimes I just, I hate to shave. And as much as possible, I don’t like coats and ties. But all these things are things that I have to do. But it doesn’t mean I have to enjoy doing them. The Bible says endure all things. It did not say enjoy all things. It says, say, rejoice always.

So I try to find a way to do that. But you and I, it’s so easy to get weary and well doing. Just keep on doing what’s right. And some things you just got to remember, the priority, keep the main thing, the main thing. The other thing that I wanted you to mention to you, and I want you to take your Bible and look at this, look in the 139th Psalm, the 139th Psalm. So this is where you talk about your x-ray vision, x-ray vision.

Now you and I may not have the x-ray vision, but I know somebody who does. He can see everything, everybody, everywhere, and body he really knows us. But look how he prayed here, David did in 139th Psalm, look in verse 23. And you want to do this, and you want the missionaries to always keep examining themselves. in verse 23, search me, oh God, and know my heart. Try me, means test me and see if I’m not real. But test me.

Know my thoughts, my thoughts about God, about the mission field, everything that I’m doing, my motives. And then he says here in verse 24, and see if there be any wicked way in me and lead me in the path of everlasting. In other words, I want to do what’s right, but I know I have a wicked heart and I’m trusting in looking to you to reveal things to me that I may not be aware of so that I can make the right decision.

And that’s something that all of us needs to do. The next thing is to be yielded to the Lord. And if you read the sixth chapter of the book of Romans, you’ll find the word yield, yield, yield, yield, all the way through it. you’re to submit. Yourself to the Lord, not fight the Lord. The word zeal down here, it talks about that in the book of John in chapter two about the zeal of the Lord have eaten me up.

And why Jesus got kind of, you would say, been out of shape because of seeing the money changers in the temple and all the things that they were doing and what’s going on. and the house of prayer into a den of thieves. Anyway, he got upset. But there’s a zeal, a zeal, a zeal to have in serving the Lord. See, it’s one thing to have the zeal, the desire to want to do something, and then you don’t have the knowledge to do it, at least to frustrate.

But if you had the knowledge to do everything. Then what’s good? So you want the knowledge and you want the zeal, the desire to want to do something with your life, to love the Lord, to serve the Lord, and to fight a good fight. Now I gave you these two poems because I wanted to read to you because the statement, this diner and the last one, that the missionary will be a flame in the wind, a flame in the So a few years ago, I wrote a couple of little poems.

One is called The Flame in the Wind to Dr. Curtis Hudson. Dr. Curtis Hudson, I had an opportunity to speak together, preach in these short conferences. And he got his doctor from Florida Bible College and the man was clear on the gospel and he took a stand and he suffered some persecution from a lot of independent fundamental Bible He was going to leave a missionary in mind to baptize too. And they really took him to task because he would come out in the sword of the Lord that salvation is very simple, very clear, just believe no turning from sin and explain repentance.

And he would take things right out of the personal evangelism handbook and put it in the sword of the Lord. It went all over the world. Well there’s a lot of preachers that preached that and they didn’t like that. he told about lordship salvation. You don’t make Christ the Lord and the master of your life in order to be saved. Well, they didn’t like that. And so Dr. Hudson took a strong stand and he was 60 years old and found out he had cancer.

I was preaching with him in March, not for God the year, but it was in San Antonio, Texas and he had just finished up speaking at night and Tuesday night. And he got a phone call that he had to leave and that his dad had just passed away with bone cancer. Three months before he had just buried his brother with bone cancer. And so he got in the car and params it was raining and it rained all the way on him.

He had to drive from San Antonio, Texas. He went through Murphy, Burke, Tennessee, picked up his wife and then headed on over there to Carolina, I think someplace. Anyway, he He got over there, did the funeral for his dad, and his wife, sweet woman, she says, Curtis, don’t you think you need to be checked? Honey, I’m fine. I’m healthy. And he was, he looked sharp. He was 60 years old, but he really looked good. And we played golf together, and he didn’t have a pain.

He didn’t look bad. He felt great. And she just wasn’t let up, and she just kept hammering him. So finally, whenFU came down here glared of the preacher, he went to see the doctor. And when he went to see the doctor, the doctor looked at him and says, do you realize you’ve only got about six months to live? WARN and he said in there, Looking at the doctor, it feels fine. He says, you’re eating up with cancer. And of course, you know what that does to the woman.

Well, it shocked the man too. So he went on… He went on this Christ diet. I mean, he started eating carrots. I mean, but he went by the same one time. He was sitting out on the back porch and he had some horses down there. That beautiful little ranch house up there in Murfreesboro. And he’s sitting out there and he has a bowl of oatmeal. This bowl of oatmeal was huge. So he’s eating all these oatmeal. Then we saw a basket full of carrots.

And I said, well, those are for the horses. He smiled and says, no, they’re for me. He was eating so many carrots, even his skin turned yellow. And he was doing everything he possibly could. To try to counteract the cancer, but he had waited too long. He bought a little time, but two years later, he passed away. And so I wrote this. I had a beautiful little plaque, had a little flame on it, you know, flame in the wind.

What went you out to see? A rejaken by the wind? Not this man from Tennessee to the spirit only would he bend? Oh, my friend, what went you out to hear? The gospel of God. make crystal clear. Salvation by grace, just the gift of God. Rewards are earned, but rebellion, the rod. The eyes of God ran to and fro to a man with a heart of fire, a burning passion to reach the lost and make this blaze the saints desire.

The flame has died down, but sparks shot up to descend, blown upon by the breath of God, to produce more flames in the wind. The sword of the Lord was the power of the pen, but Dr. Curtis Hudson was the flame in the wind. A living sacrifice on the altar was laid, hot coals from the altar and revivals were made. O Lord, this offering was burn up for thee. His reword shall be great, but his salvation was free. But anyway, Dr.

Hudson was a good friend. He loved the Lord. And you often wonder, you know, what they’re doing now that they’re in heaven. You know, like Hank, now he’s up in heaven. I’m not wondering what in the world they’re doing. Or can they really see and know what we’re doing down here? Or we lead somebody to Lord, are they still jumping and hollering and yelling and shouting all over heaven? I don’t know, but I believe it’s a joyous occasion. And, you see, whether or not in this life you are appreciated doesn’t really matter.

It’s whenever you leave this world and you get to heaven and your Father says, well done, thou good and faithful servant. When God puts his praise, honor and glory up on you for what you’ve done and all the sacrifices you made. Do you think it’s going to be worth it then? I think it’ll be worth it. On the back of this, I wrote a little poem about a guy named Ray Stanford. You ever heard of him? I had the opportunity at the time that I had wrote this poem.

It was just a couple years before this. Ray was 79 years old at the time and I had him come up to I said, I got a camera right here and I said, I’d like to just interview you. I just want to ask you some questions and you just answer them. And I said, just to put it all on tape. I said, because someday down the road, it might be worth having and to let people know because, you know, you’re not going to live forever.

He says, I’m only 79. Yes, sir. I’m only 79. Yes, sir. And I said, I want to do this. I said, would you mind if I did it? And he says, no, let’s go for it. So anyway, he came to the church and we had a little table set in there and we had the camera set. I don’t remember who run the camera. Did you do it? My wife did. And so I’m sitting there and I’m talking back and forth with Ray and by the time we got through, we had a couple hours of just going through everything.

And as I know of, well, I know it’s true. I’m the only one that has it that have all of this documented about race, Stanford, how ranch got started, about the Jim Tingen story, how the college got started, the church, and all these things, I got it all on tape. And I have spent quite a few hours getting it edited down to where I could present it. So it’s in four parts. The first part, I’m gonna show it tonight.

And I want you to hear the interview, what was said. And because you see, the reason it’s important is because whether you know it or not, it’s your heritage. Ray Stanford is the one that led Dr. Hank Lindstrom to the Lord. Dr. Stanford is the one who trained me, and everything we’ve done since then is because of what we learned from this man. But many people never met the man. They don’t even know what he’s like. And so every time I would come to Florida, I would always go buy and see Ray.

We’d take him out to eat and so forth. And we was just over there recently for Betty’s birthday. We rode over there and took him out and got something to eat. And he’s been here, I think, a couple of times. So y’all have got a chance to see him and meet him. But now this is when he was a little bit younger. His mind a little bit sharper and his response a little bit quicker. And I think you would enjoy.

Because this is what challenged and motivated guys like me and Dr. Lindstrom and thousands of other guys To me, he was the greatest soul winner I have ever met and I’ve been around for a while I’ve met dr. Hank Lindstrom But he’s no Ray Stanford Wally Marillo Lee Patton all these guys that I’ve gone to Florida Bible college with but we were no Ray Stanford. And after all these years, when I go sit with him and he starts talking and he’ll get on a rabbit trail and then he’ll chase a rabbit on that trail, but every one of his rabbit trails are great because it didn’t matter what trail he was on, it was always about the Lord and always about serving the Lord and getting something done.

But anyway, this is something that I wrote for Dr. Stanford on his 85th birthday. But this is talking about the flame in a wind. You see, it wasn’t long ago before when y’all heard about the fires out there in New Mexico and how it was coming into Texas and all the things that were burning, they tried to figure how to stop and then they had them hit in California and all. You see, a fire has to have something to burn up.

And if you don’t have something for it to burn, it dies. And so a flame in the wind. And so it’s like the Holy Spirit is the wind. And we’re the flame. And if we don’t cause something else to burn, then we die. And that’s what’s so important about Ben, a flame in the wind. I’ll tell somebody else, all I want to do is just be an arsonist. I just want to go around the world starting fires. But I’m talking about a different kind of fire, of course.

Don’t have the law come and get me yet. Dr. Clifton L. Fowler, when he was in Denver, Colorado, started the Rotmont Bible College. When I went out to Denver, Colorado, the man that I wound up working for was Archie Yetter, and he became the president of Rotmont Bible College. He served with Dr. Clifton L. Fowler. And I thought, instance is a strange world, that I can go all the way to Colorado with no plan, no design of mine at all.

And I wind up getting to be an assistant pastor to a man that’s straight and clear on the gospel. Now he didn’t have much zeal or fire, but he had truth. But you can have a car on the right road in the right lane, but no gas in the car. And some people just don’t have any motivation, but he had gotten up in years. Anyway, so there is connection there, but Clifton Elphahler, when he retired, he moved to Florida.

That’s when he met and led Dr. A. Ray Stanford to the Lord. It’s a while story. Look there, Clifton Elphahler presented the good news. To A. Ray Stanford, who could not refuse the free gift of salvation that he could not lose, then dedicated his life to Christ for God to use. The battle was fierce in the midnight sky. Planes were filled with men who were willing to die. With two engines gone from artillery fire, the will to live became their greatest desire.

See when Ray was in the Air Force, he was the pilot and he flew these bombers and he had all these men that was in there and they shot out both the engine and it was going down and he got concerned. A race Stanford knew the Lord real well. He’d go to heaven but his friends to hell. He prayed to the Lord to see them through and vowed to witness to his entire crew. When the war was over, Ray renewed his vow.

The time to serve the Lord wasn’t later but now. Ray and Sue by faith took a chance and began the ministry of Christian youth ranch. Now, will you hear all the stories about this on the videos? Very good. With youth in mind, he made the gospel clear to when souls to Christ year after year. Thousands upon thousands and perhaps a million more were reached by Ray Stanford, and he reached heaven and shore. When I first wrote this and I read it to Ray, he says, what do you mean?

I ain’t dead yet. Anyway, that was almost ten years ago. I don’t know if the guy’s going to live forever. I don’t know. He’s supposed to die somewhere along the line. I mean, because that’s my poem says he dies. You know what I’m going to do. But anyway, A. Ray Stanford went throughout the land with a Bible under his arm and a wallet in his hand. For the sake of the gospel, Ray always took the time to explain salvation from Ephesians 2, 8, and 9.

When he turned 85, he was very much alive in his quest for the souls of men. His one desire as a burning fire was to be God’s flame in the wind. No faults are listed against the heroes of faith that are mentioned in Hebrews chapter 11, though a man is God’s child and sends all the while all sins are forgiven in heaven. For the men of old, when dead and cold, is no greater than a lump of coal. But the second birth when it leaves this earth is greater than purest gold.

Now, there’s some spiritual teaching in there. I don’t know if you’ll catch it, but it is there. Ray touched my life as no other man. He taught me God’s Word in the gospel plan. His success and failures made my schooling complete, learning lessons of submission and lessons of defeat. Ray was my friend for almost 40 years. I witnessed the rise, the fall, and the tears. battle is over, his race is run, Jesus Christ will reward him for the work he has done.

And so when I read that last little thing to race says, I’m not dead yet. I’ll figure, but one of these days is going to die and then I got my poem already wrote. So when I wrote the Jim Tengen’s story and dedicated it to Ray when we had the 90th anniversary, and you’ll notice all that’s in the Jim Tingen story and this poem’s in there too. Anyway, he meant an awful lot to me. There’s certain people that will mean an awful lot to you and if you’re gonna thank them, thank them now.

I was at the hospital last night and I was talking to this one individual and I says if you really understand it you trust Christ is your Savior. I says make sure that you tell your loved ones. I says, one of the greatest joys that I have is I know that my wife has trusted Christ as Savior. She told me. I says, my kids, they know the Lord. My grandkids, they’ve trusted Christ as Savior. I said, it’s good to know.

And I made the statement to the individual. I said, let me ask you a question. I said, if you were to die, and Let’s just pretend that your wife was to ask me to do the funeral. I says, where do I tell people you went? I mean, let’s just pretend. Now here’s this funeral and your casket there. And I said, where am I supposed to tell people you went? He says, can you tell them I go, I’m going to heaven.

I says, okay. I says, you understand? He says, I understand. So anyway, I think it’s great to tell people and your loved ones that you trust in Christ as your Savior. There are some people who trust the Lord, but they never know if their husband has, or if the wife has, or if the kids have. Like it’s something, we don’t want to talk about that because it might cause an irritation. And we, you want them to die? And nobody knows.

And if they don’t, don’t you want to tell them or explain it? So I think the best thing to do is just, man, let the redeemed of the Lord say so. If you’re saved, say it. I’m saved. I have eternal life. I have trusted Christ as my Savior. And I know that I’m going to heaven whenever I die. And I think it’s the most important thing that we can never do. So anyway, look up here. I know this is something y’all have seen before, but you can see it one more time.

Let this hand represent you and me. And the wallet represent a whole of our sins. God says that He loves us. Now He hates our sin, but He loves us. And I’m so glad of that. God loves me. But He doesn’t like what I do wrong. Doesn’t like what you do wrong. And to pay for sin is eternal separation from God in a place called hell. I want people to know there is a place called hell, but God loves us and wants us to go to heaven.

And to go to heaven we have to be perfect as righteous as God. And God says nobody’s perfect. Nobody’s righteous. Because of sin, say we can’t get in. So God says you cannot earn eternal life. You can’t work your way to heaven. It’s not by your good deeds. You see, you don’t have to join a church to go to heaven. You don’t have to give money to go to heaven unless you gave it here. No, that’s not true. You don’t have to give money to go to heaven.

There’s nothing you can do by your good deeds that will get you into heaven. This hand represents Jesus Christ. He’s the Lord, God and the flesh. He came into the world because he loves us. cause he loves us. He hates our sin because it separates us from him. So Jesus Christ who had no sin didn’t have to die. But because he loved us and hates our sin, he took it, paid for it on the cross, came back from the dead and said that if you and I, if we would believe it, he did it for us.

He would put this payment to our account and we get to go to heaven on what Jesus Christ did for us. Now that’s the best news in all the world. If I offered you my wallet and you accepted you’d have an empty wallet. If I offered you my watch and you accepted, you know what time it is. If Christ walked in here right now and offered you eternal life and you accepted you would have eternal life and if it’s eternal life, it would last Forever and if it lasts forever and all you send your page, where would you go when you die to heaven?

So can you know you’re going to heaven before you die? Yeah, boy, that’s the best news in all the world. Let’s pray. Shall we? If you have never trusted Jesus Christ as your Savior friend, I can’t think of a better time than right now You don’t have a guarantee you that tomorrow will ever come. But why not right now? In the quietness of this moment, just between you and the Lord, what, just talk to the Lord. And say something like this, Lord, I know I’m a sinner.

I’ve done things wrong, but I know you love me. And you sent your son, Jesus Christ, to die, to pay for all my sins. And I believe he did it for me. And I’m gonna trust him right now to take me to heaven whenever I die. And friend, God said, if you would believe that he did it for you, Hit put that payment to your account and you get to go to heaven on what Christ did for you Would you believe that if you’re making that decision?

I’d like to have prayer for you I’m not gonna ask you to stand up. I’m not gonna embarrass you. I’m not gonna ask you to come forward or anything like that I don’t want anything from you. I just want you to receive the free gift of eternal life And I like to know it because I like to have prayer for you And I do it with heads by so that you’re not put on the spot Is there any one of all this morning say yes preacher that made sense to me I want to be certain of the one to heaven when I die and I’d like you to pray for me in closing Would you just slip you hand it very quickly and put it right back down if you’ve never done before but you’ll do it right now Just slip it up real quick.

You want it all. Yes God bless you sir God bless you Anyone else you can slip you hand it very quickly put it right back down There’s no gimmicks to this no tricks to it. I Won’t probably know your name. I I just want to know that what I said made sense to you. Anyone else before we close? Our Father, we thank You so much for all You’ve done for us. We’re thankful for the free gift of eternal life.

We ask Your blessings upon the individual indicated by an uplifted hand that they would trust You as Savior. By doing so they become Your child and You’ll never cast them out, never lose them. The Father, because of all that You’ve done for us, we’re to let the redeemed of the Lord say so. Lord, we want to be used so that others can hear the gospel. Thank you so much for this ministry and all that it stands for is rich heritage.

In Christ’s name we pray, Amen. 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. To listen to today’s message again or to obtain a free download of any of our Bibleline programs, just go to our homepage at BibleLineMinistries.org and click on the Radio Broadcast link.

If you are 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 10-30 and at 6 o’clock on Sunday evening. Live broadcast of our services may be seen by clicking on the Calvary Community Church link at BibleLineMinistries.org. Thanks for joining us on Bibleline, and now a closing thought from Pastor Arnold. friend 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 believe in that the Lord is coming soon and just keep looking up