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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 by clicking on the donations link on the BibleLineMinistries.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. You have to live a perfect life to earn your way to heaven. And you can’t live a perfect life unless you’re perfect. A good person would have to be good to bring forth good works. But God says, we’re sinners. And that there is none good. There is none righteous.

A sinner can only bring forth sins. That’s why even our righteousness in the eyes of God is sinful. In verse 8, he makes his statement. and the scripture foreseeing that God would justify the heathen. That’s us through faith. Preached before the gospel unto Abraham, saying, in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed. So God preached the gospel to Abraham before the law was ever given by Moses, so I’m outside now 430 years later. So Abraham was simply saved by faith alone.

And God says in verse 9, So then they which are of faith are blessed with faithful Abraham. Well, what was that blessing that Abraham got that I’m supposed to get to? Well, I’m glad you asked. Look what he says in verse 14. Verse 14 says that the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through who? Through Jesus Christ. That we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith, not by the law, not because you earned it, not because you worked for it.

And God says when He told Abraham about Abraham to believe God and it was kind of the hymn for righteousness and Genesis 15, say, what did He believe? Well you see in verse 16, now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made and he saith not and to seeds as of many but as of one and to thy seed singular which is Christ. So Abraham knew that what God was talking about was Jesus Christ is going to come through this line and he believed that promise.

He believed what God said about Jesus Christ. So he was saved by faith, grace alone in Christ alone. So now, what about this law that comes along? So he says in verse 17, he says, and this I say that the covenant quit that was confirmed before God in Christ, the law which was 430 years after it cannot disanall it, that it should make the promise of non-effect. God says that he preached the gospel before unto Abraham’s that He would justify the heathen through faith.

So the gospel is being justified by faith. That’s good news. Without the death, Berlin resurrection, there is no good news. I can only be justified just if I never sin because Christ paid for all of my sins. And when I believe that, I have the free gift of everlasting life. I don’t have any sins to go to hell to pay for. He died for me, paid for all of my sins. Well, if He paid for all of them, there’s none for me to pay for.

I can’t go to hell today. I can’t go tomorrow. I can’t never go to hell. I can’t go if I tried. I haven’t tried. I can’t go to hell because of what he did for me. That called grace. You don’t deserve it. I had a man tell me the other day. He says, you mean to tell me if I believe what you believe? I can just trust Christ as my Savior. Live like a devil and still go to heaven when I die.

I said, well, let’s just pretend. Let’s say you trust Christ as Savior. He saves you. He gives you eternal life and you live like the devil and you die when to heaven. I said, it’d be grace, wouldn’t it? is. Don’t most people live the way they want? Almost everybody says, he lived the way you want to live anyway. I’d rather live the way I want to live and go to heaven than the other way I want to live and go to hell.

Now, he makes this statement here about this promise. And you’ll notice that as he goes down through here, he makes this statement, and I want you to see this because it’s so important. Looking verse 26, for ye, he’s talking to these believers, ye are all the children of God. By faith in Christ Jesus. So he’s telling them that you are the children of God. What he says in verse 29 and if you be Christ, then are you Abraham’s seed and heirs according to the promise?

So, now you know who he’s talking to. He’s talking to those that know Christ as their Savior. But they have been swayed into believing something different. Let’s say for example, you trust Christ as your Savior 20 years ago. But you didn’t get into a church, you didn’t set into the Bible, and so you got to where you weren’t sure anymore. Then you started going to some heretic church, and they’d teach you all kind of weird, crazy things. And you forgot that you were, that even you have eternal life.

You don’t even know for sure. Now you question everything. You’re not sure where you’re going tonight. Did you know one of the greatest things in the Bible is this? We have this seal. The Lord knoweth them that are His. The Lord has not forgotten who you are. He hasn’t forgotten that He saved you. And if He ever saved you, regardless of what you now believe how heretical it may be, you are still saved if you ever have been saved.

If you ever were saved when you were four or five years, six years old, if you’ve ever been saved, you still are, because you can’t get unsaved. Now I’m not saying you’re saved because I don’t know whether not you believed it or you didn’t. But if you’ve ever been saved, you still are. Nobody has ever been saved twice. There is not one verse in the Bible, not one story that gives us an illustration about somebody that was saved and lost his salvation.

Now if it was possible, you would think, well, there’ll be something in the Bible. Or you have never read in the Bible where somebody got saved, got lost, and got saved again. Why can’t he get saved again? Because you can’t never get lost, can’t get lost, can’t get saved again. Because once you’re saved, you are always saved. And there’s people that call that a damnable doctrine of eternal security. And yet, when you break it all, that is the gospel.

That is what makes it such good news. That’s worth telling people about. Going to all the world and tell people to behave themselves is not a good message to take. It won’t fly because it won’t work. Nobody behaves themselves. And you don’t either. You are not perfect. I remember back in 1964, I think I said something I shouldn’t have said. Just joking. Just joking. Now look back here in chapter 4. Chapter 4 and look there in verse 5. Chapter 4 verse 5.

5 says to redeem them that were under the law. So who did Christ come to redeem? Those that were under the law. So you read the book of Romans in chapter 3 verse 19 and it says, in the whole world, whatsoever the law sayeth, that sayeth to them that are under the law, that all the world may become guilty before God. So everybody born into the world is under the law and everybody’s guilty because all have sinned. So Christ came into the world to redeem us from the curse of the law.

Now why, pray tell, once you have been set free, would you wanna go back under the law? And think now, because of what somebody says, you gotta be circumcised now and you gotta keep the law. Christ died to redeem you from the curse of the law that you might have the blessing of Abraham. What’s the blessing of Abraham? You’ll be justified by faith, not by your works. Seems so simple in my mind. But now I want you to see this.

Look there in verse six. And because in you are on the line in three little words, ye are sons. Not going to be. I am now right now. Present tense. I am a child of God. You see, if I’m trying to work on being a child of God, then I must admit, I’m not now. If I’m seeking to be justified, I’m saying I’m not now justified. If I’m trying to be saved, what I’m saying is I’m not now saved.

You see, I don’t have to seek something I already have. I’m not seeking to be saved. I’ve already been saved for 53 years. It was a done deal and you never have to do it again. Boy, that’s good. Now that’s good. But no, what else she says? In verse 9, but now. See those two of the words, but now. But now, after you have known God. . . . . . . . . . So he’s telling them, you know who the Lord is to know the Lord is to have eternal life.

As he says in the book of John chapter 17, whom to know is life eternal. And the one thing we go into all the world of praise is, do you know the Lord? Do you know the Lord? Because when you say, I know the Lord, the only way you can know the Lord is you had to know him through Christ. You had to believe on his son Jesus Christ in order to, I know the Lord. But something better than me knowing the Lord is the Lord knows me.

He doesn’t need to put it in or rather are known of God. God knows me. Why? He’s my father. I may mess up a lot. He’s still my father. I may forget. And I may even deny. But he can never deny me my salvation, my birth. He can deny me rewards because rewards are earned. Salvation going to heaven is free. He can never deny me the right to go into heaven. all of His children have eternal life and are heirs of God and join heirs with Christ.

Like that. But now notice what he says, how turn ye again. So he’s talking to believers that were under the law, that were lost. Now you are saved and now you’ve let somebody else twist your mind, cause you to believe something that’s not true. But he says, but now that you’re known of God, or rather you are known of God and I know Him, I’ll turn you again back to something that has no value to it. So therefore I don’t accept the message that you have to turn from your sins to be saved because it never saved anybody before.

Why should I believe it? It’ll save you now. You don’t have to turn from your sins to be saved. You don’t turn from sin to be saved. You have to die for your sins. Not turn from them. You have to die. When Christ came into the world, He died to pay for my sins. Not turn from my sins. You don’t make Christ the Lord and the Master of your life. We’ll see. All that means is you’ve got to start being good.

Turn from your sins, stop being bad. What is that? That’s works for salvation. That means your salvation depends upon you, stop being bad and start being good. And that’s heresy. But there’s a multitude of preachers that preach that message. You may be clear this morning because you come to Calvary Community Church and you say, I got it. But you’d be surprised how you can go and little by little, it filters down to you, you know, that’s not that bad.

It’s not that That’s not that bad. Next thing you know, you’d be promoting it and totally change and then get to where you’re not even sure if you’re saved anymore. Can it happen? Can a Christian get to where they doubt their own salvation? Yes they can. It’s not because God’s word changed. It’s because you listen to somebody’s philosophy. You no longer believe a simple verse like John 3 16. I was saved because of John 3 16 for God so loved.

If you know John 3 16, quote it with me. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever keeps the 10 commandments and goes to the Calvary community church, it must not say the same thing that used to say. It still says the same thing it always said, that whosoever believe it in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. So can you know you have everlasting life? Of course, the Word hasn’t changed.

And you don’t allow people to twist the scriptures to take away that free gift of salvation. And don’t think for a moment that you’re gonna be spiritual because you become legalistic. You know, all the do’s and don’ts. You can live by a set of rules and regulations and laws and never learn to walk with God. Can lost people go to church? Can they dress in a coat and tie? Can they even read a Bible? can even pray? Can he give money and be lost as a hound dog on the end of a soup bone?

So is it possible that Christians can become so legalistic that they don’t have a walk with the Lord? It’s all about figures, numbers, calculations of right, wrong, and they don’t see a person. My walk with God has always been with a person. I never look at the law, think about the law, oh I got I’m not this morning, I gotta keep the 10 commandments. I don’t even know what they are. They’ll show not lie, they’ll show not still, they’ll show not play marbles.

The Bible says marble not. This is all extra. You didn’t pay for this. This is just extra. But it says, now you’re known of God. Don’t turn from this. Now look what else he says. See there in verse 11, he says, I’m afraid of you. Afraid what? Because you see, you can’t grow strong in the Lord when you place yourself back under the old man and under the law and trying to become spiritual by laws. You see, there’s a thing called love, and I’ll show you that in just a second.

He said, I am afraid of you, lest I have bestowed upon you labor in vain. Now, we know from other scriptures, your labor in the Lord is never in vain, but have you ever worked and labored with people that don’t profit from what you have to say that won’t listen to you like your kids. But he makes this statement in verse 13, you know how through infirmity of the flesh, I preach the gospel on you. And here’s those three that were at the first.

The first thing anybody needs is the gospel because you can’t mature and grow in the Christian life without the gospel. You have to win a person to Christ before you can try to establish Christian character in their lives. So then he says in verse 16, am I therefore become your enemy because I tell you the truth? He’s rebuking them. He’s hitting them right between the eyes. And he says, those people that zealously affect you, it’s not because of it’s to your advantage.

They’re not helping you. See what he says, verse 17, they zealously affect you, but not well. Yet they would exclude you that you might affect them. They want to simply use you to get a following, but they’re not concerned about you. They don’t love you. Paul talks about what he went through to reach people. Me and Peter was the other day was in the office and there’s a scripture that talks about how that they are scarcely be saved. I can scarcely be saved.

And it sometimes comes into scratch your head. I can somebody be scarcely saved. You’re 100% in or you’re 100% out. Nobody’s almost saved and almost lost. You’re 100% lost or you’re 100% saved. How can you be scarcely saved? Because of what it takes for people to reach people. You see, I was scarcely saved in this sense. I’m 71 years old. only had one man ever witnessed to me. One man. Think of how many churches I’ve been to, how many conferences I’ve been to, seminars I’ve been to, church that I preach at all across this country, nobody’s ever witnessed to me.

But that one man, Raymond Jackson in 1960, my father-in-law who sat down with me on a couch and explained the gospel to me. scarcely. What some people have to do, and this is why we have kids say they go to camp. And we’ll have people that dedicate their life to come down here. Great expense. You go to camp, you’ll have little sleep. I’m just warning you. Little sleep and you get knocked around and dragged on, you play sports and you tear off the skin off the bottom of your feet and you go through all kind of thing, go to the emergency room.

You know, all kind of things can have them. There’s a price that you pay just to reach somebody. Look what missionaries go through just to reach somebody. So here, you’re not, he says, you did run well. What did hinder you from obeying the truth? And see, there’s always somebody who wants to take that fire away from you to rob you of your joy in the Lord. And the thing is love the Lord with all your heart and you can live like you please.

Did you hear what I said? Love the Lord with all your heart and you can live like you please. I live like I please because I love the Lord with all my heart and I’ll do things that somebody else may not do. Everybody’s on a different level, different plane but I trust that you love the Lord with all your heart. And I want to trust the Lord to work in your life as He says He would. But now look what He says in verse 19.

Verse 19, my little children, so is He talking to believers? Yes, of whom I prevail in birth again until Christ be formed in you. What does He want after you’re saved? Christ be informed in you. The law cannot conform you to Christ. law works off of fear. Christ works off of love. And I… Have allowed the love of Christ to motivate me. So therefore I do what I do because I love the Lord. And his love for others motivates me to reach him for him, because I know he loves them.

And I love him. Have you ever loved a little puppy? He grows up to be a dog. Cute little baby. He grows up to be a human. And they can get mean and ugly down the road and they’re not as lovable. But you’ll love them and you’ll try to reach them, do everything you possibly can because God loves you. And I want people, God loves you. And I want to make God look good. I want to make God look good.

So the Lord tells us here, Abraham had two sons, two sons. So he says, up here in verse 28, Now we brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise. But as then he that was born after the flesh, persecuted him that was born after the spirit. Even so, it is now. Now look up here, born after the flesh, born after the spirit. As it was between, no, Ishmael and Isaac and all the rest of them, boom, even so it is now.

I have these two birth and they fight all the time. And here’s some things. I wrote this down because I thought it was so good. Because the desire and power to do the will of God comes from God. See, that’s grace. Because he has the desire and the power Christ did. When he came into the world, full of grace and truth. And this desire to do the Father’s will and the power to perform He’s given to each one of us.

And you can deny the desire that God has for you. And you can do your own desires. And you can deny His power to work in your life. And try to do it all myself. It’s all on me. I can handle this. I can do anything. You know, it don’t take much for God to take care of you. We live only by the grace of God. because our very life is in his hands. So we believe that God has given to each one of us the grace to live, to the desire and the power to do the will of God for our life.

And he makes the statement in Hebrews chapter 12, verse 15, that some who rebel against the Lord have failed in the grace of God. The apostle Paul makes the statement in the book of 1 Corinthians where he makes the statement that the grace of God was not bestowed upon him in vain. Therefore he says, I labored more abundantly than they all. Living by the desire and the power of God is what gives to us the strength that we need to labor for the Lord.

Many people say that grace is just some spacey grace here, therefore I don’t do anything. I’m just, I’m just trusting the Lord. I’m just gonna let God do it all. So I don’t need Sunday school teachers, we’re just gonna let the Lord do it. We don’t need anybody to preach tonight, we’re just gonna let the Lord do it. So you don’t do anything, you just let God do it. Oh, you are one trusting soul. The grace of God causes us to labor.

It’s his love working through us. It’s his power working through us. It’s not passive, it’s active. God so loved the world that He gave. Did something. And that’s why we do what we do. So I wrote this down. Grace and fallen from grace is refusing to obey truth. Fallen from grace is walking in the flesh. It is to fail in the steps to maturity. It is striving to be spiritual by keeping the law. That’s when you as a Christian have failed of the grace of God.

It’s not that you didn’t have the grace of God, not only to be saved, but to live your Christian life. And yet at the same time, you can fail to live by the desire and the power of God in your life. And you do only what you desire, what you want. And you chase your little soap bubbles and your dreams. And they’re all gonna leave you empty. vanity and vexation of Spirit. You’re going to leave you with nothing when life is over.

And therefore I believe that we ought to serve the Lord while we can with everything that we have. That’s why when he comes to there in verse 1 of chapter 5, he says, stand fast therefore in the liberty where with Christ hath made us free. You’ve been made free. Thank you. Stand there and be not entangled again with the yoke abundance. Don’t put yourself back under the flesh, back under the old man. Don’t let the old sinful nature and its power and its desire of the flesh control your life.

And a lot of people don’t understand what Christ has is far higher and superior than the flesh. Don’t lure yourself to the flesh to obey it and the lust they’re off. By the way, part two is tonight. And you’ve got to have part two. Part one is no good without part two. But if you’re going to miss, either one of them missed this morning’s. Don’t miss tonight. Look over here. This hand represents you and me. The wall of represents sin.

We all have sin on us. God loves us. Now he hates our sin, but he loves us. And to pay for sin is eternal separation from God. That’s why every man’s sin, every man is condemned. And God says to go to heaven, you have to be perfect. As righteous as God, no sin. But because no one’s perfect, no one can save themselves. And that’s why by your works you cannot deliver yourself. Go into church, that’s nice, but it won’t get you to heaven.

Give him money, it won’t get you to heaven. You need to save you. This hand represents Jesus Christ. He’s the Lord God in the flesh came into the world because He loves us. Hates our sin because our sin separates us from Him. So Christ who had no sin did not have to die. So He took all the sin of all the world, patron on the cross, came back from the dead. And God said that if we would believe that He did it for us, He would put this payment to our account and we get to go to Heaven.

Oh, what He did. You didn’t earn it. You didn’t work for it. It is the gift of God not a works list any man should boast. If offered you my Bible and you accepted you’d have a Bible. If offered you my wallet and you accepted you would have an empty wallet. If Christ walked in here and offered you eternal life and you accepted what would you have? If it’s eternal life, I know this is a difficult question. How long would it last?

If it lasts forever and all your sins are paid, where would you go when you die? Can you know you’re going to heaven before you die? Isn’t that good news? That’s good news. Let’s pray, shall we? With heads bowed nice and closed, no one looking around. I don’t have all the answers. Don’t know it all. But I know how to get to heaven. Lord made that very clear and plain in His Word. But if you hear this morning, if you’ve never trusted Christ as your only hope of going to heaven, maybe you thought you could earn it by the way you lived.

I hope that you can see now that it’s free. It’s a gift. And if you will trust Christ as your Savior, I’m going to ask you just a moment to raise your hand. raising your hand doesn’t save you. It just lets me know that what I said made sense to you. And I like to have prayer for you in closing. But I’m not going to embarrass you. I’m not going to have you stand up and come forward. But right where you’re sitting, say, preacher, that made sense to me.

And I’ll trust Christ as my Savior. Would you just slip you in it very quickly and put it right back down and we’ll it all. And we’ll it all. If you’ve already trusted Christ as your Savior, stand fast. Therefore in the Liberty where with Christ have made us free. And be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage. Father, we thank you so much for this time together. Thank you, each person here in Christ and 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 tool free. One eight hundred. 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 Bible line 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, believing that the Lord is coming soon and just keep looking up.