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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 Bibleline Ministries dot O-R-G homepage.

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. Turn in your Bible to the book of 2 Peter chapter 2. I’ve got a few complicated statements in here, and it’s hard to know, well, now, who is this talking to? And so I want you to look here, first of all, in verse 22. But as it happened unto them, according to the true proverb, the dog is turned to his own vomit again, the sow that was washed to her, wallowing in the mire.

Now I wonder who that’s talking to. Is that to the pastor, the elders, the deacons, the people in the church? Well, it’d be interesting. And you might be surprised. Second Peter chapter 2 is talking about the believers, the Hebrew Christians mainly, but it can be applicable to all of us. Remember, he’s warning them about false teachers. He refers to the Old Testament how that there were false prophets among them and those false prophets, those false teachers, well, it causes God’s people to go astray.

Now, there’s no sense warning us about false teachers if false teachers don’t have some effect. He’s warning us because it will make a difference. Look there in chapter 3. In chapter 3 and look there in verse 17, ye therefore, beloved, seeing you know these things before. So he’s just reminding them. Beware, last ye also, being led away with the error of the wicked. In other words, you listen to the philosophy of today. You listen to the wisdom of the world.

You listen to the false teachers. They’re gone and lead you astray. And so he says here, you’ll fall from your own steadfastness. So there is an impact that can be made into a Christian’s life by listening to the wrong things. You say, well, it doesn’t really make any difference. Yes, it does. You will live what you really believe. And then he says in verse 18, but grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and save your Jesus Christ.”

All right, now go back there to chapter 2. And let’s start there in verse 9, where it says, the Lord knows how to deliver the godly out of temptation. He can do it several ways. He can literally take you out of the world. He can take the evil away from you, like he did during the flood. But he also can deliver you from the air of wicked, the temptations of the world by the truth that is embedded in your mind, because God wants to lead you in the right way, and there is an evil way, the wrong way, the Balaam’s way.

We’ll look at that in just a second. But see in verse 9, he said, the Lord know of how to deliver the godly out of temptation and to reserve the unjust unto the day of judgment to be punished. So understand that the lost man is going to be punished. God knows how to do that. So I don’t try to figure out how to do God’s job. I have enough trying to figure out how to do mine. Let God do what God does and let me do what God wants me to do.

So he says, they’re going to be punished, but look in verse 10, but chiefly them that walk after the flesh in the lust of uncleanness and despise government. Presumptuous are they, self will, they are not afraid to speak evil of dignities. In other words, they lose total respect for authority. And that authority sometimes comes out to be God. And if they have no respect for God, then they’re not going to have none for the pastor. They’re not going to have none for the Bible.

They’re not going to have none for you. And God describes him as brute beast, like an animal. And so the judgment is going to be very, very severe. Now, God knows how to do it. Now, He didn’t do the same thing in every case. No more than He does with others. Now, whatever the lost people and the false prophets can do, and whatever they think, the philosophy of life, if you listen to them, you’re going to do and act and beat the same as the false teachers.

Now, does that affect your salvation? Now once you trust the Christ you’re saving, you are his child. You are going to heaven when you die. But you see, God warns us about listening to false teachers because false teachers affect how we live. You and I are supposed to be careful about what we believe, what we listen to. Because false teachers will affect the way you think. And if it’s fixed the way you think, it’s going to affect the way you live.

So he says, in verse 12, get this. I didn’t write this, but look how strong this is. He said, but these as a natural brute beast made to be taken and destroyed. Did you know that there is verses in the Bible in the Old Testament that if a person was guilty of being a homosexual, did you know that God says that they were supposed to have been killed? No, I didn’t make that up. I mean, that’s what God said.

God says this is not gonna be tolerated in the land. Isn’t it a shame that today we tolerate everything? Because we want to be politically correct. We don’t want to say anything that would offend anybody. Everybody’s got their rights. Always thought rights were right. Not wrong. If it’s wrong, it ain’t right, right? Don’t get that. But it says in verse 12, these are natural beasts made to be taken and destroyed, speak evil of the things they understand. I think there’s a whole bunch of people like that in government.

They ain’t got a clue what’s going on. If I didn’t know the Bible, I’d have been a politician. I’d have been one of those guys who probably would be trying to kick out of Washington. But I believe that there’s so much that a Christian has that makes him wiser than those that don’t know the Lord. I think you know more and can do more. But anyway, he says, to understand what you are taught does make a difference on how you live.

You see, the reason that they’re doing all this crazy stuff like in Washington, all that, because they’re not educated, they don’t know the truth. They don’t even understand the principles of finances. They don’t understand education. They don’t know how to teach the kids to read and write. Do you know we got a lot of kids coming out of schools and they don’t know how to read because there’s teachers that don’t know how to teach. It’s more about trying to get everybody to groupthink.

It doesn’t teach them how to think it. They tell them what to think. I’m for teaching the kid how to think, giving them the tools where they can reason and relate and record this information that they’re able to gather. So anyway, I don’t want to get sidetracked, so I’m going to stick with this here. Look at verse 13, and shall receive the reward of unrighteousness. In other words, you do wrong, you earn something. In one place, you’ll talk about the wages of Balaam.

In other words, there’s wages that you get because of evil doing, and there’s rewards that you get. On top of that, see, God wants us to serve him, but God also is going to reward us if we do right. But what about people who do wrong? God says, you’re going to get your reward too. And so he says here, and shall receive the reward of unrighteousness as they, that counted pleasure to ride in the daytime. You see, there was a time when they do it at night.

Now they’re bold and they’ll do it in our streets. And there’s people who don’t care what you think about it. They’re a very bold and blatant and could care less about what you think. Because, see, they don’t got to the place where they have no fear of God. They don’t fear Christians. They don’t fear anything or anybody. They can do whatever they want to do and their conscience doesn’t bother them. Now, if you let people like that educate you, you’re going to think the way they think.

And if you think the way they think, you’re going to want to live the way they live. All this is written in here for a reason so that you and I don’t fall, don’t stumble. See there in 2 Peter and chapter 1, look what he says here in verse 10, wherefore the rather brethren, brethren, we’re talking to believers, give diligence to make your calling and election sure, for if you do these things, you shall never fall. But he’s talking about the things that you add to your faith in the first chapter.

Add to your faith. Become strong enough so that you don’t fall. And then what we just read over there in chapter 3, that you’re going to fall into air if you listen to those people who tell you wrong. So he says, don’t do that. Remember Paul made the statement in the book of Ephesians that he wants to present us to the Lord without spot in blemish. He said, this is how I want to do it. He said, like, I want you not only to know the Lord as your Savior, but I want you to live like a virgin concerning the things of the world, that you might be that chase virgin that He presents the Lord in Corinthians without spot, without blemish, without, you know, the filthiness of the world.

I guess he wants God’s people to live a holy, godly life. Now we’ll go to heaven, but there might be some problems. Not with getting there, and I would stay in there, but with the well done, thou good and faithful servant. and not getting the rewards that you would have liked ahead. Look what he says in the last part of verse 13, spots they are and blemishes, sporting themselves with their own deceivings while they feast with you. In other words, they make merchandise of you, as it says over there in verse three, the same chapter.

In other words, they use you to give what they want. That’s why you have to watch the health and wealth preachers, the gospel of health and wealth. All they’re trying to do is use the replacement theology of taking all the blessings that went to Israel, and they’re trying to apply all of those to the church. And so they go back there to the Old Testament and say, well, see all these blessings, it’s about you do this, and you’re going to prosper and get wealth and blah, blah, blah.

Well, wait a minute, that’s to Israel. The Lord says to the church, which is what we are, that He had blessed us with our spiritual blessings in the heavenlies. See, Israel on the earth and you and I will get our blessings, spiritual blessings of heaven. So we are having spiritual blessings there to have the physical blessings and there too are not the same. And if you don’t understand it, then you’ll have some, hey, send me $10 and there’s $100 going to be in your mailbox tomorrow.

And if you’re living right and if you love the Lord, you don’t have to worry about getting sick. And then they have their healing line. Come on down here, put the hand on that. Be healed! No. God’s will may be that you are sick. Go back and try to figure out Joe with that philosophy. God took away all of his wealth and he hadn’t done anything wrong. God took away his help and he hadn’t done anything wrong. No, that turkey won’t fly.

Look what he says here in verse 14, having eyes full of adultery and that cannot cease from sin, cannot cease from sin, begowing and underland these two words, unstable souls. In other words, this is what false teachers do. They take those who are not stable, that are not strong in the Lord, and they wanna make merchandise out of you. They wanna use you, get you. You see, they can’t win you to the Lord. So they try to take those who have an interest in the things of God and get you sidetracked into whatever.

And next thing you know, you know, you get involved in false churches, but they trust this crisis, Savior, because I heard a clear gospel message. But they didn’t get grounded because they didn’t keep listening or come out and get out of those things that they should have gotten out of. So he says here, they have a tasty bait, but a concealed hook. You know, that’s what you do when you go fishing. You have a tasty bait, but a concealed hook.

They try to lure you with something that you really desire. Study the word. You’ll have somebody like J.W. come to the door. And ma’am, do you have a fireplace? Well, yes, we do. Ma’am, would you take and throw your children in the fire? Do you really like your children? No. Neither would God. puter we come in and have a Bible study with you? We should come right on that. See, they had a pasted little baby that’s got a hook to it.

They got another agenda. And so because they don’t believe in hell, it would be easy to how to convince people that there’s no hell. Whew, boy, I feel better already. There’s no hell. But there is a hell. And so you have people that would try to twist things and you’ve got to be careful. Or if you’re sick, you must have done something wrong. You didn’t have enough faith. But now before we demonstrate how much faith you have, we’re going to take up an offering.

And we’ve got to have some seed money. You know, seed money, seed faith. In other words, you’ve got to plant before you have anything grow. So how much faith do you have? How much money do you have? When I was at Florida Bible College. Me and a few students Sided go to this healing meeting So we went in we sat back there in the back We said damn we watched the shenanigans going on So we stood up there and we just kind of watched and observe of course everybody knows that we’re not part of the group Because we look different what we weren’t doing what they were doing So anyway after a while he says we’re gonna have some healing here tonight and talks about all the different kind of people are gonna be healed He says, first of all, if you have, he started at $100, if you get a $100 bill,

I want you to, everybody had to stand. Come on down here, and so they came down. You don’t have $100, but you got $50, and he went down every increment. And finally got down, you don’t have any dollars at all, but all you got is a little change in your pocket. But that’s all you want to do. It only takes a little bit of seed faith. Come on down. And so after a while, everybody was down there and gave it to the money.

And everybody was down there and says, if you believe that God is going to do a miracle tonight, you’ll come on down here. So after a while everybody was down there except about five people sitting back here in the back. We’re all sitting back here watching the show because it’s a show. They’re entertaining. They were not concerned about where anybody spent eternity. It was about how can we get the money out of the people? And I felt sorry for all the people who don’t know the truth to recognize a shuster when he’s up there.

So we sat back there and finally he got up there and says, if there’s no miracles done here tonight, it’s not because of you, because there’s people back here because of their unbelief. Now he’s not got their money. But now he may not be able to do a miracle because five people back here who didn’t believe that what he was doing and he blamed the lack of healing on by people that didn’t believe instead of all the people who gave the money and did believe.

I wanted to go down there and get popping up a good one. I had my two kids one day. We’re in Colorado and on the top of this heel they put up a gray big old tent. A healing line was going to be set up so I thought I’ll take my two kids so they can get little of an education. So my kid got in the car with me and we drove up there and parked cars everywhere. People just going in and we got out of the car and right beside of us there was this other car and the guy he got up and got out of his car and he walked on the other side and he opened the door and he sat down and put on the cast a leg.

You know plaster thing on his leg and then And he walked like this. Well, I just saw him walk around the front of his car. My kid, we watched him. And he goes in there, and next thing, you know, well, he’s in the healing line. Next thing, you know, he goes up, and he got healed. That thing, mofered her. Praise God. He was healed. How about that hippo crit? They’re staging the junk, but then everybody in… I says, kids, let’s go home.

Enough of an education on this. And they got in smoother at it. Even they have a guide that comes on television. He sets them up there and they come down to the front and he goes, “‘Shlaying in the spirit!’ When they were slaying in the spirit, they always fell forward. didn’t know that. They fell backwards. And it probably blew his breath on me. I’d pass on too. But there’s people that swallowed this stuff and they’re false teachers. Now, there’s false teachers in the world.

You know this. And this is what they’re like. Looking verse 17, they are wells without water. And he says, clouds that are carried with a tempest To whom, get the underlined. To whom is the mist of darkness is reserved forever. See, hell is not a place of light. It’s a place of darkness for all eternity. And there are wells without water. There’s preachers, but they don’t have the gospel. They don’t know how to explain the gospel where you can understand it and know you have eternal life and know that you’re going to have an only life.

And they don’t teach us by grace. The only reason you can say it’s eternal is because it’s by grace. If you say it’s by grace but you can lose it, they don’t believe it’s by grace. They believe it’s by works. And it can’t be both ways. But there’s smooth talking preachers and you have to be careful. That’s why even when you come here, you should check everything I say by the book. Go by the book. Learn the Word of God.

Look what he says. In verse 15, he says, which half forsaken the right way? Now the right way is the Christ way, the Christian way, the way of life. He says, and are gone astray following the way of Balaam. Now in the Old Testament, a man by the name of Balaam, who was the king of Moab, he didn’t like the children of Israel. They’re in the wilderness in the coming through here. And so he says, get the prophet. And he went up on top of the hill and says, I want you to curse those Jews, those Israelites, curse them.

And he said, I’ll give you this and this and this and this and that, give you silver and gold and so on, at three times. But it always turned out to be a blessing. And so he was riding his jackass and all of a sudden it just stopped. So he started to beat him and the donkey turned around and looked at him and says, why are you doing that for her? Now that shows you that if God can use a jackass, God can use you.

How does that make you feel? God can use anybody. And he says, what are you doing that for? He says, you’re mad. What he couldn’t see was there was an angel standing there with a sword. What a kill both of them. If that donkey hadn’t have stopped it to kill both of them. And he told them, he says, you have perverse the way of the Lord. Puck into the baleom. You know you can’t do this. You are a prophet of the Lord, and you’re supposed to teach what God commanded.

And only that! You can’t put a curse upon the nation of Israel. You can only bless Israel. Well, that didn’t set too good with Belat. And you promised us some more stuff. He said, can’t do it. But then you made a prophecy. And you can read all about this in Numbers in chapter 22, 22, or 3, 24, and up to 25. You can read all about this incident. But in chapter 24 it talks about a prophecy concerning Jesus Christ, the star of Jacob and how he’s going to come.

And he says, you want to know what’s going to happen to Moab in the end time? He says Israel is going to rule over you. I don’t guess they like that. So much for that prophecy. But he said he was mad, looking verse 16. He says, but was rebuked for his iniquity, the dumbass speaking with man’s voice forbade the madness of the prophet. Now look at verse 18, but when they speak great swelling words of emptiness, vanity, they, the false prophets, they allure through the lust of the flesh that alluring is, like I said, the tasty bait with the concealed hook.

See, they don’t want you to see the hook, but they want you to go after the bait and they get you later. That’s what the devil does. He shows you, oh, this good looking woman, shows you all this money, this fame, power, popular, whatever you can have, but there’s always, remember, there’s a hook inside of that to snare you. Be careful. So he says, in the last part of it, those that were clean, escape from them who live in air.

While they promised them liberty, they themselves are the servants of corruption. This is why you got to be careful about even those that run for office. They talk about all this freedom and liberty. Even there’s the patriots, or now the Tea Party and all this stuff. And a lot of things can be good, but you never really know where people are coming from. You don’t know their foundation in their teaching. So some people just want freedom so they can just live like they please.

And you do have to have government. There’s a legitimate place for government. God set up government. Government has to have taxes. They have to have a means to support themselves. And there’s people that say, well, we need to have… We’re for less government and less taxes. Sounds good. How much less? But he talks about the freedom, the liberty. and they themselves are the servants of corruption. Now, whatever they teach, it’s gonna make an effect upon our lives. And he says here in verse 24, if after they have escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled therein and overcome the latter in as worse with them than the beginning.

Now, it is a little difficult trying to figure out, Now, are we talking about the teachers here? Are we talking about the believers here? Well, it might be talking about both. Why? Well, because see, this is what happens to the false teachers. They promise, they promise, they promise. And so you have to be careful of who’s feeding you what? But anyway, look in verse 21, for it had been better for them, not to have known the way of righteousness than after they have known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered unto them.

Now, 1 John chapter 3 and verse 23 says, and the commandment was that you believe on Him whom God hath sent. Now, let’s look at this two ways. One, to the false teachers, look what it does to them when they claim that they know the book and they know what’s right, they know what’s wrong, and then they teach contrary to what God says and deny the Lord that bought them, as I said on my verse 2. But their teaching affects the Christian.

You’re supposed to be that unstable soul who is begalve and the false teaching has got you back into its entanglement. Here you argue, trust Christ is your Savior, you dedicate your life to the Lord, you begin to study the Word and you begin to grow in the Lord and you start cleaning up your life and you start walking with God, and then you start listening to the false teachers, he says, you’re just like a dog that turns back to its own vomit.

And you’re just like a pig that goes to wallowing in the mare. You see, if this is referring to the false teachers, well, why warn me about what happens to them? Why do I care what happens to the false teachers? Unless this can happen to me. And that’s why I need to be careful. because I don’t want to be like I was before I trusted the Lord. I want to keep serving God and keep walking with the Lord. I don’t want the false teaching to get me to destroy me.

So therefore heed what he’s saying. Look there, this would be closed here. Look at 1 verse again, verse 17. Yea, therefore, in chapter 3. 2 Peter chapter 3 verse 17. Yea, therefore, be 11. Seeing you know these things before them. Be aware. Where? Last ye? What’s that next word? You also, being led away with the air of the wicked, fall. You’ve been listening to Bibleline, a teaching ministry of Calvary Community Church in Tampa, Florida with Dr. Ralph Arnold. We pray that you are 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, 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.