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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 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. I wanted to live as righteous of a life possible. Not to get to heaven. I already knew I was going to heaven. But I wanted to do it because I was so thankful to the Lord for what He had done for me. There’s just something that I wanted to please God.

I wanted to delight myself in the Lord. And I knew I could not do that if I did not know His Word. This is one of the things that motivated me to go to Bible school to study the Word of God. Because I knew I could not know the will of God unless I knew the Word of God in order to know the will of God. And He says, He that will do the will of God shall know of my doctrine.

In other words, if you are willing to do whatever God wants you to do, God will help you to find the way and reveal His will. Also, while you’re right there, I want you to see another verse. Look in the verse 130. Verse 130. Verse 130 makes this statement. And it says, The entrance of thy word, giveth light. The entrance of thy word. Did you know without the word of God, even as a Christian, you walk in darkness. You may know Christ is your savior, but if you’re not doing what God wants you to do because of the word of God, because of the light that’s in the word of God, because of the truth that’s in the word of God, you still walk in darkness.

So you’re going to heaven because you trusted Christ as savior, but you’re not in heaven yet. not still left us down here to live a life. And there’s so much that God wants us to do. We’re looking verse 18, while we’re right here, so close. Looking verse 18, open thou mine eyes, that I may be whole wondrous things out of thy law or out of thy word. Open thou mine eyes. Why? So that you can see. See, a lot of people who are lifted up with pride don’t think they need to go to church.

They don’t need to study the Bible. They don’t need to. They’re blind and naked and miserable, and don’t know it. Revelation 3, when he’s talking to the church at Leo Decilla. Another quote that I got that I loved. He is no fool who gives up what he cannot keep, the gain that which he cannot lose. Anybody ever heard who said that? was a missionary to the Aquamanians, down in Ecuador. Years later, they had a daughter that came to Florida Bible College, and they’d fly the guy around to give testimonies that had killed Jameliot.

So missionaries got killed. I heard one story about when a guy that came from a tribe, then there’s going to kill these missionaries, and they didn’t do it. Years later, they led him to the Lord. So how come you didn’t attack us? We knew you were around us. You had us totally surrounded. They said, well, we couldn’t because there were so many people protecting y’all. They said they saw a circle of guards around those missionaries at the jungle. God can enable them to see what you and I don’t naturally see.

Did you know that God has a reason to purpose for the things that happen in their life. And you may find yourself chasing soap bubbles. You know you blow the bubbles all over the place. And some people, that’s all they do is chase dreams. And all they do is pop and leave you empty. Next thing you know, you’re like the man who climbed a ladder for 20 years and found out it was leaning against the wrong wall. And you lived your whole life and wasted it.

Now you know you’re getting close to the end and you’re going to be facing God one day and you’re going to look back over your life that I Wonder what God could have done if I had availed myself if I’d have studied the word of God Maybe God wanted me to go to Bible school. Maybe God wanted me to be a missionary. Maybe God went well another statement David Livingston Missionary to Africa He says God had only you one son and and he made him a missionary.

Think about it. God had a son, and he called him to be a missionary. He sent him on a mission into another world. It was a terrible world. It was a dark world. A miserable wicked world. And that’s where God sent his son to be of the light to the world. Sometimes God puts us in places where we don’t really like. You may be working with people on a job. You can’t stand. Maybe they’re profanity and all the things that they say and do.

You just can’t stand. But maybe God puts you as a light right in the middle so that you could shine. Where would you want to be? You want to sit in church all day long? Where there’s no problems and everybody’s wonderful and every kind. Everybody’s kind. Go to church enough and you’ll find that there’s hypocrites at a church. There’s people that lie at church. There’s people that steal at church. There’s no kind of people at church. You’re here. If you find the perfect church, don’t join it because then you’ll ruin it.

David Livingston also said this, if a commission by an earthly king is considered an honor, how can a commission by a heavenly king be considered a sacrifice? We have ambassadors that go to different countries and represent our country and they consider what an honor. The Bible says that we are ambassadors for Christ. What an honor. Yeah, we call it sacrifice, but sometimes the sacrifice is giving up something that you have for something better. Cause I’ve never given up anything that God didn’t give me something better in its place.

I don’t care what it is you give up in this life and you sacrifice, you give up something. Do you like what God’s got for you and you get to heaven? I used to think I had plans and dreams. Well, when I used to always listen to, you know, tires of the jungle, man, I wanted to go to Africa so bad and live in a treehouse and swing around on monkey vines.

Don’t laugh, you did too. I used to put a towel around my neck and not be flying a Superman. Man, I could run so fast, I could almost feel my, I was hardly touching the ground, I was so fast. You did too? I even got some shoes for my son one time, And I said, now these shoes are fast. He took off running. Because I told him the shoes were fast. And he wouldn’t see just how fast those shoes were.

And he’d run as fast as he could run. You’d be surprised some of the things that we can think about when we’re young. And lo and behold, we grew up to be adults, just like little puppies. Puppies are so nice. And they turn out to be dogs. The only thing God has to make a man of God out of is a child that grows up and God wants to work in our lives and wants to make something out of us.

C.T. Stud said this, some wish to live within the sound of a chapel bell. I wish to run a rescue mission within a yard of hell. A lot of you want to play it safe. They don’t only get dirty, don’t only get hurt, don’t want to get offended. If you serve the Lord, You’re going to defend it, and you’re going to defend. If you decide to serve the Lord, you will offend people. You will hurt people. You know what would be safe for me?

Get in my little motorhome and just go from one church, cause all the trouble I want, go to the next church, cause the trouble I want, go to another church. And don’t have to worry about none of that stuff. But people can say because, well, you’re different, and yet you’re clear on the gospel, and yet you teach the Bible’s about it, Why doesn’t everybody love it? Did you know when Jesus was here, the best teacher in all the world?

And He said something one day that offended them. And though they left. So Jesus turned to His disciples. He says, will you also go away? And He said to them. To whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life, for we believe that thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. Some people will believe what you’re saying is truth and other people care less. Some people play games, some people are serious. Some people want to know what the word of God says.

They want to be challenged. They want to be motivated. But it’s so easy just to settle out into the world. Ruffle no feathers, don’t rock the boat. But that’s not how God made me. And I don’t believe that’s how God wants to use me. I have to rock the boat and I have to. I want to make people think life’s too short for just playing games. Another man said this, CT’s studied by the way, he said, If Jesus Christ be God and died for me, then no sacrifice can be too great for me to make for Him.”

Listen what he said. This is why a guy goes to the foreign fields because he said, if Jesus Christ be God and died for me, then no sacrifice can be too great for me to make for Him. He bought me. I belong to Him. He deserves everything that I have, everything that I am. Why would I want to hold back? 2 Corinthians 5, 14 says, For the love of Christ constraineth us because we best judge that if one died for all, then all were dead, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him who died for them and rose again.

So that I should, from this point on, I should serve the Lord because of his love for me and my love for him. And there’s nothing that He should require of me that I shouldn’t be willing to give even my life. Whatever it might be. Oswald J. Smith supported thousands of missionaries. Had a great work of an Ontario. He said, no one has the right to hear the gospel twice while there remains someone who’s never heard it once. No one has the right to hear the gospel twice for there remains someone who has not heard it once.

What about the people that never heard the gospel? Another statement, unknown. He said, we talk of the second coming. Half of the world has never heard of the first. You know, you can get so caught up in all you think about as the second coming of Christ that you forget to tell people about the first coming of Christ. I love prophecy. I love prophecy as much as any man I know. But prophecy to me challenged me to be evangelistic.

That’s why we want the radio. That’s why we want the internet. That’s why we want to produce kids that know how to serve a Lord. That’s why we want to Bible college. That’s why we want the Bible on institutes so we can train people on how to do the job. Not a game to me. It’s serious. and you can try to understand all the prophecies you want to. I don’t care what day Christ is coming back. I don’t even care the day He was born as far as celebrating it.

I don’t care if it was on December the 25th. I don’t care if it was on my birthday, February the 4th. I don’t care if it was on your day. I don’t care what day He was born. I’m just thankful He was born and that He died and paid for my sins. It came back from the dead. You won’t find a verse in the Bible that says to celebrate the birth of Christ, but I don’t see anything wrong with doing it.

I’m looking forward to him coming back, yes, but I don’t want to forget. There’s some people that’s never heard that he came the first time. And that’s what they need to hear. The reason some folks don’t believe in missions is that their brand of religion they have isn’t worth propagating. Do you believe that what you believe is worth telling people about? Do you or don’t you? Do you believe that what you believe is worth telling people about? Do you believe it’s worth being ashamed that people are going to offend you or you’re going to offend somebody that you’re willing to go ahead and do it anyway because you believe that it’s so important?

What do you believe? Every man has to answer this on question because you’re going to live According to what you truly believe, people who do not know the Lord ask why in the world. We waste our lives as missionaries. They forget that they too are expending their lives. And when the bubble has burst, they will have nothing of eternal significance to show for the years they have wasted. Do you realize that all the time that you have lived after you trusted Christ is your Savior?

You will give account of that just like commissioner, well, everybody has to give an account. But it will be better that whenever you stand before the Lord, He says, well done, not good and faithful servant. I called you to go here and you went. Or maybe God will have to say, you know, I called you. I spoke to you, I spoke to you many times. You said, there in that church service, and you heard that preach of paradah’s heart.

And you knew that I wanted you to do thus and thus. And you refused. You refused because you were afraid. You were scared. The true greatness of any church is not how many it seats, but how many it sends. Now how many it seats, but how many it sends. This is why I want people, if they listen to belong enough, I want them to be challenged to serve the Lord. And if necessary, yes, to go to Bible school. Now you take that little girl sitting there sitting right there, Rachel, one of the sharpest girls we have in this whole ministry.

But I’m thrilled that she wants to go to Bible school. I was thrilled whenever we would have angel come and hit sit right down here. Every service he had asked me questions. I said, you ought to go to Bible school. And every week he still calls me up and asked me, he says, what do you think about this and I says, what did your teachers tell you? Well, they said this, but I want to know what you think. I said, I’m not going to tell you.

I said, you study it. I said, what you went to Bible school for? I said, you’re just trying to do a shortcut to some of the answers. every week, every week, sometimes two and three times a week. But you know if he keeps on saying, you know, God’s going to use that little feller, he’s going to be dynamic. Somebody’s going to get him. He’s going to go somewhere and do something, but I believe that he is preparing. Now the point I wanted to give to you, and that is never pity missionaries, envy them.

They are where the real action is, where life and death, sin and grace, heaven and hell converge. I love it. In no other way can the believer become as fully involved with God’s work, especially the work of world evangelism as an intercessory prayer. I want to read something else to you about the prayer thing because remember when Jesus said in Matthew chapter 9, pray you the Lord of the harvest that He will send forth labors, we can reach our world if we will.

The greatest lack today is not people or funds. The greatest need is prayer. People pray in that God will use them. And Because of that, they make themselves fit for the ministry. Most people are not fit for the ministry. They’re not fit to serve a Lord. They couldn’t become a missionary if they wanted to. They couldn’t become a pastor if they wanted to. They couldn’t become an evangelist if they wanted to because they will not watch and garden their lives.

They won’t practice what they preach because too many are hypocritical. easy to say, oh, I love the Lord and live like the devil. If the God that I know that wrote this book, if you don’t live a godly life, you don’t love the Lord. You may know him as your savior, you’ll go to heaven, but you don’t love him. You can’t love him without obeying him because he says, if any man loved me, keep my word. You really love him.

You’ll keep is where you’ll do what God wants you to do with your life. You may love your life too much to serve Him, to sacrifice.” Another statement, the history of missions is the history of answered prayer. Another man stated this way, I believe that in each generation God has called enough men and women to evangelize all the yet unreached tribes of the earth. It is not God who does not called, it is man who will not respond. Do you believe that God would give us an impossible task?

It’s not that God hasn’t asked people to go. The study is word to be something, to do something else with their life. This is that people won’t answer the call. God says, I want you to go to here. Yes, I ain’t going. I want you to go there. I’m not going. Kind of like this coach one time, he coaches football team. The full back got creamed. They had to drag him off the field. Coach Holler, give Leroy the ball.

Next player, another guy got the ball. He got creamed. Drug him off the field. Coach Holler, give Leroy the ball. They gave the ball to somebody else. He got creamed. The coach said, I said, give the ball to Leroy and quarterback Holler back. Leroy don’t want the ball. Leroy don’t want the ball. Price to pay. The best remedy for a sick church is to put it on a missionary diet. The church must send, or the church will end. Isn’t that a good statement?

Because that’s the purpose of the church. Let’s just pretend for a moment there are no other churches. We are the only church in the world. Will the world hear the gospel because of us? There is no other church. And only missionaries that will ever go into this world are the ones that are sitting here right here. If we don’t have a radio broadcast, nobody else will, because there is nobody else. If we don’t send out missionaries, there won’t be any missionaries, because there is nobody else.

You know what we always say, well somebody else will do it, somebody else will do it. Somebody else will do it, but you need to ask the question, Lord, what do you want me to do? me to do and make sure that you’re doing what God wants you to do. You’d be surprised what God may have you do, or God may want you to go. Don’t underestimate God. Don’t even underestimate what God can do for you and through you.

Is what I can’t see down the road, how God, you don’t have to. Just prepare to be used. Opportunities are on wheels and a prepared man can take advantage of opportunities. But when the opportunities come and you’re not prepared, you’ll be standing on the sideline and maybe he got to put you on a shelf because he can’t use you, because you wouldn’t prepare. You see, you have to have a vision. You have to care. You have to have that compassion.

I can’t make people do anything. I only want to try to provide an environment that makes you thirsty. See, that’s what salt does. Salt causes people to be thirsty, and it preserves you. It helps you to keep your life clean so that you don’t become defiled, so that the meat doesn’t rotten. You’re the light of the world. You’re the salt of the earth. If it’s not us, then who is it? This is what I believe Christmas is all about.

So that’s the strangest Christmas story I’ve ever heard. Well, it’s where my heart is. And either we do this and people respond, or you don’t need a guy like me. You don’t need somebody like me. You can get a preacher to play patticade with you. That’s not my job. I want to see things happen. I’m not here to twiddle out my years in retirement. I’ve only got a few good years left and I promise those to God and I want to be used.

Pick up here. Letting this hand represent you and me. And you need to learn how to do this too. This is you and me and this is sin. We all have sin on us. God loves us. But he hates our sin. But he loves us. He loves you. Hates what you do wrong. And to pay for that wrong, God says his eternal separation from God in a place called hell. But he loves us and wants us to go to heaven.

And to go to heaven, we have to be perfect as righteous as God. And none of us are perfect. None of us are righteous. We have all sinned and come short of the perfection of God. But God loves us, and He says, we’re like sheep, going astray. We have no shepherd. Every man goes his own way, does his own thing. This hen represents Jesus Christ. He’s the Lord God in the flesh. He came into the world because he loves us.

Hates our sin because it separates us from him. So Jesus Christ, who had no sin, didn’t have to die, he took all the sin of all the world and paid for it on the cross. back from the dead. And God said, if you and I would believe that he did it for us, he would put this payment to our account, and we get to go to heaven on what Christ did. When I said it for the Bible college and I would watch Ray Stanford do this little wallet trick, I thought, he ain’t so great.

Anybody can do that. Anybody can do that. If you sit here long enough and you listen, you say, he ain’t so great. I can do that. Ray was copyable. You could copy the guy. Haint copied him. I copied him. Thousands of others copied him. He was a man that never went to Bible college. He just trusted the Lord when he was old, decided to serve the Lord, and just taught people how to trust Christ’s Savior. How to make the gospel clear.

I just want to be copyable. I want to be so simple you can sit there and listen to yourself thinking in your mind. He ain’t so great. I can do that. That’s right. You can. And you should. So that’s what it’s all about. The reason I don’t throw Hebrew and Greek on you is because I don’t know it. I don’t care to know it. But I’m having a heart and a time with King James. Let’s pray, shall we? Every head bowed and every eye closed and no one looking around.

If you hear today and you never trusted Christ as your savior, maybe you’ve heard about it all your life, but you never understood. I want you to understand God loves you. He paid for your sins and he said, if you would believe he did it for you, he would give you his a freak gift ever lasting life. In just a moment, I’m gonna ask you to raise your hand, your hand doesn’t save you. It just lets me know that what I said made sense to you.

Send free to that made sense to me, and I will trust Christ as my Savior, and I’ll life you to pray for me. We’ll just slip you in a very quickly and just put it right back down. Yes, God bless you, John. Anyone else? You can put it down. God bless you. Anyone who trusts the Lord, God saves. He gives them eternal life.

Father, thank you so much for all that you’ve done for us. And Father, for the one that indicated by an uplifted hand that they would trust you as Savior, Father, you guarantee eternal life as a free gift. That person can know that they’re going to heaven because of what you did for them. Bless each one here. In Kefal, we just ask your blessings upon us during this Christmas time of year that you’d help each one of us to realize how important it is to let people know about the first coming.

More than the second. 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 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 home page 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 broadcasts 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. Friends, one day it will happen. The trumpet will sound, and we will be changed.

Caught up to meet the Lord in the air. So live today and every day, believing that the Lord is coming soon, and just keep looking up.