This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors.

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 first part of this two-part message will be a blessing to you and your family.

We’ve covered a number of books in the Bible, but there’s a little book, and that’s the book of Colossians. So you can go ahead and be turned into the book of Colossians. Many people think that it’s just a rewrite of the book of Ephesians, but when Takeda was wound up taking the letters, he wound up taking Ephesians and the book of Colossians and probably the book of Philemon because they were written by Paul while he was in prison. And it’s a small little book, but it’s a very potent book.

It deals with the preeminence of Christ over everything, over everybody. You see, there’s a great teaching that I believe that comes from the Word of God as you read study it, that God does not have to have an answer for all of these new religions that comes on the same because He’s already done it, because there’s nothing new under the Son. God allowed during the formation of the Word of God for the churches to have all kinds of problems, all kind of isms and spasms and divisions.

If you name it, they had it because truth many times is best understood when it is been defended and you must defend truth when it has been attacked by air. So there is air that creeps in, and God uses the apostle Paul to address this air. And you can address air when you know truth. Paul had truth. And so he would be able to write upon this air and this air and this air. And after a while, when the Word of God is complete, there is no new errors.

all the religions coming up and the new beliefs, they’re only the old remade, resold, same junk on the inside of the body, just a different label, same poison. So as you read and study the scriptures, you’ll find out that the Word of God is complete. Another thing just to mentioned to you. There’s individuals who believe in asceticism taking the the body and trying to well atone for the wrong that they do by punishing the body and so some will burn their bodies.

I’ve read about some of that recently. I don’t mind these you know the sedins and the love ends it’s the cookouts that I have a problem with. And so you have people that want to deprive even the body, thinking that they become more spiritual if they deprive the body of the things that you need are the necessities of life. So you can become a hermit or a monk and live off nothing and punish yourself and become a martyr, die of starvation because they think somehow they’re going to find some greater spiritual enlightenment in the mystic world and the eastern religions.

And so there’s many who dive into these things, thinking that they have secrets of the unknown, the dark world, Angel’s conjuring up things. Well, you can get in all of that if you want to, but I want you to know for the believer, you have all you need in the Word of God. It is complete. It’s total. It’s everything that you and I need found right here. Now, out of the 13 books, I believe that the Apostle Paul wrote, nine of them were addressed to churches.

And these churches, there’s certain groups. There’s the first four books, you like Romans and first and second Corinthians and the book of Galatians, and it deals with Christ and the cross. So as you read it, if you have that as your underlying understanding, it helps you to approach the book from the perspective of what Christ accomplished on the cross and why. But now when you get into the book of Ephesians and Philippians and Colossians of three groups, it’s more about Christ, but it’s about Christ and the church.

You see, in the book of Ephesians you have of Christ talking about the body. And in the book of Colossians, you have Christ talking about the head. So there are two books, but they’re very important that we need. And as you read these things and you come at it from a certain perspective, and then you have like the book of thessalonians, those two books, but it deals with Christ and is coming. Now in all of these books, all nine of them, I believe that there is an order.

You see, the Bible tells us all things decently and in order. I believe that the Holy Spirit of God, in what He revealed, when he revealed it. And the certain letters in order was for a particular reason. If you’ll take your Bible and just first of all look there in the book of 2 Timothy and chapter 3. Just look at this verse and it kind of gives you the breakdown of really the whole nine books that we’re talking about, but we’re only going to be talking about one little book, the book of Colossians.

In verse 16 it says, all scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reprove and for correction, for instruction in righteousness. Now to understand in verse 15 he’s talking about knowing the scriptures that are able to make thee wise unto salvation, even from a child. But when you look there in verse 17, that the man of God, so that which takes a child of God and makes a man of God, is the Word of God.

So the Word of God is inspired, God breathed every word by God for the instruction in righteousness for the child of God to know how to live. Now those three things that I’ve given to you this before but just kind of a little review, you see there when he has the word and is profitable for doctrine, that means for what’s right, the basic teaching of the word of God. And then when you have the word reproof, that’s because of what’s wrong.

when people deviate from doctrine. So doctrine is the norm for the believer. It’s the norm. It’s the way every believer ought to live. The doctrine in the word of God is what every believer ought to know. That is only normal. If you don’t know the doctrines of the Word of God, you’re not normal. I shouldn’t have said that, huh? But I’m talking about in the spiritual realm. And if you don’t know the Word of God and the doctrines that are taught in the Word of God, you cannot live according to the doctrine.

So if you’re not living according to the doctrine, your life is not normal. Now I’m not talking about how you’re doing physically or financially or socibly. I’m talking about how you’re doing spiritually. So we have the word of God given to us for correction. For correction is how to make that which is not normal in my Christian life how to make it right. With the doctrine of the Word of God, the way it should be. You and I know that there’s a thing that we often hear about marriage.

And they live happily ever at do you know anyone that did? We won’t go there. So there is things that we consider to be the normal, the ideal, and so many do not come up to the ideal. So the Word of God is given to show us the error of our ways and the correction so that you’ll correct the error of your ways and the last part of this is for instruction in righteousness. So doctrine is for instruction and As he says here reproof is for instruction Correction is for instruction So that’s why we have the Word of God laid out in order to help us to understand what God is talking about.

So we have in the book of Romans, we have a lot of doctrine, and in the book of Corinthians, if you read it and we’ve been through Romans and Corinthians, it talks an awful lot about reproof, things that they were doing that was not right. That was contrary to doctrine. Does what God says about the Christian life, the teachings of the Lord, does your life compare? Are they almost identical? Or do you see a big gap between what God says and what you do.

Now, we may get along in this world and everybody love us and you’re doing great financially and socially and all those things, but how are you doing spiritually? That’s what God judges us by. What did he say do? Why call ye me Lord, Lord, and do not the things that I say. And then you have in the book of Galatians correction about the Judaizers, the legalistic that came down and tried to put the law off on the back. So there’s many times problems that will exist.

And as these problems exist, God uses His man of the hour to address the problem on how to correct the problem. Did you know you may have a lot of problems that you’ll have to deal with in your life? But you may not deal with them the right way. That’s why you need the Lord. You need to study the Word of God. Every time you can read and study the Word of God, you’d be surprised what God will do for you.

Don’t believe for a moment that you can get greater spiritual enlightenment from some strange mystical eastern type of religion because you know God’s Word doesn’t have everything and there’s a lot of their ideas out there. Yeah and you’re going to get in the heap of trouble boy. Don’t mess around with things that are outside this book. If you want wisdom, It’s right here in this book. You want revelation and understanding. It’s right here in this book. So you need truth, not just stated truth, but related truth.

How one truth relates to another truth and this truth relates to another truth. Because with us Christianity, truth is not isolated from other truth. It’s all together to build us into the kind of a person that God wants us to be. So Colossians, yes, is a lot of like the book of Ephesians, and you’ll see a lot of parallel. It’s very close. A lot of things. But one is addressing the body in the book of Ephesians. But in the book of Colossians, it’s all about the head who is Christ.

So if you look there in the book of Colossians and chapter two, I want you to see what I believe to be one of the key verses in this little book. Verse nine says, for in him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. I want I want you to notice the word all. All gives us the idea, it means all. It’s lacking nothing. Everything that was God was in Christ. There’s nothing lacking in Him. When you have Christ, you have God.

There is no mightier power on earth, no mightier God. He is the Almighty God. He is God. You and I are not lacking because we are Christians and we believe in Jesus. Jesus. The other word, all I wanted you to see there in verse 10, and ye are complete in Him. What does that word say? Ye are what? Complete. There isn’t anything else you need outside of Christ. You need Him. And He can take care of everything else in this world.

You’re not lacking when you have the Word of God as a source of true treasures, the wisdom of God to face whatever it is, whatever you need to know. There is no college or university, no smart men with all the degrees after their name that can come close to comparing through the wisdom that’s in this book. If they don’t know God, they don’t know Jack. And I know Jack, Jack Matthias, I led him to the Lord. I turned Colorado years ago.

Also look there in verse 13. And you being dead in your sins and uncircumcision of your flesh had to quicken together with him, having forgiven you. What’s the next word? All trespasses. All this is what he hath done for you. You don’t have to seek it, nowhere else. God has done so much for you and I that we need to see and understand and believe. Now look there in chapter one. I think I’ve told you this about three times And we’re finally going to get to chapter one.

But understanding as you read in the book of Colossians, it’s dealing with the subject of the preeminence of Christ. There is nobody over him, nobody better than him. He are complete in him. And in him, dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. So we don’t have to seek additional wisdom outside of the book. We don’t have to see through some mystical angelic powers and beings in principalities. We don’t need all of that junk. We have the Word of God.

It is complete. It has everything we need for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, that the man of God will know how to be instructed in the way of righteousness. And that’s what it’s about. Whatever it is you know, and whatever it is you do, and whatever wisdom you claim to have, if it doesn’t lead you to live a more righteous life, it isn’t worth a quarter. Yes, I’m a child of God, but I am supposed to be a holy child of God, a godly child of God.

Now, when you don’t live the way God wants you to live, it’s because you believe something, God doesn’t want you to believe. because there’s doctrine in the Word of God you’re struggling with and you haven’t totally committed yourself to truth. Truth will change you. Now in the ministry, it’s when Christ is my motive because He is to be my motive of why I do what I do. He is to be my message, and we’re supposed to have a message.

I have a message to the world. know it would be a shame to live without a message, without something to tell, without something that I have to offer, anybody else remember whenever Peter John walked into the temple and it says, silver and gold have I? None. But such as I have given thee in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and wall. What power I do have, I’m going to use. The message that I do have I want to use, but there’s a lot of people who don’t have a message.

And if your message is muddy, your life will be muddy. You want a sharp, powerful life? Then have a sharp, powerful message, something that people need. You know that is one of the things that brought me out of my shell. You realize that when I was young, I was. Shy. You’re not buying that, huh? But it’s the truth. I didn’t want to be around anybody. I like being a loner. If I had my way today, I’d get myself a cabin on the side of a mountain, up on the backside of Alaska someplace and live all by myself.

I don’t know what I’d do with bed even. But knowing what I know, knowing what I know, I can’t afford to do that. because the knowledge that I have of the Word of God says, I’ve got a message. Somebody needs to hear the message. The message of how to have the free gift of eternal life. There is no greater message than that. The greatest thing in the world. I know there’s a lot of wonderful people in this whole world.

The greatest of all time and the greatest of this of all and greater than it. But my measure of a man is Christ himself. I want to be like a lot of people, but I want to be more like him. Dr. Hudson once said, if when I die, I’m going to be just like the Lord. Why can’t I be more like him now when I can be the most good? I’d love to hear him when he said, I heard him say that about three or four times.

I’ve been in a lot of meetings with him. He would say some of the little jewels that I’d just hang on. I’d love them. He was a great, godly man. But the measure of the man that you want to be like is the Lord Jesus Christ. He ought to be your hero. He ought to be somebody you want to be just like. He’s the Lord. Walk in Him. Imitate Him, so in the book of Galatians and also in the book of Ephesians.

Be like the Lord. also to be my might means my power. Every man mature in Christ has to have something that’s in him that gives him the power to do what he does. Now in the book of Colossians you only find that one reference to the Holy Spirit and if you’ll look there in verse 8 you will see that one reference in the whole book about the Spirit. Now there was a man, a paphorous who evidently became a fellow soldier with Paul and a co-labor and a co-prisoner.

And he was no doubt at one time he was the pastor of this church. And he led a lot of people to the Lord and taught him a lot of things. And now he’s over there with Paul and so he’s told Paul, hey, we got a problem in our church. We got problems. And people don’t think Jesus is all we need. They think there’s more truth out there and more wisdom out there. And there’s this Gnostic teaching. You see, there’s people who claim to be an agnostic.

It means to be without knowledge. And I agree with them. They are without knowledge. But there’s some people say, I don’t know, you don’t know, nobody knows, and nobody will ever know. And you don’t know anybody that’ll ever know. Nobody knows. And then there’s others who think, well, I don’t know, but there might be some who do know, but I don’t know. And so I keep looking and searching. I want to tell you that I’m not an agnostic. I’ve settled it.

I know there’s a God. I know what I am. I know who’s I am. I know where I’m going when I die. I’ve got answers. I know that I have eternal life. I know that I’m going to live with the Lord for all eternity because I know the word. The word tells me all I need to know. The word, not it means knowledge or no. I know not without knowledge. There’s some people who brag about how much they don’t know.

But here I want you to see this because I think it’s important. You see here in verse one, Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by Father, will of God and Tamotius our brother, to the saints and the faithful brethren in Christ which are at Colossae. Grace be unto you and peace from God, our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Now when it says God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, down in verse 6 it makes his statement, which is coming to you as it is in all the world and bring forth forth through as at death also in you.

Since the day you heard of him and knew the grace of God, our Father, God in truth. In verse 7, as you also learned of Epaphras, our dear fellow servant who is for you a faithful minister of Christ. In verse 8, who have declared unto you your love in the Spirit, you’ve got the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, all three right there in these. A couple verses. Because you see, there’s something that God wants us to know and that is two main things.

One has to do with what God wants you to be filled with and then God wants you number two to walk with. You see, the whole chapter is broke down into two simple little illustrations. One is doctrine and impractical. A doctrinal is that you may be He wants you to be filled with and then God wants you number two to walk with. You see, the whole chapter is broke down into two simple little illustrations. One is doctrine and then practical.

The doctor knows is You feel that you may be filled, but fill with what? Well that’s what we’re going to look at. And that you may walk worthy. See that chapter three and four, the other one chapter one and two. So as you read chapter one and chapter two, you will see what God’s talking about being filled with. Why are you complete? What hath God done? what does he want you to do because of what he hath done? So that’s why you studied the Word of God.

Now, there’s the Judaism, the law keepers. There were people that were trying to put them under the law, we saw that in the book of Galatians and also in the book of Acts. Well, they were trying to do the same thing here. Trying to get the people to observe days and months and years as though that’ll make you more spiritual because of the days that you honor. You’d come to church on every Sunday and not honor God, not be right with God.

Oh, there’s also others that was touched not and taste not. Abstain from all this and don’t touch this and don’t don’t don’t. The Christian life is not made up of what you don’t do. It’s made up of what you do. The Christian life is positive, not negative. It’s all the thing, if I feel my life doing all the thing God wants me to do, I don’t have time to do all the things I’m not supposed to do. I haven’t got time to get in trouble.

You ever say something in wonder whether or not should you have said that? But a couple of things, let me just kind of give this to you because it’s very simple. And as you go through the book, because Christ is the fullness of God. In creation, and you’re gonna see how that Christ is everything we need in creation. He’s everything that we need in redemption. He is everything that you and I need concerning the church. And he’s the answer to everything that we have concerning the heresies of the world.

And they come from a lot of sources. I have done a little study of the Bible. I’ll try to stick it close to the scriptures as I possibly can. But you’re supposed to know the Word of God that if I do teach air, you should know it. True? You should know what is truth and what is not truth. The preacher does not have the corner on the market. Concerning truth. If you have a Bible, you have the Word of God, and you’re to study the Word of God so that you’ll know what God’s Word has to say.

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. Part two of this teaching will conclude with tomorrow’s broadcast. 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 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 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.