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

a Christian is the most unique individual in the world. There’s nobody quite like a Christian, a real Christian. But of course, if you’re not a real Christian, you’re not a Christian. So a Christian must be real, true. I’ve heard statements like, you know, now there’s a born again Christian. There is no other kind. If you’re born again, you’re a Christian. You’re a Christian, you’ve been born again. Now, that man’s been gloriously saved. Most of y’all have just been saved, but to be gloriously saved.

Well, if he’s been saved, it was glorious. And once you trust Christ to save, you have the free gift of eternal life. Take your Bible and turn to 2 Corinthians and chapter 11, 2 Corinthians and chapter 11. As you know, we have a multitude of churches in America, and most churches consider themselves to be Christian churches. Oh, different names, but it’s a Christian church. We have a man in a White House and those that are running for elected office and everybody’s a Christian and none of them believe the same thing or not all of them agree.

But they’re all Christians and as you listen, they’re always talking about the evangelical Christian and the moderate Christian, the fundamental Christian. There’s all these Christians. I think somewhere along the line we might have forgotten what is a Christian. Did you know that if you try to explain what a Christian is, people will get mad? Even if you tell them what a Christian church is, there’s people be furious about that because they don’t want to know what is a real Christian.

It’s their concept of what is a Christian because everybody knows We’re a Christian nation. What does that mean? It means everybody’s saved. Not really. So I want you to look there in your notes and you’ll see the notes that I have corrupt. As an adjective marked by immorality, perversion, depraved, dishonest, containing heirs or alteration. And then as a verb, corrupted to corrupt, subvert the honesty or integrity to ruin, morally pervert, to taint, contaminate, to cause, to become rotten, spoiled, to change the original form of.

So let’s look at something that’s written here in the Word of God. Second Corinthians in chapter 11. You’ll notice there’s a verse here in verse three where he says, but I fear, lest by any means as the serpent beguile leave through his subtlety so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. So now you know what the word corrupted means. The Lord doesn’t want your mind corrupted from the simplicity that’s in Christ. So if we can’t determine certain things, we’re in a heap of trouble.

That’s why when I witness to people, sometimes I’m always having to ask them, I say, would you please explain your term, define your term? When you say eternal life, what do you mean? When you say saved, what do you mean? You say, Christian, what do you mean? When you say, believe, what do you mean? Faith, what do you mean? I want to know what they mean by what they’re saying. And sometimes people have a meaning that’s not compatible to what you understand.

And so sometimes you can carry on a whole conversation for several hours and nobody’s really on the same page. Usually I know I’m married. We’re not going there today. We’re not going there today. But look in verse 4. for if he that come and preaches another Jesus, that means one that is corrupted. You are corrupting who the real Jesus is and given another Jesus, but one that’s a perversion of the truth. The next statement he talked about another gospel.

So there’s another Jesus and another spirit, the same verse, or if you have received another spirit or another gospel. So look up here just a moment. There is a real Jesus and there is a real spirit and there is a real gospel. The truth of them, the truth. But the Bible teaches that there are those that will corrupt the real Jesus, the message of it, and the real teaching concerning in the Holy Spirit and the gospel. Now you stop and think in the world of which we live.

Are there anybody in the whole world that is corrupting the true teaching about Jesus Christ? Some people don’t believe that Jesus was the son of God or that he was God in the flesh. They don’t believe that. So not to believe the truth is to corrupt the truth. So there’s people that are doing that. So if you can corrupt Jesus Christ, remember this. There are also people who are corrupting the teaching of the Holy Spirit. Now the Holy Spirit is a comforter just like Christ and he indwells every believer the very moment you trust him as your savior.

And there’s a lot of people who say, well the Holy Spirit told me to do this and he didn’t do it. He gets blamed for a lot of things. The Holy Spirit did that. He did not. The one you’re talking about is a corrupted Holy Spirit. I know the real one. I know what he’s supposed to be like because God revealed it in his word. I don’t go by feelings. I feel it. You had too many onions on your hamburgers.

So what about the gospel? Surely nobody would corrupt the gospel. The truth of the matter is that the gospel is good news. And the good news is that God will save you forever. And it won’t cost you anything. And that when you have it, he’ll never cast you out and never lose you. He says, for by grace are you saved through faith that not of yourself, it is the gift of God, not of works. So are there individuals who like to add a little works to the flavor?

And they say yes you got to believe on Christ but you’ve also you got to keep the Ten Commandments, you got to join the church, you got to obey the Sabbath, you got to do this, you got to get water baptized, you got to give money, you got to and the thousand things they add unto it. They’re corrupting the gospel. The gospel is that you’re saved by grace without works, now or ever. You can never be saved by any works, past, present, or future, because salvation is the gift of God, not of works, now or in the future, not of works.

So no works that I do have anything to do with my salvation. to add works to that message is to corrupt the gospel. And he says, I don’t want you to corrupt your mind from this simplicity that’s in the gospel. And the gospel is so simple. It’s free. It lasts forever. Don’t mess with that. I was in dwelt by the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit is God. Don’t mess with that. Don’t try to change that. Jesus Christ is God in the flesh who came into the world, born of a virgin, went to the cross to pay for all of my sins, was buried rose again and came back from the dead and ascended into heaven and is coming back to get me.

Now don’t mess with that. Adding works to all of this stuff, you can mutilate the message. Now, if we get the wrong Jesus and the wrong Spirit and the wrong gospel, is it possible that people could be corrupted in their mind about what is a Christian? Because if they’re wrong on those three things, you’ve got to be wrong on what a Christian is. So will the real Christian please stand up? Look in your notes. Let’s say deviate too far from the main highway here.

The word Christian is used three times in the Bible. And the disciples were called Christians first in Antioch. That’s in Acts chapter 11 of the 26. Then a gripper, southern DePaul, almost a persuadest me to be a Christian. That’s in Acts 26, 28. Yet if any man suffer as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God on this behalf. 1 Peter chapter 4 and verse 16. So what is a Christian? You say, well, what does he look like?

Well, I am a Christian. So this must be what a Christian looks like. See, when you trusted Christ as your Savior, you became a child of God. And when you became a child of God, you became a Christian. I want you to look at the bold part down here. I put this in nice big bold because I want to make sure everybody sees it. A Christian is one in whom Christ lives, and a Christian is one who lives in Christ.

This is the only person that can lay claim to the name. Either way, it is totally impossible for any other to claim the name of a Christian. Will the real Christians stand up? All others are phonies and therefore illegitimate. Now that’s just the truth. So a Christian is not somebody that you judge that goes to church. Think of how many churches there are and how many different names they’ve got on the churches and how many different statement of faith they have that clash with everybody else’s.

And yet God’s only given one truth. Thy word is truth. If it doesn’t measure up with the word of God, it’s false, it’s corrupt. That’s why there’s so many people who read books on the Bible, but they don’t read the Bible, study the book, so that you can have discernment. You say, well, all churches are the same. No, they’re not. You want to check out who is their Jesus? Who is their Holy Spirit? What is their gospel? What do they say makes a Christian?

You see, you can’t make a Christian any way you want. A Christian has to be somebody that admits to God, I am a sinner. I can’t save myself. And I believe Christ died and paid for my sins and I’m trusting him and him alone as my only hope to get to heaven. Now the church can’t produce that. Church can’t save anybody. Pastor can’t save anybody. Priest can’t save anybody. Pope can’t save anybody. Obama can’t save anybody. not how that slipped in there.

I have no idea. Nobody can save anybody. Only when they can save you is Christ and that’s why you must trust Him and Him alone as your only hope of going to heaven. Look at the paragraph there in the middle of the page. However, Christian is one of the most commonly used religious words in the English vocabulary. Unfortunately, with only rare exceptions, there is no consensus as to a common definition of the word, even among professing Christians. Words are important because they are vehicles of communication.

For example, if there is not an acceptable definition of the words used between two people, they can talk to one another for hours but never communicate. Thus Christian is a nebulous word to most and is understood in a generic or general sense rather than with an absolute definitive meaning. Simply stated, the word means whatever the speaker or writer and listener and reader wanted to mean based on their opinion and frame of reference. So we have all kinds of things, as mentioned here, there’s Christian politicians as Christian homosexuals, as Christian lesbians, as Christian same-sex marriage, as Christian cults, and there’s this and there’s that.

And everybody wants to say anything about anybody else’s religion because that’s just a no-no. That’s not just politically incorrect. It’s religiously incorrect because you offend people when you say something and you know being a Christian means you don’t offend anybody. And you know that the head of the Christian movement was Jesus Christ and he never offended anybody. Did he? Truth is offensive. And when you stand for truth, you offend people. And this is why sometimes we don’t like to offend anybody.

Because we want everybody, if there’s anybody that wants everybody to like him, it’s me. I want everybody to love me. I know me for seven years and I like me. Why can everybody else like me? But you see, when you come to Christianity, you need to understand just what is, what is a Christian. Take your Bible and turn there with me to the book of John, the gospel of John, chapter three, chapter three. John chapter three, there’s something that’s mentioned here, and it’s easy to define because you’re talking about the saints and the aunts.

You know, you’re either saved or unsaved, you’re either lost or you’re not. So he says here in verse 18, he that believeth on him is not condemned, but he that believe it not is condemned already because he have not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. Believers, unbelievers. God’s the one that says the only way you can become a Christian is that you must believe in Him. And then he tells you what that means to believe in Him means to trust in Him, to rely upon Him, to know that He’s the one who died and lacross paid for all of my sins.

If He paid for all of my sins and I believe that then I don’t have to pay for any of my sins. Past, present or they’re all paid. I’m going to have him because of what he did for me. I don’t earn that. I don’t deserve that. That’s why he says you’re saved by grace. But some religions tell you that you must earn the right to receive his favor. For example, I just happen to have this little booklet here.

This is a book on called Evangelism that I put together 30 years ago. It might be more than that. It really doesn’t matter does it? I had a Bible college for 15 years. And so I had to teach all the kids cult evangelism what it is and what it is not. And so here’s one of the little sections that I had on here and it dealt with the subject of Jehovah’s Witnesses. Now remember as I read some of these statements, these are simply statements they made they print.

So I’m not attacking them. This is what they wrote. I’m just telling you what they said. Then I might even say what God says. And you might be able to discern, hey, that’s not the same. Now, isn’t that fair? I report, you decide, I’ve heard that before somewhere. So let me just make sure you understand. In their book, they wrote, make sure of all things whole fast to what is fine. Name of their book. page 437 to 441, there’s certain statements made about being saved.

Faith must be demonstrated by consistent works. Letter J, this is in the book, not once saved, always saved. Endurance required. Now, as you listen to this, is that compatible to what we preach here? No. Some of you all have already learned some discernment. You could say, hey, that’s not right. That’s not right. But you see, we’re not having the same message. This is a corrupted gospel. Their gospel is corrupted because it does not agree with what God plainly says in His word.

And He says, I’m concerned that your mind should be corrupted from the simplicity that’s in Christ. You see, whenever you add work to the message, It gets really complicated. If it’s free, well that solves that. But if you have to earn your way to heaven, by the way you live, doesn’t it get complicated? Now you gotta know, are you capable of doing it? What are the real requirements? What are all the requirements? Were you good enough? How many good works do you have to do to know you made it?

How many bad works do you have to do to know you don’t have it? So do you know when you’re really saved or really lost? What do you know? They don’t know anything. And that’s why, well, I hope I’m going to heaven. I’m trying, I’m doing the best. That’s not in the Bible. God says these things have I written unto you that believe. That’s all. You may know that you have eternal life. How can I know I have eternal life?

Because I believe, that’s all I have to do. If I trust Him, He gives me eternal life and I go to heaven or what He did. Now watch the problem. There is no problem there, see. But if you had to earn your salvation or if you could lose your salvation, you don’t know if you got anything. Unless you believe that once you’re saved, you’re always saved, you don’t have anything. You have no hope because it depends upon your works and how you live.

My going to heaven has absolutely nothing to do with how I live my life. Now, I live my life to try to place the Lord but not to get to heaven. but because I’m going there. I serve the Lord because I love Him because of what He did for me. He gave it to me as a gift, totally free. And I love Him for that. Let me read this to you. This is also in their book. The following quotes are from their literature.

God’s will is that to make good His salvation to everlasting life, the believer must be a preacher in this world. That’s in their book page 137 on this means everlasting life. That’s why they all have to go out and preach and knock on doors. And that’s why when they come to your door and you know who they are and what they’re after, God says, don’t even ask them to come in the house. He says, well, I don’t want to offend them.

What about God? God says, no. God does not want you listening to anything that’s contrary to the simplicity that’s in Christ. See, God made things simple, easy to understand. Man complicated because he can’t believe it’s that easy. It’s free. Free. You understand? Free? Not of works lest any man should boast, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us. The next statement they wrote, excepting the message of salvation and devoting ourselves to God through Christ and being baptized in water is only the beginning of our exercise of faith.

It sets us on the way to everlasting life. You ain’t got it yet. You just got set on the right way, see. Then what is the second of the things that you must do to get ready for life in the new paradise? You must meet with other people who have the same knowledge and faith for these today make up a new world society. So you’ve got to go to the kingdom hall. Next statement, remember that meeting with the people who really steady such good things of God’s Word is a thing that you must do to gain God’s favor and life in the new paradise.

The third thing that you must do in order to receive God’s favor is to change your living from the former way to God’s way. That’s just how you get eternal life. This is what they say. This is what they write. Does this agree with what God’s word says? No. Then this is false. Some people say, well, you don’t have a right to judge. Well, bless it be God. I’m not judge. I’m just telling you what the judge said. He wrote his word and says this is right and this is wrong.

And I’m supposed to not be able to know what’s right and wrong. Then why did he write it? He wrote it so that I could say, hey, that’s right and that’s wrong. So when somebody makes up their own religion, I’m not supposed to agree with it because, well, they mean well. They’re such nice people. Listen, I could stand up here, a preacher from all the different kind of religions there are in the world. If any one of them adds one word to the gospel, how a man is saying, false.

He’s false. False teacher. False preacher. If I had over here sitting on the stool Some old drunk you just dug out of a gutter He looks pathetic He shooting drugs Living like the devil But five years ago some beer joint somebody gave him a heaven track and he trusted Christ as a Savior Now listen to me and listen well If that man dies and these 15 priest and pastors and whatever, all dressed up and collars on backwards and looking sharp, they all die.

There is the real Christian. Say, what? You see, these are like the people who stand and say, I fast and I give ties of all that I possess. I’m so glad that I’m not like that man. And that man, this is Lord, I’m the center. be merciful to me. Jesus said that man is justified and these are hypocrites. Jesus said that about the religious leaders and religious leaders are leading people astray and their churches all over the world and they have the name their Christian check if they do not believe that salvation is eternal and by trusting Him and Him alone that they have eternal life.

They ought to take the name Christian off of has nothing to do with Christ. Let’s look at another one. I’m not making this stuff up. I don’t have to. It’s out there and it’s real. But let’s take a look at one called Mormonism. You ever heard of Mormonism? The facts. Organized in about 1830 by Joseph Smith. Somebody else was along before that. But reveal the place where the golden plates were buried. carried an angel Moroni. He gives me some special glasses called the urine and the Thurman.

And he reads these plates and lo and behold, he’s got him a new translation. And this is what he says about salvation. We believe that through the atonement of Christ, all mankind may be saved by obedience to the laws and ordinances of the gospel. And what are the laws of the gospel? We believe that the first principles and ordinances of the gospel are first, faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, repentance, baptism by immersion for the remission of sins, for laying on the hands for the gifts of the Holy Spirit, and on and on and on and on and on.

You say, whoa, whoa, whoa, we believe the same thing. No, we don’t. Their Jesus is not my Jesus. Their gospel is not my gospel. It is not the same. Now, let me just mention this to you. This is what they say. This is from their writings. Just listen. A lot of people don’t want to read stuff, because they don’t want to form an opinion. Some people think that ignorance is bliss. Ignorance is not bliss. We believe in God the eternal Father.

That sounds good. But this is in their book in what they wrote. They said, first, God Himself, who sets enthroned in yonder heavens is a man like unto one of yourselves. God in heaven is a man like you. That is the great secret. I am going to tell you how God came to be God. We have imagined that God was God from all eternity. God himself, the Father of us, all dwelt on earth the same as Jesus Christ himself did.

Jesus says, as the Father hath power in himself even so hath the Son power. To do what? What the Father did? That answer is obvious. In a manner to lay down his body and take it up again. Jesus, what are you going to do? Lay down my life as the Father did and take it up again. You have got to learn how to be God’s yourselves. To be kings and the priests to God the same as all gods have done.

Then he says, God himself, the father of a soul, is a glorified, exalted, immortal, resurrected man, and that Adam was the first man and became God. These are the Godmakers. Their religion was so bad, they were chased out of several other places. They finally settled out there in Utah. But is there a gospel? My gospel? Are they talking about the same Jesus that I taught? No, it’s not the same. They say that Jesus and Satan were brothers. I don’t buy that.

That’s not the Bible. 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 by the line and pledge your support to keep us on the air in your area by dialing toll free, 1-800-576-3771. That’s 1-800-576-3771. To listen to today’s message again or to obtain a free download of any of our 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 1030 and at 6 o’clock on Sunday evening. 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. 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. We believe in that the Lord is coming soon and just keep looking up.