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Bibleline Bibleline, here God’s word on Bibleline, 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 You can reach us toll-free at 1-800-576-3771. Online donations may be made by clicking on the donations link on the Bibleignmenistries.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.

Turn in your Bible to the book of Hebrews, the book of Hebrews. I really enjoyed the study in the book of Hebrews. It sometimes seems like a very difficult book to understand, but remember it’s written to the Christians, it’s written to Jewish believers. It’s written to those who were under the law, and now they seem like they were seeking to get back under the law again. But they had been redeemed from the law. And so now the Lord tells them why they should move on, grow toward maturity.

And He tells them different things in the life that could hinder them. And so showing us from the book of Hebrews that if you do not serve the Lord, that God is going to chasten. It’s interesting listening to people talk about, you know, the evidences of salvation, how you can really know your say and they usually list a bunch of things that you’re supposed to do. I think one of the best evidences of salvation is that God knows you and you know him and you were there the day you got saved.

I remember it very well. But not only that. The Bible says in Hebrews chapter 12 that if we fail to grow in the Lord, to yield to the Lord and to serve the Lord like we should, that our heavenly Father is going to chasten us. And he says there in verse six, for whom the Lord love it, he chasteneth and scourgeeth every son whom he receive it. So if there’s any kind of an evidence, it ought to be that God’s going to beat the tar out of his children.

So when you rebel against the Lord, you can expect the Lord your heavenly Father to chasten you. And he says here in verse eight, but if you be without chastisement were of all or partakers, then are you bastard and not sons? You’re not my child. So one thing you can know that if I am a child of God, I cannot live as I please and get away with it, because you’re gonna reap what you sow and there’s chasing into be done.

But I don’t believe in looking for evidences in my Christian life that I’m really a child of God outside of the Word of God. I believe I’m saved because the Word of God says so, that if I trust Christ, I have eternal life. And of course, if you don’t trust Christ, you don’t have eternal life. And if you don’t have eternal life, you don’t get to go to heaven. So he goes through and he says some wonderful things, but in serving the Lord, he’s telling us, you know, words, you don’t have to get to that point where you have to be chastened.

He tells us that the first part of the chapter in verse one, where he says, we’re foreseeing, we also are encompassed about what’s so great a cloud of witnesses. Let us lay aside every weight and the sin which does so easily be said us and let us run with patience The race that is set before us run the race with patience Patience what that sounds like it’s gonna be a piece of cake. I just got to be patient. I Have been amazed at how sometimes God slows me down See I have an agenda I I have schedules and sometimes I think God forgets that I’ve got a schedule to keep.

I’ve got things I’ve got to get done. And then the Lord allows, seems like a thousand things to interrupt my schedule. I just don’t understand it. But you know, sometimes God is trying to teach us patience. But what I want you to see is this. Let us run with patient the race that is set before us. In other words, the race that is set before us is the race he sets. It’s not the one I set. It’s not the course I determined.

It’s not the obstacles that I put out there. God has a course for me to run. He’s the one that determines the race and where I run. And he’s the one that says that I’m going to have a heel here or a speed bump or it’s downhill and I can coast or it’s all in his hands. I’m just the run, the race that he sets before me. And sometimes I would love to change this obstacle course. But that’s not my calling.

That’s his. And then he makes his statement here in verse two, looking unto Jesus, the author and the finisher of our faith. Faith to start and faith to finish. You see, it’s one thing you can trust Christ as a savior by faith alone. And so when you trust Christ as your savior, You’re saved by faith, not by your work. So faith and believe in God is not a work. It’s by faith. Then He makes a statement, looking unto Jesus the author, the finisher of our faith.

And as long as we keep believing and trusting the Lord and He keeps leading guidance and He sets the race work, just run with patience. We’re not the one that gets to dictate how it’s going to be. We’re trying to do a lot of things. Okay, but it should be because we just want the Lord to open up doors and to close doors, to do everything perfectly according to His timing. You see, when you get out of that frame of mind, you put yourself under an awful lot of pressure that God didn’t put there, because we make schedules that we got to bind ourselves by and sometimes we overdo it because it’s based upon our own wisdom and ability to make it happen.

Sometimes yes, we do plan, but we trust the Lord to work things out according to His timing and for God to have the freedom to change the course any way he wants to. You see, God didn’t lay out the course ahead of time for us to inspect it in order to see whether or not we want to run it or not. Now you just start running and you take it as you go. And he says this, in verse three, he says, when you get tired and weary and worn, consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself.versive Now the title of my little message for tonight, Christ endured theosta of sinners, people that contradicted themselves and were a contradiction to Christ and look who it’s coming from.

We never used to start getting opposition to consider the source. Do you believe that the devil is against what we’re doing? Or to consider the opposition. Why should I let what the devil doesn’t like stop me from doing what God does. Or if there’s people that don’t agree with what you’re doing or like what you’re doing and they’re contrary and contradictory, should I stop doing right because somebody doesn’t like what we’re doing? No. You try to find out where does God stand and that’s where I stand.

What does God want? That’s what I want and do what the Lord would want you to do with your life. So If you look there in your notes, I start off with the very verse that we just read, for consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest you be weary and faint in your mind. In the words you’re ready to quit, stop, give up, and that often happens. Usually it happens right before victory, so you have to be very careful.

Now the prophets of old prophesied that the Jesus would be controversial, that he would be rejected of men. You read Psalms 22 and you’ll see where people were against what he did. They crucified him Psalms 22. You read there in Isaiah 53 where it says he was smitten for us, but at the same time he says that he was despised and rejected. Now how controversial was Jesus? Remember, for somebody who came into this world as a little old nobody, not a big fanfare, just a little old baby born in a manger, and you start thinking, you know who he is, but look how he came.

He wasn’t born rich, he didn’t live rich, and he didn’t die rich. But isn’t it amazing for a man to have only a three and a half year ministry to be known all over the world. Thinking of how many people throughout the world have heard of Jesus. And he know he only wrote one book. I’ve already wrote three. He only wrote one book. Isn’t that a shame? He only got to write one book. Yeah, but look what kind of a book it was.

It had 66 books in it. But one book. But he only wrote one book. But look how many copies of that book have been sold around the world. Think about it. And yet, look who he is. Was Jesus controversial? And in three and a half years, he made the world so mad and angry and there’s people today still killing in his name. There’s religious people all over the world. The whole religion of Islam started because of their hatred Christianity because of the Bible, because it made, I think, the leader of God’s people instead of Ishmael.

Well, this way goes. Look at the next one. His birth produced controversy and hatred. Look at Matthew chapter 2. Matthew and chapter 2. Now we’re going to try to go through these kind of quicks, so just have your fingers ready to move. In Matthew chapter 2, look in verse 8, and he sent them to Bethlehem and said, go and search diligently for the young child, and when you have found him, bring me word again that I may come and worship him also.

Now you know that was because he did not want Jesus to be born. He did not want there to be another King, and his only goal was he hated the child enough that he would murder the child if he could find the child. He would literally murder a child, just so there’s not even a possibility of this child really being a king someday. Look in verse 13, when they were departed, behold the angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream, sent a rise and take the young child and his mother and flee into Egypt and be thou there until I bring the word.

Didn’t tell him how long you’re going to be there. Says you flee into Egypt with the child. Well, for how long? I’ll send you word. Do you know that sometimes servant Lord is, we do what he says and then it seemed like it’s a dead end. And then you wait until you believe God wants you to do something else. But while you’re there, you do all that you’re supposed to do and you wait until the Lord opens up the next door.

Now what a lot of people do is they get a crowbar sledgehammer and they attack the door, try to bust doors down. If God wants us to do a certain thing, God must open the door. God must make it possible to do for us what we can’t do. And if God does praise the Lord if He doesn’t praise the Lord. Regardless of whether we get what we want or we don’t get what we want, we praise the Lord anyway.

One of our famous little statements that we had when it was out there in Colorado and I taught it to the college kids. I don’t know what’s happening in your life. Praise God anyway. You’re having a bad day. Praise God anyway. Everything going wonderful praise God anyway. Praise God it doesn’t matter what it is. So the kids were heard, how are you doing? Praise God anyway. How are you doing? Praise God anyway. It didn’t matter if everything was great and nothing was great.

Praise God anyway and just get to the place where it didn’t matter what the devil did or anybody else did. I’m gonna praise God anyway. Are you listening to me? You understand what I’m talking about? Because you’re going to have some dark days, okay? Praise God anyway. Don’t let the devil stifle your praise or your joy and ruin your whole day. That’s the devil that does that. And he works behind the scene and he works upon your mind. You see, you have to learn how to think because remember the battle is right up there.

That’s where the battle is. and you’ll either win or lose right up here. So all your failures and all your successes is going to be whether or not did you start right here and that’s where it is. It’s in the mind. All your actions are by product of the way that you think. Like I’ve said before if you want to raise a caliber of your life, raise the caliber of your thoughts. So here in the book of Matthew looking verse 16, verse 16 says, then Herod, when he saw that he was mocked of the wise men and seated in rough and went forth and slew all the children that were in Bethlehem and in all the coast thereof from two years old and under.

So all this happens just because a baby was born. Jesus was born. Should have been the most glorious time of all. And now look at all the people and all the codes that were murdered because Jesus was born. How many people died when you were born? Or because of you? He started off in the midst of controversy. His mom and dad had to leave town and go into another country to Egypt. So that later on when he brought him out, he could fulfill the Scriptures as out of Egypt I called my son.

And he did. Look at the next statement, his ministry so angered the people in his hometown of Nazareth that they sought to kill him. Look there in the book of Luke. Luke in chapter 4. This is where he goes into the synagogue and he stands up and he begins to read the Scriptures from the book of Isaiah where it reads about the spirit of the Lord is upon me. In verse 18, because he hath known it me to preach the gospel to the poor, he hath sent me to heal the broken heart of the priestly deliverance to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, and said it liberty them that are bruised to preach the acceptable year of the Lord.

Then in verse 21, this day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears. And you think, well, everything is going to go wonderful. See, it doesn’t matter. Wherever Christ went, He caused either a revival or a revolt. They either formed or against Him. He either loved Him or hated Him. And so He says here in verse 28, and all they in the synagogue, when they heard these things were filled with wrath, wouldn’t they want that scripture to be fulfilled? What’s the problem?

But did Jesus allow everything that they said and did against Him to keep Him from doing what was right? He always did right. And everywhere He went the Bible says He did what was good. You see, you and I are supposed to serve the Lord and nobody should be able to cause us to quit serving God. Just because people are mean and ugly and they are. That doesn’t mean that you have to be mean and ugly back. keep on doing what God wants you to do.

But anyway, all they wanted to do in verse 29, they rose up, thrust him out of the city, led him into the brow of the hill where on their city was built that they might cast him down headlong. So what would you think from that verse? What did they want to do to him? Oh, I thought they were going to exalt him and be the mayor of the city. All they wanted to do was kill him. And what wrong had he done?

You ever think you get accused of things and it’s not true? And maybe you came and defend yourself. Look there in John chapter 6 and verse 60, John chapter 6 and verse 60. You’re seeing what happens to a man who serves his father. Jesus was as good as they come. He did everything right and look at what happened to him. So he says, if they do this to me, what will they do to you? Do you expect to be treated better?

Remember, our goal is not to try to win the world to ourselves. We’re trying to win him to the Lord, but you win him with truth. If you can’t win him with truth, you don’t win him. So here in John chapter 6, looking verse 60, now we know in this chapter 6, he then fed about 5,000. Now that’s a lot of people and they were hungry, they wanted to eat, and then he got into a boat and he went on the other side and a lot of people find out where he was at and so they came around the coast and they got over there where he was at and then he talked to him some more and so there’s a lot of disciples but we don’t know exactly how many out of the 5,000 that followed him but it’s all in the same chapter and the things weren’t

going to good. So you notice there in verse 60, many therefore of his disciples, and we’re not talking about the twelve disciples, these are other followers, learners. When they heard what he said, because he preached a message, this must have been one hard sermon. I was told that you’re supposed to preach a sermon like this. Have a good beginning, a good ending, keep those two ends as close together as possible. Sometimes we have a bad beginning, a bad ending, and they’re as far apart as possible.

And that’s when everybody goes, let’s sleep in that. So hopefully you’re not going to go to sleep on me tonight. But in this verse, he says in verse 61, because he preached a sermon that was hard for them to understand. That’s why he says, is that a hard saying. So in verse when Jesus knew it himself, that his disciples murmured at it, he said, does this offend you? In other words, my sermon that I preach, you got offended. Do you believe that there are times when I have preached a sermon and somebody gets offended?

The pastor hurt my feelings. He said something. It did something. Or somebody else did something. People always got reason that Ques is to not serve God. But the devil see is always working. It works on your mind. And so you’ve got to be very, very careful. He goes down through here and we’ve covered this before. And he looked at his disciples and he makes a statement to them. He says, will you also go away? Peter says, to whom shall we go?

Thou hast the words of eternal life. And we believe that thou are of the Christ, the Son, the living God. And he got a medal for that one. But not everybody believed the same way. And Jesus knew who it was that did not believe on him. Look at the next one. In John chapter 7 and verse 43, John chapter 7 verse 43, as Jesus goes through here and he’s He’s talking to them, he makes his statement in verse 43, and so there was a division among the people because of him, a division among the people because of him.

In other words, there is a reason why they were divided. You see, some people will be formed, some people will be against him. Jesus, when he was here, understand this. Could not please everybody. Now, if there’s anybody that should be able to please everybody, it should be the Lord. And he couldn’t do it. He couldn’t do it. Do you think you are going to please everybody? Do you think, after you’ve been married for a while, that you’re going to please your little darling hall in every area?

No. Do you think that little darling of yours, I mean, the husband’s going to please this little darling? No. Or she’s going to please it? No. There’s always conflict. Do you think because of your knowledge, your wisdom, You know perfectly how to deal with every teenager. Let’s say you don’t have to worry about your own. You don’t have a clue. You’ve never been so challenged. And all of your life is when you try to deal with teenagers. So you don’t have the answers to deal with every person, every individual.

Accept it. You are not all powerful, all wise, all knowing. You’re not all present. You’re just not. We’re sinners and everybody else is too. Yet we demand perfection out of others and yet for ourselves we kinda bend a little bit. We’re more patient with ourselves. But anyway, the problem is in verse like 46 says, the officers answered, never man spake like this man. Nobody’s ever spoken like this man. Jesus was different, yet but not everybody heard Him like everybody else did.

Some people could see Him and say, this is the Lord. Other people, they heard Him, this is the Lord. And then there’s some, He’s just a heretic. He’s just divisive. He’s a troublemaker. He’s mad. That’s all these things that went on. Look in John chapter nine, John and chapter nine. Now it could take this whole chapter, but I can’t do that. But I know this. It says in verse 16, therefore some said of the Pharisee, this man is not of God, because he keepeth not the Sabbath.

Other says, how can a man that is a sinner do such miracles? And there was a division among them, always problems. And did it cause any problem? yes because he there was a man that was blind and Christ gave him sight. And so they wanted to know about this miracle. They found this blind man that now can see and says, hey, who did that? The blind man says, I don’t know. All I know is I once was blind and now I can see.

Well, who did it? I don’t know. He didn’t know it was. Well it wasn’t long before it didn’t find out. So it says they’re in this verse and they just look at it real quick there in verse 32. Since the world began, was it not heard that any man opened the eyes of one that was born blinds, never happened before? Jesus did something never been done before. He was gone where no man has ever gone before him. If this man were not of God He could do nothing.

They answered and said unto him, Thou was altogether born in sins and thus thou teach us, and they cast him out. They didn’t even want to hear the testimony of the guy that was born blind, and they said it was because of your sins. You were blind because of how your your sins. Well isn’t that a question that came up at the very beginning of the chapter when they they made this statement in verse 2. And his disciples asked him, said, Master, who did sin, this man or his parents?

That he was born blind. Jesus answered, neither have this man sin nor his parents, but that the works of God should be made manifest in him. In other words, God has a purpose for a person being blind. I don’t have to try to figure out what it is. Sometimes you can say, well, I know what it is. You may know and you may not. It’s not important. The reason is you believe God has a reason. And God has a reason.

can be glorified out of a person’s blindness. Did you know that Bobby might be able to see better than some of the people sitting in this church? It’s got an eyesight. When you talk about, you know, can you really see? And that’s why he talks about there in chapter 7 some other stuff, but we won’t have time to look at it. So he looked back there and he says there in verse 35, Jesus heard that they had cast him out.

And when he had found him, he said to him, does thou believe on the Son of God?” He answered and said, who is he, Lord, that I might believe on him? It’s not just a matter of just believe. No, you got to believe on him. Who is him? He said, he that speak of the, I’m the guy. It’s me. And he says, Lord, I believe, because he said there in verse 37, thou have both seen him and it is he that talketh with the Jesus claim to be the Son of God.

And verse 39, and Jesus says, for judgment, I am coming to this world, that they which see, not, might see, and that they which see, might be made blind. Now, he’s that’s an interesting statement, but see, what he’s showing is this, people who claim to be able to see, they know how to get to heaven, all this religion that they’ve got. Well, see, they’re in reality, they’re blind, but they don’t know they’re blind. So when Christ comes and He reveals truth, now they know there is a difference between what they’re saying and what they believe and what the truth is.

But people don’t want to believe the truth. So they become blind and people who are literally blind will be able to see. When I was 18 years old and before I trusted Christ, I was blind. I did not see. But then I saw the light. He’s singing that song, I saw the light. I understood that Christ died, paid for my sin, to my trust in Him. I could have eternal life. Now I see, now I see. So when Christ came into the world, He knew that some people are going to be blinded by Him, and some people are gonna see.

And some people are gonna stumble over Him, and to others who become their foundation. So it’s an interesting thought that He puts down here. When it is what takes a whole book of John’s first by verse. You’ve been listening to Bibleline, a teaching ministry of Calvary Community Church in Tapp of 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 Bible and pledge your support to keep us on the air in your area by dialing toll-free Call free 1-800-576-3771.

That’s 1-800-576-3771. To listen to today’s message again or to obtain a message again, please visit us at www.un.com.au obtain a free download of any of our Bible and programs, just go to our homepage at BibleLineMinistries.org and click on the radio broadcast link. If 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.

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.