This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors.

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 air. And 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.

I wouldn’t talk to you about something this month, but I want to preface with these opening remarks. And don’t forget that I’m saying this, so when I get to the other you’ll remember this. I do believe that Jesus Christ is the Lord. I believe Jesus is God and that I believe that God took upon flesh and came into the world, made a payment for the sins of the world, that He came back from the dead, sent it into heaven.

I had trusted Christ as my Savior. I know I have eternal life. I know that I’m going to heaven when I die. And I want you to understand that I do believe that Jesus Christ is more precious to me than anybody that I know and more real than the clothes I have on my back. I believe I know the Lord. I love the Lord. I want to serve the Lord. I also would like to believe that Jesus Christ is the Lord of my life, that I have committed my life to the Lord.

And I would hope that after 53 years nobody would ever question or doubt that. But I want you to understand I did not trust Christ as my Savior so that I could have a so-called personal relationship with God. good, but that’s not why I trusted the Lord. It might be why some people do, but I can’t believe it’s the reason why everybody does. I love Him and I serve Him, but I do not do it to be saved, to stay saved or prove that I’m saved.

And if I didn’t, I’m still saved. is that real to me that I can’t understand why everyone that knows them won’t serve him. I have a difficulty because I can’t picture me not serving him. I can’t even fathom the idea. I have never in my 53 years of knowing the Lord sought to be rebellious to God. I’ve never walked away from God. I haven’t what you call backslit on God. I don’t know what that would be like. I’ve watched many people who have.

I’ve seen their aches and pains and their mowns and their groans. Of people, God’s people, that have rebelled against the Lord, ruling and guiding and guarding their life. I haven’t. Many have. I am not at any time trying to exalt myself in any way. If you think so, you don’t know me. I try to be real. It’s since years I know to be. But there’s a relationship that takes place when you get saved. Where he became my father and I became his child.

That relationship as a father and son has never changed. that relationship in reality to me can’t be broken. I believe that the fellowship between you and your heavenly Father can be strained at times because not always walking as close to the Lord as you we ought to. But there are many people who believe that the reason you get saved is because you wanted to have that personal relationship with the Lord. And that personal relationship to many is talking about your walk with God.

Therefore, if you got saved in order to have that relationship with God, and then if you don’t have that relationship with God, and He’s not that precious to you, or you’re not walking with Him as you ought to, then evidently you have reason to question or to doubt your salvation because you see. Your relationship isn’t what it ought to be. You’re not living like you ought to. So then it’s evident that maybe your life has not really been committed to the Lord.

And you broke in that commitment. And if you got saved because you committed your life to Christ. Or because you decided to make Christ the Lord or the Master of your life, then you have reason to doubt your salvation. So then you look at the evidence in your life and you’re not happy or satisfied with it. And I believe a lot of people are totally deceived that they don’t see as clearly and discerned as other people can see that they would never think that they were saved because Christ was absolutely Lord and Master of every area of their life.

So once you take your Bible and turn with me to the book of Luke chapter 2, the book gospel of Luke and chapter 2. I want to seek to be as simple as I can and yet at the same time as clear as I can. The gospel of Luke chapter 2, Luke there in verse 8, because I did not trust Christ as my Savior so that I could have a personal relationship with God. I have it, it, but that’s not how I got saved.

I got saved because I didn’t want to go to hell. I was looking for some good old fire insurance. And I got some that I didn’t have to make any payments on. The pre-men’s have already been paid. I didn’t make a deal with God that if you save me Lord, I promise you I will, I made no deals with God. And what I like about God didn’t ask for any. He didn’t ask me to commit anything, change anything, alter anything, none whatsoever.

That I could simply accept this free gift of eternal life and that’s it. And He would save me by grace not because I earned it or deserved it but He loved me that much. That’s almost too good to be true. That’s what some people is so hard to believe and I’ll have to admit it took me all several months before I finally could see what my father-in-law was talking about. It was hard for me to believe that I could be saved and have eternal life and didn’t have to change one thing in my life.

And God would still keep His word. Because I didn’t have to keep my word. I didn’t give it. All I did was accept the free gift of eternal life. I had people say, well, if you believe that, that means you’ll just live like the devil. I haven’t for fifty-three years. So there must be something else to this, and I believe there is. So here in the book of Luke in chapter 2 it makes the statement in verse 8, and there we’re in the same country, Shepherd’s abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.

Hello, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them, and they were so afraid, and the angel said unto them, Fear not, for behold I bring you good titans of great joy which shall be to a few elect, which shall be to what? Now I wonder if he really meant that. He probably didn’t really mean that. He probably meant just to a few select that he was going to save. Now you could ask a child.

What do you think That means which shall be to all people. They would probably say, everybody, but you have some theologians today that know the Hebrew and the Greek. And they don’t mean that. They’re too smart for their own good. But a child can understand this. A child can understand a gift, something that’s free. And he says in verse 11, And for unto you is born this day in the city of David, a trailblazer, which is Christ the Lord, a Savior.

That means it. Get this, who is the Savior? He is Christ the Lord. That’s who He is. He is the Lord. It’s a title. He is God. He does rule. He has all power. It’s God manifested in the flesh. And the gospel of John in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. And He made all things, and without Him was not anything made, that was made.

And then in verse 14 of John chapter 1, and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. Jesus Christ was born. As He says here, which is, this is who He was at that time, Christ the Lord and just a baby. But that’s still who He was. Alright. This child was going to be the savior of the world to die on the cross and pay for all the sins of everybody. Now there’s some people that don’t believe that. They don’t understand this.

This is too hard and complicated to get. But I believe it’s very simple. Turn in your Bible to the Gospel of John, the Gospel of John, chapter 4, where we find there’s a woman who’s in the Bible. there’s a woman who went to the well about noon and maybe because of the lifestyle that she had. She went in the heat of the day, not in the cool of the day. She’d been married five times and she was living with a man now that wasn’t her husband.

So when Jesus went there, the first thing he says, woman, you better change your lifestyle. But he didn’t. But he says, I must needs go through Samaria because there was a there was a fish there and he was going to go catch a fish. Jesus was going fishing. Now his disciples went into town and they got to my McDonald’s hamburger. But he stayed there because he says, I have meat to eat that you know not of. So he says up here in verse 9, then said the woman of Samaria, how is it that thou been a you ask a drink of me, which of all woman of Samaria?

The Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans. Jesus answered and said unto her, if thou newest, the gift of God. But it’s not really a gift. That’s just the suck of the man. Or do you think he really meant gift? You think G-I-F really means a gift and that it’s free. You really believe that? You are smarter than a lot of people with PhDs, with doctors, because they can’t believe that it’s really free. They believe it’s free, but you have to commit your life.

It’s free, but I’ve got to make Christ the Lord the master of my life, but it’s free. I have a problem with that. Either it’s free or he’s a liar. He’s not a good man. He’s deceitful. Say what you mean, mean what you say. God cannot lie. He says, if thou knewest the gift of God and who it is that saith unto thee, give me the drink thou would have the ask of him and he would have given thee living water.

She says, I’m ready for it, give it to me. Yank y’all to you. He says, the water that’s in this well when you drink this water, you’ll thirst again. He said, I got some water once you drink it, never have to thirst it. never have to drink another swallow. Because one drink of the water that I have is good for all time and eternity. You never have to do it again. And people can’t see that because she says in verse 13, he said, Jesus and suspended her whosoever drinketh of this water that was in that way, where she was drawn water from shall thirst again.

He said, I got some water. You don’t have to thirst anymore. 53 years ago, I took a swallow some water, never had to do it again. That one swallow has been good for 53 years. It means that I got saved 53 years ago and I never have to get saved again. And the reason is because I can’t get lost. Thirst, no more. Thirst, no more. I’ve never thirsted again. Never had to get saved again because once was enough. But what I want you to also see is in verse 42.

Look in verse 42. Some men, and Jesus never talked to her anywhere in this whole passage about you must commit your life to Christ, or you must make Christ the Lord and the Master of your life, not even mentioned. If it was so important and you had to do it, then he left out part of the gospel because he didn’t require it. You and I, we want people to live right. Therefore, demanded of them. But God did not demand that I have to live right to go to heaven.

Now, don’t forget what I told you at the beginning. I love the Lord. I seek to live as Godly of a life I know how to live. And I have been as faithful as I know how to be in every area of my life of 53 years. But that is not what gets me to heaven. What gets me to heaven is because In a little old living room in Athens, Georgia, I accepted Christ as my Savior. He’s the Savior, not me.

I’m not even helping Him save me. I’m trusting Him to do His job. But I know that that one who saved me, I know who He is. He’s the Lord. He’s the Lord Jesus Christ. And just because I call Him the Lord Jesus Christ, Does it mean that He has to be the Lord, the Master of my life? It’s just that I’m recognizing Him. That’s who He is. I can recognize that there’s a God and believe that there’s a God, and yet have…

No desire to love God or serve God or anything to do with God. There’s a lot of people like that. But along the way, I want to understand that when you trust Christ as your Savior, there is a relationship that takes place because the moment you trust Him as your Savior, even in the Gospel of John, he says you must be born again. There is no relationship between you and God without a birth into his family. When I was born into his family, I became his child.

As many as received him, to them gave he the power to become the sons of God. I became a child of God that very moment. So there’s a relationship between me and God we’re related. He’s my dad. I’m his child. That can never be changed. From here on out, never be changed. Altered by me or God, I’m His child forever. Now, I want you to take your Bible and look there in the book of Luke chapter 19. Luke chapter 19, all the time people want to know, well, what is the real reason Christ came into the world?

I think he kind of gives us an idea. He was in chapter 19 talking to a little feller. By the name of Zacchaeus, you ever heard the story by Zacchaeus? He was a wee wee man, and a wee wee man was he. Climbed up in the sick of more a tree. What? See what he could see. And as the Savior passed that way, I don’t know if I got the rest of it. I never went to Sunday school, remember.

9 and Jesus said unto him, this day is salvation come to this house. For as much as he also is a son of Abraham, today salvation is come to this house. See, this is why Christ came. Because even the very next verse in verse 10 says, for the Son of Man is come to seek and to save that which was lost. Now, if that’s a true statement, then anyone in the world that is lost. He came to save. Yes or no?

So it can’t be that he came and selected a few because if he selected a few, well, wait a minute, weren’t they lost two? Isn’t it the loss that’s going to help? So if he does anything, then he should love all of them. How can he just love these without loving them? These are no better than those because, see, some people think that God chooses to save a few people and give them the faith to believe.

That’s heresy. If you give them the faith to believe, the Bible says, faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the world of God, going to all the world, priests, the gospel to every creature. That’s what I heard. I even read it in the Bible. So I believe that God so loved the world, but there’s some people can’t say God loves the whole world. He just loves a few that he chose to save. And predetermined to save only this few people.

Well, that sounds good. Sounds so intellectual. It is just so wrong. It is just so wrong. your Bible and turn to the book of Mark, the book of Mark, and chapter 12. And Mark chapter 12, remember this simple little illustration that if a man had to make Christ the Lord or the Master of his life, it means that you have to commit yourself to serving the Master. And if that’s true, it means that you can’t really know you’re saved until you have served the master.

That means that you have to wait till you die to find out if you did the job. Well, that’s not the Bible. That means that you can’t know you’re saved now if it depends upon you. You can’t trust you. You’re the problem. That means too. We can’t trust us to do right. I can trust Him. So if I have any security, it’s because I’m only trusting Him. But if you add me into the mixture, I have risen to question and doubt everything.

I don’t trust you and you don’t trust me. And that’s just the truth. Do you trust me to live a perfect life from here on out? I don’t you either. That doesn’t mean I don’t like you? Some of you, I even love. Two or three. But what I want you to see here in Mark 12, in verse 28, one of the scribes came in having heard them reasoning together and perceived that he had answered them well, ask him which is the first commandment of all?

Commandment, commandment. A commandment means these are not 10 suggestions, these are 10 commandments. They are what God commands you to do. And the penalty of not doing the commandment is the wages of sin is death. And since every man has broken the commandments, every man has to pay for that, which is eternal, separation from God. So how you doing? Now look what he said. And in verse 29 and said unto them, said unto them, The first of all the commandments is here O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord.

And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul, with all thy mind and with all thy strength. That is the first commandment. You talking about Christ’s Lord of all or not Lord at all. There’s gotta be Lord of all, every area. And this is the second commandment. Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. There’s none other commandment greater than these. All the laws will fill in this love. God love each other.

How you doing? Do you love the Lord thy God with all my hard mind, body, soul, and strength? No you don’t. You love you. And most people do whatever they really wanna do that they think is best for them. I mean, this whole world’s been set up just for me. Make me happy. Please me. Do what I want. And you’re going to find out, you’re going to have a lot of pity parties because people ain’t coming to your party.

But this is Lordship Salvation. This is the law. Therefore, the law demanded perfection, but we all fail. So take your Bible real quick and turn to the book of Deuteronomy chapter 6. Deuteronomy chapter 6, I want you to see this real quick. Deuteronomy chapter 6 is a simple little verse, and it says there in verse 1, this is on page 223 in a notes, go for a reference Bible, one of the church’s Bibles. Now these are the commandments, verse 1 of chapter 6, these are the commandments, the statutes and the judgment which the Lord, your God, commanded to teach you that you might do them in the land where you go to possess it, that you might do it.

Down in verse three, here, therefore, oh, Israel and observed to do. This is what you’ve got to do. But see, that’s what the law is. Do, do, do, do this. Do that. And if you don’t do it, you’re going to have to make a sacrifice to a tone for your sin. And if you don’t, you die. Sounds pretty good. Don’t you want to live on the law? Well, there’s some people who have climbed to the top of Mount Sinai and looked into the future.

And lo and behold, I saw Mount Calvary. They don’t go to Mount Calvary. They stand upon Mount Sinai. And they look into the future down the road and they can see Mount Calvary over there. And they can see that somebody died on the cross and paid for the sins of the world and came back again from the dead. So they believe that they need to trust that one that pays for their sins to make installments for them. Because if I keep failing to do these laws that I’m on Mount Sinai, then I have to keep applying forgiveness for this one.

Then I send them out, I’ve got to get some more in their plina. But see, they haven’t left Mount Sinai and they haven’t gone to Calvary. They try to mix the two together. They won’t get off this mountain and they won’t go to the foot of that one. And they get all balled up. Understand this. Come up here a minute. Just stand right there. When you want a good looking guy up here, you want a Georgian. This is Tyler.

Now, let’s say Tyler is the old man. He’s the lost man. He’s the old man. Many people believe that what God does is He saves this old man. He’s a young kid, but this is he’s an old man He’s that old man that you have you were born God saved the old man So if he saved this old man, well, then you expect there to be a change in this old man I mean after all God then saved him so he ought to live different act different think different talk different and if there’s no different Then I’ve got every reason to believe you ain’t been saved yet, but because see, I’m looking for that committed life.

I’m looking for him that has the Lord as the master of his life. And therefore, if I don’t see a change in the man’s life, because I can tell he doesn’t have a relationship with God. And if there’s no relationship and he’s not serving and he’s not obeying, he’s not following, he must not be saved. Because any man needs to be saved. Christ as a new creature. Behold, all things are passed away. Everything is new. But after about three or four weeks or three or four years, there’s no change in this guy.

Then all of us together can unanimously declare he never really meant business. And because he didn’t mean business, he’s either not saved or he was saved and he got lost. So many people are working only with this old man. And they think the job is to transform this old man. We gotta get this old man to think differently, live differently. We gotta get this old man to go to church now. And we gotta get this man to get baptized in the water.

We gotta get this old man to start reading his Bible. And this old man to start witnessing this old man to start praying. That’s not the gospel. So how do you explain it? Oh no. I’m up here. Stand over here. You get a bigger man. But understand how it’s supposed to work. When you’re born into this world, yet this is the old man. God didn’t save the old man. See, I am living in this body, and this is me, and I’m the old man over here.

This is born of the flesh, has a sinful nature. sinful nature, he sins. Because he sins, he’s got to die. God didn’t do anything with this old man. The answer to our problem is that see, he was made under the law from Mount Sinai. Do this, do this, do this, do this, do this, he didn’t. He has to die. Everyone born in the world is like this old man that sins. And regardless of how hard you try to not to sin, you do.

You can’t trust you. You can tell yourself what to do and still don’t do it. You don’t even mind you. Let alone why should anybody else mind you. We’re disobedient to ourselves. 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 2 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 For today’s message again or to 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 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. 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, believing that the Lord is coming soon, and just keep looking up.