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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 BibleLineMinistries.org homepage. We pray that you will enjoy our commitment to the clear gospel of Jesus Christ, and that today’s concluding message of this teaching will be a blessing to you and your family.

So he says you can’t see or enter into the kingdom of God unless you’re born again. So you have to be born again spiritually into God’s family. So once you trust Christ as Savior, you are born into His family. There’s a spiritual birth, but you don’t see the spiritual birth. He said the spiritual birth is not meat and drink, but joy and righteousness in the Holy Spirit. That’s a totally different thing. It’s just like here’s Florida. We all live in Florida, but we don’t all live in Miami.

So I can live in Florida and not be in Miami. But if I lived in Miami, I do live in Florida, right? So the kingdom of God is Florida and kingdom of heaven is Miami. So the kingdom of heaven is within the boundaries of the kingdom of God. So he says, you can’t get into this kingdom of God unless you’re born again. So when you trusted Christ as your Savior, you were translated from the Kingdom of darkness into the Kingdom of light.

So now He says you cannot see the Kingdom into the Kingdom unless you’ve been born again. So it’s a different one all together. The Kingdom upon the earth there will be lost people here. Here He’s talking about you have to be saved. So when I trusted Christ as my Savior 54 years ago, I was placed into the kingdom of God. Now because I am a nice spiritual realm in the sense that my new birth is spiritual. Can you see my new birth?

I can see your first birth, but I can’t see your second birth. I’m assuming you have one. I just can’t see it. In your way, I know that you have one because you told me so. So I can’t prove that you have one because a loss man can come to church just like you did. A loss man can read a Bible just like you did. And a loss man can pray just like you did. So see, there’s no way for you to prove to me that you’re in the kingdom of God.

Except by what are you trusting in to get you to heaven? And that’s the only thing I can go by. I can’t go by the way you live because how you live a loss man can do the same thing. What can you do as far as how you live that a lost man can’t do. Well, I can drive a car. Well, they can’t do. I can eat food where they can’t do. What can you do that they lost man can’t do the same thing?

That’s why you can’t judge that way. So people are always trying to say, well, I know they’re saved. I know they’re, they give you the shirt off their back. Well, there’s a lot of people to do that too. I mean, my dear old Aunt Susie, there’s no, dear, dear old Caesar. If she doesn’t trust Christ as Savior, she doesn’t get to go to heaven either. So go back here to book John in chapter 3. In verse 4 Nicodemus said unto him, How can a man be born when he’s old?

Can he end of the second time to his mother’s womb and be born? He really didn’t get it. Jesus said, You got to be born again. Wait a minute. You realize where I came from the first time? You mean I got to do that again? No, you could be born of a woman a thousand times and it doesn’t improve you one iota. But if you’re born of God as a new birth, that birth is born without a sinful nature.

If you’re born of your parents down here a thousand times you’re gonna every time you can still be born with a sinful nature, no change. You’re still the same. You got a sinful nature, you’re gonna sin, you’re gonna die. That’s why he says you must be born of God. So that’s why this is so important. In verse 5 Jesus answered very early on sin, he said, except the man be born of water out the Spirit, He cannot enter into the kingdom of God.

Now the man’s already born, so we’re not talking about a water birth. The first birth is always pictured in the scripture here as a flesh birth, not a water birth. And some people want to say, well see that means you’ve got to be water baptized. You’ve got to be baptized in water and believe. So you’ve got to not only believe on Christ, but you’ve got to be baptized in water. Alright, let’s say for example, I’m a lost man. And I believe on Christ, but I have to be water baptized.

Well, let’s just pretend Keaton here. Keaton is the only one that’s around. And I can’t get baptized unless Keaton baptizes me. So he says, I’ll do it. So he baptizes me. I come up out of the water. Now I’m saved. Do I owe it all to Jesus? Or don’t I owe a little bit to Him? Because without Him, I couldn’t have got baptized. And if I didn’t get baptized, I couldn’t have got saved. So I owe my salvation to the kingdom.

Does that make sense that you owe some person for your salvation? We are to trust Christ and Him alone. Because if you had to be baptized to be saved, you couldn’t be saved unless the preacher baptizes you. So you owe me. I saved you. I could have said, no, I’m not going to baptize you. Now what you’re going to do? See what I’m saying? That’s so ridiculous. Now the first birth is flesh, the second one, spirit. You say, how do you know that?

I’m glad you asked. See what it says there in verse six. That which is born of the flesh is water. Flesh. That which is born of the spirit. Two births, my first birth was a flesh birth. My second birth, spirit birth. And the word water is simply referring the word of God when you believe the word, then you are saved. By the washing of the water, by the word. You are born again by the word of God. Now hold your place right here.

Look there in 1 Peter chapter, what’s a good chapter? Look in chapter 1. 1 Peter chapter 1. Are you there there yet. See there in verse 23, in verse 23, 1 Peter chapter 1, page 13, 12, in a church Bible, being born again by water baptism, didn’t John say you had to be baptized? No, he said you had to be born, born again. And so here he says, being born again, not of corruptible seed but of incorruptible by the word of God, which liveth and abideth forever.

And you will not find anywhere in here about the water baptized. Not there. Did the thief on the cross have to be water baptized? These are bare nails of the cross. Jesus had already told him, today shout be with me in paradise. He was going to be with the Lord in paradise and there wasn’t anything he could do to change it. Alter it. He didn’t have to go to church, did he? He didn’t promise he’s going to be good.

He didn’t have to promise he wasn’t going to be bad. He didn’t have to promise to stop or stop anything, join anything. He’s nailed to a cross and yet that he simply believed. And Jesus says, today shalt thou be with me in paradise. Never been water baptized, I think. God saves everybody the same way, faith alone. When you believe it, you’re safe. See, here’s the cross. All those people in the Old Testament will say looking forward to the cross.

We’re saved looking back to the cross. But it’s the cross. It’s what Christ did on the cross. He paid for my sins. And when I believe it, he puts that payment that he made for me to my account. I go to heaven because in God’s eyes, Yankee Arnold died on that cross and paid for his own sins. I just didn’t do it. Somebody did it in my place. But it was substitution. He did it in my, he died to pay for what I’ve done wrong.

I should have died, but he died for me. Once you see it, it’s clear as a bell. Now go back to John chapter three. So He says here in verse 7, marvel not that I said unto thee, you must, must. It’s not an option. It’s, you must be born again. Or you don’t get the new birth. You don’t get the new birth. You don’t get the birth without the sinful nature. You see, you’ve born the first time with the sinful nature.

The second time you’re born without a sinful nature. So whenever I physically die, that old sinful nature is in my flesh. anxious in my body. And therefore, when I die, the body dies. Good-bye, sinful nature. And God will give me a new body that doesn’t have a sinful nature in it. Because my new birth has no sinful nature, I have no sinful nature, and if I have no sinful nature, the new birth doesn’t sin. If it doesn’t sin, it can’t die.

If it can’t die, how long would it live? That’s why once you trust the Christ is your Savior, you are a child of God forever. Isn’t that simple? That clear? Here you got it. All right, look back here now. He says in verse eight, he gives him an illustration. He says, no. Can you see the wind? You can’t see the wind. He says, you can’t see the spirit. Now, you can see the effects of the wind. Your new birth that God’s going to give to you, you can know that you have eternal life because his spirit bears witness with my spirit that I’m a child of God.

But how does his spirit bear witness with my spirit that I’m a child of God? How’s he do it? By the word of God. You see, whenever, and I was teaching this to the college kids, I said, now you and I are eternity. There’s the Father, Son, Holy Ghost. We’re made in his image. There’s God, the Father, that’s the soul. You got Jesus Christ, that’s the body, came into work, and the Holy Spirit. So we are all, I have a body and I have a soul I have a spirit.

So my body is what makes me world conscious. My soul is why I’m conscious of who I am, me. And I have a spirit, God’s conscious. I’m God conscious. Conscious is God. Now you don’t see dogs getting together for a prayer meeting, do you? Because they don’t have a spirit with them. They’re not the same. So God says, when you trusted Christ to save you, you became spiritually alive, quickened, made alive. You were severed from God. Now when you trust Christ as your Savior, you are made spiritually alive a new birth.

And His Spirit, witness with my Spirit, to the word of God, I am a child of God. Now how do I know I’m a child? It’s called the word of God tells me so. His Spirit, through the word, witnesses with my spirit, through the word, I am a child of God. That’s how I know I’m a child of God. That’s how I know I’m going to heaven when I die, because the word of God said so and the word of God does not change.

Don’t worry about the things this old fellow does, the old sinful nature, because that is the flesh and the flesh hates the new birth. But now look what he says here. In verse 8, the wind bloweth where it elicits and thou hears the sound thereof and kest not tell when she comes and then whether it goes so is everyone that is born of the Spirit you can’t see another spiritual person I can see your body but I can’t I you know I’ve been married to my wife almost 55 years and I’ve never seen her all I’ve seen is her body the house she lives in you realize one of these days she’s gonna really see me and I’m really gonna see her oh no I’m look like.

And that’s scary because it’s a sense that I don’t look like I used to look. I had a person going to the bookstore one day and they looked at that picture that I had on there for the gospel driven man and they said, who is this? I said, that’s me. This is not who is that? I said this. That was a long time ago. That was last year’s picture. Alright, So it was 37 years ago, but anyway, we don’t look the same way.

We change these old bodies are going to change. And one day we’re going to get a new one. But it says in verse nine, Nicodemus and Jesus said to them, how can these things be? And Jesus says, how can I explain to you spiritual things when you don’t even understand natural things? He says, you are a master in Israel. Don’t you understand? You’re supposed to be teaching this stuff. This is what you’re supposed to know. Don’t you know the story about Moses and lifting up the serpent in the wilderness and telling the people that have been bit all they had to do is look and live.

That’s all they had to do. Look and live and the son of man will be put up on a cross and all you have to do is look and lift. Nick and Amos, you don’t know that. And God used an illustration to help him to see and understand it. So he says here in verse 12, if I have told you earthly things and you believe not, how shall you believe if I tell you of heavenly things? And no man hath to send it up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the son of man which is in heaven.

Wait a minute, he’s done an talk into him. The Son of Man. Now, you’ll find out that Jesus called the Son of Man, Son of God. He is the perfect man and he’s the perfect God. He is a combination of the God-man. He’s perfect God, perfect man. And therefore, we have, see, there’s God and there was us. And we needed somebody to go between. Well, God can’t come to us because He’s too holy. And man, He can’t get to God because He’s too sinful.

So we’ll never get together. So what God did is come into the world and take up on a flesh body. Now He could live and walk and talk among us, but He’s still God. But He’s also born of a woman, so now He’s man. So we can communicate with Him and it will believe what He says, He’ll give us the new birth and everything is fine. He pays for our sins and took away the imitate that was between us and man now can be joined together with God.

Only through Christ. So Christ died so that could bring man to God. That’s why I did it. That’s 1 Peter chapter 3 verse 18. Now look what he says here. In verse 13 he’s a no man had to send it up but I want you to see this because he made this statement here, but look over there in chapter six. John chapter six, he had already talked to him about something that was very hard and difficult for them to understand.

So he says in verse 60, many therefore of his disciples, when they heard this, this is a hard saying. In the words, well, I don’t understand what you’re talking about. I don’t understand what you’re saying. In verse six, when Jesus knew in himself that his disciples murmured at it, he said to them, Does this offend you? What and if ye shall see the Son of Man ascend up where he was before? You think this is something. Where do you see me ascend up where I came from?

Where did that ever happen? They watched him ascend up into heaven. Now how would you like it? No, you go out here this morning after church and we’re just gonna watch Ken here. Ken’s just gonna all of a sudden he’s just gonna start going up into the air and he’s gonna buy y’all. I said, buy Ken, gettin’ a nice knowing ya. Tell everybody we said hello up here in heaven and you know what I’m saying is gone. Would you say there’s something miraculous going on here?

When’s the last time you were able to do that? Or can you do that? Can you walk on water? I can walk on water. If it’s in the winter time, I’ve been, you know, frozen. But he says, you think that’s something. He says, where do you see me go back up? this is what he’s talking the Nicodemus about. Now look there again back there in chapter 3 chapter 3 and you’ll notice what he says here in verse 14 look at the illustration that he uses to explain the Gotham member Jesus didn’t take John 3 16 and show it to him in the Bible.

Wouldn’t that have been easy? Why didn’t Jesus just take John 3 16 and show it to him in the Bible? Nobody knows why didn’t Jesus take the gospel of John and turn it to John 3 16 and explain it to Nicodemus? It hadn’t been written yet. So he’s telling him about an Old Testament story. So look in verse 14. Now how is a man supposed to be saved? He said how can a man be born? So this illustration and John 3 16 is the answer to Nicodem this question.

How is a man supposed to be born again? He says in verse 14, and as Moses, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up. So is he joining those two together as an illustration? Yeah. So in the Old Testament, people were bitten by the serpent, right? And they were dying. So he told Moses put a brass serpent up there and a pole and just tell the people whosoever would look would live.

That’s all he had to do. Look, it lived. They didn’t have to do anything, top he’d think, join anything, I had to look and it lived. Now how many of us have been bitten by this serpent? Every person in the world has the venom of the serpent of the devil already in their veins. Because he bit Adam and Eve. And that poison, that venom, that virus has contaminated every person born into the world. The only one that didn’t get contaminated was Jesus and that’s because he didn’t have an earthly father.

Otherwise he would have did. So therefore, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness,apache so must the son of man be lifted up. Hold your place right here quickly and turn it to the book of John chapter 12. John chapter 12. And you’ll notice that the prince of this world, that old devil, is that old serpent. And notice what he says in verse 30, Jesus answered and said, thisesley, this voice came not because of me, adherent for the sake’s.

Is the judgment of this world? Now shall the prince of this world be cast out? And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me. If I be lifted up, so he was put on a cross just like he says there in John chapter 3, if the son may be lifted up, he said, I will draw all men in me. So he tells his disciples to go world, preach the gospel to the chosen few, every person.

So he draws us by that gospel. The good news, Christ diedBILITIES for me. He was LIFTED UP and all I have to do is LOOK and LIVE. Just like the serpent New Wilderness, they were told LOOK and LIVE. That’s all that you have to do is you look to the cross as the one that died there died for you. And if you’ll believe that, you will live. You will live and all you had to do is see Him dying in your place.

He paid for your sins. See if I believe He paid for my sins, I’m not trying to earn my way to heaven. Why I’m already going. I already He’s having eternal life. I’m not working for it. I’m not trying to be saved. I already am. So I love that. I go back to John chapter 3. This is why He is explaining to Nicodemus how to be born again. In verse 15 that whosoever, whosoever believe it in Him so you’re to look the Son of Man as he was lifted up as the one who died for you.

And he says, whosoever believe it in him should not perish. Means you will not go to hell. But haveillegal kind of life, everlasting life. Now, some people think that thatRequires perish like Jehovah’s Witnesses. They teach that the word perish, it means to destroy, to annihilate, and it doesn’t mean that at all. Because that same word, Apaluma, in the Greek, is used in the book of Luke about three times where it talks about the lost sheep, the lost coin, the lost son.

They were all lost, but this is what that word lost means annihilate. That makes a lot of sense. You know, here’s a shepherd and he has a hundred sheep and the Bible says if he lose one, he will go out and search for that which is annihilated, lost until he find it. Now you take that meaning they try to give it and it is ridiculous. The woman she lost a piece of her dowry and she couldn’t find it a piece of silver before it was lost.

Same word, Apaluma meaning it was lost. They say it means to be annihilated. Okay so she’s looking for this coin to have been annihilated and when she finds it she rejoices. It doesn’t make any sense. Or the Father that says My son was dead and now he is alive, lost and now he’s found, he was annihilated and he came back. Done. No, they are not Jehovah’s Witnesses. They are false witnesses. The Bible says that Christ would be lifted up as a payment for the sins of the whole world and all that we have to do is believe that he did it for us.

Now look in John 3 16. John 3 16 is the answer to Nicodemus on how to be born again, how to be saved. So he says, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, the Hoosu ever keeps the 10 commandments and goes to the Calvary Community Church and pays 50%. You know, inflation. No, whosoever does what? Believe it in him shall not perish, but have what kind of life? If it’s everlasting life, how long would it last?

It lasts forever. Now the very next verse says, for Christ came not into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved. That’s why he came. So that everybody could say, that’s why he says he would be lifted up and I will draw He draws through the Gospel and tells us to go into all the way and preach the Gospel to every creature so that they can hear it and understand it and believe on the Lord.

Look up here, this is you and me. This is sin. I got me some beautiful sin this week. So I gave me a new wallet. Every time I pull out this wallet, I’m going to think about the person that gave it to me. That’s not a good idea. I don’t know if that’s a good amount. I connect him with sin. No. This is sin. I mean you and me the Bible says that we’re all born in this world with a sinful nature and that’s why we sin God says he loves us.

He hates our sin, but he loves us But the payment for sin the wages death and hell now God loves us wants us to go to heaven and to go to heaven We have to be perfect is righteous as God, but we’re not perfect. We’re not righteous We’re sinners Because of sin we can’t get in and God says you can’t earn eternal life. You cannot work your way to heaven It’s not by your good deeds. There is none righteous not one There’s none that doeth good not one so we can’t do good to get to heaven because there is none good This hand represents Jesus Christ.

He’s the Lord. He’s God in the flesh. He came into this world because he loves us Loves the whole world. He hates our sin and all of our sins, but he loves us. So he took our sins and he paid for them, came back from the dead and said, all I have to do is file believe that he did it for me. He put that death payment to my account and I get to go to heaven on what he did.

I didn’t earn that. Not only deserved it. I’m a sinner saved by grace. If Christ walked in here right now and offered you eternal life and you accepted what would you have? If it’s eternal life, it lasts forever. And if it lasts forever, and all you’re send or paid, where would you go when you die? The heaven. So can you know you’re going to heaven before you die? Yes. And once you trust Christ as Savior, you become a child of God and you’re going to heaven when you die.

Now, you may not always live like a Christian, but you still are if you trust the Lord. But your heavenly Father may have to chase and discipline you. Speak the Torah out of you. Take you home before your time. Serve the Lord. Guard yourself. Be wise. Watch what you see and what you hear. Let’s pray, shall we? Our Father, we thank You so much for all You’ve done for us. We’re thankful for this time together. Thanks for blessing our church.

We’ve got good people. And we just thank You, Lord, for Christ who died for us and made it all possible. In Christ name we pray, amen. We at Bibleline would like to extend a free offer to those who support this ministry financially. This month we are sending a free copy of Dr. Arnold’s teaching series on First and Second Peter. It is a small way that we can show our appreciation for your support of this radio program. Peter’s epistles are filled with lessons of suffering, trials in your faith, on the roles of husbands and wives, warnings of false teachers, and the imminency of the return of the Lord.

The CD Series is certain to help you in your home Bible studies, so contact us today to receive your CD teaching series by Dr. Arnold on 1st and 2nd Peter. Our mailing address is 4811 George Road, Tampa, Florida, 33634. And don’t forget to include your mailing address as well. Without the thoughtful gifts and prayers of our listeners, we would not be able to remain on the air. God bless you. Thanks for joining us on Bibleline. 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. 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, believe in that the Lord is coming soon, just keep looking up.