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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 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.

Well, we’ve got several things we want to talk about today. And that is that Jesus steals the storm. He steals the storm. So I want you to take your Bible and turn to Matthew 8, the book of Matthew and chapter 8. We’re going through some of the things on the life of Christ. So you understand a little bit about who He is, what He did. And the Bible says these things are written that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God, and that by believing in Him, you may have life through His name.

Everything He did is not written down. But what is written down is enough for us to believe. So that’s why it’s so important for every one of us to believe what God has to say. So here in the book of Matthew and chapter eight, and verse 18. The Bible says that Jesus went about doing good. Then everywhere he went he just he did good. Found in the book of Acts in chapter 10. So Christ did good everywhere he went and he was able to do some things that nobody else could do.

If you think you’re gonna follow the example of Christ in every area, have fun, He could walk on water, try that. And I would never tie you going to feed 5,000 next Sunday because you may have a problem, especially if you only had just a cup of fish and a cup of loads of bread. You may come up short. The Bible tells in the Old Testament, the book of Isaiah, that a man can sleep on the bed and the bed is too short.

You ever seen some big fella with the bed is too short and the feet hang over? In other words, he’s coming up short and put a blanket over you and the blanket’s too small to cover you. You ever have that happen? When your wife turns over and she takes all the covers So then you kick her out of bed and take the covers well The Lord lets us know that in life we come up short We don’t know everything we can’t do everything.

We can’t stop everything we can’t heal everything. We don’t have the wisdom to get ourselves out of a lot of jams. And the Lord delights in deliverance, doing something for you and I that we can’t do for ourselves. But just kind of get an idea. Look what he says here in verse 16, in verse 16 of chapter 8. When the evening was come, they brought unto him many that were possessed with devils. He cast out the spirits with his word, healed all that were sick.

Now that’s better than the Obama Obama Healthcare plan. You know that affordable healthcare? This was free. I was like it, if somebody could just, it was free, free. So I guess the Lord in heaven, he knows about all the sicknesses and diseases. And he can heal everything, everybody, solve every problem. And the Bible even makes this statement. Now under him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that they think.

doesn’t mean you will. And that’s the hard part about learning in life. Just because God is able to do anything doesn’t mean he’s going to do it. And the Bible also makes his statement that sometimes people don’t have because he says you have not because you ask not. And sometimes you can ask and still not get. Does God know what you have need up before you ask? Then why should I have to ask? He already knows. But he wants you to ask.

And just because you do ask and he can do something about it, he may choose not to, because he may have a better reason for not answering your prayers. I have lived long enough to be so thankful that God has not answered all of my prayers. And some of them that he answered, that wasn’t really what I wanted, but I’ve learned that his way is always best. best. Don’t argue with God. Don’t try to bless God out. I did that in the early part of my ministry, but it’s not the best thing to do.

You know, you’re getting mad at God and just I’ll tell God what I really think. You know, like sometimes I have a hard sermon, I’ll preach in church and somebody walk out the door and says, why don’t you just tell us what you really think? Well, here he makes a statement. Look there in verse 17, that it might be fulfilled DonaldTrump He’s not in the cross and therefore you can claim healing because Christ died on the cross. That is not true.

That is a heretical teaching done by a lot of times, Pentecostal, or apostolic, or like or the charismatic that get into the healing line. He said, just claim it, just claim it. No, you can’t claim it because you have no right to it. This is what Christ did while He was here, and He did do this, and it is written from the book of Isaiah in chapter 53. So Christ did this, but see, he fulfilled that scripture, but he hadn’t gone to the cross yet, so it’s not in the cross, it’s not in the payment He made on the cross, and you can just name it and claim it.

No, you can’t. You can give it all you, give it your best shot, but that’s not where it is. Now look what he says here in verse 18. Now when Jesus saw great multitudes about him, he gave commandment to depart onto the other side. So the Bible says that there were a lot of people and he knew how to drum up a crowd, didn’t he? I mean, he could just do a little miracle and everybody come out to see what he did.

And a lot of people did it because they simply wanted something from him. They didn’t want him, they wanted what he could do. They wanted those free fish sandwiches they could get. You know, like trying to have a special at Burger King or whatever. Look in verse 23. In verse 23, verse 23 to 27 kind of gives us an idea of this little story of what took place. He says there in verse 23, and when he was entered into a ship, his disciples followed him.

And behold, there arose a great tempest in the sea. And so much that the ship was covered with the waves, but he was asleep. And his disciples came to him and woke him, saying, Lord, save us, we perish. Now, remember, they’re with the Lord. It’s hard for us to understand, but if you have been there, you probably would have done a little wine and pine in yourself. He’s asleep, there’s a storm. They think they’re gonna sink. They’re worried and the one that can calm the waves, steal the storms, sound asleep.

Believe it or not, there’s sometimes in life, we think God is asleep. He just, he doesn’t know what’s going on in my life. I mean, if he knew what I was having the face, he’d do something about this. And so we try to put pressure upon God. Lord, if you only knew, if you’d have been here, remember Mary and Martha? Lord, if you’d have been here, this would not have happened. But you were not here, sure fault. You could have stopped this.

As you live your Christian life, you’ll find that there’s a lot of things God could have done. But you know, as God looks down from heaven, He looks at you and He says, you know, you need to learn this lesson. And so the way for you to learn this lesson is to me to let you have this trial. This trial will teach you this lesson that I want you to learn. Because I have some people that need to know this, but you don’t know it.

You don’t know the answer to that problem that this other person has. So I’m gonna teach you a lesson so that you can share it. So God will let trials come into your life and they don’t come all at one time, but he said, I want you to learn a lesson. So you’re asking God to remove it and God says, no, it’s there for a reason. He wants you to learn something. Always be willing to learn from every trial and tribulation, to everything that you have that comes in your life.

The ups and the downs and everything about God. He teaches us differently. See, we like to just think, I just sit down with the word, he’s going to teach me all I need to know. No, this is just book learning. Now you’ve got to apply it. So in your life, God is going to teach you things that you don’t know. So believe it or not, things may be going along a little smooth right now. But the Lord says, no, no.

There’s somebody over. It’s got a real big problem. going to have it next week. So I think I’ll just, I’ll take Lynn and teach him a real good lesson this week so he’ll be ready to go. And so the Lord may give you personalized attention. Now you and I are not the one that decides what we need to learn. Our Heavenly Father is doing that. He is teaching us. Just like when he was here, literally he taught the people because he knew what they needed.

Well, he knows now what we need, so he’s still going to teach us, but we sometimes don’t like the way he teaches. But he wants you to learn. So whatever you’re going on, say, Lord, help me learn it quick. Help me learn it quickly. I had some things happen not long ago, but he says, you better learn it quick. You need to learn it quickly. Because you think as soon as I learn the lesson, maybe the problem will go away.

And you know that It’s a lot of truth to it. If you’ll just stop fighting God, learn what He has for you. And it could be He wants to teach you patience. It means you don’t get what you want when you want it. You don’t get the answers when you want it, but you learn how to be patient and meet and happy. In spite of everything that’s something that’s going wrong. God is a wonderful teacher. Jesus Christ was the greatest teacher ever.

Nobody could teach like he could teach He’s the Lord so he knew what he was doing, but he noticed this and he says there in verse 28 and he said unto them Why are you fearful? Oh ye of what? Little faith remember this Going to heaven is not the result of having great faith, you know, because that’s a long ways away way. So I really got to have a lot of great faith to get me all the way there.

No, it’s not the size of your faith, it’s the object of your faith. See, if you put your faith in the Lord, then you’re all right. Is it you’re not putting your faith in Him? You’re putting it in something else and it’s going to let you down. They were putting their trust in that boat, their own talent, their own abilities, and they’re very limited. But if you learn to go through life, just trust in the Lord. He’s to be surprised to a greater peace of mind and joy that you will have.

And then look what he says here in verse 26, then he arose and rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great column. Now, if the Lord has such power that he can just speak the word and cause it to be peaceful, steal. God is able to do all of that. Remember, he was able to cast out demons. He was able to heal, able to raise the dead. He’s able to do anything. And at verse we read why you go, So for he is able to make all things do all things, and it will amaze you what he is capable of doing.

They are in the book of Ephesians in chapter 4. But you know, just because he is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that you ask or think, doesn’t mean he will. you and I are supposed to live our life believing he’s able to. When the three Hebrew children was going to be cast into the burning fiery furnace, the king says, well, your God be able to deliver you? He says, be it known unto you, O king, whether he does or he doesn’t.

Our God is able to do it. But if he does find, if he doesn’t, that’s fine too. So you You can trust the Lord because it’s one thing to believe God can’t do anything that hurts. But when I know he can, but he might not unless he has a higher purpose for my life. You know, there comes a time when God will allow us to die, right? If he doesn’t, none of us will ever get to heaven. Don’t we want to go someday?

Well, we can’t get there unless we leave here. So one day we’re going to have to die. So one day God just lava let you get sick. God just lava let something happen to you. And he’s able to prevent all things, but that doesn’t mean that he will. So it’s important to remember that. Look what else he says here in verse 27, but the men marvels saying what manner of man is this that even the winds and the sea obey him.

The winds and the sea obey Him. Now, that’s that’s power. And when they made the what manner of man, well, this was a different kind of a man. This was a perfect man. He had no sinful nature. But He was also a perfect God. He was a perfect God and perfect man. Unity. This was a very awesome man. A man that could do anything because he says, as a man, he humbled himself to the Father and did all that he did and all the miracles by the power of the Holy Spirit.

In other words, to teach us we’re supposed to depend upon the Lord and not upon our own personal wisdom and strength. So these things are in God’s word and it’s very important. Now I want you to take your Bible and just look at it real quickly in the book of Psalms. The book of Psalms, Psalms 56. There’s a verse there that you might enjoy looking at. Psalms 56 and verse 3. And you’ll notice what it says. What time I am afraid I will paint it.

Are you reading your Bible? Did you look at it? Did I read it right? You just take the preacher at his word, you don’t check him to make sure that he’s staying by the book. Look what it says in what time I am afraid I will lose my mind. I will panic. I’m looking for the panic button. I will trust the Lord. I will trust in them. There’s times when you don’t know what to do. You just don’t know what to do.

In spite of how much Bible you have and all the wisdom that you have and how many years you’ve been serving Lord there still seems like there’s things that comes up and you just don’t know how you’re going to handle it. So you just trust the Lord. Trust the Lord religio through it. Remember he’s walking with us. He lives inside of us and he’s going to walk with us. He’ll walk you through everything you need to go through. And sometimes he doesn’t go around things.

He doesn’t go over things. He doesn’t go under things. Sometimes you’ve got to go right to the middle of things. The Lord is good. And he’s teaching us all these wonderful, wonderful lessons. Now, I want you to take your Bible and turn to the book of Matthew 14, Matthew in chapter 14. Jesus knew that people get hungry. He knew they had to have things to drink, no foodie. He knew this as a man. He was here. He got hungry.

He got thirsty. So what he’s doing is showing them that, look, in the Old Testament, when they were hungry in the wilderness, God gave them manna to eat. Miraculously supplied them manna to eat, a heavenly food. And God gave them exactly what they need to live on. Now you might get tired of eating the same food every day. Whatever it was was some kind of miraculous food. I wish I could invent whatever it was. Because evidently they stayed in pretty good shape.

You know, they lived in the wilderness. And did you know that the Bible says that their clothes never wore out? Their shoes never wore out? Can you imagine they were there for 40 years, your wife’s saying, honey, I’ve been wearing the same dress for 40 years. So, I hope she had two dresses. where one dress for 40 years, what about the shoes? The day you find one shoe that you like and fit shoe in your side, biting all colors and get it now.

And going to most houses and you’d be surprised how many shoes a woman will have in a house. I made a comment about that one day to my wife, not the smartest move in the world. She pulled that closet thing back and she said, look at your ties. I had as many times as she has shoes. And I think in the Old Testament, I don’t even know if they have a word tie. Now you know where ties come from, Thailand.

So when I get to heaven, I’m going to find a guy, I hope he’s in heaven, because I’m going to beat a tar lot of him for inventing ties. That’s been the curse of mankind as ties. I only do it because I’m supposed to look dignified. But if I had them all the way, I have dungarees and a t-shirt and tennis shoes. When I was growing up, I went barefooted. I had to squish the mud between my toes. You may ever do that, just getting the mud, just squish the mud between the toes.

Now when I get there having, I’m going to squish gold dust between my toes. But anyway, in Matthew and chapter 14, look there in verse, oh, what’s a good verse. Look at verse 13. They were in a desert in a desert place. In verse 13 when Jesus heard of it, He departed then by ship into a desert. Now why would you go to a desert in a ship? I mean if it’s a desert, how do you get a ship to go and I’m just being cute.

But you’ll notice over there in verse 28, same chapter, it says, coming to be on the water. So whether with the Lord, you know, desert water, the Lord is always with you. I was told to be faithful in season out of season, always be faithful, because you never know when there’s going to be a harvest. when you’re talking about winning people to Christ. So whether it’s on the internet or wherever, you want people to trust the Lord. And sometimes it seems like there’s dry spells and then it seems like a flood of them.

And it’s just a wonderful thing. Be faithful all the time. In your Christian life, when it seems like being faithful doesn’t pay off. There’ll be time when it seems like, I’m doing right, but nothing goes my way. Just keep doing right because it’s right to do. Always do right. God will bless you for that. And in verse 14, now this is similar to Matthew chapter 9 when he says, he saw the multitude and he was moved with compassion on them.

For they were like sheep having no shepherd. So God is interested in teaching you and I things so that we can be leaders. See when the Bible talks about be an example of the believer. An example of the believer means other people are supposed to follow you example so that makes you a leader. So whether you’re a wife or whether you’re a husband but whoever if you’re a child of God you’re to be a leader because you should be able to say to somebody else follow my example follow me as I follow Christ.

Now if you’re not following Christ they I’m not following you. Follow me as I follow Christ. Because some people, they’re just lost without a shepherd, somebody that helps them in teaching. So the reason we try to teach people the word God, so you’ll live by the word of God. And so people will follow you example. Because you’re gonna influence people. That’s what serving the Lord’s all about. But look in verse 15. When it was even in his disciples came to him saying, this is a desert place.

The time is now passed. Send them altitude away. they may go into the villages and buy themselves, digital, little words, the people are hungry. So send those people away so they can go into the town. They’re by, you know, McDonald’s or Burger King and someplace like that or village inn and get something ate in verse 16. But Jesus said to them, they need not depart. Give you them to eat. Give them something to eat. Now, when you read the same story over in the book of John chapter six, The Bible says that Jesus knew in himself what he was going to do.

He already knew what he was going to do. He didn’t tell them. So he says, we’ll go feed them. Well, with what? Because they were helpless to do anything. They couldn’t feed them. He said, well, what do you have? Well, there’s a little ad here. He’s got a little bit. So what has he got? Is he in verse 17? And they said unto him, we have here, but five loaves and two fishes. He says, bring them, head to main.

Now, buddy, this is a miracle. Now, there were some people who followed Christ in chapter six of John who only followed him because of the miracle that he did because they were on the Gimme Train. Gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme. He wanted people to come to him and want him more than what he could give. What there’s people like that today. You know, God is somebody that you always, you put him back there in like an S-girl town and you stay put until I need you.

And let me live my life. When I get in trouble, I’ll holler. Then you can help deliver me from my devastating dilemma. In the Lord’s of the, you don’t get it. I want to lead you and guide you where you ought to go. I want to walk with you. I want to talk with you. God wants to fellowship with each and every one of us. Not just park him someplace and then live our lives. Down here we need food to maintain these bodies, but Jesus says, in the Old Testament, yes, your father’s eight manum, and they’re dead.

He says, but I have some bread that If you eat this bread, you’ll never hunger again.” Now he was actually teaching them eternal security. Now when you eat this bread, you’ll never hunger again. So it means once you’ve come to Christ and you trust Him as your Savior, He gives you eternal life. How many times can He give you eternal life? Only one time. If it’s eternal, it’s eternal. So you can’t lose it so you never have to do it again.

So when I trusted Christ as my Savior when I was 18 years old, 54 and a half years ago, I’ve never had to do it again. I can only get saved once. You can’t get saved and then lose eternal life and then get eternal life again. Because if I can lose it, it had to be a sin that he never paid for.

That means if I wanna get saved again, I can’t get saved again because Jesus is coming back to pay for that sin that cost me my salvation the first place. So when Christ doesn’t cross, how many sins did He pay for? All of them, past, present, future, all sin, all paid. One payment, never coming back to do it again. So once you believe that and you accept that payment He made for you, He gives you a free gift, eternal life.

And so it’s the water that springs up in the life everlasting and you never have to do it again. It’s the bread that you eat that you never have to do it again. But now he’s going to make some bread and feed it to them and they’re still going to die because that wasn’t the same bread. They were eating that bread. He says, I am the bread of life. And he that believeth on me, half everlasting life. So it’s a total difference.

So look what he says here in verse 19, he commanded the multitude to sit down on the grass and took the five loaves and the two fishes and looking up to heaven, he blessed and broke and gave the lows to his disciples and the disciples to the multitude. And they did all eat and were filled and they took up the fragments that remained 12 baskets full. Do a 12 baskets full is left over the scraps.

Is he able to do abundantly, exceedingly, abundantly above all that we ask or think? You think the disciples thought about this before he ever did it? No. So he was showing up. But see later on when he’s no longer here, you’re supposed to remember these stories. He says, the Holy Spirit will bring these things to your remembrance. So you know, there’s a lot of things he can do. Doesn’t mean he will, but he is able to do everything he wants to do.

So if you have a God who is that powerful, what problem do you have that’s greater than what he can solve? Do you and I have a problem too big for God? I don’t think so. Because our God is able. 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 and 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.

and we will be changed. God, I have 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.