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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 BibleInemistries.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 want you to take your Bible and turn with me to the Book of Isaiah chapter 55. The Book of Isaiah chapter 55. That’s in the Old Testament for you college students. Isaiah chapter 55. I want to just kind of give you just a couple of little what we call secrets of scripture. There’s a lot of things that seem like it’s a paradox in the Bible. And so here in the book of Isaiah, chapter 55, notice what he says here in verse 8, you might as well just know this up front, your ways are not God’s ways, your thoughts are not on the same plane as the Lord.

So he says in verse 8, for my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways, my ways sayeth the Lord. So whenever he makes the statement, all we like sheep have gone astray. This is what he means. thoughts are not his and they’re not about him and they’re not like his thoughts. So your ways is a result of how you’re thinking. So if you don’t believe right, you can’t live right. To live right you have to believe right.

So he says also in verse 9, for as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. So that you see that, you know that. But I want you to take your Bible and also look in Psalms 92, the 92nd Psalm, Psalms 92. And you notice that the Bible is referring to some other things here about the way that we think and about the mind of God and our ways and so on.

But here in the book of Psalms 92, look there in verse 5. Verse 5 says, Oh Lord, great are thy works and thy thoughts are very deep.” Now it says, as the earth is lower than the heavens and his says our thoughts are lower than his. Well now he’s talking about his thoughts are very deep. If you want to study the deep things of God, study the Word of God. Because you see that which God had to reveal, is deep.

It means that man on his own could not have found them. Man, without the Word of God, cannot know them. So when you study the Word of God, you’re studying the wisdom of God that no man can manufacture or come close, duplicate the Word of God. It is the truth. But also I wanted you to see this. Look there in verse 4, for the Lord hath made me glad through thy work. I will try yump in the works of IHEN.

I will try Him because a little bit later when you talk about this one word, we are more than conquerors through Him that lobbed us. More than a conqueror, it must mean that it’s impossible once you’ve conquered through Crete. It’s impossible to ever lose that which has been conquered. What Christ has done for us, what he won for us, the battles he fought for us, are so great, so magnificent that it never has to be redone. The work that he did can’t be lost.

When he saved you, he really saved you. And there’s no way possible that it can be undone because it was such a perfect work that he did. Now I want you to see also something down here in verse 12. In verse 12, the righteous shall flourish like the palm tree. He shall grow like a cedar in Lebanon. Now, you know whenever you read the first Psalms and talking about being planted by the rivers and so on and shall yield its fruit and its leaves and so forth and not not wither.

That’s what God says when a Christian walks with God drinks from the living water from this way. that springs up, God says, you will be like a tree, a cedar. And now we’re not saying maybe a big old oak tree. But somebody that’s going to be strong in the Lord. And he makes this statement here. He says in verse 13, those that be planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of our God. If there’s any place that we ought to be planted, It means where you go to get the nourishment you need, the refreshment you need, the food that you need, the fellowship you need, the prayers that you need, you will stay stronger because you go to church and you meet with God’s people.

You will be stronger. Then if you were to stay outside and just try to do it on your own, we need each other and it will help you tremendously. Now look what he says because now I love this next verse. Look what he says in verse 14. They shall still bring forth fruit in what? Still have fruit in your old age. I went down to the Bible study. And everybody was in it. And this one lady, she came in and she saw my Bible in there.

So I put my Bible down and I went to the restroom and I came back and she walked in. She says, I was here and I didn’t see anybody so I left. But I decided to come back. I said, well, didn’t you see my Bible? She said, yeah. I just figured you’d go on. So anyway, she was the first one there, and then a few other people came in. So I asked her before they got there. I said, let me ask you what kind of a church you go to.

She says, I go to the seventh day Baptist Church. Seventh day Baptist Church. I said, you mean seventh day of Venice? No, seventh day Baptist Church. I says, OK. Where are you going to go in your night? She said, I’m going to heaven. Another one. I says, there are anything you can do to keep you from going to heaven? Oh, yes. I says, let me explain it to you. So I didn’t have time right then. Because everybody started coming in and said to him, so I asked questions and answers.

So they asked a few questions. And I answered, and then I got on the gospel and the eternal security. And I hammered it. When I got through and got ready to leave, she was still sitting there. And then she got folded up her Bible and she stood up. She says, you know, what I believed means I wasn’t saved at all, was I? I says, no. I says, are you now? She says, yes. I says, now you know you’re going to heaven?

She says, yes. And she was just a big smile and says, eternal security really does something for people when they really see it. Because it’s such a relief. I’m going to heaven. Doesn’t depend on me trying to shtick good enough and hope I don’t lose it when you really understand. And so look also in Psalm 71. You’re right there. Psalm 71. There’s a wonderful verse here. See that? Look in verse 17 where he says, Oh God, Thou have taught me from my youth.

And hitherto have I declared Thy wondrous works. Now also when I am old and grayheaded, Oh God, forsake me not until I have served thy strength unto this generation and thy power to everyone that is to come. He still wanted to be used by God, even when you get old. Don’t think, well God, when I get old, just put me on the shelf and just let me about my time and you don’t have to worry about using me or anything like that.

you want to be used all the days of your life all the way through. I think that’s the best way to go. Looking at Psalms 116, Psalms 116, in looking verse 14, verse 14, where he says, I will pay my vows unto the Lord now in the presence of all of his people. serve in the Lord now when I was young or when I’m old. Serve the Lord all the days of your life because I think that’s what God wants us to do.

Now I want you to take your Bible and look there in the book of Romans in chapter 8. Romans in chapter 8. Understand what Christ has done for us. It’s a permanent job. When He saved us, He saved us. Doesn’t have to be done again. When He came into this world and He kept the law, He did it perfectly. He doesn’t have to do it again. When He died for our sins, for our sins, He did it perfectly the first time.

Doesn’t have to do it again. When He came back from the dead, He didn’t almost make it. He made it. I’m slowly getting out of the time. Oh, I couldn’t move the rock. I didn’t make it. No, he made it. And when he saved us, he saved us. When he ascended into heaven, he did it perfectly. Right. First time. Everything God does is right. And so he says here in verse 35, I want to see the verse, who shall separate us from the love of Christ?

Contribulation or distress, persecution, famine, nakedness, pearl, sword, as it is written for thy sake we are killed all the day long. We are counted as sheep for the slaughter. Nay, in all these things we are more than conquer.” You ought to underline that statement. We are more than conquerors. Through Him that love does. You see, what He did for us is how we conquered. We conquered through Him. What He did was put down, He did it for me. And He didn’t almost die for me, and almost buried from me, and almost resurrected from me.

No, he did it, and he did it in grand style. Never has to be done again. It was a perfect word. I am more than conquerors because it never has to be repeated again. Then look what he says in verse 38, for I am persuaded that neither death nor life nor angels nor principalities nor powers nor things present, things to come, height, depth, or any other creature shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

You could say separate us from God. This is talking about the security that you have in salvation. You are secure. You are more than conquerors because it was through Christ’s work and not our work. And that’s why he says in verse 31, what shall we say then to these things? God before us, who can be against us? He that spared not his own son, but delivered him up for us all. How shall he not with him also? For he give us all things.

And who can lay the thing to charge? God, you know, I am God’s child. And nothing could be put to my account except the righteousness of God. Sins can’t be attributed to me. Blessed is the man to whom God will not impute sin. That’s good. I want you to think about this. When God says for the Christian life that he wants us to conquer, well, there’s a way to do that. Look there in chapter 6 of Romans. The key to conquer, live a Christian victorious life which everybody wants.

You want to win all your battles. But with the Lord, the key to winning and being victorious is for you to surrender. Surrender to the one who can work through you to give you the victory. If you try to do so much in your own energy, you wear out fast. You get so frustrated so quickly. But just look at this word that’s found here in the book of Romans in chapter You notice what he says here in verse 12, let not sin that old sinful nature.

Therefore, reign in your mortal body. You live in a mortal body. Your body has a sinful nature in it. Therefore, you should not obey it in the lustor of. So there’s going to be this desire, strong desire to obey the lust of the flesh. In verse 13 he says, neither yield your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin, but yield yourselves unto God. So how do you have victory over the old sinful nature? Fighting it and battling it with all your might.

No, yield to God. Do what God wants you to do and you will not have time to fulfill the loss of the flesh. If you keep doing all the right you’re supposed to do, you won’t have time to get in trouble. Think about it. The reason I’m not in a beer joint tonight is because I’m in church. And reason that my wife has never had to worry about men all these years, I wonder where my husband’s at tonight. She always knows where I’m at, I’m home.

Or I’m at Wendy’s drinking a cup of coffee and reading and studying. But to know where each one is. So as you read the Scriptures, it talks about yielding. Look in verse 16, know you not to whom you yield yourself servants, obey His servants, you are to whom you obey whether sin and death are of obedience under righteousness. So the word yield, it’s in the middle part of the last part of verse 19 also, but yielding yourself to the Lord is the way to conquer.

Remember, the Bible says that we’re not fighting physical battles. We know with guns and bazookas and knives and bullets and not… No, ours is a spiritual war. And we’re trying to win a person’s mind and you can’t do it by force. You can’t make a person trust Christ the Savior. But we can try to persuade them to do so. Some people say, well, persuade in a person that’s the work of the flesh. I know some Christians that they present the gospel, but they never ask anybody to believe it because they don’t want to get in the middle of it.

And so they just present it, but they never ask anybody to believe it. I like asking people to believe it. If it makes sense, will you believe it? I get more people to trust the Lord than if I don’t do it. So I don’t believe it works for salvation just because you ask somebody, does that make sense to you? Will you believe that? Ask the person to believe something does not work for salvation, but anyway. Next thing I want you to know, when the Bible talks about where supposed to live, what’s the key to living?

What’s the key to living the Christian life? Dying? The key to live is to die. And I know that doesn’t sound very good, but look in 1 Corinthians in chapter 15. Corinthians in chapter 15. And you’ll notice in verse 12, down to a few scriptures here, it kind of hits on a couple of these little issues. The Lord says in verse 12, now if Christ be preached that He rose from the dead, I’ll say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead.

But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen? Christ be not risen then is our preaching vain, your faith is in vain. Yeah, and we’re found to beat Jehovah’s Witnesses because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ whom he raised not up if so be that the dead raised not for if the dead rise not then is not Christ risen and if Christ be not raised your faith is in vain you’re yet in your sins and we are of all men most miserable but the Apostle Paul made the statement for me to live is Christ to die is gain but he also made the statement I die daily.

Looking at verse 31, I protest by your rejoicing which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord I die daily. The Bible talks about bear your cross daily. Every day live as a man on the way to die because if you’re dead to the world you’re alive unto God. In other words I’m not here for this world. Just to see what I can get out of this world, just to enjoy the things of the world. That’s not my purpose and goal.

Yet God has said in His Word, He has given us all things freely to enjoy. You can enjoy a lot of things, but you have to watch that nothing becomes so dominant in your life, that’s all you live for. I like pizza, but I cannot let it be my main source of food or it’ll kill me. Have you ever wondered why everything is so bad for you, it tastes so good, and everything is so good for you, it tastes so bad?

Something needs to be changed. I don’t know how does it happen. They say, you just got to develop a taste. I developed a taste for eclairs. You know what Betty did the other day? She came home and she said, I got a surprise for you. So I couldn’t wait. She showed me a little packet. There was about five eclairs in that thing. I quickly ate two of them, let her have one and I saved two of them for later on.

But the key to living for the Lord is dying to what you want. See sacrifice whatever it is you want for what God wants. But if you can’t make up your mind, it’s hard for you to get what you want and to get anything for what God wants. You’ll be a double minded man. But if every day you say, I sacrifice my life for the Lord today, I’m going to live for the Lord. So whatever is right, whatever He wants me to do, however He wants me to think, it doesn’t matter what people say or do, this is where I’m at.

And you’d be surprised how it can help you in your Christian life. But some days I think I really need that. Oh, that’s so many things I could share with you, but I just can’t do it all. But anyway, I want you to take a bival look in Matthew 10. Matthew and chapter 10. . . . . . . . . . . I really love Matthew 10. I’ve preached a number of sermons from this book. But here is a verse that I like pretty well.

And it’s in Matthew 10 and verse 39. In order to save your life, in other words, to profit your life, to have something as, you know, what do I get out of it? Then he says, you got to lose your life. The inverse 39, he that findeth his life shall lose it. But he that loses his life for my sake shall find it. This is, it’s a paradox. It’s just backwards thinking. Remember the Lord says your thoughts are not mine, your ways are not mine?

Well we try to look at things, as Spock would say logically. And some of the things that God says this doesn’t sound logical. It just seems like it’s the opposite. And so how you normally think is not how God wants you to think. So it’s almost like upside down. God says you want to find your life and lose it for my sake in the gospel. And you’ll find your purpose for your life. You’ll find out what life is all about.

We have a man at the Bible study, he’s always asking me, what’s the purpose of life? And then the next week he asked me, what’s the purpose of life? He never either listens, but he’s about 80, 80 when you’re all in here the next time he says, I just don’t get it. What’s the purpose of life? I think, duh. I done told him a thousand times. Well, few times anyway. But he wants to understand the purpose of life. And I said, you better find out something very quickly.

You are running out of time. But look what he says here again. In verse 39, he that findeth his life shall lose it. In other words, you live your life of what you consider to be your dream, what you want out of life, what you want to be, your plans, your goals. And you’ll think, this is really, this is it. Whenever you’re trying to accomplish what you want out of life, you’re going to be so frustrated because you can’t make some things happen and you can’t always get your dream.

Well whatever the mind can conceive the body can achieve. Oh, Philip, I want to be ten foot tall. It ain’t gonna work. I want to be the greatest golfer in the world. I can conceive that. I can think about that. Yeah, I can’t even make the lady sing your tour. But anyway, I couldn’t qualify it. Even though at my age now I get to hit from the red teas, you know, that’s official now. I can do that because I’m old enough to get.

But you are talking about in the Word of God, He says, lose your life for my sake and the the Gospels and you’ll find it. You’ll find your purpose for living. That’s why it gives the church the real reason for living. You take away the pursuit of souls. Take away the pursuit of souls. And then what’s the purpose of our church? Sit around here and just have a nice little Bible so I didn’t get fat. Do nothing. Just you don’t do nothing.

But see, we’re always working on trying to figure out a way how to get some more. Get some more. because I believe that’s the reason we’re here. It’s not that important until somebody dies. Then it’s very important. For example, if you have trusted Christ as your Savior, but you never tell anybody, do you realize what you’re doing to your family? Because they won’t know that you trust the Lord. Or if you have trust the Lord, but you tell them you haven’t, just out of front of it.

That’s real big fun. But I know people have done that. He’s just don’t want to, he’s like, oh, I’ve already trust the Lord. I just like to hear them argue. But when the person dies, and they don’t know where he is, then they think that person is gone to hell because they never gave him the shirt that they were going to heaven, you ought to let people that you know and love, let them know you trust the Lord. And don’t always take it for granted that, well, whenever I die, preacher, I want you to do my funeral.

I can’t impose myself upon the funeral home or your family and demand I’m doing the funeral. That could be some other people involved and they’ll have other plans and you’d be surprised. I’ve had all kinds of things that have happened. People said, no, Remra, I want you to do my funeral. Then they died, but they never told their, they didn’t ever tell anybody. Then they have some wild guy give up a service and he’s all messed up, never gives the gospel.

That was the best chance to reach all of the relatives, and they blow it. Think it through. Anyway. This is a wonderful portion of scripture down through here. But just look what he says here in verse 38, the verse right before where he says, and he that take it not his cross and follow after me is not worthy of me. Talking about, are you willing to die for the Lord? It means die to that old sinful nature that you have.

Otherwise you’ll spend all your lifetime to fulfill the desires of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh, and the pride of life. That’s what will become your goal in purpose and life. you give all that up and sacrifice for the Lord. I said, people say, well, I’m willing to die for the Lord. Well, there’s some places. You may have to do that, but God would probably really prefer you to live for him. Because dying, okay, that’s that one moment in time, oh, when I’m really going, I’m going to die for the Lord.

Yeah, but you live for 70 years and you live for yourself or 50 of them. Live for the Lord. And when it comes time to die, it won’t be that big of a problem of you dying for the Lord. Look at another scripture, look in Galatians in chapter 6, something that most people never get. I sometimes teach 12 steps to success. And I’ll go through the things, you know, one run to two zoot, three, three, four, door, five, six, six, seven, heaven, eight, eight, nine, wine, ten, ten, and eleven, twelve, it goes into motion.

But I would say, yeah, one run, you know, your attitude determines your altitude. Number two, have goal will travel. Got to have a purpose in life. Number three is the tree, and it’s got the fruit on the tree. And so you got to plan big, think big, and act big. Number four, door, and so you got a foot in the door and God opens up doors and God closed doors and if God opens the door, go through the door and look for big opportunities and people have a big God expect big God to do big things.

People who have a little God expect their little God to do little things. And some Christians that seem like they’re God is very, very small because they don’t think he can do anything. So number five was always fear. You know, the bee’s coming out of a beehive. You’re gonna get ya. And so people are afraid and they live in fear, instead of learn how to trust the Lord. Fear is a success crusher. And number six is you gotta be a go-giver.

Learn to go and give before you receive. Number seven, heaven, enthusiasm, excitement. Know where you’re going when you die. And so all these things, and so I would go through I would teach some of these things in the memory page, and so I can remember them. And I learned those things about 40 years ago. I still got them right there. I can go to them. And so you try to work in home your mind so that you can remember these things.

Are you a new listener to Bibleline? Do you enjoy the teachings of Dr. Arnold? Well, if you’ve never contacted us before, we want to give you Dr. Arnold’s book, The Gospel Driven Man. Every day we receive many emails from folks to have questions about repentance and salvation, about faith in works, and about how to share the gospel with friends and loved ones. This book, The Gospel Driven Man, covers all those topics, and we want all new listeners of Bibleline to receive a free copy.

There’s no obligation, no donation necessary, simply call us at 1-800-576-3771, or write to us and request your free copy of The Gospel Driven Man. The mailing address is 4811 George Road, Tampa, Florida, 33634. Again, don’t forget to include your mailing address. And God bless you and thank you for listening to Bibleline. 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 4081 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.