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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, it’s good to have you here today. This is a little bit of a Christmas message but delivered a little early, the art of divine forgiveness. This is one of the hardest things for people to ever do for another, to forgive. Cause we remember and we wanna get even. And if you do me wrong, I’m gonna get you back. But the art of divine forgiveness, understanding, forgiveness is clearing the record of those who have wrong God and removing all offenses against them.

So what is it? Removing all guilt so that it’s just like you’d never done it before. God be holding them as though they had never sinned and that they never will in the future. Now, I’m gonna prove these statements as we go, but I want you to understand, this is a very valuable lesson. is a reason that Christ came into the world. It’s the way that God has chosen to show us that He loves us. He manifested His love for us by Christ dying for us.

So who needs it? The art of divine forgiveness. Who needs forgiveness? All who have sinned? Well, who has sinned? All of y’all. All. All. All of us. Everybody has sin. So if everybody has sinned against a holy God, then everyone is in need of forgiveness. Did you realize you can make a lot of people angry and mad in this old world and do a lot of things to a lot of people and get away with it? But God is a holy God and sin must be punished.

You can’t fool him. You can’t run and hide from God. Where can you run to? How can you get away from God? So it doesn’t matter how good you have been in your life. A lot of people say, well, of course I’m good, I’m good. So we imagine that if you’re born in America, you must be a Christian. That’s not true. You missed the mark of perfection. First John chapter three, verse four, it says, who so ever committed sin transgresses also the law.

That means you overstep the boundary. No trespassing means don’t step on that property. And so we have done that. we have transgressed God’s law. For sin is the transgression of the law. So we know that we’ve all broken God’s law. Romans 14, 23 says, for whatsoever is not of faith, it is sin. In other words, if it’s not because of your confidence that you know in your heart that it is right, could be the guilt that it is wrong.

Why do you feel guilty about things? though you don’t have a law that says not to do it. There’s something on the inside of you that has an uncanny sense of right and wrong and fairness and justice. And you know when someone does you wrong. If somebody cuts you off in a road rage, you know that’s not right. You gotta make it even, right? Get them back. And that beautiful little car can be tumbled or a battering ram. I just saw that this week is on the news.

There’s ladies that did this in a parking lot. Two ladies went at it, did the cars. They were bumper cars, but somebody was trying to steal somebody else’s parking place. And you just don’t do that, not with women. But anyway, James 4 17 says, therefore, and get this to him that knoweth to the good, and doeth it not to him it is sin. Even when you and I know what is right, we don’t always do right. Even if we know what is right.

He says, if to know what to do and you don’t do it, he says it’s sin. So who has sinned? Everybody, everybody has missed the mark. So he says, for all have sinned and comes short. It means you missed the mark of perfection, the perfection of God. So God doesn’t judge you and I based upon how we did with each other. God bases everything upon his perfection. And we’ve all come short of his perfection. Now we may look at each other and say, well, I’m better than she is or she’s better than he is.

It’s always in comparison to God. So we’ve all come together. come short. Everyone has sinned. What is the payment or the consequences for sin? Because if there is sin and we’ve offended a holy God, well what’s the consequences? And Exodus 18, 4 says, Behold all souls are mine as the soul of the Father, so also the soul of the Son is mine. The soul that sineth it shall die. So that’s why all of us that are born this world, we’ve all sinned and we’re all going to die.

That’s the consequences. But that’s going to be an eternal separation from God because if I can’t get to God now, I can’t get to God later. It’s either now or never. This is why it’s so important to understand. So what is the payment for sin of the consequences? The soul that sineth. It shall die. The Son shall not bear the in the equity of the Father. Neither shall the Father, by the iniquity of the Son. The righteousness of the righteous shall be upon Him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon Him.

In other words, you’re responsible for yourself, God, we’re the whole, you accountable. Forget mom and dad, brother and sister, just yourself, are you perfect? Well, nobody’s perfect, that’s the point. And if nobody’s perfect, then all have sinned, and all are accountable, we’re all guilty. That means that we have sins that we have committed against a holy God that needs to be forgiven. Or there’s consequences. Romans 6 and verse 23 says, for the wages of sin is death. What that means is if you go to work and you work for a week and they pay you at the end of the week, you earn that, that’s your wage.

Well, death is something you and I have earned the right to die. We got to get paid one day, aren’t you glad? We deserve to die. Why? Because we have sinned. We have sinned by nature and by choice. Even when we don’t want to, we do. And then sometimes we sinned because we want to sin. You know, sin wouldn’t be so bad if we didn’t even want to do it. But the problem is we all have the lust of the flesh and we all want to sin.

It would be so easy if nobody had the desire to sin, but we do. In other words, like the little mouse, the cheese that’s in the trap, see the problem is there’s something’s wrong with the mouse. It likes the cheese. If it didn’t like cheese, you couldn’t use cheese. But you can use your one because there’s something inside the mouse that says I like cheese. So he wants to try to get the cheese, he gets trapped. There’s something on the inside of each one of us that likes to sin.

That’s why we’re so easily led astray. And the lust of the flesh that we have, the sinful nature, that’s why we desire to sin. We desire our own way. Go our own way. Do our own thing. And if we can sin whatever sin and get away with it, most people would do it. But there’s consequences. And the consequences of some of those sins is what restrains us from fulfilling them. So God says there is a payment required. Wages of sin is death.

But the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. And we’ll look at that a little bit later. The gospel is the good news that Jesus Christ died to pay for our sins. Now, if there’s no payment, they can be no forgiveness. So the good news is that Christ paid for my sins. Well, why did he pay for my sins? so that I wouldn’t have to pay for my sins. Duh. That’s why he did it. And people have heard about this, and that Christ died on the cross most of their life, but they still don’t know where they’re going when they die.

If you were to die right now, where would you go? Where would you spend eternity? Can you know positively that you’re going to heaven before you die? I have known for 56 and a half years that I’m going to heaven, and I’ve known that. and so for the rest of my life. It can’t be reversed. God can’t change his mind. It can’t be altered. I mean, it’s a done deal. You said, do you deserve it? Of course. No. No, I don’t deserve it.

No one deserves it. But this is how he showed us he loved us. So in Romans chapter 5 and verse 8, it says, but God commended his love toward us. In that while we were saints, sinners, cries died for us. Christ died for us. How does he mean he died for me? He paid for my sin. He paid my sin debt that I owed a holy righteous God. I was in debt and he paid that sin debt. So the gospel is the good news that Christ paid for our sins.

So in 1 Corinthians chapter 15 verses 1 down to verse 4, it makes a statement. He said, for I delivered unto you first of all, that which I also received, How that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures means that it was written in the Old Testament, recorded beforehand, telling about Jesus Christ, how He would be born, where He would be born, and how He would live, and how He would die, and why He would die. All that was mentioned in the Old Testament, but it was supposed to be good news.

The gospel is this good news of what happened to Christ. He did that for you and I, for my sins, and that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the Scriptures. So Jesus Christ and everything that he did, he did it because he loves you. This is how he proved that he loves you. He did something for you and for me that he didn’t want us to do, because He didn’t want us to be eternally separated from Him for all eternity.

And He is the propitiation. That’s a big fancy word which means satisfaction. It means that He made a payment for our sins and not for ours only, just not for those that just believe. It’s for those who didn’t believe. It’s for the sins of the whole world. It means that Christ died on the cross, pay for all the sins of all the world, for every individual. That’s why he says, go into all the world and preach this good news of the gospel.

So this is the art of divine forgiveness, how God himself, who is so divine, so perfect, so righteous, so holy, is able to allow us to come into his perfect heaven, because we’re not perfect. So he made a way. And this is the way that he made. That’s why Jesus, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes unto the Father, but by me. So the only way we can get to heaven is through Jesus Christ.

Now, this is a very important point that I want you to see. There cannot be forgiveness for all sins until there is a sufficient payment made for all sin that is acceptable to both parties. In other words, here I am, there’s God. I have sinned against God. God wants me to pay my debt. I owe him. So what’s, do I have to pay? He says, you gotta die. Yeah, but what if I just go to church? No, you gotta die.

Well, how much money you want? No, no, no, you gotta die. You see, the payment for sin is death. It’s not going to church. See, a lot of people think, well, if I go to church, and if I live a good life, and I take and do all these good things for so many people, that’s all good and well. but it will not pay your debt. The debt has to be paid, and the only debt he will accept is your debt.

This is one of my own sins, and I die. I can never go to heaven, you can’t, you’re eternally separated from God. That’s why you gotta be separated now. Well, how would you ever get back? You can’t. So that’s why there has to be another way, but the payment has to be acceptable. So when Jesus Christ came into the world, took upon himself the sins of the world, and paid for it came back from the dead. God was propitiated.

Means he was satisfied. He accepted his death. It will be acceptable. So if you will accept that payment, God already has. He has accepted that payment. He was satisfied with the payment Christ made. Now, He doesn’t force that upon you. You have to be willing to say, do you want to accept that payment he made? Now, if you don’t accept that payment, you can spend the rest of your life trying to earn your way into heaven by your good works.

So God says, not by works of righteousness, which we have done. It’s not by works, as he says in Ephesians 2, 8, 9. Not of work, so you can’t earn it. So if you can’t earn it, how are you going to get it? You can’t. Impossible. Think of how many people today are going to church because they think that’s going to help them go to heaven. It has absolutely nothing to do with them going to heaven. No one’s going to heaven because of their good deeds.

I don’t care how much you try to aim for that mark of perfection, you have all harmatonic, you have all missed the mark. And for the rest of your life, regardless of your desire to be perfect, you’re going to miss the mark. You will not qualify because God will not accept your way of salvation. God says, you will be accepted only in the beloved. So this is why he makes the statement Ephesians 1-6. to the praise of the glory of his great wherein he hath made us accepted how in the beloved.

There is no other way he can accept you. In verse 7 he says, in whom we have redemption through his blood. In other words, his blood paid our debt, paid our sin debt. And because of that, we have the redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of his grace. No death, no payment. That’s why it’s so important for you and I to accept that payment he may. Why? Because there is no other payment. There is no other way.

So when you hear those words Christ died for us. What does it mean to you? And this year, think of how many people are going to be celebrating the birth of Jesus. There’s nothing in the scriptures that tells us to celebrate the birth of Jesus. Now we can, and we can do that if we want to. It’s supposed to be that God is given to us a gift of eternal life, so we celebrate that. But if there hadn’t been a cross, there would have been no payment, there would have been no gift.

The gift was not baby being born. We cannot have this free gift of eternal life and the forgiveness of sins if the babe had not become a man who took upon himself the sins of the world and he had to live a perfect life and be held not accountable for any sins. He had to be perfect, spotless, no fault in him. And so that’s why Jesus Christ could be born so that he could die. And he made a payment for the sins of the whole world.

That’s why we should be so thankful for grace. God did this and he did it for all of us. Now get this point, very important. Imputed righteousness can only be given to a man because sins are forgiven and future sins cannot be imputed to Him. Think about that. Imputed righteousness can only be given to a man because sins are forgiven and future sins cannot be imputed to Him. Because if future sins could be imputed to me, I’d be back in debt.

True? I’d be right back in debt. You say, well, don’t you still do things wrong? And it’s not imputed to my account. It’s not put to my debt. is put Christ paid for it. See, when He died for me 2000 years ago, before I was born, it didn’t just pay for the sins up to the time I am today, it was for my whole life. So all my sins He paid for, or He did me no favors. He’s not coming down next year and pay for what you did this year.

He did it once and for all. So Romans chapter four and verse six says, Even as David also described the blessings of the man unto whom God imputed righteousness and these last two words are very important without works. In other words, God will take His righteousness and give it to you. Now if God gave you His righteousness, that would make you as righteous as God. We go to heaven on His righteousness, not ours. You see, He took my sins, gave me His righteousness.

And once He gives you His righteousness, then God considers you and looks upon you as righteous as though you have never sinned in your life. That’s grace. You say you don’t deserve it. That’s the point. No man deserves to go to heaven. No man’s live good enough to deserve this. Now, get this again. Imputed righteousness can only be given to a man because sins are forgiven and future sins cannot be imputed. He can never be indebted again. In Romans chapter four and verse seven, it says this, blessed is the man, or blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven and whose sins are covered.

In Romans four eight, blessed is the man to whom? Get this, the Lord will not impute sins. So for the rest of my life, God will never take any sins that I commit and impute those to me, college that would put me back into debt and then he’d have to go pay for it again. And he died one time for all the sins of all the world once and for all. This is what he has done for us. Otherwise, there cannot be any security for anybody.

If tomorrow or the next day or the next week or the next year, you can commit sins that can be put to your account. You have a debt to pay again. Grace means without works. Grace means I don’t deserve it. Grace is the most wonderful thing in all the world to you and I. Because, see, none of us can ever save ourselves. And we cannot keep ourselves saved by keeping ourselves from getting in debt again. If you had to keep yourself out of debt for the rest of your life, you’d have to keep yourself from any sins for the rest of your life.

Can you do it? Would you like to try? Aren’t you glad your eternal destination doesn’t depend upon your good behavior for the rest of your life? Because if it did, goodbye, you’re gone. You’re out of here. So blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin. He said, well, who got blamed for it? Jesus, he took all my blame. He took all my shame, paid for all of it. Now, forgiveness is complete. It’s perfect. You see, if you have to be perfect to go to heaven, then forgiveness of sin has to be done perfectly.

It means nothing can be left to be paid for it. Either he pays for all of my debt or it doesn’t help me at all. So I believe that he paid for all of it. Now in Colossians in chapter two and verse 13, 13 and also verse 14, very good. But here, and you have being dead in your sins separated from God because of sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh hath he quickened made alive together with Him. And look at this, having forgiven you most of your transfer dresses.

You look in your Bible and check out that verse. You ought to be writing down every one of these verses on a piece of paper and you’re going to double check and make sure the preacher told you right. Don’t you just trust the preacher? You go about what that book says and that Bible, these are Bible verses. I did not add one letter to it or change one thing. This is the book. All your sin is Bible, Bible, Bible.

Have forgiven you all trespasses. Having forgiven you, it’s already done. He’s already forgiven me and that I like. Now get this. If he’s in chapter one verse seven says, in whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins according to your good works because you went to church, because you kept the Ten Commandments and obeyed the golden rule and you gave 10% to Calvary Community Church. Hey, it all helps didn’t it? No, it doesn’t help. It’s according to the riches of His grace.

You see, God has a lot more grace than we got sins and His grace covers our sins. You read that in the book of Romans in chapter 5 and last part of it. Important verses. Get this, the art of divine forgiveness. Forgiveness is by grace. For by grace are you saved through faith and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not of works lest any man should boast. This is the only reason God can give us eternal life is that He paid for all of our sins.

Well, if He paid for all of my sins and God was propitiated, satisfied with that payment. So when we accept the payment, God satisfied with, God satisfied with me. I am accepted because I am in His Son. I believe He did it for me. So God accepts me on that basis. Not because of what I’ve done, but because of what Jesus did. The only reason I’m going to heaven is because God loved me so much, He sent his son to pay for my sins and came back from the dead.

Said, if I would accept what he did, he’d give me eternal life and I’d get to go to heaven. That made sense to me. Fifty-seven years ago when I was a little old teenager, well, maybe I wasn’t so little. I was 18 years old. All I knew was it was free and it was forever. So I accepted Christ as my savior. And so I have been saved ever since and I’ve only been saved from here on and there’s nothing that can ever change that.

It’s not a works. It wasn’t back then and it isn’t today. So I didn’t have to do any works to get it. I don’t have to do any works to keep it because his payment is infinite. It means it’s forever. The purpose of redemption through his blood is so we can receive the forgiveness of sin because see if there’s no payment, there can be no forgiveness because God is a holy God. And the Old Testament, there were prophets that prophesied of this payment that Christ was going to make.

They were saved looking forward to the day. And we’re saved looking back to what he did. But he says to him, give all the prophets witness that through his name, whosoever keeps the 10 commandments and obey the golden rule, or whosoever does what? Whosoever believe it, that through his name, whosoever believe it shall receive. That’s the promise guaranteed remission of sins. The only thing you and I have to do is believe that He did that for us, and we would receive remission of sin.

In other words, they’re taken away. Forgiveness is a present certainty. In other words, I can know it now. I don’t have to wait some day in the future. Maybe my sins will be forgiven. I don’t have to go to a priest or some father and have him pray over me or say anything, try You know, bless me. I’ve already been blessed by God Himself. He’s the one I sinned against and He’s the one that forgives me. My salvation doesn’t depend upon some other man forgiven me of my sins.

That is blasphemy. When you study the Bible and find out what it says. First John chapter 2 verse 12 says, I write unto you little children because your sins are forgiven for His namesake. This This is all for His honor. It’s for His glory. This is why He did it. You see, if He didn’t do it that way and make it eternal, then none of us would make it. He didn’t do that so we can get a fresh start and see if we can make it now.

Okay, Alan, just forget all about all those you’ve already done. Now, try your best. Now, come here or not. Do your best. No, that’s not it. It’s forever. It goes to eternal life. Colossians 2.13 again. you being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flight? Half past tense. Half he quickened together with him. He had quickened together with him, having forgiven you, how many trespasses? All trespasses, all forgiven. All because of what he said, because of what he did.

That’s how we can know. Forgiveness is infinite separation from sins. You see, what does that mean? Now once my sins are forgiven, they are so far removed that we can never be in contact again. I will never meet them again. There is a verse that is fantastic. I’m going to show it to you in just a second. It is awesome. But never to be seen, heard of or brought up again. Now I’m talking about from God’s viewpoint. Now from our viewpoint, we don’t do that with each other, do we?

But God says He hath not dealt with us after our sins. rewarded us according to our iniquities. Because there’s something that we do and they’re not put to our account. You see, Jesus, when he died on the cross, it’s like an escrow account. It goes into that account, that’s paid. He put enough money in there to cover it. Enough grace in there to cover it. A grace that covers a multitude of sins. We don’t deserve that. That God can save you and keep you saved by his power, not by your power.

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 who 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 Mail. 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 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 it that the Lord is coming soon. Just keep looking up