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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 concluding message of this teaching will be a blessing to you and your family.

Now, I want you to take your, we don’t have to take the time to look there now, but in Matthew chapter 6, he says, in setting your priorities straight, he says, seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things shall be added unto you. Seek ye first. So there’s a priority, things that we need to do that’s first and we should expect, God said, and all these things shall be added unto you. You can expect certain things to be done.

But your life is going to be one great big disappointment if you expect an easy road. at the little things that I got, where it says, A, B, C, and D. Now in Psalms 37 and verse 4, was one of my favorite verses, not my favorite, but one of them for a long, long time, and still is, where it says, delight thyself and the Lord, and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart. So there is nothing wrong in having desires, but seek the Lord first, delight yourself in the Lord, and he shall give you the desires of your heart.”

See, you put God first and then the desires that you have will be probably greater desires that please the Lord because you put him first. But if you don’t, then you’re going to desire things that God’s not going to be able to fulfill in your life. And so you’re going to be in for a lot of disappointment. So things that I don’t expect in life every day and if you’ll see there letter A on the easy road, now I desire it, but I really don’t expect it.

I know that there’ll be some days I’m going to have an easy road. Some days I’ll have a few easy hours. That doesn’t mean every hour will be wonderful. If you make a lot of decisions, you talk to a lot of people, and you hurt some people sometimes. And people don’t always do what they say they will do, so you’re going to have disappointments. Everyone to love me, now I don’t understand why everybody doesn’t love me. It just breaks my heart.

I probably will not sleep for 10 seconds tonight worrying about that. But now you know that everybody does not love you. Now can you see me running for President of the United States and saying some of the things that I say and so forth and everybody out there going, oh, he’s so wonderful. You can’t see that either, huh? I don’t either. But everybody is not going to love you. You already know, don’t expect it. You know that if you serve the Lord that every man who lives godly shall suffer Persecution it’s not going to go your way so Don’t expect an easy road.

It’s not going to be there and Don’t expect everybody to love you don’t expect fame and wealth and so forth now. I might desire it, but I don’t expect it Happiness and health I desire it But I don’t expect it all the time because every once in a while, whether I want it or not, sometimes I don’t feel so good. Sometimes you don’t feel so good either. Sometimes you don’t look so good either. Sometimes I don’t look so good either.

But we get sick and we have bills and we got to go to the doctor. I’ve noticed that the older I get, the more doctors that I go see. I have to check my daily schedule that somebody says, can you meet with me and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah? I don’t have to go check my church calendar. I got to go check my doctor’s calendar. Well, I see, I’m not an over here and here. Because the older you get, you may have to go see them about moral things.

So just so that you know. Regardless of how good and shape you are in now, I mean, for years I didn’t have to go to the doctor. Only until this last year, Betty never meant to the doctor. She didn’t have to go. Not until she got about 73 years old. There’s all of a sudden, you have a few things, you gotta go get checked. And so some of you young guys are so young and healthy and bulky and forget to don’t worry about it.

Don’t worry about it. It’ll change. You’re gonna be puny and helpless and some little woman’s gonna have to… You know what’s gonna happen to these guys because it’s the truth. They’ll be winers. Now you know and I know that most guys are winers. They get a little headache. Oh honey, I can’t move. I can’t move. Would you give me some soup? And he gets you to say, why don’t we do get me the paper? Oh, I can’t remember. How do you get me the TV changer?

I mean, it’s sitting right there beside you, but you can’t reach it. I’d have to move. So how do you know all this? I’m married. Like I told you, it was said, whenever my wife gets sick and the dishes duck pollen up, there is no way. I’m going to have my wife get out of bed and go in there and wash those dishes. I think they can just wait until she gets better. Now y’all have visited for the first time, I’m not really like this.

You probably believe every word I’m saying. I’m the only preacher that’ll tell you, don’t believe everything I say. The next aim is in a little bowl there. Expect nothing in anything will be a bonus. If you aim at nothing, you’re more likely to hit it, and you’ll be successful. But it’s better to aim at something and miss than to aim at nothing and hit it. So if you do expect all these things, you’re in for a life of a lot of disappointments and life is full of that.

So, if you don’t expect all those things and things are not going right, what’s your problem? You didn’t expect it anyway, did you? Did you expect everything to go right and no problems? No, life is full of problems. The reason we studied the Bible so that God can teach us how to solve problems. And it’s hard for you to help somebody out solve their problem when you never solve any of your own problems. Don’t run from problems, try to figure out how to solve them.

Look at number two, there are your notes. things I don’t expect to get because I already have it. Some things I don’t expect to get because I already have it. I already have salvation. So if I’m already saved, I’m not trying to get it. So I’m not coming to church to try to get salvation. I don’t give money to try to get saved. I don’t do anything to get saved. Why? I’m already saved. I will save 55 years ago.

When you trust Christ as your Savior, He saves you when you trusted Him. So from that point on, I’m never trying to get saved because I already am saved. So I’m not trying to do anything to go to heaven. I’m already going to heaven. I couldn’t go to hell if I tried, not have tried, but I’m not going to hell. I can’t go to hell. I have eternal life. I’m going to heaven when I die Christ paid for how many of my sins?

All of my sins. One we have here, letter B, justification from all my sins. I have been justified, declared righteous. Well, if it didn’t include the very next sin, then I just became unrighteous and unjustified. So when I got justified, it had to be for all of my sins, but if it was only for that moment, or the next moment, I didn’t lost it. How long can I live without sin? Well, if I’m gonna be unjustified because I failed, no.

Once you’re justified in declared righteous, that’s for all time and eternity. You can only get justified one time. You can only get saved one time. You can’t get saved twice. Salvation is of the Lord. And his salvation is an eternal salvation. So that’s why volunte when you trust Christ to save you, he gives you the next point down there, the free gift of eternal life. Now if he gave me eternal life, the day I trusted him, which was 55 years ago, would not today I still have eternal life?

What about 10 years from now? Will I still have it? What about 100 years from now? I remember Hank Linsomass, this one guy named Willie James. He says, Willie James, If you live a thousand years from now, we’d just still have it. He said, well, I don’t know. I don’t think I’ll live that long. So I had to go over it again with him, but once you have it, you have it. Look at number three, things I expect to receive from the Lord in this life.

There are things that you should expect to receive in this life. So just look quickly there in the book of Psalms, and 62, Psalm 62, Psalm 62. And look in verse five. just showing you that as a child of God, you can expect your heavenly Father, who loves you, cares about you, is watching over you and wants to bless you. So in verse five, my soul, wait thou only upon all of my friends, my neighbors. No, for my expectation is from him, from the Lord.

So you learn how to trust the Lord and your expectation from God because God won’t fail. But now he won’t fail in doing what he promised. So that’s why you studied the Bible so that you’ll find out what did God promise me? And in verse 6, he only is my rock and my salvation. He is my defense. I shall not be moved. In God is my salvation and my glory. the rock of my strength and my refuge is in him.

Trust in him at most of the time. Trust in him at all times, at all times. Yee, people pour out your heart before him. God is a refuge for us. Surely men of low degree are vanity and men of high degree are a lie. To be laid in the balance, they are altogether lighter than vanity. Trust not in oppression and become not vain in robbery, if riches increase, set not your heart upon them. So you may be blessed by God and your riches can increase and there’s nothing wrong in heaven thing, as long as you get it right, save it right, spend it right and to do right by it.

And use it to lay up treasure in heaven and for the Lord’s work, that’s not a thing wrong with him. But you don’t set your hope, trust in riches of this world. That’s why you’re not to make the riches, the gold of your life. The Bible says they who seek to be rich will pierce themselves through with many arrows. In other words, going to produce a lot of sorrow and like, now you can do it. God says, you can do anything you want with your life.

You can waste your life. You can see fame and popularity and wealth and all those things. But he just tells you head on you’re going to have problems and it’s going to hurt you. And anything God says not to do is because he knows that that’s going to hurt you. That’s not the best for you. always wants the best for his children. Believe that. So he says here in verse 11, God had spoken once, twice have I heard this, that power belongeth unto God.

Also unto thee, O Lord, belongeth mercy, for thou rendereth to every man according to his worst. So as a child of God you know, as he says in the New Testament, that as a man soeth, that shall he also reap. So you learn how to put your confidence in your trust in the Lord. Now look down at the bottom of the page very quickly. First on one undermin God to forgive my sins when I fail. Now this is what I can expect in my Christian life.

These are some things I can’t expect but it’s all based upon what God is going to do. I can expect God to do what God promised. My expectation should be of the Lord. So he says that I should expect God to forgive my sins when I fail. Are you going to fail? I expect I’m going to fail. I expect that that wheniterator I talk to the Lord about it, I know the Lord’s going to forgive and I know that.

So that’s a wonderful thing to know. I can expect that. And I can expect God to answer my prayers. Why? Because God promised that He would. So I believe that when I pray, I can expect God to hear my prayer and to answer my prayer because I want it according to His will.joy I don’t believe I’m going to talk God and doing something against as will. Hebrews chapter 12 verses 5 through 7, God to chase me when I rebel.

See once you trust Christ as Savior, you are His child for all eternity. As a child of God, can I live like I please? Yes. Can you get away with it? No. There’s consequences. So God is going to chase in you when you’re disobedient. He promised to bless you if you’re obedient. Now which one do you think I want? I mean, if you’re sensible and reasonable, can’t you figure this thing out? God said, can I live any way I play?

Yes, you can. I can live to please me, walk in the flesh, and I can seek to please God, live in the Spirit, and have the blessings of God reward when they get to heaven. No, wait a minute. What did he do for me? My motive, why should I serve him? Because we are supposed to consider that we are to be motivated by the love that Christ had for us, because He did love us. And this is the love that God is talking about in 2 Corinthians chapter 5 and verse 14.

For the love of Christ constraines us, because we thus judge that if one died for all, then all were dead, and that they which lived should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto Him who died for them and rose again. So I should live for the one who died for me. So that makes sense. But I got to make a decision. And every man’s going to receive what he deserves. Now salvation, nobody deserves. That is the gift of God.

Going to heaven is free what you have before you get there. Depends upon what you do for the Lord. But notice the next statement. First Corinthians 1013, God, to deliver me from temptations because it says in there that we’re all going to be tempted, but he will not allow you to be tempted above that which you’re able in that God will with the temptation make a way of escape that you may be able to bear it. Now not all of God’s children look for a way of escape from a temptation.

And that’s why they wind up falling in to temptation and yielding to temptation because they’re not going to be able to bear it. they didn’t seek the escape route. There’s always a way out of every temptation, problem, trial, if you’ll just trust the Lord. He’ll lead you out. So you’d be very, very careful. So I can expect God to give me the strength and the grace and they open up the way, the door, the flee temptation. And you need to know that and do that.

Now, letter E, I already know and I expect God to allow me to suffer. He says, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you. And he says, you’re going to suffer because Christ suffered, we’re going to suffer in this life. This time that we’re in this world is a time of suffering. Now think, this is the worst Christians will ever have. The best for us is coming. To the lost man, this is the best that he will ever have.

To us it’s the worst we’ll ever have. I’m so glad I’m going to heaven when I die. The next statement, I can expect God to comfort me when I sorrow. He says that He is the Father of all mercies, Father of all comfort. And He wants us to be comforted so that when we work with the lives and lives of other people, we can help comfort them. We’re with the comfort we were comforted. It’s a wonderful chapter. You need to read that whole chapter.

It’s very, very good. And I do expect God to reward me when I get to heaven. Don’t you expect that? If you serve a Lord now and you know you’re going to stand at the jebbins of the Christ, you should be looking for that. That’s the great expectation. Don’t you expect God who is the just God of all the earth shall not he do right. And he says, every man shall receive his own reward according to his own labor.

So when you stand before the Lord, aren’t you expecting God to do right by you? That’s why we can serve him with confidence because we know that God has already taken care of everything. It doesn’t matter what happens in our life. He just wants us to be found faithful to do right. And if you put your expectations in the Lord, then you don’t have to worry like some people worry. This is why you’ll find on the book of Philippians in chapter 4 where Paul says, I have learned and whatsoever state I am there with to be content.

If you can’t be happy today with what you have, you won’t be happy tomorrow. But what if tomorrow you only had in life what you told the Lord you are happy for today? So you might all to be thankful to the Lord for whatever it is. And we read it in the verse in Sunday school about how that God says that we can, you know, we’re to love the Lord and be thankful to the Lord. Thankful for all things.

Thankful for all things. Anyhow, so I had to put another word in. Be thankful always for all things. Now, that’s asking a lot. But if you put God first and your expectations of the Lord, now the reason we get so disappointed and despair because there’s so many of our expectations that don’t come to fruition. You stop and think, when you were young, you probably had some visions and dreams of accomplishing something big and great and you’re going to have this company and you’re going to retire by the time you’re 25 with a million dollars and all that kind of stuff, and it didn’t work.

you were going to play football and you’re going to be a professional football player. And I love to play golf. I can’t even qualify for the senior ladies’ PGA Tour. And they don’t even have one. But if they had one, I can’t even get on it. So you just have to be patient, be thankful for whatever you can do and where you are and you’ll be more content. So many people are notBelow what God’s already doing for them. Remember here a little there, a little keep growing in the Lord.

Keep your confidence in the Lord. It’s all about you in the Lord. And I mentioned to you just before, you can talk about David and Goliath. But it’s not really about David and Goliath. The whole thing about David is about David and the Lord. He just use a lion and a bear and Goliath and the Philistines and all that. those were just incidences about David and the Lord. And Joseph is about Joseph and God. It’s Daniel. Daniel. And the lion’s den, no?

That was one incident. There’s a lot more about Daniel. It was Daniel and God. See, as you go through life, it’s like Moses and God. It was Peter and God. All the apostles and God. It’s you and God. Your whole life revolves around you and God. And you’ll find out there’s many places where… and Noah walked with God. Noah walked with God. This one walked with God. That one walked with God. So the whole thing about you and your life is…

going to be is, did you walk with God? It’s you and God. You’re writing a book. You’re living stories, experiences. You’re writing something and your life ought to be so exciting to you you can’t stand it. Now sometimes you can read books from somebody’s life is exciting. I watched the movie one time on TV. It was about a guy named Indiana Jones and he was running in the natives or after them and all these thing going on. He went from one chaos to another.

I mean one peril to another, just no end. And I thought, man, is anybody ever have something like that real? And then I read the second Grinton’s chapter, 11 about Paul. He says, parallel by countrymen and parallel of this and all of a sudden, Indiana Jones had nothing on Paul. I mean, because that was real. That was just a show. That was just an act. That didn’t happen. The apostle Paul, that was real. Your life, it’s real. Yours is not a movie.

It’s not a book, but I mean you’re writing it, but yours is real. And this whole story is about you and God, you and God, you and God. Now when it’s all over with, and somebody talks about you, it ought to be, you know, you know that John John? You know what about him and God did. You know that Tyler, you know it’s him and God. Just it was him and God. Jesse was him and God. This holy is about you and God because that’s what life is about.

GodFINEST we didn’t put you here. God did that. He’s the one that told you how to live. So your whole life is that did you obey him or disobey him? It’s about you and God. The last one you have on your page there should be about the devil. I don’t have it on mine. You have it on yours. I expect the devil to fight me every step of the way. I had to write my name. But do you expect the devil to fight you every step of the way?

Don’t you believe that you’re going to have problem with the devil? Don’t you hope that you’re worthy of satanic attacks? So well, no, I don’t want to go that far. I mean, that is stretching it pretty well. And I don’t want to be bold and in the flesh. Okay. There’s always room for a few wimps, but you are going to be tested. The devil is going to have his little demons after you because he’s not going to let you alone.

He’s got to stop you somehow. He’s got to disappoint you, discourage you. And he’s working on you. Always works on your mind up there. Look up here. This hand represents you and me and the wallet represent sin. We all have sin on us. God loves us but He hates our sin. And for us, the paper sin is eternal separation from God in a place called hell. But God loves us once to go to heaven. To go to heaven we have to be perfect.

As righteous as God. Now who is perfect, nobody. We have all sinned. And so we’ve all sinned. We’re all condemned the way to sin is death. of sin we can’t get into heaven because you have to be perfect to get into heaven. Not one sin is allowed in heaven. Not one sin was tolerated in the garden of Eden. So God says a man cannot earn his way to heaven because he’s already guilty and he has a debt payment to make.

And what’s the payment? Eternal separation from God for one sin. That’s a long time, eternal separation from God and we’re all guilty. So how can a man pay for sins in the other way? He’s already condemned. So God didn’t ask him to bring money. God didn’t say go to church and that’ll pay for your sins. You have to die. And then you don’t have the power to come back. Now what you’re going to do? So God says you can’t earn eternal life by the things that you do.

No good works will get a man to heaven. You don’t have to join this church to go to heaven, you don’t have to be water baptized to go to heaven, you don’t have to stop anything, join anything. This is what he said. This hand represents Jesus Christ, he is the Lord God in the flesh. He came into the world because he lovesollar. Now he hates our sin but he loves us. But our sin separates us from the Lord. So the Bible says that Jesus Christ, who had no sin didn’t have to die.

So he took all the sin, all the world, paid for it on the cross, came back from the dead and said that if we would believe that he did it for us. He would put the payment to our account. We get to go to heaven on what he did. 55 years ago, sitting in a little old living room in Athens, Georgia, I knew I was a sinner. I knew I could not save myself. My father-in-law told me about Jesus Christ paying for my sins.

And he says that he came back from the dead and all I had to do was believe that he did it for me. And he put this payment he made, a payment for my sins that I owe it. I’d have a payment. No, I don’t have to go to hell and pay for sin because I have a payment. for my sins. Christ was the payment for all of my sins. And I get to go to heaven on what Christ did for me.

That was the best news I ever heard. I was 18 years old. And I never understood that before. I never heard it from my mother. Never heard it from my dad. I never saw my mother and dad in a church. I never saw them sitting in the pew and saying or never saw them in a church. Never my mom and dad never took us to church. So I wasn’t raised that away. But my daddy, when he got drunk, he would visit the little Methodist church down the road.

And because he could sing, they’d let him get an acquirer and sing, and buddy he’d get an acquirer and just let her rip. And drunk, and they named him Shine. His name was Shine because he made moon shine. And so the drunker he got, the better he’d sing. And the more he drank, the more sociable he got. So that anyway, my mom and him told me about that that because I never saw it. I never went to a church and saw it.

So I never saw a Bible in our home. Don’t never remember what it seemed. So I wasn’t raised around all this stuff but I am so glad that finally a man came across my path. Raymond Jackson told me the best news I ever heard in my life. At that night I trusted Christ as my Savior. I did not know for the last 55 years I didn’t know all that was going to happen in my life. But God took a little old Georgia boy and turned his life around, changed my whole life.

That’s the best thing that I know. So I have expectations, little in me, but an awful lot in the Lord. I expect God to do what He promised to do. How do I know I’m going to get to heaven? Because I expect God to keep His Word. Don’t you? Let’s pray, shall we? Every head down, every eye close, no one looking around. If you’re watching by internet or if you’re in the auditorium, if you’ve never trusted Christ as your Savior, would you write down to say, Lord, I know I’m a sinner and I believe Christ died, pay for my sins and I’m going to trust Him as my only hope of going to heaven.

And if you will, I’d like to have prayer for you. And I’d like you just to raise your hand very quickly, put it right back down. Not going to embarrass you, not going to have you come forward or anything. Anyone’s all before we close. Anyone Our Father, we thank again so much for all you’ve done for us. We thank you for giving us a good day today. And Father, for all the food that people have fixed and they brought and shared.

And for those at Weighbe come and visit with us, many for the first time we thank you for them. And for the outreach you’ve given us through the Internet and the radio. And we thank You Father, for those who come our way and visit with us. We’re thankful for every person that you send our way. We want your blessings upon them. You thank your Christ name, amen. 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 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 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 can meet the Lord in the air. So live today and every day. Believe it that the Lord is coming soon, just keep in looking up.