This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors.

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.

Why? Because you see, a prophet hath no honor in his own country. It means that sometimes you’re going to find out you’re not going to be appreciated all the time by the ones you know and love the best. That’s what taking a strong stand for the Lord is all about. When it costs you something, when it hurts you. And you do what’s right and sometimes people don’t see it and they don’t understand. And it kind of twists your guts inside out and you can’t explain it.

nothing hurts like rejection. We don’t think they really know care. What did they want to do with Jesus? What He said all of these things. Do you think they were getting His drift? Well, all they wanted to do, well it says they’re in verse 28, and all they in the synagogue when they heard these things were so impressed and filled with love and joy and they wanted to declare Him king right there on the spot. Is that what it said?

They were angry with what he said. Is what he said, was it true or was it false? He told the truth. Do you think before this ever took place, that Jesus who is God himself and he knew that those scriptures referred to him, and this day shall these scriptures be fulfilled in your ears? Do you think he knew the outcome of their mind thinking before he did the first thing and said the first thing and yet he did it anyway.

And sometimes I have already known how people are going to respond about things and I will do it anyway because if it’s truth it’s truth. And if people get hurt because of truth and rebuild because of it and get offended because of it so be it. I cannot and will not try to ever change anything because I’m afraid it’s going to offend somebody. If truth offends, then let it offend. Because being offended was your choice. Mine is to declare truth.

What people do with truth is their choice. I do not purposely ever seek to try to offend anybody. But I know that truth is offensive. The most offensive person ever to come into this world was not Hitler, not Mussolini, not Stalin, not Osama bin Laden, thought him Hussein, the most offensive person in this world ever coming into this world with Jesus Christ. He offended more people. He made everybody mad. He split everybody and it’s still going on today because he’s truth and people don’t want truth.

And so it says in verse 29, and rose up and thrust him out of the city and led him unto the brow of the hill where they said the city was built that they might cast him down head long but he passed through them. What do they want to do with them? They wanted to kill him. What wrong had he done. They wished not who he was. They didn’t understand the times in which they were living when the Scriptures were being fulfilled at their time and their moment in that one little synagogue and they blew it.

They blew it. And you think, well, how could they be so blind? And you’d be surprised how many times you and I are doing the same thing. We’re not sensing the opportunities that God gives to us and what we could accomplish for the Lord. I’ll look there in the book of Luke chapter 19. Luke chapter 19, just a couple of scriptures I want to show you here that I think is very important. Luke chapter 19, and look in verse 41, this is mentioned several times in the scriptures about him looking over the city of Jerusalem.

But look at verse 41 where he says, and when he was come near, he beheld the city, talking about Jerusalem, and wept over it. That’s Jesus’ wept. He wept. But why did he weep? Why was he crying? Saying. So what we’re reading here is something that he says weeping. If thou hath known. You ought to just think about that. If thou hath known, if you only knew, if you could only perceive. Here is talked about for almost 2,000 years about my coming.

I gave you all of these signs, and I’m here. He was in the world and the world was made by Him and the world knew Him not. They didn’t know who He was. is God in the flesh standing in front of them, talking to them, walking with them, all the miracles that he did, and they perceive not who was in their midst. Sometimes we don’t appreciate somebody until it’s too late. I don’t want it to be that you don’t appreciate your husband, your wife, or your kids.

I know most of you do. Make sure you show it. Make sure you show it. you do things now instead of living in regret, wishing you to done it differently down the road. Look what he says, if thou hath known, even thou, at least in this thy day. Because see, you didn’t have last year, it’s gone. You have now. When? Now, gone. And you may not have next year. You have now. Do you think God is concerned about our life and what’s going on and what we can do for him and opportunities he might send our way but we may not take advantage of it?

I just want to take advantage of everything that I can think of by all means, by all means, every mean because the devil will do every means he can to destroy us and I want to do everything I can to build us. And he makes a statement. If thou hath known, even thou at least in this sight if the things which belonged unto thy be. In other words, it’s for you. This was planned at this particular time for this to happen and for you people to be here.

But see, God does not override the will of man’s ignorance. He won’t override the will of man’s rebellion and his unbelief. If you choose not to know, not to perceive, not to understand, God does not force His light upon you. He says in verse 43, He said, for the days shall come upon thee that thine enemies shall cast a trench about thee and compass thee round and keep thee in on every side shall lay thee even with the ground and thy children within thee and they shall not leave in thee one stone upon another And you ought to underline the last part of that verse because because why because because because thou knewest not the times of the visitation when God came to visit the time of thy visitation someone came to your house he told you he was coming he announced it and then when he got there

you didn’t want him, you didn’t want anything to do with him. How do you think Jesus Christ felt? That’s why he said, he wept over the city. He wasn’t talking about the buildings, he’s talking about the people. God loved his people. And he says, this was designed with you in mind. This is for you. And all the things that some of the things that have happened for the 2000 didn’t have to take place. It was a legitimate offer. God don’t play games and they would not believe.

Look there in Matthew chapter 13, Matthew and chapter 13. Matthew chapter 13 is interesting. Chapter deals with a lot of parables, but I want to go through this kind of quickly here just a part of it. Matthew chapter 13. I want you to look there in verse Verse 10. Verse 10. And the disciples came and said to him, why speakest thou unto them in parables? He answered and said unto them, because there’s a reason, because. You see, when he had a mixed audience, a mixed multitude, he was speaking parables so that those that wanted to know the truth could understand and those that didn’t want to know the truth, they wouldn’t get it.

Did you realize that God’s work and be preached from the pulpit and those that want to learn can learn and learn? those that don’t want to learn, won’t learn. You can hear the same words. Some people will grow and others will be stagnant. Do you know that God already knows who will do the will of God and who will not do the will of God? He said, those that will do the will of God shall know of my doctrine.

John 17. But here in Matthew, he makes a statement because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given. Why isn’t it given to them? He said, because they’re hard-hearted, they’re stiff-necked. They won’t listen. They’re ears, they won’t hear. Their eyes, they refuse to see. So he says there in verse 13, therefore speak unto them in parable because they seeing see not. Hearing, they hear not. Do they understand?

Notice what he says. He’s referring to an Old Testament description, the book of Isaiah, where it says in verse 14, and in them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah, which sayeth, by hearing ye shall hear and shall not understand. See, and ye shall see and not perceived. For this people’s heart is wax gross or hardened. Their ears are dull of hearing. In other words, it doesn’t matter if I hear or if I understand what you’re saying, I’m not going to do it.

God knows that even if you heard the word of God in your heart, you have already decided, I will not do the will of God. And opportunities will come, but you won’t see them. God will speak, but you will not hear. And you’ll find yourself one day realizing I let all my great opportunity slip away. I’ve wasted my life. I wasted my life. What do you think at the judgment seat of Christ when he talks about the haywood in a stubble, the gold, silver and precious stone, that it will try every man’s work of what sort it is.

Is it gold, silver and precious stones or is it haywood in stubble? Do you believe that God’s people could have some haywood in stubble? It means the times of your life that burn up and wasted. A lot of Christians are wasting their whole lives, wasting it. To no profit, no gain. And they don’t seem to get it. They just don’t understand. They don’t perceive. It never changes their life. They hear the word of God, they soak it in, and nothing ever happens.

Nothing ever changes. No decisions are made. No corrections in their life. just keep doing the same old thing they’ve always done. Same old habits they’ve always had instead of working in your life and discipline your life and trying to be as God as you possibly can be. Nothing changes. No power in their life. No influence in the lives of other people. And yet one day when we stand before the Lord God says I gave you thousands of opportunities and you didn’t take advantage of them.

You lost your power of influence. Nobody would believe you. your testimony was shot for whatever the reason. And get what he says in verse 15. He says, for this people’s heart is waxed, grows their ears are dull up here and their eyes they have closed. It’s because of what they’ve done. They have closed. He said, lest at any time they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears should understand with their heart and should be converted And I should heal them.

But no, they chose not to. Did you know a lot of things in life doesn’t have to be that way? But because of the hardness of people. And they refuse to be sensible, to be teachable, pliable, teachable in the hands of God so that God can mold Him into the kind of a person that God wants Him to be. God wants all of us to have this vision. Two of the scripts I want to show you right quick before we close.

First Corinthians chapter 2. First Corinthians and chapter 2. I’ve looked at this with you before, but I just want to briefly refresh your mind. And first Corinthians in chapter 2, look there in verse 3, the Apostle Paul, great man of God. He says, I was with you in weakness. And in fear and much trembling. You ever feel like that sometimes? Serving the Lord can do that to you. Sometimes you’re not as strong as you think you are. But sometimes you just go ahead and you do right because courage is nothing but fear that says its prayers and goes ahead.

He says in verse 4, my speech, my preaching was not with enticing words of man’s wisdom. But in demonstration of the spirit and the power, remember this. It’s not so important that a person who preaches or teaches a Sunday school class or whatever has a super-duper outline Where you can get up and preach a great sermon? Because you can preach a great sermon and not have a message It’s better to have a message What is that message that I believe God wants me to give to the people?

So those that speak on Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night, whatever night, ranch on Friday night, Saturday, I don’t care. There has to be a message, not just a beautiful outline sermon with the three points in the poem, you got to have a message. What is it that you believe that God wants me to say to the people? What’s that message? There’s got to be something that reaches to the heart of man, that somehow it burns inside of a person, something that can change a person’s life.

He says here in verse 7, but we speak the wisdom of God in the mystery, even the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the world under our glory, which get this none of the princes of this world knew. For had they known it, had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. Why did they They crucified the Lord of glory because they didn’t know who he was. They didn’t believe who he was. They didn’t listen to what he had to say.

But they blinded their eyes. They closed their ears. And that’s why they did what they did. You trusted Christ as your Savior. You’re God’s child. You’re going to heaven. Your eyes are open. You heard. But if you don’t watch it, you realize that as a Christian, you can start closing your eyes. and become dull of hearing, where you are no longer effective for the Lord. And you can sit on the pew, but God will set you on the shelf.

You understand what I’m saying? You can sit on that pew and you can be faithful to the day you lead this world. But God has put you on the shelf because God knows the heart and knows that you’re and know that you’re rebellious in your heart, and you have hardened yourself against the will of God. You refuse to change or make any corrections in your life. God knows, and you may pass up some great opportunities. And you can even get to the place where you don’t know really, know and understand that person you’ve been living with all your life.

And they not appreciate them like you ought to, or even the people in the church until they’re gone. I am justPASSING reassured to know some of you people. Some of you are not so bad. If I had just came here and you died that week, the same week I can you die, I probably would not have shed a tear. Because I didn’t know you. Now I’m getting to learn you. I spent some time with some of y’all. You died now, I probably shed a tear.

Might not, but I might. You’ve weaseled your way into my heart. I can get you out of my Supplementary, I can’t get you out of my Heart. And so you become more precious as time goes on because you spend time with people and you learn people and you appreciate people. I appreciate the people we have in this ministry. And I know that if I was to lose anybody, it would break my heart. It would hurt me. Because I’ve learned to depend upon individuals.

I depend upon y’all. You know that I’m getting older and I can’t do everything, but I got a lot of good people who do a lot. I’m very thankful for that. But if they had known, if they had only known, they wouldn’t have done what they did. Last verse I want to show you in Matthew chapter 11, look there real quick, Matthew chapter 11, Jesus Christ went around the nation of Israel and preaching all the cities. He came to a couple of them and he says, oh, got some bad news for you because of their unbelief.

He says, whoa, unto you in verse 21 of Matthew chapterParents 11. He says, Corazon, whoa, unto thee best say unto them, if the mighty works which were done in youth had been done entire inside them, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. In other words, if what I did here had been done there, there’d have been some changes made, but God didn’t do it. God knows why he does. that’s what he does, but they blew their opportunity.

In verse 22, but I send you, it shall be more tolerable for tyrants in the day of judgment than for you. In other words, there’s gonna be judgment coming, but one has more light than the other. Because what I did here, and I didn’t do there, you’re responsible. God said, I know what you could have known, and you did understand, and you refused. God knows the potential of every individual. God knows your potential, and God knows what you could have done if you had yielded.

That’s why he can judge accordingly. Don’t mock light. Don’t mock light. I mean, don’t mock truth. Now, when he talks about a man being a fool, just because He mocks God. And how do you mock God? You mock sin. In the words, it doesn’t matter what I do. It’s not gonna be that bad. And it is. Truth is something that people better not mock. Don’t mock God. He is truth. Look at this. In verse 25 he says, at that time Jesus answered and he said, now here he is in front of them, he just, he just upgraded the people in the city.

Then he says, as he turns to the Lord and he prays this prayer, I think the O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou has hid these things from the wise and the prudent. Wise and the prudent means in their own eyes and have to reveal them on the babes. Do you know sometimes a little child just has a simple child-like faith? It’s so easy to teach children, isn’t it? They’re just so easy to believe. Work with adults.

Have you ever heard that most adults are set in their ways? Have you ever heard a phrase you can’t teach an old dog new tricks? What do you think that means? It means what most adults, and this is just the truth, and I’m included. I’ve already didn’t live most of my life. Don’t try to tell me to do anything or change anything. I’m gonna do what I’m gonna do. This is me. You do whatever you want. I’ll do whatever the one.

Let’s just be friends and get off each other’s back. See there? But look what he says in verse 26. “‘Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in thy sight. “‘All things are delivered unto me of my Father. No man knoweth the Son but the Father. Neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son. And he too, whomsoever the Son will reveal him. Get that last part. And to whom the Son will reveal him. Now you trusted Christ as your Savior, you have eternal life.

But don’t you want him to reveal himself to you in a better way? And then after he says that you can’t do this unless the sun revealed and then in verse 28, come unto me and you ought to circle that next word. All. All. Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden. So yeah, he can reveal himself to those that he chooses revealed, but he says, it’s those that comes to him. If you come to Christ, and I’m not talking about just for salvation, I’m talking about, see, you trust Christ as your Savior, and He gives you eternal life.

But as a child of God, there’s a lot of things that God wants us to learn. Come into me all ye that labor and are heavy, laid, and I will give you rest. Take upon you my yoke, learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and you shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light. But so many of God’s people are going to miss out on so much because the day will come when we’re realized we didn’t understand the time in which we lived.

I wasted so much of my life. Or I thought I had so much more time to go, and I didn’t. And I wasn’t very wise. I were not perceptive, and I missed so many opportunities. Why you can do what you can, where you are, with all that you have, and God said that He will bless you for it, and He will reveal Himself to you. That’s worth it all. up here. This is you and me. This is sin. We all have sin on us.

God loves us. And I hate our sin, but He loves us. And God says for us to pay for sin is eternal separation from God in place called hell. He loves us, wants us to go to heaven. To go to heaven, we have to be perfect as righteous as God. None of us are perfect. None of us are righteous. We have all sinned and come short of God’s perfection. And God says, you cannot save yourself. It’s not by our works that we do.

This hand represents Jesus Christ. He’s the Lord God in the flesh. He came into the world because he loves us. He hates our sin because it separates us from him. So Jesus Christ took the sin, paid for it on the cross, came back from the dead and said if you and I would believe he did it for us, he would give us as a free gift of our lasting life and we get to go to heaven. Oh, Christ did for us.

No doubt there’s people watching that don’t realize the importance of the gospel. If they don’t trust Christ as their Savior to realize what an opportunity they missed. To think that to be in a literal fire burning hell for all eternity and they could have taken advantage of that opportunity. And all they had to do was to believe Christ died and paid for their sins and trust them as their Savior. All they had to do is believe it, and they could have been saved and gone to heaven.

The outcome would have been totally different. Just something so simple. And as a child of God to approach the Word of God with the attitude that I want the will of God for my life, whatever it might be, to take advantage of whatever God gives to me. Let’s Let’s pray, shall we? If you’re here tonight and you’ve never trusted Christ as your Savior, or if you’re watching by internet, friend, right where you are, all that you have to do is the only thing you can do is believe that God so loved the world, that’s you, that He gave His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ.

The hosts so ever believe it than Him should not perish but have everlasting life. If you’ll believe He did it for you, God would save you, give you eternal life, and you would go to heaven on what Christ did for you. Friend, I pray that you will. There is no other way. Believe on him now. Our Father, we thank you so much for this time together, for the opportunity you’ve given us, the side of eternity to serve you. And Lord, it is an opportunity, an opportunity to take advantage of.

And I grew to, my Father, I fear that so many will pass by and never see it, never perceive, because they’ve hardened their heart. We thank you for this church and all these people that make it possible they get the gospel to so many people. And I want to hedge put around us in the protectors. I know the devil will do anything he can to hurt or to destroy this ministry. And I pray, Lord, that whether they try to infiltrate or storm the gates, that you would protect us.

And I’m trusting that you will. Give us good people to do a good work. Christ name we pray. Amen. Don’t miss out on all the fun. Join Pastor Jesse and Kyla Martinez on Thursday nights from 7 to 9 p.m. for Tampa Youth Ranch and Calvary Community Church. Tampa Youth Ranch is a great mix of live music, games, Bible study, food and fun where teens 13 to 18 get to know God and the Bible with their friends. Check it out online at You can use the earth ranch dot o-r-g and see the cool pictures from past activities and all the fun you’ve been missing.

No ride, no problem. Call 813-334-4655 today for information on getting a ride to Tampa Youth Ranch. Thanks for joining us on Bible Eye. 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.

Believing that the Lord is coming soon, just keep looking up.