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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. We just 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.

Wow, we had done first yum. Look there very quickly in chapter three, in verse one. Chapter three, verse one, so important. Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called, they see those words, son of God. When you trusted Christ as your savior, you became a child of God. When he writes you, beloved, it means be loved. When you accepted Christ as your savior, you are letting God love you. When a person rejects Christ’s Savior, they’re saying, no to the love of God.

Christ is God’s love. That’s how God proved to the world that He loves us. And some people will reject the love of God. Now look what else He says. In verse two, beloved, now are we the sons of God? I’m not going to be a child of God someday. I already am a child of God. I’ve been a child of God for 57 years. But anyway, this is what is happening. You’ve trusted Christ as Savior and God wants you to know this and understand them.

Now take your Bible and turn to the book of James in chapter 2. Just backwards to a couple pages. You’ve got, you know, first and second Peter in there. And you go to the book of James, the book of James in chapter 2. James chapter 2 in verse 23, when God is talking about his great servant Abraham. You know Abraham, not Abraham Lincoln, Abraham that was in the Bible in the Old Testament. He says, concerned Abraham, that one night he took him out and says, count the stars.

And he says, your seed is going to be just like that, innumerable. And he says that he believed God, and then he makes this statement. And his faith was counted for righteousness. He was made righteous by his faith in God. Then when God also asked him to do something difficult for him one day, it was offered up his own son. was willing to do it. And God says in verse 23, and the scripture was fulfilled which said Abraham believed God and it was imputed unto him for righteousness and he was called the, and here’s those three little words, the friend of God.

Now I got a few friends in life, not a lot, but I’ve got a few. But my greatest friend is the Lord himself. He is my friend. I am his friend. So there’s also this fellowship, and there’s also the friendship that you can have with the Lord. He ought to be the greatest friend you’ve ever had. No man is greater than the man who was willing to lay down his life for his friend. Because he laid down his life for me.

The greatest way I could be a friend of God is to lay down my life for him. See, you’re his child, but you’ve got a choice in life. How much does he mean to you? So look there in chapter four of the book of James and look in verse four, James chapter four and verse four where he says, you adulterers and adultresses, know you not that the friendship of the world. Get that, you’re not online. The friendship of the world is imitated with God.

Whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the what? Ooh. And that’s where some of God’s children are. They’re greater friends with the world. They get along better with the world than they do with God or God’s people. I’ve had people tell me, say, I don’t have to go to church. You don’t. But if you want to be right with God, you do. Now that’s the problem. Do your don’t you? Do you want to be a friend of God?

It means you can’t be a friend of God and love the world. You figured out where you want to. I’m just telling you what he said. And those who are friends with the world, he says, you’re set yourself against God, and then God will have to chase and discipline you. Now take your Bible and turn to the Gospel of John, the Gospel of John in chapter 15. John chapter 15, and there’s a portion of the scripture that’s mentioned that’s, I think, really sharp, really good.

So in John chapter 15, look what he says in verse 11. Verse 11, these things have I spoken to you that my joy might remain in you and that your joy might be full. This is my commandment that you love one another as I have loved you. Now this is not to get to heaven. This is to his disciples on what he wants us to do. And so if he tells you to do something and you don’t do it, and you’re not acting like he’s your friend.

And he tells you why. He says in verse 13, greater love hath no man than this that a man laid down his life for his friends. He are my friends. See the next word? If, ye do what I command you. Abraham was the friend of God and it fulfilled the scripture because he believed God. And he was willing to even lay down his son’s life and obedience to God. And God says, he’s my friend, because he’s willing to do what I told him to do.

Now here you are, there’s things you want to do. It’s your life. This is your life. So why can’t I do whatever I want with my life? Because God says, it’s not yours. I bought you and I paid for you. Therefore you belong to him. And your body belongs to him. So he says, glorify the Lord in your body and you speak which belongs to the Lord. Now look what else he says here. verse 14, ye are my friends, if you do whatsoever I command you.

And what did he command you to do? Love what another. And look what he says in verse 15, henceforth from now on. I call you not servants, for the servant, no, not what is Lord doeth, not were slaves, but in contrast to that, God not only tells us what he wants us to do, but he tells us why he wants us to do it. God tells you how he wants you to live, and he’ll tell you why he wants you to do what you do.

So that you’re not in the dark. Cause God says in verse 15, he says, but I have called you friends for all things that I have heard of my father, I have made known unto you. I made them known unto you. You see, if you love people and you want them to have the best, then the best thing is for them to know Christ is Savior. And after they know Christ is Savior, the best thing for them is to learn how to walk with God.

Well, the last thing I’d wanna do is to do something with my life that would cause them to stumble over my testimony. I’ll say this, it’s not to brag it on because I need a good illustration and I can’t think of anything better. My kids, regardless of what my kids do or however they choose to live, they never saw their dad take a drink. They didn’t learn that from me. My kids never saw their dad on drugs or smoking or using profanity.

I’ve never sworn a cuss word in my life. So anything that they learned, they didn’t learn it from their dad. They can learn it from somebody else, but I don’t want them to learn it from me. I don’t want to be a stumbling block to them. As far as the church goes, I tried my dead level best to maintain a testimony that’s right and honoring to the Lord. Do I do it perfectly? Yeah, no I don’t. Nobody does, but I strive to honor the Lord.

I want to be a friend of God, and by being a friend of God, then I gotta do whatever he asks me to do. Friendship, who is your greatest friend? There’s people that can choose and pick all kinds of people. The Lord ought to be your greatest friend. The best friend you’ve ever had. He laid down his life for you. He loves you that much. And then he tells you, look, I’m not just telling you what I want you to do.

I’m telling you even why I want you to do it. He said, if you’ll do this for my saker, you’ll do this for the gospel sake, because you just don’t want to see people go to hell. You want Christians to have the best. You want to be an example of the believer. You want to be that testimony that people need to see. That’s what makes living your Christian life so important. Look at the next statement I have down here.

The anatomy of leadership. Oh boy, I wish I could just bypass this one, but I’m not going to. Turn to the book of Ephesians, the book of Ephesians. Just a couple of comments and then we’ll move right along. I don’t want to stay there too long. Because as you know, people get married. I think that’s a wonderful thing. Marriage is a good thing, the Bible says in the book of Robert A.H.E. that findeth a woman, findeth a good thing.

She’s so a woman is a good thing. God created a woman, God created the man and let’s say that marriage was an institution. But then some people would say, who was to live in an institution? Mary was ordained in heaven, but so was stunner than lightning. You know, they say love is blind, but marriage is an eye-opener. And that’s when you find out what they’re really, well, I didn’t know you was really like that. Well, lo and behold, you get married, and so most spend their time not knowing who is in charge.

Now, just so that you know, just according to your Bible, the ideal, the way God wanted it. Now you may not fulfill it, that’s your choice, but God put the man in charge. Lock the doors. God put the man in charge. It doesn’t mean that he is greater and better and all that. It’s just that the woman should not marry the man if she cannot trust his judgment. He is to be the umbrella that protects her. She is under his authority.

I had a woman tell me that. We don’t believe in that junk. We believe in 50-50. It don’t work that way. That’s not how God set it up. Now, woman can give all the advice she wants and she does. I had a man tell me, counsel you no. And she talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk. And I figured that he’ll say something Yes, as soon as she gives them a chance. So anyway, there’s a lot of things I could say about something like this, but I’m not going to.

I don’t have. It’s understood, yeah, it’s understood. But I came to the conclusion, and I hated it when I found out my wife knew the Bible better than me. Cause whoever knows the Bible the most, usually is the leader. That ain’t what the Bible says, you can’t do that. You’re supposed to honor your wife. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. So I had to start learning the Bible. I didn’t know how to pray. She would pray and pray such beautiful prayers.

So I’m fine. I said, okay, we’re gonna pray. So when we get on our knees in front of the bed, I say, okay, you go first because I had no clue how to pray. And so she would pray. And it was just a beautiful flowing, you know, like God’s right there. And so when she got through, I said, amen to what she said. And I said, so that couldn’t think of anything different than what she already said. And then we started, okay, we’ll read the Bible.

I’ll read the chapter one night, you read the chapter one night. You got to start somewhere. So I’d read a chapter. And I come across some word and I think, what does that mean? Because I couldn’t finish the chapter. I got to, I don’t know what it means. I get, what does it mean? And she would, okay, you read the next time, she would just read it, no problem. I mean, I start reading, I can’t pronounce these words. And this being doused up that really got to me.

I didn’t talk like that. And so there’s a problem with that. And so finally after a while I said, okay, you go ahead and read the night and the next night and the next night. Growing in the Lord is not so much fun. But once you have learned how to build your boat, you wanna see if it’ll float. You’ve gotta come to the place in your life. was this thing sink, you can raise your kids and you try to teach them all the things but sooner or later you got to cut them a drift.

You got to let them get out there and see if they can make it on their own. You don’t mind if they come home just don’t stay long. Just you’ll let them see them come, let them see them go. But you want them to be able to then to make it. Can they trust the Lord? It’s all those things you taught is it gonna hold up and you got to learn to trust the Lord and even cutting the strings sometimes.

Because that comes the time when you can’t raise more, but when a man or woman gets married, the man is to have the spiritual leadership of the home. He’s to be the godly head of the home. He should be the one that makes the decision and says, we’re going to church today. We’re gonna do this, we’re gonna do that. He can take all the advice he wants, and he does. He’s gonna get it one way or the other, but he still has to be the main one that makes the decision.

God’s gonna hold a man responsible. But today we have it to where not many men are men. They don’t take leadership. And they’re willing to give it to the wife. And the wife is like a half-ton pickup, and you just put a two-ton load on it, and you wonder why the thing’s breaking down, and the marriage breaks apart. You’re not doing the things that are right. Put God’s word first, and you’ll be surprised. I wrote a little statement in here, women are to follow their head, not their heart.

Because the head seed, the Bible says in the book of Corinthians chapter 11, the head of the woman is the man. I didn’t write the Bible. I just want to let you all know that. I didn’t write the Bible. But that’s in the Bible. And if you don’t believe that, then you got, what are you gonna do? Cut it out of the Bible? You don’t believe that’s in the Bible? You’re gonna have to give it a different meaning. And one time I had this couple of them that came to see me and they wanted me to perform their wedding for them.

So as I’m sitting there talking to him, I looked at him and I said, why do you want to marry her? She looked over and said, well, I’m thinking. I said, because you love it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Poor guy. And I says, now when we do the marriage vows, this is what I usually say. I says, you know, where you love, honor, and obey. She says, oh, strike that. I says, what? The obey part. Strike that out of that.

I says, you don’t want me to say that? No. It says, this is 50-50. I says, I cannot do your wedding. I can only do a Christian wedding. I said, you can get a justice of the peace to marry you, but I said, I do a Christian wedding, and I honor the Lord, and you are to obey Him. And if you’re not gonna do that, let Him marry a woman who will obey Him. I will say this, my wife and I, we’ve been married going on 58 years.

I have never met a woman like my wife. I told my wife years ago, I says, we’ll never have an argument if you don’t argue. You say, you did not say that I most certainly did. We will not have an argument if you don’t argue. And the reason you argue is because you question their judgment, I says, just let me fail. Let there be problems and that’ll wake me up a lot faster than you’re trying to correct me. I says, and that made me a lot more careful with all of my decisions and that poor little woman has followed me all across his country.

As I look back over my life, I says, God bless her. God bless her. She has been a gift from God because most women would never have your dear husband like that woman has done for me. But then that’s why I’m in the ministry and that’s why I’m serving the Lord. You take away my wife and I ain’t got much left. Behind every good man is a woman, sometimes two or three. And that’s what you’ve got to watch. Love your wife and be the right example.

If you’re married, you love your wife. You honor your wife. Don’t you ever flirt with another woman that doesn’t belong to you? And all sex outside of marriage is wrong. You can’t make it right, it’s wrong. And keep your eyes on the Lord and you’ll be surprised that the difference it can make in your life and in your marriage. And wives, don’t try to be some good looking Hollywood star, be what you are and be real. You’re pretty if you do right.

You’re a thing of beauty. But anyway, in John 15, why we were there just a moment ago. It talks about bearing fruit. Moreover, God is pleased if a man bear much fruit. God wants every one of us to be fruit bearing. Since you’ve trusted Christ as your savior, are you bearing fruit? You should, because that is what God wants every man to do. Just like man, woman, getting married. Two become one flesh. Bob, there’s a child. Because nobody had any kids, that’d be the end of the human race.

I wanna take one generation to end all. But God brings people together, and it’s a normal thing. For a little John had to come along, a little Mary had to come along. God wants fruit. In your Christian life, there is a tree of life. You can follow the branch. I can follow mine back to my father-in-law, who follows his back to Jesse Hymnley. Hank Lindstrom could follow his back to Ray Stanford. There’s a tree. And then when you trust Christ as your Savior, has there been any others that you’ve led to the Lord since you’ve trusted Christ?

So there should be. That’s an important thing. The last one here I want to mention very quickly. very quickly, the anatomy of stewardship. Don’t have to turn to this right now, but in Romans in chapter 15, right during your notes, for whatsoever things were written a four time. We’re written for our learning that we through patient and comfort of the scriptures might have hope. God says all scripture is for us. Not all of it is to us directly. In other words, I don’t go build an art because my name isn’t Noah.

And I don’t, you know, good I in the Egypt and say, favor, let my people go because that’s not me. There’s a lot of scriptures that we can learn and it says these things were written for our learning. So I want you to take your Bible and look at this one scripture in the book of Malachi chapter 3. Malachi chapter 3, it’s the last book in the Old Testament. And it’s right before Matthew, which is the first book in the New Testament.

And then the church Bible is on page 982. But I want you just to see this very quickly. Look in verse eight. In verse eight. Will a man rob God? Yet you have robbed me. But ye say, we’re in have we robbed thee. He says in tithes and offerings. I’m not under the law. But then you can’t say, well, we’re not under the 10 commandments anymore. Well, the 10 commandments is thou shalt not lie. So, no, I’m not under the law.

It’s okay to lie now. Thou shalt not kill. Oh, it’s okay to kill now, right? Well, I’m not under the law. Thou shalt not bear false witness. Well, it’s okay to do it now. She just because it was in the law didn’t make it wrong. Even the principle of how they gave doesn’t make it wrong just because, well, they did that under the law. They ate under the law too. They put clothes on under the law too. Was all that wrong?

Now we should walk around negative to the jade of birth. No, but if it was written for our learning, what can I learn from this? When it makes a statement, you have robbed me in tithes and offering. Whatever that was, if they didn’t give that, they were robbing God. Well, if that was robbing God, I don’t want to rob God. So I have made sure in the last 57 and a half years of my life that I don’t rob him.

I’ve always given a tithe. not because I have to, but because I want to. The last thing I wanna do, I feel like if I give less than that, I am robbing. If they were robbing back then, wouldn’t I be robbing it now? Why can’t I give under grace what they gave under law? And so I give a tithe, and then I give an offering over that. So every week of my life, I’ve always done that. You say, you do because you’re the preacher.

I did it before I was a preacher. That’s how I got to be a preacher, because I was faithful before. I was always faithful going to church on Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night. Every time I could, when the doors were open, I was faithful in going. With a wife and two kids, and sometimes I would have to come into Wednesday night, and I had all my work boots, and my clothes were dirty, and so forth, and I’d sit there, and I’d been sweating, and I stuck it.

But I was gonna do it. And other people won’t do it, because they always got a good reason not to do it. No, no, no, if I can do it, I’m there. So over the years, I’ve never had to worry about if my wife’s gonna go to church today with me. I never have to worry about what? My wife, we go to church. We hardly ever miss. She’ll get up and she’ll go. I don’t have to worry about, well, then I, well, then I, you know, she’s hard to hard to say, she probably just doesn’t wanna come tonight.

If she’s not half dead, she’ll be here. And so will I. And Wednesday night. And then we go all the time in between, well, because that’s our life. I wanna be a friend of God by doing what He asked me to do, not because I have to, I want to. I don’t know what it is, God, I guess just put a want-to machine inside of me. Don’t you have the desire to wanna serve God, to be close to the Lord, where He’s the closest thing that you have?

See, people will fail you. He won’t fail you. He’s my best friend. I’ve learned how to walk with the Lord and I can share anything with my best friend. And I have things that I can’t share with people. You don’t know what they’ll do with the knowledge. I can always trust Him. He doesn’t go around telling them I’m either. And God doesn’t gossip to me. And God doesn’t gossip about me. Best friend you’ll ever have. But first of all, you have to become His child.

And watch one more time. You and me sin. We all have sinned. We’re all in the same boat. God loves us. You don’t like what we do wrong, but He loves us. And because we’ve all sinned, we’re all condemned. Means we’ve always got to pay for what we’ve done. But the Bible says that Jesus Christ, who had no sin, didn’t have to die. But because He loved us, He took all the sin of all the world and paid for it on the cross.

came back from the dead. Why did he do that? Because he didn’t want you to do it. He paid for your sin because he didn’t want you to pay for yours. He did it. Two thousand years ago. So when he was on the cross, you were on his mind. He was thinking about you, even though you hadn’t been born yet. He went ahead and paid for all of your sins that you’ll ever commit your whole life. Time you’re born to the time you die.

He paid for all of them and says the only thing he wanted you to do is would you believe he did it for you? He came back from the dead. It says, who so ever would believe that he did it for them. He would give them as a free gift ever lasting life. life. So when I was 18 years old and I heard this for the first time, Christ died for me. And all I had to do was believe He did it for me.

There’s no tricks to it, no gimmicks. They can give it to me in a big print and you can’t get away in a little print. I mean, exactly what He said. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, the who so ever, who so ever what? Believe it. When you believe it, that payment is put to your You go to heaven as though you never committed a sin. And God’s eyes you have been washed pure and holy and white as snow.

You’re perfect in God’s eyes because you don’t have a debt to pay. You don’t have any sins to your account. Christ died for you. You see, you’ve got to be perfect to go to heaven. And in God’s eyes, I am. God gave me His perfection. I’m going to heaven on what He did for me. The only reason I’m going to heaven because Christ died for my sins, but He did it for you too. And the only thing you have to do to go to heaven is where you believe He did it for you.

I pray that you will. It has bow nice clothes, no one looking around. If you have never trusted Christ as your Savior, why not do it right now? If He asks you all that He wanted you to do is believe that you can handle that. You can handle that. You can do that. That’s not hard. It doesn’t depend upon you doing something or being something. It’s just you’re receiving what he did for you. And friend, if it makes sense, would you trust Christ as your Savior this morning?

I’m going to ask you in just a moment to raise your hand. Raising your hand does not save you. It just lets me know that what I said made sense to you. I’d like to know it and I’d like to have prayer for you. Not going to embarrass you. like you said, I’m not gonna have you forward. It’s over and done with when you make the decision. Just God bless you, man. Just slip it up very quickly, put a right back down.

Just God bless you. You can put him down. Anyone else, just slip your hand up very quickly, put a right back down. If you trust Christ as your savior right now, God saves you right now and gives you eternal life. God bless you, sir, I saw your hand. Anyone else? Our Father, thank you so much for these that have indicated by and uplift that hand that they would accept the payment. Jesus Christ made on the cross for them. By doing so, you guarantee them eternal life that you’ll never cast them out, never lose them.

And Father, we thank you so much for all that you do for us and that we can have you as our very best friend to walk with you. And Father, as that relationship, I’m your child. You’re my Father. And Lord, I want to walk with you and have the fellowship that I so greatly desire. Bless each one here that you’ll give us good fellowship and thank you for all that you do for us in Christ’s name. Amen. Do you listen to Bibleline?

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