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 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 message will be a blessing to you and your family.

You know how to really celebrate Resurrection Sunday? Let me tell you how you should really celebrate Resurrection Sunday. is to live for the Lord the under 364 days. That’s how you really celebrate it. It’s just keep serving the Lord. It’s one thing for him to come back from the dead, which he did. And the disciples went everywhere preaching it. And they did. Wouldn’t it all the world preaching this good news? Well, let me ask you a question. Why should we stop now?

That’s what they did. That’s what we ought to do. So it should not change. I want you to take your Bible, turn to the book of Romans. The book of Romans in chapter one, if the resurrection is not true, then the Bible is not true. No one could be saved. That is the biggest danger of all. If there is no resurrection, there can be no salvation. And yet that is the most important thing in all the world. You see, if there is no salvation, then nobody can be justified with God.

Nobody can have eternal life. Nobody gets to go to heaven. Well, if the Bible isn’t true, we wouldn’t even know if there was a heaven or a hell. We wouldn’t have any clue. All we would be able to go by is just what we can see and hear and think and imagine, touch and feel and taste and all that, just what we see in this world. there be no justification and you’d destroy the deity of Christ because there wouldn’t be no such thing.

So here in Romans in chapter 1, look there in verse 16, because see if there is no resurrection then there can be no gospel. There is no good news. For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God and the salvation to everyone that believe it, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. The gospel is the power of God. And the power of the gospel is the death, barrel and resurrection of Jesus Christ and what He did on the cross for us.

And that’s why it’s so important. I’m going to use this verse a little bit later, but I just want you to look there in verse 4 of chapter 1 of Romans, where it says, concerning the gospel itself. He says about Jesus Christ from verse three, he says, and declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, and you ought to unline this part of the verse, by the resurrection from the dead. So Christ came back from the dead, and that’s what gives us a good news, a gospel to preach.

And if you don’t believe that, there’s nothing to tell. Wouldn’t it be a shame if we had no Bible? Think for a moment. If there was no Bible, think of how much of our knowledge and things that we say and do is based upon the Bible. But now that you know the Bible, what if you didn’t have a Bible? What if there’d never been a Bible? What would you be doing with your life? What would be your purpose? What would be your goal in life?

What would you be doing? I’d hate to think what I would be doing and what would have happened in my life if somebody had never explained the Bible to me. What if it had been no Bible? I am so glad, so thankful that it’s all true. There are people who do not believe in the supernatural, the power of God or the miracles. And yet without miracles, there isn’t anything. By the very fact that you are here, you are a miracle.

Did you realize that evolution cannot be true? Because you see, you’ve never seen anything come from nothing, and it’s never happened. It’s not going to happen. So that would be a greater miracle than the miracle of creation. Because at least we start with, in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. So it’s easier for us to believe it. Somebody did something than to believe that nobody did something. So therefore we are a miracle. The world is a miracle.

Our children are little miracles. To me, even a little kitty cat or a little puppy, a little chick, you realize that’s a miracle. Man, today, with all his intellect, can’t reproduce it. He can’t make it happen. They can’t do what was supposed to think that it just happened. No. I believe that the Bible is true and that is real. Look here in chapter four of the book of Romans. Look in chapter 4 and verse 25, Jimmy verse 24, I want to see you.

But unto us also to whom it shall be imputed, talking about his righteousness. If we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead, we have to believe that the Lord raised up Jesus from the dead. It appears that the resurrection is part of this good news.undown news. And without the resurrection, there is no gospel to tell. There is no good news. And when he was raised or delivered for our offenses and raised again for our justification, being justified didn’t change my life.

But it made it possible for God to be just and declaring me just to declare I am righteous. That was a judicial act by God that satisfies God’s wrath. And so therefore justification deals more with God’s viewpoint than it does with man’s viewpoint. Now there’s things that God has delivered unto us because of justification, but we’ll talk about that later. The Bible says that we were justified because God raised up his son from the dead. So is that a possibility that we could have a gospel without a resurrection?

I don’t think so. It’s not possible. Resurrection makes Christianity superior to all all the religions of the world, all the religions of the world can’t compare to what we have. He did die and he rose again from the dead. And so there’s a couple of things that I wanted to mention to you. And look at in your Bible to the book of Psalms chapter 16, Psalms chapter 16. You see, there is no doctrine that’s hated anymore than the doctrine of the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

But it’s not a new teaching. It was also written in the scripture, so prophecy of the resurrection is not new. And these are reasons on why I would believe in the resurrection. If this is all that I had, is that God said so. Here in the book of Psalms in chapter 16, now some people think the whole 16th Psalm could have been written about Christ and it could be. And it seemed like that maybe David wrote some of it down to about verse 8 and then the rest of it’s talking about, you know, the Lord.

But whatever looked there in verse 9, therefore, my heart is glad. My glory rejoices. My flesh also shall rest in hope. But why? Because of the resurrection. Remember, he says, for the joy that was set before him, he endured the cross because he saw what dying for the sins of the world and being buried and coming back from the dead, he knew what it was going to accomplish. In the book of Isaiah in chapter 53, and it talks about that his seed, he shall see his seed, he shall see the results of the payment that he made.

For the joy that was set before him, he endured the cross. Now, we do not necessarily enjoy all the things that we go through, but because of the end results as you look down the road, you know it’s going to be worth it. You don’t know how it’s going to be worth it, but you just know it is. You don’t even know what the rewards are going to be. It really doesn’t matter. But we know that whatever it is, when we ruling reign with Christ, it will be worked at all.

And so because of that, we have joy. We have gladness. We have hope. Because we know, and I wrote this down, I thought about this, we’re the only people in the world that live with the hope and joyful anticipation. That will never die. All the other religions, they have no hope like that. But we because of the Bible and true Christianity, we believe that there’s a good possibility that there are some of us that will never physically see death.

I already talked to the Lord and He said, I’m one of them. I think Hank said that too, didn’t he? Oh well. But anyway, but we live with that hope that we are not going to physically die. There is no hope that we are not going to die. There is no hope that we are not going to die. other religion that even has anything close to that. And isn’t that a wonderful thing? The one thing that everybody fears is the die.

Well, I’m not really afraid to die, but I do rejoice more in living. I would like to be alive when the Lord comes back. But you know, if he never came back from the dead, he can’t come back from heaven. So I believe he came back from the dead. I believe in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. That does in my lifetime really give me hope because it says if in this life only we have hope we are of all men most miserable.

If there is no resurrection, say there is no life after death and all we do is just go to the grave. That’s it. When you’re dead you’re dead. That’s it. I asked him any one time. I said, where are you going when you die? He says Tennessee. I said, what? I said, where are you going when you die? He says, Tennessee. He said, that’s that’s where they’re going to bury me. I said, but I’m not talking about the body.

I’m talking about you. Where are you going to go? He said, I’m going to stay with it. He said, when I’m dead, I’m dead. That’s it. There’s nothing else. I said, have you ever died before? He says, no. I said, then you don’t know that’s true, do you? He said, Smarty. I mean, here in verse 10, he says, for thou will not leave my soul in hell. Now he didn’t go and suffer in hell. He paid for our sins on the cross.

He went to the place of the departed dead and to a place of Abraham’s bosom, the place of paradise, and he preached to the spirits in prison there and came back after three days7601. Neither will thou suffer thine holy one to seek corruption is talking about his flesh. And so he’s gonna raise him back from the dead. Then he says there in verse 11, Thou will show me the path of life in thy presence is fullness of joy. At thy right hand, there are pleasures forevermore.

So on the other side of the grave, I’ll be in his presence, fullness of joy, and there are pleasures forevermore. I can’t think of a better description, I guess, of what happens going to be life. And then we’re only there, no, temporary. Then we’re gonna be here on the earth in a thousand year reign and there’ll be a new heaven and a new earth. So we’re gonna be moving around a little bit. I don’t mind it. I got, I’m a gypsy at heart.

So I told people and I got married. We lived in five states in the year and a half. God would just prepare me. That’s all. You know, Jesus is the only one I guess you could say, you know what was so interesting about him getting that cult that was supposed to be never man rode upon? no man ever said on. I think it should have been wild. Should’ve kicked him through him off. But it doesn’t say he did that.

He even borrowed an animal. And then the Bible taught that he borrowed an upper room. He didn’t own another place. And then he borrowed a tomb. You ever heard somebody borrowing a grave? I just wanna borrow the grave for a little while. I’m only gonna need it about three days. Well, I thought that was pretty good. I’m just gonna borrow it. And when I’m through it, you can have it back. You know anybody else has ever borrowed one like that?

I don’t know. But it’s so wonderful knowing that we have a living faith because we have a living savior. He came back from the dead. I want you to take your Bible turn to the book of Matthew 12. Matthew and chapter 12, they came to him and they says, give us a sign. And so he told him, he says, an evil and adulterous generation, seek it after a sign, but there shall no sign be given to it, but the sign of the prophet Jonah.

Whereas Jonah was three days, three nights in the will’s bell, even so shall the son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. Now, whenever you read the book of Jonah, you may never have thought about, hey, Don, this is a story about the resurrection of Christ. This is the type you may never have thought it or saw it. But when Jesus comes and he connects the two, all of a sudden you say, now, you know, I know I can see it, but I didn’t see it before until Jesus explains it.

Did you know I believe there’s a lot of things in the Old Testament that says an awful lot of things that we don’t see? I would have loved to have been in that conversation whenever they were walking along with Jesus after his resurrection. And he says, did not our hearts warm within us as he opened to us the scriptures? And he told them, he says, old fold and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have said unto thee.

And then he went to the prophets and the law of the Psalms and he explained to them things concerning himself Man, that would have been a great Bible lesson wish it could have you know videotaped it Could have played it Wouldn’t have been great if they’d had videos back in those days Today you can’t sneeze about some I caught that on video. I got that You drive a nine-year road in your car and somebody takes your picture and you’re picking your nose and it’s on Facebook You can’t trust anybody anymore.

You can’t trust your friends. I mean I’ve already seen things on there that I said Betty I didn’t get on there. I don’t know and it’s amazing what what people will do but I’m just so glad that the Lord does what he promises. He says but as Jonah was three days and three nights in the Wales belly. So shall the Son of man. And so it’s a picture of the right. Now if it didn’t happen, if Jonah’s the story about Jonah, if it’s not true, wouldn’t it be ridiculous for Jesus to refer to Jonah and the whale or the great fish if it isn’t true?

See everything hinges upon is he telling the truth and And even God Himself says, you know, He’s going to come back from the dead. Jesus said five times, He says He’s going to be crucified. He’s going to die. But of course they didn’t listen, they didn’t hear, or it was hid from them. And they just didn’t grasp what He was saying. But He told them. So He had to keep His word and come back from the dead. And He did.

And the proof of the resurrection? Yeah. When you think about the resurrection, you’ve got to think about this, what happened to make the people think the way they think? You know, there was a Jewish man who challenged a guy named Harry Reamer. I had a bunch of his books years ago and I was going to Bobo College and it wasermanent good, but Jewish man asked him, says, what makes Christ different from all the other people that were crucified? He said, well, about how many people were crucified back in those Roman days, they estimated about 30,000 were crucified.

So why is Jesus any more different than all the others that were crucified? Harry Rimmer says, I’ll tell you what, I’ll mention the name of one of them that was crucified and then you mentioned somebody that was crucified and we’ll go back and forth and see who can go the longest. He says, Jesus was crucified, your turn. He says, name somebody. Well, He couldn’t name anybody. Why 2,000 years later, we still know the name of that one that was crucified and the other 29,999, we don’t know who they are.

But we know the name of this one. Jesus is different, very different. Whenever you go down the street and you see a flag, flag. Say, well, what does that flag mean? Well, that’s the flag of the United States. Well, what does it stand for? Well, you see, about 1776, that they had a revolution here and they declared the independence and this is the flag of that nation. And there were some people over 50 of them that signed this document and this represents our country.

When a little bit further and he’d ask his man, he says, what does that cross on top of that steeple on that church? What is that for? He said, well, you see, about 2,000 years ago, he says, that was the main mother name of Jesus. Call the Son of God, came into the world, born of a virgin, lived a sinless life, died on the cross, was buried and came back again from the dead. And over 500 saw him after his resurrection.

He said, why should I believe that’s true? He said, what do you believe about the The flag, he said, yeah. He said, there was 500 that saw that when Christ came back from the dead. There’s more proof and more witnesses than there were at the signing of the document that we call the Declaration of Independence. I said, but people can pick and choose whatever they want to. But you and I have a reason why we should believe on the Lord.

And when you get right down to it, you think about, and I’ve done a lot of funerals of people who have lost loved ones. Betty and I lost our son. I’ve done funerals for a lot of people that’s lost a child or a husband or wife. And their grieving is not over in one day or two days or three days or four days. Sometimes they grieve for months. It was nine months later when I was over in Israel that I broke down one night and I I whipped like a baby.

I sobbed. Nine months later. Now I don’t know what it takes for some people, but most people it takes them a to get over the loss of a loved one. There were some people who had followed Jesus, listened to him, saw what he did, believed on him. And as the disciples said, we believe that he was the one. That’s now not heard what’s happened here. And this is the third day. And they were sad. They were grieving. And those that came, they were grieving because Jesus was dead.

But did you know when he came back from the dead and he revealed himself to everyone and over 500 at one time? Do you know the whole story changes? Nobody’s grieving? After three days nobody’s grieving except one guy. You ever heard of a guy named Dowdyne Thomas? Dowdyne Thomas says I will not believe. You know, God, He didn’t really rebuke Him for saying that. He said, unless I see the scars in His hands and in His sight, then I’ll believe it.

And so all of a sudden with the doors locked, Jesus appeared in the mist and He says, Thomas, reach forth your hand. And He says, my Lord and my God, did you know that it goes from morning to joy. That is a miracle. For if everybody really believed he was dead and he had not come back from the dead, you can’t change and hide and manufacture these false emotions for long. But then they were willing not only because of the great joy that they knew he was alive, they were willing to give their life and die.

physical horrible deaths. Wouldn’t it be a shame to do that if you knew he really didn’t come back? Unless all 500 of those people not counting the disciples unless they were all drugged. But in Mayes and if they were all drugged they all saw and believed the same thing. That would be a miracle too. And what’s What’s amazing is I never saw him, but he is as real to me as he was to them. He’s more real to me than the clothes I’ve got on my back.

Is the Lord real to you? You don’t need any more evidence. Whenever you see and what I hear over the years that if people trust Christ as Savior, have eternal life and know that they’re going to heaven when they die. Just think a moment about all those people whose lives have been changed because of their contact, their meeting, with God Himself. When they come face to face with that moment when they believe that Jesus is who he claimed to be and that he really did die and he did come back from the dead and they’ve accepted him as their Savior and then live for the rest of their life and study this book and continue to preach the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Why do it if we know it’s not true? But when you do believe it, it kind of gets a hold of you and you can’t think of anything that’s better. That was a man standing one time. Look into a window. Oh, man. And on the inside, there was this picture of Jesus being, you know, nailed on the cross and soldiers around and the disciples around and, you know, some of the ladies and so on. They just staring at it.

Just a little boy walked down the street and looked at this old man looking through this wind and looking at that picture. And he looked at the man and the man didn’t say anything. The little boy says, I go to Sunday school. That’s Jesus. Mandim saying that. Says those soldiers, they nailed him to that cross. Mandim saying that, just stared at the picture. You see that other people over there? He said they buried him and gave him perfume and all that kind of stuff.

were put in the grave. The man never said a word. And so he turned and started walking down the sidewalk. And a little boy stood there and looked at the picture and looked at that old man walking down the sidewalk. He started running down after him and he said, Mr. Mr. He rose again came back from the dead. You and I regardless of how many times we may tell the story, tell all of it, prove the resurrection. I believe that gospel is part of the resurrection story, so resurrection story.

Because if Christ did not come back from the dead, there’s no story to tell. You know, there’s a lot of religions that talk about crisis on that cross and they still got him there. Some of them bury him and they don’t believe he came back from the bed. But then they forgot to tell people he came backHundreds but then they don’t tell them why he did it. You saw that movie called The Passion, Mel Gibson put out a lot of people saw it.

I saw it. I don’t think I know if I saw the whole thing but I saw enough of it. And I thought, man, it’s so realistic, but he didn’t tell him why he did it. Didn’t tell why he did it so that we could have as a free gift eternal life and know that we’re going to heaven when we die. Always in your presentation as much as possible that lies within you always try to include the resurrection. Because if he didn’t come back from the dead and save anybody.

You’ve been listening to Bibleline, a teaching ministry of Calvary Community Church in Tampa, Florida with Dr. Ralph Arnold. We pray that you are blessed by today’s message. If you have enjoyed our commitment to the clear gospel of Jesus Christ, you can reach Bibleline and pledge your support to keep us on the air in your area by dialing tool free 1-800-576-3771. That’s 1-800-576-3771. To listen to today’s message again or to obtain a free download of any of our Bible Line programs, just go to our homepage at BibleLineMinistries.org and click on the Radio Broadcast link.

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. Our Sunday morning services begin at 10-30 and at 6 o’clock on Sunday evening. Live broadcast of our services may be seen by clicking on the Calvary Community Church link at BibleLineMinistries.org. Thanks for joining us on Bibleline, 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 and just keep looking up