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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 You can reach us toll free at 1-800-576-3771. Online donations may be made by clicking on the donations link on the BibleLineMinistries.org homepage. We pray that you will enjoy our commitment to the clear gospel of Jesus Christ and that today’s first part of this two-part message will be a blessing to you and your family.

I want you to take your Bible and turn it to the book of John chapter 1, The Book of John chapter 1. I want to run a few scriptures by you because the longer I live, the more I’m convinced that many preachers that used to keep quiet about some of the things they probably believed because they didn’t want to split their church have gotten very bold and they’re coming out very strongly on the teaching of Calvinism. And if you was to follow some of the trends on some of my YouTube videos, it would just break your heart to see some of their logic.

I’ve read many of them and breaks my heart that they can’t see the truth. Some of them even want to debate me and I want to go around and around and I told him one day I says, because he called me up and he called me up and says, when are we going to debate? I says, I don’t mind stating my position but I’m not really interested in debating my position. You can believe whatever you want to believe and I want to believe what I believe.

I know what you believe and you know what I believe so what’s the point? I’m not changing are you? And if you’re not willing to change and I know I’m not willing to change because I believe I already know the truth and so do you. I says there’s one that’s going to judge us and that’s the Lord. And I said, your day’s coming. I can wait. Anyway, I want to take and run a few things by you. Look there in the gospel of John in chapter one.

The thing I want to just kind of mention to you is the light that light of every man that cometh into the world. I know that’s in the Bible somewhere, right? The light that light of every man that cometh into the world. Now, look in verse one, in the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. The same was into beginning with God. All things were made by Him and without Him was not anything made that was made.

That’s the point. You see what He made is the evidence that God is real. So God made didn’t see let us see Him but He let’s us see what He made. And because God is holy, men can’t look upon him. So he says, you can see the things that I’ve made. And that’s the evidence that I’m for real, that I did all of this. Then he says, in him was life, eternal life. And the life was the light of men.

Because every man wants to live forever. Every man wants this light of how can I keep from dying? How can I live? It’s amazing how many people are religious. religious, everybody, all over the world. Regardless of where they are, they wanna have answers. And they believe that there’s a supreme power, supreme being. So people seek God, but they seek God their own way. Even though they can realize that there is a God, all we like sheep have gone astray.

Even when they know there is a God. Because the flesh doesn’t seek God, the old sinful nature of man. And so the old sinful nature causes man to take the evidence and go the wrong direction. And even though there is a God and God has revealed himself through the nature that he has given, then he says in verse five, and the light shanneth in darkness and the darkness comprehended it not. In other words, unbelief cannot understand. There was a man sent from God whose name was John.

The same came for a witness to bear witness of the light And get this. This is an important statement that all men through Him might believe. Now if God didn’t mean that… He really messed up by putting that in the Bible. But if I was to read that verse without understanding Calvinism, I would actually believe that all men through him might believe. That was the reason. I really believe that God said what he meant, meant what he said, and I don’t care how you can twist the Greek.

Still says what he says right there. He was not that light, but was sent to bear witness of that light, which was Jesus Christ. That was the true light which light would get to every man that cometh into the world. So I believe that there is a possibility that through nature there is a certain amount of light or truth where a man can have some evidence that there is a God. But some people will not take that evidence. Some people will.

And they will follow evidence and follow evidence wherever it may lead them. He says here in verse 11, He was in the world and the world was made by Him and the world knew Him not. So He was in the world, world was made by Him. So you and I are supposed to know, yes, there is a God because there is a world, even though we cannot see God. So the statement always comes up is, how does a man find God?

Is it God that’s lost or is it man that’s lost? You often hear people say, you know what? Well, when I was 18 years old, I found the Lord. Well, I’m not sure if I found Him or He found me. But I’ll know this. We met. We found each other. But I do believe that He was looking for me. And He has a lot of evidences out there, and He’s worked in different ways in my life. And even had a man come by that knew the gospel and explained it to me.

But I already had the desire to know the Lord. I can’t say, well, I didn’t seek God because there is a version of a Romans in chapter 3, none seeketh after God. So how did you explain that? Well, the covenant say, well, man’s dead. He’s dead. So take your Bible and look over there in the book of Ephesians in chapter 2. Ephesians chapter 2 and verse 1, because if a man is dead, you and I ought to know, then he can’t do anything.

Why? Well, he’s dead. If a man’s dead, he can’t believe, he can’t seek, he can’t find. Why? Well, he’s dead. Now, that logic holds very well if the Calvinists wanted to go to the cemetery. Then I would agree that everything they’re saying is probably true. If you went to a cemetery where people are already really dead, laying in their caskets. I actually believe that God would probably have to give them life before they could believe. Would you believe that?

You say, well why? Well because they’re dead. But there are people that are living while they’re dead. You see it means it separated from the Lord. And so because of this separation and what separated us from God is sin. So that’s why he says in verse 1, and you have to quicken in the word quick. It means to be made alive who were dead in trespasses and sin, because we trespassed, we overstepped a boundary, thou shalt not, and we did.

Is it what is sin? Well, whatever it is, we did it. And so we’re dead in trespasses and sins. But if a man is in the cemetery and he’s literally in a casket, then he’s dead. Yes, God would have to give him life before he could do anything. But that’s not what God is talking about here. It just means that we’re separated from God. Doesn’t mean you can’t see and can’t think, can’t walk, can’t talk, can’t reason. Because he still gave the world for the world to use reason that there’s a God.

And this world is evidence that God expects some kind of a response from man. Now take your Bible and turn to the book of Acts. The book of Acts chapter 17, but here in the book of Acts in chapter 17, look there in verse 24, because there is a connection between God and man the world. So he says in verse 24, God that made the world and all things therein seem that he is Lord of heaven and earth. So he is the Lord.

That means he is in charge. He is the master. He’s the ruler. And he says, seeing that he is Lord of Heaven and Earth, developed not in temples made with hands. Neither is worshiped with man’s hands, as though he needed anything, seeing he gave it to all life and breath and all things. So God expects us to believe that. That’s reasonable thinking. But you see, because of man’s sinful nature, no man seeks after God. See, that doesn’t mean you don’t know that.

a God, doesn’t mean you don’t, but you won’t follow the truth of the evidence because the evidence in a wicked man’s mind becomes distorted. It’s like we call lust love. We don’t truly understand everything the way that we should understand and we don’t see it as clearly as we’d like to. As he says, we see through a glass darkly. We can’t have good vision, so therefore one day. Yes, we’re gonna know as we are known, but until then. So now notice what he says here, in verse 26, and hath made of one blood all nations of man for to dwell on all the face of the earth and have determined the times before appointed in the bounds of their habitation.

Now get this. Who is he talking to or about in this one verse alone? Is he talking about a few chosen few or is he talking about all that he’s made and half made of one blood, all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth. So it includes every person born, because later you’ll see, well just who is he referring to? What does he expect from all the world. Then in verse 27 that they should seek the Lord.

So the evidence is here that could cause a person to seek God, to know God, to want to know God. So does God want man to seek the Lord? That’s what it says. If happy they may feel after him or desire after him and look at the next two words, find him, though he be not far from every one of us. So should a man seek God? Find God. I found the Lord. But that desire that we have that God gave to us because of the creation of the world and the desire that he has placed eternity in our hearts, I believe a man can seek God.

Isn’t there a verse somewhere in the Bible that says, knock in it shall be open, seek and you shall find. And I believe there’s no test of a verse somewhere, seek the Lord with all your heart. Love the Lord with all your heart, seek Him. And then He says here in verse 28, for in Him we live and move and have our being. Lord’s without the Lord, we can’t live another minute. Your heart could stop if it wasn’t for the Lord sustaining your very life.

He says that certain also of our own ports have said, for we are His offspring. We’re made in the image of God for as much then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like under gold or silver or stone, graven by art and man’s devices. That ought to handle the evolutionists right there. That ought to take care of all the atheists and the religionists don’t know the truth. Then now notice in verse 30, and the times of this ignorance, God winked at.

You know that bothered me for a long time. God winked. God was winkin’ at people. And hell, I don’t know, I’m winkin’ at you. But see, when there’s little evidence, God still expects the same result because He gave the world. And there’s that desire on the inside. And so there should be maybe not as much evidence, but everybody has some evidence. And so in some evidence, God expects some result, and that result should be you ought to believe the truth.

Because you see, there’s some people who get more evidence than somebody else. But I believe you’ve got evidence that you know there’s a God. And if you’ll follow truth, wherever it leads, truth will go back to the source, the light, the light of every man. Now get this. But now, commandeth all men that he elected. No, all men everywhere. Now, you think that he says, now, I am God and I created the whole world and all the nations of men of one blood all over the whole world.

And then He says, and command all men everywhere. Now how can you just boil a light down to a few people that he chose? That mutilates the scriptures. I believe when he says all, I believe it’s all. Now get this. Come in with all men everywhere to repent or to believe. To change your mind. He says up there, see when he says, think not in verse 29, we ought not to think. That’s the way a man thinks. He says, don’t think like this.

Repent. Change your mind. mind. Don’t think like that. Think like this. Because now God says, I’m giving you more evidence when there’s little evidence. You’re still responsible for the evidence. But look, he says, I’m giving you more evidence. Jesus Christ has come back from the dead. Over 500 witnesses at This is at one time. What kind of evidence is that when a man can come back from the dead, that’s evidence that there’s life after death and death doesn’t end at all.

And somebody who has the power to come back from the dead, that’s strong evidence. But the results is still that God expects things to happen. Turning to the Bible to the book of Romans, since we’re going to the right, Romans in chapter 3. Romans in chapter 3. remember he’s just gone through and Tycoon and showed how all Gentiles and all Jews, the Jews had creation and revelation. So didn’t the Jews have more evidence than the Gentiles? Isn’t that what it says in verse 1 of chapter 3?

What advantage then have to Jew or what profit is their circumcision? Much every way chiefly because unto them were committed to your articles or the Word of God. They had creation plus, so they had more evidence. But just because you have more evidence doesn’t mean you’re going to believe anymore. Have you ever witnessed this somebody and you’d have told them 10 times more than what you ever heard to get saved? And they still won’t believe it. And you can tell them and tell them and tell them and go over and give them all the Scriptures, everything else.

You know what I heard the night I got saved. If I didn’t trust Christ as my Savior, I’m going to hell. Well, I don’t want to go there. And nothing else mattered. I don’t remember him giving me one scientific fact, one prophetic fact. He didn’t speak to me in Hebrew and Greek. He just told me that Jesus died on the cross and paid for my sins and I need to trust Him as my Savior. there. I didn’t have much evidence, but I didn’t need much evidence.

You see, I was always willing to follow truth if I could ever find it. Now, some people, it won’t matter how much evidence you give them. They’re not going to believe it. And if you witness enough, you’re going to find people that are just like that. He makes a statement here. What If some don’t believe it, does that make what God offered of non-effects? See there in verse 3, what if some did not believe? Should their unbelief make the faith of God without effect?

In other words, the faithfulness of God. Does that mean that God isn’t faithful because people don’t believe Him? Well no, just because people don’t believe and people are not faithful, God is faithful. God will do what He promised He will do. He just wants us to believe Him. So what’s the conclusion of all of this? So he says in verse 9, what then are we better than they know and know wise? For we have before proved by the evidence both Jews and Gentiles that they’re all under sin, Jews, Gentiles.

With creation only, the world, the word, reason, revelation, doesn’t matter. The evidence is that everybody has sinned against God. And he says in verse 10, as it is written, there is no one because they’re all in the flesh. There’s none that understands. That’s the flesh, birth. There’s none that seeketh after God. After God. It doesn’t mean you don’t know there is a God, but you’re not seeking after Him. In other words, you’re not seeking truth, additional truth, additional evidence to get to the source.

I could take this, of course, and say that, see, there’s nobody ever seeks God. Nobody ever has ever sought God. Well, that contradicts other scriptures that says that man can seek God. And because the evidence God given, we can. And I believe that a man like Cornelius of the Tinterion band. He had his own right band. He saw God. And God got Peter to go see him. Well, that’s happened a few places in Scripture. I believe the Ethiopian unique while writing his little chariot down to the desert.

And whenever Philip came up alongside, he says, what are you reading? What are you doing? He says, how can I accept some man should guide me? Do you think He wanted to be guided. He had a desire. He was studying. He went to Jerusalem for what reason? To worship. Aren’t there people all over this world seeking and worshiping? But they can’t worship the true and living God if they don’t know Him. So there’s people who do have a desire to want to know God.

I can’t answer all of the questions. I don’t have all the answers. All I know is that I believe the Scriptures that there’s a lot of people that can seek God. But there’s a lot of Christians that I know that have already trusted Lord. But during their Christian life, 20, 30, 40, 50 years, may not seek after God. True? May no Christ is Savior, but you’re not seeking to walk with God, not seeking to learn more from God. So anyway, take your Bible and turn all the way over there to the book of Hebrews, the book of Hebrews, chapter 11.

And look what it says here in verse 5. Now this is talking about faith. And God is using different illustrations of Old Testament people and how they obeyed the Lord. And so obeying the Lord is because they had faith in what God said. They believed it. Verse 5 says, By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death and was not found because God had translated him. For before his translation he had this testimony that he pleased God.

But without faith it is impossible to please him. For he that come to God must believe that he is and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently do what? Seek him. So you can seek God, but do you seek him according to the flesh or according to the Spirit, according to the revealed Word of God? You see, without this, the world itself is not sufficient to guide a man to God. He can know there is a God, He can seek all the truth that He can.

But it’s not enough evidence to reveal to Him what Christ did on the cross form, how you can have eternal life. Therefore only by the revealed Word of God can a man ever find the Lord. And so without revelation a man can seek God and that’s why so many people all over the world are religious because there’s If people worshiping a God they do not know. Unless it’s the God of this Bible, they worship a false God. But are they religious?

Do you think many of them are sincere? I do. But lost. But lost. Now take your Bible and turn to the book of John, chapter 6, the Gospel of John. John, chapter 6. But let’s look at John, chapter 21st. 21st John chapter 20. First, let’s look at John chapter 20. Got to have a little fun every once in a while and that was very little fun. But in John chapter 20 look in verse 30 so that you understand a little bit about the purpose of the book and many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples which are not written in this book but these are written, get this, that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you might have life through his name.

Now some of them will tell you that God has to actually give you the faith to believe and he has to save you before you believe. Because you see he has to give you the faith to believe. So if you got the faith to believe you did that before you actually believed. It goes in a little circle. But Now think about this. If a man was chosen and given faith to believe, why are miracles given that they might believe?

If God already gave you faith to believe, why do you need these miracles to convince you to believe? If God’s already chosen you before the foundations of the world. Well, if God chose you to be saved, is there a time when you were really lost? Is there a time when you were really in danger of hellfire? If God has from the beginning already decided that He’s going to save Warren over here, He’s already determined, he’s going to say, he warned.

And that can’t be changed. Can’t be altered. Has nothing to do with him. God just arbitrarily chose him. Why? I don’t know why. He doesn’t know why. But I’m so glad God chose him. Now, if God chose him, was he ever in danger of hellfire? Was he really ever really lost then? And if he was really lost, How could he be lost? What if he’d have died before he actually got saved? So is being chosen by God a guarantee that you will live until you really believe it?

You talk about a can of worms. You can go and mess up your mind so easy. But not good. That you might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you might have life. So when do you get life before you believe or after you believe? When you believe? And the reason for those miracle, he says now, the ones that are mentioned in the Gospel of John are here as evidence that Jesus is who he claimed to be and that evidence will help you to believe.

Now go to the book of John chapter 6. John chapter 6. And look at John chapter 6 and verse 64. Jesus said some mighty strong words. They were not clearly understood. Those that were following Him, the multitude, had a problem and said, this is a hard saying, who can understand it? They could not understand what He was saying. But Jesus says, in verse 64, but there are some of you that believe not. Now do you believe that Jesus knew out of a multitude which ones believed and who did not believe?

It would appear to me that he would know every individual and who believed and who does not believe. And because some did not believe, he says, this is why I made a statement, because he made a statement. And therefore, he says in verse 65, therefore said, I unto you that no man can come unto me except it were given unto him of my Father. In other words, if he believed the evidence, he’d trust Christ as Savior, he would believe on Christ.

And in John chapter 6 and verse 37, he says, all that the Father giveth me shall come to me and him that come unto me, I’ll know why it’s cast out. But they could only come because you believe, but he knew there’s some who did not believe. So he says there in verse 66, from that time get this many of his disciples. So this shows you that you can be a disciple and not be saved, and you You can be saved and not be a disciple.

So you can be a disciple and not saved and you can be saved and not be a disciple. But the best thing is to be saved and be a disciple. 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 13-18 get to know God and the Bible with their friends.

Check it out online at tampayouthranch.org and see the cool pictures from past activities and all the fun you’ve been missing. No right? 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.