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

Now, I get this. Life is accountable. Now, what we mean by that is that there is a purpose to life. life. There is a plan to life. There’s something going on. If we were just accidents, then of course, you know, there’s no purpose to it. You just do whatever you want to do. Nothing matters. Nothing matters. But this little statement I wrote here, whatsoever will be will be is wrong thinking. And what it’s the will of God. Everything happens to the will of God.

No, it’s not. There’s people who are going to go to hell, and that’s not the will of God. There’s people that are Christians and are rebellious, and that’s not the will of God. Not everything is the will of God. And so, God is grieved at times. He has wrath at times. So, no, God doesn’t get His way on everything because He gave us a will to choose, the ability to think freely of coercion or the force of anything outside of ourselves.

We can freely make decisions. And there are consequences to our decisions. No purpose, nothing matters is wrong thinking. But do we do this sometimes? Like, well, it doesn’t matter. Who cares? It’s my life. I’ve heard a little bit of everything. I guess at times in my life I’ve said the same thing. I mean, I’m no angel. I’ve got a sinful nature like everybody else. And if it hadn’t been for the verses in the Bible kind of pulling you back, pulling you back, pulling you back, pulling you back, pulling you, there were restraints upon you.

And you think a lot of things, but sometimes, aren’t you glad that you live long enough not to have done all the things you thought about? Well, aren’t you glad that not everybody knows all the things you did? Aren’t you glad Nobody knows what you thought about. Isn’t that wonderful? Just knowing that nobody knows what I thought. And then you think, well, God knows, oh, I hope we don’t tell. Hope we don’t tell. Hope we don’t tell. Look at the next statement.

There is a divine purpose. God has a plan, and everything matters. You see, either everything matters or nothing matters. It’s got to be one way or the other. Has it ever occurred to you that nothing has ever occurred to God? I don’t like that statement. In other words, you just got yourself in a jam and you don’t know what to do. You’re frustrated and it never occurred to God that was gonna happen. God didn’t know that. And God really loved us and He knows everything that is going to happen to us.

He knows what people are gonna say and what they’re gonna do. And He may not stop them. He loves just to let you simmer a while, stew for a while. He doesn’t always immediately open the door that you want them to open. He doesn’t always close the door. You want Lord, if you want me to go through this door, open it. And he doesn’t, like God, did you hear what I said? I mean, I spoke, you’re supposed to jump.

And it’s like nothing happens. God will let you make decisions. And God will also make you, let you make wrong decisions. See what we want to do is blame God if I made the wrong one. It was God’s fault because I asked him for the wisdom. He didn’t give it to me. Well, he gives it to you when you ask in faith and you’re patient and you wait for it. Did you wait for the answer or you just take things in your own hands?

Jump the gun, it’s possible. Look at number four, a look at the past of your life. What do you see? All right, I’m say 76 years old, I look back over my life. What do I see? Do I see accomplishments? Do I see accomplishment? Do I see any failures? Do I see any guilt? Do I see a lot of undone things that I wanted to do and never did? As they’re places I wanted to go and I never got to go.

As you look back upon your past of your life, does it bring joy, guilt, shame? What do you think about it? Because see, somewhere along the line, this is you. This is your life. I remember years ago they had a TV broadcast. This is your life. And they would bring in somebody and they would say, this is your life. And they’d bring up some of your brothers’ sister that have it’s hanging 40 years, or some parent or a grandparent or something like that.

somebody was really important and shocked them that they were there and they had whatever you asked for, you could get and all that kind of stuff. I used to love watching that. I even saw one they called, who wants to be a millionaire? Remember the guy walked around and he would give a million dollars away? I mean they literally did it. Who wants to be a millionaire? And of course if I say, me, me, me, me. Well, there’s a lot of things that gets us to the place where we should not be comfortable, where we are and what we’re doing and so forth.

And yet God says, be content with whatsoever you have, wherever you are. But we’re not always content. We always want more. That’s just something like that’s the nature of man to want more, do something else, be adventure some, you know. And we don’t like to be bored. We want something happening, something exciting. And so this takes a whole lifetime to figure out. the time you finally figured it out. Life’s over. It’s kind of like playing golf. By the time I get to the 16th hole, I finally figured out what I’m doing wrong and only got two holes left to play.

That is so frustrating. And I wonder, why can’t I start off the way that I ended up? It just seemed like it doesn’t work better way. But look at the next statement, no purpose, nothing matters is wrong thinking. But you look at your past, what do you see accomplishments? How does it make you feel? Who are they for? Whatever you did, who did you do it for? Did you do it for yourself? Did it leave you empty? How would you feel that you are right now in your life?

Are you satisfied that you’re doing what God wants you to do? Are you right now? Are you where you believe God wants me to be? In your maturity, things you’ve done, your accomplishment, or there are a There’s a lot of things in the past that really cause you a lot of grief. Even though you think about them and brings it up, you think, man, I wish I had never done that. I wish I hadn’t have done that. Has there ever been like there’s somebody playing ping pong inside, back and forth, you know, and just you’re so unsettled.

And there’s things like that that can happen to us where people, we live in a sinful world, we have a sinful body and it’s a crooked and perverse generation that the Bible talks about. This is why it’s going to be so good when we finally get to heaven and all this is over with. Because God is promised He’s going to deliver us one day from all of this because we’re not going to be able to solve all these problems.

Regard us how long you and I live and regard us how holy, righteous you try to live. Not everything seems like it works out. There’s problems. There’s persecution. We talked about that in our son’s school class this morning. There’s persecution. Those who live God who are self-aperticution. is you look back over the life, are you glad you did what you did? There’s a good decision and there’s bad decision. Now from this point on, remember, if you’re looking back at your life and you see a lot of failures and things like that and you try to figure out, no, my future, that’s out there ahead of me, it’s gonna be determined by what I’m doing now.

Cause 10 years from now I’ll be looking back on this time. I told Betty, I said, you realize we’ve been here almost nine years, a few more months, nine years seemed like I just showed up. Like I just came down here. Because of course I never, I don’t know how you’re supposed to look at things, but you know, I feel like I’m just temporary. But in reality, we’re all temporary. And we don’t know how long we’re gonna be here.

But God is working in our lives. And despite of all the things that goes on, we live in a wicked world and we have problems. But look at the next statement. They look at your present. This present time today, where you are right now, do you feel a loss? You’ve lost your way. And there’s people who like, they’ve gone astray from the Lord. There’s a song we sing called, Wasted Years, Wasted Years. And I have preached in different places and I’ve had people say, you know, I just feel so ashamed that I’ve wasted so many years.

I knew the Lord, I went astray. And now I’m back and I want to serve the Lord. I got all these memories, I got these scars, and I’ve wasted so much of my life. I wish I had never wasted those years. And maybe if you think about it, don’t waste any more. You can’t go back and get, but you don’t have to waste anymore because your future is being determined by your obedience to God today. Do you want to be able down the road at the end of life be able to look back and say, I have fought a good fight.

I’ve kept the faith. You can’t say that if you don’t do the things. You should always take a look at your life. How am I doing? This is my life. Look at the next statement. Are you totally confused? Are you discouraged? Think about where you are right now. Are you discouraged? Now, thank you in your mind. Why? What are you thinking about? Are you thinking about things you can change? Or then you can change it? Are you thinking about some things you can’t change?

If you can’t change, let it go. Do what you can and forget the rest. Leave that in God’s hands. Or you’ll drive yourself nuts. Because there’s people, you can’t change people. Only one you can change is yourself. I was going through some of my notes the other day and I found three pages of notes front and back, all those notes. And they were all on prayer. And the first time I preached that sermon on prayer, it was three and a half hours long.

I preached it Colorado Bible Church long time ago. And I’ll leave Stanford, took over Florida Bible, called it, he had me come down and he says, I want you to see. And I was gonna be on a Wednesday night. He says, we need prayer. We need prayer, so I thought this sermon would be good. And I told them I said, it’s gonna be done after the evening service and I’ll be speaking. And so they had college students there and it was full.

And it was on a Wednesday night. And I preached that sermon. I told them I said, that morning I said, it’s a long sermon. So I really cut it down. I trimmed it down to it. It was only two and a half hours. But it was a sermon on prayer. And I said, one of the things we do is like the flashlight. We’re shining a flashlight on what we want to pray about. Whatever you want to pray about, you got to focus in on it.

Shine that flashlight on whatever it is. And then you pray about it. Then you take the flashlight and you turn it over and look at yourself. Now how can I be used of God to answer that prayer? I said, because sometimes God reveals things to you, lets you see things that needs to be done. Then expect you to turn the flashlight over and says, what are you gonna do about it? You see, when you’re really concerned about reaching the lost, turn it back over to yourself.

Now what are you going to do? Somebody needs to help and acquire. What are you going to do? Somebody helps in the nursery, in the youth group, in the Oana. What are you going to do? So you’re always trying to find out, am I just trying to stir up problems? Am I really concerned? Did I really pray that God will be done? then don’t I want God to use me if it’s possible and do whatever I can do because it doesn’t take much to say, you know, this is what you ought to do.

You know, you ought to be involved. You ought to do this and you ought to do this and you ought to do that. And you all got never do anything. Boy, we ought to really support the college kids. We ought to take and send some kids to camp. We ought to have some scholarships for this and scholarship for that. And we ought to have money for the radio broadcasts. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. Y’all ought to get involved, but not me.

You don’t do nothing but boy I want everybody else to do it. Should you do what you expect others to do, to do what you can do, and maybe you can’t do a lot of things, but you’ll always have to remember the little flashlight illustration. When he says, pray the Lord of the harvest that he’ll send forth labors into the vineyard. You pray the Lord of the harvest and then the very next verse he sent them out. You pray for the Lord of the harvest, he’ll send forth labors into the field.

then he sent them. But anyway, look at the next statement. What about your vision? Do you have a vision right now? This day, are you encouraged or discouraged? How are you looking at life? How are you looking down the road of what do you want God to do with you? What would you like to do for the Lord? What would you want to accomplish? Or you just see yourself as, well, I’m going to fail anyway, so there’s no sense trying.

I can’t do this. I can’t do that. And you’re building wall bricks or rangers of I can’t. I can’t. I can’t. And after a while you’ll build yourself a little prison and you’ve got to live in your little prison. You can’t do anything. You can’t go anywhere. You can’t be nothing because you have bocked yourself in. Well, I can’t. I can’t. I can’t. And God says you can. See, all these I can’ts is just because there’s a lie behind it somewhere.

But when you believe the truth, the truth is I can. I can. I can. And the way you dispel the lie is by believing the truth and the truth will set you free out of this prison that you build for ourselves. Look at the next statement. Number six, a look at the future will be determined by the things you do in the present. Your future has been determined by your obedience to the Lord today. Your future is being determined by your disobedience to the Lord today.

Whether you obey the Lord or you disobey the Lord determines what’s going to happen to you down the road. Whether God blesses you or has to chase in you or take you home before your time. So your future has been determined by your obedience to God today or by your failure to obey the Lord. Very important. Look at the next statement. What will your future hold? What do you look at? What do you look at? Now we know that there is in the book of Genesis a little lady.

Her name was Eve. Did she do anything wrong? Did she do anything wrong? She saw fruit took her eyes off of what God says and she saw fruit. But remember it’s not just the fruit. Is it that she rebelled against what God says to do or not to do? You can do this and you can’t do this. and she made the decision. Think for a moment, has that decision she made has it affected anybody? Has there been any consequences down the road?

Now if Eve could walk in here right now and look back over her past and I would say Eve is there anything as you look back over your life? Is there one decision that stands out more than others you’d like to change? I leave that fruit alone. I hope that’s what should say. Now some of our misery that we have today is because there were some decisions that we made in the past that we shouldn’t have done and we did it anyway.

Don’t make it again. Don’t do what caused that. Whatever that might be. We’re supposed to learn and move ahead. Look at the next statement. A look at Aiken. Who was Aiken anyway? By the time you got through throwing some stones, he was Aiken all right. What was this about? Anybody know the story about Joshua and Joshua went in and they, Joshua fit the battle of Jericho and the walls came a tunneling down and there was a great victory, right?

And everybody was excited. Well, city of A.I. was, that’s just a little low place. Don’t have to send everybody just enough to do the job and did they have victory or were they in defeat. They were defeated and Joshua’s beside himself. What happened? Well see, there happened to be one man in the mist who did something he shouldn’t have done. What did he do? What did he do that was so wrong? He took something he wasn’t supposed to take.

Was it some Babylonian garment or something? Did he steal some silver? Now the Scripture is right here and we could take time to look at it but I think that y’all have heard enough of the story. I just want to tell that I want to cover the rest of these here. But Aiken stole. He said, I saw, I coveted, I took, and then I buried. And so what did it cost? Well, the price that he had to pay, it’s no big deal.

I mean, just a few little old items, nobody’s He’s going to miss. Who knows? And lo and behold, He took those little, those simple things. He hid them. And Joshua had Him, His wife, His kids, all His animals, all His possessions, that silver, everything they had, killed them, burned them all. They’re all destroyed. Look at the fallout. Now if He could stand here today and you say, hey, if you look back over your past, is there anything that if you could do it over again, what would you do?

It’s just number one, I would have never taken those things I was told not to take. You see, life is supposed to teach us something, but most people they repeat the same problem, they got them into the same problem, and you’ll do that again, and you’ll do it again, and then do it again, because we just can’t believe, You know, it wasn’t that bad, but you’ll find out there can be a lot of consequences down the road. Don’t do today what has a bitter end in the future.

Terrible results down the road. Look at David in 2 Samuel chapter 11 and verse 2, the day when kings go forth to fight and he sent forth his armies to fight. What did David do? He didn’t go, did he? went on and looked out over the balcony, didn’t he? And he saw something. What did he see? Don’t get too graphic. He saw a beautiful woman, a beautiful woman. The Bible puts it in security. She was a beautiful woman. God created her.

She was beautiful. Where was her husband? He was in the battle. Oh, where was David? He was out of place. He wouldn’t put me there. See, he should have been where he he was supposed to be, but he wasn’t. He stayed and he saw a beautiful woman. And from that one beautiful woman, sin was committed, then he had to kill her husband. She got pregnant, the baby died, and he paid for four times in his family. Four times in his family, he had to, because of what David did.

And if David was here today, it could look back over his life. I bet there’s some decisions he wished he had made better. Now we can’t go back in time. Wouldn’t it be me we could correct this, correct that, but God didn’t allow. He wants you to correct the day, correct the future. So that when it’s all over with, and you stand before the Lord, aren’t you glad that God forgives us of everything we have ever done? But it’s amazing how that we have a difficulty for giving ourselves and we’ll carry the guilt all the way down the line.

You commit those saints to Lord, Lord, it was wrong. I send, forgive me, and go ahead. And try not to repeat the same thing because you’re the same problems. Because you see, you just liable to live another 10 years. And the consequences down the road that they’re gonna be good or bad. Are they things you could tell everybody, do what I did. Whatever it is that I’m gonna do, it should be right for everybody to do. Because right is always right.

Look at the next statement. Ahab, anybody ever heard of Ahab? The Ahab, the Sheikah, the burning sand? Well, maybe it wasn’t the burning sands. And, but anyway, Ahab, well, somebody had some land and he wanted it. What was the name of the guy that had the land? And he wanted it. What was his name? Anybody know his name? Neighbor. And he had some land. And what did, well, Ahab coveted. He wanted that land and he didn’t care what he had to do to get that land.

And no Jezebel, his wife, well, I don’t know how old she was, but Jezebel, his wife says, why don’t you just kill him and take it? Isn’t that wonderful, godly wife of, you know, for you hubby? Because he was having a founding party. He wanted that land. She said, well, kill him and take it. You’re the king. You’re the king. Was there any consequences after that? Yeah, took old Jezebel and says, Chuck are down boys. So they chucked her down seven times.

I have a poem that I’ve read that has to deal with somebody learning how to preach the Word of God. And it’s funny, it really is. Everyone’s in a while, it comes into my mind. Look at the next thing, but he wanted land. See the next one, Judas, he wanted silver. What do you want? He gave him 30 pieces of silver. What did Judas do for that 30 pieces of silver?

He wanted something. What did he have to do? Betray Jesus. For money, he betrayed Jesus Christ. Now, if Jesus were being here today, is there any decision you think he might change? Or if he was in hell, he might say, boy, I messed up, but he did say I have betrayed innocent blood. You see, if we look back up on our life, we’re not to focus upon our past. We’re not to focus there, but it is once in a while good to take a glimpse at what our life has accomplished, what God has forgiven us of, and move forward looking onto the Lord.

And realizing that if I don’t watch myself, I’m going to do the same things I have done before and I’m going to suffer the same consequences, learn, be wiser from now on. Make better decisions. Stay close to the Lord. sure that you always ask and seek God’s wisdom in everything that you do. As far as our future goes, they’re in 1 Corinthians in chapter 3, and we know this part of the verse. Every man shall receive his own reward according to his own labor.

I know that down the road, God is going to reward me because there is accountability. There’s accountability in everybody’s life. We’re going to have to give an account to God. Now if there is no God, nothing matters. Nothing matters. Good matter and nothing matters. But if you want God best for you, God’s will, everything matters because everything that touches our lives touches God. God is watching and he wants to play. God’s, I see, I am convinced. I have no God.

I believe God really loves me. Not just enough to save me. And then he, I don’t love you anymore. No, I think God really loves me. I really am convinced God loves you. I am convinced God wants the best for you. And I want you to trust it to believe that. Look up here. This hand represents you and me. The wallet represents sin. We all have sin. He loves us. He loves us. God, He loves us. Now, He hates our sin, but He does love us.

And remember, He loves us so much He’s going to do something for us. But see, you and I, the only way we can pay for sin is to spend eternity separated from God. Inhale, but God loves us and wants us to go to heaven and to go to heaven. We have to be perfect as righteous as God. And none of us are righteous. We’ve all sinned. We can’t get in. So the Bible says you cannot save yourself by your works.

This is representing Jesus Christ. He’s the Lord God in the flesh. in the flesh. He came into this Sounders because he loves us. Now he hates our sin because our sin separates us from the Lord. So God says if you and I would just simply believe he took our sins, paid for it on the cross, came back from the dead. He would give you and I as a free gift eternal life and we shall not perish. We will not have to go to hell.

I will not have to pay for these sins in hell. God gives me eternal life and I go to heaven on what Christ did. And all that he asked me to do is believe he did it for me. These things have I written unto you that believe you may know you have eternal life. You can know that you have eternal life. Let’s pray, shall we? With heads bowed and eyes closed, if you’re watching by internet tonight, we want you to know that God loves you.

In spite of everything you’ve ever done or what you ever will do, God loves you so much that he died on that cross and paid for your sins. The only thing he wants you to do to go to heaven is believe he did it for you. Yes, God wants us to do right, but we don’t do right to get to heaven. Going to heaven is a gift. It’s free. He loves you that much. Would you trust him? Well, on the screen says, yes, I’ll trust Christ as my Savior.

I pray that you will. If you’re in the auditorium tonight, two things. One, if you’re heaven, trust that Christ is your Savior, you need to trust him. If you already know the Lord, you know you’re going to heaven when you die. Just take a moment. Don’t you want better things in the future than you’ve had in the past? A lot of things you can’t change, but there’s some things you can, and that’s that walk between you and the Lord.

You can always walk a little closer. Get close to the Lord. Ask for His will. Tell Him you want that more than anything else in your life. If you have to be humbled, then let God humble you. you. But don’t lift yourself up and pride against the Lord and find that you’re fighting against God. You can’t win. Father, we thank you so much for your blessings. Bless each one here. For those who have never trusted you, save you, we pray, Lord, whether here in the auditorium or there, those that are watching by internet, we put their complete confidence and trust in what you did on the cross for them.

And Father, for each one of us is your children. We don’t have all the answers. We know that we’re growing and some things we’ve done when we were younger. a lot of decisions and a lot of things that’s brought a lot of pain perhaps in our lives. But Father, help us to look to you and walk with you and a little bit closer and realize that we can’t trust our flesh. And Lord, that we want to be pleasing to you.

We want your will more than anything else. So thank you so much for this time together. Bless each one here in Christ’s name and glory. Are you a new listener to Bible Eye? Do you enjoy the teachings of Dr. Arnold? Well, if you’ve never contacted us before, we want to give you Dr. Arnold’s book, The Gospel Driven Man. Every day we receive many emails from folks who have questions about repentance and salvation, about faith in works, and about how to share the gospel with friends and loved ones.

This book, The Gospel Driven Man, covers all those topics, and we want all new listeners of Bibleline to receive a free copy. There’s no obligation, no donation necessary, simply call us at 1-800-576-3771 or write to us and request your free copy of the Gospel-Driven Man. The mailing address is 4811 George Road, Tampa, Florida, 33634. Again, don’t forget to include your mailing address, and God bless you and thank you for listening to Bibleline. Thanks for joining us on Bibleline. If you are in the area, we welcome you to visit us.

The address for Calvary Community Church is 4811 George Road, Tampa, Florida, 33634. And now a closing thought from Pastor Arnold. Friend, one day it will happen, the trumpet will sound and we will be changed. Caught up to meet the Lord in the air. So live today and every day, believe in that the Lord is coming soon, just keep looking up.