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Bibleline Bibleline, here God’s Word on Bibleline, everywhere, every time. 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 prayers and monthly support make it possible for Bibleline to continue on the air. You can reach us at 813-884-4328, or you can donate on the homepage at BibleLineMinistries.org. 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.

Now look at this next thing. Here in Acts chapter 14 where he says he would be killed. We know that and believe that according to 2 Corinthians in chapter 12, he said, I knew a man in Christ about 14 years ago, whether in the body or out of the body I cannot tell, but such a one was caught up into the third heaven. We believe that’s what happened to Paul. Even though they wanted to kill him, God used that to show him things that no man had ever seen and come back to the earth and live and then God put a thorn in his flesh to make things worse for him, lest he be exalted above measure that he was somebody that he shouldn’t think that way.

So God had to humble him all the days of his ministry. He said, well, why would God do that? Because he’d be lifted up with pride. Pride destroys every person. When you think more about yourself than you do about the word of God says. When you get to think, I don’t need God, I don’t need church, I don’t need the Bible. No, you get it all nailed down. You can handle everything all by yourself. You fool. That’s a fool.

All right, but anyway, Galatians chapter one, look over there very quickly. The book of Galatians, Galatians in chapter one. Look what Paul had to say. Galatians chapter one in verse 13. Here he is telling a little bit about the way he was before he ever trusted Christ as a Savior. He says, for you have heard of my conversation or my behavior, my testimony, in time passed in the Jews religion because he was a religious man. How about beyond measure?

I persecuted the church of God and wasted it. This is what I did. Now God had to do a work in his life. Have you got things Sometimes you have to hit somebody over the head with a two before. Not everybody sees everything the same way. And sometimes you can prejudge things that happen in somebody else’s life. And sometimes you can look at somebody and they’re going through the trials of tribulation, I know what they did. You don’t really know, you guess.

But did you know there’s a warning in the scripture, like in the book of Luke about the one Pharisee that says, Lord, I’m so glad I’m not like those other ones. And they look down their long fairs, silken nose. Well, I’m glad I’m not like that. I’m glad I’m not like that. I’m so holy. I go to church all the time and I pray and I give. Man am I holy. And another man just says, Lord be merciful to me as sinner because he just knew he was a sinner.

And there’s some people don’t think, well, I’m glad I’m not that bad. I’m not that bad, but I’m not that bad. And they just kind of prejudge everybody else. You better watch that, because there’s verses in the Bible about people who do that. Lock those doors. No. Now look at this. Look there in 1 Corinthians chapter three, 1 Corinthians chapter three. Now you need to know these verses are in the Bible because they will help you. 1 Corinthians chapter three, when you trusted Christ as your Savior, The Bible says you were born of God and your body becomes the temple of God.

See, God doesn’t live here in this church. I’ve seen some people that don’t just… Quiet. Be holy. So why are we going to be holy? Quiet. We might wake up God. He doesn’t live here. But how do I know God is here? I brought him. He lives inside of me. My body is the temple of God. Look what he says there in verse 17. If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy. For the temple of God is holy, which temple you are.

Your body is the temple of God. And if you defile that body, and a lot of people have died way before their time. They have killed that body with alcohol. drugs and doing things that should not do, running with the wrong people at the wrong time, doing all kinds of things, AIDS. But there’s crimes, sins that can be committed against the body. And a lot of people who have gotten diseases of the body because of sex with people they’re not supposed to be with.

And there’s a price to pay and they die early. But if you know Christ is your Savior, you can’t sin against the body and get away with it. Now God talks about, yes, as a word praso, poeo, not one single act, but praso to habitually committing certain sins over and over and over again, and you can destroy that body that you have, and you have to be very careful. So He says, for the temple of God is holy which temple you are.

Now look in 1 Corinthians chapter 5. 1 Corinthians chapter 5, just briefly. I I want to show you how the church doing what’s right, it became a blessing. And verse 1, it is reported commonly that there is fornication among you. So it wasn’t something that was just a casual thing. This was commonly reported. Is it not so much as named among the gentile that one should have his father’s wife? Where are you are popped up and not rather mourn why because it’s wrong that he that have done this deed might be taken from among you.”

In other words, taken out. You say, I don’t know if that’s what it’s said. Well, if you look down here a little bit further, for I verily has absentened body, but present in spirit have judged already as though I were present concerning Him that have so done this deed. In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when you are gathered together, talk about this church, and my spirit with the power of the Lord Jesus Christ to deliver such a one unto Satan for the destruction of the what?

Of the flesh. That’s dead. So God can remove his hand of protection when you decide to live outside of that little umbrella called the will of God. And so whenever you move outside that realm then I don’t pray God bless that person because I don’t want God to bless that person in his rebellion. I pray God chasing the person for the purpose of correction, put a hedge of forms around that individual, so that whatever he does, or she does, it pricks them and makes them get back under that element.

So you can always pray for everyone within the will of God. And those that are in the will of God, they still get sick And they still get tired and weak and they still die. But it won’t be because of chasening of the Lord. Or I should say, rebellion. So you can serve the Lord and suffer for it. And you can be rebellious and suffer for it. That’s why in the book of Peter, he talks about it is better to suffer for doing right than to suffer for doing wrong.

Doesn’t it say that? It’s in there. So there’s choices that we can make. So when I go home to be with the Lord, I wanted to be because he’s ready for me, not because I had to be taken home against God’s will, because I was rebellious. I want to serve the Lord all the days of my life. That’s why these scriptures that are written in the world of God are so important for us. But what I want you to see, though, that’s what they were prayed to take it home that his spirit may be saved in the day of our Lord, This is what God wanted the church to do, but now take your Bible and turn to 2 Corinthians 2 Corinthians in chapter 1 Now this is an important tag on that verse of that incident and You’ll notice here in 2 Corinthians chapter 2 and look in verse 1

He’s referring now back to the time when he told them as a church what to do about the brother of that sin against God. But I determined this with myself that I would not come again to you in heaviness. For if I made you sorry, who is he then that makeeth me glad, but the same which is made sorry by me? And I wrote this same unto you lest when I came I should have sorrow from them of whom I ought to rejoice.

Having confidence in you all that my joy is the joy of you all, for out of much affliction and anguish of heart. Now this is Paul’s feelings because you see, doesn’t mean that Paul doesn’t love the person. You love the person but not what they were doing and the testament was having for the church. So he says if I wrote unto you with many tears, not that you should be grieved but that you should know the love which I have more abundantly unto you.

But if any have caused grief, he have not grieved mean, but in part that I may not overcharge you all sufficient to such a man is this punishment, which was inflicted by many. In other words, the church praying for the individual woke the person up. They correct the problem. Now that person has corrected the problem, forgive the person, now pray for the person. So that contrary wise you out rather to forgive him and comfort him, lest perhaps such a one should be swallowed up with over much sorrow.

See, sometimes you step outside that little umbrella of protection and God’s people are supposed to pray that God can correct that person or chasten that person for the purpose of correction because you want them to get back so they can commit a sin that is worthy of death, but if they’ll correct the problem, they don’t have to die. Did you realize, and I’ll show you this in just a minute, this is such an important lesson to remember because every one of us sooner or later, somewhere along the line, will have to face it for ourselves or someone we know and love, because not all of God’s children all serve the Lord to the same degree, do they?

Yet we want them to, but discerning how to pray is very, very important. So he says up here in verse eight, wherefore I beseech you that you would confirm your love toward him. Now, without first Corinthians, we would have a clue what he’s talking about here. But we do have Corinthians, and so we do know. And he says in verse nine, for to this end also did I write that I might know the proof of you whether you be obedient in all things and learning how to forgive an individual who steps outside of the boundary of the will of God.

So that’s why he says in the book of Galatians, he says, ye which are strong, seek to restore them that are weak. So that means you have to know why are they weak, well because they’re walking in the flesh. See, strong believers don’t walk in this flesh, they walk in the spirit. Weak believers can walk in this flesh, and not the spirit. So those who are strong to suppose encourage and pray for the other individual. Now look at the next script I want you to see.

In the book of 1 Corinthians in chapter 11, turn there, 1 Corinthians in chapter 11, just turn to you, left a couple pages. These are verses that we generally read just about every time we have communion service. But I want you to see a couple verses here with me. You’ll notice there in verse 28. There were individuals in the church that were coming together but they were getting drunk and they had a lot of problems in the church and they were not correcting anything.

So you can’t get right for somebody else and somebody else can’t get right for you. So he says examine yourself, see there in verse 28, but let a man, the individual, examine his neighbor. And what we do? Well I’m not as bad ass boy I’m glad you’re there. I’m glad you’re really bad because that doesn’t make me look so bad. No he says let a man examine himself so let him eat that bread and drink of that cup and for he that eateth and drinketh unworthily eateth and drinketh damnation or judgment to himself not discerning the Lord’s body judgment to himself then you see there in verse 30 for this cause many are weak and sickly among you and many sleep.

Three different things, but you’ll notice that I have here in the notes. I want you to look at it very quickly. One is examine yourself. Two, judge yourself. You got to correct it, right? Three, confess to God. That means all up to it. This is what I did. The fourth thing for sake of sin. And that’s where you have 1 John 1 9. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us of our sin, thank cleansers from all unripe.

That is one of the things that you do. Why do you confess it? Because I examined myself, I’ve judged myself that it was wrong. And now I confess it to God. And now the last thing is forsake the sin. Now, look at the words under result, because this is so important. When we have here, he is faithful. Talk into God now. He is faithful and just to forgive us of our sin and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. And according to 1 Corinthians 1131, we will not be judged.

Our look up here, I’m God and I’ve got a great big O’ Umbrella. And there’s room here for everybody. It’s called the will of God. And you’ve got a lot of freedom within the will of God to make a lot of decisions between right and right. You see, this is right and that’s wrong outside of the will of God. you’ve got a lot of decisions that you can make. But when you step outside of the will of God and you walk into flesh and you wind up doing things that you know is ungodly and it’s wrong, you can do one of two things.

You can examine yourself because you know God could take you on home and there are sins to be taken home and there are sins that once they have been confessed to God because you examined yourself, judged it was wrong and corrected the problem, then God says, you will not be judged. So there are sins that are not under death. Sins that the Christian has made right concerning. And I believe that is also taught in the book of 1 John, and I believe that’s a good possibility.

This is what those verses are talking about. So when we see those at the outside of the will of God, we’re to pray that God will use chasening in their life to bring them back to the Lord. It’s not because you hate people because you love them. And you know the greatest thing for them is to walk with the Lord and to love the Lord and stay within that boundary of the will of God. And you’d be surprised I pray God blessings on all those people who want to serve God.

Who want to be used by God. And I want God’s blessing. I want you to be happy because you’re doing what God says to do. And the Holy Spirit brings you great comfort when you obey the Lord. But when you step outside of that boundary, I don’t ask God, Lord, comfort them. They’re committed adultery, they’re on drugs that are ruining their life. Lord, I want you to bless them. No, I don’t. I want you to put a hedge of borns about them so that they’ll be pricked in their hearts and their minds and see the era of their ways.

And that’s why I want you to see another verse with me. But look there in the boldness first of all, what I have, these can be sins that are not under death because they were confessed and corrected. And I believe that’s what 1 John wants us to do. Everybody doesn’t always walk perfect. We mess up. But when we mess up, straighten up. When somebody falls, don’t put your foot on the back of their head and say, well, you blew it, mash them into the mud.

No, we try to pick them up. We want to help them. Because if we don’t, then God says considering it could be you next time. You realize how easy it is to fall and there are all these problems in life. So look down at the next statement, 1 Corinthians 11, 28, not everyone that was sick committed the same sin. Not everyone that is weak commits the same sin. Not everyone that dies commits the same sin because these committed a certain sin and not the same thing happened.

Just because somebody did something and they did nothing happen to them, well, I’m going to do it too. Bad move, bad judgment. And James chapter 5 very quickly I want you to turn there. The book of James, right after the book of Hebrews, this is in James page 1310 in your Bible. We have some interesting scriptures that are mentioned here and they kind of give us another idea of the power of prayer. And you’ll notice here in the book of James in chapter 5 started there in verse 13.

In verse 13, is any among you afflicted? How many of you feel like you might be in the afflicted area? I’m there. I am there. I have been greatly afflicted. And some of y’all have been going through exactly the same thing. Just another area, another part of your body, but there’s problems. And the older we get, they come heat together. Anyway, is any among you afflicted? Let him pray. Well, why pray if it can’t be resolved? If nothing can happen about it.

You may want to pray. not so much that the affliction goes away, but you may have the strength and the grace you need to bear the affliction. Because see, that’s something that can be done. That’s in the will of God. God cannot just take away everybody’s affliction. Now nobody got any problems. Isn’t that great? But then that’s contrary to Scripture.

Look what else he says. Is any Mary let him sing Psalms? Well, I can’t even sing the opening song we did today. But I anticipate down the road with great, joyful anticipation, I’m gonna be all singing again. And I know that’ll bless your heart. Verse 14, is any sick among you? I bet I don’t want to raise a hand on this. That might include the half of the church. Is any sickling? Let him call for the elders of the church?

Let them pray over him, anointing him with all in the name of the Lord. That’s why we have a Wednesday night prayer service. You want prayer? Come on and give us your request. And the people here, everybody here will pray for you. That means somebody has to know you’re hurting. I’ve had people say, I was in the hospital and you didn’t come to see me. Did you tell me you were in the hospital? Well, no, you’re supposed to know.

So I have decided it from now on. Anybody goes to the hospital? That’ll be Bob Gilbert and Bob Brooks’ responsibility. And we’re moving to verse 15. And the prayer of faith. Now, if you have been sick because of sin that you have done against the Lord and God knows what you’ve done and you know what you’ve done and you’d be surprised how God can prick your little mind to let you know this is what this is for. I don’t believe my heavenly Father just spanks me for no reason and then never tells me.

I believe God lets you know. And if it’s because of sin and you’re like, You know, you know, you know. It’s kind of like that guy that went into the pet story wanted to find him with just the right pet. He walked in and there was a parrot. And that parrot says, hey, mister. Little Trois is this? Yeah, you’re ugly. So you walked in before the wagon. That parrot hollowed out, hey mister, you’re ugly. And so the owner came back there and took ahold of that bird, shook them, slapped them right a little bit, says, don’t you talk to the customers like that?

Don’t you ever again? Went back to the front, that mister came back getting ready to go out the door, and that bird said, hey mister, you’re trying to look at that bird, better at birds, you know. You know. You know. When you do something wrong, you know. You know. And he says, and the prayer of faith shall save the sick and the Lord shall raise him up. And if he have committed sins, they shall be what? Because if the sickness is because of sin, you can correct the problem.

Otherwise, the sickness could take your life. But that’s between you and the Lord. But he also says in verse 16, see that word confess? Because if you’ve done things against somebody and you haven’t confessed that sin, maybe even to the person that you wronged and you haven’t confessed it, is that right or wrong? Is that a sin? Is it possible that you could get sick from something like it? Could God have the freedom to take you home if you wanted to?

And yet nobody else know the real reason, but you know, you know. And so that’s why he says in verse 16, the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man available much, not everything, much, but not everything. Some things we can pray for that can never be. There’s some things God cannot do and will not do. And that’s why he made the statement down here in verse 19. Brethren, if any one of you do air from the truth. So we’re talking about believers go in a stray living in air and one converted.

Let him know that he which converted the center from the air of his way shall save a soul from what? Death. And shall hide a multitude of sin. Now that also helps when we apply it to the lost man. Is it we want a man to have eternal life? So you can pray for that. But you see, God can extend a person’s life who corrects the problem, but God may not, and you don’t know how much time God’s going to give you to correct the problem.

You don’t know where the finish line is. You might have thought you had 30, 40 years, and God just moved that up because of your rebellion. I’m not God. I don’t play Holy Spirit in people’s lives. But I know what this book says, and sometimes it’s scary for me to tell. the last line on here that’s in bold. NBN is where are you going? When you die, whether you’re lost or saved, you should know that you have eternal life because God doesn’t take that away from you.

But God can shorten your life because of stiff-necked rebellion to God. So if you want to live a little bit longer and get a little extension of life and little tranquility of peace in your mind, then realize I need to examine myself and I need to judge myself on how I correct this problem. Confess that thing to the Lord and God says He’ll forgive and you can have but you need to forsake the wrong way. That means get back underneath the umbrella of the will of God.

Look up here. Letting this hand represent you and me and this wallet represents sin. We all have sin on us. God loves us but He hates what we do wrong. And everything that I’ve said this morning, I want you to understand this. Saved or lost, God loves you but He hates what you do wrong. And so Christians sometimes step outside the will of God. We just got to find out what we’re missing out on. You know, can I have more fun doing my will than I can, God’s when I realize that my very life, my very breath, my very heartbeat depends upon God.

I don’t want to make him mad, would you? Not me. He has power and he can take everything away, even my very life. God says He loves us, hates our sin. And for us to pay for sin is eternal separation from God in hell. But God loves us and wants to go to heaven and to go to heaven, we have to be perfect no sin. But we all have sinned. We’ve all come short of God’s perfection. God says we cannot save ourselves.

This hand represents Jesus Christ. He’s the Lord, God in the flesh. Came into this world because He loves us, but He hates our sin. He hates what we’ve done wrong. And our sin separates us. So Jesus Christ, see, I couldn’t do anything about it. But Jesus Christ, who had no sin, took all my sin and all your sins paid for them on the cross came back from the dead. And God said if we’d believe he did it for us, he’d put this payment to our count and we get to go to heaven on what Jesus Christ did for us.

It’s the greatest thing around, you know why I want to live long? I enjoy telling the story. If there’s no other reason for telling the story, you can learn to take me on now. But I enjoy telling people the gospel of Jesus Christ. And if you’re watching by internet, all you have to do is trust Christ to save you and God will give eternal life. You’ll never cast you out and never lose you. It’s the gift, totally free. And on the screen it says, yes, I’ll trust Christ as my Savior.

If you’ve never done it, I pray that you would. You’ve been listening to Bibleline, a teaching ministry of Calvary Community Church in Tampa, Florida with Dr. Ralph Arnold. We pray that you were 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 813-884-4328. That’s 813-884-4328. 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’re 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 1030, and at 6 o’clock on Sunday evening. Live broadcasts of our services may be seen by clicking the Calvary Community Church link at BibleLineMinistries.org. 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.