Call-In Classic Christianity Radio – Bob George P542 (06-05-20)
Synopsis
It is so wonderful to hear people call in to get answers to their questions. People are looking for truth, and desire to grow in Christ, from the newest believer to those serving as deacons. Pastors and teachers are a gift to the body of Christ, to equip them for works of service. A pastor cannot get bogged down in waiting on tables, but must have time in the word of God and time equipping a group of men, so that they too can counsel and disciple others. Recall the great commission Jesus spoke about to the eleven men he reached and sent out. He told them to teach them to teach others to obey everything He has taught them and to make disciples of men.
Now, to a new believer who asks you advice on how to stop doing the things he used to do as a non-believer, what would you tell him? So many people would tell him to do this and not do that, and it amounts to legalism. You share with him that he is a new babe in Christ, and to get to know the love of God, and to grow in that. You encourage him to keep reading the scriptures to get to know the love of God. Remind him to enjoy the journey of faith and that Christ will continue the work He began in you, and to allow time for that. You are getting to know His love. And you are learning how to respond to that love. Love will change your heart first, then will change your actions. It is in that order. It is the love of God then that results in dependency upon God that then results in obedience to God.
God wants all of to learn how to walk by faith, to depend on Him, to trust Jesus, to abide in Him. There is no greater passage than what Jesus gave us in the parable of the vine and the branches in John 15. We cannot love in the energy of our flesh, as you will here a caller share that revelation of how free she is now, knowing that. We can no more produce love than a branch can produce fruit. A branch bears fruit by remaining attached to the vine. Jesus is the vine, and He produces fruit of the Spirit, such as love, joy, peace, patience and loving-kindness, in and through us as we rest in Him.
Many times people call in asking how to reach a family member or neighbor to come to Christ, or someone from Jehovah Witnesses or the Mormon religion. The bottom line is, irregardless of whatever denomination you are raised, you have to realize you are a sinner, that you are wretched, that your works of self righteousness are like filthy rags to God. You are spiritually dead, and you must recognize that condition you are in.
Now that you see your need, you now hear the message concerning Christ Jesus. Jesus is eternal life, God in the flesh. He is the Jesus we read about in the bible, not what we read in the book of Mormon or some other book or ideas made up by man. He is the only one who had a life to lay down and the only one who has a life to be given to mankind. You must come to Christ by faith in Him and Him alone.
You must realize that you do not get your sins forgiven. You do not keep asking God to forgive you. For God already took your sins away on a cross. That is what frees you to come to Him for life. If Jesus did not take all your sins away then that would be like saying to Jesus that he lied when he said, “It is finished” It would be insulting the Spirit of grace, exposing Jesus to public shame, asking Him to do something He has already done, and He will not, nor needs to, do that again, shedding his blood on a cross, without which there would be no forgiveness of sins.
But life is the real issue here. Death cannot give life. Only life can give life. Sin was in the way of being able to offer new life. Take the sin out of the way, which Jesus did at the cross for the entire world. Then put the sinless life in, which God now can and will do for those who receive Christ Jesus by faith. Why? He rose from the dead and lives forever more, so He can always intercede for you. So then when you do come to Him for life, He seals the Spirit in you. That is what being born again is, becoming a new creation in Christ. Come to Christ Jesus to receive new life today.
Transcript
Aila from Lincoln, CA
Aila: I am wondering if people who believe they can lose their salvation, are they saved?
Bob: Aila, again, I think we have to leave those kinds of decisions into the heart of God. But what we can do is state what the bible says. In order to say you can lose your salvation, you would first of all, you would have to believe you had salvation. So then, why did you have salvation? If your faith was not in the fact of a Jesus that took away all of the sins of the entire world, that God was in Christ reconciling the whole world unto Himself not counting their sins against him. There is no other Jesus of the bible. There is no Jesus of the bible that died for some of our sins.
2 Corinthians 5:19
19 that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them.
Acts 4:12
12 Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to mankind by which we must be saved.”
Aila: Yes, that is what I was thinking.
Bob: So, you are down to the point of wondering just how technical, so to speak, God is in those things. The issue is, we say, as an example of the Mormon faith, they do not have Jesus of the bible. Jesus of the bible did not come over here to America and land in Utah. The Jesus of the bible is not Satan’s brother. The Jesus of the bible did not start as a man and ultimately was able to become God through his works. That guy is not there. They have a different bible for they are saying that Jesus did not die for all sin. Or another group of people, very respectable, incidentally, who say Jesus only died for the elect. Sorry, there is no Jesus of the bible who died for the elect. He died to take away the sins of the whole world.
1 John 2:2
2 And he is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.
Bob: You cannot spin the world. You cannot spin that. So, it makes me wonder how many people have placed their faith in the true Jesus of the bible.
Aila: That is what I was wondering.
Bob: I cannot answer that question. But I do believe that the more that I have been teaching recently, and when I study Hebrews, that if we continue to sin against the knowledge of the truth. That is what people are sinning against, the knowledge of the truth. For me to say I can lose my salvation, then I would have to say Jesus did not take away all the sins of the world because I would not have salvation apart from that.
Hebrews 10:26-27
26 If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, 27 but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God.
Bob: So if I can lose my salvation, then I am saying, “I am sorry. Jesus did not die for the sins of the whole world. He missed some”. I would be very frightened, to be very honest with you, if I had theology saying that Jesus did not mean what he said when he said, “it is finished’, meaning “paid in full”.
John 19:30
30 When he had received the drink, Jesus said, “It is finished.” With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit
Bob: I do know the Jesus I came to and the Jesus that is in the bible. The Jesus of the bible is the Jesus who took away the sins of the entire world. He entered into your and my death with you and me so that raised from the dead we could enter into his resurrection with him. I do know that the Jesus of the bible is the one Paul talks about.
1 Corinthains 15:14-19
14 And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. 15 More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead. But he did not raise him if in fact the dead are not raised. 16 For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either. 17 And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. 18 Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. 19 If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied.
If Christ is not raised from the dead we are to be pitied of all people and are still dead in our sins, knowing full well that a cross had occurred, taking away our sins, and realizing that we would not be alive without the resurrection. The provision for forgiveness was providing forgiveness for the entire world on a cross but that is received only in his resurrected life. That is the completeness of the gospel, Aila, and no one can add to or subtract from that at all. You have to take it just as it is. There is no baptism or tongues or manifestations. It is just, have you entered into the fact that you are lost, you are dead, you are a sinner, you are wretched, your heart is deceitful above all things and do you know it, and you have come to Him to correct that condition. If you have, you are saved. If you haven’t then you are not. I do not know how you can come to Jesus who did not complete all of those things, the totality of it all, and be a born again believer?
Aila: I do not know about the Jehovah Witnesses.
Bob: You have to come to Jesus for who He is and what He came for. Most of the major denominations today teach you can lose your salvation. Most of them have turned into liberal organizations, which tells you they never had it, or they would have never lost it.
Aila: I have a sister-n-law who is a Mormon, and I sent her one of your tapes.
Bob: If they would just read it. I wonder in my own heart, is how many people are sitting there, not having a clue how the book of Mormon was brought into existence? I have difficulty believing that anyone with a mind, who knew how the book of Mormon was brought into existence by Joseph Smith sitting there supposedly looking into a pair of binoculars reading Egyptian Hieroglyphics and supposedly translating it into the King James. That is an impossibility to me. How many of them do not have a clue as to what they are taught? Maybe they just like hanging around a lot of nice people.
Bob: I get more and more concerned, as time goes on, even of mainline Christianity, who are sinning against the knowledge of the truth.
Aila: That has been coming to me. I was talking to one lady about People to People, that once you are saved, you are saved. She says, “Oh, that is too much for me”. She is in her 80s now. She said, “All my life I believed if you sinned too much you can lose your salvation”.
Bob: How in the world would you know if you sinned too much?
Aila: I tried to tell her, but she must have got ticked off, for she would not speak to me for a while.
You are a prideful individual to think if you sinned enough you would go to hell. But they evidently think they have not sinned that much. “I am a righteous dude. I have never sinned enough to lose my salvation, but you have.”
Bob: All you can do, Aila, with people in that situation, there is no way for them to come to the unconditional love of Christ Jesus, and be saved by grace when you do not have any grace. It is works.
Romans 11:5-6
5 So too, at the present time there is a remnant chosen by grace. 6 And if by grace, then it cannot be based on works; if it were, grace would no longer be grace.
Bob: So such a person cannot be saved. I pray people get it. I think people in that camp do not know the Lord at all.
Aila: That is sad.
Bob: Yes, it is. You keep proclaiming truth and hope people have the wisdom to hold onto it. God bless you.
Demo from Atlanta, GA
Demo: I just recently accepted Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior. I was wondering, I know Jesus has forgiven my sins. I received it. I have not been taught that, I have been taught that you have to continually ask for forgiveness. How can I stop some of the things I am currently doing? I am trying to build a relationship with the Lord. I am still finding it hard to stop doing some of the things I used to do in the past.
Bob: God will complete the work He began in you. Who stated that? Jesus.
Philippians 1:6
6 being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.
Bob: Who is going to complete it? Jesus. You have to give Him time to do that. This is in Titus. I recommend you look this up.
Titus 2:11-13
11 For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people. 12 It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, 13 while we wait for the blessed hope – the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ
Bob: That is what you are talking about, to say “No” to unrighteous deeds and unrighteous thoughts. It is the grace of God that will teach you to do that. It is the grace of God that teaches you to have self-controlled, upright lives in this present generation, while we wait for the blessed hope – the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ.
Bob: You are a babe in Christ. You are a baby in Christ. I do not care how old you are physically. A babe in Christ is going to burp and throw up and all that kind of stuff. You do not sit there and say, “why you do you not grow up?” You just grow naturally and continue to do what you are doing. If you are reading that bible, you are getting to know Jesus. You are getting to know His love. And you are learning how to respond to that love. Love will change your heart first, then will change your actions. It is in that order. It is the love of God then that results in dependency upon God that then results in obedience to God.
Bob: We try to get people to obedience before getting them in love, and all that ends up being is legalistic obedience.
Demo: If something should happen that I should, in this infancy state, will I still be forgiven of my sins?
Bob: Your sins are already forgiven. You believe it and received it. Yet, by asking the question, then you are not sure. Jesus took away the sins of the entire world. No man will ever go to hell because of sins. The only sin is the of rejection of the Son of God.
John 16:9
9 The world’s sin is unbelief in me
Bob: The sins of the world have all been placed on Christ Jesus.
2 Corinthians 5:21
21 God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
Bob: Your sins are on the back of God never ever to see them again.
Demo: Thank you very much. Can I get a copy of your book?
Bob: I will put you on hold and let you know how you can purchase that.
Carmine from Kenner, LA
Carmine: I have been a Christian since 1987, from Catholic, now Baptist. They the gave plan of salvation and then I was born again. Now they tell me once saved you have the Holy Spirit. So what is this tongue’s thing. I do not understand that?
Bob: You do not need to understand those things, Carmine, because it is totally irrelevant. Paul even said that what good is it going to do you to speak in a language that nobody else understands.
1 Corinthians 14:6-11
6 Now, brothers and sisters, if I come to you and speak in tongues, what good will I be to you, unless I bring you some revelation or knowledge or prophecy or word of instruction? 7 Even in the case of lifeless things that make sounds, such as the pipe or harp, how will anyone know what tune is being played unless there is a distinction in the notes? 8 Again, if the trumpet does not sound a clear call, who will get ready for battle? 9 So it is with you. Unless you speak intelligible words with your tongue, how will anyone know what you are saying? You will just be speaking into the air. 10 Undoubtedly there are all sorts of languages in the world, yet none of them is without meaning. 11 If then I do not grasp the meaning of what someone is saying, I am a foreigner to the speaker, and the speaker is a foreigner to me.
Bob: Today, I have heard babbling of tongues, which is not the tongues Paul wrote about. First, I do not even believe it is a language of the bible anymore. Tongues was a known language. I have never heard people speak in a biblical tongue, a known language that can be identified as a known language and understood by people who live in a country where the language was used. That is what biblical tongues is nothing less and nothing more.
Acts 2:5-11
5 Now there were staying in Jerusalem God-fearing Jews from every nation under heaven. 6 When they heard this sound, a crowd came together in bewilderment, because each one heard their own language being spoken. 7 Utterly amazed, they asked: “Aren’t all these who are speaking Galileans? 8 Then how is it that each of us hears them in our native language? 9 Parthians, Medes and Elamites; residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, 10 Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya near Cyrene; visitors from Rome 11 (both Jews and converts to Judaism); Cretans and Arabs—we hear them declaring the wonders of God in our own tongues!”
Bob: I have one more thing to tell you. I have been in New Orleans for many years. I am 59 now. I was a police officer for 21 years. It was by the grace of God I stayed alive. The Lord spoke to me in my little church ministry. I never could understand how I could love my neighbor. I never could. From God’s mouth to his mouth, you cannot. A ton of bricks was off my back for days. I have been here in Louisiana, and I have witnessed miracles for myself. I had to put a blue roof on my house. God put it in place. Someone said, “Do not worry about it. I will have four come by and put a roof on your house before you get home”. That is from God.
Bob: It sure is. If people will just recognize that apart from Christ Jesus, we can do nothing. We are a branch and he is the vine. A branch does not go and produce fruit. A branch abides in the vine and the vine produces the fruit in and through the branch. The branch bears the fruit produced by the vine.
John 15:1-5
1 “I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. 2 He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. 3 You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. 4 Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.5 “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.
Bob: You are right, Carmine, that you cannot love people. You have to abide in Christ Jesus and let Christ love them in and through you. You cannot do it in the energy of the flesh.
Carmine: One more thing. You know the Mardi Gras thing down here. When Moses went to Mt. Sinai to talk to God. He left Aaron in charge. So Aaron told everybody to melt gold to make a golden calf. There is a certain crew down here, their first slope that comes down the street is a golden calf. That is so scary.
Bob: Well, the whole parade is heathenistic. What is one more heathen up against the rest of them? The whole thing is totally demonic. There is nothing about God in the whole parade or the Mardi Gras deal.
Carmine: He had to break it to make it right. Our whole church is praying. I am praying to you guys. Someone said Moses stuttered. Well, Aaron didn’t stutter. Wait until I come back and they would not wait. I keep praying.
Bob: Keep praying and walking one day at a time, Carmine.
Carmine: You know that is right. God bless.
Bob: You too.
Lorenzo from New Orleans, LA
Lorenzo: I believe God does have his hand on you. I listen to your show quite frequently there.
Lorenzo: I want some general idea in thinking on these scriptures. Do we have eternal life as of right now because I spoke to a group of people and the guy that I was speaking to. I was sharing from John 10, that God has given us eternal life and we shall never perish. If we are in Christ Jesus, we have eternal life now. I just felt like that we do not die. I am just going to ask you to elaborate on that for me.
Bob: Well, it tells us in 1 John, Lorenzo, this is the record. This is God’s record. We believe man’s testimony readily enough but this is God’s testimony about His Son. When something prefaces that you know that what he is getting ready to say is exactly what the truth is and for the purpose of correcting the error that is in the world out there.
1 John 5:9-12
9 We accept human testimony, but God’s testimony is greater because it is the testimony of God, which he has given about his Son. 10 Whoever believes in the Son of God accepts this testimony. Whoever does not believe God has made him out to be a liar, because they have not believed the testimony God has given about his Son. 11 And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. 12 Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life. 13 I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life.
Bob: He who has, not will, but has the Son, has life. That is the testimony. When does eternal life begin? When you have the Son. Why? Because Jesus is eternal life. He is the life eternal.
John 17:3
3 Now this is eternal life: that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.
John 11:24-26
24 Martha answered, “I know he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day.”25 Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die; 26 and whoever lives by believing in me will never die. Do you believe this?”
Bob: He is eternal life and that is why you cannot have eternal without being attached to Christ Jesus, for Him to come indwell in your spirit. That is when we get eternal life is the moment we have the Son.
Lorenzo: That is beautiful, right there. Thank you for helping me know that I am not walking around believing false doctrine.
Lorenzo: With these pastors who have very large congregations, and some of them multi-millionaires, I am wondering. In most such churches, we are like numbers. If we are like numbers, is it fair that when someone’s loved one comes into glory, he cannot contact the pastor to be there. If someone takes sick, you cannot look to the pastor to come to the hospital. I am confused. Is it best to make sure we have someone who is going to be preaching over us that knows us as opposed as being just looked at as another number?
Bob: Again, Lorenzo, the multiplicity of pastors and elders and deacons, is really the way the church structure is supposed to be. There is no way one man to be the preacher and the hospital visitor and the person who marries and buries people. Those kinds of activities will suddenly take away from the study of the word of God and the ability to present the word of God. That is why the early church formed deacons to help with those kinds of things. Deacons and elders were assigned to the people to serve them. There is no way for a pastor to do that in huge churches. On the other hand, if people want that kind of attention, they need to get out of that and go to a small church. You cannot get that in a large church just physically. There is no way for a man to pull that off.
Acts 6:1-3
1 In those days when the number of disciples was increasing, the Hellenistic Jews among them complained against the Hebraic Jews because their widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food. 2 So the Twelve gathered all the disciples together and said, “It would not be right for us to neglect the ministry of the word of God in order to wait on tables. 3 Brothers and sisters, choose seven men from among you who are known to be full of the Spirit and wisdom. We will turn this responsibility over to them 4 and will give our attention to prayer and the ministry of the word.”
Lorenzo: I am actually serving as a deacon myself. I was told to stay in my place. My pastor has a license and could be a counselor. If I was to lead someone in the wrong direction, they could come back and sue the pastor. I am so distorted right now.
Bob: That is not true. Nobody is going to sue the pastor because of something you said. That is his fault. He is not training and equipping people underneath him. That is his fault. The fault with pastors is they do not equip the saints for the work of ministry. They stay in their studies instead of using their information that God has given them to train a corps of leadership underneath him. Jesus had twelve men. He had a real successful ministry. He started with twelve and ended up with eleven. The issue is he poured his life into those eleven men. Those eleven men poured their life into their eleven men.
Matthew 28:19-20
19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
Bob: That is how it multiplied in the early church. A pastor should be an equipper of the saints for their work of ministry. Just preaching from pulpit is not necessarily going to equip them unless he does such a great job that their are able to go and communicate he truth. If you are elder or a deacon, yo should be in situation of making hospital calls and going in ministering to people. Those what those functions are for, not just to sweep floors necessarily.
Ephesians 4:11-13
11 So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, 12 to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up 13 until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.
Lorenzo: Yes sir. You have been a blessing to me. I am going to continue to rejoice, looking for that high calling in Christ Jesus. I would like to get my hands on your book, Classic Christianity.
Bob: We will put you on hold and let you know how you can do that.
