Radio Broadcast Wednesday 06/28/2023

 

Join Bob George in this chapter by chapter exposition of the gospel of John. Available for download the complete series on the Book of John. Realize why Christ, Himself, is REAL LIFE and how He personally offers hope in daily living that you may:

 

• Discover an abundant and meaningful life as a Christian.
• Overcome fear with His assurance that you have His eternal life.
• Experience joy during adversity.
• Apply God’s wisdom in decision making, no matter how big or small.
• Experience freedom as you walk by faith in His love and acceptance. 

 

Purchase Online at Shop.BobGeorge.net

 

Announcer 0:12
Welcome to Classic Christianity Radio with Bob George Bob’s clear, timeless teachings on the complete forgiveness and unconditional love of Jesus Christ will transform your life as you learn about God’s amazing grace. Let’s join Bob as he teaches us from God’s Word.

Bob George 0:28
The issue is that it’s your attitude. What is the attitude of our heart, toward the way we treat one another? And the way we interact with one another? Are we vile? Are we selfish? Or are we thinking about serving one another in love? How can I serve you in love? How can I help you to grow in your knowledge of Christ Jesus? How can I help you to grow in the world? Is there anything I can do to help you to become more successful in life? And these are attitudes of the heart that God honors and as partially what he’s saying to us here is, you’ve got the light, now live in it, before the darkness overtakes you. Guys, when you are and I are indwelt by Christ Jesus, which if we’re born again, we truly are indwelt by Christ Jesus, we have received the light of the world. But he says, there’s darkness out there and and walk in this light, before you get overtaken unless you get overtaken with it. Now, what does that tell us? That tells us that we can get so involved in the world that nothing spiritual ever comes through. We’re spiritual people. We are in Christ Jesus. We’re in the light. Our destiny is secured as to where we’re going to be when we’re absent from the body and present with the Lord. And yet we wander back in to the darkness.

I wonder sometimes and not to be overly critical. But I wonder sometimes what people are thinking in the so called church life that we call Christianity. When we go out to the world and find out what did you do to get business? How did you get people into your store? Walmart. How do you How did you attract people to your store? Well, let’s take those same principles. And let’s apply them to the church. So you got people into your store by advertising and sending out mailers and all of this and you’ve got the all of this church growth and everything else that hey, if you do these things, your church will grow. We see guys, what you’re saying is if you do these things, your numbers will grow. But what about the maturity of the people that are here? And I wonder sometimes in regard to have we said in the In the world that what kind of music do, what kind of music do the kids like? And so let’s let’s develop our music so the kids will like it. Well, I want to tell you something, what I liked as a kid, I wouldn’t be real proud of. I think a role of a parent is not to reduce yourself down to the level of the child, but to try to elevate the child to the level of the adult. And what we’re doing is compromising in order to be socially acceptable and politically acceptable. Instead of helping people to understand good things. I appreciate my daughter because she plays good music to her kids. She plays classical music. She plays Josh Groban. I think she likes him about as well as Jesus. I’m not sure but she she is a big Josh Groban fan. Now I tell you, it’s thrilling sometimes to see our little ones walking around and singing songs that Josh Groban sings to get them exposed to good music that some of you don’t know who Josh Groban is, and that’s okay. But to get into good music, and to help to elevate their, their thinking into something that’s better than just the vile, and the bass or emotions that could be generated through the musical scores today. And some people don’t agree with that. But that’s all right to these old hymns, you’re never gonna beat those guys, any more than you’re gonna, somebody’s gonna out art, Michelangelo, or DaVinci, you’re not gonna, sorry, you’re not gonna beat him, or them. That was an era that was in this world that will probably never be duplicated again. And so the issue is that we need to elevate people, we need to encourage people into goodness, as it says in the scripture, to think on things that are good and holy, instead of the things that we think about so much, so often.

So what he’s saying to us is, you have the light, you had the light in person in Christ Jesus, now we have the light in regard to the Holy Spirit of God who lives in us. I was talking earlier in the service when one of our dear people here in the congregation came up to talk to me a little bit about Classic Christianity and about a story that meant a lot to her. And I, I thought that is that’s very true of a friend of mine Sid, who was a alcoholic. When we lived in Whittier, California and got a call one day from one evening, late at night from his wife and said, Could you come down and talk to Sid, he’s drunk? And sure enough, he was. But I remember walking down our street there in Whittier down to his house, and it was quite late at night. And thinking to myself, God, there isn’t anything wrong with you, there’s got to be something wrong with Sid and he’s understanding. Because a number of weeks prior to that, they both he and his wife, who had both of them than alcoholics, since the time they got out of college, had walked an aisle of one of the Baptist churches there in Whittier, California. Liz had been totally freed of her alcoholism. And Sid was still drinking. I said, There’s got to be something wrong with Sid not you Lord. And I remember as we were sitting there, interacting, and he through his drunken stupor, was, was talking to me about why he was drunk and all this stuff. And I finally asked him a question, Sid, when you walked the aisle the other day, did you receive Jesus, the God? Or did you receive Jesus the man? And he said, What do you mean? And I said, Well, did you accept the fact that there was a man named Jesus walking on the face of this earth? Who did one many wonderful deeds? healed the blind? Made the deaf to hear? raised the dead? Is that the man that you received? Or did you realize that that man who did those things was raised from the dead as God? And today is seated at the right hand of God interceding on your behalf? Which did you receive Jesus the man or Jesus the God? And Sid looked at me through his blurry eyes and he said, I received Jesus the man. I said, Did you realize said that this Jesus, who is the man is also God. And do you realize that this is As the one who was raised from the dead, after entering into your death with you was raised from the dead in order to give life to you, did you understand that? No, I didn’t understand that. Are you ready today to accept the living Christ, not just the one who walked on this earth and died on a cross, but the one who was raised from the dead, and today is ready to raise you from the dead? And I saw that man, fall onto his knees, and accept the living Christ into his life. That was years ago, never had to touch another drink, to start into a newness of life, because why he was new in life, that he had come to the fullness of Christ Jesus, not just what Jesus did for him here on Earth. But what he did in his resurrected life. And God restored the years that the Locust ate away. And although his life at that time looked like it was totally destroyed by his choices, that is not the case, because God restored his life and made him into a brand new creature in Christ.

And so there’s darkness out there. And we have that tendency, many times to wander back into darkness, and to engage in the deeds of darkness. And what God is saying to us is, look, the light is in you. Now walk in that before the darkness overtakes you. Because guys, do you realize you can be overtaken by darkness? Even though you’re a born again, believer? How many of you believe that, that you can get back into the world and be overtaken by it? And that’s really true. How does he do that? By changing your attitudes, by getting your mind off of what is truth and getting it onto what’s a lie, by convincing you as to how much fun you used to have back when, before you knew Jesus. And so he continually is bombarding our minds with with thoughts that are not thoughts of God. And I have people sometimes saying how do you know when you’re being led by the Spirit? You know, I’m convinced what the Bible says that if you’re in Christ Jesus, you are being led by the Spirit. It’s just like, if you’re not in Christ Jesus, you don’t have a choice as to who you’re being led by, do you? You’re being led by Satan. Now he can lead you into good sounding things to can’t he? Because all Satan is interested in is your eyes off of Jesus, he doesn’t care what your eyes are on, as long as they’re off of Jesus. And so when you’re lost, you don’t have any choice as to who’s leading you Satan’s leading you. Why not would it be true then that if you’re in Christ Jesus, that you’re being led by the Spirit, that’s what it talks about. If you’re in Christ, you’re being led by the Spirit. Now, what can keep you then from being led by the Spirit, if you’re born again, that’s the job of the Spirit now is to lead you, what keeps you from being led by the Spirit? Getting back into the world. And it says in that its relation to the law getting back under the law where the power of sin is. And so he’s saying to us is, if you will relax and recognize that you are a child of God, and as a child of God, I’m leading you. And the only reason the only thing can cause me not to lead you is your refusal to be led. But if you’re willing to be led by the Spirit, I’ll be there leading you. And that’s what he’s saying to us while you while if you know that truth, walk in it, because when you’re in the dark, you don’t know where you’re going.

So he says in verse 36, put your trust in the light while you have it, so that you may become sons of light, to be people, sons of God to as many as received Him to them, he gave the right to become a child of God is the same thing as son of light as a child of God. And when he had finished speaking, Jesus left and hid himself from them. Now he’s talked about last week, and even after Jesus had done all these miraculous signs in their presence, they still would not believe in him. It was to fulfill the word of Isaiah the prophet, the Lord who has believed our message, and to whom as the arm of the Lord been revealed.

Guys, you can sit and I see people today and that’s another facet of the Christian religion, where people are involved only in signs and wonders. Give me a sign. You know if you went up to Jesus and said, Give me a sign, you know what he had say to you today, the same thing he said to the disciples back then I’ll show you a sign. Tear down the temple and three days, I’ll rebuild it, talking about his own body. Guys, if the miracle of the resurrection isn’t enough for you, then what do you think lengthening your legs gonna be? Or what do you think some other miracle is going to be? Or some healing, which a doctor can do is going to mean? If I cannot believe in Jesus, by the resurrection, there is no so called miracle that he could do to me, that’s gonna cause me to believe in Him. Because I want to tell you something, guys, the greatest miracle that you and I will ever experience in our life is the miracle a new birth. The day that God made you into a new creation? That’s a miracle, is it not? And for some of you, it’s even a greater miracle than with others. But the issue is, that is the greatest miracle that you will ever experience is the day when you’re in a situation where you know nothing. You don’t know how anything works. You just know what you’re doing doesn’t. That’s what you do know. And somebody comes along, as Bill Bright did with me and says, Bob, did you know that Jesus died for you? And all of a sudden, something causes you to believe that? Yeah, I knew I believed he died on a cross. But I really had never personalized that. Hey, I believe that. And do you believe that Jesus was raised from the dead? Sure I do. Did you believe that he is raised from the dead so that you could be raised from the dead? That’s not just believing in a historical event that took place, but he did it for you? Did you know that? No, I didn’t know that. Do you believe it? Yeah, I do.

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Bob George 15:35
And just putting your faith in the death, burial and resurrection of Christ Jesus. And putting your faith in that something changes. One moment, you’re going in this direction, the next moment, you’re going in another direction. Now guys come up with an explanation for that, to get hyped? Was it the brilliant presentation that somebody gave? I have people sometimes say, Oh, Bob, I’d like to share but I can’t share Christ as good as you do. I said, good. Good, because you don’t want the credit to go to you. When Bill Bright, bless his heart, is the President of Campus Crusade, dear brother in Christ, and he’s with Christ today gave the most boring presentation I’ve ever heard in my life. fact I don’t ever remember him giving anything except a boring presentation, to the world. But something about that man when he started speaking about God, God did something in to people’s lives. He had that gift he just talked to you about Jesus just fell on your knees and accepted him. But when he shared this, that time Four Law booklet with me. He said read it. Me read it. You read it? No, you read it. And I had to read For God so loved the world. I was just hoping I could say all the words, right. So it was no presentation. It was God. Now guys, how do you explain that? And on the other hand, I look at the world and I see a guy like Larry King. How many of you are familiar with his program, Larry King? How many times do you suppose he’s heard the gospel on his television program? How many people has he interviewed? Had people on the other night, Franklin Graham, Tim law Hey, another pastor. I’ve heard him on there with with I don’t know how many people tell him the gospel. And the guy’s head is still like a brick. As we talk into a wall, and coming back with all these what he thinks are clever, little, little side issues. And you say, Larry, what’s wrong with you? What’s wrong with you? You’re supposed to be smart. You make a lot of money. You’re on television, but you’re dumb as a mule. And that’s all I can say about it. You are dumb as a mule. And so but I’m not alone in that, because Isaiah said the same thing. Is your eyes. Your eyes have been blinded to truth, you can’t see truth. It’s there in front of you, but you can’t see it. Your heart is dead. How would you like for God to tell you your heart’s dead? I don’t think I’d be saying how do you get it alive? They can either see with their eyes or understand with their hearts. And they’ll never turn if they did, I would heal them in a minute, but they won’t do it. And so we have to realize there were some people whose hearts have been so hardened, that when they hear truth, they cannot respond to it. And that’s a sad situation isn’t folks, but it’s true. It said yet at the same time, even among the Jewish leaders they believed in him. But because of the Pharisees they would not confess their faith for fear that they’d be put out a synagogue. Why? Well, they love the praise of for men more than the praise of God. And guys, that’s probably one of the biggest things that we need to deal with and to allow God to deal with in our lives, is the fact that I had to come to the conclusion a long time ago that I’m not running for sheriff. And so I’m not there to win a popularity contest. But I’m there to do what God has asked me to do and that’s proclaim Jesus to people. And I realized that in so doing that some people are gonna say, you know, who are you to be doing that you’re not perfect. And I’d say you’re right. You’re not better than I am. You’re right. I’m better off but I’m not better than others. People could say, oh, you’re a hypocrite, possibly so. But I’m a saved hypocrite.

So we can’t sit around fearing the face of man, or fearing the response of man. Not if we’re living in a world that’s in darkness. And we’re constantly living around people who don’t know the Lord from an apple tree. And who’s going to tell them? If it isn’t for people like you and me. And so we have to understand that when forever, we get down to the point where we love the praise of men more than the praise of God, is that possible as a as a Christian, to love the praise of men? Sure, it is. Sure it is. What what’s happened to us? We’ve just slid back and gotten back into the thinking of the darkness. But again, when we allow God to give us the boldness, that He has given us to not be fearful of man, not be fearful of the response of man. Because many times the responses of man is what enables the man to see where he is. I’ve had people come right out of their chairs at me, nose to nose, so angry at what I was telling them about Jesus. And, and sometimes when they did that, my response wasn’t what it should of been. But sometimes it gets people’s attention. I had a guy who in my early days when I was a relatively new Christian, but I was teaching Bible Studies. And I had the privilege of leading a girl in California that had studied to be a nun for I can’t remember how many years, very sweet Spanish girl and her husband. And so she, they asked one time, Bob, would you consider teaching a study over in our in our house? You know, I was teaching in somebody’s home and, and so I finally said, Yeah, I’ll do that. And I went over there 22 Catholic couples. And that was all right, that that didn’t bother me. But it bothered some of them. And when we’re talking about what we’re talking about being born again, because they had been taught what they had been taught and in that’s kind of what we go along with is telling me what to believe. And I believe that. And it’s amazing how we’ll defend what we’ve been told what to believe from another man. We’ve never checked it out to see if what that man was teaching was true or not, we just grab a hold of it and believe it. And so, at the end of one of those studies, this guy came over and got in my face. And I mean, he was mad as a wet hen. And he was just there, right, right in my face and telling me all kinds of things about myself. And I remember saying to him, I shouldn’t have done this. But I remember saying to him, you know, sir, if there’s anybody in this room that ought to be happy and grateful that I’m born again, it ought to be you. Because if I wouldn’t I take you outside and clean your clock.

That calmed him down a little bit. Two weeks later, he came to Jesus. Two weeks later. You know what happened? His reaction, showed him something about himself, that he didn’t know how angry he could be at another person who was doing nothing but telling him about how to be saved. And so many times we’re so concerned about what a person’s first response is going to be. But we forget about the fact that that response could be the fact of what shows them who they really are. Because you see, circumstances don’t cause your nature. They reveal your nature. Are we together on that? Your wife cannot put mad in you. She can just draw mad out of you. And if you didn’t have mad in you, they couldn’t get it out of you. Have you ever noticed how hard it is to stir up beans in a pot when there aren’t beans in the pot?

So circumstances just reveal your nature. I remember one of the guys on our board of directors. And he’s in his 80s. He said to me one day, it was in a board meeting he said, You know God gave me the absolute perfect wife. I said George, that’s a nice thing to say why do you say that? And he said because everything that God wants me to know about myself, she reveals it. Circumstances don’t cause your nature, they reveal it. And so when we come to understand the truth of that, then we realize that whatever you say to somebody, whatever it’s coming out of them, is going to show them where they are. And if they’re sensitive to that, it could be the very thing that leads you to Christ. So don’t fear. And don’t look forward to the praise of men. Because whatever men say about you really is temporal, temporary, it isn’t going to last long. But the praise of God who’s going to last through eternity. And I said about rewards, guys, if you and I hear from the voice of God, someday, when we’re absent from the body, and present with the Lord, well done, good and faithful servant. As far as I’m concerned, that’ll be the greatest reward that I could ever receive. Let’s pray together.

Father, we thank you for the truth of the Word of God. Thank you for the privilege that you have given us to becoming a part of this body of believers. And we thank you that as members of this body, that you’ve given each and every one of us gifts, for the purpose of serving the body, of reaching out to one another in love and the special way that you’ve given us to reach out. And in so doing, we teach others how to exercise those gifts. So Father, allow us to be cognizant, and to be aware, and to be curious as to what kind of a gift did you really give me, a special gift of service to the body of Christ? And show that to me, so that I can be used effectively in this marketplace of darkness that I live in. So Father, we thank you now for what you teach us. I pray that you will embed these things into our hearts where we pray in Christ’s name. And for his sake. Amen.

Announcer 27:16
Thank you so much for tuning in to Classic Christianity with Bob George. We hope you’ve enjoyed today’s program. We truly hope that today’s message has inspired you to walk a life of faith in the Lord. Find more information online at BobGeorge.net. There you’ll also find available CDs, DVDs and Bible studies available for purchase. It’s through your help that we are able to spread the good word of Jesus Christ. Until next time, walk in faith be good to one another in praise the Lord. Amen.

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Listen to the Salvation message today!

Stand on the firmness of truth. Don’t keep going back and forth. Thank Him that the forgiveness issue is settled.

Let’s pray together:

• Lord Jesus,
• I thank you for taking away my sins on the cross,
• never ever to see them again.
• Having done that, I now thank you for giving me eternal life,
• through your resurrection.
• I now receive that life.
• And I am going stand in the fact that I am a child of the living God.
• In Jesus Holy name I pray.
• Amen

All believers are now brothers and sisters in Christ.

 

 

John 3:3
³ Jesus replied, “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again.”

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