SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the Preaching the Cross Radio Podcast, featuring the radio ministry of Pastor James W.
SPEAKER_00: Knox of the Bible Baptist Church of Delant, Florida.
SPEAKER_00: Our prayer is that these half-hour Bible study programs will bring the lost to a saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ and enable the saved to grow in the grace and knowledge of the Savior.
SPEAKER_00: Now here's your host, Pastor James W.
SPEAKER_00: Knox.
SPEAKER_01: I'm Brother James.
SPEAKER_01: I greet you once again in the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.
SPEAKER_01: Those of you who are watching, thank you for joining us today.
SPEAKER_01: I know, I know you have a thousand options.
SPEAKER_01: You could be doing just about anything right now, listening to just about anyone watching, who knows what.
SPEAKER_01: And to think that you have taken the time to tune in to someone who is preaching the word of God, that in itself is a great joy to my heart and a great blessing.
SPEAKER_01: We are in the middle of a study on the biblical doctrine of the eternal security of the born-again believer.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible teaches in Romans 8, 38 and 39, that when a person puts their faith and trust in the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ, that from that point forward, nothing, nothing can separate them from the love of God which is in Jesus Christ our Lord.
SPEAKER_01: We have been looking at making our way through 25 additional biblical statements, Bible verses or passages, 25 of them, which support the teaching of Romans 8, 38, and 39.
SPEAKER_01: And I am aware, I am aware that many, many churches teach that salvation is by works.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible does not.
SPEAKER_01: I'm aware that many, many churches and ministers teach that salvation is by grace, but kept by works.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible doesn't teach that either.
SPEAKER_01: And we're in the process of trying to persuade you, as we are persuaded, that God's promises can be trusted and all of them will be kept.
SPEAKER_01: Our next verse is number nine in our series of verses, and it's found in 1 Peter chapter 1.
SPEAKER_01: In fact, not a verse, but a series of verses.
SPEAKER_01: 1 Peter chapter 1, and we're going to read together starting at verse number 18.
SPEAKER_01: If you have a Bible, you're welcome to follow along, unless you're driving or working, and then just listen and we'll read it to you as it's written.
SPEAKER_01: So 1 Peter chapter 1, verse 18 says, For as much as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot.
SPEAKER_01: Now, now, here's the qualifier.
SPEAKER_01: And this is why many of you are either in or were raised in a church that taught you that salvation was by works.
SPEAKER_01: Do you know how many sacramental religions there are in the world and how many people attend sacramental churches around the world, and they are taught directly or indirectly, they really truly believe that silver and gold play a part in the saving of their soul.
SPEAKER_01: I'm here to tell you if you gave a million dollars to the church of your choice, it wouldn't get you one inch closer to heaven than you were without it.
SPEAKER_01: I'm telling you, if you tithed every Sunday of your life and doubled the tithe on weeks of special offerings, it wouldn't take away one sin you'd ever committed.
SPEAKER_01: That's not my opinion.
SPEAKER_01: I'm giving you the Bible now.
SPEAKER_01: I'm telling you, if you allowed a priest to con you out of your money to say prayers for your departed mother, hoping that those masses you're buying would get her out of the fires of purgatory and into heaven itself, I'm telling you, you are being defrauded.
SPEAKER_01: Silver and gold cannot redeem the sinner.
SPEAKER_01: That's what the Bible said.
SPEAKER_01: And in addition to that, the only, the only thing that can take away your sins, the only thing that can wash you clean in the eyes of a holy God is the precious blood of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: If you were to offer every sacrifice laid out in the Old Testament, it wouldn't take away your sins.
SPEAKER_01: If you were to, now hear me, if you were to offer every sacrifice invented by every religion on the face of the earth, it wouldn't take away your sins.
SPEAKER_01: If you were to shed your own blood and die as a martyr, it wouldn't take away your sins.
SPEAKER_01: If you were to offer a baby in sacrifice to Moloch or some other god or a virgin, throw her into the volcano in the fire, it wouldn't take away anybody's sins.
SPEAKER_01: God didn't ask you to pay for your sins.
SPEAKER_01: He provided a payment for your sins.
SPEAKER_01: And he wants you to put your faith and your trust, not in your sacrifice that you make for God, but in God's sacrifice that he made for you, the blood of Jesus Christ, precious blood, sinless blood, holy blood.
SPEAKER_01: There's none other.
SPEAKER_01: So verse number 20 says, Who verily was foreordained before the foundation of the world was manifest in these last times for you.
SPEAKER_01: So this was God's purpose.
SPEAKER_01: God determined this.
SPEAKER_01: The world, the system of evil and sin that result, evil and iniquity and everything that results from Adam's sin, God determined if man ever needs to be saved, he'll be saved by the blood of my son Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: And the Son, the Word at that time, the Word who was made flesh and dwelt among us, he agreed, he entered into a covenant agreement with his father.
SPEAKER_01: If man ever needs to be saved, I will sacrifice myself, I will be their substitutionary offering, my blood will save them.
SPEAKER_01: That was God, that's what God predetermined before the foundation of the world.
SPEAKER_01: That the way for you to be saved would be through the sacrifice of his son, not through your works.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, verse 21.
SPEAKER_01: Who by him do believe in God, that raised him up from the dead, and gave him glory, that your faith and hope might be in God.
SPEAKER_01: Christ died, shed his blood.
SPEAKER_01: The Father raised him from the dead.
SPEAKER_01: Do you want to be saved?
SPEAKER_01: Put your faith in that, nothing else.
SPEAKER_01: Put your faith in that, not yourself.
SPEAKER_01: Verse number 22, seeing, Ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit, unto unfeigned love of the brethren, seeing that ye love one another with a pure heart fervently, being born again.
SPEAKER_01: Not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God which liveth and abideth forever.
SPEAKER_01: For all flesh is as grass, and the glory of man is as the flower, uh as the flower of grass, the grass withereth, the flower thereof falleth away, but the word of the Lord endureth forever.
SPEAKER_01: And this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, those who have believed the gospel, and thereby have been redeemed by Jesus' precious blood, whose souls have been purified by a work of God's Holy Spirit upon this belief.
SPEAKER_01: They have been born again of incorruptible seed.
SPEAKER_01: Now, every one of us has a physical birth, and your body, my body, your physical life, my physical life, it has an expiration date because the seed from which our physical life has come is corrupt.
SPEAKER_01: And sooner or later, but eventually, barring the rapture of the church, every one of us will die.
SPEAKER_01: Corruption will win the day, and we'll be buried in the cold, cold ground.
SPEAKER_01: But if you've had a second birth, a new birth, a spiritual birth, the saving of the soul, the seed that wrought that birth, the word of God, is incorruptible, meaning it carries with it no trace of death.
SPEAKER_01: Why will our bodies die born of corruptible seed?
SPEAKER_01: How could our souls ever die if they are born of incorruptible seed?
SPEAKER_01: My friend, they can't.
SPEAKER_01: They won't.
SPEAKER_01: You have eternal life, and your authority for that is the statements made by God in God's word.
SPEAKER_01: Hallelujah.
SPEAKER_01: All right, next we come to John chapter 10.
SPEAKER_01: Let's go there.
SPEAKER_01: John chapter number 10.
SPEAKER_01: John the 10th chapter.
SPEAKER_01: Beautiful passage, beautiful passage.
SPEAKER_01: John 10 and verse number 26.
SPEAKER_01: The Lord Jesus Christ is speaking, and he says, Do you believe not because you're not of my sheep?
SPEAKER_01: As I said unto you, you ready?
SPEAKER_01: My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me, and I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish.
SPEAKER_01: Neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.
SPEAKER_01: How about that?
SPEAKER_01: My father, which gave them me, is greater than all, and no man is able to pluck them out of my father's hand.
SPEAKER_01: I and my father are one.
SPEAKER_01: All right, so here we go.
SPEAKER_01: Here's a sheep, and a sheep hears the voice.
SPEAKER_01: If Jesus Christ is the shepherd, the good shepherd, the chief shepherd, the great shepherd, so how does this thing begin?
SPEAKER_01: As we have seen repeatedly through our study.
SPEAKER_01: Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.
SPEAKER_01: So when you hear the gospel, Ephesians 1, when you hear the gospel, 1 Peter chapter number 1, when you hear and believe the gospel, you come to Jesus Christ, my sheep hear my voice, I I I know them, they follow me.
SPEAKER_01: You come to Jesus Christ, then what does he do?
SPEAKER_01: I give unto them, hang on to it life.
SPEAKER_01: Let's try it again.
SPEAKER_01: I give unto them temporary life.
SPEAKER_01: No, I give unto them, do the best you can, life.
SPEAKER_01: You you know that's not what the Bible says.
SPEAKER_01: You know that.
SPEAKER_01: I give unto them eternal life.
SPEAKER_01: The gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
SPEAKER_01: The new servant believes that Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
SPEAKER_01: Now, if the Bible repeatedly says that, why does your church repeatedly deny it?
SPEAKER_01: If the Bible repeatedly says that, why do you repeatedly doubt it?
SPEAKER_01: Come on, come on, brother, come on, sister.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus said, I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish.
SPEAKER_01: Never perish.
SPEAKER_01: Neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.
SPEAKER_01: What an amazing promise.
SPEAKER_01: What a blessing truth.
SPEAKER_01: In this passage, those who have come to believe are called Jesus' sheep.
SPEAKER_01: He gives them eternal life.
SPEAKER_01: He does not give them conditional life.
SPEAKER_01: He gives his word to his sheep.
SPEAKER_01: And if they believe what he said, they will know of a certainty, they will be absolutely confident that they shall never perish.
SPEAKER_01: He assured every one of them that they would live eternally.
SPEAKER_01: Those who teach that salvation can be lost, do not believe the words spoken by Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: He has placed each believer in his hand.
SPEAKER_01: He has simultaneously placed each believer in the Father's hand.
SPEAKER_01: And the Lord Jesus Christ states that no one, just as Romans 8, 38 and 39 told us, no one has the ability, the power, the strength, the might.
SPEAKER_01: No one will ever have permission to remove a believer from the hand of the Savior.
SPEAKER_01: Now I've been told by some, determined to make a liar out of Jesus, that they might persuade me to live in fear of having my eternal life cut short.
SPEAKER_01: That while it's true no man can take a believer out of the Lord's hand, you could remove yourself by misconduct.
SPEAKER_01: But my friend, no man would have to include the saved sheep securely situated in the shepherd's hand, as like all those S's.
SPEAKER_01: So once upon a time, this is back 19, let's see, I got saved in 76.
SPEAKER_01: So this be about 1979, I was attending a church, and the church and its denomination taught that you were saved by grace through faith, through the the the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: But, but if you didn't live it, and there we have it, live it.
SPEAKER_01: If you didn't live it, you would lose your salvation.
SPEAKER_01: And so I was probably at that, let's see, 76, 79.
SPEAKER_01: I was 21 years old, the pastor's son was 20 years old, and we got into a heated, prolonged discussion on the eternal security of the believer outside in the church parking lot one evening.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, he said, I just believe that if you do not, do not stay faithful and true to God, you will not make it to heaven.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, give me an example of of what you mean by not remaining faithful or true to the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: And as usual, he named the biggies.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, Well, what if you what if you kill someone?
SPEAKER_01: And I said, Jesus said, they shall never perish.
SPEAKER_01: Oh, oh, what if you what if you told a big lie?
SPEAKER_01: Jesus said, they shall never perish.
SPEAKER_01: Now this went on for 15 or 20 minutes as he just kept trying to think of every what he was trying to do is embarrass me.
SPEAKER_01: You can't possibly believe that a person could do that and they could still be deserving of heaven or still be worthy to go to heaven or still be good enough to make it to heaven.
SPEAKER_01: And I kept, I kept trying to tell him, what you are saying to me, sir, is that you believe God will owe you a place in heaven if you don't do the things you're talking about.
SPEAKER_01: And I am telling you that if you have ever committed one sin in your life, God does not owe you anything but hellfire.
SPEAKER_01: Now, here's what it comes down to.
SPEAKER_01: If you think that someone can go so far or do so much that God will take away their sin, then your hope is built on nothing less than what you think.
SPEAKER_01: But Jesus said, they shall never perish.
SPEAKER_01: That's what he said.
SPEAKER_01: Now, I I'm I'm gonna I'm gonna turn your argument back on you.
SPEAKER_01: If this indeed is your argument, I'm gonna I'm gonna turn it back in your direction.
SPEAKER_01: This is what I'm told.
SPEAKER_01: Just a few weeks ago, I was told this on the on the streets of Daytona Beach.
SPEAKER_01: Well, I just believe you can go so far.
SPEAKER_01: And my question to that man and to you is well, how far?
SPEAKER_01: How far would you have to go?
SPEAKER_01: Well, I just believe that that you could do so much and and how much?
SPEAKER_01: How much?
SPEAKER_01: If you lose your salvation by sinning, how many sins?
SPEAKER_01: If you lose your salvation by wondering, how many steps?
SPEAKER_01: If you don't have an answer for that, you don't have a Bible doctrine.
SPEAKER_01: Now, if you if you say I believe if you sin, you lose it, then you've lost it.
SPEAKER_01: Because you've sinned.
SPEAKER_01: Listen, don't don't don't go all uh philosophy on me here.
SPEAKER_01: Stay with me.
SPEAKER_01: The reason people say you can't murder, you can't commit adultery, you can't kidnap without losing your salvation is because they don't do prison ministry, they don't do rescue mission ministry, uh they they don't deal with lost people, they don't deal with saved people.
SPEAKER_01: They watch TV, they watch movies, they play games on on their computer.
SPEAKER_01: In the real world, people don't just commit those sins.
SPEAKER_01: You ready?
SPEAKER_01: Well, I just think if you sin, you lose it.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, so a man came to Jesus and he said, What must I do?
SPEAKER_01: What good thing must I do to inherit eternal life?
SPEAKER_01: Well, that'd be a good place to find out.
SPEAKER_01: And Jesus said, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, with all thy strength, with all thy mind.
SPEAKER_01: And you don't.
SPEAKER_01: And nobody does.
SPEAKER_01: And and wait, the second commandment is like unto it, thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.
SPEAKER_01: So if you say to me, preacher, I just believe if you sin, you lose it.
SPEAKER_01: I'm telling you, you don't love me as much as you love yourself.
SPEAKER_01: And there's only two things God said you had to do to have eternal life love with all your heart and love me as much as you love yourself, and you don't.
SPEAKER_01: Some of you, some of you love your wife or your husband as much or more than you love yourself.
SPEAKER_01: What a happy home.
SPEAKER_01: And some of you love your children or your parents as much or more than you love yourself.
SPEAKER_01: What a happy home.
SPEAKER_01: But beyond that, beyond that, come on.
SPEAKER_01: Come on.
SPEAKER_01: If all you had to do to keep your salvation were the two things Jesus told you to do, you haven't done it.
SPEAKER_01: So let's read the verses again.
SPEAKER_01: I thought we'd get to several uh passages today, but it doesn't look like we will.
SPEAKER_01: Look at this.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus said, My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me, and I give unto them, underline it, eternal life.
SPEAKER_01: And they shall underline it, never perish.
SPEAKER_01: Hallelujah.
SPEAKER_01: Neither shall any man underline it, any man pluck them out of my hand.
SPEAKER_01: My father which gave them me is greater than all, and no man has able to pluck them out of my father's hand.
SPEAKER_01: I and my father are one.
SPEAKER_01: You say, Wow, what great news! Amazing, what a message of hope and joy and and hallelujah.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 31.
SPEAKER_01: Then the Jews took up stones again to stone him.
SPEAKER_01: Now, here's a group of people.
SPEAKER_01: They believe they're good enough to go to heaven without Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: And they are devoutly religious, and according to their religion, they can earn a place in heaven without Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Now, now listen, the irony of this is astonishing.
SPEAKER_01: They are so convinced that they're good enough to go to heaven, they're going to prove it by killing a man who tells them they're not.
SPEAKER_01: That's impressive.
SPEAKER_01: That's really impressive.
SPEAKER_01: They stand there saying, Well, I've never killed anybody, but I will the next 30 minutes if I can.
SPEAKER_01: You know the best thing for you to do is just believe God, take him at his word.
SPEAKER_01: In the day of judgment, I don't know if I have time to squeeze this in today or not.
SPEAKER_01: The day of judgment of nations, not of individuals, maybe, maybe individuals, maybe nations.
SPEAKER_01: I don't have time, I shouldn't have even mentioned it.
SPEAKER_01: I don't have time to get started on it.
SPEAKER_01: But Jesus said, these men are going to stand before him, arguing, arguing with Jesus, with God, with the Lord, arguing with him in the day of their judgment, and saying to him, We did many wonderful works.
SPEAKER_01: We cast out devils in your name.
SPEAKER_01: And they go on bragging about themselves, saying to the Lord in the day of their judgment, Do you not know we didn't need you?
SPEAKER_01: We got discovered, we're good people, and he will say to them, Depart from me.
SPEAKER_01: I never knew you.
SPEAKER_01: Now hear me, hear me, friend.
SPEAKER_01: They bragged about their good works at their judgment, and the Lord did not deny it.
SPEAKER_01: He didn't say you haven't done good works, he didn't say you didn't live a good life.
SPEAKER_01: Well, why didn't they get in?
SPEAKER_01: Because he didn't know them, and he never knew them.
SPEAKER_01: Now, on the other side, on the flip side, I'm gonna tell you right now, I have not been good enough to earn heaven, I have not done enough good works to enter God's heaven, but I've trusted the Lord Jesus Christ, and he said, My sheep, my sheep, I know them.
SPEAKER_01: I give unto them eternal life.
SPEAKER_01: So, what about tomorrow, a month from now, a year from now?
SPEAKER_01: Listen, listen, Jesus Christ couldn't possibly say to me, I never knew you, after saying, I know you.
SPEAKER_01: You get that?
SPEAKER_01: If you're saved, Jesus Christ said to you in John chapter 10, I know you, well then he can never say, never, never, never say that he did not know you.
SPEAKER_01: My brother, my sister, it was very, very difficult for someone to persuade you to trust Jesus Christ as your Savior, but how he set you free when you did.
SPEAKER_01: And for some of you, for some of you now, it is so very difficult to persuade you that your savior really has saved you.
SPEAKER_01: But if you will ever believe that, it will be so liberating to your soul.
SPEAKER_01: It won't set you free to sin.
SPEAKER_01: It will fill your heart with a love and a gratitude toward the Savior that will in fact be the only force strong enough to keep you from iniquity.
SPEAKER_01: I hope this has been a help to you.
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SPEAKER_01: And there you can find all of our books and recorded sermons and many things that I don't have any time to tell you about because we got to get out of here.
SPEAKER_01: The announcement will be all now in just a moment to let you know when you can hear this program again on this radio station.
SPEAKER_01: And we hope you'll join us then for the preaching of the cross radio broadcast.
SPEAKER_01: Until then, I'm Brother James.
SPEAKER_01: May the Lord richly bless you, and good day.
SPEAKER_00: Join us every weekday for another episode of the Preaching of the Cross Radio Podcast.
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SPEAKER_00: Until next time and throughout eternity, may Jesus Christ be praised.