SPEAKER_01: And thank you so very much for that kind word of introduction.
SPEAKER_01: Thanks to each and every one of you for tuning in today.
SPEAKER_01: I'm Brother James, and I greet you as always in the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world.
SPEAKER_01: This is the Preaching of the Cross Radio Broadcast.
SPEAKER_01: Our duty, our responsibility, our privilege, our joy is to come your way and try our very, very best to make the Word of God understandable to God's people.
SPEAKER_01: Now, if along the way somebody gets saved, what a blessing.
SPEAKER_01: If along the way someone tunes in who doesn't know Jesus and comes to know the Lord Jesus Christ as their personal Savior, that is a tremendous blessing.
SPEAKER_01: But our primary, our primary purpose on these programs is to teach saved people the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: And that certainly is the great need of the hour.
SPEAKER_01: No question about that.
SPEAKER_01: We're studying the book of Philippians, and we come on the broadcast today to Philippians chapter one and verse number six.
SPEAKER_01: A tremendous portion of Scripture.
SPEAKER_01: In this verse, the Holy Spirit says, being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: I hope, I hope you will not leave us until our half hour program has run its full course today.
SPEAKER_01: There are few doctrines in the Bible more controversial.
SPEAKER_01: There are few things taught as being Bible doctrine that are more hotly debated than the idea of what has come to be called eternal security.
SPEAKER_01: It is used by those for and against it, this term eternal security, used by those for and against.
SPEAKER_01: It is termed by those for it and against it, once saved, always saved.
SPEAKER_01: It is proclaimed by some groups as being the absolute truth.
SPEAKER_01: It is taught against by other groups as being the most horrendous or horrific of falsehoods.
SPEAKER_01: And as always, we're not really concerned with what the Baptists say or the Methodists say or the Presbyterians and the Pentecostals say.
SPEAKER_01: We're concerned with what the Bible has to say about the matter.
SPEAKER_01: Now we have only two options.
SPEAKER_01: Either heaven is an earned reward for those who do good works, or heaven is the destination of those who have been given eternal life as a free gift of God.
SPEAKER_01: Those are the only two options.
SPEAKER_01: Either you earn heaven or you are given heaven.
SPEAKER_01: Either you merit eternal life or you are given eternal life by grace through the mercy of God.
SPEAKER_01: It can only be one or the other.
SPEAKER_01: It cannot be both.
SPEAKER_01: You cannot be partly saved by grace and partly saved by works, or grace would not be grace.
SPEAKER_01: You cannot be partly saved by grace and kept by works, or works would not be works.
SPEAKER_01: It can only be one or the other.
SPEAKER_01: I'm confident, and I'll journey with you through the Bible in the in the next half hour, maybe two programs, but I am confident that the good work of my salvation was begun by the Lord Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: I am confident that I did not save myself.
SPEAKER_01: I am confident that I was a hell deserving sinner, that in me, that is in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing.
SPEAKER_01: I was a child of wrath, I was a child that had gone astray, by nature I was an erring, wandering sheep.
SPEAKER_01: I was among those the Bible says are not righteous.
SPEAKER_01: Romans three and ten the scripture says there is none righteous, no not one.
SPEAKER_01: I was among those of whom the Bible says, For there is not a just man upon the earth that doeth good and sinneth not, Ecclesiastes seven verse twenty.
SPEAKER_01: I was among those who could say If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.
SPEAKER_01: I stood a guilty sinner before God, and I found that God had sent his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, to die on the cross to pay to pay now get this, to pay for all my sins.
SPEAKER_01: I could not find a scripture that said Jesus died to pay for part of them.
SPEAKER_01: I couldn't find anything in the Bible that said Jesus had died to pay for half of them.
SPEAKER_01: I could not find a verse that even suggested that Jesus died for three quarters of them.
SPEAKER_01: Not all the little ones and leaving out the big ones, not all the big ones and leaving out the little ones.
SPEAKER_01: I found in my Bible that Jesus Christ the Son of God had died for all my sins.
SPEAKER_01: I read in the Word of God that that same Jesus rose from the dead and sent those whom he had saved out into the world to proclaim the good news, that if one would believe on the Lord Jesus Christ he would be saved.
SPEAKER_01: I did believe.
SPEAKER_01: So my salvation began not with me doing good works for God, but with a gracious, merciful, all powerful God performing a good work in me.
SPEAKER_01: God the righteous saved this sinner.
SPEAKER_01: God did that.
SPEAKER_01: Now, I am confident of this very thing.
SPEAKER_01: You may not be, but I am confident of this very thing.
SPEAKER_01: Some ministers and some denominations may not be, but I am confident, as was the apostle Paul when he recorded the words of the Holy Spirit, I am confident that the same one who began a good work in me will perform it that same good work in me until the day of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: I am confident of that.
SPEAKER_01: My confidence today, when I tell you I have eternal life, is in Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: When I say I have eternal life, I am making that statement without any self confidence at all.
SPEAKER_01: How would I know I have eternal life if it was up to me?
SPEAKER_01: I know what I am.
SPEAKER_01: I am confident today when I say heaven is my home and I will dwell forever with the Lord in heaven.
SPEAKER_01: I say that without one ounce of self-trust in my being.
SPEAKER_01: Why if I had to live it, keep it, earn it, pay for it, stay straight, stay crooked, stay right, stay left, stay up, stay down, I could never know if I was going to heaven.
SPEAKER_01: I might stumble and fall just short of the finish line and miss out after all.
SPEAKER_01: But if God the moment I trusted his son, the moment the Lord Jesus Christ gave me what he said was eternal life, then guess what I have?
SPEAKER_01: I have eternal life.
SPEAKER_01: If God did not lie when he gave me everlasting life, then I am confident today that I have life that lasts forever.
SPEAKER_01: It's not self-confidence, it's not a proud boast.
SPEAKER_01: It is a belief in what God said, and that is what He said.
SPEAKER_01: Look with me to your Bible to Hebrews chapter twelve.
SPEAKER_01: Hebrews chapter twelve and let's start at verse number one.
SPEAKER_01: Hebrews twelve one.
SPEAKER_01: Wherefore, seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us.
SPEAKER_01: Now the people addressed in verse one have weights that have not yet been laid aside.
SPEAKER_01: They are being instructed to lay aside every weight.
SPEAKER_01: They still have baggage that is slowing them down.
SPEAKER_01: They have things that they are carrying about with them that are hindering their race, the race they are running for the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, keep going.
SPEAKER_01: And the sin which doth so easily beset us.
SPEAKER_01: The people addressed in verse one still have some sin that besets them.
SPEAKER_01: They are being instructed to take those sins that are hindering their race as a Christian and lay them aside.
SPEAKER_01: Do you see that?
SPEAKER_01: You see that they have weights and they have sin.
SPEAKER_01: Now, verse number two says, looking unto Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Looking, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus Christ has authored the faith of a people who are still beset by weights.
SPEAKER_01: He has authored the faith of those who are still beset by sin.
SPEAKER_01: Now you know that's what the Bible says.
SPEAKER_01: We just read it.
SPEAKER_01: You can't deny that's what it says.
SPEAKER_01: And the scripture says the same one who authored their faith will take the responsibility upon himself of finishing their faith.
SPEAKER_01: He will finish the good work in them.
SPEAKER_01: In spite of the weights that slow me down, in spite of the sin that trips me up.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus who authored my faith will finish my faith.
SPEAKER_01: Praise his holy name.
SPEAKER_01: In the next chapter, Hebrews 13.
SPEAKER_01: Hebrews chapter 13 and verse number five.
SPEAKER_01: Let your conversation be without covetousness, and be content with such things as ye have.
SPEAKER_01: For he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee, so that we may boldly say the Lord is my helper, and I will not fear what man shall do unto me.
SPEAKER_01: Now look, I am saved today.
SPEAKER_01: Not by good works, not by good deeds, I am saved today by the grace of God, because I put my faith and my trust in the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ, and God has made me accepted in the beloved Ephesians 1.6.
SPEAKER_01: He has placed me in the body of the Lord Jesus Christ, 1 Corinthians chapter 12.
SPEAKER_01: He has made me bone of his bone and flesh of his flesh, Ephesians chapter 5.
SPEAKER_01: But God has done all that, and yet somewhere today, somewhere today, someone who has been accepted in the beloved, placed in the body of Christ, made bone of his bone, flesh of his flesh, promised everlasting life, is being threatened with the departure of God if they don't measure up to certain rules, regulations, standards, and commandments.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says in Hebrews 13 5, I can be confident and I can boldly proclaim that the Lord will never leave me.
SPEAKER_01: He will never forsake me.
SPEAKER_01: If God leaves a saved man, he's a liar.
SPEAKER_01: If God forsakes a saved woman, he's a liar.
SPEAKER_01: If you don't do that, you'll lose your salvation.
SPEAKER_01: If I have one hundred preachers telling me God might leave me or might forsake me, and I have one verse of Scripture wherein God has promised He will never leave me and never forsake me, I'm going to believe God.
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to believe God.
SPEAKER_01: Men change.
SPEAKER_01: Denominations change.
SPEAKER_01: Opinions change.
SPEAKER_01: Preachers change.
SPEAKER_01: Heaven and earth will pass away.
SPEAKER_01: God's word will not pass away.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, He said, I'll never leave thee nor forsake thee.
SPEAKER_01: Look at Hebrews chapter 5.
SPEAKER_01: Hebrews 5, verse 8.
SPEAKER_01: Though he were a son, yet learned the obedience by the things which he suffered, and being made perfect, he became the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey.
SPEAKER_01: Now what did he tell me to do?
SPEAKER_01: Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.
SPEAKER_01: Did you obey that?
SPEAKER_01: Did you do that?
SPEAKER_01: Did you?
SPEAKER_01: If you did, what kind of salvation did he give you?
SPEAKER_01: Now wait.
SPEAKER_01: The author said you got eternal salvation when you obeyed him.
SPEAKER_01: At the point of authorship, not the point of completion, he said, I am the author and the finisher of your faith.
SPEAKER_01: Nobody with an ounce of understanding would fail to see that the same one who is the beginning is the end.
SPEAKER_01: When do you get eternal salvation?
SPEAKER_01: Hebrews 5 9.
SPEAKER_01: When do you meet the author?
SPEAKER_01: You meet the author of eternal, that's forever, eternal, without end, eternal beyond the bounds of time, eternal salvation.
SPEAKER_01: When you obey the author, not the finisher.
SPEAKER_01: The day I trusted the Lord Jesus Christ as my Savior, in obedience to the gospel proclamation, I was given by God Himself a salvation the Bible says is eternal.
SPEAKER_01: The author of eternal salvation.
SPEAKER_01: And the author of Hebrews chapter twelve said he'd see to it, he'd see to it that what he began, he finished.
SPEAKER_01: Oh, I know what happens.
SPEAKER_01: People interpret the Bible on the basis of somebody they know.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not asking you this morning if you think that guy you went to church with who left his wife and got drunk and shot somebody has eternal life.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not asking that.
SPEAKER_01: I'm asking what the Bible says.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not asking about somebody you knew who did something you wouldn't have done one time when you wouldn't have done it.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not asking you that.
SPEAKER_01: I'm asking what God said in the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: If you know twenty people who say they're saved and live like hell itself, that's not the issue.
SPEAKER_01: I know people that aren't saved and live decent lives.
SPEAKER_01: What does that mean?
SPEAKER_01: It doesn't mean anything.
SPEAKER_01: I know people that say they're saved and live crummy lives.
SPEAKER_01: What does that mean?
SPEAKER_01: It doesn't mean anything.
SPEAKER_01: You go to heaven through Jesus Christ, you go to hell without him.
SPEAKER_01: Now 1 Corinthians chapter 1.
SPEAKER_01: You know what's going on in Corinth?
SPEAKER_01: The church that received this epistle, 1 Corinthians.
SPEAKER_01: You know what's going on there?
SPEAKER_01: Chapter 3, they're fighting.
SPEAKER_01: Chapter 4, they're worshiping men, making idols out of Christian celebrities.
SPEAKER_01: Chapter 5, there's sexual immorality going on around the church.
SPEAKER_01: Chapter 6, they're dishonest in their business dealings.
SPEAKER_01: Chapter 7, they're messing up their marriages.
SPEAKER_01: Chapter 8 and 9, they're fighting over what they're allowed to eat and not allowed to eat.
SPEAKER_01: Chapter ten, they're people coming to the Lord's Supper intoxicated.
SPEAKER_01: Chapter eleven, women are cutting their hair short and rebelling against their husbands.
SPEAKER_01: Men are refusing to be the head of the household.
SPEAKER_01: Chapters twelve through fourteen, they're fooling around with babbling and calling speaking in tongues and doing human expedients and calling them the gifts of the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_01: This church was a mess.
SPEAKER_01: I mean a mess.
SPEAKER_01: First Corinthians 1 6 says, Even as the testimony of Christ was confirmed in you, so that ye come behind in no gift, waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, who shall also confirm you unto the end, that ye may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Do you know what he said in verse 6?
SPEAKER_01: The testimony of Christ was confirmed in you.
SPEAKER_01: That's what he said.
SPEAKER_01: Now there is an awful lot of terrible living going on in the church at Corinth.
SPEAKER_01: And many of them apparently have pretty well ruined their testimony.
SPEAKER_01: But they aren't going to ruin God's testimony.
SPEAKER_01: In fact, verse 90 says, God is faithful, by whom you were called under the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Chapter 3, they're not faithful.
SPEAKER_01: Chapter 4, they're not faithful.
SPEAKER_01: Chapter 5, 6, they're not faithful.
SPEAKER_01: Chapter 7 to 14, they are not faithful.
SPEAKER_01: How can some people who were confirmed and then unfaithful be confirmed unto the end?
SPEAKER_01: Because God is faithful.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not saved because I'm good.
SPEAKER_01: I'm saved because God is good.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not saved because I'm righteous.
SPEAKER_01: I'm saved because God is righteous.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not staying saved because I got better.
SPEAKER_01: I am staying saved because God can't get any better.
SPEAKER_01: It's His word that is my assurance.
SPEAKER_01: It's not my deeds.
SPEAKER_01: Praise God for that.
SPEAKER_01: I'll tell you if it was up to me, if it was up to me to get myself to heaven on my merits, I'd quit right now, I would.
SPEAKER_01: I would at no point in trying.
SPEAKER_01: You ever grow a garden?
SPEAKER_01: Ever grow a garden?
SPEAKER_01: Now, here's what happens.
SPEAKER_01: You go out and that Garden about two or three months after you plant it, you say, Man, I better weed this thing.
SPEAKER_01: And so you go up and down those rows and you pull out all the big weeds and throw them in the wheelbarrow and haul them off.
SPEAKER_01: And after you got those weeds removed and you think you're done, then you see all of these middle sized weeds that you never noticed when the big weeds were there.
SPEAKER_01: And so you take all that time to pull them out, haul them off, and you think you're done.
SPEAKER_01: And then you see all of those teeny tiny little weeds that you never noticed when the middle sized weeds were there.
SPEAKER_01: Let me tell you something.
SPEAKER_01: The man that says I'm I got saved and now I'm keeping it because I don't sin anymore, that's a man that's not dealing with sin.
SPEAKER_01: Because I guarantee you, as soon as you get the big ones out of your life, you're gonna find the middle sized ones that you hadn't even noticed.
SPEAKER_01: And once you get those middle sized sins out of your life, you're gonna see all the little ones you didn't even know were sins.
SPEAKER_01: And by the time you get two rows of those all pulled up, they start popping back up.
SPEAKER_01: You can't keep the weeds out of a garden and you can't keep sin out of a body of flesh.
SPEAKER_01: The person that says, I believe if you sin you lose it, he's got a definition of sin that includes nothing he's ever done.
SPEAKER_01: Oh, you don't sin, well, not the big ones.
SPEAKER_01: But the Bible says, the Bible, you remember the Bible, God's Word, it says in James 2 10, for whosoever you keep the whole law and yet offend in one point, he's guilty of all.
SPEAKER_01: So if all sin is sin, if no sin is okay, if you have to live above sin to get to heaven, you're not going.
SPEAKER_01: You're not going.
SPEAKER_01: Look at Leviticus.
SPEAKER_01: In Leviticus, a man had to offer a burnt offering and a blood sacrifice in order to pay for errors.
SPEAKER_01: Well, it was just a mistake.
SPEAKER_01: I didn't know I was doing it.
SPEAKER_01: Doesn't matter, you did it.
SPEAKER_01: You did it.
SPEAKER_01: If you're listening to my voice today, I don't care if you've been saved five years, ten years, fifteen years, twenty years.
SPEAKER_01: I'm telling you, the more time you spend in the Bible, the more time you spend under the preaching of God's Word, the more time you spend in prayer, you will not come to the conclusion you're getting better and better.
SPEAKER_01: You'll come to the conclusion that you're a whole lot worse off than you thought you were, and you will come to realize more and more and more and more that the only way to heaven is the grace of God.
SPEAKER_01: The grace of God.
SPEAKER_01: You know, Isaiah.
SPEAKER_01: He he found himself looking around at his nation, a pe an unclean people, a dirty people.
SPEAKER_01: And then next thing you know, he was in the presence of Almighty God.
SPEAKER_01: And when he saw himself in God's presence, he said, Woe is me, for I am undone, because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwelt in the midst of a people of unclean lips.
SPEAKER_01: You see, looking at everybody else, he was alright.
SPEAKER_01: Looking at God, he didn't stand a chance.
SPEAKER_01: Now, my friend, there is no question about it.
SPEAKER_01: A saved man, a saved woman should live like it.
SPEAKER_01: Should live a righteous, holy, decent, God-honoring life.
SPEAKER_01: There's no doubt about it.
SPEAKER_01: But if you live that life, you could not go to heaven without trusting the shed blood of the Lord Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Obviously, living a good life can't save you.
SPEAKER_01: And if you had committed one million sins and put your faith and trust in the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world, you could be forgiven and saved by the grace of God.
SPEAKER_01: We're gonna have to stop.
SPEAKER_01: We're gonna have to finish this next time.
SPEAKER_01: I hope you'll be with us.
SPEAKER_01: I hope you uh have the time, I hope your situation is such that you can listen.
SPEAKER_01: If not, this entire study of Philippians is available.
SPEAKER_01: Entire study of Philippians available.
SPEAKER_01: If you write to us and request it, we will tell you how you might obtain the full study when it has run its course.
SPEAKER_01: Or you can just check on our website, and it'll be real easy to find it there.
SPEAKER_01: You just there's a little search area at the top, and you you just type in Philippians, and it'll take you right to the study.
SPEAKER_01: That web address is jamenox.com.
SPEAKER_01: That's pretty easy.
SPEAKER_01: Our mailing address is 872 Glenwood Road.
SPEAKER_01: 872 Glenwood Road, Deland.
SPEAKER_01: D-E-L-A-N-D, D-Land, Florida.
SPEAKER_01: The zip code 32720, 32720, and that mailing address is in the United States of America.
SPEAKER_01: This program is heard at many different times over many different radio stations, and we're going to trust the announcer to come on in just a moment to let you know when this program will be heard again over this radio station.
SPEAKER_01: And we hope and pray that at that time you and a friend that you invite to listen with you will do us the great honor of joining us for the preaching of the cross radio broadcast.
SPEAKER_01: Until then, I'm Brother James.
SPEAKER_01: May the Lord richly bless you.
SPEAKER_01: And good day.
SPEAKER_00: Thanks for tuning in today.
SPEAKER_00: Join us every weekday for another episode of the Preaching Cross Radio Podcast.