Join Bob George as he delves into the complexities of outward appearances versus inward faith in the latest episode of Classic Christianity Radio. Discover how historical rituals like circumcision once symbolized faith and how today’s focus on numbers and external achievements may distract from genuine spiritual growth. Explore with Bob as he unpacks the pressures of societal acceptance and the importance of nurturing a personal relationship with Jesus that transcends ceremonial acts.
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.
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That’s how phony we are, folks. Do we realize how phony we can be on the outside? Just phony as can be. On the outside, everything’s wonderful. Everything’s good. But inside, our guts are hanging out. You want to know something? Jesus isn’t looking at our outside. He’s looking at our guts. What’s going on underneath the skin?
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Not what’s going on in the outward appearance. But what’s going on underneath the skin? Where are we? Where are we living right now? Underneath the skin. And so this thing of trying to please people and to look good outwardly is not unusual. It’s been going on for centuries. So he says in this particular case that the only reason that these people are doing this is to avoid being persecuted of the cross. Now, Who got responsible for killing Jesus at the cross? Who was the blame laid on there? The Jews. Now, did the Jews execute Jesus? No. Who did that? The Romans. What did the Jews do? Encouraged it. They were the motivation behind it. But the Gentiles carried it out. So who killed Jesus? The Jews and the Gentiles. But in essence, you killed Jesus and I killed Jesus because of my sins. But the Jews got credit for it. Now here, they had a way and a means of being set apart from the rest of the world. What was it? Circumcision. So if I can get the Gentiles circumcised, no one’s going to know whether I’m a Jew or not because everybody’s circumcised now. And that has gone on to this very day. And I won’t go into the details of that. But I think we know that to be true. That circumcision is no longer a sign of being a Jew. So that was accomplished. And that was one of the ways in which they avoided being persecuted for the cross of Christ. Now he’s saying about these people who are looking for outward impressions, that even to those who are circumcised, not even those who are circumcised obey the law, yet they want you to be circumcised so that they may boast about your flesh. Again, how does that relate to this modern day? I don’t care what’s going on in your heart. Just show up. I’m not interested in you. I’m interested in numbers. nickels and noses is what I’m interested in and so it doesn’t make any difference whether you’re growing in the Lord or not I could care less about that I just want a large number of people to show up so that I can boast in how many people show up any of you been involved in that around that and so everything is outward And we brag on how many people we have in our congregation. We don’t have a clue what’s going on inside their hearts, whether they’re in the Lord, whether they’re not in the Lord. And, of course, then the way to do that is to promote baptism. Not baptism as proof of salvation, but as a means of joining my church. So the way that you become a member of my church, not a member of Jesus’ body, but a member of my church is to get baptized. And so we baptized hundreds last year. And because we’ve convinced ourselves and others that that’s a means of joining the church, and then we may throw a little Jesus in there. That’s also a means of coming to Christ. We throw that in just in case we might need it. But basically, this is church membership. When I was a kid, we went to church in the Christian church. It was a branch of the disciples of Christ. And in that church, every Sunday, you recited the Lord’s Prayer. And every Sunday, they had communion. And every Sunday, the cup was passed by with the bread. And I loved grape juice. And every Sunday, that grape juice came under my nose. And I sat there dying to get some grape juice. And I used to, you know, have those little glasses. And after it was passed, I’d get the little glasses out and lick the bottom out of them. Just to get me some grape juice. And finally one time, I asked Mom, Mom, how do I get to drink grape juice on Sunday? And said, by being baptized. I said, it would lead me to the waters. And I was baptized the next Sunday. And I got my grape juice. Now, that’s a phenomenal motivation, isn’t it, for being baptized? And that lasted for a while until one of my buddies asked me to go over to the Presbyterian Church. And what was spiritual about the Presbyterian Church is it had a basketball court in the basement. Now, the ceiling was only about eight foot tall, so you could slam duck when you were five foot tall. But it didn’t make any difference to me. It was a basketball court. And Reverend Spurgeon loved kids. He had a phenomenal youth ministry. In that little church, 20,000 people, 300 kids marched down the aisle on Easter Sundays with palm branches, singing, Up from the grave he arose. None of us knew the Lord. He didn’t know the Lord. But we sang songs. And in order to play basketball in the basement, you had to be in the choir. And so every kid in the church was in the choir. And his concept was, I don’t care whether you can sing or not. Some people are off key low, some are off key high. It’ll all balance out in the end. Just open up your mouth and make a joyful noise unto the Lord and sing. And that’s what we did. What did it sound like? I don’t know. But we sang and we got to play basketball. And we got to go out on, he bought a bus. That was unheard of back in my days for a church to have a church bus. We had a bus, went out to Memorial Park, and Amy and I were just back there recently, and we played ball there, and we’d take our lunches out, and he’d have a prayer with us. And all those things were true, and they were good. It was a good environment to be in, but no one knew the Lord. No one knew the Lord, but we had a nice youth ministry, and we had a nice program. And today, the same is true. You’ve got a program. You’ve got a youth program. And that’s what, where am I going to go? Where they’ve got a good youth program. Doesn’t matter whether we know the Lord or not. Just activity. And we’ve got a good singles department. And we’ve got a fantastic young marriage department. We’ve got the adult. And here, the Bible says we all are mixed together. And here we separate. You’ve got the old adults and the medium adults and the young adults and all this. And you’ve got all of these classes down. So the people can relate to each other because that’s what’s important is relating to each other. And that’s the condition of our organized church today. It’s programs. And more money. And more buildings to house what? Hearing the gospel? Programs. And so before long, as we’ve talked about before, what is a supplement to becomes a substitute for. And it’s subtle. And anyone who thinks that they’re not subject to that, something’s wrong with your head. You’re not aware of the spiritual battle that is going on in the hearts of man today. You’re not aware of what Satan wants to do to you. And that is to deceive us and to get our focus off of him and on to anything except him. Satan does not care what you have your eyes on as long as they’re off. Of Jesus. That’s all he cares. Christian activity. Praise God. He likes that. It doesn’t make a difference. As long as they’re off of Jesus. And so. We have to understand. That the apostle Paul. In writing this book. Is trying to drive us to our senses. And trying to get us to see. It’s not activity. It is not fun and games. That this Christian life is a serious matter. It doesn’t mean we walk around looking like we just ate a skunk. Because we have joy in the midst of trials and tribulation. But he says in this world you’re going to have trial and tribulation. I want to tell you folks there’s not a person sitting in this room that doesn’t have trials and tribulation. Is there? And so in this world you’re going to have it. If you don’t have it externally we have it internally. And the issue is Where are you going to go to? And you see, we get all of these young people, especially, all wrapped up in our youth groups, in our high school youth groups. What happens when you go to college and your youth group isn’t there anymore? I’ll tell you what happened to probably eight or ten people that I know of. They all died of AIDS and became homosexuals when they got to college. They might have been in high school. I don’t know. But I do know they’re dead today from AIDS. Sitting in a Baptist church singing their hearts out. Folks, you don’t have anything to draw upon if you don’t have Jesus. You cannot draw upon your youth program when you don’t have a youth program. You can’t draw on your young marriage class when you don’t have a young marriage class. If you’re by yourself, all you have is Jesus. And we better have a relationship with him. And someone that we can talk to. And relate to. And pour our heart out to. And be ministered to by him. Because he’s all you’ve got. And so to these outward appearances that we get so hung up on. They’ll kill you. And they’ll put you in bondage to desiring outward appearances. And acceptance by man. Jesus said, if I was… If I was teaching the law, I would not be persecuted by man. I’m not here to be pleasing to man. We’re not running for sheriff. We are children of the living God who’s under a continual spiritual warfare and attack every moment of our lives by the one who says, I have only one goal for you to kill, steal, and destroy everything in your life. I’ll steal your marriage from you if I can. I’ll destroy your marriage from you. I’ll destroy you. I’ll destroy the ministry. I’ll destroy anything that I can get my hands on if you allow me. And that’s the enemy that is nudging into your and my head every single moment of the day. And I want to tell you, fun and games. Don’t contradict that. And so he’s saying to us that not only those who are circumcised obey the law. The people were saying, be circumcised. That’s a part of the law. But I don’t obey the law. What are the requirements of the obedience to the law? If you’re under the law, it says, first of all, you’re under a curse. Why are you under a curse? Because you can’t obey the law. And what’s the wages of sin under the law? Death. That’s the curse of the law. As long as you hang on to one piece of the law, he says, you may as well hang on to all of it. Because if you’re trying to obey one law, you’re obligated to obey all of it. We studied that, didn’t we? And it says in there that if you kept the entire law and just violated one law in all of your life, you violated all of them. And so he’s saying to you, if you’re under the law, you’re under a curse. So if you’re going to hang on to the law of circumcision or baptism… or any other law that you hang on to for salvation, you’re under the curse of death because you’re obligated to obey all of it. And all of it’s outward signs, outward impressions that mean nothing to God.
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Let’s turn to the sixth chapter of the book of Galatians. we have to understand that the Apostle Paul, in writing this book, is trying to drive us to our senses and trying to get us to see it’s not activity, it is not fun and games, that this Christian life is a serious matter. It doesn’t mean we walk around looking like we just ate a skunk. But he says, in this world, you’re going to have trial and tribulation. I want to tell you, folks, there’s not a person sitting in this room that doesn’t have trials and tribulation. And so in this world, you’re going to have it. If you don’t have it externally, we have it internally. And the issue is, where are you going to go to? And you see, we get all of these young people, especially, all wrapped up in our youth groups, in our high school youth groups. What happens when you go to college and your youth group isn’t there anymore? I’ll tell you what happened to probably eight or ten people that I know of. They all died of AIDS. And became homosexuals when they got to college. They might have been in high school. I don’t know. But I do know they’re dead today. From AIDS. Sitting in a Baptist church singing their hearts out. Folks, you don’t have anything to draw upon if you don’t have Jesus. You cannot draw upon your youth program when you don’t have a youth program. You can’t draw on your young marriage class when you don’t have a young marriage class. If you’re by yourself, all you have is Jesus. And we better have a relationship with him and someone that we can talk to and relate to and pour our heart out to and be ministered to by him because he’s all you’ve got. And so to these outward appearances that we get so hung up on, they’ll kill you. And they’ll put you in bondage to desiring outward appearances and acceptance by man. Jesus said, if I was teaching the law, I would not be persecuted by man. I’m not here to be pleasing to man. We’re not running for sheriff. We are children of the living God who’s under a continual spiritual warfare and attack every moment of our lives by the one who says, I have only one goal for you to kill, steal, and destroy everything in your life. I’ll steal your marriage from you if I can. I’ll destroy your marriage from you. I’ll destroy you. I’ll destroy the ministry. I’ll destroy anything that I can get my hands on if you allow me. And that’s the enemy that is nudging into your and my head every single moment of the day. And so he’s saying to us that not only those who are circumcised obey the law. The people were saying, be circumcised. That’s a part of the law. But I don’t obey the law. What are the requirements of the obedience to the law? If you’re under the law, it says, first of all, you’re under a curse. Why are you under a curse? Because you can’t obey the law. And what’s the wages of sin under the law? Death. That’s the curse of the law. As long as you hang on to one piece of the law, he says you may as well hang on to all of it. Because if you’re trying to obey one law, you’re obligated to obey all of it. We studied that, didn’t we? And it says in there that if you kept the entire law and just violated one law in all of your life, you violated all of them. And so he’s saying to you, if you’re under the law, you’re under a curse. So if you’re going to hang on to the law of circumcision or baptism or any other law that you hang on to for salvation, you’re under the curse of death because you’re obligated to be all of it. And all of it’s outward signs, outward impressions that mean nothing to God. And so he’s saying yet that they want you to be circumcised so we can boast in your flesh. May I never boast except in the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. Only got one thing to boast about, and that’s the cross. Now, folks, again, have you ever wondered, why do we carry the symbol of the cross? You say, why don’t we carry some symbol of the resurrection? And as I said, the reason for the cross is this, and people don’t understand this. The cross is universal in application. How many people did he die for the sins of? The whole world. How many people was he raised for? All people, but only the ones who accept his life are saved. Whether you accept it or not, your sins were taken away. So you see the cross is a symbol of the one who came and took away the sins of the whole world. Not only ours, but the sins of the whole world. That is universal in application. There’s not a soul alive that has ever been born that you could not walk up to and have the authority as a child of God to say to them, I got good news for you. God was in Christ reconciling you unto himself, not counting your sins against you. Could you say that to anybody? Absolutely. It’s scripture, isn’t it? Could you say that to someone in the jungles of New Guinea? Yeah. Could you say it in the city of New York? Yeah. It’s universal and therefore it’s truth. And so that is true, that the sins of the whole world were taken away at the cross. Does that mean you’re saved? No, because you’re not saved by getting your sins forgiven. That’s a part of salvation, but it’s not in and of itself salvation. So the cross, the reason it’s a symbol, universally, is because it’s the pronouncement of God saying, I took away the sins of the whole world. There’s no one who will ever go to hell because of his sins. Do we understand that, folks? There’s no sin that you have ever committed that was not taken away at the cross of Jesus Christ. Do you believe that? Now, some of us have tried to out-sin God, but we can’t do it. There is no such thing as a sin unforgiven. They were all taken away at the cross. I have people who say, well, what about my future sins? How many of your sins were in the future when Jesus died for them 2,000 years ago? It appears to me that that would be all of them. And so there’s not a sin that has been, is, or will be committed that was not taken away at the cross. Now, we talk about the atoning death of Jesus Christ. Did Jesus come to atone for sins? No. No, a bull and goat atone for sins. And we hear preachers today continually talking about atonement, atonement, atonement. Say, what are you talking about? There is no atonement in the New Testament. Atonement was Old Testament way of getting your sins covered until the next covering. So atonement covered sin. Jesus took it away. And if you have a translation where atonement is used, check it out in the Greek. That is not the translation. It’s propitiation. It is a word that means it’s done. It’s final. It’s over. So knowing that to be true and knowing that the cross is the universal sign that your sins have been taken away at the cross. Can any of you go up to a person and say, if you don’t shape up that sin, you’re going to hell? Can you or not? Is there any sin you can commit that would send you to hell? How about Hitler’s sins? That couldn’t send him to hell? Gee whiz. What about Stalin’s? What about old Ben Laden? I’m not so sure about that one. Were those sins forgiven? Yes. Absolutely. Absolutely. Are they saved? No. Why? Because they have not gone to where you received the forgiveness. It’s money in the bank, but I haven’t gone to the bank. So guess what? I’m going to die impoverished because I don’t go to where the money is, in the bank. And the scripture says, in him you have redemption The forgiveness of sins. Where is forgiveness that was provided for the whole world received? Where is it received? In Him. Now what do you mean in Him? What do we mean in Him? The one that sacrificed for the sins, but more important than that, is the one who was what? Raised from the dead. And there’s where we’ve come with a half-gospel. And in so many of our churches, and I say in the Baptist churches I went to, it doesn’t make any difference where it was, you got a great evangelistic call, but it’s always come get your sins forgiven, get your sins forgiven, get your sins forgiven. And so young people are buying a life insurance policy, a fire insurance policy. Who wants to go to hell? You got to be an idiot. So come forward and receive Jesus and forgive your sins and you won’t go to hell. That’s not true. And you go back to the pew as empty as you walk to the altar. Why? Because you don’t come to get forgiveness. You come to get life. And it’s not just the physical Jesus that walked on the earth 2,000 years ago. It’s the resurrected Christ. That’s why he said, without the resurrection, we’re to be pitied of all people and are still in our sins. What’s the matter? Didn’t Paul understand the cross? How can he say that? Did he know that Jesus died for the sins of the whole world? Was he confused on something? No, he wasn’t confused. He was just giving you truth. Without the resurrection, we’re to be pitied of all people and are still in our sins. Why? Because without the resurrection, there’s no forgiveness. Even though it was provided, it can’t be received any place except in the resurrected Jesus. Not the Jesus who walked on the face of this earth, who healed the blind and made the deaf to hear. but the one who was raised from the dead and today is seated at the right hand of God. That’s the resurrected Jesus. And folks, without the resurrection, we’re lost. And if you’ve never come to believe in the resurrection, you’re lost. We’re not saved by believing Jesus hung on a cross. You’re saved by believing he was raised from the dead. Now, in order to come to a resurrected Jesus and receive what he came to give you, eternal life, you have to believe in the eternal consequence of the cross. And we have people who teach the opposite of that. We don’t teach the finality of the cross. We teach, yes, he died for the sins of the world, but if you keep on confessing your sins, he’ll keep on forgiving you. That’s nonsense. It’s idiotic nonsense. I taught it for years. I taught nonsense for years. There’s nothing true about that. When Christ took away your sins, he took away your sins. And when he took it away, he took it away eternally. That’s why that act of the cross is as an eternal function as his resurrection is eternal. He had to die for all sins in order to give you eternal life. He had to deal with the cause of death eternally. in order to give you eternal life. So had he not dealt eternally with the sins of the world at the cross, he could never have offered you eternal life. I sat with a young lady in Toronto who was talking afterwards with a chaplain and myself, and she was saying, well, what do you think about these people Because they don’t believe in eternal security. What do you think about these people who just teach, well, I can come to Christ and go do anything I want to, and I have eternal life. I said, let me see if I can help you with this. And I went over what I just went over with you. That what caused spiritual death was sin. The wages of sin is what? Death. But what? The gift of God is what? Life. Now, in order to give you life, eternal, he had to deal with the cause of death eternally. Because had he not dealt with the cause of death eternally and gave you life, the next time you sinned, you’d die again.
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Until next time, walk in faith, be good to one another, and praise the Lord. Amen.
