Join us on Classic Christianity Radio with Bob George as we dive into deep conversations tackling the tough issues that many believers face today. From understanding Catholic traditions and their discrepancies with the Word of God to exploring the profound concept of entering into Christ’s rest through the Sabbath, our discussions aim to bring clarity and spiritual wisdom. Bob George responds to listeners’ questions with insightful biblical perspectives that are both enlightening and faith-affirming. In this episode, we also delve into the dynamics of prayer, questioning its role and how it aligns with God’s will. Through meaningful exchanges with
00:00:01 Introduction and first caller Ora from Gautier, Louisiana
Welcome to Classic Christianity Radio with Bob George. Today we are pleased to present a special radio show featuring call-in listeners from Bob’s original people-to-people daily radio program that was on the air for over 30 years, offering real answers for real-life problems as he addresses common questions as well as the tough issues of today, directing callers to the centrality of Christ in you, your only hope of glory. Let’s go to Gautier, Louisiana, listening on WLNO. Ora, you’re on the air. Okay, my question is,
SPEAKER 06 :
I remember when Mary went to visit Elizabeth and it had been magnificent and she said from here on wherever people rise up and call me blessed. But I didn’t see anywhere where she would be co-equal with Jesus. When do you think that started? Why is it in some denomination that he’s almost co-equal with Jesus. And I think Jesus said, I wouldn’t no longer drink with you this Passover until I drink with you in my Father’s divine, he said. And some of my friends think that the Lord’s Supper is really transferred into blood and the body.
SPEAKER 02 :
Yeah. Well, Ora, that is all Catholic tradition. And the emphasis that the Catholic Church, and again, I’m not talking about people. I’m talking about the leadership of the Catholic Church. And people then have a tendency to believe the leadership. and to put tradition ahead of the Word of God. And nothing could be more dangerous than doing that. You cannot put church tradition ahead of the Word of God. The Word of God is the final text that we put our faith in, not tradition. And there is nothing in the Scriptures at all that put Mary in that kind of a place at all. She was blessed of all people to be picked of God. God had to pick somebody in whose womb Jesus Christ would come out of. And he picked Mary, and that was a wonderful selection. But you realize that spiritually, as an example, that each and every one of us have been indwelt permanently by the Holy Spirit of God. It’s not a body living in us, it’s the Spirit living in us. So that to me is a greater thing than the physical. But again, there’s just no, nothing in the Scripture at all that would even hint of the position that the Catholic Church has placed upon Mary. And again, that’s leaders who have done that. That is tradition that’s done that. And then they have the Eucharist where when you take a wafer and that you’re eating into the body of Christ and that’s a substantiation and all that takes place. That’s nonsense. That is voodoo. And there’s no way in the world that anybody, and to me in their right mind, and believe that because, again, whatever I put in my mouth is going to go out again. Jesus said that. And so I guess that’s why you have to keep going back to get Jesus all the time. Well, that is not what salvation is.
SPEAKER 06 :
It’s just a thing that I really want to keep in my mind because the times are coming when the Bible says if we’re not careful, even the elect will be.
SPEAKER 02 :
Oh, absolutely, and that is a deception.
SPEAKER 06 :
I want to really know everything that I need to clear up.
SPEAKER 02 :
Don’t have anything against Catholics. As a matter of fact, probably 80% of the people…
SPEAKER 06 :
I just need to get that cleared up in my mind.
SPEAKER 02 :
But that teaching is causing a lot of people to live in deception. Well, Vera, I appreciate your call, Ora, and God bless, and you keep walking by faith.
SPEAKER 06 :
You’ll be very close to me when you get to New Orleans. I know we will. My daughter’s not saved, or she would bring me, but if there was any way I could get there, I would. But I’m in this wheelchair, and… And I can’t, well, I have to go where people take me now.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah.
SPEAKER 06 :
You know what Jesus told Peter. You go where you want to go now, but you’re old. Somebody else will take you where you want to go. That’s right, yeah.
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, God bless you, Ora. Yeah, thank you so much. All right, bye-bye now.
SPEAKER 06 :
Bye-bye.
SPEAKER 02 :
We’re going to go to Beeville, Texas, listening on KCTA. James, you’re on the air.
SPEAKER 04 :
Hello, Bob.
SPEAKER 02 :
Hi, James. How y’all doing? Doing fine, thanks.
SPEAKER 04 :
Oh, that’s good. I wanted to get in touch with you today and let you know that still out there proclaiming Jesus Christ and spreading the good word, you know, and let y’all know that, let people know that the conference is really, it’s a really great place to go to get a solid foundation and find out what’s real and what’s not, you know, and once you get a hold of that, you’re going to find out that you’ve got something that is really real that you can hold on to.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, that’s for sure.
SPEAKER 04 :
And I was talking to a lady this morning. She has a bookstore here in town, and her name is Kate. And she was asking me a few questions. I was asking her to see if she could write y’all and get classic Christianity in there and try to get it distributed out in this area. And she asked me about the Sabbath. I didn’t get to finish explaining to her what the Sabbath was all about. But I was trying to explain to her that the Sabbath is us entering into His rest. So many people think the Sabbath is just Sunday and that’s it. But it’s not. It’s much more than just one day recognizing… a day that we set aside to go praise Jesus. That’s fine, but it’s so much more when we enter into his rest and we give up our self-sufficiency.
SPEAKER 02 :
Yeah, that’s for sure. Well, I hope that you, you know, if she’s interested in purchasing any of our books or this type of thing, she can either log on to information on the Internet or get in touch with us. There’s no problem with that, James, and we’ll be more than happy to… accommodate her any way that we can.
SPEAKER 04 :
Right.
SPEAKER 02 :
So, you know.
SPEAKER 04 :
I just wanted you to elaborate on the Sabbath because people think that Sunday is the only day, and it’s not. I was trying to tell her that it’s every day. It’s every day that we get to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ. And the rest, see, people don’t know what the Sabbath really is. The Sabbath means a day of rest. See, he rested from his work, so should we, just as he did.
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, I don’t think I need to answer it all. You’ve just already done it, brother. So I think you called to give a sermon and you gave one.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, I didn’t know if she was understanding me or not. And I said, well, I didn’t have time. I was on my way to work. And I said, well, I’ll call and I’ll let Bob explain it, go into a little bit more in depth of what the Sabbath is and what it means so she can get a good understanding that He rested on the seventh day, so should we.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yep, that’s for sure.
SPEAKER 04 :
And it’s not just one day, it’s every day that we let Christ Jesus shine in our life.
SPEAKER 03 :
That’s for sure.
SPEAKER 04 :
And that’s what the conference does. It nails down all those loose ends that you have a solid foundation in Christ. And then we went on to the law a little bit.
SPEAKER 02 :
We’re going to use up a whole program on that one, brother. I think we better call this a quit and get to our other calls here.
SPEAKER 04 :
You know what I found? It’s a word that they’re using, and they’re saying, observe the law. I heard this from another guy. I said, of course we’re not supposed to steal, kill, and rob. We know that, but we have been called out from the darkness. We know that we’re not supposed to do those things as children of God. So the law is not for us. If we’ve been called out from among them, then what does that mean?
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, I’ll tell you, James, we could go on and on with this type of thing, and I know that you would love to do that, but we’ve got to go on to some other calls here. But I appreciate your call, and you keep preaching out there, okay?
SPEAKER 04 :
Okay.
SPEAKER 02 :
All right, brother. Good to talk to you, James. Have a good day. Bye-bye now.
SPEAKER 01 :
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SPEAKER 02 :
Let’s go to Alexander, Virginia, listening on KFAX. Don, you’re on the air.
SPEAKER 05 :
Good evening to you. How are you today?
SPEAKER 02 :
Pretty fine, Don.
SPEAKER 05 :
I’m very short-winded. I can’t talk quite as much.
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, that’s all right.
SPEAKER 05 :
Unfortunately, when you’re talking about the Lord, you should be able to talk quite a lot. I’ve got a specific question. Is a sinner’s prayers answered or considered?
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, of course they are. Certainly God reached out to everybody on the face of the earth. If God was in Christ reconciling the whole world unto himself, why wouldn’t he be listening to what people were praying to him about? So, you know, there’s a lot of people that get into the fact that God doesn’t hear a sinner’s prayer. That’s nonsense. How could you ever come to Christ and pray to him otherwise? So, yeah, God hears who he wants to and who he wants to hear or anyone who really wants to talk to him. Now, when you’re talking about people who are praying to Allah or praying to Buddha or people like that, why, obviously, he isn’t listening to that because no one’s talking to him. You’re on another line. And so, but… But anyone who is sincerely wanting to know God, as the Scripture says, will know that he is who he is, and that is God. He’s revealed himself to us in numerous ways to prove that. So the one true God that you and I worship, that was revealed to us in the person of Christ Jesus, anyone who prays to him, whether lost or saved, they’re going to get an answer to that prayer. And again, sometimes the answer is, I’m not going to answer right now. You know, the issue, Don, with all of this type of thing, people talk about answered prayers all the time and answered prayer and answer prayer and answer prayer. The issue is Jesus said that I do nothing on this earth unless the father tells me to do it. And I don’t say anything unless the father tells me to say it. Now, Jesus set for us an example of living in total dependency upon his father. In other words, we are not the initiator and him is the responder. We are the responder because he is the initiator. And I believe that not only did Jesus not say anything unless his father told him to or do anything unless his father told him to, which indeed he did not, I also don’t believe that he prayed anything unless the father told him to. And so what you’re dealing with is praying in accordance with God’s will. And I say to people many times, do you want your prayers answered or do you want God’s will for your life? And quite frankly, I would rather have God’s will for my life than it would to have a prayer answered because a lot of times the things I’m asking for aren’t worthy of asking or answering. And so if God is the initiator of all things to us and he is putting on our hearts to pray for someone, it’s because he’s got the answer on the way. Otherwise, I don’t think we would have it on our hearts. Now, you can put stuff like, you know, we get in our prayer meetings on Wednesday and pray for Aunt Nellie’s toenail and stuff. We don’t know Aunt Nellie from a hole in the wall. But the issue, what I’m talking about, when you really have a true burden for a person and that burden is real and that burden comes from God, it’s because God has an answer on the way. And so answered prayer, you know, a lot of times you hear that person says, well, I prayed for you and God answered the prayer and To me, it reminds me of the golfer who’s praying for sunshine and the farmer who’s praying for rain, and both of them are Christians. Which one’s God going to answer? So the issue is what we need to do is to quit worrying about getting prayers answered and to concentrate our time on talking to the Lord about what he has taught us and verbalizing back to him truth that he has taught us. It’s kind of like James was doing. He’s verbalizing back. what he’s learned, and that’s good.
SPEAKER 05 :
I wasn’t referring to praying for good food or good fortune. I was referring to praying for the benefit or the health of someone else.
SPEAKER 02 :
Sure, absolutely. And with that, Don, you pray that God’s will be done. You don’t know what God’s will is. You don’t know what the situation is. And so it’s, Lord, you know what my desire is my desire is for this person to get well but if that’s not in accordance with your will i want your will to be done and that’s the way you pray on that type of thing um i don’t think our prayers is going to cause a person to get well or not to get well uh god that’s god’s business not ours and you know we have to we have that tendency to take credit for this oh i prayed and that’s why you got well no it isn’t if you if if god got you well he’s the one who did it not because i prayed And what that does, Don, it puts us in a situation where we’re more interested in the health of somebody than God is. In other words, if God has to wait for me to pray for somebody to get well, that means I’m more interested in they are than he is. And that’s nonsense, isn’t it?
SPEAKER 05 :
Well, it’s nonsense, but you’re not insinuating that we shouldn’t pray for people, then. No, I think what you… If God wants them to be better, then he’ll make them better. You don’t even have to pray for them. That is true.
SPEAKER 02 :
You don’t have to pray for them. The issue is what you’re praying is God’s will will be done, and you’re the one doing the praying, and what you’re praying is whatever God’s will is, I’m going to walk by faith in you. If the person dies, I’m going to walk by faith in the fact, if they’re in Christ, that they’re in your presence. I’m not going to mourn and grieve like the heathen do, as the Scripture talks about. Basically, the prayer is going to be for my benefit. It’s going to be that, Lord, this person that I’m praying for is in your hands. And whatever the result of that is, I’m going to trust you. Though the world slay me, I’m going to trust you. And that’s what he wants to have coming out of our hearts, is that we’re trusting him to fulfill his will in that person’s life. And so I’m not saying for us not to pray. I’m saying we should talk to God. But don’t talk to God as if you’re the initiator and you’re the boss and he’s the responder because God isn’t responding to you. God is initiating to you. You know, Ron, we live in a law of causality. I don’t know whether you’re familiar with that law or not, but if you studied physics, the law of causality is that the effect of something is never greater than the cause of something. The warmth of the sun is not greater than the sun. My salvation is not greater than my Savior. A house is not greater than the builder. It’s a law of causality. Well, you see, we live by that law down here in this realm, but then we ignore it up in heaven, and we say, no, I’m the cause, and God now is the effect. And that puts me in a position of being greater than God. So God is the initiator, Don, of all things, and we respond to him. And the way I respond to him is, God, this is your will that is to be done. And regardless what takes place, I’m going to praise you, And I’m going to believe in you, and I’m going to follow you.
SPEAKER 05 :
Am I taking it out of context when the Bible says, ask and thou shalt receive? If you ask and you don’t receive?
SPEAKER 02 :
You know, the context of that is salvation, Don. Is that what that refers to? The context of that is salvation. The context of that, if you ask, you’ll receive. But again, it’s not you’re receiving because you’ve asked. It’s because God has initiated you.
SPEAKER 05 :
So that verse is pertaining to salvation, not to make my pocketbook thick.
SPEAKER 02 :
Yeah, absolutely. This prosperity gospel that’s being taught that all you have to do is name it and claim it, the book of Timothy says that anyone who teaches that godliness is a means to financial gain is a man of perverted mind. And look how many of the people on television are teaching people that godliness is a means to financial gain. He says they’re perverts. They’re perverts.
SPEAKER 05 :
The program just before you on my local station was preaching that very same thing.
SPEAKER 02 :
Absolutely. And that’s why you listen to Christian radio and you hear one person one hour teaching one thing and another another. And that’s why I’ve said to people, don’t believe me. I could be lying out my teeth to you. Look it up in the scripture. And the scripture tells you very clearly that anyone who teaches that godliness is a means to financial gain is a man of perverted mind. and uh so i uh personally don’t have much to uh that i want to listen to uh when i have a person that’s teaching that that’s incidentally is in first timothy the sixth chapter and you can read that people have been robbed from the truth and they think that godliness is a means to financial gain and that’s the one thing you didn’t have to tell me i knew that yeah you can’t i don’t think god i pray for money god’s not going yeah money down like rain to me and i wouldn’t i wouldn’t pray for that anyway uh
SPEAKER 05 :
You know, I’m concerned that I’m not a saved person, even though I’ve prayed a sentence of prayer. I have done what I think is necessary or what’s been taught is necessary to be saved, but I don’t really feel saved. And I still pray, and I want to know if my prayers are being heard.
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, Don, the thing that you need to get into your mind is this. You’re saved by faith in what God did, not by faith in what you do. either before you’re saved or after you’re saved. It’s all faith in the total provision of God for you and for me. God looked down upon you and saw you in your state of spiritual death. That death, you didn’t bring it on yourself. You were born in the loins of Adam, dead at birth. That’s the consequence of sin. Had you not been born dead, it wouldn’t be long before you would have become dead if you were under the law because the man who sins will surely die. Now, Jesus came to take care of that problem. First of all, he had to find a way whereby people who are dead spiritually can be made alive spiritually. And the only way that he could do that was through resurrection. They have to be the recipient of resurrected life. Now, in order to give you a life that is indestructible, to give you an eternal inheritance that he had to take away the cause of spiritual death, which is sin. That’s the purpose, Don, of the cross. The purpose of the cross was to take away sin, which is the cause of spiritual death. Now, having taken away the cause of spiritual death, he was able, through his resurrection, to offer you and me spiritual life that’s called eternal life, life that cannot be taken away because the cause of of the loss of life has been taken care of at the cross. Now, when you enter into that by faith, it’s not a prayer that saves you. It’s faith that saves you. Prayer is merely a way of expressing your faith. But your faith is what says, Lord Jesus, I believe this. I believe that you went to a cross not to cover sin as atonement did, but to take it away, never to see with it again. And as it says, when you come back, you’re not coming back to bear sin because you already have. but you’re coming back to bring salvation for those who are waiting for me. And so you’ve done that at the cross for me, for you, Don. You were raised from the dead so that that life that raised you from the dead can raise me from the dead because I found out from the scripture I was born dead spiritually. And the only thing a dead man needs is life. Forgiving a person cannot bring life to a person. Life has to bring life to a person. And so the cross is what God did to clear the deck for the divine action of bringing life to the dead. Now, when you’ve entered into that resurrected life of Christ Jesus, you are saved, and you’re saved eternally because what salvation is is life, and the life he gave you is eternal, and the only thing that could cause that life to leave you is sin, and the reason that’s impossible is because of the cross itself. where your sin was taken away. And that’s why you know today that you have eternal life. But, Don, you’ve got to enter into that by faith. In other words, you may not even understand that, but you enter into it by faith. Lord, this is what you said of my condition. You said I’m a sinner. I agree with that. And you said that I was dead. When you were dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave all your sins. And so I recognize that I was born dead And I recognize that the meaning of your resurrection was that you could now give me resurrected life. And I accept that. Now, Don, if you’re not sure you’ve accepted that resurrected life, that’s your first step. If you have, then begin to trust Christ that he did exactly what he said he was going to do. And that is to give you life and it’s eternal life. And now he lives in you. He gave his life for you in order to give his life to you in order to live his life through you. And so now if you are sure that you are in Christ and Christ is in you, then recognize that he’s in there in order to live his life through you. You cannot live the Christian life. You could not give the Christian life. You cannot live the Christian life. Only Christ can live his life in and through you and me. We get to enter into that life and bear the fruit of that life, but we cannot produce one iota of that life. Where do you think you stand there, Don?
SPEAKER 05 :
Well, I have done what you said.
SPEAKER 02 :
Okay.
SPEAKER 05 :
I do believe and I have… Then you’re a child of God, brother. Well, I just, you know, I know that the devil tempts you constantly. Yeah. And I have impure thoughts.
SPEAKER 02 :
We all do.
SPEAKER 05 :
I still sin. We all do. I pray that God will forgive me every day for the sins that I’ve committed.
SPEAKER 02 :
Well, now, I want you to quit doing that because that’s a sign I didn’t believe that he took away my sins at the cross.
SPEAKER 05 :
He took away the ones I had.
SPEAKER 02 :
No, no, no.
SPEAKER 05 :
I’ve created more.
SPEAKER 02 :
That’s all right. How many of your sins were in the future when Jesus died for them 2,000 years ago?
SPEAKER 05 :
They were all in the future.
SPEAKER 02 :
Okay, then there is no such thing as past, present, and future. Your sins are already behind his back, never to see him again. You don’t have to keep asking for what he’s already given you. In fact, that’s a repudiation of faith to do so. What you need to do is start thanking him for what has been accomplished on your behalf instead of thinking, see, there’s your problem, Don. You’re thinking, I’m going to initiate my confession for forgiveness, and he’ll respond to me. He never responded to you to begin with. There wasn’t a person that asked him to go to the cross. He initiated that. Nobody asked him to forgive him when he cried out from the cross, Father, forgive them. They don’t know what they’re doing. You’re not an initiator. You’re a responder. So if you’re going to walk by faith, you need to walk by faith by thanking him for what he’s accomplished and quit begging him for what he in Christ has already accomplished in your life. See what I mean?
SPEAKER 05 :
Maybe I should ask him to continue helping me be a better person and stop the sin.
SPEAKER 02 :
You’re never going to stop sin. If you really mean that prayer, he’ll kill you because the only way you’re going to stop sinning is to die. You’re going to be engaged.
SPEAKER 05 :
I guess you could cut back a little bit maybe.
SPEAKER 02 :
But you see, he isn’t grading on the curve. You are preoccupied with you and what you’re doing instead of him and what he’s doing. And as long as you’re preoccupied with you and what you’re doing, you’re going to be a miserable Christian for the rest of your life. You’ve got to get your eyes off of Don and get them on to Jesus and be thanking him. That’s what the Bible says. And all things give thanks. Thanking him daily enough. hourly, minute by minute for his provision and love and mercy to you. You can’t do that when you’re thinking about you and how bad you are and all this kind of stuff. We’re all bad. All of us have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. There’s none righteous, no, not one. And there are no big sins and little sins. There’s just sin. And James said, if you violated just the least of these, my commandments, you violated all of them. That buries all of us. There’s none of us are going to stand down in our own righteousness before God. What you need to do is to let the grace of God go into the book of Titus. It’s the grace of God that teaches us to say no to unrighteousness. It’s not the law of God. It’s the grace of God. And you’re never going to know about the grace of God being preoccupied with you and what you’re doing. You’re going to have to get preoccupied with him and what he’s doing. And let the grace of God teach you to say no to unrighteousness. Okay, pal?
SPEAKER 05 :
Thank you very much. I appreciate all the time. And God bless your ministry.
SPEAKER 02 :
You… You give that a try, Don, and get back with us, okay? Thank you very much. All right, pal. Bye-bye.
SPEAKER 01 :
Until next time, walk in faith, be good to one another, and praise the Lord. Amen.
