In this captivating episode of Classic Christianity Radio, listeners are taken on a transformative journey of faith as Bob George addresses the concept of salvation. The conversation begins with a heartwarming call from Janie, a listener grappling with the complexities of spiritual life and seeking answers to profound spiritual questions. Through gentle guidance, Bob uncovers the essence of spiritual rebirth, making the concept accessible and relatable to all. Listeners will learn about the significance of Christ’s sacrifice and how understanding one’s spiritual condition is pivotal in accepting divine life. The episode also explores the transformative power of faith, as
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. We want to remind our listeners that Bob George Ministries needs your financial support to continue to have Classic Christianity Radio on the air. Please visit BobGeorge.net to find out how you can help support us financially. Let’s now join Bob as he presents practical biblical insights as he helps people experience a life of faith, hope, and love in Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER 04 :
Kansas City, Missouri, listening on KCKN. J.D., you’re on the air.
SPEAKER 08 :
Hi.
SPEAKER 04 :
Hi, Janie.
SPEAKER 08 :
Hi. Well, I recently heard a term used by a preacher that said to go to heaven you have to be saved. And I don’t understand that. And I don’t even know what it means.
SPEAKER 04 :
say from what yeah well you know jenny uh i was 36 years of age before i came to the lord and uh i had sat in church probably the same kind you’re sitting in uh or had set in possibly and i never knew what men either um it’s like somebody said christ is the answer and i said what’s the question but let me explain that to you jenny um Man, you were born into this world dead spiritually, and what you are dead to is the life of God living in his creation. God designed man in such a way whereby God in the man is indispensable to the true humanity of the man. Just like electricity in a light bulb is indispensable to the function of the light bulb, gas in the car is indispensable to the function of the car, oil in the lamp is indispensable to the function of the oil lamp. It’s made that way, and that’s the way we were made. Man was designed and made by God, whereby God was to be indwelling the man. Now, we were born, therefore, not indwelt by God, And that’s what’s called dead spiritually. So what we are to be saved from is the wages of sin, which is death by the gift of God is life. Now, sin is what caused death. When Adam sinned, we all came into this world as a result of that sin, dead spiritually. So in order to give you and me God looking down on us, seeing us in our fallen condition. said, I’m going to make a plan to redeem man. And the plan was that I’m going to send my only begotten son, Jesus Christ, into this world to become a man and to walk on this earth as a man, go to the cross, and be the final sacrifice for the sins of the world three days later to be raised from the dead so that that life that raised him from the dead is can raise you and me from the dead and give us life. So all of that took place through this person of Christ Jesus. So in order to give you and me a life that is indestructible, a life that is eternal, he had to deal eternally with what caused death, and what caused death was sin. And so at the cross 2,000 years ago is where the Lord Jesus Christ, it said, there he who knew no sin became sin for you. Janie, if you’d have been the only person on the earth, he would have done this. So that in him, in his resurrected life, you could become the righteousness of God. So he became the final sacrifice, only the blood of God himself died. was of such value to cover and take away the sins and the vileness of the entire world. And so Jesus went to a cross volitionally and died.
SPEAKER 09 :
I don’t know what that word means.
SPEAKER 04 :
Volitionally, by his own volition. In other words, his own choice. He went there by his own choice to take away the sins of the world, and that included yours, never to see them again. so that he can now, in his resurrected form, come into the world through his Holy Spirit and say, Janie, I’ve taken away the cause of death, and you were born dead. I came to give you life. He who has the Son, we’re told, has life. He who does not have the Son does not have life. And he said, Janie, I am the resurrection and the life, and if you’ll believe in me, though you are dead spiritually, yet shall you live spiritually. And whosoever lives and believes in me will never die. He said, do you believe this? So a person comes to recognize, according to God, his condition. We have no way of knowing that apart from the scriptures revelation of this. But we recognize that we’ve bounced prayers off the ceilings. We recognize there’s no reality. We can look and see, it sure appears that there’s a God who made this place. But what’s he look like? Is he merciful? What kind of a God is he? We have no way of knowing apart from that being revealed through Christ and then the truth of that being revealed to us through the Scripture. So we read the Scripture and we understand or hear the Scripture and we understand our fallen condition. We understand that Jesus came to be our provision for that condition, taking away my sins, never to see them again, and offering me life. So now I got a choice. Do I believe what the scripture says that I am spiritually dead? Do I believe what the scripture says that Jesus came to give me life? Am I empty inside? Is there a God shaped vacuum there that I can’t get filled? Say, yeah, there sure is. Well, Jesus said, if you will trust in me, I will come and fill that void with my life. And what faith says is, Lord, I believe that, and I want you to come in and to be my Lord and Savior.
SPEAKER 08 :
I don’t know how to do that.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, I’ll tell you how. Janie, we’ll just do that tonight by prayer. And prayer is merely a way and a means of talking to God as to what you’ve now come to understand. And that emptiness that is in you is in every person on the face of this earth until they come to have that emptiness filled by him.
SPEAKER 08 :
Do you feel this side?
SPEAKER 04 :
Absolutely. So what we can do tonight, if it’s your heart’s desire, is to accept by faith Jesus’ substitutionary death on the cross for you and recognizing his offer of life to you and by faith merely accept him into your heart. And if you want to do that tonight, I’d love to pray with you. Okay. Are you ready to do that tonight?
SPEAKER 09 :
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, Janie, let’s just pray. God already sees your heart and what you’re doing is just merely talking to him. And why don’t you just repeat after me this prayer? Lord Jesus, I need you. Thank you for taking away my sins. Never to see them again. I now thank you for offering me your life.
SPEAKER 08 :
I now thank you for offering me your life.
SPEAKER 04 :
Your resurrected life.
SPEAKER 08 :
Your resurrected life.
SPEAKER 04 :
I ask you now to come into my heart.
SPEAKER 08 :
I ask you now to come into my heart.
SPEAKER 04 :
To be my Lord.
SPEAKER 08 :
To be my Lord.
SPEAKER 04 :
And my Savior.
SPEAKER 08 :
And my Savior.
SPEAKER 04 :
And my best friend.
SPEAKER 08 :
My best friend.
SPEAKER 04 :
In Jesus’ name.
SPEAKER 08 :
Amen.
SPEAKER 04 :
Amen. Now, Janie, based upon the word of God, it says to as many as received him. And that’s what you just did. You just received him. He gave the right to become a child of God. And so tonight you became just as well, however old you were or are, just as you were born physically. Tonight you’ve been born spiritually. And to as many as received him, to them he gave the right to become a child of God.
SPEAKER 08 :
Can I tell you something?
SPEAKER 04 :
Uh-huh.
SPEAKER 08 :
I’m visiting my cousin, and I don’t live in Kansas City, but I was visiting, and she had her radio set here. And I was listening, but I really just wanted to take a bunch of her pills.
SPEAKER 09 :
Uh-huh.
SPEAKER 08 :
And to get to the pills, I had to go by the radio station, And so it was cold outside, so I just did what the weather is, and you were there.
SPEAKER 04 :
Isn’t that something, Janie? Well, Janie, it’s very obvious from your heart that God was drawing you unto himself, that loves you so much. I don’t know why. Well, you know, I don’t know why he loves me either. He just does, and that is so great about it. I couldn’t earn it. I didn’t deserve it. It’s just the fact that God loves you. And he loves you so much that he preserved you tonight from destroying your own life by giving you life. Here you were thinking probably about taking your life. He said, no, I’ll take it, and I’m going to give you a brand new one.
SPEAKER 08 :
I was just real scared.
SPEAKER 04 :
That’s right. Well, Janie, it’s such a… I’m not so scared now. Isn’t that wonderful? Well, you see, Christ has now come to take up residence in your life. Janie, are you in Kansas City now?
SPEAKER 06 :
I’m just visiting.
SPEAKER 04 :
Just visiting there. And where are you from originally?
SPEAKER 06 :
I live close to Columbia, Missouri.
SPEAKER 04 :
In Missouri, yeah. Well, Janie, it’s such a thrill to me for you to call tonight and to just watch the Lord’s work in a person’s life.
SPEAKER 06 :
I didn’t plan it.
SPEAKER 04 :
That’s right. It’s a good thing you didn’t. But you know that God did, and that’s the beauty of this type of thing, is how miraculous it is that God sees your heart, and he sees the pain, and he sees the hurt that you’re going through.
SPEAKER 08 :
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER 04 :
and says, I want to go down and give Janie life.
SPEAKER 08 :
I feel real warm inside.
SPEAKER 04 :
Isn’t that something? Well, I’ll tell you, it’s hard not to. How old are you, Janie?
SPEAKER 09 :
I’m 30.
SPEAKER 04 :
You’re 30, huh? You sound like you’re about 18. Well, Janie, that is something else. Now, are you married?
SPEAKER 09 :
No.
SPEAKER 04 :
No, okay.
SPEAKER 09 :
I’m divorced.
SPEAKER 04 :
You’re divorced, uh-huh. And you’ve been having some trials and tribulations, I assume. Yeah.
SPEAKER 09 :
Yeah.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, J.D., you’ve got all of the problems that most of us have gotten ourselves into in life has come from the fact that we’re searching for unconditional love. And we think that that’s a need that could be filled here on a human level, but it can’t. The unconditional love is a spiritual need and can only be filled by Christ. And so the things that you’ve searched for in life have now been fulfilled spiritually in the person of Christ Jesus. You’re in for a great adventure.
SPEAKER 08 :
Should I go to church somewhere?
SPEAKER 04 :
Are you going to get back to, when are you going back to Missouri?
SPEAKER 08 :
I’m in Missouri, but I’m going to go back home in a couple of days.
SPEAKER 04 :
In a couple of days, uh-huh. Janie, what I would like to do, one thing for sure that I want you to do is to give us where we can mail some material to you.
SPEAKER 08 :
I don’t really care that much.
SPEAKER 04 :
You what?
SPEAKER 08 :
You really want to. I mean, you really care that much about me.
SPEAKER 04 :
Oh, absolutely. Absolutely we do. And we want to get some material into your hands that will help you to grow. Do you have a Bible? Somewhere. You sound like me. I just have to be truthful, right? I want you to, absolutely. When I first came to the Lord like you did, I was 36 years of age when I came to the Lord, and I didn’t know one end of the Bible from the other. So it was all a brand new experience for me. Freaking out right now. Yes, but that’s how God takes you and grows you. But, Janie, we’ve got some material that I want to send to you, and you read through that, and there’s a little workbook that you can go through your Bible and kind of solidify what has taken place in your life tonight.
SPEAKER 08 :
Am I like a Baptist or something now?
SPEAKER 04 :
You what?
SPEAKER 08 :
Am I like Baptist now?
SPEAKER 04 :
No, no, no. You’re just a child of God. Not just. You are.
SPEAKER 08 :
I don’t know.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, right. Well, Janie, that’s why it’s so refreshing talking to you. Like I say, you almost are a female version of Bob George a number of years ago. But, no, you’re a child of the living God. See, this is a personal thing between you and God. Now, where you go, let’s say that you go back and go to a Baptist church. Well, where you go doesn’t make you a Baptist. You’re a child of God who is going, maybe, say, to go to a Baptist church or a Presbyterian church or wherever it might be. But your identity is not in where you go. Your identity is in who you are. You’re a child of the living God now. And as a child of the living God.
SPEAKER 08 :
Does that mean I have a father?
SPEAKER 04 :
You better believe it. And that’s your heavenly father who loves you perfectly.
SPEAKER 08 :
I haven’t had a father in a long time.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, that’s right. And, you know, I remember a young girl that I led to the Lord a number of years ago. And she was a single girl. And her comment to me was, Bob, I’ve never been alone again. And that’s really a true thing. Christ is now living in you. He’s made a promise, incidentally. I’ll never leave you nor forsake you. And he is your heavenly father and he’s your loving heavenly father. And so but these things will you you’ll grow more in your understanding of these things. Janie, as you get into the word and let that grow, I would advise you when you do get your Bible. We may have, in fact, I’ll dig up some things, some additional things to send to you, but we’ve got a little booklet on the Gospel of John, and I’ll send that to you, and I would spend some time just reading that.
SPEAKER 09 :
Right.
SPEAKER 04 :
And right now, just spend time not worrying about where you go, but spend time getting to know the one that loves you perfectly.
SPEAKER 08 :
It’s so bizarre.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, it is, it is.
SPEAKER 08 :
I mean, a half hour ago, I was trying to figure out how I could leave this world, and No, it’s like maybe I’ll hang around a while.
SPEAKER 04 :
A wonderful new life. Yeah, that’s really true, Janie, and God saw that too. I had another good friend of mine that I had the privilege of introducing to Christ, and she had attempted suicide I don’t know how many times at a banquet. She spoke at a banquet of ours, and she said, you know, I tried to commit suicide three times. I finally made it. I died and came alive in Christ. Wow. So it is bizarre. Thank you. Well, God bless you, Janie. We’re rejoicing with you. The Bible says that all the angels in heaven rejoice to everyone who comes to the Lord. So you’ve got to be a bunch of people rejoicing for you. But let me… I’ll put you on hold and we’ll get your address and we’ll get all this information to you. And then… If you can’t hear the program where you are, we are here.
SPEAKER 08 :
That’s how I knew how to call you. Oh, you mean where I live?
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, where you live.
SPEAKER 08 :
Oh, okay.
SPEAKER 04 :
I don’t know whether you can pick up the program there or not, but if you can’t,
SPEAKER 03 :
Of course, we’re on the Internet, but if you can’t, do you? Mm-hmm. Oh, well, great. Yeah. Our website, Janie, is realanswers.net. That’s where you’ll find us.
SPEAKER 09 :
Realanswers.net.
SPEAKER 03 :
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER 04 :
And you can pick up the live broadcasts on the Internet. Wow. Yeah. And we’re here from 6 to 7, Dallas time, Monday through Friday. When you get these things and start studying them, you’re going to have some questions. And don’t ever hesitate to pick up the phone and call us. We’d love to hear from you.
SPEAKER 08 :
I just feel like crying.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, we do too. Well, Janie, thank God for you. And we just couldn’t be rejoicing anymore. And we want you to feel like you, you know, as you said, you’ve become a child of God. I’m a child of God. So you and I are brothers and sisters in Christ. So you’ve got a new family.
SPEAKER 09 :
Wow.
SPEAKER 04 :
Thanks. Okay, Janie. You hang on now, and we’ll get that information to you. And please call back. Don’t hesitate to do that. You’re going to have some questions. Don’t hesitate to call, all right?
SPEAKER 09 :
All right.
SPEAKER 04 :
Okay, Janie.
SPEAKER 09 :
Thanks.
SPEAKER 04 :
God bless you. You hang on now.
SPEAKER 01 :
Amy George’s book, Goodbye Is Not Forever, is a wonderful story about her life in the Ukraine during World War II. This book will inspire you as you read about the struggles and hardships of wartime and the faithfulness of God throughout it all. Get your copy of Goodbye Is Not Forever today at BobGeorge.net.
SPEAKER 04 :
Let’s go directly to the phone lines and go to Chattanooga, Tennessee. Let’s go on WLMR. Randy, you are on the air.
SPEAKER 05 :
Good evening, gentlemen. I wanted to ask you a question about divorce, about what Jesus told the Pharisees and his disciples and how it pertains to today on divorce.
SPEAKER 04 :
Randy, under the New Covenant, the instructions on divorce are in a different part of the Bible than the Gospels. Yeah, you’ve got the Gospels, but the New Covenant did not go into effect until the death of Jesus, which is not in the Gospels. The Gospels is the life of Christ, so he taught under the law. So the teachings that Jesus had under the law, in the Gospels, were under the law, and basically for the purpose of burying us under the law, to show us that we cannot. That’s what prepares us for the cross. After the cross, after… Yeah, in Corinthians. And that’s basically what you go to. And basically what that says, that is, if you are divorced, and he said if both of you are Christians, he said don’t get divorced. Hang in there and let God do his work. On the other hand, he says if you’re a Christian and you are married to a non-Christian and they don’t want to live with you, it says let them go because God wants us to live in peace.
SPEAKER 05 :
Right, that’s where I’m at. My wife and I were not… saved when we got married so god didn’t put that marriage together you know a lust and a preacher i didn’t know were at the wedding and um i was uh i thought she got saved we both uh were saved in march 05 i thought she was but there’s in four years there’s been absolutely uh no evidence no fruit no uh she could care less and she went to church with me for a while and um
SPEAKER 04 :
just dropped out and there’s and uh it’s a lot of mental cruelty and a lot of um uh i just have no evidence no to back that she’s a christian whatsoever and you’re not divorcing your wife no i was gonna say you’re not divorced because he’s not a christian you’re divorced because you don’t like her anymore uh but again randy you’ve got to go to the lord on that and if the lord is encouraging you and she doesn’t want to live with you she should be the one initiating not you I don’t want to live with this.
SPEAKER 05 :
She’s been begging for divorce for years, several years.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, yeah, again, you don’t have to beg for divorce. If you want a divorce, you go get it. But that’s her decision, not yours. Right.
SPEAKER 05 :
But I may be the one to have to initiate the paperwork and the lawyer.
SPEAKER 04 :
No, if she wants to get a divorce and she does not want to live with you because of your being a Christian and she doesn’t want to live that kind of a lifestyle, then she’s the one that needs to initiate it. I don’t say that you have to. You’re not going to go to hell on any of this. There isn’t anybody that’s going to go to hell because of anything except denial of Christ.
SPEAKER 05 :
Well, I pray to the Lord for wisdom when I speak and when not to speak and to guide me on this matter.
SPEAKER 04 :
Sure, and you need to do that, and he’ll guide you.
SPEAKER 05 :
Actually, I’ve been praying since March 05 to either change her or remove her. I mean, I know God, she has to want to change, and I’ve seen no evidence of any one or the other, actually.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, it takes two to tangle, Randy. It’s not just one person changing. There’s probably things in you that she thinks that you ought to change. The issue is the two of you, you didn’t start out this way. You started out with a love toward one another. And so the issue, they say, well, I lost it. Well, where did you lose it? And if you could find it again, would you be willing to find it? And the whole issue is our pride and everything else. It tells us that our hardness of the heart is what causes divorce. And our pride is involved in there. So there needs to come a time, regardless of what the circumstance is, of two people sitting down and saying, look, we’re acting like idiots. We started out loving each other. We could love each other again. But let’s sit down and try to determine the areas of our lives that are unpleasant to the other and to see if you can work it out. If you can’t work it out and she doesn’t want to work it out, then she’s going to initiate the divorce. And if that’s the case, why, you’ve got to let her go. What the scripture says, you let her go.
SPEAKER 05 :
She’s the mindset, bring me the papers, I’ll sign them.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, that’s signed fine. You can do whatever you want to on that. I’d say that’s not the issue. The issue, if you want a divorce, you go get the papers, and I’ll sign them. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. All right, Randy. I hope that helps, my brother, and I hope you can work it out. But, you know, don’t give up too easy. Try to work it out to the best of your ability, and let’s see if God can do something in this. You loved each other once. You loved each other once. And there had to be some things about each other that you loved or you wouldn’t have gotten married. And so try to rediscover the good things and take a look at the bad things and maybe let’s see if we can get rid of them and go forward on the strengths that we have, not the weaknesses. But, again, just let the Lord lead on you. Okay, Randy, good to talk to you, my brother, and we wish you the best, my friend. Orlando, Florida, listening on WEUS. Gordon, you’re on the air.
SPEAKER 02 :
Hi, guys. I appreciate you taking my call.
SPEAKER 04 :
You’re welcome, Gordon.
SPEAKER 02 :
It’s not going to be easy to follow that call.
SPEAKER 04 :
No, no, exactly.
SPEAKER 02 :
I just wanted to ask you about something that was related to, I think, two calls ago, the lady called in, and about forgiveness. And that is that even though we don’t confess for forgiveness, there is a scripture passage that says, confess your sins one to another and be healed.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, that’s who you’re supposed to be confessing is to one another. The context of that passage in James is feuding and fighting and fussing in the body of Christ. That’s why people have gotten sick. If you’ve ever been in a church split, you will understand the truth of that, where people can have heart attacks, they get all kinds of sickness, and everything else is involved. And he’s telling you to come together and to get those disputes taken care of by confessing your sins one to another, and to be healed one to another of the rift that you’re in. So the confession, what we’ve done is to say, heck, I don’t need to talk to old Gordon. I’ve insulted him and made a fool out of him, but I don’t need to talk to him. I’ll just get forgiveness from God. And God’s saying, I’ve already forgiven you. Your issue is you’ve got a problem with Gordon. Go to him and straighten it out. And if the church was functioning like that, you wouldn’t be having all the problems that we have today in the body of Christ.
SPEAKER 02 :
Right. And, well, also, I was thinking about a couple of things that you had said just previously while I was waiting about the pastors, and also about hearing you refer to yourself that it was some time along in your pastorate before you recognized the truth about forgiveness, that it’s been paid for once and for all for anybody who Christ is their Savior and Lord. And… I think there are probably a lot of pastors in the pulpit who haven’t made that transition yet.
SPEAKER 04 :
Oh, I agree. The vast majority, Gordon, they’re still teaching the 1 John 1-9 mentality, and it is so embedded in them it is almost like a doctrine where it is not a doctrine, but it’s almost like something that they will not let go of.
SPEAKER 02 :
And it’s not even salvation.
SPEAKER 04 :
No, absolutely. It has nothing to do with it. Nothing to do with it.
SPEAKER 02 :
And I want to ask you one other question. There’s a story in the Bible, and I’m not really good at chapter and verse, but there’s a story in the Bible where it talks about, and I think it’s a king who has a wedding banquet for his son. And I guess he’s moving around amongst the guests, and he himself had purchased the wedding garment for all of the guests. And he finds a guest who’s not wearing the wedding garment. Is Jesus the wedding garment?
SPEAKER 04 :
It’s a picture of being clothed in the righteousness of Christ. If you’re going to go into his presence, you’re going to have to come in clothed in his righteousness because he is not going to accept ours. So we don’t have any righteousness. We have to be clothed in his righteousness.
SPEAKER 02 :
I’ve read that so many times, and I did not understand what it was saying, and then the Lord just revealed it to me a little while ago.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, Gordon, we’ve got to get off the air, but I appreciate your call, brother, and you call again.
SPEAKER 02 :
Thank you.
SPEAKER 01 :
Until next time, walk in faith, be good to one another, and praise the Lord. Amen.
