Welcome to Truth Time, where you'll get a shot of the truth with no chaser.
And now, your Truth Time host, Trey Searcy.
This is Truth Time, and we are delighted to be with you.
Today, we're going to go back to the telephone lines and field some more questions from our listeners.
Okay, again, welcome.
Thank you for being here.
Hello, Mr. Searcy.
I live in Greentown, Indiana, and I understand the concept that our sins are already forgiven, but I was recently asked a question, and I couldn't answer it, and I was wondering if you could possibly do a show on this.
The question is this, do you think that unbelief is a sin, and if so, is it a sin that was paid for?
Some have said that unbelief is the only sin that can keep you out of heaven.
Is that true?
I just wondered if you could give an answer to that question or do a show on that topic.
I would love to hear your take on that.
I really appreciate all that you do and look forward to hearing from you.
Thank you so much, sir.
Bye-bye.
Okay, great question.
We have some real Bible students asking some really good questions, and we do appreciate it.
Do I think that unbelief is a sin?
Yes.
And you said, if so, is it a sin that was paid for?
Yes.
And let's see, you said, can unbelief keep us out of heaven?
It certainly can.
You see, just because the sin of unbelief is not being imputed does not mean the world doesn't need to believe the gospel to be saved.
No, it simply means the sin of unbelief, just like all other sins, are not being imputed.
Salvation is you resting your faith in the gospel.
Hey, if you want the gospel in seven words, I was thinking about this the other day.
The gospel in seven words.
The risen Christ died for your sins.
The risen Christ died for your sins.
Don't add to or take away from, just rest in that truth, okay?
If Christ died for all sins, then he died for the sin of unbelief.
But it does not change the way someone gets saved.
The fact remains that belief in the gospel is required for salvation.
He died for all sins, and that includes unbelief.
But you need to believe that.
Christ did away with the sins of the world at the cross.
They were put on him, 2 Corinthians 5:21.
They were charged to him, imputed into his account.
But listen, here's where people miss it.
You are not saved by what Christ did for you.
You're saved by believing what Christ did for you.
Hey, Mike, I hope this helps.
If not, call back, and hey, we'll try again.
I am calling to ask, How come Bible-believing Christians, and sadly, some so-called grace Christians, believe that saved people are automatically controlled by the Holy Spirit without having to yield to the Holy Spirit?
When people do that, it can cause weak, struggling Christians to doubt their salvation, and it can cause strong Christians to question other people's salvation and become judgmental.
I have noticed this mainly happens when pastors, including grace pastors, slip verses from James and 1 John and such into Pauline verses, and that seems to be causing the problem, but I'm not exactly sure.
I would like to know more about the situation and what can be done about it.
This is Robert Shepkey, goodbye.
Robert, God has given everyone free will, and I agree with you.
Being saved does not mean we're on autopilot.
We're not automatically controlled by the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit is a dweller.
The Bible says the Holy Spirit dwells within the believer.
He's a leader.
He leads if we let him.
He's a griever.
He grieves when we don't let Him.
He's a sealer.
He seals the believer at the moment of belief.
The Holy Spirit is an intercession prayer warrior who prays for us, prays for things we don't even know to pray for.
And while we should, Galatians 5:25, keep in step with the Spirit, nowhere do we find that he makes us do that.
He is not a controller, and regardless of what Calvinists tell us, things do happen by chance.
Luke chapter 10 verse 31.
See, that's the problem again in the church today.
That's one of the reasons TV evangelism is embarrassing the body of Christ, because in our mind, we think we need superstars.
That's what the world has, you see.
It puts its most powerful, its best looking, its most financially capable people up.
They ride around in limos and fly around in jets and eat the best food and wear the best clothes, and the people are always taking pictures.
We've made stars out of the people of power in the world, and the church has sunk so low as to think that we've got to have a star.
If they got them, we got to have them.
So we got to be on TV.
We got to have jet planes that dress in Canali suits and eat the best food and talk the best language.
God is saying, I never have used it.
I won't use it now.
You can put Saul's armor on all you want to, but it won't help you one bit.
Your victory will not come from what you wear, what you look like, how much money you have.
Your victory will come when you've got nothing on except the righteousness of Jesus Christ.
This is Truth Time Radio, providing Bible answers in a clear way for all to understand.
Bible questions, email us from our website, truthtimeradio.com.
Looking in truth, daily living in God's grace and victory, oh it's such a great and wonderful, powerful message.
It's truly a nice place to be.
You know when I came across verse 7 of 2 Timothy chapter 2, my life began to change.
In 2 Timothy 2:7 Paul said, Consider what I say and the Lord give the understanding in all things.
Well, this was what I wanted.
I wanted to not only read and study my Bible, I had been doing that for years, practically my whole life.
I wanted to understand it.
I wanted to actually understand what I was reading.
While some of us don't like to admit it, lack of understanding brings on doubt and unbelief.
I sincerely wanted to believe my Bible and one day I finally decided to do that.
I decided to believe the Bible for a change, I decided to believe it over my tradition, to believe it over the preacher, and this Bible that I finally decided to believe also said that I should follow Paul,
1 Corinthians 4:16, a truth I had never heard before.
Well by following Paul, I have learned to be a Christ dependent.
Paul has taught me that I am totally dependent on the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
So often what we do is we begin to develop a lack of dependency on the Lord, allowing outside things to come in and affect our trust in him, bad doctrine for example.
Well this only leads to doubt and unbelief, a lack of faith, but we find a straight pathway to peace when we finally decide to commit our salvation to the Lord, when we finally surrender our salvation to him, when we let go and let God, when we let go and stop struggling with it, stop struggling to earn salvation and stop struggling to keep and maintain it.
Just stop struggling, stop struggling for favor, for blessings, for approval, stop struggling all together.
It's only when we stop and rest our faith solely in his finished work that we can begin to grow in His grace.
Doing this allows the peace that passes all understanding to consume us, to stabilize our hearts and minds, allowing Christ to have preeminence in our life.
You see, Satan has a real hatred for this kind of preaching.
He's not afraid of Joel's every day a Friday.
He's not afraid of John Hagee's four blood moons.
Satan's not afraid of the ecumenical movement that wants everyone to turn a blind eye to their doctrinal differences, and matter of fact, he actually rejoices over the fact that all world religions are now coming together.
All religions coming together is Satan's direct attempt at destroying the one true faith of Christianity.
That's all it is.
Rick Warren's The Daniel Plan doesn't scare him.
Jennison Franklin's The Fasting Edge, no, that don't scare him either.
Running Down Your Dream, a 40-day journey, he's not scared of that.
None of the fads that make their destructive way into the church have any effect on Satan whatsoever.
Well, other than giving him a good laugh.
But you want to know what makes Satan and all his minions tremble?
You want to stop his scoffing at the church?
Preach about the gospel of Christ, and how he shed his life's blood at Calvary, forgave the world's sins, and has risen to proclaim eternal victory.
Preach about that.
Preach about how we've been delivered from the bondage of sin, and how it no longer has dominion over us.
You see, Satan is well-versed in the Word of God, so remind him and his deceitful workers of Romans chapter 5, and how that by the righteousness of Jesus Christ, the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life.
Preach how that at the moment we believe the gospel, God sealed us unto the day of redemption,
Ephesians 1:13.
Satan knows all about the power of the Holy Spirit, and he can't stand the fact that he cannot have our souls because the Holy Spirit has sealed it.
Bad news for him, wonderful news for us.
Well that's going to do it here on Truth Time Radio.
And remember, 2 Timothy 2:15 tells us to educate ourselves, because listen, in life, you only get two educations, the one you're given, and the one you give yourself.
Through the years, I thought I was saved.
I knew the gospel, and I knew a lot about the Bible, and I thought I was saved.
But I never had perfect peace about it, because I didn't know when I got saved.
When my husband came back from overseas after World War II, he told me that he had gotten saved through talking to a fellow soldier.
And since he was saved, I wanted to be saved.
So one day, I got down by my bed, and I just asked the Lord to save me.
I prayed and asked the Lord to save me.
And through the years, I counted that as my testimony.
Well, I never found peace about it.
So I rocked on with that in my mind.
And ever so often, I would get to worrying about it again, and I would go ask the Lord to save me.
And I'd beg him to save me, and so forth.
That just kept going on, and then finally, my husband did get saved.
And when he got saved, it really threw me for a loop, because I had thought he was saved already.
I really began to get troubled then, and every time I would get troubled, I would go pray and ask the Lord to save me, again.
And I was even so stupid that I would think, surely one of them times, the Lord saved me, but I don't know which one it was.
So one day recently, my daughter came up to my house, and we were just visiting and talking about the Lord.
And she mentioned the fact that when she got saved, she had been troubled for a long time.
And finally, she heard her preacher one day, one Sunday, say, you don't have to do anything.
All you have to do is trust what the Lord has done for you.
And when she said that, it was like a light bulb went off in my brain.
And I thought, that's what's the matter with me.
I've been trusting what I was doing, praying, asking the Lord to save me.
And He didn't tell me to do that.
He told me to trust what he had already done and what he's written in his Word.
And so right there that day, I was doing, and I trusted the Lord.
And as I said, I had always wanted to give my testimony, but I didn't have one because I didn't know when I got saved.
I thought I was saved, but I didn't know when.
So, that day, I know I got saved.
Now I know I have a testimony as well as a Savior.
I praise the Lord for it.
And as I said, I'm 85 years old, and this past Valentine's Day, I got saved.
And I feel like, if I've been fooled all these years, and the devil had me so fooled, I feel like there possibly is some people here tonight that is in the same boat I was in, and I would ask you to really search your heart.
When I was in the denominational church, we were taught that we had to ask Jesus into our heart to be saved.
And that has stuck with me, and I feel like that's probably some of my problem.
So, be careful who you listen to and what you listen to, because it had me fooled.
And I just praise the Lord that I finally realized what was going on, and I got saved.
And now I have peace.
Thank you.
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