Dealing with Heartbreak and Loss

Does God always give his people a miraculous turnaround?

That's the question I want you to ask and answer through the course of this message. Does God always give his people a miraculous turnaround? Or, to put it another way, are there times when God does not grant the miracle or the request we've made? Hello and welcome to this Tuesday edition of Destined for Victory with Pastor Paul Shepherd, Senior Pastor at Destiny Christian Fellowship in Fremont, California. Wherever you are and however you may be listening, thanks for making this part of your day.

Well, it's a fascinating question, one that deserves an answer. Does God always give us a miraculous turnaround the way he did for Job and Joseph and many others? Or, are there times when he doesn't grant that miracle? To answer that question, Pastor Paul takes us to the story of a familiar Old Testament figure. Let's join him now for his message, Dealing with Heartbreak and Loss. Today, I want to focus on dealing with heartbreak and loss as I wrap up this theme so that we can say hallelujah anyhow no matter what we're going through. And I realized that there's one more thing after disillusionment I needed to cover, and that's helping people who are dealing with heartbreak and loss. So, I want to remind you that the last three examples I gave when I preached Dealing with Disillusionment, all three of those cases went through major disillusionment, but the end of the story was quite glorious, even circumstantially God blessed them in tremendous ways.

Think about it. Job went through hell on earth, but at the end of the book of Job, you see God bringing him through miraculously, giving him children, giving him his wealth back, and he came out looking so good at the end of that, even circumstantially. He was blessed in tremendous ways, and then when you think about Joseph, you know what happened. Yes, he went through that hellish experience where he was in jail for 10 to 13 years for a crime he did not even commit. Imagine being a felon and in jail for something you didn't do, and he had to go through all of that as well as previously, of course, the betrayal of his own brothers, but despite that, think about it. At the end, God blessed that man and gave him a promotion he wasn't about to deserve.

Why? He was not an Egyptian, but here he is, the second in command in the entire nation of Egypt. God blessed him circumstantially in such a wonderful way, and then, of course, Mary and Martha went through the disillusionment of calling their best friend Jesus, and he didn't respond until four days later, and they were completely disillusioned. Why in the world would he do this to us, but look at what happened when he showed up. When he shows up, he stands at that tomb and says, Lazarus, come forth, and Lazarus was raised from the dead.

So in all three of those cases from the previous message, circumstantially those people came out really in really great shape. That poses for me a question that I need to help you ask and answer in your own life. See, I'm a disciple maker. That's what God called us all to be, go and make disciples, and as a pastor teacher in the body of Christ, I have to be diligent in the making of disciples. Now, if I'm going to do that, I've got to be true to the word, and I've got to help people work through the real everyday questions. I don't believe in church that always just shouts you and makes you happy. If church isn't helping you think, if church isn't helping you deal with your everyday life, then church is not doing you much good. I don't need just somebody to stir me up.

If I want to get stirred up, I'll buy a good record. I need somebody to help me live. I need somebody to help me deal with the hell I got to go through sometimes, and so I can't just say, oh, yeah, Job came out, and God gave him double for his trouble. Oh, Joseph came out, and he was second in command in Egypt, and Mary and Martha had their brother come back home. Yes, oh, that's true, but that's not everybody's testimony, so I got to help people who say, well, I didn't get a Job experience. I didn't get a Joseph experience. I didn't get a Lazarus experience.

Am I left behind because I didn't get those? The answer is no, and I'm going to prove it to you in the rest of this message. So the question we need to pose is, does God always give his people a miraculous turnaround? That's the question I want you to ask and answer through the course of this message.

Does God always give his people a miraculous turnaround, or to put it another way, are there times when God does not grant the miracle or the request we've made? I need to preach that because if you hear all these folks singing and shouting, talking about what God did for them, and you look at your life and say, he didn't do nothing like that for me, then I need to be able to help you grapple with that. You, too, are his child. You, too, are in his plan, and he has a way to bring you out as well, so we're going to walk through that in the remaining time here. To do that, I want you to look with me at a passage of Scripture in 2 Samuel, the second book of Samuel in the Old Testament. Now, before we get to the passage, let me explain what we'll be dealing with. You know very well that David, for all of his being a man after God's own heart, and all of that, David, when he messed up, he messed up royally. I can relate.

I don't do much that's just commonplace. If I'm going to go, I'm going to go big, and unfortunately, there are a lot of people who even when we do wrong, we do wrong big. That's what David did, and here he was for all the blessing of God in his life. He's the king.

He's had a wonderful run. Things been going well, and one night, he sends his army out to attack the enemy, and he decides I'm not going. Now, kings in those days went to war with their soldiers. He decided, no, I'm going to take some R&R, and he stayed back, and he stayed home, day out there fighting, and he went up on his roof one night, and looking around, and he saw this pretty little child bathing, and he saw her, and he saw her, and he saw her.

Y'all get my drift? He didn't say, oh, Lord Jesus, and then run back in the house. He stayed up on the roof and continued to behold, and you know the story. Lust filled his heart and mind, and he decided, I want her. He had her come to the palace. He spent the night with her, sent her back after they had a Luther Vandross, if you don't know what I said, don't even worry about it.

Bottom line, she got pregnant, sent word. He said, oh, man, all right, what we going to do? They said, well, her husband's out there fighting your battle right now. He said, oh, all right, let's bring him home on leave, and you know what happened. The man is such a soldier, Uriah won't drink, but the king insists, and Uriah won't even go in the house. He sleeps outside of the bedchamber, because he refuses to act like he's a civilian when he's a soldier. And so when David heard he won't go in with his wife, that's when he sent the wine, and he sent the wine over, but he still would not cave in. He said, no, no, I'm a soldier, my countrymen are fighting right now, and I'm going to behave myself here. He did what the king should have done, but how many know just because you are supposed to do right doesn't mean you automatically do right, and the king blew that royally.

So the man won't cooperate with the king, and the king is desperate because now he's trying to cover his sin. We'll be right back with more of today's Destined for Victory message from Pastor Paul Shepherd. To listen to any of Pastor Paul's recent broadcasts, be sure to stop by pastorpaul.net to listen on demand. That's pastorpaul.net. And be sure to stay with us after today's message when Pastor Paul joins me from his studio in California. But first, let's return to the story of King David in the rest of today's teaching, dealing with heartbreak and loss. Once again, here's Pastor Paul.

And you know the story. He sends the man back to the army with sealed orders. What he is taking back is David telling the commander in the field, put Uriah out on point at the front of the battle, and then have the troops withdraw from him.

How cold-blooded is that? Sin can make a fool out of all of us. And he has the man killed. David is not only now an adulterer, he is now a murderer. The Bible tells us these kinds of things because it wants to show us all the things we need to know.

Things written beforehand are written for our learning. And so he's an adulterer and a murderer. And he's hoping he's gotten away with it. But God sees everything. And here in 2 Samuel 12, that's where I want you to join me. After this has happened and he's hoping that he's gotten away with it, God sends a prophet named Nathan. Look at verse 13 of 2 Samuel 12. So David said to Nathan, I've sinned against the Lord. Because you know the story, the earlier verses, Nathan told him a little story.

And the point of the story was one man who had access to so much did so wrong by somebody else. And when David got mad, hearing about this man, got mad. He said, go get him. Nathan looked at him and said, well, you the man. Look in the mirror.

If you want to confront him, just go to the mirror. Now look what it says. David says, I've sinned against the Lord. And Nathan said, the Lord also has put away your sin.

Let me tell you something. I don't care how wrong you've been, and we've all been wrong. And no need of you comparing your wrong to somebody else's wrong.

Yeah, but I was never as shady as David. No, no, don't waste your time comparing sins. You're on the Titanic like everybody else. When you're on the Titanic, no need to brag about which cabin you were in.

I was on the royal promenade. The whole thing going down. And so he says, God said that he's put away your sin, you shall not die. Thank God for grace. However, look at verse 14. Because by this deed, you have given great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme. The child also who is born to you shall surely die.

Then Nathan departed to his house. The Lord struck the child that Uriah's wife bore to David. Look at how the Bible describes her. That's that man's wife that you killed. Uriah's wife bore to David, and it became ill.

So the child is ill now. Look at verse 16. David, therefore, pleaded with God for the child.

David fasted and went in and lay all night on the ground. So the elders of his house arose and went to him to raise him up from the ground, but he would not, nor did he eat food with them. Then on the seventh day it came to pass that the child died. He's forgiven, but God said you're going to suffer the consequences. See, forgiveness doesn't always mean a reset of everything. Sometimes forgiveness is get right with God and then wait to see what God's going to do with you now. And so he wanted, okay, I'm forgiven, so Lord, heal the child.

Don't let him die. But God says, no, no, you have caused other people to blaspheme my name, and I'm going to discipline you and let you experience the consequence of what you have done. And so he's prayed and fasted these days, but the child dies. Quick question, have you ever experienced tragedy or heartbreak or loss on a very painful level?

Many of us have. We know what it's like to have something, nothing short of a trauma, of a tragedy take place in our lives. And the fact is we live in a sin-cursed world. This is one of the reasons Pastor Paul is respected as a preacher, a balanced preacher of the word by so many because there's a whole lot of candy store theology out here. There's a whole lot of preachers that really need to open up a candy store.

Because that's what they do, give people sweets all the time. And the fact of the matter is if we're going to be true to the word, you can't build a life on sweet tarts and M&Ms. You got to build a life on foundational truth. And the fact of the matter is I can't tell you like some folk, God always going to do this and that and always going to give you a miracle and always going to, no he will not.

Sometimes his plan calls for something different. And furthermore, we live in a sin-cursed world. And sometimes what we go through really has nothing to do with how good we live. You can be living ever so right but you live in a sin-cursed world among sinful people and the world system is dominated by the ultimate sinner, Satan himself. The result is we are in this world and we have to experience some of the fallout of the curses of sin in this world. Paul said in Romans 8, the time is coming when creation will be redeemed as the Lord comes back and resets everything. But until then, he said creation is groaning. Creation is groaning earthquakes and all kinds of things going on even in the physical world because of sin. And folks, we got to live here and sometimes a bullet is not aimed at a child of God but they can be shot just like other people. I know you would love to believe that literally nothing can harm me. Well, when God says so, he will keep the enemy from taking you out.

But the fact is there are many who have met an untimely death who knew the Lord but we would look at it and say, boy, we sure wanted to see them have many more years on earth. There are things in this world, there are mysteries in this world that you need to do yourself a favor and stop trying to explain and figure out all the time. Sometimes stuff happens. It happens.

I said stuff. All right, you all know it happens. And we don't like it but we have to go through it. And the boy died. We've all experienced tragedies. I have preached the funeral of a day's old child.

That is not fun. Little casket that you can just hold with your hands like this. Day's old infant. I have preached their funeral and mother and father and family weeping and I'm trying to bring comfort to a difficult situation. In January of 2020, just before two months before the pandemic hit, my wife and I are in Dallas at the funeral of Dr. Lois Evans who was a dear friend of ours.

We met the Evans in 1999 when Dr. Evans and I were both preachers at a major conference and the conference leader said to me, I want you to meet Dr. Evans. I was scared. I said, that's Dr. Evans. I ain't nothing but Paul. You sure you want me to?

He said, no, no, no. I'm setting you all up for lunch. Come to lunch. And my wife and I went to lunch and there was Dr. Tony Evans and his wife Lois and we met them and had lunch with them and began to fellowship and what have you. And he has been a valuable person in my life. He's the one who shortly after that really encouraged me to get into writing.

Now I'm writing books because of the encouragement and enlightenment I got from him and all that. But his wife also really took to Meredith and the two of them became close friends and she became a friend of mine as well. And she, Dr. Lois Evans is one of the dearest people we knew. And we had to sit there and watch her. She had an aggressive form of cancer. Saints had prayed over the country and other parts of the world for her healing and yet she transitioned from earth to glory at I think 70 years old. We wanted to see her live much longer. She was such a valuable friend. In our darkest time as a couple, she was right there. When we had our celebration of restoration service in San Jose at a major church there, thousands of people, Dr. Lois Evans was sitting there grinning, excited because of what God was doing in our lives in marriage.

She loved her so much, but love couldn't keep her here. Stuff happens saints. And we have to learn the lessons that will bring us through those. Thanks so much for being here for today's Destined for Victory message, dealing with heartbreak and loss. Look for any of Pastor Paul's recent messages online on demand at pastorpaul.net. That's pastorpaul.net. You know, every day here at Destined for Victory, we ask people to stand with us financially and that's because we are a listener supported ministry.

And let me underscore that for just a moment. This means the only way we exist is through the prayers and financial support of people just like you. And in 2022, our prayers that you might consider if you haven't done so already, becoming a Destined for Victory partner. Partners are a special group of people that give a monthly gift of at least $20.

If you can make that commitment today, we have some special gifts I'll tell you about in just a moment. But Pastor Paul joins me right now. And Pastor, take a moment and please tell us why partners are so important to this ministry.

Yeah, I'm glad you brought that up, Wayne. Partners are really the lifeline of this ministry. Without those people committed to giving regularly, we literally could not continue doing what we're doing.

I guess people hear that a lot, but it is really true. Without partners, we simply can't get the gospel out to the world. The gospel is free, but the plumbing costs an awful lot of money and we want to continue preaching. As I've said in times past, we've got generations to reach that have never heard the gospel and they misunderstand when they hear people talk about things like serving the Lord.

And we need to make it plain to them. The only way I can do it is with my partners helping us reach them through their generous gifts. I'm so grateful for every single partner. And I'm praying in 2021 that God will give us thousands more. There are many more outlets and many more opportunities we could take advantage of in our ministry, but the only thing that holds us back is lack of income. So I'm praying that God's going to touch the heart of many more people to realize that with just your gift of $20 or more, you can help us remain strong on the stations and outlets we're on and reach many more with the gospel of Jesus Christ.

All right. Thanks, Pastor. That's what it's all about, reaching more people with the gospel. And if you make that commitment by pledging $20 or more per month to help us do that, we'll send you with our thanks a couple of great gifts, including one of Pastor Paul's most popular CDs, The Best of Let My People Smile.

It's a compilation of some of Pastor's most humorous stories and illustrations, something that will be sure to make you laugh and learn at the same time. Call 855-339-5500 or mail your gift, letting us know you wish to become a partner. The address is Destined for Victory, P.O.

Box 1767, Fremont, California, 94538. And you can also sign up by clicking Become a Partner right at the top of the homepage at pastorpaul.net. And if you're already a partner, Pastor Paul and I want to say a heartfelt thank you and challenge you to consider becoming a legacy partner. These are special ministry friends that are able to support us with gifts of $2,500 or more each year. The details are available at the website, pastorpaul.net, or by calling 855-339-5500. If you can't become a partner today but would like to make a generous donation to Destined for Victory, we'll be glad to send you Pastor Paul's DVD message, Influencers for Christ.

That's Influencers for Christ, our gift to you this month by request for your generous donation to Destined for Victory. Although God still works miracles today, we are not guaranteed a miraculous and positive answer every time we pray. But God promises to give us his grace, peace, and strength to overcome the heartbreak and loss life sometimes brings. That's tomorrow in Pastor Paul's message dealing with heartbreak and loss. Until then remember, he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion. In Christ, you are Destined for Victory.