Some of you all have had. a grace period. I don't know the time, the length in your life. You've had a grace period. And God is saying, Time's up.
You change today? or you reap the consequences. The book of Daniel is a beautiful tale of faith in the face of friction, but Daniel's is not the only story being told. Hello and thanks for stopping by for today's Destined for Victory, where we feature the preaching ministry of Pastor Paul Shepard. King Nebuchadnezzar had made progress in the early chapters of Daniel, but he wasn't quite ready to humble himself completely.
Much like he does in our own lives, giving us a grace period in hopes that we might repent. God gave the king a one-year warning. That's where you pick up today's message, and it comes your way next. Online, you'll find us at pastorpaul.net, where you can hear any recent Destined for Victory message on demand, including today's. That's pastorpaul.net.
Now, let's listen closely to the message: being good stewards of success.
Now, here's what happened in the life of Nebuchadnezzar that really drove home to him that he needed to spend the rest of his days giving God glory. He is the king of a vast domain. I mean Babylonia was a big deal. in that time in history. And he's the king of it all.
And he has these four Jewish men. Who God has used to really have a positive impact on him, but he's still, you know, serving false gods and he's still full of himself. He thought he was all that. And so the dream he has in chapter four is a dream of this. Gigantic tree.
It says that the top of it reached the sky. And its branches stretched out incredibly wide. And they said they provided food and shelter for beasts and for birds. The beasts would gather under it and find shelter, and the birds would light on it and eat what was on the branches, and they would find sustenance. And in the midst of that, God sent an angel and said, Cut it down.
And it went on to describe other details. And when he asked Daniel, what does this mean? Daniel said, Well, King, I sure wish this applied to somebody other than you. But God said it's you. And he said, What it means is, God is going to cut you down.
Because you haven't given him the glory, you've been full of yourself. And he is actually going to convert you for a period of seven years. When you read about the dream, it uses the term seven times. What that means is seven years. For a period of seven years, he said, You're gonna not be the king.
God is going to cause you to lose the mind of a human and take on the mind and the behavior of a beast. And for seven years, you're going to crawl on all fours. and you're going to eat the grass from the ground. And your hair is going to grow, and your nails are going to grow, and you're just going to be wild and insane for seven years. God gave this dream not as you're done, you're finished, everything is going to go wrong from now on.
God gave the dream as a warning. God loves us so much. That when he disciplines us, Or when he warns us. It's not the end. It is saying if you don't straighten up.
Here's where it's going to end. I love that about God. Discipline in the plan of God is not punitive, it is redemptive. You know what I mean by that? See, the reason why a lot of people today don't understand that is because many, especially those of us who are 50 and over, We grew up in a day where discipline was punitive.
I need the old heads to work with me because the young folk are not gonna know what I'm saying here. We grew up in a day where If they said, I'm gonna get you. They meant it. This was before, you know, before America figured out that a spanking was abuse. This is back in the day before America figured out that they had to protect kids from sensible, reasonable parents.
Who just want to raise somebody who got some sense. And back in the day, they just had more in their arsenal than timeout. And in my day, timeout was only heard at the ball game. Y'all trying to help On time you're a timeout. The umpire called timeout.
Or the coach of the team called timeout. I grew up in a day. Where if you messed around and did the wrong thing, your parent would get you anytime, any place, anywhere. See, these days there are a lot of parents who are scared to take their children out in public 'cause their children will embarrass them. When I grew up, nobody was afraid to take their kids out in public, 'cause if there was gonna be any embarrassing going on, If that was.
Gonna be embarrassment, I promise you the parent wasn't gonna be the one embarrassed. I grew up in the day of F.W. Woolworth. You could take your kids to F.W. Woolworth any old time you wanted.
I remember times I'm there with my mother. where we knew not to ask for a toy that we couldn't get. But there was some kid in aisle three Who just didn't want to take no for an answer? And it didn't happen much, but every now and then we would be at the store, and you would hear some kid screaming, and you'd run over to that house, and they said, I'm watching. And they fall in the floor.
And in my day, when we saw that in all three, we just backed up. We did it. Any of y'all back up? We wanted to be out of the way. We just backed up because we knew what was getting ready to happen.
That mother was gonna say no you did not Out here in Woolworth embarrassing me. And when she got through with that kid, He got saved. Father, I stretch my hand to thee. No one. the help I know.
You gotta say, right there in the store. Oh man, I grew up in a day where they didn't play that. And so we grew up with that idea. But in God's economy, God said, I'll warn you, because I'm trying to prevent you. From being this crazy.
And he said to Nebuchadnezzar, This is a warning. You say, how do you know that, Pastor? Look at verse 27. Daniel said, King, take my advice. Renounce your sins by doing what's right.
and get rid of your wickedness by being kind to the oppressed. It may be that then your prosperity will continue. He got the dream as a warning. The dream was saying: if you get it together now, if you humble yourself now, you can avoid being an animal for seven years. I love that about God.
Some of you all have been making some pretty big messes. In your life. And God's saying, I didn't send you to this word to condemn you. I sent you to tell you it's time to straighten it up. It's time to get your act together.
You've had enough time fooling around in a grace period. Grace period is over. I'm getting ready to show you who I am. If you don't straighten it up.
Some of you have been dangling out on the edge of living in sin and doing things that are not God's will and are destructive. And I see the hand of God saying, I'm trying to keep from getting you. But it's time for you to stop.
Somebody's been fooling around and having pregnancy scares unmarried. About to change the course of your life. And God is saying, I'm trying to prevent it. But it's time for you to stop it. Stop it now.
This is redemptive in nature. God gets no pleasure out of seeing the king in the grass.
So he sends the warning. Sad thing is He didn't heed the warning. Look at verse 29 of Daniel 4. Twelve months later, God gave him a one-year grace period. Period.
Some of you all have had. A grace period. I don't know the time, the length in your life. You've had a grace period. And God is saying.
Time's up. You changed today? or you reap the consequences. Twelve months later, verse 29, the king is walking on the roof of the royal palace. And look at what he says.
Is not this the great Babylon I have built? As a royal residence by my mighty power. And the glory of my majesty. Verse 31, look at this. While he's still talking.
God said, No, he did not. Y'all see that in your Bible? God said he Last year, I told him what was going to happen. And he up there. the roof.
Acting stupid. That's the Paul Shepherd translation of Daniel 4. While he's still speaking, the word's still on his lips, a voice from heaven. Said, here's the decree. Your royal authority has been taken from you.
Immediately What has been said about Nebuchadnezzar was fulfilled. He was driven away from people. He ate grass like cattle. His body was drenched with the dew of heaven, until his hair grew like the feathers on an eagle, and his nails like the claws of a bird. And he lived that way for seven years.
Seven years. Going from the glory, leading the largest. Kingdom of his day. From that So on all fours. acting like an animal.
But look at this. Seven years later, go down to verse thirty-four. At the end of the seven years, he raised, this is autobiographical.
So Nebuchadnezzar's writing: he said, I raised my eyes toward heaven. And my sanity was restored. Then I praise the Most High. I honored and glorified him who lives forever. His dominion is an eternal dominion.
His kingdom endures from generation to generation. Verse 36: At the same time my sanity was restored, my honor and splendor will return to me for the glory of my kingdom. My advisors and nobles sought me out, and I was restored to my throne and became even greater than before.
Now I praise and exalt and glorify. The king of heaven. Because everything he does is right. All his ways are just. And those who walk in pride, he is able to humble.
Oh my, do y'all see that? Seven years of living in hell, insane, not thinking like a human, thinking and behaving like an animal. Seven years. And God gives him the grace to lift his eyes and acknowledge that God is everything and worthy of all praise. I just came before I let you go, I came to let somebody know that every good and perfect gift that ever comes into your life from this moment on, you are to give God all of the glory.
You are to take none of his glory. You are to say, Lord, you are the one who gave me this job, who gave me this education, who gave me this open door, who gave me these responsibilities, and I give you the glory for all of it. Oh, I want somebody. to get good at giving him glory for everything. Everything, every good gift, every perfect gift, I give you the glory.
You got more coming if you glorify him. You got more coming. You got more advances. You got more influence. You got more money coming.
God said, I'm ready to raise up a generation of people who will glorify me on their job, glorify me at school, in the university, everywhere you are. God said, I'll take you to new heights, but you're going to have to give me all the glory. I'm not sharing my glory with anybody. I want it all. I deserve it all.
God wants to bless you in an incredible way. But he's teaching you through Nebuchadnezzar: don't make me humble you. Humble yourself.
So I can do the exalting. God would rather lift you up than tear you down. But He shows us, but if I have to. I'll come for you. You know, that's the way we say it today.
Don't make me come for you. And God says, if you make me, I'll come for you. And I'll take you down. When I get through with you, you'll know what the real deal is.
So, humble yourself now. Give him the glory now for everything he gives you, everything he blesses you with. Give him the glory. Don't rob him of any of his glory. Glorify God so good that He looked at you and say, Oh, shoot, I have to give them something else.
That's just too good. They're praising me so good. Let me just go and throw some more blessings in there. That's what you want. Just make God bless you.
He can't even put up with how much you thanking him and praising him. And giving him the glory. But more importantly, you recognize that it all belongs to him. I'm not being charitable. I'm just giving God what he alone is worthy of.
When I think of what God has brought me through. When you think of all the ways he has Made for you. When you think of the goodness of Jesus. All that he's done for you. Andre Crouch said, How can I say thanks?
For all the things you've done for me, things so undeserved, yet you gave to prove your love for me. The voices of a million angels. Couldn't express my gratitude. God's made ways for you. Think about the ways he's made, the doors he's opened.
Thinking about the favor he's given you.
Some of you can say, I wasn't supposed to get this job, but he gave it to me. I wasn't supposed to get out of that mess I made earlier in my life, but he got me out of it. Come on somebody.
Some of you can say, I know somebody who's done less than I did, and they died for it. And look at how God has blessed me. To move on. You owe him a whole lot of praise. You owe him a whole lot of glory.
You know, that's why our parents, they lived in a day, most of us in here could say, I have much more money or bigger house or better job than my parents ever did, but they were happier. They had more peace. They had more joy. My grandmother My father was able to later buy her a big house and all that. But he grew up in these little row homes in the ghetto of Philly.
And he said, my mother was so... Grateful for every little thing God did. She married a man back in that day who, my paternal grandfather, was the original Rolling Stone. Wherever he laid his hat, it was his home. Oh, y'all so holy, y'all don't know the temptation.
Oh, okay, okay. All right.
So it's like that.
So y'all never listen to the temptations.
Okay. Fine. Yes, I'm the heathen that listened to all That was my granddad. He'd come home long enough to make a baby. My grandmother ended up with ten children.
and a husband who couldn't stay home and take care of him. But she met Jesus early in her life. She learned to trust him. She raised them. took them to church.
Laid hands on my dad when he was in her womb. Said, Lord, make a preacher out of this one. He passed it for 45 years. Because of that prayer. He said, We were one of the poorest families in the church, and my mother always wanted to bring somebody home to eat Sunday dinner with us.
And we hardly have enough for ourselves. He said, me and my sister be walking home mad. Because they see who their mother's bringing home to church. Oh, Sister Sarah, come on and eat with us. You see, they had these slogans today like children first.
Not back then. Back in the day. It was children if you get to the table. Come on some of you old heads. when your parents were were having guests in, they would sit them at the table.
And then you just wait and you stand around the wall. And you got chicken and you see the different chicken pieces on the And you say, oh, I sure would like that drumstick right there. But you had to wait see what the guests get And he says, sure enough, me and my sister may be standing there and say, I bet she's gonna eat that people. And sure enough, she just sitting there. You had to reach right in.
And he said, we know we're going to get the neck now. But those folks were blessed. Because they knew how to give God praise for little to nothing. I found out That if you walk humbly before God like that, He'll take care of you. I'll never forget when we came out here.
to pastor a 35-member church. They paid us $24,000 a year. That was the best they could do. They said, Pastor, when that vision you told us about comes to pass, all these people come, we're going to hook you up. But in the meantime, you gotta make it on two thousand a month.
And with the rent being $9.95 a month. And God showed me. I used to preach about faith in Philly, but I learned to live it in California. Because he showed me he really did know how to pay bills if I would just stay humble. Because there were several months when there was too much month at the end of the money.
You ever been there? Too much a monthly dinner money in. And one Sunday I was in my office, a little office in a little church over there in East Palo Alto. Saying, Lord, we don't have enough groceries for this week. And I got my wife and these two little children.
I would suffer, I would suffer hunger for you. But I got a little family Lord. I don't want my kids to ever know a hungry day I started crying. This is about a quarter to 11. Because you know, back in 89, Jesus didn't come to church till 11 anyway.
Yeah. You know. When we started these little newfangled services, 8:30 and still late, we had to figure out Jesus would come early if you asked him to. Back then, 11 o'clock.
So they gather it in, quarter to 11, 10 of 11, and I'm in there praying. I didn't want them to know that I was. that I was broke for the week. I just wanted to go out there and preach, and I said, Lord, I don't want to be distracted. Buy this, so I'm just giving it to you, and I'm praying and crying.
And what I Said amen and and wipe my eyes. I looked at the door that led out to the sanctuary, and there was an envelope. And I picked it up and opened it up. It had no name on it. Opened the door to see what Didn't see who had dropped it off in their gathering.
And I opened it up and it was five $20 bills. Because I had just told God I needed groceries for the week. Five twenty dollar bills. And I said, What? Who?
Oh. And the Lord said, who gave it to you? You just got through. Telling me you didn't have groceries.
Now do you want to go to Lucky or don't you? I went out there and preached. I tore that church up. God is aimed. Yeah.
And we left church and went to Lucky. Let me tell you something, just live on the grateful worshiping side. Don't rob him of any of his glory. You're going to see amazing things. happen in your life.
Thanks so much for being here with us for today's Destined for Victory. Pastor Paul's message, being good stewards of our success, is part of his teaching series, Standing for Right in a Wrong World. Look for it online at pastorpaul. net. You know, for years I had the pleasure of talking to Pastor Paul about a variety of subjects.
one of those conversations concerned charitable giving during the busy summer months, I asked him then if it was true that summertime was particularly tough on Destined for Victory, and here's what he said. Yes, it is. And it's simply because people love us and they want to support us. But sometimes we're so glad to be through the winter and the spring, and we're now in the summer and we're ready to take some vacation time and do some things that we've longed to do for months. And we get to do it, whether it's travel or whatever.
But I just want to encourage and remind our listeners that if we're going to keep on preaching the word throughout the year, then the support is absolutely necessary because I have found out that the bills don't take vacations. They keep coming every single month. And so we have to be ready to meet them with the finances necessary. And again, it's not about the money, it's what the money does. Your giving allows us to keep on declaring truth that people need to hear.
Day in and day out, month in and month out, so at every season, even in the summer, we get to keep preaching timeless truths if we have the financial support. I want to thank all of our partners, all of our donors, everyone who makes sure to meet the financial needs so that lives are changed, souls are saved, and people come to know who Jesus is and how important knowing him is in their lives. Your giving does change lives, my friends. And as you give generously today, we have an outstanding resource to share with you as our way of saying thanks. Introducing our brand new booklet, Overcoming Bitterness.
Based on some of Pastor Paul Shepard's best sermons, this message will show you some key strategies to removing bitterness from your heart once and for all. As you follow along, you'll gain strategic insight into ways to cultivate hope and reclaim the joy of the Lord's salvation. Again, that's Overcoming Bitterness, a helpful booklet for anyone who still Struggles to let go of past wounds and press on toward his or her victory in Christ. Request a copy today for your generous gift to Destined for Victory. You can give by phone by calling 855-339-5500.
That's 855-339-5500. Or visit pastorpaul.net to make a safe and secure donation. You can also mail your gift to Destined for Victory, post office box 1767, Fremont, California, 94538. There is A built-in curse that you bring on your own life. When you dishonor God, in any area of your life.
It's not like he has to get you. He can get you. And in many cases in scripture, you see he does get people. And this dude is about to get God. He openly mocked God and encouraged others to do the same.
His rise and his downfall come your way next time in our message: wane in with God. But until then, remember. He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion. In Christ, you are destined for victory.
