I want to let you know God has a plan for each one of our lives, a plan for us, a purpose for us. Ephesians 2.10 says, we are God's workmanship created in Christ Jesus to do good works which the Father prepared in advance for us to do. Hello and welcome to Destined for Victory, featuring Pastor Paul Shepard. Whether you are listening on radio, online, or from our free mobile app, thanks for making this part of your day.
Well, the spring and summer months are often a season of beginnings, new goals, new priorities, new plans. But God's plan for you has never changed. Long before he formed you in the womb, he had a plan for the life you would one day live. And the time to fulfill that calling is now.
Now is the season for discovering His plan, for surrendering to His plan, and for carrying out His plan. And who knows? Maybe listening to Pastor Paul's message today is part of that plan. Remember, if you're unable to stay tuned, you can always visit us at pastorpaul.net, or you can hear any recent Destined for Victory message on demand, including today's. That's pastorpaul.net.
Now, let's listen closely to Pastor Paul's Destined for Victory message: no time to waste. The ninth chapter of the Gospel of John, beginning with verse one. As Jesus went along, he saw a man blind from birth. His disciples asked him, Rabbi, who sinned this man or his parents, that he was born blind? Neither this man nor his parents sinned, said Jesus.
But this happened so that the work of God might be displayed in his life. Look at verse 4. As long as it is day, we must do the work of Him. Who sent me? Night is coming when no one can work.
We don't have any time to waste. Whatever we're going to get done for God. We better get it done now. Because night is coming. When no man can work in this text, we find Jesus Coming across the path of a man born blind.
And those who were with him asked what we would consider a ridiculous question. They look at a man in his condition of blindness, and instead of having hearts of compassion and sympathy, and what can we do to be a blessing, if anything, to this man, instead of thinking about things like that, they look at him and they said, All right, now, Jesus. Who did this? Who's responsible for his condition? Is it him or is it his parents?
Somebody caused this. And their focus was: what is the cause of this? Even more ridiculous than focusing on the cause rather than the need in front of them. is the notion That he himself could have caused this blindness because he was born blind, and they knew it. Apparently, they had some notion.
That his sins are being visited upon him in some way retroactively. That maybe God looked down the corridor of time, saw what He was gonna do. And it was so bad until God punished him before he ever got here. You know, when our focus is on somebody else's business instead of ours. We always bark up the wrong tree.
We always ask the wrong questions. We always get focused on the wrong issues. We start majoring in minor subjects and we start dealing in things that are none of our business. First thing I want to tell you today, in Jesus' name, bless your heart, I love you. But I got to tell you the truth: focus on your own life primarily.
Don't spend all of your time looking around at other folk, trying to figure out what they're doing and why they're doing it, and are they right? Jesus put it this way one day. He said, if you see something wrong with somebody else and you want to help correct their problem. He said, if you see a speck in their eye. And you want to help get it out, take the log out of yours first.
Now those are the words of Jesus. Take the log out of your eye, then you can focus on the speck in somebody else's. The idea being, all of us need God's grace, His mercy, His help. He is at work in us to willing to do of His good pleasure. He's begun a good work in you if you are saved by grace.
And that work is going to be completed at the end of your life. In the meantime, all of us have a sign up in our lives. We are under construction. And since I'm under construction and so are you, no need of you focusing too much attention on my construction project. I'm preaching already, you just don't know it.
Yes, as brothers and sisters in Christ, we hold one another accountable. We play a good role of redemptive rebuke sometimes in each other's lives. We put each other in check. All that's fine. But don't do it, number one, to the preoccupation of it.
In other words, don't focus the attention of your life on somebody else. Secondly, when you do it, do it in the right spirit. Galatians chapter 6 said: if your brothers and sisters overtaken in a fault, you who are spiritual, restore them in the spirit of meekness. Considering yourself. Lest you also be tempted.
You ever seen people talk about somebody else like a dog? Because at the moment they're not going through what that other person's going through. But I've watched it over the years. You just give it enough time. And their time to need mercy is coming around.
It might not be over the same offense that they're being self-righteous about. I just don't understand. how somebody could do that.
Alright, you might not understand how they can do that, but you got this. To deal with. And your best bet is to not get into this syndrome that these folks got into. Lord, what's going on here? They asked the wrong question.
They asked who sinned. What's the cause? They shouldn't focus on the cause, they ought to focus on the cure. The gospel focuses on the cure. It mentions the cause of sin in all of our lives.
All of us are born in sin, shaping in iniquity. It's not the visitation of punishment on us prematurely. We're born alienated from a relationship with God, and therefore we start down the wrong road from the very beginning of our lives. And all of us are sinners according to Scripture. And when you come to that knowledge that all of us have sinned and come short of God's glory, that's about all the cause you need to focus on.
From there, you need somebody to give you the cure. The cure is the gospel. The cure is why I'm standing here now. The cure is that God knew our plight and he loved us so much that he wrapped himself up in flesh, came into the world through the womb of a virgin girl, lived among us for 30 some odd years, and one day went to a cross, allowed himself to hang on a cross as a common criminal when he had done nothing wrong. He had lived a sinless life.
Why did he hang there? He hung there because the Father in heaven poured your sins and mine on him on the cross. When he hung there, my sins hung there. When he hung there, your sins hung there. And if you trust him, you can be cured of your problem of sin.
See, that's the good news. Focus on the cure. Cause this bad news. You have to give them enough of the bad news just to set them up for the good news. You who preach, you who minister to others.
Let me give you a little tutoring here as one who God is blessed to have some fruitfulness in winning souls. Let me help you understand something. If you're going to share the gospel, don't major in the bad news. Don't be one of these folks that go out to events with a sign. You're going to hell.
That's bad. What do you want to preach the bad news for? You know you're going to hell. You're on your way. You got one foot on the grave, the other one on a banana peel.
You're on your way to hell. No, no, no, no, that's not the good news. The good news is you don't have to go. The good news is, you can be saved. You don't have to be lost.
The good news is, God loves people like you. Doesn't matter what bag you're coming out of. God loves you. Whether you are homosexual, whether you're a heterosexual adulterer, or fornicator, whether you're a liar or a thief, whether you're a child molester, whatever you are, you are loved by God who resents your sin, who hates your sin, who will judge your sin, but He sent the cure. And if you put your trust in Him, all of your sins are covered by what Jesus did.
So you who preach, make sure you're preaching good news. Don't major in the bad news. Old preacher told one of my mentors, he said, I was sitting there with one of my idols in front of me one day, and I just wanted to impress him. And I knew he was a hardline preacher. And he said, So I preached hard and strong against sin and what have you.
And he said, After the service, I expected this man, my idol, to come up to me and congratulate me. He walked up to me and said, Young man, let me give you a piece of news. He said, Yes, you do have to preach about sin sometimes, but don't sound so happy about it. He said, You just sound downright happy that the people were in sin and God was going to get them? Don't sound so happy about it.
You do have to say the wages of sin is death. You do have to say that hell is a reality. Oh, but I don't want to focus on that. I want to focus on the fact that you don't have to go. Because of what Jesus did.
we can be safe. Don't go away, we have more of today's Destined for Victory message coming up next. We want to thank all of you who support Destined for Victory with your prayers and financial support, gifts that help keep this media ministry going. And if you'd like to join us in our mission to preach timeless truth for a victorious life, please consider making a safe and secure donation at our website, pastorpaul.net. Or give us a call at 855-339-5500.
That's 855-339-5500. We may look at ourselves and other people and see our sin, but God focuses on our deliverance, not our dilemma. And that's how he wants us to think as well.
Now, here's the rest of Pastor Paul's Destined for Victory message: no time to waste. Learn to ask the right question. Right question here would have been, Jesus, what can we do to help? Right question would have been, Jesus, what's your plan for his life? Right question would focus on what do we do now?
Focus on the cure, not the cause. I want you to just be reminded of some important truths based on Jesus' response to all this. First of all, he said, Neither this man nor his parents sinned. He said, but this happened so that the work of God might be displayed in his life. The work of God.
He said, if you're looking for a reason, the reason is God has sovereignly allowed me to come across this man's path because He wants to show Him and He wants to show you His glory. And his glorious plan is to be displayed here. The first thing that this passage reminds me of, and I want to share it with you, is that God has a plan for each of our lives. I want to let you know you're not just one of billions of people on the planet, and God just sees one big mass of people. I want to let you know you are unique, you are special, you are personal in the plan of God.
Our God is a personal God. Our God is watching us personally. He is familiar with each of our lives on a personal level. I want to let you know that God knows you intimately and personally. He knows you in a way that you don't know you.
I know every now and then the enemy will whisper in your ear, God's left you when you're going through bad times. Oh, God doesn't care about you. And then people think they've trumped you when they're going through. And if God cared about me, why did all of this happen to me? And the answer is what Jesus said.
The fact that it happened may not be what you want to focus on. What you want to focus on is what God can do about it. God can display His glory in your life. He knows you. He loves you.
He sees you going through what you're going through. God is familiar with you. And if you will put your trust in Him and walk with Him through this valley, He will not allow you to stay in the valley. But according to Psalm 23, He'll bring you out of the valley. And they'll bring you to a better place.
But in the meantime, he'll teach you some things about his love and his grace. And I want to let you know, God's familiar with you. Jesus said on one occasion that He knows the very hairs on our heads. God has a count of the hairs on your head. If you're like me losing some, He knows how much you used to have.
Used to have. You who bought some, he knows how much you bought. Hallelujah. How much your body says, all right, go on. Do yourself, knock yourself out, have fun, go for it.
Don't let anybody knock you. When they ask you, is it yours? Yes, I have the receipt, it's mine. Yes, yes, yes, it's mine. Make yourself look good, feel good, but know that God is familiar with your life.
No, it's the very hairs on our heads. And God has a plan for your life. Did you notice that Jesus said, we must work the works of Him. It's not just him. He said, we collectively must work the works of God.
Now he said that on the heels of saying, this is an opportunity for God to display his glory.
Now, how's God going to do it? We must work the works of him. God gets much of the work done through us. It's not that He needs us in some sense that without us, God's in big trouble. Don't trip now.
Because God can raise up somebody. Don't think you're tying him up. If you refuse to do what he's called you to do, you're not messing up God's plan. God said, Well, I would get something done, but I can't convince them. No, no, no, no, no.
Don't ever believe that you got a God handcuffed. One day, the disciples wouldn't praise right, and Jesus said, you know what? The rocks can cry out if necessary. And I want to let you know that God chooses to partner with us. And part of why he does that is for our fulfillment.
You know, God's given us the privilege of partnering with him. The privilege of being part of his work on earth. We must do the works of him who sent me while it's day. I want to let you know: God has a plan for each one of our lives, a plan for us, a purpose for us. Ephesians 2:10 says, We are God's workmanship created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which the Father prepared in advance for us to do.
What that means is, when you got saved, that was just one of the steps. of God working out His plan and purpose in your life. And that you were created to do good works. You and I are called to do the work of Him who sent us. You didn't just show up, you were sent to the planet.
You were sent here to do his work. That's why your life won't work right till you get in the center of God's will. You can make money and not have fulfillment. You can have a great job title and not have fulfillment. You can have the trappings of success and not have fulfillment.
Because fulfillment is the result of doing what you were created to do. And if you do what you're created to do, you'll be surprised how little of all the rest you absolutely need. It's great to have some of those things, but you don't need them to be fulfilled. I know some fulfilled folk who don't have money. But they have joy.
They have contentment. They absolutely love getting up every day because it's another opportunity to do the work of Him who sent me. I want to let you know, fulfillment is the key to your life, and fulfillment is based on doing the work that you've been sent to the planet to do. All of us are part of that plan. He's got a plan and purpose for our lives.
So Jesus reminds us of this as he looks at this man and says, No, no, he's not excluded. He has a physical challenge, but don't think he's excluded from God's plan. There's a plan and purpose for every life.
Some of God's purposes, frankly, we have a hard time comprehending, but don't think God doesn't have a plan. God is infinitely more wise than all of us. And I want to remind you that God has a specific plan for each of our lives. That's why Philippians 2 says, Paul said, In my absence, I'm writing you from jail, church at Philippi, but I want to tell you, in my absence, you need to work out your salvation. Philippians 2.12, work out your salvation with fear and trembling.
Then he said, Because it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to do of his good pleasure. You work it out. God worked it in.
Now you work it out. God's worked some things into you, and until you discover and work out His plan and purpose for your life, you will never experience divine fulfillment. Often people ask, now, how do I discover God's plan?
Okay, I'm saved. That's job one. If you want to be in God's will, the first thing is you have to repent and trust Jesus for your salvation because his plan first calls for you to be a redeemed child of God. That's job one. Don't try to get in God's plan and you don't even know Jesus Christ.
First thing is to get to know your Savior. Come to know the one who died for you and repent of your sins and trust him for salvation.
Now, once you've done that, very often people ask, now, how do I discover God's plan for my life?
Well, there are a couple of important features that you'll always see run like a thread through the plan of God for your life. The things that God has called you to do, the things that are part of his plan for your fulfillment. The first component, the first thing you want to look at is the will of God is consistent with the gifts and abilities he's given you. Because remember, Philippians 2 says, God has worked in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure. The Bible teaches very plainly that we all have gifts that God gives us as children of God.
He gives us spiritual gifts. And frankly, even before you came to Christ, he gave you some natural abilities that can be consecrated and used for his plan and purpose. Everything he built into you, naturally and spiritually, is part of what he wants out of you.
So if you want to know what God wants out of you, look at what He put in you. It's consistent. The plan for your life is consistent with the gifts and abilities He's given you. Don't worry about it. If God meant for you to be a singer and bless people with songs that'll edify them and strengthen them, guess what He'd have done?
Yeah He would have given you a voice that people wanted to hear. Have you ever seen anybody persecute an audience? With a solo. Yeah. Thanks so much for being here with us for today's Destined for Victory message: No Time to Waste.
As you may know, Destined for Victory has always been committed to using the media to share the gospel with as many people as we can. I once asked Pastor Paul to talk about why radio is so important, not only to the ministry, but to him personally. And here's what he had to say.
Well, I want to tell you that it's important to me as a discipler that my voice is heard And it is used to help people grow in their knowledge of the Lord and in their faith walk with Him. Fact of the matter is, my voice doesn't sound like most of the other folks you hear on Christian radio. I'm well aware of that, and I'm really comfortable with that. I come from my own unique background, both ethnically and in terms of life experience. There are things I share, there are things I say, and there are the ways that I say them that are unique.
I believe that that perspective needs to be heard throughout Christendom. And so, while I'm so grateful for all of my heroes, your heroes are mine. I listen to the same people, the guys who have been on the radio for decades and have proclaimed God's word faithfully. I really do appreciate those guys. But I've learned not to be intimidated by them because I've got my own way of processing and own way of sharing and helping people to learn and to grow in their faith.
So, It's quite intentional.
Sometimes I like to be really colloquial in what I say and how I say it because I'm just using who I am, and I think God wants to use that. He's the one who called me. I didn't call myself, He called me, and I believe He knows what He was getting when He called me into the ministry. And so I'm just trying to make a difference because the gospel really does change lives, and I believe I have a unique calling to help present the gospel from my own perspective. And I pray that that's resonating with listeners, and I pray that that means enough to them that they'll make sure my voice can continue to be heard right along with our other heroes who teach the gospel of Jesus.
Today, friends, you can help us do just that. As you generously support the Ministry of Destined for Victory, you'll help us bring Timeless Truth for a Victorious Life to radio, online, and on our free mobile app. And when you give today as our way of saying thanks, we'd like to send you our latest booklet, Clothed in Love: 7 Gifts for the Ones Who Matter Most. Based on Colossians 3, verses 12 through 15, this booklet will challenge you to direct your best self toward the ones who matter most. Through seven powerful virtues, compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, patience, forbearance, and forgiveness, you'll discover what it truly means to honor your mother and how giving these gifts can transform your most important relationships.
That's clothed in love. Seven gifts for the ones who matter most are gifted to you today by request for your generous gift to Destined for Victory.
Now if you'd like to give, we've got several options for you. Stop by Pastor Paul dot net to make a safe and secure donation online. Call us at 855-339-5500. That's 855-339-5500. Or if you prefer, you can mail your gift to Destined for Victory.
Post Office Box 1767, Fremont, California, 94538. When Jesus moves into your life, He moves into the master bedroom. It's the only way He's coming in. He doesn't stay in guest rooms, comes into the master bedroom, and you go stay in the guest room because He moves into our lives to revolutionize them. And that's next time in our continuing message, No Time to Waste.
Until then, remember. He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion. In Christ, you are destined for victory.
