Men, if you want to be a father by the book, first of all, the Bible says lay the foundation of your life. By loving God with your whole heart. Then it says: love your neighbor as yourself. Jesus said to love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and love your neighbor as yourself.
So what happens when you have trouble loving yourself? Hello, and thanks for stopping by for today's Destined for Victory, where we feature the preaching ministry of Pastor Paul Shepard. If you want to be a good man, a good father, but you don't quite know how to manage it, you've come to the right place. Stay with us now to find out how loving yourself is an important part of becoming a good father. We hope you will stay with us for this important message.
But if your schedule doesn't allow it today, remember, you're always invited to come see us at pastorpaul.net, where you can listen to any recent message on demand, including today's. That's pastorpaul.net.
Now, let's listen closer to Pastor Paul's Destined for Victory message: Fatherhood by the Book. Men, if you want to be a father by the book, first of all, the Bible says, lay the foundation of your life. By loving God with your whole heart. Then it says: love your neighbor as yourself. Suggesting that the proper foundation for fatherhood, the proper foundation for manhood.
Is being in proper relationship with God by loving Him. Being in proper relationship with ourselves, because if we're to love others as ourselves, then you gotta be able to know. Who you are, and to be able to live your life. In right relationship to yourself, so that you can love people. Out of the surplus.
of a rich life. This is where a lot of men are specially challenged. Being in right relationship with themselves. Because a lot of us were socialized. To really not deal with the crucial issues.
A lot of times men are socialized to deal only in external things. And we're not taught to be introspective. You know, the Bible says you got to know your heart. Life is emanating from your heart, the issues of the heart. And if you've been socialized like many men have been, you really haven't been.
Taught by your environment or by your mentors, your parents, whoever, to be introspective.
So you have to learn this from the manual. If it doesn't come easy for you, and a lot of us it doesn't come easy. To get inside yourself. Look at, you know, little boys are often just taught. I mean, we grow up and it's all about activity, all about sports, all about doing.
As opposed to being.
So there's a lot of doing and I do and I'm very action oriented. Nothing wrong with that. But somewhere along the line, if you're going to live life in the will of God You gotta let the manual help you Deal with issues of the heart. Deal with issues of the heart. You can't just.
Be external oriented. You gotta deal with issues of the heart. That's why a lot of men have a false definition of success because we tend to see, until we get to the manual, we think success has to do with objects. Success is making a certain amount of money so I can live in a certain kind of house in a certain neighborhood. Success is having the toys.
The trappings, you know, and come on, men, just be honest, we've loved toys all of our lives. And so, when you grow up chronologically, very often that love for toys is still there. Nothing wrong in this place. You just got to know that that's not a definition for success. It had to be a man who created the bumper sticker that says he who dies with the most toys wins.
A man had to create that. A woman knows better than that. But that sounds like a man. I beat y'all. What?
See, that's us. How on? I got more than you. You got three houses. My got five.
That's a man. It's like he's in a race. How many houses do you have? No, no, no, no, no. He who dies with the most toys is still dead.
And leaves more stuff for his family to fight over. That's no definition of success. Having the most toys. God will bless you with some toys. I mean, I've loved toys all my life.
And you know, what happens is as men grow up, they still like toys. The toys' price tags just change. Come on brothers, let's be honest here for a minute. When I was a kid, when I was a preteen, My favorite toy was my matchbox collection. I had matchbox their little small cars.
And I had the biggest matchbox collection in my neighborhood. Friends would come from blocks away. To see my matchbox collection, I tell them at school. He said, How many match bars do you have now? I said, I'm up to 119.
I'm serious. I had them, man. I was just, I'd put my allowance together. I was getting those jokers. All kinds of cars.
I had a whole little town. Toys. Loved it. I played on the ground with my match boxes till I was too old. I'm telling you, no lie.
I did it until I got ashamed of myself at a certain point. Yeah. At a certain point it's like that, this don't even make no sense. I'm down here supposed to be trying to learn how to mac on girls. I'm still.
Girl, want to talk to me? You better get down here and help me move some of these cars. And so, if Cars is a little boy's thing, he just grows up and the price tag changes, no more 99 cent matchboxes. And so we tend to live our lives very action-oriented, externally-oriented. Nothing wrong with it in its place, but you got to learn to deal with matters of the heart.
If you grow up just shooting guns, bang, bang, bang, I got you, you dead. You're not ready to deal in real life issues. You need a manual and you need some models. And if you didn't get them growing up, You can get them out of the Word of God. Because God wants you to get a right definition of success.
It's not about the money you earn, not about climbing the ladder of success. Who told you that ladder was leaning against the right building? And I've seen people climb the ladder and lose. Because they're standing at the top of a building feeling good, and then they realize that this is not where God wants me. I've seen people make a living and not make a life.
I've seen people sell out for financial trappings and lose significant relationships along the way. And then they're bewildered. I thought this was it. But we've got to get into the manual and look at the models. To find out that success is not about those things.
We've got to learn how to deal with the issues of the heart. We've got to learn that it's okay to stop pretending. To always be strong. See if you're socialized as a boy, you gotta always be strong. Don't cry.
Stop that boy, you better shut up. I'll give you something to cry about. Come on, am I talking right? And if you intimidate somebody like that, where are they going to end up in life when life brings you to a point of tears?
So now you got tears you're trying to hide from everybody. And now you have shame on top. Because you haven't been given permission. To be who you really are. And nothing worse.
than trying to pretend to be what you are not. Life is too short to pretend. Nothing worse. Than trying to live your life behind a mask of being a superhero. And it's interesting, all the superheroes have on uniforms or masks.
And most of them are men. They do their conquest behind a mask. Or in a uniform. And some of us grow up as Men thinking that's manhood. It's to be strong, to be powerful, to always conquer, to always overcome.
And to be comfortable behind a mask in the process.
So that you really don't know who I am, you just see my mighty conquests. Dun dun dun dun. But you have a problem when you say, Batman, do me a favor, take that mask off. Let me see who you are. No, no, no, no.
Clark Kent. You knew good and well who he was. You knew who Superman was. Only difference was you take off the little suit, you put on glasses. But he had the facade, he had the feeling of not being known and he was comfortable with that.
Petrified for people to get to know that Superman is really a mild mannered reporter. Because that's not That feeling that you've been told. You're supposed to have of invincibility. But the reality is nobody is Superman all the time. Every man you know is a mixture of Superman and Clark Kent.
Every man you know is a mixture of a Batman and Bruce Wayne. There are no permanent Batmans, no permanent Superman. You can't be mighty mouse in every area of your life.
Some areas you're Mickey Mouse. Oh, I'm gonna help somebody if you let me. Mickey Mouse, and you gotta be able to be okay with I'm not Mighty Mouse all the time.
Sometimes I'm just hanging on. Hoping it's gonna be all right. And guys have to be given permission. If you weren't socialized that way, if it's not okay. To get into internal.
Issues. then you're not really prepared to live in right relationship with yourself. Consequently, you're not prepared to live in right relationship with others. Still ahead, the rest of today's Destined for Victory message with Pastor Paul Shepard. Our mission at Destined for Victory is to serve you and all of our listeners by sharing timeless truth for a victorious life.
And one of the reasons we're able to do it is because of your prayers and financial support. You're invited to prayerfully consider making a generous gift to Destined for Victory today. Call 855-339-5500 to make your gift over the phone. or give safely and securely at pastorpaul.net. And we have some exciting news to share at the end of today's program.
But first, let's get you back to the second half of this message from Pastor Paul titled Fatherhood by the Book. You can't ask a man to get married, give his heart to somebody, and he's not even learned how to deal with issues of his heart. He go through the ceremony and say, I do. And then go about the business of doing what he saw other men do. Who said they were husbands or fathers?
But that's not living according to the design. And so don't beat a man up. When you say you never open up to me, he never learned. Nothing ever taught him. To go there.
In fact, he was made fun of if he ever went there. And dealt with issues of the heart.
So it takes the manual to tell us. That's the way to become what God wants you to be. It's to let The Lord turn the light inward and show you yourself. And take who you are before the God that loves you. Just like you are.
I'm glad that God doesn't hold us up to that crazy standard many people hold us up to. God says, no man, just come to me like you are. You don't have to pretend like me. No future in front. Just come and talk to me about where you really are, not where people think you are or where they make fun of you if you're not there.
Come to me just As you are. Dealing with issues of the heart. That's why young women, you gotta be careful when you're dating you who are marriage age. You want to see is the man on this road? That's why I'm preaching, is to get more men on this journey.
Because I promise you, you don't want to marry him, and he doesn't know how to deal with the real issues. All he knows how to do is skim the surface and deal with superficial things. And you can pick it up in your conversations. Late night talks on the phone. They ought if it's late night, they ought to be on the phone.
Y'all with me? Late night talks on the phone. Here you are, pouring out your heart. Tell him about your stuff. And then you say, what do you think about that?
How do you deal with situations like this? She's talking about some changes she's going through with people on her job and all of that. And she's talking about the intricate emotions involved and the little feelings. And she looked a certain way, and I thought I knew what she was thinking when she did that. And she's dealing all in there, and she wants to know what you think.
And you can tell that he's not used to that because he's like, oh, you just need to forget about them. T for a man is just cutting dry. Oh, man, don't worry, man. What are you tripping over them for? Forget those people.
Just go and do your work. Get paid, get your paycheck, go home. See? He not used to going there. Let's explore the inner workings of your emotions and Not used to going there.
Men have to learn to even to empathize with their wives. I told you before, that was a journey for me in marriage. Madam would start that exhaling stuff. You know, women, exhale. And she would, she would, you know, at the end of a day.
She'd want to talk. and exhale about all these feelings and emotions. And things going on and the way they're making her feel and And all of that and You know, when I was young, married and dumb, I would just Think the goal is to end this conversation as soon as possible. Yeah. That's the goal.
Get this puppy done. Sports gonna be on in seven minutes. Let's see if we can knock this out in six minutes, go get my snack.
So she'd start exhaling. And I would tune in, but I would tune in for the purpose of getting my mind around what's the problem. And so I listened to see if I could hear the problem, identify the problem. I'm running a mental diagnostic here. What's the problem?
Okay, there's the problem. There it is. Then my mind would shoot to what is the solution? And as soon as I had the problem, as soon as I had the solution, I would cut in on her exhaling. And say, baby, what you need to do.
It's such and such a thing. And it took me years. To figure out why She wasn't happy when I did that. Yeah, yeah. Because I figure I saved her.
Probably an hour of continuing to talk about this. And I saved myself. That same hour That is the sports center hour. It's win-win as far as I can see. You got your solution, I got my sports center, it's all good.
And it took me a while. One day she said, listen, when I talk to you like this. I'm not talking to you to get a solution.
Well, I'm thinking What's the point of talking about a problem? You mean to tell me you want to talk for an hour? and arrive at no conclusion? I mean, we were years married before I got this.
So I'm not talking for a solution. I'm talking because there's pressure built up inside of me. And I need to get it out. And that's what exhaling is. Getting it out.
You know, after enough arguments. over why my solution wasn't satisfactory. I realized, you know what, there is something I need to learn here. Which is if I really want Her to get what she's looking for. I've got to bite my tongue with my solution-oriented self.
And I gotta instead pull on what's in there and help her get it out. I gotta be an emotional. you know, midwife and just kinda help. Brothers, that does not come naturally for most of us. That's a learned thing.
We don't, nobody taught us that. If a man comes to you with a problem, you better give him a solution. He ain't sitting up in there just to get it all out.
Okay, I feel so much better. Thanks, dog. A man talk, when he gets through talking, he wants you to pick up where he left off and say, All right, here's what you need to do. Different mechanisms.
So he's got to learn some other features that things don't come naturally to him.
Furthermore, men have to learn that there are times in our lives where, even though it doesn't come naturally to us, we have to learn to exhale as well. Because men just tend to only inhale. Just take it in, deal with it, be strong, be a man. Meet it up! What's the matter with you, man?
Don't let it just get you down?
Well, sometimes you can't live under that pressure. There's too much, and you can't pretend like you can handle it and bear up under the load. And so the manual says Get in right relationship with yourself. Learn what's going on in the inside of you, and then bring it to the Lord, and bring it to trusted, godly men. Who are also walking with God and can show you the way of the Lord.
and get you the help that you need. And then, if they get in right relationship with God and get in right relationship. with ourselves then Then we can look at the business of getting in right relationship with others, and in this context, our children. But you can't be a decent father. When you are a hurting man.
If you're a hurting man, a man who isn't grappling with the right things. Fatherhood, somewhere along the line, is going to suffer. Oh, you can play a lot of roles and do a lot of things, but sooner or later. Our stuff catches up with us. You cannot outrun reality.
Oh, you can give it a good little run for a few years or something. But sooner or later, it's going to catch up. And so the Bible teaches us: if we'll get into the manual and follow the models, the Bible teaches us. To track as we go. Loving God.
Right relationship with ourselves. Getting connected with others in the body of Christ.
So that out of the surplus of a life that's growing, that's learning, that's working through issues. That's getting bitter. We can then offer to our children. The things that God has ordained for our lives. I want to challenge all of us.
and especially men. to lay the right foundation. Love God with your whole heart. Get in right relationship with yourself. And that's the best foundation for beginning to Get in right relationship with others.
Thanks so much for being here with us for today's Destined for Victory message: Fatherhood by the Book.
Now, with that exciting news I told you about earlier, here is Executive Director Alicia Shepard Greer. I hope you're excited for summertime. I know I am. And for all of you who, like me, have kiddos out of school, may God's grace abound to you in this season. But I do pray that it's a fun time of bonding or taking a vacation, whatever it is that you may have planned.
So I just wanted to stop by and remind you to please prayerfully keep in mind ministries like Destined for Victory during this season. Pastor Paul would always do this, and the reason for that is giving tends to drop the most during this time of year.
So I just wanted to ask you to prayerfully consider sending a special gift to Destin for Victory to help us continue airing these teachings during the often challenging summer months. And when you do, we're pleased to make available a special thank you gift in June. It's a video collection of Let My People Smile, and it's available to everyone who sends in their most generous donation of twenty five dollars or more. Thank you so much, and God bless you.
Well, let my people smile as Pastor Paul, I think, at his very best, combining biblical wisdom with his unique style of humor. And for the first time, we're making it available on video. You can choose from a DVD format or a streaming link when you make your most generous donation of $25 or more today. If the Lord is leading you to give, we have several options for you. Stop by pastorpaul.net to make a safe and secure donation there online.
Call us at 855-339-5500. Again, 855-339-5500. Or if you prefer, you can mail your gift to Destined for Victory. Post Office Box 1767, Fremont, California, 94538. Paul said in Romans 12, 1, I present myself as a living sacrifice.
So you got to know what you're presenting to God. You gotta know who's that guy in the mirror. When you strip away his title, When you strip away what he does, when you strip away what he makes, When you strip away his claims to fame, Who is he really? God is after who we really are. That's tomorrow in Pastor Paul Shepard's message, Fatherhood by the Book.
Until then, remember. He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion. In Christ, you are destined for victory.
