Hello and welcome to Destined for Victory with Pastor Paul Shepard. Before we kick off today's message, Meredith Shepard has a few words she'd like to share with you during this critical season of life in the Destined for Victory Media Ministry. Hi, this is Meredith Shepard. Pastor Paul was my beloved husband. I want to take a moment to thank every person who has supported Destined for Victory through your prayers and financial gifts.
Your generosity allows us to continue bringing the life changing message of Jesus Christ to listeners near and far. Many are encouraged, surprised. Strengthened and reminded of God's faithfulness because you chose to invest in this work. We often hear from listeners who tell us that they heard Pastor Paul's message at just the right moment: a word of hope during a difficult season, a reminder of God's love when they felt alone, or a message that helped deepen their walk with Christ. Those moments are made possible through your partnership.
As we look ahead, especially during these summer months, we invite you to continue standing with us. The need for the gospel has never diminished, and every gift, large or small, helps keep these broadcasts on the air and extends our reach to those who are searching for hope and truth. If this ministry has been a blessing to you, or if you believe in the importance of sharing God's word through Destin for Victory, I would be honored by your continued support. Simply visit our donate page at pastorpaul.net/slash donate. Together, we can continue proclaiming the good news and touching lives for the glory of God.
Thank you for your faithfulness, your generosity, and your commitment to advancing God's kingdom. I thank God for you and pray His richest blessings upon you and your family. Thank you, Meredith. When you choose to give generously today, we have a special gift to share with you as our way of saying thanks, introducing our latest booklet, More Than Conquerors. You know, the Christian life is a victorious life, and it doesn't happen by accident.
It's your birthright as a child of the living God. And yet, so many believers live in defeat, selling their birthright for things worth far less. In More Than Conquerors, Pastor Paul Shepherd helps you understand how to take on a victor's identity and tear down the idols competing for your heart. That's more than Conquerors yours this month for your generous donation to Destined for Victory. You can give by phone by calling eight five five three three nine five five zero zero.
eight five five three three nine fifty five hundred. Or visit pastorpaul.net to make a safe and secure donation online. You can also mail your gift to Destined for Victory, post office box 1767, Fremont, California, 94538. God will set you up sometime until you get to a place where you say, God, I tell you what, you can have it all. If you'll just give me your joy and your peace, if you'll just assure me that you're with me, if you will just answer my prayer, the prayer of my heart, I want to be significant in your plan.
I want to do your will. And God, I don't care what it costs me. Hannah prayed a prayer very much like that, and She submitted to the Lord's will, and along the way, she not only forged a deeper, more intimate relationship with God, she also gave birth to a son. Her story continues next, and it holds some valuable applications for you and me today. The message is called Dying to Have Significance, and it starts right now.
God doesn't want you to just be in His purpose, but part of His purpose is not just what you do. Part of his purpose is who you are when you do what you do. And so, God won't just grow you in your ministry and in your anointing. Oh, God, I'm believing God for a greater anointing, believe Him for greater character, too. Because God doesn't want you to be great in ministry and horrible in lifestyle.
And so he'll grow those different elements of your life. And so she doesn't understand it, but God just has her on a track of growth. And she's gotta grow. Whenever you have a panina in your life, you're either gonna hurt somebody or grow. One of the two is going to happen.
I'm either gonna grow or this chick is in trouble. One of the two is the problem, is that right? And so God wants her, of course, to grow. And that's why she's dealing with what she's dealing with. And I dare say some of us are dealing with troubles in our lives and we don't get it.
Lord, I don't understand. Why would you allow this to happen? But please know that when you're called according to purpose, Nothing escapes his notice and nothing stays outside of the plan.
So he'll take things that aren't his will. It's not God's will for this woman to act like the devil. but God'll take her acting like the devil. and say I can use that. To grow you.
In fact, it looks like you go through some seasons in life where God recruits enemies for you. Yeah. That's my take on this now. You might have a different take, but my take is that it looks like there come times where God just has an open call. For enemies for you.
And he will bring them from the north, the south, the east, and the west. They're all lined up waiting for their chance. Looking down when it's going to be my chance. Yeah. Yeah.
Come into your life. Oh God, let me be next. Fact of the matter is, God is at work.
Now, what's He doing? He wants to get Samuel here in the earth. Samuel is going to be a difference maker for redemptive history. Samuel's going to be one of the greatest, one of the most noble leaders Israel has ever experienced. Samuel's going to be the one to one day anoint David.
He's going to be the one to discipline Saul. He's going to be a prophet. He's going to be a priest. He's going to be a military leader, all rolled up into one. God wants to get Samuel here.
But Samuel has to walk with God, has to learn the voice of God from a very early age.
So he can't be just the average kid, can't grow up the average way. God's got special plans for him. And so his mother is going to have to release him into the Lord's hands at a very early age.
Now, the reason why I'm preaching this in the context of a series called Dying to Live is because it militates against everything in a mother to give up a child. that she has brought into this work. And so God is orchestrating things in such a way That Hannah gets to the place. Where she goes up one year to Shiloh. Look at verse 9.
They have finished eating, this annual trip up to the feast. They finished eating and drinking. Hannah stands up, and Eli the priest is sitting on the chair by the doorpost of the Lord's temple. In bitterness of soul Hannah wept much. and prayed to the Lord.
And she made a vow. saying, O Lord Almighty, If you will only look upon your servant's misery and remember me, and not forget your servant, but give her a son. Then I will give him to the Lord all the days of his life. No razor will ever be used on his head. And she kept on praying to the Lord.
As she did so, Eli observed her mouth.
Now, pause right there before we move further. Do you see what happened? Year after year, she is tired of this scenario. My womb is closed. I can't give my husband a child.
Panina never lets me forget that. It's constantly provoking me, constantly irritating me. And this particular year, she is at a place of extreme surrender. And that's where God wanted her to be. God will set you up sometime until you get to a place.
Where you say, God, I tell you what, you can have it all. If you'll just give me your joy and your peace, if you'll just assure me that you're with me, if you will just answer my prayer, the prayer of my heart, I want to be significant in your plan. I want to do your will. And God, I don't care what it costs me. We live in a day of extreme sports.
People weren't just happy to have sports, now they have extreme sports. And they take bikes and jump off of mountains and you know just do all kinds of things, extreme sports.
Well, God's trying to bring us to a place of extreme surrender, where your surrender is so deep, it's so unconditional, it's so ultimate, until there's nothing God can't have. There's no change he can't make in your life or in your lifestyle. There's no priority that's off-limits to him where you just say, God, you can have it all. And he'll bring you to a place of frustration. God orchestrates divine frustration in our lives.
To bring us to a place where it'll result in extreme surrender. And she is finally there, and she says, Lord, I tell you what. If you'll just please give me a child. I'll give him right back to you. Because perhaps early on she wanted a child for the reasons anybody would want.
First, to make sure that her husband's legacy lived on. In Old Testament days, that was very, very important, to make sure that her husband's legacy was there. But then also to have the joy of raising that child, the joy of nurturing that child and taking that child through all of the stages. But somewhere along the line, she went to the place of extreme surrender where she said, God, I don't have to get my significance from raising this child and the joys of motherhood. I tell you what, I'm going to get my significance simply by being in the center of your will.
And I tell you what, if you give me a child, I'll give him right back. And ow. Make sure that he is a child dedicated. Exclusively to your use. He'll be a man of God.
He'll be a boy destined to be a man of God. Thus, the part of the vow that no razor would ever touch his head. You who read the Old Testament are familiar with that, the Nazarite vow. In fact, that was tied to Samson and the whole thing with his long hair. It was because he was dedicated to the purposes of God.
And although he blew it from time to time in his life, That dedication could never go away. And he ended his life, even though he ended it unfortunately in a lot of ways. He ended it saying, God, I want you to get glory out of the very last breath that I draw. Why is that? Because he knew that he was called according to divine purpose.
And she's saying, God, I tell you what. This boy will be dedicated to you if you give me this child.
Well, that's what God wanted out of her. And I'm telling you that some of us are where we are because God wants something out of us that He hasn't yet gotten. And the frustrations won't go away, the paninas will not leave you alone. That ache in your heart, that holy discontent will not go away until. You have experienced extreme surrender.
And until God has you on. That track. That'll cause his perfect will to come to pass.
Now, she is so surrendered that she's not even offended by the presumptiveness of the prophet Eli. Look at his presumption here. We're told that in bitterness of soul, she wept much and prayed to the Lord and made this vow to him. But verse 12 says, As she kept on praying, Eli observed her mouth. She was praying in her heart.
Her lips were moving, but her voice was not heard.
So Eli thought she was drunk. See, he just assumed, he presumed, well, she's over there muttering. To herself. You know how drunk folk can talk, and not necessarily to anybody in particular. And she's muttering and what have you.
And he just thinks that she, this woman, had the nerve to come up here drunk. Presumption. You have people in your life like that. They don't ask. They don't get the facts first.
They draw the conclusion first. People of God, please, we've got to develop more discipline than that. We've got to learn. Find out what you need to find out before you offer your remarks and your criticism and your rebuke and before you formulate your attitude and decide you know what's going on. Ask some questions.
Don't assume when you can just stop and find out. Our marriages will be better. Our relationships, parents to children, will be better if we will just open up better lines of communication and dialogue. And say, would you explain something to me? I'm a little confused, and ask the question.
And get the information first. But Eli just assumes. That she's drunk. And verse 14: And said to her, How long will you keep on getting drunk? Get rid of your wine.
Not only did he assume she was drunk now, he presumed that she drunk a lot. Yeah. You You saw what he just said, didn't you? How long will you keep on getting drunk? Come to think of it, last time I saw you, looked like to me.
You looked a little. But you know what? You know you had a place of extreme surrender when folk can hardly offend you. All you know is you want to be in the will of God. That's all you know.
I don't have time for y'all's nonsense. I don't have time for your stuff. You're going to have to take that somewhere else. People come to you with the latest little piece of gossip, baby. I don't mean no harm.
I don't have no time for that. I'm before God. I got to get to another level. It's a matter of life and death, and I don't have time for foolishness. This is no time to sit around and speculate and comment on everything and be nosy about other people's lives.
I don't have the luxury. Don't have the luxury of holding conversations about, well, did you see so-and-so? I don't know. I don't have time. You get to a place where, no, no, not here, not me, not today.
And that's where Hannah is. She is so fixated on God's will now. Until I mean this is downright offensive. And most of us, you know, if you're not in a place of extreme surrender, you'd have gone off on Eli. Panina's already on your nerves.
You're already dealing with the shame of having no child and not a man. Call yourself a man of God. Come on now, you know how you'd have gone off. On some preacher who misdiagnosed your situation, said something off the wall to you, and you, of all people, I expect that out of the other people, but you. You know how some of us would have done.
Man, we'd have walked up one side of Eli and down the other one. But she is so extremely surrendered now. Until look at what she does. Rather than get offended because he's presumptuous, she just clears him up. Oh, this is a woman who's locked in on the will of God.
That's where some of us have to get. We got to get to that place where I'm just locked in on the will of God. And so when he says, You keep on getting drunk, verse 15, she simply says, Not so, my Lord. Gives him the title of respect and everything. She's not trying to pick a fight.
She says, I'm a woman who's deeply troubled. I've not been drinking wine or beer. She wants to make this crystal clear. To this man of God, I haven't had anything. She said, I was pouring out my soul to the Lord.
She said, do not take your servant for a wicked woman. I've been praying here out of my great anguish and grief. Eli answered, go in peace. And may the God of Israel grant you what you have asked of him. Do you see?
She's so extremely surrendered that she just clears him up. And now it pays. That humility and that focus she has has led to Eli now understanding what she really is.
Now, if she had acted in her selfish nature, acted out of carnality and been offended, she would have alienated herself from this priest. But she's so extremely surrendered, rather than to alienate him, she reconciles. She pulls him in to the place of understanding. She said, No, no, here's what's going on. She gets him so that he can now be in agreement.
And he blesses her. Go in peace, and may God grant you. what you're seeking. From him.
So now she has an ally instead of an adversary.
So you don't need any new adversaries, you got enough. What you need now are some allies. What you need now are to find some people who will believe God with you. You need to find some people who aren't out for mess, don't want to fool around in trivial things, who will just lock in with you on God, your will be done. God, I want to make a difference for you.
I want you to be glorified with my life. And I want to tell you, folks, that God is taking us to a place where we will surrender so deeply and so unconditionally to Him until really nothing else matters. And Eli says, I tell you what, I'm with you. And I'm believing God with you. That he'll grant you.
What you have asked of him. and she goes her way And then she eats something, and her face was no longer downcast. Oh, that's what I want to tell somebody. It's time for you to eat something. It's time for you to let your countenance reflect.
Faith and trust and hope in God. Why so downcast, oh my soul. Put your hope in God. And you got to bless him and believe him. Lord, I've surrendered, I've given you everything.
And now I'm going to get into a place of faith and trust. And I'm just going to believe you until it happens. I'll say hallelujah anyhow. When the indications are that it's not going to happen, I'll just ignore those. And I'm just going to stand here and believe you.
And it's time for some of us to now move. Having surrendered, if you've surrendered, if you've given up everything to God and yielded to His will, then as an act of faith, go away and begin to say, I'm believing God. And she put her trust deeply in him. And she went away and ate something and was no longer downcast. Early the next morning they arose, worshiped the Lord, and then went back to their home at Ramah.
El Cana lay with Hannah his wife. And the Lord remembered her.
So, in the course of time, Hannah conceived and gave birth to a son.
Now, notice that. See, we love fairy tales, but fairy tales, that's why they're fairy tales. We would love it if it said, and she went back.
Soon as they got home, she got pregnant. It didn't say that, it said, in the course of time. The Lord remembered her. And she conceived. brought forth this son.
And God will do the same thing in your life.
Sometimes, once you get in the place of faith, then that faith will be tested. That faith will be tested, and you've got to believe God, and you've got to stand firm and trust Him. And sometimes you have lying symptoms that say God's not going to do it, but you have to stand there and say, Oh, no, yes, He will, He's going to do it. He'll bring it to pass. God has never spoken anything that he won't make good.
And she stood and she believed God. And the Lord opened her womb. and she had this son, And it's a wonderful story as you read the rest at your leisure: that not only did the Lord remember her, but she remembered her vow. to him.
Sometimes folk get blessed and get amnesia. You know what I'm talking about? You begged God for something. Once He brings it to pass, you forgot how faithful you said you would be. But she remembered her vow to the Lord.
And when they went up to offer the annual sacrifice, She said, I've got to make sure this boy is weaned, and once he's weaned, I'm going to take him and present him. Before the Lord, and verse 22 says, and he will live there always. Imagine mother's extreme surrender to the point where. where you just wean your baby. And say, now this is God's child.
I just nursed him to get him to the place where now I can hand him over to the priest. And he'll be raised, and I'll only get to see him when I go up to Shiloh to worship and to sacrifice. And you're told that she would take those opportunities to go up and she would take clothing for him. She still had that mother's heart. and what have you, but she had given him over.
to the Lord. And then, when you get a chance, read chapter 2. It's her prayer of praise and rejoicing. I'm saying, Lord, thank you. And my soul rejoices in you.
You are a wonderful God. We have to learn not to take God's goodness for granted. He's been too good to us. We're a spoiled generation. We're so used to getting so much, but we gotta stop and go back to the old way of being grateful for everything.
I grew up hearing the old saints say, Lord, I thank you for everything. And then they would go for the next five minutes and enumerate. What they were thankful for. But the bottom line was: they said, God, thank you for everything. Thank you for the air I breathe.
Thank you for the food I eat. Thank you for the clothing. Thank you for a roof over my head. Yeah. Sometimes they'd be sick, but they say, Lord, I thank you for a reasonable portion of health and strength.
Thank you that I have enough to at least whisper a prayer. Thank you that I'm in the land of the living. We gotta learn to thank him for everything. He's been too good for us to have no manners. He's been too kind.
He's been too merciful. And it's time that we give him praise. She would go up and worship the Lord and take things for her son and just rejoice to know. That it was being raised in the House of God. Folks, we've got to die.
In order to have significance in the plan of God. God will make you a significant person. You are called according to His purpose. But you gotta get to a place of extreme surrender.
so that his purpose and his purpose alone is fulfilled in your life. We're so glad you stopped by for today's Destined for Victory message, Dying to Have Significance. To find out more about Destined for Victory's mission and purpose, or about the special gift reserved for you when you give generously today, please come see us at pastorpaul.net. Again, that's pastorpaul.net. We love being blessed, but the question is: will you pass the test?
Because there are some blessings that reside on the other side of obedience. And so sometimes you see a blessing you want from God, and you, ooh, that's exciting. Oh, God, please give me that. And he says, all right, but now I need you to pass this test. And if you pass the test, the blessing will come into your life.
And that's next time at our message, dying to pass your test. I hope you join us. Until then, remember, he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion. In Christ, you are destined for victory.
