Do not be misled. Bad company corrupts good morals. That's First Corinthians fifteen thirty-three, and this is destined for victory with Pastor Paul Shepard coming your way in just a few moments. An important message about the company you keep. First, I want to share just a little bit of a conversation I once had with Pastor Paul.
I asked him about the importance of destined for victory's media ministry and why he felt so compelled to use his voice to lead people to faith in Christ. Here's what he said: 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 Christ. Them 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. That was Pastor Paul's mission, and it remains our mission today—to bring timeless truth for a victorious life to radio, online, and on our free mobile app, and on every available digital platform. We can't do any of this without your help.
So today, we're asking you to send a generous donation to Destin for Victory in honor of Pastor Paul's memory. As our way of saying thanks, we'd like to send you our latest booklet called "Before Qualified." If you've ever felt called to something you didn't feel ready for, contact us right away and request your copy of this outstanding resource. Called before qualified gives you an up-close and personal look at Gideon, a man called by God to be a mighty warrior long before he was brave enough to go into battle.
So, if you've been stalling on your calling until you feel capable, this book will remind you: God may not always call the qualified, but He absolutely qualifies the called. That's called before qualified. Our thank you gift this month for your generous donation to the Destined for Victory Media Ministry. Give by phone by calling eight five five three three nine five five zero zero. That's eight five five three three nine fifty five hundred, or visit Pastor Paul dot net to make that safe and secure donation online.
You can also mail your gift to Destined for Victory, Post Office Box seventeen. 1967, Fremont, California, nine four five three eight. Quit thinking you can marry any old body you want. You can't do it. And end up where God wants to take you.
God says, "I have you heaven bound, and the best way to get to heaven is walk with people who are on their way." So, quit thinking you are going to heaven and linking your life with hell-bound folks. Jesus spent time with all sorts of people during his life on Earth, but his inner circle, his closest friends and confidants, were like-minded men and women who believed the same way he did. Today, you'll get some helpful advice about the kinds of people you should invite into your inner circle. The message is called "I've Got a New Attitude," and it starts now. Proverbs twenty seven seventeen says, "As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another." Positive influence.
I set a godly, good example in your life, and I encourage you on the positive side to be all that God has destined you to be. But I don't get into manipulation or anything that would be counterproductive. And some good news.
Some good news. Before I get off this disappointers point, one reason you want to keep your disappointers in your life. Is because they can grow and they can change and end up being a better blessing to you. In fact, right here in Second Timothy four, Paul attests to that in verse eleven, where he says, "Listen, when you come, Timothy, bring Mark with you." You see that in your text; it says, "Bring Mark with you." Then he says, "Because he has been helpful to me." In my ministry, now you say, what's significant about that, Pastor?
Well, listen. John Mark was a young man who years before got on Paul's last nerve. When you read Acts chapter thirteen, when they are out on the first missionary journey, Paul and Barnabas, and they took some companions with them. One of their companions was John Mark. John Mark was a young man.
He was used to being in the safe confines of the church. In fact, the church met in his mother's house. You know that in Acts twelve, when the Lord supernaturally got Peter out of jail, and the saints were having a prayer meeting for Peter that the Lord would spare his life, that prayer meeting took place in John Mark's mother's house. And Peter shows up, and they saw that God had miraculously answered their prayer.
So he's used to having the saints around him praying and and fellowshiping, and he's used to nice, comfortable Christian environment.
Well, he got out there on the road with Paul and Barnabas. People were threatening their lives. People were resisting the message of the gospel, and it got a little thick. And John Mark said, "I am out of here." Acts thirteen thirteen. John left them in the middle of that missionary journey, and Paul was the kind of guy.
You leave me once, I'm not going to give you much more opportunity to hurt me. I'm out here doing the work. He was very choleric. He's very decisive kind of guy. I don't fool with people who aren't ready for prime time.
And so when John left him, he was through. He said he's not going to be a ministry companion with me. That boy needs to grow up. And so, in Acts fifteen, when they get ready to do the second missionary journey, Barnabas said, "Okay, we're getting ready to go out and minister some more. Let me go get John Mark, and I'll be right back." Paul said, "He's not going." And read it when you get a chance.
The contention was sharp between Paul and Barnabas over John Mark, and Paul said, "Read my lips, he's not going with me." And they ended up doing two different versions of the second missionary journey. Because Paul insisted, this boy is not ready to go and be a companion. He can't handle the heat, and so Paul took Silas and Barnabas took John Mark, and they began to minister in two separate ways. But thankfully, Paul understood you don't throw out forever your disappointers, and he gave it some time.
Some of you need to give some of the people in your lifetime. God is working with them. God has begun a good work in them, and you need to give them some time—time to grow, time to understand, time to mature, time to get focused. And later on, obviously, Paul opened his heart back up to fellowship and interaction with John Mark, and here he is at the end of his life, testifying that John Mark. Has been a real blessing to him, and I need you to understand that sometimes you need to give people in your life just a little time.
Keep on nurturing, keep on encouraging them, keep on resisting the urge to throw them out, and understand that sometimes, with a little maturity and life experience, some of those people. Will really grow to be quite a blessing in your life. And so you got to understand that Paul sets the example of how to deal with deserters, how to deal with disappointers. And one of the things I mentioned it in the last message, and I want to remind you again: one of the things you got to learn to do is celebrate those people that are still there. See, Paul could have focused on just the deserters and disappointers and act like my life is just falling apart, just pitiful.
These people make me mad. Nobody's coming through for me. Make all of y'all make me sick.
Well, you are not going to get anywhere living like that. What you got to do is stop and realize. You know what? The Lord is still with me, and secondly, God has made sure that there is somebody still being a blessing to me. And He says in Second Timothy four eleven, Luke is with me now.
He's the only one here right now, but thankfully, He's here. I'm not by myself. There is somebody who's being a blessing. There is somebody who's giving me a word of encouragement. There is somebody who says, "Is there anything I can do to help you?" There is somebody who can run the errands for me if I need them.
God will see to it if you stay connected to the body of Christ. God will see to it that there is always someone there who can be a blessing to you. That's why you got to be connected to the body of Christ. That's why you can't be a lone ranger Christian. That's why you can't be too spiritual to join a church.
People floating around.
Well, I just go every weekend where the Lord leads me to go. You are going to hit a point in your life where you need somebody, and because you have not settled yourself in to a Christian lifestyle and committed and connected yourself to a local body of believers, you won't have anybody. But Paul said, "Thankfully, although Crescens is one place and Titus is another place, I have Luke here who is helping me." And God wants you to celebrate your Lukes. Quit fussing about your Crescens and Titus is so much. That you don't celebrate your lukes.
Stop and say, Lord, you have provided for me. Lord, there is somebody who's giving me a word of encouragement. There is somebody I can call up and have a word of prayer with. There is somebody who will read me the word of God and remind me of the promises of God. And so you got to learn to walk with the right people.
Quit bringing raggedy folk into your life, thinking you're going to live an exceptional life. If you have raggedy companions, you're going to have a raggedy life. You can't do it. You can't be unequally yoked. There are unbelievers in all of our lives because the Lord loves them, wants us to be a light of love and a testimony of His goodness to them.
Indeed, you're going to have them in your life, but not as life companions to walk with you through the hard places because they don't have the same Lord that you have. That's why the Bible says, "Don't be unequally yoked." I'm trying to get believers to understand that. Tired of believers thinking you can be an exception to the biblical rule and prosper. Quit thinking you can marry any old body you want. You can't do it and end up where God wants to take you.
God says that's not my plan for you. I have you heaven bound, and the best way to get to heaven is walk with people who are on their way.
So, quit thinking you're going to heaven and licking your life with hell-bound folks.
Now, if you're already in an unequally yoked relationship in a marriage, you don't jump out of that because they're not saved. The Bible teaches you very clearly how to be salt and light and be a godly influence in their life, and you stay and you pray for the grace to deal with it and love your spouse appropriately. But God wants to strengthen you by connecting you with the body of Christ so that they can help you. And so, you must understand the importance of celebrating the folks who are already there, because God will make sure if you have the commitment to be connected to the body, God will make sure that you have the right folks. God will see to it that you have a banana person in your life.
Now, when I say that, I'm hearkening to a story I've told from time to time over the years. A pastor friend of mine in Boston is a man who has always stayed in excellent physical condition and and has often run a lot. And he decided that he would enter the Boston Marathon one year, back in the late '80s, as I recall. And he decided he would enter it. He began to train for it, and what have you.
And as that time approached, the weekend of the marathon, he felt like he was ready, but he Did not follow the guidelines that experienced marathoners had given him regarding what to eat in the hours leading up to the race. They knew why there were certain things you needed to eat. Basically, it was because they would help lock up your system, so that your system didn't have certain needs during the race. Come on, work with me. Work with me.
A lot of folks don't like me to get too graphic, so I'm trying to. Yo, come on, y'all with me. Everybody's there, okay, good. And so he had trained in terms of running very well, but he made some mistakes in terms of eating in the 24 hours or so leading up to the race. In case you joined us late, you're listening to Destined for Victory, where we feature the Teaching Ministry of Pastor Paul Shepherd.
Stay with us; the second half of today's message is coming right up. One of the things we love to do for friends and listeners like you is to pray for you when you're in need.
So, if you do have a prayer request, please visit PastorPaul.net, click Contact in the top menu of the homepage. Our minister team is always happy to lift you up in prayer. And of course, when you stop by our website, remember that's where you can listen to the broadcast on demand at your convenience, PastorPaul dot net.
Now, let's get you back to the rest of today's "Destined for Victory" message. I've got a new attitude, and so he's into his first Boston Marathon, and he's feeling pretty good. But somewhere in the midst of the race, his body began to talk to him and said, "We need to make a pit stop." And he tried to ignore it and keep on running, but he said, after a while, I couldn't ignore it anymore. And so he said, but I remembered that one of my members had a house that was just a block and a half or two blocks off of the race course. He said, so no problem.
I'll just run under the rope when I get to her street and run down there and ask her to use her bathroom. And so he did that. He got to her block and he went under the rope and ran down the street and rang her doorbell. She came into the door. Oh, Pastor, let me do.
Oh, wow! I know you're you're running today. What you doing here? He said, I got to use your bathroom, sister. Can I please use your bathroom?
And she said, Oh, sure, Pastor. Go ahead on. And he went to the bathroom. And he said, When I got through, my legs said to me, "You think we're still in the Boston Marathon?" But we have come to tell you that the race is over. He said, "My legs locked up, and I was through." He was heartbroken, disappointed.
Five years later, he decided, "You know what? I'm not going out like that. I'm going to run it, and I'm going to complete it this time." Five years later, he re-entered. He had prepared well, and all. And he re-entered, but in the days leading up to the race, the second time, one of his members, a young lady in his church, who ran the marathon every other year, said to him, "Now, pastor, I know this is really important to you.
I know you want to finish this time.
So proud of you. Let me give you a little advice. Let me help you succeed." And the way I want to do that, Pastor, is I understand having run it as many times as I have, that there are points in the race when you not only need the hydration. You know there are different water stops that you can go and drink a little water and and hydrate and what have you. She said, not only will you need that, but there are moments in the race when you're going to need a little extra boost.
And I have discovered in my years of marathoning that what will get you through is two bananas. She said, "Pastor, I know the points in the race when you're gonna need them most." She said, "So I'm gonna have one of the saints stationed at the first place." She told him what mile marker they would be at, and she said, "When you get there, Pastor, look over to the side as people are lined up on the race route and what have you, and you'll see one of the members there with a banana. They'll have it unpeeled and ready for you to go." And she said, "Then there's another point, much later in the race, when you're going to need a second burst of energy, and I will have somebody stationed there to give you a second banana." He said, "I didn't understand on a personal level how important that would be, but she knew what I didn't know. See, we have to learn to take swimming lessons from folk who swim well.
Some of y'all take swimming lessons from drowning people." And you're wondering why your life isn't getting where God's trying to take you, and so he said, "All right, sister, I'll be glad to receive that help." And he said, "I was running the second time, and sure enough, I got to a place right when she said, where my body was starting to feel like, oh, I don't know if we can make it." And he said, just then, I looked over, and one of the saints was saying, "Pastor had my banana." And he said, "I ran over, grabbed a banana, and kept running." And he said, "Listen, man, God was in that banana." He said, "God was in that banana. I'm telling you, I never had a banana like that." And he said, "I got that little second win, and I kept on running for miles more." He says, "Sure enough, I'm well into the race." And I'm trying to recall when she said he would need the second. I'm pretty sure it was at mile 18. Because the marathon's twenty six point two miles, and I'm pretty sure it was at mile eighteen that she said, "You're gonna need a second one that'll really help you," and I'll have somebody planted there. And he said, "I was getting down there, and I was—I felt like I'm about to hit the wall where I can't make it anymore." And he said, "Sure enough, when I got to that point in the race, I looked over, and not only did somebody have my banana, but it was the marathoner herself." And when he got over and started running toward her, instead of her staying behind the rope and handing him the banana, she came under the rope.
She had her stuff on and she handed him the banana, and she said, "Pastor, this isn't my year to run it, but I'm so proud of you that I decided I would run the last eight miles with you." And she came under the rope, handed him the banana, and encouraged him while he ate it. Pastor, you're doing good. I'm so proud of you. He said she could still talk. I was panting, carrying on.
I didn't have anything to say, but she's encouraging me. And we ran the last 8.2 miles together. Let me tell you something. God wants to raise up some banana people in your life. You got to stay connected and committed to the body.
Because there's somebody who will help you get where God is taking you. There's somebody who will pray for you when you don't even know they're praying for you. There's somebody who will send you, drop you an email or a text or a word of encouragement and let you know you can make it. I know you feel like you're about to hit the wall, but they that wait on the Lord shall renew their strength. They'll mount up on wings like eagles.
They'll run and not be weary. They will walk and not faint, and I want to tell somebody: if you'll get committed and connected to the body of Christ and discern the importance of others in your life, you won't spend all your time fretting about the people who are disappointing you. You will begin to rejoice that there's a Luke who's with me. There is somebody who God has raised up. And sure enough, when your Luke's disappoint you, God will raise up somebody else who can meet you at the point of that need.
And then there are times when the Lord will see to it that no human being can scratch your itch, because He wants to always remind you that He is the strength of your life. That's why David said in one of the Psalms, "The Lord is my light and my salvation." Whom shall I fear? The Lord is the strength, the stronghold of my life. Don't anchor your life in people. They can't always come through.
Anchor your life in the Lord. Thank Him for the people He's raised up around you. Be grateful for the people who love you enough to go out of their way to encourage you and help you, and all that. But never put your trust in a man or a woman, a boy or a girl, because the Lord is the only one who said, "I will never leave you. I will never forsake you." I will be with you to the end, even when you are going through the valley of the shadow of death.
When you look up, I am there with you. My rod and staff are there because I'm your shepherd. I'm the one leading you from where you are to where I want you to be. And we are sheep desperately needing a shepherd. Don't ever think another person is going to be your shepherd.
Oh, God has raised up pastors like myself to be under shepherds to help nurture you and guide you in the things of God. But the great shepherd is the one who leads all of us, and he's leading us. Beside still waters. He's causing us to lie down in green pastures. He's causing us, even when we go through the valley, He is there.
He has a rod and staff to protect us. I've told you before, the staff has the hook of the end of it, and that'll help get the sheep when they go off somewhere they have no business get caught off in the thorns and thicket. He can grab them with that staff and pull them out of the mess that they've gotten themselves into. And the Lord is going to pull you out of some of your stuff. Don't look.
For people, don't be over there complaining. You over there caught in the thicket and you mad at everybody. They knew I was coming over here, and then somebody said to help me. Bad. And while you over there bad, you don't understand that the Lord has a staff, and He's reaching out and pulling you out of what you got yourself into.
And then He has a rod to beat off the jackals and things, your enemies that will try to destroy you. And I'll talk about enemies in the next message. And there are some enemies that we're going to learn to deal with. But the Great Shepherd said, "I'm the one who started the good work in you, and I am going to bring it to completion." We're so glad you stopped by for today's "Destined for Victory" message. I've got a new attitude.
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 dot net. That's PastorPaul dot net. As sure as you set your heart to follow God, you are going to have some enemies.
Some folks are going to show up in your life who oppose you and oppose what God is doing in your life. That's next time in our continuing message. I've got a new attitude, but until then, remember, he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion. In Christ, you are destined for victory.
