Listen. When God places His calling on our lives, He establishes it by the counsel of His own will. God doesn't ask you or me what we're called to be; He tells us who we're called to be. When you meet the Lord, when He becomes your Savior, the calling is built in to salvation. As soon as you are born again, you are also called.
In fact, your calling predated your. Being born again. Hello, and welcome to Destined for Victory with Pastor Paul Shepard. It's always a pleasure to have you with us. But what Pastor Paul said just now was so important it needs to be said again.
Long before the creation of the world, God already had a specific plan for you, a calling on your life that He invites you to answer. If that makes you nervous, even a little bit frightened, you're in good company. You're about to meet a man who felt much the same way. Remember, you can always stop by PastorPaul dot net to listen to your recent message on demand, including today's. That's PastorPaul dot net, or subscribe to the podcast at Spotify or wherever you enjoy your podcasts.
Now, let's listen to our "Destined for Victory" message, taking to heart our calling. Gideon is in a wine press threshing wheat when this angel of the Lord shows up. I love this story. God sends the angel to minister. You know the Bible says in the Book of Hebrews that angels are ministering spirits, and some of them are ministering in heaven through praise and worship, giving God glory.
But others are sent to minister to us here on earth. Which is why the Bible says you have to be careful how you entertain strangers, because it could be that you are entertaining an angel and you are not aware of it. Which means they don't show up when they show up down here. See, we picture angels in heaven. We just have these views of angels and they're just flying around and fluttering around, and they're all white and brilliant and wings and all that.
When they show up down here, you don't see any of that. The average angel who ministers to someone here on Earth is going to look like just somebody else. And sometimes you can have an encounter with someone, and it's rather brief, but they say some profound things to you. And the next thing you know, they are gone. And some of us don't know, but we've gotten help, and we've gotten direction, and we've gotten encouragement from a ministering spirit.
But you didn't know who it was. That's what happens with Gideon. When the angel is there in this story, the angel is sitting under an oak, just chilling. But he's waiting for this encounter with Gideon. And when he encounters Gideon threshing wheat in a wine press, listen.
You don't have to know anything about threshing to know this. All you have to know, rather, is this: you don't do it in a wine press. The reason why he was there is because the text tells you he was trying to keep his wheat hidden from the Midianites. Because again, for seven years they have had the experience of the Midianites taking their food. They never knew if they were going to get to keep their crops.
The Midianites didn't even have to plant for seven years. All they had to do was go over and steal Israel's crops. And so they never knew if they were going to keep their have enough food to eat for themselves. And so here he is trying to hide from the Midianites in a wine press. When along comes this angel, and look at what the angel says.
He says, "The Lord is with you, mighty warrior." Now Gideon is hiding. He is worrying. He is afraid that the Midianites might spot him. He's acting like anything but a warrior. And the angel comes along and says, "The Lord is with you, mighty warrior." That's when the angel spoke those words.
He was giving Gideon his calling. Listen. When God places His calling on our lives, He establishes it by the counsel of His own will. God doesn't ask you or me what we're called to be. He tells us who we're called to be.
When you meet the Lord, when He becomes your Savior, the calling is built in to salvation. As soon as you are born again, you are also called. In fact, your calling predated your being born again. God called you and me before the foundation of the world was laid. He calls us the elect in the Word of God.
He chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world. We love to argue about the basis of that calling. Was it purely sovereignty or was it foreknowledge? And we get into theological debates. Listen, quit debating that.
The fact is, we're called. We're called. We're not going to settle that debate. It's been raging for centuries, so we're not going to get into all that. We can all agree we're called, and we all agree we were called before the foundation of the world, because the Bible clearly tells us that.
And the fact of the matter is, your calling predated you. In fact, it predated the earth itself. God knew what He wanted out of you before you ever showed up. And he knows what he wants out of our lives.
Now, the significance of the calling in Gideon's case is, Gideon doesn't know it at this moment, but he is the man who is going to lead Israel out of this oppression. The way he's behaving, the way he's viewing himself, his life, his circumstance is certainly not the way of a warrior. But God says, "No problem. I've called you to be a warrior, so I know how to get you from where you are to where I've called you to be." I want to tell somebody something. God is the one who called you, and He knows good and well who you were when He called you.
But He also knows His calling upon your life is going to demand a transformation. Don't worry about how God's going to get you there. Just know that when God calls you, He knows how to get you from where you are to where you ought to be. And so we must take to heart. The calling.
Now, the first thing Gideon does is begins to express all of his misgivings and concerns. Verse thirteen, he says, "But sir, if the Lord is with us, why has all this happened to us? Where are all His wonders that our fathers told us about when they said, 'Did not the Lord bring us up out of Egypt?' But now the Lord has abandoned us and put us into the hand of Midian." I love this story. The angel let him exhale just before he hit him with his assignment. Gideon offers his disillusionment and his complaint, and the response is, he gets a job.
He said, "If the Lord's with us, why is all this happening? How come we don't even know whether we're going to get to enjoy our own crops? We are in a mess. Where are all the miracles I heard about? I heard all the other generations talking about what the Lord did and how He let them cross the Red Sea and how He destroyed Jericho.
and I've heard all of that stuff. Where is all that?" Angel said, "Funny, you should ask." He said, "God is ready to do it again, and in fact, He's going to use you to do it. You better be careful how you complain to God. Be a little slow to give God your complaint, because you could go into your prayer closet with a complaint and come out with a job. And that's what happened to Gideon." He said, "Where are the miracles?
I've never seen a miracle. I heard about all these miracles, but I've never seen one." And the angel said, "Okay, go and work one. You've never seen one. That's true. You've never seen it.
Go in the strength you have and save Israel out of Midian's hand. Am I not sending you?" He started with a complaint. He ended up being commissioned. And I want to let you know that in our lives, God has a plan and purpose to use us in significant ways. He has called us to do some things for Him, to be some things for Him.
He has called us to be people who are being transformed into the image of His Son. There is a lot God wants to do in us, for us, and through us. And the first thing we have to do is what Gideon had to do is we had to take to heart our calling. You got to get serious about the fact that God has plans for your life. He's not going to change his mind about your life.
You can't wait him out. You can't get him to go to a plan B. God knows what He wants out of you and me, and He is going to get that work done. Paul said, "We are confident of this: that He who began a good work in us is going to bring it to completion." Completion, but we have to take to heart our calling.
Now, the problem with many of us is we're more in touch with where we are than where we ought to be.
Now, it is important to be in touch with where you are. In fact, there are some people that that's their problem—they are not in touch with where they are, and it is dangerous when you're not in touch with where you are because you don't know how to make the transition if you don't even know where the starting point is. And there are people, not you, but people I know, who are in denial, and they are not aware of where they are. They're not aware of how messed up they are. They're not aware of the kind of mindset and the kind of activity that is in their life that is not pleasing to God.
The first thing you want to do is be in touch with where you are, be in touch with what's not right in your life. And we've got to learn, as people of God, we've got to learn. That's the right starting place. You will not make real progress. You will not experience genuine transformation if you don't even know how jacked up you are.
You ever run into somebody who's just completely out of touch? Everybody around them knows they're messed up. They're the only one that doesn't know it. That's a sad state of affairs. When your relatives, your coworkers, everybody around you know something is seriously wrong with you, and you think your life is fine.
We gotta get in touch with where we really are. In the church, we have gotta stop being so heavenly minded that we're not in touch with the earthly truth about ourselves. The church has got to be a place where people are discouraged from being hypocrites and encouraged to be real. We got to be encouraged to be real. Because that's my starting point.
Here is where I am. I have been saved by grace. Yes, I received Christ into my life as my Savior. But here is where I am. I have hangups.
I have besetting sins. My mind is not where it ought to be. I got some things that got to be worked out. Here is where I am, and in the church, we've got to help people to be okay with acknowledging where they are. Cause you know, if you're not careful, sometimes in the church we just want to impress one another.
If we're not careful, we just all get our big Bibles and we walk in and we all say, "Praise the Lord and Hallelujah." And somebody asks you how you're doing, you say, "Oh, blessed and highly favored." Well, I know what you mean. Yes, we are blessed. Yes, we are highly favored because of the grace of God in our lives. But now, that's not what I asked you. I ask you, but how are you?
How are you doing? What's actually going on in your life? What are the things you're wrestling with? What are the challenges you're dealing with? It's important to be in touch with that because transformation requires we know where we're starting from.
So that we know what we have to give over to God. When the Bible says, "I beseech you, brothers, by the mercies of God, that you give yourselves as a living sacrifice, you got to be intentional about that sacrifice." Lord, here is where I am.
So we have to be in touch with that, and we got in the body of Christ. We got to stop penalizing people for being honest. They got to be true about where they are. That's our starting point. And we have to be aware of that.
You will not experience deliverance if you are still in denial. You will not conquer what you will not confront. You cannot heal until you acknowledge there is a hurt. There must be the acknowledgment point.
So Gideon acknowledges very clearly where he is. You and I have to do the same. Here is where I am. Here is what I think. Here is how I'm behaving.
I'm not proud of it. Actually, I'm ashamed of some of it.
Sometimes that's where you have to start. I am ashamed of where I am, and I have the tendency to want to hide it. But if I'm ever going to get where God wants to take me, I can't hide from the truth. I've got to expose it to the light of His Word and the light of His calling on my life. And so, you and I have to take to heart our calling.
We are called to be warriors, but you got to acknowledge, Lord, right now, I'm a warrior. I'm called to be victors, but Lord, right now, I'm acting like and feeling like a victim. And some of us, that's where we are. And we have to acknowledge that's where I am, Lord. I have a victim mentality.
I think the whole world. I blame my life on everybody. I just feel victimized at the drop of a hat. And some of us, that's where we are. You might not be proud of it, but that's where you are.
Somebody look at you wrong, and it'll give you a bad day. You just feel so victimized that people would just stop oppressing me. And you got to acknowledge that's where you are, because you can't get where you want to be, where God has called you to be, until you acknowledge it.
Some of us have to realize that we are trying to take on an identity God never gave us.
Some of us have that Naomi tendency. You remember the story of Naomi in the Old Testament book of Ruth? Naomi and her family went down during the time of a famine in Bethlehem. They went down to Moab. And God didn't necessarily ordain that trip, but He rolled it into His purpose.
And they go down. They're no longer with God's people. And so her husband died. Her two sons died. And her daughters-in-law are there with her.
One says, "I'm staying here." The other says, "I'm going back home with you." Ruth and Naomi make the journey back after they hear the Lord has come to the aid of His people, and they make the journey back. And when they get there, the people see Naomi, and they see she is so different than she used to be, and they said, "Could this be Naomi?" Because her whole countenance, her disposition had changed, and she said, "Don't call me Naomi; call me Mara." Now, the significance of that is Naomi means pleasant, Mara means bitter, and because of her circumstances, she said, "I have renamed myself what I feel like." And let me tell you something. That's where some of us are. We have the tendency to rename ourselves after our environment. We have the tendency to rename ourselves after our besetting sins.
Don't call yourself anything God hasn't called you. She was born Naomi. She was born Pleasant. That was part of her calling. God wanted to bless her life.
That she went through a season where she felt bitter. She must grapple with that, but she cannot take that as her identity. And you and I cannot rename ourselves after our circumstances, or after our challenges, or after our struggles, or after our besetting sins, and say, "Well, you just have to understand, this is me, and I'm always going to be this way." No, God has a calling on our lives. We will not always be here. He has called us to another place.
And so you acknowledge it, but you acknowledge it in the light of a calling, so that you can determine there is some growth, there is a journey that I must embark upon to get from where I am to where I ought to be. Don't rename yourself. Don't call yourself something God hasn't called you. The only calling that counts is His. Don't call yourself anything God hasn't called you.
Don't justify what God wants to change. Don't say, "Well, see, you just have to understand me." No, we don't have to understand you. You have to get before God and say, "Lord, I know this is not what You called me to be, and so I present myself to You." Listen, not only shouldn't you call yourself what God hasn't called you. Don't let somebody else call you what God hasn't called you. Don't take to heart what somebody says about you when they're not speaking for God.
When people call you what the Word didn't call you, you know that they're lying. You got to get into this word and decide I am who God says I am. My wife has a list of ABCs that she developed years ago, and she just went down the alphabet and found things in the Scripture that helped her understand who she was in Christ. and And she has a list: A is I'm accepted in the beloved, and she has a Scripture listed. B is I'm born again, and she has a Scripture listed.
C is I'm a conqueror, and she has a Scripture. D is I'm delivered, and she has Scripture. And on and on. I'm not going to give you her list. Make up your own.
Go through the Bible and find out who you are in the Word. When the Word says who we are, when it identifies who the people of God are, note that that is your calling. You're called to be a conqueror.
So when somebody calls you a loser, they're lying. You think I'm a loser, but God says I'm a conqueror. I believe Him and not you. One of the ways you singles can know that you're at least looking at somebody you can have a second conversation with is when they know how to speak about you the way God speaks about you.
Somebody calls you a loser, and you know that you're a conqueror in Christ. You don't even have to pray about that.
Now it's different if someone is helping you grapple with the truth about yourself, and you're engaged, and you're trying to really get a grip and understand where you've got to come from to where you got to go. That's fine. But if they are just out of their own frustration and their own issues, they are just harping on you and looking at all of the things about you they don't like, and they're very critical and all that. You don't. That's not somebody you have to pray about.
Oh Lord, is this my spouse? God not calling somebody into your life to work your last nerve. Yes, there ought to be a sharpening element in any good and godly relationship. They ought to love you enough sometimes to speak the truth, but even when they do that, it'll be in love and it'll be out of a thorough knowledge of you. When somebody is just talking about you and they hardly know you, what are you doing praying about that?
I am praying to see what the Lord. Is the Lord? Is this the one? I got a word for you. Yea, and the Lord would say unto thee, No.
Yea, and the Lord would say unto thee, Run for your life! Run, forest! Run! Fact of the matter is, we are called according to His purpose, and we've got to take to heart our calling.
So God didn't call Gideon what he acted like; God called him what he was destined to be. God doesn't call you and me what we act like; He calls us what we're destined to be, and we must take to heart. That calling from the Lord. Thanks so much for being here with us for today's Destined for Victory, featuring the Teaching Ministry of Pastor Paul Shepherd. Today's message is part of our teaching series from Warrior to Warrior.
Look for it online at PastorPaul.net.
Well, you may know that Destined for Victory has always been committed to sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ all over the world, but every now and then we like to remind you why we're so passionate about using the media for God's glory, and why Pastor Paul's voice is so critical to that undertaking. In fact, I once asked him to talk 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 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 Learn 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 on radio, online, on our free mobile app, and on every available digital platform. Today, when you send a generous gift in support of that mission, we'd like to send you a special gift in return: our latest booklet called "Before Qualified." Based on the messages you're hearing now on the life of Gideon, called "Before Qualified," gives you an up-close and personal look at a man who. God called a mighty warrior long before he was brave enough to go into battle. God may not always call the qualified, but He absolutely qualifies the called.
Learn what that can look like in your life in our booklet, "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 five. Five hundred, or visit PastorPaul dot net to make a safe and secure donation online, or mail your gift to Destined for Victory, Post Office Box seventeen sixty seven, Fremont California nine four five three eight. Do you know why God is calling us to take authority in our lives?
If we're going to move forward into the things He has for us, it's because there are forces gathering against us. If you are serious about doing the will of God in your life, there are forces that are gathering against you as we speak. That's next time in our Destined for Victory message, taking authority over our enemies. Until then, remember. He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion.
In Christ, you are destined for victory.
