Properly Addressing Pain and Loss (cont'd)

Move forward because there are new things, there are other things ahead of you. And so you want to live a life that's purpose driven. God's purpose is for my life, move on. Therefore, I'm not going to get stuck in the what was. I'm going to by faith believe for what is yet to come. As long as we keep asking God what if, He can't take us to what's next. Hello and thanks for being here for today's Destined for Victory with Pastor Paul Shepherd. Always glad to have you with us. Well, I'm sure you have your fair share of pain from the past, hurt feelings, the loss of a marriage, the death of a friend or loved one.

God wants you to mourn these things the right way, which means there's a time to mourn and a time to move on, a time to learn from the pain, a time to leave it behind. Today's message is straight ahead. Stay right here or visit pastorpaul.net to listen on demand. That's pastorpaul.net.

You can also listen and download the podcast at Apple Podcasts or wherever you get yours. But right now here's Pastor Paul with today's Destined for Victory message, properly addressing pain and loss. Some of you are hurting and I'm here as a man of God to tell you cry on, work through it, get with someone who can counsel you, who can walk you through the pain, who can help you address those things. We're not going to hallelujah over them. We're not going to glory to God over them.

We're not going to try to speak in other tongues over them. All of that has its place, but what else needs to happen is sometimes you got to give yourself permission to say here's where it hurts. And I want to let you know God is up to something good in your life. The only way you're going to experience it is you got to be willing to mourn. You say why in the world would I mourn when somebody was abusive, when somebody was toxic to me, when they tried their best to destroy me? Why would I mourn them? You're not mourning the loss of them. You're mourning what they left you with.

Do you get that? You're not mourning the person. I have had a lot of folk do me wrong, promise when they died I was not unhappy that they were gone. Now see, okay, I'm sorry. I just showed you all my humanity.

You all want me to be super spiritual all up in the clouds. I'm so sorry. If you need me to be better than that, pray for a brother. But the fact of the matter is I've had some toxic folk leave my life. I have yet to cry one tear over those people leaving, but I have had to cry over what they left in me. And if you have people who have left some raw stuff in you, some anger in you, some of the residue of mistreatment in you, it's time for you, my brother, my sister, to give yourself permission to deal with that stuff because it has to be mourned. So if you're gonna move to higher and better, you're gonna experience your promises, yes, we're on our way there, but don't try to ignore stuff that needs to be dealt with. Because if you don't deal with stuff properly, you don't really leave it behind. Have you learned by this point in your life that anything undealt with follows you where you're going?

No. It is exactly why some folks had a bad marriage and that person left them and then they moved on, tried to get with the next one, and they found trouble in that next relationship and they are surprised because they thought the problem the last time was the last person and the problem is they didn't deal properly with the stuff that last relationship left with them. You gotta deal with it. Even if it wasn't your fault, say, oh, but it's not my fault, Pastor, you don't, see, you don't understand what he did. You don't understand what she, I don't have to understand it to know that while you're not mourning losing them, you still have to mourn what they left with you and you gotta work it through properly. Gotta work it through properly. You cannot act like it didn't happen.

It did. And so mourning is part of the paradigm shift. I know you saved, sanctified, filled with the Holy Ghost.

Give yourself permission to mourn. Not only mourn, but these people honored Moses. They honored Moses.

During that time, they thought about the good ways God blessed them through that leader. They had never known a leader but Moses. They're about to get introduced to Joshua's leadership. The army knew Joshua's leadership because even under Moses, he was the general that Moses trusted to fight their battles. But they never knew Joshua as the leader of the full two million person nation. Only Moses had been the leader of those folks.

And now he's gone and they honor him. Do yourself a favor. Don't be silly or immature enough to play down the contributions of the people who helped you get to where you are. Don't be one of these folks who acts like you are self-made. My brother, my sister, please know you are not self-made. You've never been self-made. You are the product of people God used to get you to the place where you could become somebody. I'm so sick of seeing these people, especially when they become millionaires or billionaires, call themselves self-made.

That is so silly. You aren't self-made. You had to have somebody teach you the ABCs, the 123s. You had to come through school. You didn't teach yourself in school. They had to teach you. You had to learn all kinds of lessons from your parents, from the people in your life, and it took you a lot of years to learn at the feet of other people before you got to the place where now you're pretending to be self-made.

Don't show your ignorance like that. Learn the fact that you're in a relay race and God used a whole lot of people before you got to where you are. You need to learn to honor them.

Here's what I say. Sometimes I see younger people disrespectful of older, say, I'm a pastor, so I see a lot in the church world and I see a lot of young upstart pastors and they're in their prime years and they think they're all hotshot and annoying and all, and I see them sometimes throw off on and disrespect older ministers. I'm glad I learned when I was a young minister to respect the older ministers because now that I'm one of the older ministers, I want my respect from them. But the fact of the matter is you should never look across at people that you should look up to.

You should never act like folks or peers who God used to pave the way for where you are. One of the things I've enjoyed about watching this great documentary that celebrates the six championships of Michael Jordan, I love the fact that they've interviewed a lot of his foes and a lot of the people he went to war against on the basketball court and some of his mentees and all of that, and when they showed the part where Kobe Bryant was talking about Jordan, I already knew the class and what Kobe understood, but I was glad that they put it in the documentary. And Kobe said, there are always people who are trying to get me to talk like I think I'm better than Michael Jordan was. And he said, I always tell them there would be no Kobe if it wasn't for Michael.

And when you saw me play, you were watching Michael, because that's what I wanted to be. Folks, we got to learn that principle in our lives. Don't dishonor folks who helped you get to where you are.

Now, you said, but Pastor, earlier you said, we need to also interact with people who have been toxic. How can I honor folks who did me wrong, who abused me, who didn't treat me right? I can't honor them. I'm not telling you to honor them. Honor the lessons God wants to teach you. In other words, what you want to honor is the Romans 8.28 principle.

What do I mean by that? God takes the wrong they did, but he says, because you love him, he's going to work that together for good. What wrong is never right. Wrong is always wrong. We never say abusive people were okay. They weren't.

If they did something criminal, they need to be prosecuted. But the fact of the matter is, God says, I will take wrong and I'll make it work together for good because you love me, because you're called according to my purpose, and because I got great things ahead of you. So we need to properly mourn. That's part of the paradigm shift. We need to properly honor.

And let me tell you one more thing. We also need to learn to bid farewell and to move past some things. Now, did you note in the verses we read there at the end of Deuteronomy that the people mourned for 30 days, and then the text is clear to say that those days came to an end in verse 8. There is a time to mourn, then there's a time to dry your tears, say goodbye, and to move on. Saints, let me help you with something.

I was a pastor's kid, so I grew up going to funerals and stuff with my dad. I've seen families that just fell out, fell all over trying to drape themselves on the casket, seeing people trying to, oh, I can't, and they're doing everything but trying to climb in there. Let me help you understand something. There's no need of you trying to climb in there because you got a life to live. They already lived theirs. You can't live the rest of yours holding on to something that's gone. So you got to mourn properly, you got to honor properly, but then you have to learn to be a bit of final farewell.

You got to admit some things are past their season with you. And some people, when they're gone, you can't bring them back, so you say farewell. I've known folks who once a loved one died, they never recaptured their sense of living. I've seen people die internally because their mother, their father, their spouse, a child, somebody died and it ended their life emotionally, psychologically.

They stopped living. The second half of Pastor Paul Sheppard's message is coming right up. We want to thank all of you who support Destined for Victory with your prayers and financial support, gifts that help Pastor Paul share the good news of salvation in Christ with a growing audience.

Destined for Victory is a listener supported ministry and as we continue to walk through a challenging year together, your support is critical because now more than ever, people are looking for answers that only God can give. Give online safely and securely from our website, pastorpaul.net or give us a call at 855-339-5500. Once again, 855-339-5500. And when you give, we have a gift of our own to share with you. I'll tell you all about it after today's message. Do you want to press on towards your high calling in Christ Jesus? Learn to let go of what was and shift your focus to what's ahead. Here's Pastor Paul with the rest of today's Destined for Victory message, properly addressing pain and loss.

Brothers and sisters, if you plan to get where God's taking you, you've got to know that is a sin against God's purpose for your life. There's a time to mourn. There's a time to reflect. You take the lessons you learned from them into your future. You honor them, but you don't keep holding on to something dead.

Now let's just think about this practically. At a funeral, when they closed the lid, I've seen people say, ah, ah, don't shut that lid. Why? If it stays up and you keep that body unaddressed properly, which means to bury it in a proper grave, all that's going to happen is the flesh is going to begin to decay right in front of your eyes. There's nothing you can do but admit this is over and honor their life by saying goodbye and moving ahead. So I want to encourage you, be sure to honor properly, mourn properly, and say a proper farewell. Some things in your life had their name. Enjoy it while it was there.

Now it's done. Move forward because there's new things. There are other things ahead of you. And so you want to live a life that's purpose driven. God's purposes for my life move on. Therefore, I'm not going to get stuck in the what was.

I'm going to by faith believe for what is yet to come. A lot of people are just in the habit of never really understanding purpose in the first place. Some of you have probably heard me tell the story of the little girl who was watching her mother bake a ham and she said, Mommy, I noticed that when you, just before you stuck it in the oven, you cut off both ends of the ham and then you stuck it in the oven. Why did you do that? And the mother said, well, actually I don't know. I got that from my mother. If you want to know, go in the other room and ask, ask your grandmother. So the little girl ran in there and said, Grandmom, I was watching mom bake a ham and before she stuck the ham in the oven, she cut off both ends of it and when I asked her why, she said she got it from you. Why did you cut off both ends of the ham? And grandma said, honey, I don't know. Actually, I got that from my mother.

If you really want to know, get on the phone, call your great grandmother. Little girl wanted to know, so she got on the phone, called her great grandmother and said, I was watching my mom bake a ham. She cut off both ends. I asked her why. She sent me to her mother who sent me to you. I'm trying to find out why are y'all cutting off both ends of the ham before you stick it in the oven. Great Grandmom fell out laughing and she said, I had a small pan.

She had to cut off both ends because the ham wouldn't fit in her small pan. But you know what happens when you do things without purpose? You begin to act and you don't even know why you're acting. And we have to learn as people headed toward fulfillment, don't have a bunch of purposeless activities or unaddressed emotions going on.

Deal with things properly, deal with things correctly and then let God move you into the greater that he has in store for you. Let me wrap this up by just introducing the next point. I'm not gonna expound it. I don't have time to do that but let me just introduce the next point. So we've learned that the journey toward fulfillment requires passion. We've learned that the journey toward fulfillment requires a paradigm shift. One more thing I just want to introduce and I'll preach it in its entirety the next time. The journey toward fulfillment requires precise focus.

What do I mean by that? Go to Joshua chapter one and let me share with you verses three and four. Here's what it says. God says to Moses, every place the sole of your foot will tread upon I have given you as I said to Moses. Then he says from the wilderness and this Lebanon as far as the great river, the river Euphrates, all the land of the Hittites and to the great sea toward the going down of the sun that shall be your territory.

Now pause right there. Here's what I'm going to expound in the next message. If you want to claim your promised land make sure you know what God has promised you. Fact of the matter is there are a lot of people who try to claim something that is not theirs. We live in a day where we have a whole lot of people who in pulpits and in seminars would want you to believe that whatever you want you can have. Brothers and sisters I got to rightly divide the word of truth. When the Lord called me to preach he called me to preach his word not what would make you excited. So I don't get to say things that sound exciting such as you can have what you want. I don't get to do that because I'm called to preach his word and his word doesn't tell you you can have what you want. His word tells you if you abide in him and his word abides in you you can have what you want. What's the difference? His word is going to direct you as to what he has given you.

I don't get to claim stuff that's not mine. We have to learn to have precise focus on what is God's will for my particular life. That's what you and I need to learn to major in and that's what I'm going to expound as I continue this series because I don't want to try to go after somebody else's blessings I want what God has for me.

Anybody with me you just want what God has for you because if God has it for you it's going to bless your life and it's going to bless other people because you are in the center of God's will. So whatever you do my brother my sister make sure that you're properly addressing the paradigm shifts that need to happen in your life and then you'll be prepared to focus on what God has given you. I hope you've received this therapy. I hope it hasn't been too much for you but God said you got to share this because if I'm going to bless the people to experience greater and higher they got to deal with their stuff. In fact let me take some time I actually want to pray for some of you right now because some of you really are experiencing what you may not have been officially diagnosed but you're experiencing PTSD.

You really have post traumatic stress disorder in your life. Some stuff has happened and it hasn't been properly addressed and you're hurting and you're wounded. Sometimes it's worse because Christians make you feel like you just need to have stronger faith.

Fact is nothing's wrong with your faith. Fact is you need proper healing. So let me pray for you and then we're done. Father I pause and I pray for my brothers my sisters who have heard this word and Holy Spirit I know you're taking the parts of this message that they need to process and you're going to help the entrance of that word to bring light and to bring healing and hope. Some of us need to identify the proper counseling. I pray that you'll help us do that and that you'll give us the boldness to open our hearts to you and say Lord be my healer.

You can use a counselor to be the means but I look to you to be the great physician. So God I pray that you'll minister to the needs of your people who have received this word and I thank you that you're going to do a tremendous work of healing and blessing as a result of the entrance of your word today. We pray this in Jesus name. Amen. God bless you. Go in peace. God has plans for you. Plans for welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and a hope. To get there he wants to help you learn from your pain without letting it linger.

It's okay to draw from your past just don't let your past draw from you. Thanks for stopping by for today's message properly addressing pain and loss. To hear any of Pastor Paul's recent messages on demand log on to pastorpaul.net. That's pastorpaul.net. Well Satan is always fighting against the people who are trying to share the gospel of Jesus Christ. He seeks to kill, steal and destroy and that's why it's been so important through the years that people like you have stood by destined for victory, lifting up this ministry with prayer and financial gifts. Today we'd like to lift you up in prayer. From the home page at pastorpaul.net click contact us and tell us how we can pray for you. While you're there be sure to ask for Pastor Paul's monthly letter of encouragement, yours at no cost or obligation.

And here's something else. For your best gift to destined for victory in December we'd like to send you Pastor Paul Shepherd's DVD message refocus. In a year like 2020 with so much chaos and confusion it can be easy to lose sight of our primary mission.

We may begin to focus on social issues, political issues or the pandemic itself. None of these of course are bad in moderation but our primary focus should be on worshiping God, enjoying the gift of his salvation and sharing that gift with others. In refocus that's exactly what Pastor Paul encourages you to do, offering you three practical steps for addressing the events of this year and moving ahead into 2021 with your faith intact knowing that God is moving you ever closer to your destiny in Christ. Again this DVD message is called refocus and it's our gift to you by request for your most generous gift to destined for victory today. So call 855-339-5500 to give over the phone or mail your gift to destined for victory post office box 1767 Fremont California 94538.

You can also make a safe and secure donation from our website pastorpaul.net. You can't drive forward safely if you're looking in your rear view mirror and so you take honor with you throughout your life but you do not allow yourself to remain focused on what was. You've got to move into what shall be. That's tomorrow in Pastor Paul Shepherd's message knowing what to claim. Until then remember he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion. In Christ you are destined for victory.