It's a Wonderful Life, Part 4 (cont'd)

Hello and welcome to this Wednesday edition of Destined for Victory with Pastor Paul Shepherd, Senior Pastor at Destiny Christian Fellowship in Fremont, California. Today Pastor Paul shares his message, It's a Wonderful Life, but before he gets started, he's joined me from his studio in California. Pastor, I think all of us at some level feel that Christmas and the Christmas season has become much more than just a celebration of the Savior's birth.

There's so many distractions. As a way of encouraging our listeners, maybe you could share how you and your family keep the focus of Christmas on Christ. Well, I think, Wayne, I can truthfully say that keeping focused on Christ has never been a challenge and here's why. Because I grew up in a home and so did my wife where Christ was the reason for the season. Yes, there was gift giving. Yes, there were good times to be had and enjoyed. But Christ was always at the center. Our two children, as they were growing up, we enjoyed sharing with them the fairy tales, you know, twas a night before Christmas and the reindeer and the elves and of course Santa.

But we made sure that our kids, like we as children, always knew that this season is about Jesus and we kept him front and center. And even now in our 60s, my wife and I are seasoned citizens. I don't want to use that word senior yet. Hey, I like that.

I'm going to stay away from it as long as I possibly can. But we're seasoned citizens in our 60s and and these days we don't give gifts to each other. We give each other cards and and all of that. But we decided sometime back what we'd rather do is give what we would spend on each other.

We want to take that money and invest it in the lives of families in need or individuals in our sphere of influence. We do that every year. And we bless a few families. We do that every year. We do that every time.

We do that every year. We bless a few folks and they're always just amazed by that. But we find it just as fulfilling as receiving. In fact, a lot of ways it's more. It's kind of what Jesus said. It's more blessed to give than to receive. You can't imagine that when you're a kid, but once you get my age, you realize that it really is true. We do.

We really do. I find that it's not so much keeping our focus on Christ that's a challenge. It's all the activities that get in the way. All the things to do and you know as a pastor, you know, all the responsibilities you have. So that's a difficulty to overcome too.

Yeah, it is. And we just have to make sure that our schedules line up with our priorities. And so if our priority is to worship and if our priority is to spend quality time with family and with the saints of God, then we just have to make that happen.

You know, time is one of those things that if you don't control it, it will manage itself in ways that you don't want it to. So we make sure to keep our priorities firmly in focus and we don't let the busyness drive us crazy. I don't like to see people lose all their sanity and their dignity because they're trying to enjoy the holidays. Take your time, pace your life, enjoy what's important, and let God be glorified because Jesus really is the reason for the season.

Amen. Thanks, Pastor Paul, for encouraging words as we all get ready for the celebration of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. It's up to you to understand God's plan for them is to find out how to fish rather than come showing up at your house at dinnertime.

Teach them to fish. Some of y'all are steady giving out plates when you're supposed to be giving out fishing poles. Jesus came so that we might have life and have it more abundantly. He healed the sick, he fed the hungry, he died so that we might live, and he taught men to fish. Today Pastor Paul reminds us that God wants you to have the abundant Christian life, but in order to get it, there will be something required on your part.

Let's join him now for today's message, It's a Wonderful Life. I need you to know some folks are drainers by God's design. Now let's be practical. Some folk are drainers just cause they are drainers. Some folk will drain you for everything good you got, whether it's spiritual or not. Some folk are just drainers.

Some folk have a mentality that somebody's supposed to do something for me. Some people live in that place of you gotta. You got any friends who live at you gotta?

Any relatives you gotta? Oh, it's a big city. You gotta is a big place. A lot of folk live at you gotta. You supposed to.

Those are big cities. It's up to you to decide who's supposed to drain you because what you have, God wants you to give to them. Watch this. There's some other drainers who want what you have. God didn't send them. Their laziness sent them. Their lack of personal drive sent them. Their sense of entitlement sent them. Why should I work when you got money?

Huh? Why should I work when you got money? Just give me what I need.

Pretty good. What's the problem? It's up to you to understand God's plan for them is to find out how to fish rather than come showing up at your house at dinner time. Teach them to fish because feed a man a fish, feed him for a day, teach him how to fish, feed him for a lifetime, right? Some of y'all are steady giving out plates when you're supposed to be giving out fishing poles. Oh, I'm, I'm a priest till I'm done. Y'all giving out plates. Got nerdy beef. I said, Lord, this child, Lord, this child, I ain't put some more on the plate.

I know how he like to eat. Do you know that hunger is a wonderful motivation? Let them get hungry enough. You hungry enough to go fishing? Come on. Let me show you how. Let me show you how to identify where they're biting.

Let me show you all the nuances so you can go fish for yourself. Now, please understand, drainers, some come by God's design cause what you have is what they need. When people come because their own sense of entitlement or laziness or whatever it is and yet their drainers always pulling on you, always asking you, always getting from you, always guilting you. And if y'all have people who are expert guilters make you feel guilty for what you have. I'm not guilty by what I have.

I'm blessed because of what I have. It's a difference. See if I had what you had, you could go to work, then work the work. Some folk go to work, don't work. Not you, but somebody on your road, look down, see who it is. Somebody on your road goes to work, but they don't work.

They think somebody's supposed to pay them to sit there and to be Facebooking and all this stuff on somebody else's time. So you've got to identify who those drainers are. You got the drainers God sent, feed them, fill them, send them on their way. But the drainers who are there because their lack of drive or their sense of entitlement or whatever it is always brings them to you, redirect them. Those are to be redirected.

Come over here, baby. Here's what you're supposed to do. Amen. Paul told the church at Thessalonica, I heard y'all got some folk that are no count and are depending on your graciousness to always bail them out. Paul said it's in the anointed word of God. Paul said, let them live by the rule.

If a man will not work, he shall not eat right in your Bible, meaning you can be spirit filled. Just come out of wonderful worship. Somebody show up at meal time. That means you get to stand in the door and say, Hey, what brings you by? Oh, you know, I just round this guy come in for a little bit.

Not right now, but tell you what, take care. You have a good evening. Shut the door. You get to do that according to the word of God. Not cause you're not. Oh, so you're supposed to be so spiritual. I am, I got this from the Bible. Oh, I'm trying to help somebody. Bible told me to keep you out. I would bring you in, but Jesus say it.

Why? Cause some folk don't need a handout. They need a hand up and a hand up in for many is redirecting them.

Here's where your supply is. Back in the old days, you would get them a paper. There's a whole section called look through there and God's going to have something jump off the page at you and apply for everything you almost qualify for cause it could be somebody's going to make God get, God's going to give somebody a grace, a mercy to extend to you when you don't even meet. I'm not telling you what I think. I'm telling you what I know has happened in some people's lives. They applied for something they weren't qualified for, but when they had the right attitude, showed up with the right disposition, oh, we got to teach people that too. Some of y'all got these little rude kids and they're talking about I can, nobody will give me a job, baby. Let me show you how to do an interview. Do it just like I'm going to show you.

You be the boss. I'm going to come in and I'm going to show you what you're supposed to be. Sometimes y'all need to role play with them. Stop going in there to mess up. Oh, I'm trying to, so they take you through the first part of the interview.

Teach him how to speak in complete sentences. Slang doesn't place for slang. You know me, I'm right up in the pulpit. I'm slang and gun, but I preached in the greatest pulpits in America.

I know where I can't do that. And you would be proud of me when I'm at one of these cathedrals and stuff like that. Y'all should see me look back in the day I preached in the crystal cathedral. I couldn't believe the invitation and said, no, Dr. Schuler heard you speak at a conference where both of y'all were speaking and he told his assistant sitting next to him, I want that man at my next successful leadership institute. Next thing I know, I could hardly preach for looking around. I'm in the crystal cathedral and then afterwards, Dr. Schuler and his family meet them in the tower for lunch. Oh, I was somebody. But you know why I got to go there?

Because when it was slang time, I slang, but when it was time to show them I got some food from the word that'll feed your life and change you, I knew how to bring that too. We'll be right back with more of today's Destined for Victory message from Pastor Paul Shepard. Listen to the broadcast on demand at pastorpaul.net. That's pastorpaul.net.

Or download the podcast at Apple podcasts or wherever you get yours. Now, here is Pastor Paul with rest of today's Destined for Victory message, It's a Wonderful Life. Oh, man, I preached in some place and one day my phone rang, David Jeremiah said, I heard you on the radio.

I want you to come preach in my church. David Jeremiah said, yeah, right, David Jeremiah, yeah, right. This Johnny, right? No, I didn't do that, but you know, that's what I was thinking, like, no, is this really? Showing up, it was him.

I preached there, bless the people. You got to know how to navigate in different places. Some of y'all only got one face and that one face shows up everywhere.

You're supposed to have one character that shows up everywhere, but you need to learn how to be a new answer. I know the nuance of this environment, I know the nuance of this. I know how to function when I'm over here.

I know what not to say over here. That's why I can pastor Republicans and Democrats, cause all of them need the same truth. And I don't bring my politics to my pulpit. Amen.

Cause I got to lead a whole bunch of folk. I got friends who think you can't be a Democrat and be saved. I got friends who think you can't be a Republican and be saved. I can priest all of them cause salvation don't have to do with that. Now, when it comes to your politics, you ought to have a certain conviction. And if you believe one party best represents or one candidate best represents, then go with that.

Go with condemning everybody else who's not like you on debatable matters and learn how to function in different environments without putting people off unnecessarily. This is good. You just don't know it. This is good.

I'm going to get this CD myself. So you got to figure out how to redirect people. Some drainers, you're not supposed to fill them up. You're supposed to send them to a place where they can be successful. Teach them how to speak, teach them how to navigate. You know, some folk are sensitive, too sensitive to work on a job and stay on a job. When you see sick people and they always change in jobs, do you know the problem isn't all those jobs?

Do you realize that? Do you know people who have been on four jobs in two years? Everything is wrong and it's not those four jobs. They don't know how to work a job where they don't feel affirmed. I need to help y'all in the 21st century.

Not every employer is looking to affirm you. I just need to help y'all. I'm a boomer. I'm a baby boomer. Baby boomers are those of us born between 1946 and 1964. I was born in the 50s. I'm a boomer.

I can help you. I'm a teach some of y'all who are in the generations after me, generation X and then millennials and now you've got generation Z coming up, which is the ones after the millennials, kids born after 9-11. And we got to help all three of those. And so listen to us boomers real quick and tell some of these other generations you don't go to work to be affirmed primarily. Primarily you go to work to get paid. Oh, I need some boomer amens. I need some boomer.

I need some boomer help up in here. You go to get paid. My affirmation was when I got my check, they could have called me everything but a child of God. All that, but when I got paid, I'm so affirmed. I'm so affirmed. So I'm just trying to help y'all. I love y'all generations coming on behind me. Generation X and millennials and Z, I love y'all.

Wishing God's best for y'all, but let me challenge you. Don't look for fulfillment as your primary reason for going to work. And the only way you get to be picky is if you have so excelled in the business of learning how to be an expert at what you know, you need to be in a position where you can be picky because everybody going to want you to work for them. That means you have to have handled your business at school and in training. Oh, I'm trying to help you.

You a C student and then want the world? Baby, be glad somebody going to give you a job at the entry level and then what you got to do is have the spirit of Joseph in the Old Testament and although you show up as a slave, you end up running the whole house. That's what Joseph did. When he got to Potiphar's house, he was a slave.

He was sold to Potiphar. But the Bible says, but the Lord was with Joseph. Oh, somebody need to hear this. The Lord can go with you on a job you don't like. See, people need to learn how to respect me.

No, you earn it by the way you respect them, serve them, work in excellence for them. You can't be a slave talking about there's some things I just won't put up with. I'm telling y'all what I see, y'all think I'm trying to make you laugh. I see folk who ought to be glad they have a job going somewhere talking about what they will and will not put up with. Are you out of your mind? See baby boomers, if we had come back in the house talking about, yeah, they wanted me to work there, but I didn't like the attitude.

So I'm not going to go there, I'm going to just wait for the right position. Why are you laying up in your mother's house? Oh my Lord.

They would have said, boy, what's the name of that, what's the number, give me that number. My son had a temporary loss. I'm sending him back right now. Data got you a second interview on the spot. Go back in there bowing and scraping and tell him you were tripping.

Pastor trying to help somebody. You can't be entitled, you broke. I'm just, I love y'all, GX, millennials Z, love all of y'all, but you can't be broke and full of pride. It doesn't work. You need to be the kind of person who goes in there with your attitude and your work ethic and your willingness to put up with what else happened.

You need to be one of those folk. I've seen it happen where they're laying off most of the people, but they say, I know you knew, but what's in you? We need to keep around here and they will lay off veterans and keep you. I'm not telling you what I think. I'm telling you what I've seen cause you go in with the right attitude. I'm leaving. See, I'm sick of that.

That job. They disrespect me. Gave me looking at me all funny. What, some people that's the only look they got is a funny look. Some people are funny looking, that's what they are. So why are you mad that they looked at you funny? They looked at you with the one look they got. Quit getting mad and say, Lord, give me the grace to ignore the way they treating me and you see some of y'all just follow all this macho and I'm not going to be punked.

No, you too broke. Let them punk you for a while. Just pray that God will get you out and his own time.

Where am I in this message? You got trainers and redirect your trainers. The ones you're supposed to fill, fill them. The ones you're not supposed to feel redirect them. Stop carrying their burdens for them.

I'm free in some of y'all. You are carrying burdens and you are enabling the person in the wrong direction. When I enable you to be a bum, I'm the problem. I have to enable you to succeed. So I got to teach you how to get up and go on time.

Come on. That's how we were taught. We were grown and if we were still like say in our late teens and we still in our parents' house late teens just getting those first couple of jobs. I remember my mother would come up the stairs. I got to go to work, but she coming up the stairs just scared. I might be sleeping too late. I said, no mom.

My clock said, all right, just want to make sure. You know what that was? If you lose that job, you still going to have to do what you're going to have to do.

And we learned how to do what we had to do to get it done. Thanks so much for joining us for today's message. It's a wonderful life. Before we leave you today, let me remind you that for your best gift this month, we're pleased to offer you a DVD from Pastor Paul called Refocus. That's Refocus, a message that will help you put the past year in its proper perspective so that you can move ahead with faith into 2021. Request your copy when you make your most generous gift to Destin for Victory today. Call 855-339-5500 to give over the phone. That's 855-339-5500. Or visit pastorpaul.net to make a safe and secure donation online.

You can also mail your gift to Destin for Victory, Post Office Box 1767, Fremont, California 94538. I came to tell you in the midst of the feelings of it, there is a truth that undergirds it. That Christmas is really about Christ. You can't even say the word without talking about Christ.

It is Christmas. It is Christ's mass. It is because Jesus came to be the sacrifice for our sins that we have the right to be saved. That's next time when Pastor Paul Shepherd shares his message, The Best Gift Ever. Until then, remember, he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion. In Christ, you are destined for victory.