Built to Last, Part 1

God has a plan and purpose for our lives, but some of us are at a point where we must now transition and understand that God wants to introduce some persons into our lives who will come alongside, who will help us in some ways, and we've got to get out of the solitary kind of life.

Two are better than one, for when the one falls, the other can lift him up. Hello and welcome to Destined for Victory with Pastor Paul Shepherd. Isolation can sometimes feel comfortable, especially if you've been deeply wounded in the past, but in order to reach your full potential in Christ, you need people. Good friends, a husband or a wife, an inner circle made up of like-minded believers in Christ who will encourage you as you seek to live out God's plan for your life. Over the next few days, Pastor Paul will introduce us to seven building blocks for strong relationships. The first of those comes your way next. Stay right here or visit pastorpaul.net to listen to Destined for Victory On Demand.

You can also subscribe to the podcast at Google Podcasts or wherever you get yours. Right now though, let's join Pastor Paul for today's message, Built to Last. In order to fulfill God's purpose for his life moving forward, David has got to transition out of a rather solitary life, into a life where he embraces the persons God is going to be bringing into his life to support him, to help him, to walk with him at some key junctures.

And this is important because the same is true for you and for me, that we are called of God, God has a plan and purpose for our lives, but some of us are at a point where we must now transition and understand that God wants to introduce some persons into our lives who will come alongside, who will help us in some ways and we've got to get out of the solitary kind of life. Now think with me about David. He has spent the better part of his life to this point hanging out with sheep. Sheep are not that much of a challenge. Sheep generally speaking are rather docile and you can herd them and lead them and feed them and deal with them.

All one might get a little attitude every now and then, you have to just kind of straighten them out real quick, but no big deal. Sheep are relatively easy. The other thing he has spent the better part of his life doing is playing his harp. Harps cooperate wonderfully. You pick them up when you're ready, you play them when you feel like it. When you are tired of playing them, you set them aside and they don't complain. But how many know when God graduates you from sheep and harps to people, you've got another challenge on your hands.

Because people aren't as docile as sheep and people aren't as cooperative and melodious as harps. And yet God wills to bring people into your life. Let me tell you something, there will be no such thing as doing the will of God without being involved with people.

Now that's sad news for some of you. Some of you I'm sure would love to believe that there's a way you can please God. You can hear the Lord one day say, well done good and faithful servant and yet not have to deal with folks. And I'm here to tell you it won't happen.

You know why? Because the will of God always involves you being a blessing to people. And I'm here to tell you in this message that it always involves people being a blessing to you in the process of you being a blessing to others. So you are not going to get the will of God done without dealing with people. And so this is a transition point for David as he must begin to learn now to cultivate the right relationships with the right people. The reason why this is true is because you can do the will of God for your life but you cannot do it alone.

I'll say that again until it sinks in. You can do the will of God for your life but you cannot do it alone. There is not independent study available in the school of God.

There is no way that you can just kind of hang out by yourself, get this done on your own terms. You will only get the will of God done when you allow the Lord to bring into your sphere of influence for the purpose of being ministered to and for the purpose of ministering to other people. You can't be a lone ranger in the will of God. God endorses no lone rangers. In fact, even the lone ranger, you know the rest of the sentence, even the lone ranger was not alone.

Isn't that right? Now come on, you who grew up with me, there might be some young folk talking about who is the lone ranger. And if they don't watch TV land and some of the few anointed channels that still take us back, only a few with the anointing left now that will still take you back to yesteryear. Before things got as crazy as they are now, some of those shows would come on and the narrator would say return with us now to those thrilling days of yesteryear. And I return every chance I get. Because those days are gone, man.

And you see this stuff now and you just pray. But some of us grew up watching the lone ranger, but he was not alone. He had help, he had companionship in the person of his Native American partner named Tonto. And the lone ranger, now he was called, just let me give you a little trivia.

He was called the lone ranger because the premise of the opening of the series was he was the last surviving Texas ranger from this troop that had been ambushed. And all of them had been killed, but God spared his life. And he was the lone survivor and one of the Native Americans that he came across was dying, but he nursed them back to health. And so instead of them being mortal enemies, they formed a bond and rode together and Tonto said I'll ride with you or die. And the two of them hung out together. So the lone ranger was not alone. I'm going to preach, but let me just do some little trivia with the folk who grew up with me real quick.

I'm a preacher, I promise. But now let me see how well you know. How many of you know the name of the actor who played the lone ranger?

Let me just see your hand. Name of the actor. Few of you.

Some of you all have it. What's the name? Clayton Moore. You got it. You got it.

Give that sister a plaque or something. What did Tonto often call the lone ranger? Kimo Sabe. Look at y'all. All right. Wait, wait, wait. I got one for you. What did that mean? Trusty friend.

Y'all are good. What was the name of the lone ranger's horse? What was the name of Tonto's horse? Scout. You say what does God do with the Bible?

I'm coming. I'm just getting my yesteryear worked out right quick. Oh, you know what? One interesting thing that one of our Hispanic members pointed out to me once when I was mentioning the lone ranger in Tonto. He said, Pastor, do you know that Tonto is actually a derogatory term? And I said, I said, they never said anything in the show. We had no idea. He said, Yeah. He said, in fact, that's why when you see it, if you see it on a Spanish channel, they have renamed Tonto Toro because Tonto means fool. And we never knew it. So we just we thought and he accepted the name so we didn't know it was a problem.

But that's just a little trivia for you. Now, listen. If the lone ranger knew that he had no business riding those hills alone. How much more should you and I understand who have embarked on a much more challenging journey, which is to do the will of Almighty God? How much more should we understand the importance of the role that other people will play in our lives? Here's the biblical principle behind this.

My statement about the lone ranger. It is not good for man to be alone. Now, of course, that was first spoken from the mouth of God in Genesis Chapter two, verse 18. And his response to that was, in fact, the follow up sentence was, I will make a help suitable for Adam. At the moment he uttered that Adam was the only creature who did not have companionship. And so God said, it's not good for me to give this man, this human the responsibility of having dominion over the earth, unless he himself has the help and support he will need. So I will make a help that is suitable for him. And indeed, marriage is perhaps the ultimate expression of that principle that God said, it's not good for this man to be alone.

I've given him a responsibility and to help meet the responsibility, I must give him the right partnership. But let me hasten to say, while the solution there at the beginning of time and for all the obvious reasons, in order to initiate the process of procreation, God had to give him female companionship so that they could have children and begin to replenish the earth. But here is the point, the principle is different from the application. So that the principle is true in your life, whether or not you are single. The principle is true, it has nothing to do with your marital status. The principle is, if you want to get the will of God done in your life, you must allow the Lord to bring into your life persons who will come alongside to help you, to bless you, to support you.

Marriage is a wonderful application of it, but it is not the only application of the principle. Coming up next, the rest of today's message built to last with Pastor Paul Shepherd, who is Senior Pastor at Destiny Christian Fellowship in Fremont, California. If you've never stopped by our website, pastorpaul.net, I invite you to do it when you have some time. You'll find all of Pastor Paul's recent messages on demand, plus a host of great resources in our online store, including books and DVD messages from Pastor Paul. Pastorpaul.net is a great place to learn more about the ministry, and all the great things friends like you are doing through your prayers and financial support. And if you love this program, we know you'll love watching some of Pastor Paul's best video clips.

Subscribe at YouTube today. And for more details and links to all of his social media sites, be sure to visit pastorpaul.net. Well, God has things he wants you to do for his glory, but you can't do them without help. Remember, not even the lone ranger wrote alone.

Here's Pastor Paul with the rest of today's Destined for Victory message built to last. And I've come to tell you that you, as a believer, whether single or married, you must understand that it is not good for man to be alone. Now, let's just be honest.

Sometimes it is comfortable for man to be alone, but God says it is not good. I'm going to take my time and walk through this because some of us, I think the tendency would be to fight this principle. And so I want to take all the fight out of you so that by the time I'm done, you are on the altar of your heart saying, Lord, yes, bring into my life the people in the family of God that you have ordained to help me get where you're taking me. I want to take all the fight out of you. Now, let's be honest.

There's no future in front. Let's be honest. For some of us, we would say, I know it says it is not good, but it sure is comfortable to call the shots myself.

If I am a committee of one, I don't have to have anybody weigh in on it. For some of us, it is a control issue. I like being in charge. My way or the highway.

I say it, it's done. And I live that way. The way I ensure I get my way is I stay to myself.

That's what some of us would say. And God says yes, but it is not good. Not good for you to be in charge. Not good for you to run your own life. Not good for you to be a committee of one so that when you have a meeting, you're the only one that shows up. When there's a vote, you have the only vote. You win every time. You get your way, but your way is not God's way.

For God says it is not good. For some of us, it is a temperament issue. For some of us, it is comfortable to be alone by temperament. Now let's be honest. Some of you by temperament really enjoy the highlight of your week. It is when nobody is around.

Come on, let's be honest now. For some of you, it is a temperament issue and you really enjoy. Oh, everybody sooner or later, even the most people oriented persons, every now and then get a little burned out. But for the most part, extroverts live by the idea that the more the merrier. If there are folks around, then I'm happiest with very few exceptions. But there are other people who have a very different temperament and they're like, I have a certain level of toleration for people. Tolerance. Tolerance for people. And after I have tolerated people enough, when I reach my limit, the best thing all y'all can do is get away from me.

Isn't that where some of you are? I give you a few hours or whatever, but after that, leave me alone. And it's a temperament thing. Not wrong. God created us with various temperaments. It's very interesting when you look at a family, often you'll see a variety of temperaments, all of them born from the same two folk. But very different temperaments.

By God's design, God loves variety. But all of our temperaments have strengths and all of them have weaknesses. And for some people, the temperament which says, I can only deal with people to a certain extent can be a weakness unless we allow God to bring us to a place where we're ready to say yes to the partnerships and the persons He would bring into our lives. For some, this business of it being comfortable to be alone is a matter of our past dealings with people. For some, your past dealings with people haven't been very good, so you're thinking, the fewer people I have to really bring into my inner circle, the better off I'll be. And that's because of the persons who have come into your life. But the reality is, your past in the plan of God never dictates your future. And you must be willing to say, yes, it's true, I've run into some folk who disrespected me or mistreated me or abused me or hurt me in some way, and so I have a fear of dealing with people because of my past experiences, but God still says, I understand that.

I want to heal you of the hurts associated with the people in your past, but I want to bring some folks into your life who will be there to do you good and not harm. And so you must be open to it. For some, it's a fear of rejection. We've dealt with a lot of rejection from people. Some of you have never quite fit in. You've always felt like the odd man or odd woman out, and so no matter what group you were in, you never quite felt like you were all the way there. You tend to feel more like you belong on the aisle of misfit toys.

You remember that from Rudolph? And you just have never quite fit in with other folks. So you say it's comfortable for me to be alone, but God says it's not good. Now, I want to make sure you understand that as I speak of this business of being alone, I speak of a lot of different manifestations of it. So for some of us, we isolate ourselves socially. For some of us, we isolate ourselves spiritually. There are people who are living in spiritual isolation. There are people who want to get close to God but don't want to get close to people.

I'm here to tell you that you can't even pull around you the cloak of spirituality to justify your desire to be alone. I know a good number of people who have this orientation who say, I want to be close to God. In fact, some of them say, I am very close to God, but I don't deal with people. Some of them say, I don't join churches because I don't deal with the church.

I deal with Jesus one on one. There are the kind of people who say, I'm very spiritual. I'm just not very churchy. Well, I'm here to tell you that you can't love God and hate His bride. The Bible describes the church as the bride of Christ. And you can't love me and hate my bride.

And say you have a real clear relationship because the bride is one with the groom. And so for you who would say, I'm spiritual. I love God. God and I have a really great relationship, but I don't deal with the church.

You need to be set free from your deception. Because you are deceived if you think that you're that close to God and not that close to people. I know people who won't join a church. They'll visit every now and then. They'll fall through here every now and then. They say the Lord led them to come this Sunday.

Whenever He leads them, they'll be back. And they float around being led every now and then to just sort of drop in and check something out from a distance. And the way they practice their Christianity the most is they practice it in their prayer closet. And they pray. I'm here to tell you that if you spend a lot of time in prayer and little time with God's people. You are a prime candidate to be as spiritually confused and mixed up as a barrel of fish hooks.

Just as mixed up as. Listen, I'm not telling you what I think. I'm telling you what I know. I know people who pray a lot. But don't discern the importance of the body of Christ. And they are by far the weirdest people I know.

By far. Give me a pagan over them any day. Oh, I'd love to hang out with a rank show enough center versus hanging out with them. I'd just give me somebody who hardly knows, you know, anything about God, church, cuss, every other word. I can handle all of that before I can deal with these pseudo spiritual, spooky, confused, unsubmitted. Refuse the less somebody tell them, you know, you're getting strains, don't you?

You know, you're getting weird. You know, it ain't that much Jesus in the world. In fact, the more spiritually oriented you are, the more it's important that you connect with the body of Christ so that they can help keep you on the path of true righteousness. And keep you away from spiritual deception. You know, one of the reasons King David became a great man is because he surrounded himself with great people. If you've been wounded in the past and have chosen to remain isolated as a result, I encourage you to find just one person you can trust for friendship and encouragement.

Find yourself a Jonathan because no one can live the Christian life alone. In Psalm 107, King David writes, then they cried out to the Lord in their trouble and he delivered them from their distress. So if you need prayer today, the Destined for Victory ministry team would like to join you in prayer. From the home page at pastorpaul.net, use the contact feature to let us know how we can pray for you. And while you're there, be sure to ask for Pastor Paul's monthly letter of encouragement, yours at no cost or obligation. Well, we have a great resource for you today, two in fact, and we want to share them with you this month for your most generous gift of $25 or more to Destined for Victory. The first is Pastor Paul's book, Why God Created Dads, an insightful and inspirational look at the subject of fatherhood through the lens of scripture. The second is the audio CD, A Tribute to My Dad, a message delivered by Pastor Paul following the death of his father. Men and women alike will be inspired by these timely resources.

Again, that's Why God Created Dads and A Tribute to My Dad. Our gifts to you this month as you give your best donation of $25 to help us through these summer months and support the ministry of Destined for Victory. So please call 855-339-5500 or visit pastorpaul.net to make a safe and secure donation online. And as always, you can mail your gift to Destined for Victory, Post Office Box 1767, Fremont, California 94538.

And I'll repeat that, it's Destined for Victory, Box 1767, Fremont, California 94538. How many know you can show up at a church and still be alone? You can go to a party, still be alone. You can go to a Bible fellowship, still be alone. I'm not talking about proximity, I'm talking about connectedness.

Intentional connectedness and interaction with other people. That's next time when Pastor Paul Shepherd shares his message, Built to Last. Until then remember, he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion. In Christ, you are Destined for Victory.