We Are Royalty

You may think you know who you are, but do you know who you are in Christ? Pastor Paul Shepherd explains the difference next as he shares his Destined for Victory message, We Are Royalty.

But first, he joins me from his studio in California. Pastor, I'm excited for a couple of reasons about the thank you gift we have for all those who are able to give generously in support of this program. First, it's not often that we're able to share a video message, but we're doing this because I know you feel that Get Your Hopes Up is a message that everyone needs to see and hear.

Absolutely. I'm eager, too, to share this encouraging word with our listeners. We all know that hope is a premium commodity these days.

You can't find it easily at all. We look around and we see all sorts of challenges, both in the world at large and also in our personal lives. Pastor, I'm seeing the effects of the vicissitudes of life on my members.

I hear from listeners even as they share their praise reports and prayer concerns. It's just a challenging world. The bottom line is, I thought this is a time for me to remind people that we've got to get our hopes up and we've got to keep them up. Because pain, heartache, reality is just among us and we are going to deal with these challenges.

But I believe God has given us every reason to get our hopes up and to keep them up. Because He is Lord of all, not just the good stuff. He's Lord of everything that's going on. And even when chaos surrounds us, His plan and purpose will prevail.

I constantly remind myself of what we say daily on this broadcast. He who began a good work in us is going to bring it to completion. So in this message, people are going to hear me share and I'm going to use case studies from the scripture. How people who faced real life challenges, such as we're all going through, but how they saw the Lord's hand in the midst of it. How God brought them out of it and gave them hope and help even in difficult times.

And I hope that people are going to be blessed as they receive this video message. You need to know that you are who God says you are. You are not what people say you are. You are not what those who brought you up say you are.

You are not what social scientists say that you are. I am who God says I am. I can do what God says I can do. People may try to define who you are, but God's word tells you exactly who you are. On today's Destined for Victory, Pastor Paul Sheppard reminds us that as believers, we have not only been chosen by God, but we are part of a royal priesthood.

With this message, we are royalty. Here's Pastor Paul. Go with me to 1 Peter chapter 2 verse 9.

These are days when social media statuses are everything. And in the last message, we began looking at 1 Peter 2 and verse 9 in an effort to update our status from a biblical perspective. I'm not so much interested in what you put on your social media page. I'm interested in how you truly identify yourself. And according to the Word of God, from a biblical perspective, from God's point of view, there are some things that need to be established in your heart and mind by way of your identity in Christ. I want to make sure that you are familiar with who you really are so that you can live out who you really are. By the end of the day, you need to know that you are who God says you are. You are not what people say you are. You are not what those who brought you up say you are.

You are not what social scientists say that you are. I am who God says I am. I can do what God says I can do. I can be everything God says I can be. In fact, I can do all things through Christ who gives me the strength. And I want to make sure you understand who you are.

Now, in the last message, when we opened this part one of this message, we talked about the first key word there in First Peter two nine. But you are a chosen generation. We looked at the word chosen and we discovered that in Christ we were chosen for his own purposes. You didn't choose him. He chose you. People love to say, oh, I found the Lord in 19, whatever it was.

I beg to differ. You did not find him. He was not lost.

You know what happened? He found you because you and I were lost, but he found us. He chose us.

And we are excited about the fact that we're chosen. So whoever didn't choose you, whoever hasn't chosen you in this world, you need to know God has chosen you. Don't let people make you feel inferior just because they had something else in mind.

You who looking for a boo and the one you were looking at is looking at somebody else. Don't even worry about it. That's not for you because what's for you. You're not going to have to run it down. You're not going to have to chase it down and you're not going to have to convince it to be with you. And then once they're with you, you won't have to convince them to stay with you. And in the meantime, you can know I am chosen. You would do well to choose me because God already chose me chosen.

Now, I want to move on and look at the second identifying word in the passage. Not only are you a chosen generation, but secondly, a royal priesthood. Today, I want to put in your status royalty. You are royalty.

I need you to know you're not a commoner. You are a royal in the plan and purpose of God. You are royalty. Now, let's park there a little bit before I get to the other identifying words in the verse. Let me spend a little time at royalty because Peter said that's exactly who we are.

Think about it for a moment. How is it that God identifies me as royalty? Well, it's because he is the king. Not only is he the king, he's the king of kings. He is the Lord of lords.

It gets no higher than him. Every knee will bow. Every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. And so you need to understand that we serve the king. Not only do we serve the king, but we have been brought into the king's family by the new birth, so you and I in Christ are royalty. When it comes to, for instance, the British monarchy, the way you're established first and foremost is through the bloodline because if you come in by the bloodline, you're in no matter what.

There are other ways to get in, which I'll mention in a moment. You can marry into royalty. But before that, the first way you become a royal is you are born a royal.

Everybody understand that? When you are born a royal, you are it. Now, the reason I'm pointing that out is because if you're going to understand who you are in Christ, you need to understand that you are that no matter what you do.

See, a lot of people think you have to perform your way into the good graces of God, but he calls you before you ever start performing anything. When you're born a royal, you're a royal when you just show up. We have, in our lifetime, we have watched the British monarchy develop.

In our lifetime, we have seen, of course, that Prince Charles, who is the son, the eldest son of Queen Elizabeth II, Prince Charles, you all remember back in the early 80s when he married a little girl named Diana. You all remember that? Come on, you old heads. The millennials, they weren't born yet.

They were on their way trying to get here. But we Generation X and earlier, my generation, the boomers and the folk before me, we all got to see it. I remember watching that royal wedding. Diana marrying the prince, who is the future king of England. When Queen Elizabeth II passes off the scene, she looks healthy, doesn't look like she's going anywhere anytime soon, but when she does go, he becomes king of England. You know he is the king of England because he was born to the queen. He didn't get here, and they said, well, let's see if he's king material. Had nothing to do with, well, they got to make him king material because he is already designated as the future king of England. Oh, I need somebody to get this revelation because if you get it about them, you can plug it into your own life. You are royalty before you ever start showing your nature, your character, or anything else.

You have got a bloodline that brought you into royalty. And we all got to see Charles live his life, and he didn't always make wonderful decisions. Amen.

Glory to God. We're not going far into the details of the situation, but he didn't always make the best decisions. And after a while, Diana said, no, I'm going to let this go. And they separated and all of that.

You know the story of all that he hooked up with sister girl that he'd been with ever since. But even when Diana wasn't in the royal line, folks still honored her. They would often still call her princess even though she wasn't that. She used to be in the family, and they didn't like that she was no longer in the family, but they still treated her with that honor. In fact, if you recall, after her tragic death and that car accident, after that, people were still wanting her to be honored by the royal family. And at first, Queen Elizabeth, the second looked like she wasn't having that.

No, she's not in the family. But the pressure of public opinion started crowding in, and they're like, you're going to honor her. I tell you, the people rose up, and they started doing it, and finally the queen caved in, and you saw her come out there and pay tribute and honor and all of that.

That was the right thing for her to do. But the fact of the matter is Diana married her way into royalty. When you are born again, though, you don't even have to marry your way into God's plan.

You get in by the new birth. That's the bloodline. I came to tell you, we're in the royal bloodline.

I'm not taking any backseat to anybody. I am royalty by blood. What blood? You're talking about the blood of Jesus? The blood that saved me, the blood that cleansed my sins, the blood that made me whole again. What can wash away my sins? Nothing but the blood of Jesus.

What can make me whole again? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. What is precious is that flow that makes me white as snow.

No other fount I know. Nothing but the blood of Jesus. I'm in by the bloodline. I came to tell you, you're in by the bloodline. You are legitimately royalty. You need to know that about yourself. I'm royalty, and it didn't start out with me being impressive in the way I behaved.

No, no, behavior has to come on the backside of your calling. We are born royal. And so we are born again royal. Do you know how believers in Christ became royalty? They were reborn that way.

Let's join Pastor Paul again for the rest of today's message, We Are Royalty. Now, I love the fact that Prince Charles is going to be the king one day, but even now, Charles and Diana, before they separated, you know they had two boys. Their names were Prince William and Prince Harry. They were princes the day they were born.

Soon as they showed up, many of us saw. We remember when they were born. We remember watching the TV as they had the camera there at the hospital door, waiting to see Diana come out with her firstborn. And there's young Prince William. And then a couple of years later, we saw her come out with Harry. And we were so excited as the boys grew up.

They were princes already. Now, William grew up, got married to Kate Middleton. And the same camera was set up a little while later at the same location.

Some of you all remember that? They looked like it was identical because that's the door she's supposed to come out with. And we saw Kate come out with her firstborn. I had to write down because there's too many names in that family. Prince George, she came out and showed us Prince George is now here. What's he doing to Prince?

Because he was born into the bloodline. Prince George came out. And a couple of years later, Princess Charlotte came out. Pretty little girl, got the nicest smile. George, you know, he's nice, he's pleasant, he smiles at the people, but Charlotte will wave at you. Have you all noticed that sometimes she see the camera, she just wave at the people. I said, oh boy, she's going to be a heartbreaker.

She's just going to kill them dead. Prince George, Princess Charlotte, and lo and behold, here came a third one. Prince Louis. Now Louis is on this.

It's spelled Louis, but you're supposed to do it the European way, Louis. The fact of the matter is all of them royal. Princes, princesses, how'd you get to be that? Because I was born in, I came in through the bloodline. I came to tell somebody in Christ, you got in through the bloodline.

I'm not taking a backseat to anybody. I am who God said I am. I can do what God said I can do.

I will be all that God called me to be because I'm in legitimately by the blood. Now, there is another way you get in. If you're not in the royal bloodline, but if you marry in, you're still in. Now, just to be technical, when it comes to the throne, you're not eligible to the throne, but you don't need the throne because you married a royal. Amen, so it's not about the throne.

I am a royal. And many of us have recently seen that in a dramatic way that excited many of us for an additional reason. We saw that when Harry grew up, Harry, he was in the armed forces. We saw him fulfilling his service.

I think he's still in the armed forces, so still fulfills his service in the British Army or Navy or whatever it is. But we saw that he was somewhat of a playboy. He liked the girlies, and so we see him dating various ones at different times. But oh, back, when was it, in 2016, a friend of theirs, a friend of his, and a friend of a young lady whose name was, let's see, Rachel Meghan Markle. She doesn't go by her first name. They just dropped off Rachel, and we call her Meghan Markle. And somebody knew Meghan, and somebody knew Harry, and said, I think the two of them would hit it off and set them up on a blind date.

Did you all know that? That's how they met, on a blind date. Didn't know who they were coming to see. They were praying as they came, Jesus, in the name of the Lord Jesus.

Oh, God, don't let this be one of the worst days of my life, Jesus. They probably weren't praying, but that's just in my mind, what they should have been doing, pleading the blood. And they met and hit it off. So after that meeting, the friend had done their job, and they continued talking to one another and hanging out with one another and all of that. And lo and behold, in 2017, they got engaged.

Now, here's what I love about it. Meghan not only is not a royal, Meghan is a homegirl. Come on, somebody. Meghan grew up in LA.

Come on. LA, I mean, as homegirl as you get. Urban America. She grew up, she wasn't all highfalutin, living somewhere out in the Brentwood Hills or wherever.

I don't know what it's down, the fancy places there. She down in the LA basin with all the rest of the folk. She down there with Kiki and them.

Come on, somebody. Oh, but one of Kiki's girls met a prince on a blind date, and it turned her life around. They hit it off, they started hooking up. Now, she's married before. That first marriage didn't work out too well. They were married less than two years.

It was a year and several months in, and they said, no, this ain't for us. And they divorced. But she figured her life wasn't done because this marriage didn't work out. She kept living her life, kept enjoying herself. She was an actress, but she wasn't getting A-list jobs. She just acted where she could, how she could. Eventually, she got on a pretty decent series and what have you, and she was making ends meet. But, oh, there was a plan that she didn't know about. And she hooked up with Harry, and they started getting together. Now, not only is she a homegirl, she's an African-American homegirl.

Amen. I'm just trying to show you that when you are royal, it doesn't matter what else other folks try to focus on. And so there had never been, there has never been until she showed up, there has never been a non-Anglo member of the royal family. Oh, but she changed things. She got in Harry's heart. Harry said, the Lord is my shepherd. I see what I want.

Come on, somebody. And old Harry found himself a homegirl from L.A., who when he found her, she living in Canada, working and doing her thing. She wasn't sitting around wishing and hoping and looking out her window for a prince to drive by. She was living her life, doing her thing. That's what I'm trying to get somebody to do. Live your life.

Quit putting yourself on hold, trying to figure out what you're going to do and who's going to come sweep by and rescue you. You got to live your life, baby. So whether somebody comes or not, I am who God said I am.

I can do what God said I can do. And that blind date turned into an engagement. And many of us saw on May 19, 2018, they got married in royal style. I mean, folks flew over from the U.S. If they got one of those precious invitations, we saw them all on the TV. Oprah was there. Oh, man, it was a sight.

The A-list was there. We're not even British, but we got excited. We just got excited anyhow.

And we enjoyed it. Over here, people were having wedding parties, going to somebody's house. They're putting on crazy hats.

Oh, come on, y'all saw some of them. And the TV cameras would go to the various parties, and you saw them because, you know, those British can wear you a hat, boy. They got some stuff like, who even thought that up?

Where did that concept come from? They don't know, but they don't care. They just put it on, and they going on out to the wedding. I came to tell you that we are royalty. We didn't even have to marry in.

We are in through the bloodline. But I point out, Megan, because when other folk want to discount you for your ethnicity or your background or anything, don't let anybody discount you when God included you. If God included me in His plan, I don't have to worry about you and your comments on who I'm not and where I come from. In fact, God is intentional. He loves taking the base things to confound those that are high and mighty. He loves taking not much and making it more than enough. He loves taking somebody who's down and out and put them up in the end. When God has a way of glorifying Himself, when God blesses you and blesses me, people have to look at that and say, now that had to be God. Thanks for being with us for today's message, We Are Royalty. If you'd like more information about Destined for Victory or the DVD we're offering as our thank you gift for your generous gift this month, be sure to stop by our website, pastorpaul.net.

That's pastorpaul.net. If it doesn't work out the way you thought it would work out, that just means that wasn't God's way. That's all it means. Don't get desperate. Don't get frustrated. Certainly don't get mad at God. He didn't give you the plan. You had the plan. That's next time in Pastor Paul Shepherd's message, We Are Royalty. Until then, remember, he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion. In Christ, you are destined for victory.