Live Free! Part 1 (cont'd)

Some of you brought bondage by today's message with Pastor Paul Shepherd.

Well, even after you're saved, you still need to go through the process of sanctification, and you'll have some tough times along the way. Struggles with sin, battles with bondage. Today, Pastor Paul explains how you can break free from your bondage and how you can help others break free from theirs. Stay right here or visit PastorPaul.net to listen anytime on demand. That's PastorPaul.net.

You can also subscribe to the podcast at Apple Podcast, at Spotify, or wherever you enjoy yours. Now, here's Pastor Paul with today's Destined for Victory message, Live Free. You will receive explosive power after the Holy Spirit comes into your life, and you need both the authority to walk in and then you need the power to pull off who you really are. Let me help you understand it this way. A police officer goes on patrol, but their police force doesn't just send them out and tell them, stop people when they're breaking the law, and just tell them things. It doesn't send out a cop and say, when you see people breaking the law, go out and say, now you really shouldn't do that.

Why? Because that would be totally ineffective. So what do they do? They send them out with two things. They send them out with authority and they send them out with power.

They send them out with exousia and they send them out with dunamis. Your legal right, your exousia is represented by the badge when you are a police officer. The badge means I am not coming to you on the basis of who I am personally. I'm coming to you on the basis of who I represent. The badge says don't mess with me because to mess with me is to mess with the entire force that I represent. You get that? So when someone stops you and shows you their badge and it is a proper badge representing their authority from an agency, you better think twice before you get bad with them. Why?

Because it's not about them, it's about who they represent. When I go out in the world, my badge is I'm in Christ. To fool with me, you got to go through Jesus to get to me. But the police officer is sent out not only with exousia, they're sent out with dunamis. They got a whole holster full of dunamis.

You ever noticed it? I mean they can shoot you and the Christian cops shoot you in Jesus' name. Blow you away in Jesus' name. When I was in Bible school back when I was young and one professor was talking about the need to walk in self-defense and he said, you know the Bible isn't against you practicing self-defense. Don't misunderstand when Jesus talked about if they slap you on one side of your face, turn your cheek. He said don't misunderstand that. That doesn't mean you can't defend yourself against genuine attempts to harm you. It just means that passage means people trying to humiliate you as the Roman oppressors were in Jesus' day and he said show them you're bigger than that by letting them slap the other side.

He said that's not an attempt to harm, that's an attempt to humiliation and so you can show them that you're bigger. He said but no, no, no. If you need to really defend yourself and you are saved, even we, we were aspiring ministers in that class. He said you need to know you have every right legally to defend yourself and so he said so if you need a firearm you know where you live.

You know that the cops don't always respond. He said if you need a firearm go ahead and get one and we these little aspiring preachers, we had never heard anybody say that in church that you can shoot them. And so one young student raised his hand. He said but, but our job is to lead people to Christ. He said you're just saying I can go get a gun if somebody's breaking into my house and I can go.

He said I want to lead them to Christ and the professor said I found out you can lead them much better when you got a gun on them. So y'all take that for what it is. I'm going to go ahead and say that.

So y'all take that for what it's worth for you. That's just sudden. I just threw that in.

That's not in my notes or anything. The fact of the matter is they don't just send them out with the exusia. They send them out with dunamis. They got a gun on there. They got a stick on there. You can beat them in Jesus name.

They got stuff on there. You can stun them or tase them in Jesus name. You got handcuffs. You can lock them up in Jesus name. Why?

Because authority is good but power is necessary to execute your authority. Now let's bring that down to your life and mine. There are areas where all of us can get into bondage. Some of you brought bondage into your Christian experience. When you got saved you already had some bondages in your life. And if you don't know it, let me make sure you understand just because you get saved doesn't mean every bondage automatically falls away from your life.

That's just not reality. When you get saved as an alcoholic, you are truly saved. But even if alcohol still has a grip on you, you have every right to say now that I'm in Christ, now I want to believe God for a breakthrough so that alcohol doesn't control the rest of my life.

And so you just have to make up in your mind I'm gonna be who Christ wants me to be. Now I'm saved. I got saved and I'm an alcoholic. Don't let anybody tell you you're not saved. Jesus came into your life. So he's there but he comes in to say not only do I want to give you life, not only do I want to give you hope, I also want to give you freedom. And so you stand in faith and you believe God. Whatever process that's going to take you through, believe God that at the end of it by following him and exercising your authority and using your power, God's going to break you free so that you won't be bound to alcohol the rest of your days. See we got to know that in the body of Christ. And we who are saved got to stop beating people up because they have bondage. The church has got to become a safe place for people to find acceptance and love in the process of them getting free from bondages. I'm so sick of Christians who have nothing but condemnation and arrogance for people. You know you need to give up that alcohol. You need to put that bottle down.

Well, if it was that easy, they'd have done it by now. Now you need to suck on that cancer stick. That's the way holiness folk talk sometimes.

Sucking on that cancer stick. Well, okay, they already know. They've heard the message that it's not good for them. But you condemning them, nobody gets condemned in the church. They're condemned in the transformation.

Do you understand that? You can't condemn people long enough until they say, well, you know what? They made me feel horrible, so let me go on and get free. Now what happens is you take people away from the help they need because what you show is that your condemning attitude is not an environment in which they can find freedom.

Oh, I'm telling you now, thank you for my encouragement, sister. I'm telling you all the truth because there are too many condemning folks in our churches and we wonder why more people aren't coming to Christ. If you go somewhere where you got a bunch of mean, holy people, you ever met that kind of holiness?

They so mean, they like a rattlesnake. Don't even smile. Praise the Lord. Well, I wish you would praise it.

And why don't you start by just putting a smile on your face. You don't condemn people into change. Furthermore, we need to be honest with ourselves. Sometimes we pick pet peeves and those are the sins we preach against and talk about all the time while we ignore other sins. Whole lot of folks will condemn you for drinking and smoking and being bound by those kinds of vices and habits. Meanwhile, they never even look at some of the sins in their own life. You ever met backbiting Christians talking behind people's back the thing they won't say to their face?

The Bible talks about verbal sin, gossip, and a whole lot of Christians are guilty of verbal sin. Gossip, they call it prayer requests sometimes. We need to pray for sister Judy because you know what she's doing, don't you? They don't want prayer, they want to gossip. Because if you were really concerned, you'd go to sister Judy and say, sis, what's going on in your life?

Let's talk because I want to see God's best in you. No, you don't do that. Go to find some other folk. You should know what's going on. The devil is busy this evening.

That's nothing but sin. You're listening to Destin for Victory with Pastor Paul Shepherd, Senior Pastor of Destiny Christian Fellowship in Fremont, California. The second half of today's message comes your way next, so stay tuned. To listen anytime, be sure to download our free mobile app. The app allows you to select from any of Pastor Paul's recent messages.

You can order some great resources from our online store, and you can even take notes from the daily messages right on your mobile device, and they'll be waiting for you the next time you stop by. Search for Destin for Victory in your app store and download it today. Romans 8 verse 1 tells us that for those who are in Christ, there is no condemnation, but there is conviction. Here's Pastor Paul with the rest of today's Destin for Victory message, Live Free. And it's amazing to me how folk will condemn certain brands of sin and tolerate the sins in their own life. And drinking alcohol is the only problem. If something is a bondage, it means you can't get free, even when it is holding you against your will.

And guess what? Alcohol isn't the only bondage when it comes to drinking. I know folk who are bound by Starbucks.

It's a bondage. Because unless they drink two cups, or one grande something, I don't know the terms. I don't drink coffee.

That's not a religious thing at all. I drank coffee for years, but a certain time I was at a restaurant drinking coffee for breakfast years ago. I had drank it for years and enjoyed it. I was sitting down drinking it and I got sick. And I said, oh my God.

And so I just thought, well, something just happened that day. The next time I went somewhere else and I ordered coffee and drank it, I got sick. And I said, you know what? My body is trying to tell me that for whatever reason, I can't drink this coffee.

And you know what? I had to learn to listen to my body. And we have to learn to do that. When your body's talking to you, listen to it. Whatever the issue is, your body is trying to help you. And so I stopped drinking. So I'm saying that I'm not condemning coffee drinking.

I would do it if I could. I just had to stop at a certain point. But here's my point. If you're going to be down on your alcoholic relative, why don't you get down on yourself? If you don't drink two cups of coffee, nobody better fool with you. I came to tell you something is wrong with you.

And you need to say, Lord, deliver me. Why is it that I got to drink two cups of something before I can be sweet? Why I got to be mean as the devil? Because you know, I haven't had my coffee.

Y'all better back up off of me. Well, something's wrong then. Why don't you condemn yourself since you love condemning folk? No, because condemnation is never right.

I'm a child of God. There is no condemnation to me. But there should be conviction. See, conviction's different from condemnation. Conviction says God has a better plan for you. He is not going to let you live in this bondage and stay happy. You've got to do what it takes to get free. And so we need to break ourselves free. And that's not the only Christian bondage.

Some Christians can't walk past the refrigerator. When I start lying, you can get up and walk out. I see everybody's still seated. Good. Why? Because sometimes we go through those little seasons where I'm eating too much and it's not because I'm hungry. Sometimes you go through a season and you're frustrated by stuff. And sometimes you eat emotionally.

Oh, I need some honest people up in here. Sometimes you eat emotionally. Am I the only person who has ever gone through a season of emotional eating where you just eating because it's sitting there looking at you? You're not hungry, but you see it. And sometimes when you're going through some tough season or whatever, food will just talk to you. Food will say, come unto me. I will bless you real good. Oh, come on.

I got something for you. So if we all know what that's like, why are we going to condemn other people? Sometimes you're eating. You're not hungry.

You're just eating because it's there to be eaten. And so the idea is exercise your authority and your power, but don't do it to condemn other people. Do it to set yourself free. If I get free, then I can help other people find freedom. If I get free from my own habits and addictions, I can help somebody else. Say, look, baby, I know how to pray for you because I've been there. See, that's how you're helpful.

Be honest and tell them I know where you are. I've been there. And you can get free because I've been there too.

And sometimes our habits aren't say things like eating or drinking or cigarettes or something like that. Sometimes you have an anger issue that is out of bounds. There I've met, not you, not you. I'm not talking about you. I'm talking about somebody on your row.

Look down, see if you can tell who it is I'm talking about. Somebody on your row has an anger issue and their anger goes way out of bounds. See, anger by itself isn't sin. The Bible says be angry, but don't sin. Don't let the sun go down while you're angry. See, that's appropriate anger.

You keep it focused on the issue. You can be angry at an issue and address it properly. That's why the Bible says if your brother sins against you, rebuke him. You have the right to rebuke people. You have the right to tell folks that what you did was offensive, what you said was offensive. I don't appreciate being treated like that. You have every right to say that. You're still in the will of God. You don't have to grin and smile all the time to be saved.

You can shake your finger in somebody's face and say, I resent that. I will not take that off of you. You're all right. You're not in danger of hell fire, but when you go to talk about their mother, when you weigh off the issue, now you're just reading them just for reading sake.

Oh, come on, someone see there. Y'all go perpetrating the fraud acting like you don't know what I'm talking about. You got to know when I go out of bounds, some of y'all when your family sees you're angry, they see at a certain level they all back up because they know you can't be trusted. I came to tell you that's the kind of bondage you need to be free from. If you're a child of God, you had no business getting so angry, you don't even know what you're going to do yourself. You end up saying, woo, I just blanked out.

I know what happened to me. Well then you out of control. If you don't even know what you about to do, something's wrong. You need to get that in check in Jesus name. Say Lord, I want to be free to serve you and I want to be free to be angry in an appropriate way without going out of bounds. I'm preaching good, you just don't know it.

You need to be able to stay in bounds. My anger is appropriate and I don't have to worry about anything and nobody else has to worry. See, cause we don't know you have an anger problem cause you sitting up here looking real Christian. You sitting up here looking real holy and stuff.

Some of y'all got a Bible big enough to choke a mule and you all holy looking and stuff. You praise the Lord. When we asked you, how you doing? Blessed and highly favored. You can't even give us, I'm doing fine.

You got to be blessed and highly favored. Fine. That's good. Well that's good. But tell you what, that doesn't prove to me whether or not you walking in the spirit all the time.

Cause sometimes I've seen some of them saying blessed and highly favored people. Soon as you do something that takes them in another place. See, so the proof that you're saved is not you sitting up here looking spiritual. The proof that you're saved is the way you drive on the freeway. Some of y'all, if we were with you in the car on the freeway, if we saw you, you going through a crisis on your job. If we saw you at your house, lighten it up with your friends and your family over something you don't like.

That's the proof right there. Some of y'all are cousins. We just don't know it cause we never seen you in a cousin environment. Oh see, no, I'm not playing with you.

I'm telling you, I came to tell you the truth. You are in a cousin and we know you can let her rip. Some of y'all, see some folks you can't even imagine them cussing.

I dare you to see them in a certain environment. You're blankety blank, you better get the blankety blank. You want to walk up on them and say sister Josephine.

Fact of the matter is all of us need to check ourselves. Lord, where are there areas of bondage that I need to give to you so you can let me enjoy freedom? I want to be free to not blow everybody away. Some people show their anger through just getting the attitude.

I want you to put some money on your row. Especially if you have a spouse or somebody in your family who hates silence. Some people will punish you with silence. When I'm mad at you, I'm not speaking. Walk right past you. You're coming, passing in the hallway, coming from the bathroom, you going to the bathroom in the morning.

You say good morning. God, because they're punishing you with their attitude. If your spouse is nudging you, that's you. God didn't call you to punish people that way. If somebody does something that offends you, tell them what they did to offend you and let it go.

Be walking around in the summertime and there's a chilly breeze in the house because of your attitude. We need to learn to get ourselves under control of the Holy Spirit. The Word and the Spirit ought to guide and direct us in every area of our lives. And if we will allow it, God will give us not only life and hope, He will give us freedom.

We already have it positionally, now we need to learn to walk in it positionally. Let me encourage you today. Take a personal inventory and see if you're living in bondage, a bad habit, a wrong attitude, a wound from your past that you can't let go. Identify them, confess them, and then allow God to help you overcome them by the power of the Holy Spirit. Thanks for being here for this Monday edition of Destined for Victory and Pastor Paul Shepherd's message, Live Free. Listen to any of his recent messages on demand at pastorpaul.net.

That's pastorpaul.net. We're almost out of time, but before we go, I want to thank you for all you're doing to help Pastor Paul share the love of Jesus through the Destined for Victory broadcast. Your prayers and gifts have helped turn this into a growing ministry with a growing audience, but we don't want to stop there. Taking a cue from Philippians chapter 3 verse 13, we want to press on towards our high calling in Christ.

We'd love to have you join us by keeping us in your prayers and by offering some financial support. In appreciation of your generous gift of $25 or more today, Pastor Paul will send you his brand new book, Lessons from the Vineyard. You know, God has asked all of us as believers to go and bear fruit, but because we each have different gifts, we obey that calling in different ways. In Lessons from the Vineyard, Pastor Paul shows you how to lead people to faith in Christ and to help them grow in that faith. That's Pastor Paul Shepherd's brand new book, Lessons from the Vineyard, our gift to you today by request for your generous donation of $25 or more to Destined for Victory. Call 855-339-5500 or visit pastorpaul.net to make a safe and secure donation online. You can also mail your gift, of course, to Destined for Victory, Post Office Box 1767, Fremont, California 94538.

Again, our address is Destined for Victory, Box 1767, Fremont, California 94538. If there's any area where there is bondage, where you do things that are against your will, you wish you were free to not always practice a certain thing or not always have something that is addictive in your life, I've got good news. Jesus came to make sure nothing could be an addiction in your life except glorifying and praising His name. That's tomorrow when Pastor Paul Shepherd shares his message, Live Free. Until then, remember, He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion. In Christ, you are destined for victory.