You're in Training, Part 3 (cont'd)

Music Playing Hello and welcome to this Tuesday edition of Destined for Victory with Pastor Paul Shepherd, who is Senior Pastor at Destiny Christian Fellowship in Fremont, California.

You see it almost everywhere you look, people hopping from one job to the next, one church to the next, one marriage to the next. But in this age of broken contracts and shattered vows, the God who never changes asks us to commit to Him, to His ways, and to His instruction. And today, Pastor Paul reminds us that as believers in Christ, we are in training.

And if we quit halfway through, we may as well have never started at all. Stay with us here or visit pastorpaul.net to listen on demand. Again, pastorpaul.net. Now, with today's Destined for Victory message, you're in training. Here's Pastor Paul.

Music Playing God calls you through a ministry and He does it through others in the body of Christ who can then train you and grow you up and mentor you in the things of God. That's what's wrong with us now. We got all these independent folk running around talking about God's hand is on them.

No, it's not. God's hand is not on you because you haven't even been faithful enough to somebody else to put their hands on you. You can have all the inner witnesses you want until someone authorized, trained by God, puts their hand on you, stands in front of you and says God's hand is on you. And I want to anoint you for this or that. You have no business going out in ministry.

We got to get back to that. We got to get back to understanding that there is a succession in the body of Christ. Leadership comes through succession. God does it from one generation to another through the process of succession.

Somebody else has got to see it other than you. The saints told me I was called for. I knew I was called to do what I've been doing throughout my adult life.

Leading people, ministering to people in this way. People said it to me. They saw God's hand years before I saw it. I ran from it. Ran, ran, ran.

Now we got folk running to it. It's okay to aspire for ministry, but you got to do it lawfully. Well, how do you do that?

You're faithful over a few things. You get under a leader. You don't just hop around until you find somebody who will promote you. Sick of these some timey folk that come to your church as long as you will put them on the stage quickly and give them something conspicuous to do.

Doesn't work like that in the kingdom. My first job was to teach a Sunday school class and we had no classroom. Just put a few chairs out. That's your class. Teach them. And do it faithfully. And don't be late. And be prepared when you show up.

Don't be standing there talking about, what y'all want to talk about today? And you do it for years. And I graduated to deacon. Graduated to deacon, which means servant. Graduated to servant.

And you learn how to serve people. And I told you, you've heard me tell the story. One of my jobs as a young deacon was to take the lady who lived the farthest from the church home every Sunday the Lord sent unto the planet. I had to drive that lady. I still don't know what town that was she lived in. It wasn't Philadelphia.

I can tell you that. Church was smack dab in the middle of the city. And this lady lived God knows where. She was a little West Indian lady. She worked as a home servant, living servant, to a wealthy physician and his family.

And they lived way out somewhere. And she wanted to come into church. And she's faithful. She wanted to be there every Sunday. And I didn't have to go pick her up.

They made other arrangements. But my job, Deacon Paul, you take her home. To drive that lady never did give me gas money. She just singing in praise. Oh praise the Lord.

Hallelujah. And you know this is the day where we had three hour morning services. Oh my church, we had church till we were done. Three hour morning service, then you go downstairs and you eat.

Fellowship me y'all. Some of y'all grew up in them fried chicken churches. You'd smell the chicken coming up toward the end of the service. The chicken just hitting you all in your face.

You trying to concentrate on Jesus. Macaroni and cheese just coming at you. Macaroni and cheese, chicken, green beans, little roll on the plate.

Old folk over here slicing pound cake, sweet potato pie. And you were going to eat after church. And she just sitting there fellowshiping and eating and praising God. And you know the other saints would get up and say goodbye and they'd go home. But she was there with that last few.

She wanted to get that last little bit of fellowship in. And I'm standing there deacon because you can't interrupt. You know you just stand there.

I'm just standing there. When is this lady going to be done? She there the last her and two other senior citizens at the table. Everybody else gone in the whole church.

They just sitting there fellowshiping. Long finished eating. Finally she said okay I'm ready brother. They got to drive her way out somewhere.

The days before GPS you just had to get home by faith. Just figure out how to get home. That's my wife. We were dating. Sometime in order to hang out with her she had to drive out there with me.

Come on I ain't going out there by myself. But you had to prove faithful. My daddy told me years later when he used to be really hard on me over things. I was the musician of the church.

And every now and then he'd work me so hard. Every now and then I want to take a little break and we'd have guest singers or something coming in. People I knew. And they're going to lead the music for that service and what have you. And so it's like okay I got some guests coming in. They're going to lead the afternoon service.

Sometimes we'd have special afternoon service or something. So I'll get them situated and I'm going to go home. Take me a few hours. Game going to be on. You know one of them evening games. I'm going to go home and rest and relax. One time I was home I had set it up. The music people, the guests were there. My phone rang. This is my father at the church. Service going on. I've set up the guests there singing. I can hear them in the background.

Saints are worshiping. It's all good. What's the problem? He said did I tell you you didn't have to come to afternoon service. I said well Pop you know I just you know. He said we lived about 10 minutes away from the church. He said I expect to see you in 10 minutes. And I ain't got my church clothes on.

Give me 15 minutes. He said all right but be here. When I got there there was only probably a half hour more of service to go. I didn't have to go back because he wanted me to play something. He said you had to come back because you weren't supposed to not be here in the first place. I had to go sit around for nothing. And he didn't even speak to me at church when I got back there because he knew he had taught the lesson.

Next time save yourself this extra trip by having your happy hips in their service. Unless you've gotten permission not to be apprenticeship. Where do we get off modern day Christians thinking any old thing goes because we wanted to go. You know God doesn't accept our stuff just because we have free choice. You got free choice but that doesn't mean God has to be pleased with it. Cain didn't give well but he gave and he just I guess assumed God was just going to take it. And God said your offering is displeasing to me.

It's not about what we think. It's about what the Father wants. And the Father starts with commitment. Apprenticeship has to do with commitment. You got to be sold out.

You got to be all in. If you're going to follow Jesus you got to follow him all the way. Elisha left his family.

When you look at the rest of verse 20 and 21 of 1 Kings 19 Elisha left his family to follow this new mentor. He said let me go kiss them goodbye. And Elijah said you can do whatever you want. Whatever I've done to you.

Yes I put my cloak over you but he said it's no big deal with me. I told you God's called you. Now it's up to you. You got to respond to the call with commitment. And a lot of us have been called by God.

God's hand is on you. He wants to use you in a more significant way in your family, on your job, in your community, in your church. He's got plans for you.

But he says you've got to now respond with commitment. And Elisha went and took care of things. He took the meal which was a show of respect. He was saying to his parents I honor you as I get ready to leave. I'm not leaving in a huff. I'm leaving honoring you. I'm leaving taking care of you.

He was saying by cooking for them I will always be available to help you if you need me but I must go. There's a calling on my life. And he set out and followed Elijah. We got a generation of very poor followers. Oh we want somebody to respect us.

We want somebody to treat us right and we have our demands and we have our and all of that. But how well do you follow? God's looking for followers in this day. Not only for followers of him but he's looking for us to follow those he's raised up to lead us.

I'm astounded at how poor we follow pastoral leadership in today's church. He ain't nobody. Yes he is. He's God's man. God called him. He's an under shepherd under God. If God called him then you follow him as he follows Christ. And we just he put it on his pants just like I put on mine. Well I put them on the same way but mine are the pastor's pants being put on.

This isn't mano e mano. You know you'll raise up on me like I'm your peer. By brotherhood we are brothers.

By calling though I'm a leader. We'll be right back with more of today's Destined for Victory message from Pastor Paul Shepherd. To listen to any of Pastor Paul's recent broadcasts be sure to stop by pastorpaul.net to listen on demand. That's pastorpaul.net and stay with us after today's message when Pastor Paul joins me from his studio in California. But first the rest of today's teaching you're in training. Once again here's Pastor Paul Shepherd. And if you want to be blessed you got to learn how to follow the leader.

It's not popular but it's right. In the Karate Kid Daniel would have never been anything until he got under the tutelage of Mr. Miyagi. I'm talking about the 1984. The original one. Mr. Miyagi. You all remember Miyagi. Could hardly talk English but that man knew something.

The Lord brought Miyagi into Daniel's life in a time of crisis. The bullies was beating him up. Had him over against the fence. You all remember that. And they went to old bully karate school and they were taught no mercy. And the one boy was telling the other boy leave him alone he's had enough.

You know what we learned. No mercy. Get ready to come in for one final blow. And Miyagi jumps over and saves the day. Miyagi chop them all up.

All of them laying around sprawled out. Daniel sitting there hurting but he sees he's got somebody. And he doesn't know it but Miyagi was throwing his cloak over him.

Saying you are the next karate master but you're going to have to respond to the calling with commitment. And then over in the 2010 same revelation different characters. Jaden Smith moved to China with his mama. Father is dead. He's feeling he's in a whole new world.

No father. They're starting out fresh. His mama's excited but he's trying to figure out how to live in this new world. And he runs into his own bullies over there.

And the same thing happening right at the crisis point. He about to get served sure enough. Y'all saw it. They beat him up a little bit and then the one guy said he's had enough. No mercy. He's about to come in there and take him out. And here come Han. Mr. Han. Jackie Chan. Oh Jackie flies in there.

Handles it. Jackie used some of them to beat the others of them. Y'all remember that? I said I was a bad boy when you can take a bully and beat a bully with a bully. You are bad somebody. I want to learn how to do that myself.

Be so bad you take somebody and beat somebody with that somebody. Anyway let me get back to my message. And as a result of that in effect the cloak was cast over him but he had to respond with commitment. Jaden had to say all right I'm all in. I will learn from you.

His name was Dre in the movie. Dre said I will learn from you. It takes commitment. Number two second quality of apprenticeship in Bible culture is obedience. An apprentice must learn to obey unconditionally. It is not the apprentice job to figure out what he agrees with.

It's not his job to even understand why he's being commanded to do something. Doesn't that mess us up in today's world. Everybody want an explanation about everything before they decide whether they feel like doing something. Starts in the home. We grew up you could ask the question why but you didn't necessarily expect an answer.

Some of us come on y'all we grew up with well why I got to do that. Every now and then you may have gotten an answer but most time you got to look. And that look told you everything you needed to know. The look was your answer.

The look was you better start doing what I just finished telling you relatively quickly. Now full blown explanations. Whole negotiating.

I just watched these parents today in amazement. They sit down. They negotiate. They explain. They rationalize. And God bless y'all.

God bless y'all. If it's working for you work it. But I have no frame of reference. I start scratching I don't even itch. When I see that it just say I don't. Oh. Oh. What's all this negotiating. What's all this.

Would you please consider the possibility of perhaps thinking about picking up your toys and putting them in the box that you pulled them out of. Would you. It would be a really helpful thing if you. Oh. Oh. I can't. I can't handle that. If you don't get them toys in that.

Oh Jesus. And you know these kids are smart. If they can get away with it at your house they do.

You let them go to their aunt or grandpa or somebody who come from a different world. They don't try that same stuff at their house. Kids are smart. They know what they can't get away with. Every now and then the saints bring some little kid over to our house for some fellowship or something like that.

And you can tell the kid don't have no home training. They just all everywhere. And when my wife or me we just say no you can't go in there. They look like what you mean I can't go.

I'm used to going everywhere I want to go in the world. But then we shoot them that look if they try to go anywhere. I said did you hear what I just said. And then you see a look come over there and they're learning. You can see. You see it going on on the inside of their head.

Don't play with this dude. They're learning on the spot. Obedience unquestioning obedience was part of apprenticeship. Jesus learned obedience by the things he suffered. And he shows us and models obedience both at the beginning and at the end of his earthly ministry.

Let me show you what I mean real quick. We want to turn to it in the interest of time. In Luke 4 jot this down and read it when you get a chance verses 1 through 12. Before he launches his earthly ministry. Anointed by John the Baptist. The Holy Spirit has come upon him. Meaning the 30 years of training of apprenticeship under his earthly father is up. Now he's going into apprenticeship under his heavenly father as he launches his ministry.

And it starts where? With the spirit driving him into the wilderness. Why? To be tempted of the devil.

Why? How do you start a ministry in a season of grave temptation? Because the father, the master is proving his apprentice by putting him through that.

He says if you can come out of this then I can use you. And Jesus passed the test. Every time the devil came up with a temptation he passed it with the word. Unquestioning obedience.

He didn't even bother saying what he thought. He said it is written. Here's what my daddy said.

Here's what my master said. That's how he got anointed. Through learning how to be an effective apprentice and the power of God was on him. And at the end of his ministry the worst of all of the temptations really was the temptation to resist the cross. And he passed that one in the Garden of Gethsemane.

When you get a chance read Matthew 26 verses 36 through 44. And you see him in the garden struggling. I mean he struggled so until blood broke through the membranes of his sweat.

He struggled like no man has ever struggled before. But he said nevertheless not my will but thine be. See the problem with you is your will.

I don't want to. That's why you'll never be anything. Because what you want to do is of primary importance. If you ever want to be something for God you're going to have to learn to say nevertheless not my will but thine be done. If you want to be a good leader learn to be a good follower.

If you want God to bless you with much be faithful to what he has already given you. Thanks so much for being here for today's Destined for Victory message. You're in training. As promised Pastor Paul joins me now from his studio. Pastor your ministry to us each day on the radio and with the various online sources for Destined for Victory is so encouraging. And one more thing that you do. Now you feel strongly about this is the monthly encouragement letter that goes out to everyone.

Why don't you say a word about that. Yeah absolutely. The one letter I feel strongly about making sure we produce every month is an encouragement letter. And so I take some time and based on some teaching of that month and occasionally it's not related to the teaching just something that God's put on my heart in that particular time. I write a letter to let people know not only are we preaching messages but we're really trying to impact your life and help you with application. Because again our ministry exists to help people know God's son apply God's word and fulfill God's purpose. And my encouragement letter is designed to help you know him apply his word fulfill his purpose. And so I feel strongly about it. And I want to encourage people who are not on our mailing list to please take a moment and let us know.

Hey I'd love to get the letter. It's absolutely free. There's no obligation for it.

No obligation at all. We will take care of the stamp and everything. All you got to do is let us know we can reach you. We'd be happy to send it to you. We can also send it to you by email. And it's important for you to be encouraged month by month. And so please let us do that. Get in touch with us. Give us your email and your mailing address so we can get in touch with you on a monthly basis. Well the word encouragement means to give someone support, confidence or hope.

Sometimes all three. And that's what Pastor Paul seeks to do each month with these letters of encouragement. Sign up today and you'll be glad you did. Remember Destined for Victory exists only through the faithful prayer and financial support of friends like you. And when you send a generous gift to Destined for Victory, we'll gladly send you by request, Pastor Paul Shepherd's booklet, Creating a Relational Legacy. That's Creating a Relational Legacy, a companion guide to the messages you heard earlier this month by the same title and our gift for your generous donation to Destined for Victory. Please call 855-339-5500 or visit pastorpaul.net to make a safe and secure donation online. You can also mail your gift to Destined for Victory, Post Office Box 1767, Fremont, CA 94538. Once again the address is Destined for Victory, Post Office Box 1767, Fremont, CA 94538. The second characteristic is obedience.

That's what we're currently looking at. Obedience. Jesus modeled obedience for us.

He was our example in all things. When Jesus was about to launch his ministry, he modeled obedience at the beginning of his ministry. That's tomorrow in Pastor Paul Shepherd's message you're in training. Until then remember, he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion. In Christ, you are Destined for Victory.