Set Yourself Up for Success (cont'd)

The most valuable life lessons you'll find yourself acting on it without even consciously knowing you're acting on it. Now offer a foundational principle for achieving biblical success in your life. Stay with us here or stop by pastorpaul.net any time to hear today's message and your recent message on demand. That's pastorpaul.net. And be sure to subscribe to the podcast at Google Podcast or Spotify or wherever you enjoy your podcasts. Now with today's Destined for Victory message, set yourself up for success. Here's Pastor Paul. Being successful is not just doing things right, it's doing the right things.

And the right things are learned best by somebody who God brings into your life to teach you not only the what but the how. So when I said you'd quicker learn it at the movies, I'm thinking of certain types of movies, one of which when I was a young man in the 1980s, some of y'all were just born in the 1980s so just trust me on this. In 1984, a movie came out called The Karate Kid. Karate Kid. Some of y'all only saw the one that came out I think in 2010.

That's nice too. Jayden Smith, he did a good job in his version. I'm talking about the old school one because you got Mr. Miyagi. Come on some of y'all Miyagi people.

Don't leave me by myself. I'm talking about Daniel LaRusso. He moved to California with his mama and didn't like it a little bit. Got in trouble, got beat up at school, all that didn't like it, wanted to go back to New Jersey. But God had a plan for him. Because they moved into a place where Mr. Miyagi lived. Long story short, y'all know that he learned so much. He thought all he wanted to do was go to a karate school and learn how to do karate so he could protect himself from the people who were beating him up.

Mr. Miyagi was old school. He said, no, no, this is not just about you learning how to beat folk up. This is I'm going to teach you some life lessons. And let me pause right here and say something to the younger generations I pray you will get. The most valuable life lessons are more often caught than taught.

Let me say that again. Some of y'all missed it. Jot it down.

Put it on the screen for me if you can. The most valuable life lessons are more often caught than taught. What do you mean, pastor? Some things nobody sat you down and taught you verbally. They just showed you and they led you in it. And before you know it, you had caught something. When you catch stuff, you find yourself acting on it without even consciously knowing you're acting on it.

Because more often, those kinds of lessons are caught than are taught. So in the 84 version of The Karate Kid, Mr. Miyagi, you all remember when he made a pact with Daniel? Because Daniel said, I want to learn how to do karate. And he said, all right.

He looked at Daniel and he said, I promise, teach karate. That's my part. You promise, learn. I say, you do.

No question. That's your part. Then he said, deal. And Daniel said, all right, cool. Daniel still didn't know what he was in for. The first assignment was wash all the cars.

And there was a yard, you all remember, a yard of these old vintage cars. Wash all the cars, then wax. Daniel begins to protest. Daniel said, wait, wait.

I just asked you to be my karate teacher. You're talking about wash your. And as he started protesting, Miyagi said, remember, deal. And then he told him not only what to do, but how to do it. Wax on. He said, wax on, right hand. Wax off, left hand. Breathe in through nose, out through mouth. Wax on, wax off.

Breathe in through nose. Not just one car, all the cars. And after that, next assignment, sand the floor. He had created this wooden area out in this big yard and it had these wooden floors and wooden fences and all that. So he said, sand the floor, the whole floor. Daniel finished late that night.

Took him that long to wash and wax all the cars, to sand the floor. Late that night, he went to Miyagi, finished. And Miyagi said, come back 6 a.m., start early.

The next day, he saw this paint and Miyagi instructed him, paint the fence. Daniel thought he had finished. He came to him and Miyagi said, both sides. Daniel said reluctantly, not yet. He finished both sides and then Miyagi said, come back in the morning.

Start early. In the morning, Miyagi wasn't even there. But he left him a note and some paint. And the note said, paint the house.

Now, you all know. You don't learn this kind of stuff in biz school. You don't learn this kind of stuff from hotshot entrepreneurs who dropped out of college and created what is now a multi-million dollar success story. Great, but you don't learn the principles of being successful from them. Because where they got to, first of all, is not true success. It is admirable for what it's worth, but it's not true success.

If you want to learn true success, it builds something on the inside and not just something on the outside. And so the next morning, you all know, many of you all would have dropped out of Miyagi's karate school at this point. Daniel could not believe it. And when Miyagi returned that night from fishing, he had been out fishing. And he left him with the instruction, paint the house.

When he returned that night, Daniel said, that's it, I'm lighting into this dude. He was angry. He began complaining, for four days you treated me like a slave. I asked you to teach me one thing, and for four days I've been nothing but your slave.

And he's ready to quit him. Don't go away. The second half of Pastor Paul Shepherd's message is coming right up. We want to thank all of you who support Destined for Victory with your prayers and financial support. Those are gifts that help Pastor Paul share the joy of the Gospel message with a growing audience. Destined for Victory is supported entirely by friends like you, so please prayerfully consider making a generous gift today. Give online safely and securely from our website, pastorpaul.net, or give us a call at 855-339-5500.

Again, the number is 855-339-5500. And stay with us after today's message when Pastor Paul joins me from his studio in California. But first, let's tune in to the rest of his teaching, Set Yourself Up for Success.

Once again, here's Pastor Paul. Just when he's ready to quit, Miyagi said, show me, sand the floor. Then he said, show me, wax on, wax off. Show me, paint the fence, paint the house. And as he showed him the correct way to do each of them, he didn't know it, but he was making serious karate moves.

Why? Because the teacher knew that it wasn't just the moves he needed to learn, he needed to build character. He needed to become a person worth dealing with in the world. That's what God is making out of all of us, especially we who represent his kingdom. He said, I don't want a bunch of spoiled rotten kids representing me in the world, so I'm going to teach you all some hard lessons while I bless your life. That's why some of you all got to understand, you can't just be in the bless me frame of mind. Every time you're talking to God, bless me, Lord, bless me, oh, God bless me, oh, bless me, bless me, bless me, Lord, bless me, bless me. Sometimes you don't need to be blessed. Some of you all need to grow up, need to say, grow me up, Lord. Some of you all don't need to be blessed, you need to be tried. Some of you all need to be treated like chicken, boiled, broiled, fried, stewed, roasted, baked, burned, barbecued, blackened, and smoked. And God will do it before he blesses you. So I need you to understand something. God is into making us people who live from a place of success, not just enjoy the trappings of success.

Now the trappings are great. Any of you all who become multimillion dollar persons, send all the tithe into the storehouse. I'm not against you. Oh, I'm not against you all being blessed at all. When we see the envelope and open it up, we supposed to know how blessed you are. I don't fight prosperity.

Prosperity can be a blessing, but prosperity in and of itself is not success. It is doing the will of God with what he's given you. So younger generations, I just want to challenge you to make sure you find the people God brings into your life and then listen to them. My grandmother, one of my dad's mom, my paternal grandmother, one of the things I heard her say more than a couple of times is, boy, you better listen to me, then she said, I'm coming back from where you're going. Better listen to me, I'm coming back from where you're going. If you want to do something, you want to be somebody, I'm not impressed. I can tell you what's down the road.

I can tell you what you better avoid before you make a royal mess of things. And you got to know, sometimes the mentors in your life don't have the brain matter you have. They might be less intellectual than you, but don't make the mistake of believing people who are less intellectual are dumb. Some of the people, they might not have your degrees, didn't go to your school, didn't do all of that, but they had old-fashioned stuff like mother wit. Mother wit, common sense. In case you don't know, common sense is not common anymore. Sense is quite uncommon. Have you ever seen people who are smart and dumb at the same time?

I need somebody to help me through it here. Smart and dumb at the very same. You're like, wait, you got a master's degree?

And you do something that dumb? That's because you don't learn wisdom in school. At best, you learn knowledge in school. You got to get wisdom from the God of wisdom. And from the principles he has sown into the world, and wise people have picked them up and learned them and lived by them. You got to understand, our job then is to take wherever we are in the world, that's your ministry platform. Ministry isn't just what I do up here. Ministry is what you do when you leave here. When you sign off online, you go out to live out the faith.

And you live it where you work, where you live. And God will use you and bless you and make you a blessing, just like he made Elisha a blessing to his generation. God wants to make you a blessing to yours. And so stop thinking, well, pastors in ministry, we're all in ministry. My definition for years, you've heard in ministry is everything we do out of love for God to win the lost, edify believers, and meet people's needs. That's the definition of ministry. If you're winning the lost, if you're edifying brothers and sisters in Christ, helping them, and if you're meeting the needs of people, even folks who aren't in the kingdom of God, and one of their greatest needs is to know Jesus and know how good he is. And if you are reaching people with love and with the power of God and the plan of God for their lives, you are in ministry.

Don't go out and get a black shirt with a white collar. That's not ministry. That's just what some of us in vocational ministry do. Your job is your place of ministry. Your place in the world is your place of ministry.

Wherever you go, God's taking his word, putting it in your mouth to make a difference for his kingdom, both in time and ultimately in eternity. And I need you to know. So what did this boy do? He became an excellent follower. He learned how to follow.

He learned how to learn. You got to understand something. Don't just go out there.

Some people launch before they learn. Learn first. Sit at the feet of somebody who knows what they're talking about and stop looking for perfect people. In fact, do yourself a favor.

Avoid the people who claim to be perfect because I've met several of them on the radio and on TV. They look really, really, really great. Some of y'all just fan out. You just fan out. You just see, oh, that's so and so.

Trust. It ain't all that. Come on, somebody. You might see that glory. You don't know nothing about that story. So I just need you to understand.

I'm done in two minutes or so. This is it. You've got to make sure you position yourself.

Learn before you launch. Serve before you lead. Because at the end of the day, we are all servants. All us big shot preachers on radio and TV, we're nothing but servants. I got friends who are archbishops and all that.

You've got all these titles. It's a great, wonderful archbishop. God bless you. You're a servant. You're a servant with Bishop Garbon. We are all servants. When you get to heaven, nobody going to be a bishop. Ain't going to be no bishop section. You ain't going to need no adjutants. Come on, son.

I'm trying to help you now. No adjutant. You don't need somebody carrying your stuff.

You ain't got nothing to carry. Just glorify God and mind your business. I'm sick of us thinking that there's some big shots and little shots in the kingdom. The kingdom of God, we all stand at the foot of the cross and thank God for his love and his grace and his mercy. I am who I am by the grace of God. I'm nobody special. You're nobody special.

Except we're all special in the eyes of the Lord who loved us and gave himself for us. And so I am not a leader who serves. I am a servant who leads. Some of us have mixed up our identity with our responsibility.

My activity might be leadership, but my identity is always servant. And so if you get those kinds of lessons, learn from the people. Sit at their feet.

Let somebody tell you something. Younger folk do what we did. We did a lot of it informally.

We just would sit and listen to the older folk talk and just listen to them. And there was wisdom in what they said. And stuff like every now and then they let you ask a question. And you learn something that you wouldn't know otherwise. And you got to understand that, and older people, I want to ask you to make yourself available. When you see somebody who's eager to learn, pour into them.

When you see somebody who you just, you see they got that learning gene, it's going to stand out because not a whole lot of folk got that gene. They know it. There's a whole lot of folk that know it all gene.

I wish some of y'all would help. Have you ever met some of these folk? They know everything. They haven't met a mystery in their life. They know everything or they take a good guess at it.

But they're not trying to have you tell them anything. But some of us need to go back to old-fashioned, I'm Daniel, that's Miyagi, I'm going to listen. I'm going to learn so that I can truly do the will of God and succeed in my lifetime. Thanks so much for being here for today's Destined for Victory message, Set Yourself Up for Success. Always glad to have you join us. I'm pleased to welcome in Pastor Paul, who joins me now from his studio. Well, Pastor, we are excited for the opportunities the Lord is giving us to expand our ministry this year.

Let's talk about this new digital platform we'll be launching later. Share with us your heart as you look toward the future of Destined for Victory. I thought way back to the 80s when I was an associate pastor in my dad's church in Philadelphia. During those years, the Lord gave me a vision. He sort of downloaded a vision into my heart and mind about the pastorate I would have when he would send me away from my home church somewhere else in the country I didn't know where.

That ended up being Northern California. And I went there with a vision to reach thousands, and I knew that reaching them by means of media would be extremely important. I knew that then, but then that translated into I got to get on the radio. And so when I came to California, had a real small church but a real big vision, and I said, well, let's get on radio. Eventually the Lord blessed us to do that. And it went from a local broadcast to eventually a national broadcast. And I was so excited to see God fulfilling the vision in that way.

Well, these days that vision still lives. I still want to see thousands more discipled and come to Christ. But I realize that it can't just be radio. I'm grateful for radio. I don't plan to leave radio.

But I want to reach people by all means possible. And today that means we've got to get involved with new digital platforms. I'm excited about what's being developed, the infrastructure we're creating. We're going to have a fresh, new, attractive presence online. We're going to use many social media platforms, everything at our disposal, so I can keep doing what God sent me to California to do back in the late 80s, which was to make sure people understand how to know God's Son, how to apply God's Word, and how to fulfill God's purpose. And I know we're going to do that even bigger and better because of the support we're receiving from our listeners and donors. I look forward to reaching far more people for Christ. That sounds so great. What if God gave us all this technology for the express purpose of his Gospel message?

What do you think? That's an exciting thought. I truly believe that the Church has got to become all things to all men, that by all means we may win some. And in today's world of technology, instead of cursing it, we need to use it for the Kingdom of God, and I'm excited about those possibilities. That's what it all comes down to, reaching as many people as we can with the Gospel of Jesus Christ by any means necessary.

And this new digital platform is set to launch later this year, and your faithful financial support will make that happen. When you make your generous gift today, we'd love to send you by request a brand new booklet by Pastor Paul. Did you know that there is some rather compelling evidence in support of the resurrection of Jesus Christ? Pastor Paul shares that evidence with you in his booklet, He's Alive. That's He's Alive, a brand new booklet from Pastor Paul, which is our gift to you by request for your generous donation to Destined for Victory this month. Call 855-339-5500 or visit pastorpaul.net and make a safe and secure donation online. If you'd prefer to mail your gift, our address is Destined for Victory, Post Office Box 1767, Fremont, CA 94538.

One more time, that's Destined for Victory, Box 1767, Fremont, CA 94538. Sometimes you need favor. Sometimes you need Him to make people say yes.

When their policy says to tell you no. Anybody ever got a house you weren't supposed to get? Anybody ever get a job you weren't supposed to get? Anybody ever had God just give you favor?

I need somebody to know favor is not fair. God's not even trying to be fair. He'll just bless you just because He decided He was going to bless you. And that's next time in Pastor Paul Shepherd's message, The Miracle is in the House. Until then remember, He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion. In Christ, you are destined for victory.