Destined for Victory

Paul Sheppard: You got to put off the old man, you got to be renewed in the attitude of your mind, and now we're ending by saying then you put on the new man. And this is the fourth habit of putting on the new man that he mentions here: Clean up your language, filter what you say.

Guest (Male): Here's a four-letter word we can use any time: L-O-V-E, love. Hello and thanks for stopping by for today's Destined for Victory with Pastor Paul Sheppard.

You know, when the Apostle Paul asks us to clean up our language, he's not talking about foul language. That's part of it, but there's also harmful language, language that isn't rooted in love but in pride and jealousy, slander and gossip, for example. These are things that can destroy relationships and even divide a local church. Now, let's listen closely to Pastor Paul's Destined for Victory message: The Process of Becoming New.

Paul Sheppard: So far, we've covered three themes, three habits we need to develop in our walk of faith. The first habit we talked about is truth-telling. We got to learn to be people who tell the truth all the time and get out of the lying business. I didn't want to tell him what was really going on? Well, you don't have to tell him what was really going on, but you don't have to lie, too. And so we learned about truth-telling.

Paul taught us about anger management. Some of us still need that. I know you're saved, sanctified, and filled with the Holy Ghost, but sometimes you're in your flesh and you get angry and you need to learn how to manage your anger better. We learned about that. And we learned habit three is making money honorably. Making money honorably. Some of you used to be Slick Willie out in the streets and now that you're saved, you need to quit being slick with it and go on and do it God's way.

Now, we're going to pick it up here in Ephesians 4. Look with me at verse 29. Paul says this: "But do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen." Habit number four: Clean up your language and filter what you say. Clean up your language and filter what you say. Look at your neighbor, say, "Clean it up." Thank you, thank you.

I know you're saved, but sometimes some of the stuff that comes out is less than wholesome. So Paul teaches us the fourth habit. If you're really going to put on the new self, remember, we're in the section where he's talking about the three stages of real life change. He says you got to put off the old man, you got to be renewed in the attitude of your mind, and now we're ending by saying then you put on the new man. And this is the fourth habit of putting on the new man that he mentions here: Clean up your language, filter what you say.

Now, unwholesome. The word there, "unwholesome." The Greek word literally means something that is foul or rotten. Foul. Remember back in the day they called it foul language? That's where they got it from, this kind of thing. Some language is rotten. It's foul. It's unwholesome in the most vulgar way. And so Paul is saying, as followers of Christ, we now want to put on some new things. And one of the things you want to put on is you want to put on language that is wholesome.

There's a wonderful dictionary, there's a wonderful vocabulary you can take advantage of. You can say everything you want to say without going to the place of being foul or rotten. And as a follower of Christ, Paul says that's what we ought to do. Now, this Greek word is usually used about material things, when something is rotten. Oh, don't eat that, that's rotten. Oh, no, leave that alone, that's rotten. It's got bacteria. It's foul.

But it's very interesting that here in Paul's letter, he takes a word that usually speaks of something you don't want to touch materially or physically and he says, stop that stuff from coming out of your mouth. We want to get out of the business of rotten language. You ever heard somebody who just cuss just because? Like, there's no really there's no even rhyme or reason to it. It is not like they're angry even. Now you still ought to learn how to handle anger better. You don't have to fly off just because you're angry.

But some folk are so used to foul language, they don't even have to be mad. Come on, y'all know what I'm talking about. In fact, there's probably a few in here right now and many more online. And just why are you talking like that? What is the point of such gratuitous foulness? So Paul is saying, you want to get out of that business. You want to stop doing that. Make yourself say it better. Say it with class. Say it with dignity. Hit the nail on the head. If there's something you want to say, find the real word, the non-foul word to say it. Teach yourself that. Build it into your working vocabulary and say that. Amen. I brought my own amens in my back pocket right here because y'all are going to sit there looking at me. I just said, "Amen, Doc. Go ahead, Doc. Come on up, Doc."

Yeah, you got to teach yourself how to do this. Now, notice the rest of Paul's sentence, though. He doesn't say just unwholesome talk out of your mouths. He says, "But only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen." So it's really a two-fold thing. That's why I called the habit: Clean up your language, that's one part of it. The other one is to filter what you say. See how he said that in one long sentence. Clean up your language, stop talking so foul. They used to call it "cussing like a sailor." Don't put that on the sailors. The sailors? Oh, yeah, we got Navy people in here today. Marines, Army, all of them. Don't put it on none of the armed forces because y'all ain't never been to the battlefield in your life and cuss like God knows you have lost your mind.

So clean up your language and filter what you say. Look at that second half of the sentence: Say only the things that are helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen. So not only do you want to clean it up, but you want to learn to start filtering what you say.

In fact, a couple of sentences later, as Paul wraps up what we call chapter 4, now remember he wrote one long letter, he didn't create chapters, we did that later, the editorializing did the chapters. But as he ends this portion of his letter, he uses the word "slander" just a couple of sentences later. He says, get rid of several things and one of them is slander. So I want to talk about that in particular because a lot of us are slanderous. Maybe you've never thought of yourself as being a slanderer, but when I get through you're going to see, oh, okay.

Because he says, get rid of slander. Stop not only using certain words, but when he talks about this slander, he's talking more about the reason why you say something in the first place. So now it's not just the word, it's the reason for saying anything. Why did you just open your mouth? Is the question he wants you to ask. And ideally, before you answer it, why am I about to open my mouth and say this? And we live in the world of social media. We live in a world now where people say things to the biggest audience they can make for themselves through followers and likers and all of that, bloggers and podcasters. Everybody's saying something. This is the talkingest world. Everybody, people who ain't got nothing to say are talking all the time. And what's more sad, and they have an audience.

Used to be if somebody did something in a public forum, you listened because you said, well, maybe they got something to say. Now, because of social media, everybody got something to say. People who don't have a job have a podcast. People who don't work a work-a-day world, they are an influencer and making more money than you hitting the clock every day. That's the world we live in. So we got to learn. We could curse the darkness all day, but it's not going to change. This is the new world. What we need to do is turn on the light. Let's quit cursing the darkness all the time, just turn on the light.

Now, how are we going to turn on the light? We got to show them there's a higher way to speak, to communicate. It's a way that pleases God. It's a way for which we can answer on our final day. You do have to remember, and I need to remind you every so often, that this isn't it. It's just not what people think. At the end of the day, we will all give an account. The Bible says every one of us are going to stand before God and give an account for what we said and why we said it. So I'm just helping you get ready for that great day.

So let's look at a couple of things about slander. Slander can take place in three categories. One is making false charges, lying. We've already covered that earlier in the chapter. I don't need to go back to that. Quit lying. Quit leveling false charges at people. That's one way to slander folk. But here are the other two ways you may not have thought about. I need you to think about them. A second way is speaking as fact something that's unsubstantiated.

You say it like it's real. You think it, but you don't have evidence. You don't have proof. This is definitely what happened, but it's what I think. So I'm going to tell it like it happened. You, my friend, are a slanderer because you are putting out something into the world you can't take back. And people who believe you are going to believe the truth, that what you said is true, when in fact it's not. So you've led them down the road of lying. So speaking as fact that which is unsubstantiated.

Imagine what can happen even among good people when if you say in the wrong setting something that you think but it's not true. Think back to the Old Testament. Remember when Hannah went to Shiloh to the temple because she was so distraught that she hadn't gotten pregnant? Remember she went to the man of God? Eli is the priest in Shiloh at the temple. She went in and her heart was so heavy that he looked across to see what she was doing and she was muttering and she looked like she was just muttering as a drunk person could do.

Eli walked over to her and said, "Put away your wine. How dare you come," here's the implication, "How dare you come to the house of God drunk." And I want to say that to y'all. Don't show up here drunk. I'm playing, none of y'all ever came like that. But just as a reminder, don't. He said, "Put away your wine." If he had said that in today's social media world? Got the nerve to come to the temple drunk. Calls herself a woman of God, Hannah.

Imagine what that could do. Everybody who follows you and who knows Hannah, even if they don't know Hannah, just know of Hannah. I had people who hate me because somebody who thought they knew me didn't say something about me and they believed them so they believed that what they said about me is true. And so the more you're known, the higher the chances are people are going to attack you and misrepresent you and think they're doing right and they're dead wrong. And God calls it slander, for which he himself will judge you.

What if he had done that in today's social media world? Now Hannah's reputation is shot. She went to the temple drunk. I always knew there was something. There was something. You know how people do. Then they just say, "You know, I always, I know y'all was always impressed with her. But there's just something." You ever had people do that? "I can't put my finger on it."

But he did the right thing. Fortunately, he said it to her and she clarified it for him. She said, "Oh no, man of God. I haven't drunk a thing. I'm in anguish." And she poured out her heart and told him what was going on. "I can't have a baby. My husband loves me tremendously. It's not on him. He loves me, but I can't have a baby. And that's why I want so much to be a mother. I want to give my husband a son."

She pours out instead of teeing off on him like some of y'all would have done. Oh, see, come on now. Oh, just be honest. Only way to get help, be honest. Some of y'all would have said, "Hold up, just one minute. Call yourself a man of God. Stand up here in the temple, trying to look got your little stuff on, trying to look all holy, and going to come for me. And here I am in the worst condition of my life. You should have discerned something. You say you know God. You should have had some discernment and knew that I wasn't what you accused me of. You should have known if you call yourself a man of God. Looks like to me you ought to have enough discernment." Y'all know that's how it would have gone. Don't even try it. Time y'all have got through with Eli, he'd have had to check his wallet for what his name really was.

She said, "No, man of God," and she cleared him up. After she cleared him up, she was able to get him on her team. He said, "Well, may the Lord bless you." He put a blessing on her heart's desire. And she went on back home and got pregnant.

So slander is never good. Fortunately, he just talked to her. But these days, people don't talk because they're into talking to other folk about stuff. If you're wondering, if you think, "Oh, I think I really did see something that should not have happened," okay, what do you do? You talk to the person. You say, "I got a question. I don't mean to insult you. I really don't mean to insult you, but can you clear me up on something? It looked like that maybe you came to Shiloh into the temple drunk. Is that what happened?" Then you haven't accused. You're inquiring. Accusation and inquiry are two different things. Inquiry is appropriate. Accusation is inappropriate.

And then the person can clear you up. Hopefully, if they're a person of good character and they want to clear you up. Because you know some folk, if you come even with your inquiry, they're going to tell you where to go and draw you a map so you don't get lost. Oh, come on somebody. "Who are you asking where the What the blankety-blank do you mean when I" see because they didn't read verse 29 of Ephesians 4. "What the blankety-blank are you talking about accusing somebody of?"

Now you created a problem. And that's why if you're not sure they're a person who could handle your motive and clear you up, better to just keep it to yourself and pray and say, "Lord, I hope nothing's going on wrong there, but if it is, God, I want you to intervene because I want to see my brother, my sister, do right, do well." Sometimes you talk to God. He's the one. Talk to him, he got you covered. So making false charges or lying, one way of slandering. The other way of slandering we just talked about: speaking as fact something that's unsubstantiated.

Guest (Male): Well, we hate to cut today's message right there, but we are out of time. We'll pick it up right here next time in our continuing message: The Process of Becoming New. Before we leave you today, though, here's a special word from Meredith Sheppard.

Meredith Sheppard: Hello, Destined for Victory family. This is Meredith Sheppard, Pastor Paul's wife. This is the first time you're hearing from me since my beloved husband went home to be with the Lord. And I want you to know your prayers have carried me. Your letters, your messages, cards, books, the ways you've reached out during these months, they've strengthened me through the shock and the grief in ways I can't fully express. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

You know, Paul often said that he wanted to be the Black J. Vernon McGee. He'd say it with that grin of his, but behind the humor was something deeply serious: a vision to create a teaching library that would outlive him, that would keep speaking biblical truth long after he was gone. And that's what he did. For decades, Paul poured himself into building Destined for Victory, not just as a radio program but as a legacy. He wanted to make sure that timeless truth would be available to help people live victorious lives no matter what generation they're in.

That's why I'm talking to you today, because what Paul worked so hard to build needs your help to continue. Recently, we experienced a change in one of our major funding sources, and for the first time in this ministry's history, we're at risk of losing radio stations, of having to pull back from communities where people depend on this teaching. I don't want my husband's voice silenced. I don't want the work he dedicated his life to build to disappear because of funding. We need to preserve what Pastor Paul poured himself into creating.

So I'm coming to you, this family that's already been so supportive, and I'm asking: Will you help us? If Destined for Victory has encouraged you, challenged you, or helped you grow in your walk with God, would you consider giving today? A monthly gift would especially help us stabilize our funding and keep Paul's teaching on the air in every community that needs it. You can give at pastorpaul.net. Thank you for your prayers. Thank you for standing with us. And thank you for your generosity in helping to preserve this legacy. God bless you.

Guest (Male): Thank you, Meredith. We do want to say a special thank you to those who have already responded to this need. And to those who haven't, we want to make sure you know how much you are needed now. When you make your generous gift today, we'll gladly send you a brand new booklet that will help you persevere through life's challenges or maybe through a past you can't quite forget. It's called Keep Moving Forward and it seems rather appropriate in this moment.

Drawing from Israel's transition from Moses to Joshua, this booklet will help you understand that God will go before you as your leader and your protector even when you're facing new challenges. Again, that's Keep Moving Forward, our gift to you for your generous donation to Destined for Victory today. You can give by phone by calling 855-339-5500. That's 855-339-5500. Or visit pastorpaul.net to make a safe and secure donation online. And you can mail your gift to Destined for Victory, Post Office Box 1767, Fremont, California 94538.

Paul Sheppard: You can be slanderous telling the truth. I had that on reliable. Just because it was reliable and you have proof doesn't mean it ought to come out of your mouth.

Guest (Male): And that's next time when we continue our message: The Process of Becoming New. Until then, though, remember, he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion. In Christ, you are destined for victory.