Destined for Victory

Paul Sheppard: Some pain seems worse because we can't trace their origin. Pain can be even more painful if we don't know where the pain came from. My first word of encouragement to you is don't sweat it when you can't find answers. There isn't always a one-to-one correlation between what you do and what happens to you.

Guest (Male): Sometimes we suffer the consequences of our own sin, but that's not always the case. Hello and thanks for stopping by for today's Destined for Victory with Pastor Paul Sheppard. In a fallen world, pain will sometimes find its way to you whether you bring it on yourself or not.

Coming up next, a familiar Old Testament story reminds us that pain is not always the result of our own mistakes. As you follow along, pay close attention to what this man did right after enduring unimaginable sorrow and loss. Please be sure to pay us a visit at pastorpaul.net when you get a chance. That's where you can hear any recent Destined for Victory message on demand, including today's. Now, let's listen to Pastor Paul's Destined for Victory message, Three Things to Remember When Life Hurts.

Paul Sheppard: I've entitled this message Three Things to Remember When Life Hurts. If you don't need this now because nothing's hurting, take some notes because you might need it somewhere along the line. I want to give you some wisdom and encouragement. I want to be practical. This isn't really a sermon. I want to wrap this up not so much by sermonizing.

I want to wrap up this talk about pain by simply sharing with you from my heart. Just picture us sitting down together at Starbucks. All you coffee drinkers love Starbucks. I'm going to grab a water from the display there, and you go on and get your fancy stuff. I can't relate when I go to Starbucks. People are ordering all this special stuff I've never heard of.

The wall is full of all these things. I grew up when it was just Maxwell House. I can't relate, but enjoy your latte grande and all that stuff. I couldn't work at a place like that. I couldn't memorize all that stuff. Anyway, you order your special drink and you come sit down at the table. Let's talk through some things. I don't want to preach to you because when you're in pain, you really don't want a sermon. You don't want anybody preaching at you.

When you're in a certain kind of pain, you want somebody to talk to you and not so much preach at you. Some people make your pain worse by what they have to say while you're in pain. I'm not going to do that to you today. I'm just going to talk to you. Let's talk about three things I would like you to remember when life hurts.

Here's the first point: don't sweat it when you can't find answers. That's a challenge for some of us because some of us don't like not knowing. We are people who want answers and information. One of our favorite three-letter words is why. Some of us have been that way all our lives. As children, your favorite three letters were W-H-Y.

Some of you were kids who just needed to know why about everything. As soon as you started talking, that's what you wanted to know. You know some of us were raised where after a while your parents got sick of hearing that. Parents now are much more tolerant and they sit and explain the universe. Some of us were raised by people where you could get a few answers to a few questions, but by the fourth or fifth question, they would say, "Because I said so."

That's why. Because I said so. Ask me again and there's going to be a problem. Then you're going to want to know why you just got popped. Some of us were raised in cold-blooded times. It wasn't abuse when we grew up, you just got popped. I found out there was always an agency you could call, but none of us ever knew that.

Nobody gave us that number. They weren't giving it out at the school or anything. There was a number you could call, but we didn't know. We'd see our friends come to school messed up and say, "What happened to you?" They got tore up. If they had the number, we were raised by people who said, "It's going to take them a while to get to the house. They might be on the way, but it's going to take them a while. Before they get here, you're going to learn something."

That's not in my notes. I've got to help the people in pain. Some pain seems worse because we can't trace its origin. I can't figure it out, and pain can be even more painful that we don't know where the pain came from. My first word of advice is don't sweat it when you don't have answers. There aren't always those kinds of answers. There isn't always a one-to-one correlation. You can't trace it.

If you don't believe me, ask a guy in the Bible named Job. There's a dude in your Bible named Job. Some of you haven't even read much about him because as soon as you heard the name, you wanted nothing to do with the trouble he went through, and you ignore that book. I want you to go back briefly long enough for me to help you understand that there is not always a one-to-one correlation between what you do and what happens to you.

In the first chapter, you find a man whose life is idyllic. This dude's life is going so well. You find in Job chapter one, verse one, he was blameless and upright. That means he was morally sound. King James says "perfect," but that's not accurate in the way we think of perfection. It doesn't mean he was a man who had never sinned at all. He was born in sin like everybody else, but it means he was living a morally sound life. You can't look at his life and see stuff he's doing wrong.

He is blameless and upright. It tells us he feared God and he shunned evil. You can't say this dude is messing up and that's why all the trouble that you're getting ready to read about happens in his life. It's not payback for how he's living at all. He is blameless, upright, fears God, and shuns evil. Verse two tells you he has seven sons and three daughters.

He has possessions. Verse three shows 7,000 sheep, 3,000 camels, 500 yoke of oxen, and 500 female donkeys. He has a very large household, meaning servants. He has a large staff that works in his household whom he employs. He is the greatest of all the people of the East. Northern Arabia would be what they're referring to. You just read a man's resume and thought, "Look at that dude."

With all of that going on, in Job's day, we would call that a billionaire. He wasn't a millionaire; he was a billionaire. Dude had money for real. Everything is clicking on all cylinders and doing well. Not only all of that, but you find as you read through the book other wonderful things about him. He has a wonderful reputation. He is still going to experience pain that none of us have ever had to go through.

Not only is he doing well, but his family is functional. You would think at least he must have had messed-up kids. No. Verse four tells you his sons would go feast in their houses each on his appointed day. They would send and invite their sisters to eat and drink with them. All the boys liked all their sisters. When they were having a feast, they would call everybody to come over for a barbecue.

When was the last time you wanted all your siblings over to the house? Everything was going well. These people were getting along. Job would sanctify them. He would rise early in the morning, as we're told in verse five, and offer burnt offerings according to the number of them all. He said it may be that my sons have sinned and cursed God in their hearts.

What could go wrong in a situation like this? My point is one of the things you have to remember when life hurts is don't try to trace it. Don't look for the one-to-one correlation because that's not a life rule. Sometimes you do all the right things, and for a season, you get all the wrong results. There can be no connection.

We're uncomfortable with that because we like to find something or someone to blame. That's why this happened. The Bible won't let you do that because there are times when you're making great decisions and getting lousy results.

I know I'm a faith-walking man, but I've learned enough that I have to contradict some of this stuff out here. Some of my faith-walking pastor colleagues take it too far. They make you think if you're walking in strong faith, nothing's going to go wrong in your life. I don't know what Bible they're preaching out of. You can be walking in strong faith and all hell break loose in your life.

You need strong faith because life does that way sometimes. That's why you have to learn to walk by faith. All is going well in his life, but keep on reading. Before too long, Satan has this conversation with the Father God and says the only reason everything's going well in his life is because you won't let me get to his stuff. If you would let me get to his stuff, I'll make him curse you.

God said, "All right, let me prove a case to you that he's not serving me only because of how well his life is going. I'm going to let you find out that you're wrong. Go on and touch his stuff. Just don't touch his physical body." As a result of that, when some of us get to heaven, we're going to want to know why did God take Satan up on an offer like that in the first place? Why didn't you just tell Satan he was wrong and keep it moving?

God said, "Fine, I'm going to show you." Job was the guinea pig. He gets permission and look at what happens. He loses his loved ones in tragedy. All ten children are gone. Then he loses his prosperity. All of his wealth is gone, wiped out by the enemy.

Then God says, "I showed you that he wasn't serving me because of stuff. He was serving me because he loves me, he fears me, and he shuns evil. He's living right because it is right." I want to tell somebody God calls us to live right because it is right. I need to help you understand in this day when we have so many people who are putting the American Dream to theology that we need to rightly divide the word of truth.

The Bible doesn't teach that if you live right, everything you ever want is going to come into your life. That's not a biblical teaching. I love you too much to tell you a lie. You need to live right because it is right. Don't live right just because you think you'll get all your stuff. Some of us were raised by some godly people who lived right and never had a bunch of stuff, but they had joy in their heart and peace in their soul.

Their minds were stable and they trusted God day by day. They didn't even think the first thought that they wanted to drive a luxury car. Some of them were riding the streetcar or the trolleys. I'm talking way back in the day now. Some of them never even owned a car of their own, but they loved God with their whole heart.

I'm a little sick of this generation that thinks God owes you something because you live right. You live right; that's to your credit. Yes, God blesses his people. Yes, God has done amazing things in many of our lives. But there is no one-to-one correlation. You can't say, "I live right, therefore I'm supposed to get all this stuff."

That's the American Dream. That's not Bible. Now, if you can get it, get it, and then use it to glorify God. I'm not against wealth. If you can be wealthy, go ahead. I've been broke and I've been broke off. Broke off is better than broke. I'm not glorifying being broke. That's not fun. It's not fun when you can't even pay all your bills and your ends don't even see one another, much less meet.

Have you ever been in that state where your ends can't even see one another? One's on one end of the chasm and one's on the other end, and they're looking for one another but they can't quite see. That's not fun. I don't glorify that. It's great when you can pay your bills, when you're generous in the kingdom, and when you can bless other people. It's wonderful.

Don't get it twisted. That is not only because you're living right. We all know people who are living lousy lives, but they've got a whole lot of money. You live right because it is right. Then you ask the Lord to bless you and see what you get. If we just will discipline ourselves and learn what we need to learn and excel where we need to excel, we can be responsible for the wealth that comes. When it comes, give God the glory for it.

I don't preach against prosperity. I just say prosperity isn't something everybody is automatically entitled to and responsible for getting because they live right. It's not true. Live right because it is right. I've heard people talk that way. Because they're living right and they're sowing into the kingdom, they think God is going to give them a husband. They all believe for a Boaz.

They read the book of Ruth and say, "That's my guy. God is going to give me a Boaz." I'm not going to mess with your faith if you're believing for a Boaz, but notice you don't know what Boaz looks like. I've read the Bible from cover to cover and I have not seen a description of Boaz anywhere in there. The problem is some of you have defined your Boaz to your own personal fantasy and you think God is supposed to give you that.

I'm here to tell you there is not some factory cranking out spiritually-minded men based on your physical specifications. There is no such factory. I preach all over the world. I've been everywhere. It's not happening. If you get you a man and he's kingdom first and doesn't want to break God's heart, you're blessed. What he looks like is what he looks like. It's his priorities that are going to bless your life.

You think you need all that. I know some people who got what they thought they wanted. All good-looking and fine, and they thought that's what they wanted. But I have seen those same people get to a place where they say, "What was I thinking?" If you're believing for a Boaz, you need to say, "Lord, as long as he's got the quality and the character, as long as he has the kingdom passion, as long as he doesn't want to break God's heart, as long as he wants to treat me well, God, I don't care."

He might be a little on the homely side, but I don't care. Some of you need to get there. You're not there now, but you need to get there. You believe for your fine man all you want to. There are some sisters who wouldn't want to make their husbands feel bad, but some sisters here could tell you to do yourself a favor. You don't need too fine. When he's too fine, he knows he's too fine. Everybody else knows he's too fine, and you will spend your life fighting off people.

Guest (Male): Thanks so much for being here with us for today's Destined for Victory message featuring Pastor Paul Sheppard. Always a pleasure to have you with us. Destined for Victory could not exist without the faithful prayers and financial support of listening friends and partners like you. You've been the lifeblood of this media ministry since its inception. It's because of you that we can share the gospel of Jesus Christ with people all over the world.

As you give today, we've got a great thank-you gift to share with you, one that will challenge you to persevere through life's challenges or through a past you can't quite forget. Introducing our booklet, Keep Moving Forward. 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.

It's a great resource for anyone who wants to be more fully equipped to move confidently into the future God has prepared. Again, it's called Keep Moving Forward, and it's our thank-you gift for your generous donation to Destined for Victory today. You can give that gift by phone by calling 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, California 94538. Think about the pains you're suffering now or have experienced in your life. You didn't bring them on yourself, but somebody did you so wrong. Bunches of people did you wrong. Whatever the case might be. And there you are, lonely and betrayed and rejected and miserable. But I came to tell you that while pain is mandatory, it's inevitable, misery is optional.

And that's next time in Pastor Paul Sheppard's message, Three Things to Remember When Life Hurts. Until then, remember: He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion. In Christ, you are destined for victory.