Destined for Victory

Guest (Male): Hello and thanks for being here with us on Destined for Victory with Pastor Paul Sheppard. Before we get going with today's message, When Jesus Comes, we want to let you know about a great resource to help you grow in your relationship with Jesus. It's a thank-you gift to all of you who choose to make a donation to our media ministry. This month's gift is a booklet called Access Granted. To tell you a little bit more about it, here's our executive director, Alicia Greer.

Alicia Greer: Thank you so much to everyone who responded to our appeal. We are so grateful for your support. We're not all the way out of the woods yet, but I can say that your support has helped and we're so grateful for all of you who are continuing to support the ministry. My dad often quoted Philippians 1:6 that talks about God being faithful to complete the work that He has begun in us. I just know that God is faithful to complete the work that He began in Destined for Victory. That work did not end when my father passed, and I have every hope and confidence that God is going to see the work through. We're excited to continue to move forward and we're so grateful for your support.

Guest (Male): Again, that booklet is called Access Granted. It's our gift to you by request for your generous donation to Destined for Victory today. If you'd like to give, we've got several options for you. Stop by pastorpaul.net to make a safe and secure donation online, call us at 855-339-5500, or if you prefer, you can mail your gift to Destined for Victory, Post Office Box 1767, Fremont, California, 94538.

Paul Sheppard: Jesus, when He taught us how to pray in Matthew 6, we call it the Lord's Prayer. Technically, it's not the Lord's Prayer. It's the prayer He taught His disciples to pray, so it's the disciples' prayer. He gave us a prayer agenda and taught us how to pray in terms of giving us a prayer agenda. He said, "When you go to pray, first spend some time in worship, magnifying the name of your Father. Hallowed be thy name." He taught us to praise God around His name, around who He is.

Then He taught us to intercede for the will of God to be done on earth. He said, "Pray your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven." The will of God is always done in heaven. He said you pray now and intercede that the will of God will be done on earth. When you see people who are lost, pray that they'll be saved because that's the will of God being done on earth. When you see injustice, pray for justice because that's the will of God being done on earth. On and on, He taught us to intercede that the will of God is done in the lives of people on earth.

Then He taught us to pray that our needs are met. He said, "Pray, give us this day our daily bread." Pray that yours and the needs of others in the body of Christ will be met, that God will provide for you everything that you need. We don't have a problem with any of those agenda items. Then He gets down to the next one and says, "Pray, forgive us our debts as we have also forgiven our debtors." Don't let that one slip by because the key to overcoming bondage is tucked in there.

Jesus said if you are praying and asking God to set you free from your debt of sin, to set you free from the guilt of sin, if you are acknowledging that you've fallen short of the glory of God and you're expecting God's grace to cover that, He said make sure that you have forgiven all who have wronged you. You might say, "Pastor, what in the world does that have to do with being free from bondage?" Simply this: you can't be set free by God as long as you have your personal jail in which you're holding everybody who's ever hurt your feelings.

Everybody who's ever abused you, everybody who's ever wronged you, everybody who's ever offended you, everybody who has ever made you upset. You know that we have these little personal jails and in our minds and in our hearts, we have locked up a bunch of folk. You're upset with them and you don't mind them knowing it. You are holding them responsible for how they offended you, how they wronged you, how they abused you, how they messed over you, and you are proud of the fact that you have them in jail.

You're proud of the fact that you don't treat them like you treat everybody else because they're in jail and you're the warden and you don't have to be nice to a prisoner. You ever seen folk who sometimes show you that they have a personal jail? You stand there talking to them, having a wonderful time, a little time of fellowship. One person walks in the room, they look over and see them, and all of a sudden their whole countenance changes. You know why? Because they jumped from fellowship to being a warden. They just saw a prisoner walk in.

Somebody I'm holding responsible for what they did in my life. I have them locked up in jail in my heart. Jesus said if you want to be released from your sin and bondage by your Father, you can't ask for release when you are holding people in unforgiveness. Do you know the word forgive from the Greek means to send away? It means to send the offense away. You can't hold them responsible for what they did if you want to be released for what you did. You have to let them go free first.

Jesus said when He taught you how to pray, make sure all of your jail cells' doors are wide open. You've let everybody out. Then you go to the Father and say, "See, nobody's in jail. Now can you help me out, please?" We don't understand how powerful a principle this is. We want to reserve the right to hate our enemies. We want to reserve the right to punish people for what they did to us. You need to understand Jesus simply doesn't give you that right.

Some folk say, "Wait a minute, I have a problem with that. You mean to tell me that I'm supposed to just let people go free? That tells them it's okay to abuse me. That tells them I'm a doormat." No, you don't understand. No one who has ever offended a child of God goes free. The Bible says vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord. Let me tell you something, somebody who's abused you and messed over you, they might look like they're getting by, but they're not getting away.

For the day is coming when they're going to stand before the Lord. The Bible says it's appointed once for every man to die, and after that the judgment. The Bible says about that, that in judgment every sin and every secret thing is going to be brought to light. Don't you fool yourself if someone has offended you as a child of God, they won't get by. It's going to run into God. God is a parent who says, "Don't mess with my kids," and He means it.

When you are called or commanded to release them, to send the offense away, you release them into the hands of the Father. You say, "Lord, you told me not to take revenge on people but to put them in your hands." You know why God makes you send your enemies to Him? Because He loves them and He would rather save them and forgive them and change their hearts than to punish them. So He says release them to me and I'm going to spend the rest of their lives convincing them that they're wrong, convincing them that they must repent because God wants to save your enemy rather than destroy them.

I've seen God so save enemies until they come back on their knees begging forgiveness once the light comes on and they see the error of their ways. Like the Apostle Paul after he was struck down on the Damascus Road and he realized what an awful thing he had done to persecute the church. He spent the rest of his life trying to make up for it by being the most fruitful of the apostles. God loves your enemies and He wants to turn them around. So you cannot take revenge on them because God's got a plan to save them and to do some good things in their lives.

You are called to release them, not so that they can feel like it doesn't matter that they offended you, but you send the offense away and you release them into the Lord's hand. You say, "Okay God, you deal with my enemies and I'm going to go free so I can get on with the rest of my life." A whole lot of people who are holding folk in unforgiveness don't understand that when you hold people in unforgiveness, you have to stay there and be the warden. Meaning, you can't get on with your life as long as you're being a warden.

God's trying to move you down the road, take you on to other things, and you can't go because you're busy trying to watch over the prisoners. Some folk say, "I can't forgive them, they destroyed 15 years of my life." Well, until you forgive them, they're going to destroy the next 15 because you can't move on. Jesus said send the offense away, forgive them, release them into my hands, and then I can begin a process of healing in your life and I can begin the process of dealing with them about messing with one of my kids.

Send the offense away. Now, if you think all of that wasn't in Matthew 6, let me take you to Matthew 18. Matthew 18 goes from bad to worse. You who are trying to hold out the possibility that God will give you permission to hold people in unforgiveness, I want to let you know it's not an option. Matthew 18, Peter came to Jesus and said, "Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?" He's giving Jesus a suggestion. "Seven's a good number, it's a spiritual number, it's the number of completion. How about seven? Why don't you set the limit at seven? How much do I have to put up with? When is enough? Seven times?"

Jesus said, "No, not seven times, but seventy-seven times," or some translations say seven times seventy. The point is, it's not a number, it's a principle. Jesus said whenever you reach a limit and you're ready to say, "Okay, by now I should be given permission to hate them, isn't this enough?" He says no, not yet, and pushes the number out further. They mess over you some more. You say, "Okay Lord, now they did it again. See that? I told you they're no good. Can I hate them now?" Jesus pushes the number out and says no, not yet. "Lord, see, now they're not only messing with me, but now they're messing with my kids. Can I hate them now?" He pushes the number out and says no, not yet. The point is, He'll never give you permission to hate your enemies or to hold them in unforgiveness. Then to drive home the point, He went into a story.

Alicia Greer: Hi everyone, this is Alicia Sheppard Greer. We'll be back to today's teaching in just a moment, but first, I want to share a quick invitation with you. This weekend, March 20th through 22nd, Kingdom Collective is hosting Kingdom Revival Weekend. Three gatherings focused on worship, prayer, encounter with Jesus, and seeking the presence of God together. Destined for Victory and Kingdom Collective have partnered together to share this opportunity as we remain committed to the goal that was near and dear to Pastor Paul's heart: helping people experience victory through encounters with Jesus and His word. The first gathering begins tonight and all are welcome. If you'd like to join us or learn more, you can find all the details at kingdomcollective.com.

Paul Sheppard: Therefore the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. Look at this story. He's bringing all these folk in who owed him money and one man comes in who owes the king 10,000 talents. Now, there were a number of different types of talents depending on what metal you were dealing with. Typically it was talents of silver, but in some cases talents of gold or other metals. We don't know exactly which unit Jesus had in mind when He tells the story, but many scholars speculate that it was talents, and they figure in today's economy a single talent would be worth approximately $2,000.

So, in walks a guy who owes Jesus 10,000 talents. That's 10,000 times 2,000, which equals 20 million. In walks a guy who owes the king 20 million bucks. How did he get that line of credit? Jesus goes on to say since he can't pay, he falls on his knees and says, "Be patient with me and I'll pay you back everything." Yeah, right. How are you going to pay back 20 million dollars? You know why he said be patient with me, I'll pay you back? Because he didn't have the gall to say, "Hey man, I will never be able to pay you back."

So he's asking for time. It's a bogus request. It's a desperate attempt to delay the inevitable. Do you know that your sins and mine are of such a nature that the inevitable result is that you and I must pay the debt or die? And we can't pay the debt. Our sins are the problem and they prevent us from ever meeting the righteous standard of God. All you can do is say, "Lord, please have mercy on me." That's what Calvary is about.

You are the person in this story who owes God 20 million dollars for your sin. You know why it's 20 million dollars? It simply means it's way out of our range. Now if you're a multimillionaire, I have to push the number out for you so you get the principle. You owe 20 billion bucks. I want you to get the point. The point is we can never pay. So you ask for mercy and look at the next verse. It says, "And the servant's master took pity on him, canceled the debt, and let him go."

That's what God did for you on Calvary. Took pity on you, canceled the debt, said you'll never pay, you'll never be righteous unless I do it for you, and He let you go. Now, look at what you and I want to do when we want to hold somebody in unforgiveness for the way they abused or offended us. But that servant went out, found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii. Literally, a few bucks. The verse said he found him. He's cruising the streets looking for this joker.

He's driving around looking for him. I know he's around here somewhere. Spots him on the corner, pulls the car over, jumps out, runs across the street. Look at what Jesus said: grabbed him by the neck and said, "You owe me," let's call it 20 bucks to stick with the 20 analogy. "You owe me 20 dollars and I want my 20 dollars. Tired of playing with you now, I want my money." Grabbed him by the throat, threatened his life. Look at the fellow servant's response: he begged him, "Be patient with me and I'll pay you back."

Sounds familiar, doesn't it? Because you just finished asking God to cancel a debt you'll never be able to pay. When He granted it, you ran out and found somebody who abused you, messed over you, mistreated you, but by comparison to what Jesus did for you, it's like comparing 20 million dollars to 20 bucks. Your hurt is very real. What happened to you is very real. But when you compare it to Calvary, it's nothing. Especially when He says when you release them into my hands, they haven't gotten a by because they have to deal with me because they messed with one of my kids.

By comparison, it's nothing. It's no big deal when you release your enemies and forgive them. And he said, "I'll pay you back." Now, when this guy says I'll pay you back, he can do that. He doesn't have a debt he can't respond to. When God changes the heart of the people who mess with you, they can pay you back. They can attempt to make restitution for what they did if you'll leave them to God and let God change their heart. You may one day get that apology you long for. You may see the changed behavior you long to see.

Even if you don't, always remember they've got to meet God in the end. So you have no reason. They can pay back if they want to. 20 bucks, you can come up with 20 bucks. If you're industrious, you can come up with it just like that. If you're lazy, you can go stand in front of 7-Eleven. Just bum a dollar here, 50 cents there. You'll come up with 20 bucks. I grew up on the East Coast. If you needed money, you could make money. In the summertime, get yourself a little lawn mower, run around and offer to cut people's grass. In the wintertime, get yourself a shovel.

I had a friend of mine, my pastor Gilbert Thompson, when he was in Bible college in Chicago. He was struggling those days and had started his family and he said many were the days when we were poor, down to next to nothing in the cupboard. He said one night I was crying and praying, "Oh Lord, we don't have any food for the next few days. Oh God, you got to come through for me. Here I am trying to study your word so I can pastor and fulfill the calling you put on my life and I'm struggling. Oh God, help me." He said while I was praying, it started snowing.

Chicago in the wintertime. Started snowing. He said it snowed all night. Said when I woke up in the morning, looked outside, I said, "Hey, thank you, Jesus." He said, "Grab my shovel, kiss my wife, say I'll be back." You just go out and knock on doors. Say, "Hey, I'll take care of your walkway, the front and the end all the way down the street." He said I didn't let anybody turn me down. If they didn't like my first price, I went down to a lower one. I went down until they had to let me do it. Came home with pockets full of money.

You can do this and your enemies, God can deal with them in such a way that they attempt to make up for what they've done to you. Even if they don't, they have to meet God. The bottom line is, if you want to be released from the bondages in your life, you must release people who have wronged you. You simply don't have an option. Some folk say, "Yeah, but see, I'm hurt, they hurt me. What am I going to do about the hurt?" You have to give the hurt to God because He's the healer. He's the one who gives you hope.

He can heal where you hurt. If you have a deep bruise, you dress it and you bandage it. You've done all you can do. That's like your forgiveness. When you express forgiveness as an act of your will, when you release, when you send away the offense and release the offender so that you don't hold them responsible but you send them to God who is the avenger, it's like dressing a deep wound. Now if you're bruised, it's still bruised. When you dress it and have done all you can do, now you have to wait for the healing. Same thing with forgiveness.

As long as it's still bruised, if somebody touches it accidentally, you'll wince. It still hurts. Sometimes when people have offended you, you have forgiven them, but it still hurts to deal with them. Don't let the enemy condemn you. That doesn't mean you haven't forgiven. It means you need to trust God for healing. Reaffirm your forgiveness. Make sure you've dressed the wound and then trust God for healing. Some folks say, "Yeah, but if I forgive people, do I have to trust them?" No, those are two different issues.

You forgive people because you send the offense away, but you only trust people who are worthy of trust. If you trust an untrustworthy person, that's not forgiveness, that's foolishness. If you have proven to me that you are untrustworthy, then I can't trust you even if I wanted to because you've proven you can't handle the trust. So I have to trust God and I have to watch you. You have a dope addict kid and they're in and out your house stealing everything they can get their arms around so they can support this habit in their life and they have hurt you and abused you and offended you until you finally understand, "Okay, the word says I got to release them." So you release them.

Now, you don't have to give them a key. No sign you forgave them because you give them a key. That's foolishness. You forgive them, release them in God's hands, lock them out your house. You give them a key trying to prove you forgiven somebody? All right, they took armfuls of stuff last time, now they're going to wait for you to go to work and back a truck up this time, clean you out. You come home echoing all through the house. Forgiveness and trust are two different things. In fact, the Bible says we really should reserve our trust for the Lord anyway.

Guest (Male): You know, God never asks us to do something we cannot do. He may ask you to do the unlikely or the improbable, but He never asks us to do the impossible because with God, there is no such thing. Thanks so much for stopping by for today's Destined for Victory message, When Jesus Comes. To find out more about Destined for Victory's mission and purpose, or about the special gift reserved for you when you give generously today, please come see us at pastorpaul.net. That's pastorpaul.net.

Paul Sheppard: You are not going to be set free from the bondages in your life until you decide that you are going to be a follower of Christ as a matter of lifestyle. Because even if He were to set you free, if you don't follow the Lord, you're going to go right back into the bondage.

Guest (Male): And that's next time in our continuing message, When Jesus Comes. Until then, remember, He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion. In Christ, you are destined for victory.