October 12, 2025 • 13 mins
This is a fascinating topic that few of us think about. God has a calling on your life, but he may be using various assignments to prepare you for this calling. In this episode, Sean uses an awesome example from the Bible to encourage us to be patient and wait on God.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:10):
Good morning everybody. This is Sean Copeland. Today is Sunday,
October the twelfth, and welcome to another brand new, life
changing edition of the ninety four X Kingdom Driven CEO.
Thank you, thank you to the fake applause people. I
am so happy to be here with you, guys. I
(00:32):
had a super super fun week this week and listen
to this week. So Monday night and Tuesday we had
the first ever ninety four ex Faith at Work summit
up in Springfield. My team, led by Conrad Griggs, did
an amazing job of putting that together. It was awesome.
(00:52):
I got to speak their tremendous honor. Wednesday night we
had Journey Group, which is our large discipleship group. We
had about thirty two guys crammed into a room at
Southern Hills Baptist Church and it was packed and it
was amazing. And then Thursday I went over to Oklahoma
(01:18):
City for our VIP dinner over there, which was very,
very fun. Friday took a quick trip down to Dallas
and had some meetings down there, and then Friday night
had a Findley's football game and he had we think
over one hundred yards rushing and a touchdown and then
(01:38):
yesterday he and his girlfriend Blair had homecoming and they
looked absolutely precious, and Kennedy, our middle daughter, came home
from college. So man, what a great week and what
an amazing way to top it off. Here with you, guys,
I want to talk with you today about a topic
that I just happened to hear as kind of part
(02:00):
of a conversation. I was talking to some guys and
one of them mentioned the concept of assignment versus calling,
and I thought, what a cool topic. And I'm going
to kind of give you a really neat example to
show this. But sometimes we get our calling and our
assignment mixed up. Our calling is ultimately what God wants
(02:23):
us to do with our life. It is our purpose.
It's the reason that we were placed on this earth.
Assignment assignments are those things that we do on the
way there. Okay, So it don't make more sense here
in just a moment, but I want you to remember
our subtitle, which is don't wear the crown too early, okay,
(02:47):
And our base scripture is going to be out of
First Samuel sixteen and seventeen if you want to go
back and read it yourself. But let's talk about kind
of the gap between the dream and the duty. Have
you ever felt like Guy gave you a big calling,
but your current assignment feels very small, Like you've got
a king's dream but a shepherd's job. Maybe you're anointed
(03:10):
to lead nations, but right now you're just leading a
toddler who won't eat their vegetables. You know God has
more for you, but you're stuck out in the pasture.
Welcome to the space between assignment and calling. David understood
this space. Well, Okay, think about this. He was anointed
(03:30):
to be king, but he was assigned to be a
shepherd for a period of time as preparation to be king.
And here's the key. He did not confuse the two.
So let me give you a few points here to
consider as we're thinking about assignment versus calling. Because I
(03:51):
am positive that I have listeners out there who feel
like you're stuck in a role and you're going, God,
I know, Oh, this is not what you've called me
to do. Why am I here? Well, I think today
is going to answer that question for you. And I
spent much of my life in confusion between assignment and calling,
and that's why I wanted to share it with you today.
(04:15):
Your assignment is what you do. Your calling is who
you are becoming. When Samuel annointed David, oil was dripping
off his head and his dad said, okay, great, but
the sheep still need to be fed. Now that is humbling.
Imagine being told you'll be the next CEO and the
next day your boss says, hey, can you go make
(04:35):
some copies? But David didn't complain, He didn't say do
you not know who I am? He went back to
his post, back to the sheep, because he knew something
that most of us forget. The pasture is part of
the palace process. If you're too big for your assignment,
you're too small for your calling. You've ever seen that
(04:57):
intern who starts the job and already wants the corner office.
And this is an epidemic today. I'm telling you, I
see it all the time. They've been there forty eight
hours and they're already talking about executive leadership strategy and
you're kind of sent in there, going, buddy, you don't
even know where the printer is. Well, that's us Sometimes
with God. We want the promotion, we want the influence,
(05:19):
we want the platform. But God says, can you be
faithful in the pasture. First, we don't want to wear
the crown too early. David knew he was destined for
a crown, but he didn't grab for it. He waited
for God's timing. If David had stormed the palace early,
he would have missed the process that made him a
(05:39):
king worth following. You can't microwave maturity, and you can't
door dash destiny. Some things have to be slow cooked
in obedience. Psal seventy five six and seven says promotion
comes neither from the east nor the west, not from
the south. God is the judge. He puts down one
(05:59):
and sets up another. God's timing isn't just perfect, it
is protective. We want to be the best version of
a shepherd that we can be. When David was in
the field, he didn't slack. He didn't just watch the sheep.
He protected them with his life. First, Samuel seventeen thirty
four and thirty five says, your servant has been keeping
(06:21):
his father's sheep. When a lion or a bear came
and carried off a sheep, I went after it. Now,
if I'm honest, if a bear takes one of my sheep,
I'm saying, well, that one's gone, But not David. He
fought the bear. He killed the bear and went back
to his harp like nothing ever happened. Why because he
took his assignment seriously. Excellence is where you are. A
(06:45):
friend once told me Sean, I want to be a preacher,
and I said that's awesome. How's your small group going?
And he said, well, nobody comes. I said, then preach
like the angels are setting in the front row. If
you can't serve faithfully in front of three, that's not
going to trust you with three thousand. David's excellence in
private gave him credibility in public. If you want to
(07:07):
slay giants later, you better be killing lions now. The
assignment builds character, and the calling requires it. God wasn't
just teaching David how to lead sheep. He was teaching
him how to shepherd people. He was teaching him how
to stay calm and chaos, how to fight for the vulnerable,
how to worship through the lonely seasons. That's what assignments do.
(07:30):
They build the kind of character that your calling will demand.
If God gave you your character before your character gave
you your calling, I'm sorry. Before your character was ready,
it would crush you. Calling before character will not work.
The palace without preparation becomes a prison. James one four says,
(07:50):
let perseverance finish its work so that you may be
mature and complete, not lacking anything. It's like lifting weights.
The resistance is what builds strength. You can't get stronger
without pressure. So when life gets heavy, when the assignment
feels hard, don't say why, God, Say what are you
building in me? God? Your assignment is the gym where
(08:12):
your faith muscles are built. Your calling is the race
where those muscles were made to run. Don't confuse visibility
with value. You might feel unseen in your current season,
like nobody notices your hard work. But let me tell
you something God sees. Matthew six 's four says, then
your father, who sees what is done in secret, will
(08:35):
reward you. Nobody saw David practicing his slingshot in the pasture,
Nobody saw him writing psalms to the Lord. But one
day the whole nation saw him drop Goliath. Here's the pattern.
Hidden seasons precede historic moments. So if you're in a
hidden place, thank God. That's where he shapes kings and queens.
(08:57):
We need to stay humble and let God do the lifting.
When Saul was chasing him, David had a chance to
take the throne by force, but he refused. He said
in One Samuel twenty four to six, the Lord forbid
that I should do such a thing to my master,
the Lord's anointed. In other words, I'm not going to
kill my way to the crown. If I have to
cheat to get it, I'll have to cheat to keep it.
(09:20):
David trusted God's timeline. He didn't hustle into his destiny.
He honored his way into it. In the corporate ladder,
people will climb over each other to get ahead. David
teaches us a different way. Let God open the door,
because when God opens it, no man can shut it.
Sometimes God delays your promotion so your character can catch
(09:42):
up to your title, or he keeps your business small
so that you can be prepared for when it is larger.
One Peter five six says, humble yourselves under the mighty
hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time.
Your assignment may change, but your calling won't. David's a
asignment change many times. Shepherd, musician, armor bearer, warrior and king,
(10:05):
but his calling never changed to love and serve God
with all his heart. Your assignment might change seasons of parenting, business, ministry, leadership,
but your calling is consistent to clorify God wherever you are.
Colossians three twenty three says, whatever you do, work at
it with all your heart, as working for the Lord.
(10:26):
Be the best version of a shepherd, a teacher, a banker,
a mom, a mechanic, a leader that you can be
because excellence in your assignment honors God and prepares you
for your calling. The shepherd who became king still called
God his shepherd. When David did finally become king, he
wrote in Psalm twenty three, verse one, the Lord is
(10:48):
my shepherd. Isn't that beautiful? He never said the Lord
is my subject. He never said the Lord is my assistant.
He said the Lord is my shepherd. He remember who
led him through the pasture, the palace, and the pain.
One day, when David finally put on the crown, it
fit not because of the gold, not because of the growth.
(11:10):
It's because he was ready. His heart had been shaped
in the shadows. Maybe today you're still in the pasture,
still wondering why it's taking so long, But the pasture
is where God grows kings and queens. Don't rush the process,
don't despise the season. Your assignment is your classroom, your
calling is your graduation. And when the time is right,
(11:32):
God will say, now you're ready for the crown. So
let me give you a few key takeaways here. Assignments, prepare,
prepare you for your calling. Don't skip the pasture. Be
faithful where you are. God's watching how you handle the sheep.
Don't wear the crown too early. Let God promote you
(11:52):
in his timing. And your calling is who you are becoming,
not just what you were doing. So I thought this
was so important so that we could be patient as
God takes us through the various stages of life. And
I pray that this speaks to you today. When closing,
I want to remind you that on October twenty eighth,
we have our national ninety four X Faith at Works
(12:15):
Summit here in Tulsa at Oral Roberts University. If you
would like to attend, please go to ninety four xmovement
dot com, click on the summit button, and if there's
any issue with you being able to afford to come,
don't worry about it. Just put in the coupon code
Regent with a capital R, ninety four X with a
(12:35):
capital X, and it will totally be free to you.
I'd love to meet you and love to see you
at our summit. Please let me close the side in prayer. Father,
thank you for the season that we're in, whether it's
visible or whether it's hidden. Teach us to be faithful
in our assignments, to serve with humility and excellence. Shape
our hearts so that when you open the door we're
(12:57):
ready to walk through it. Help us not to work
our crown too early, but to grow into it with
your grace. We love you so much, Father, in Jesus' name. Amen,
and I want to thank you all so much for
joining this edition of the ninety four X Kingdom Driven
CEO
Good morning everybody. This is Sean Copeland. Today is Sunday,
October the twelfth, and welcome to another brand new, life
changing edition of the ninety four X Kingdom Driven CEO.
Thank you, thank you to the fake applause people. I
am so happy to be here with you, guys. I
(00:32):
had a super super fun week this week and listen
to this week. So Monday night and Tuesday we had
the first ever ninety four ex Faith at Work summit
up in Springfield. My team, led by Conrad Griggs, did
an amazing job of putting that together. It was awesome.
(00:52):
I got to speak their tremendous honor. Wednesday night we
had Journey Group, which is our large discipleship group. We
had about thirty two guys crammed into a room at
Southern Hills Baptist Church and it was packed and it
was amazing. And then Thursday I went over to Oklahoma
(01:18):
City for our VIP dinner over there, which was very,
very fun. Friday took a quick trip down to Dallas
and had some meetings down there, and then Friday night
had a Findley's football game and he had we think
over one hundred yards rushing and a touchdown and then
(01:38):
yesterday he and his girlfriend Blair had homecoming and they
looked absolutely precious, and Kennedy, our middle daughter, came home
from college. So man, what a great week and what
an amazing way to top it off. Here with you, guys,
I want to talk with you today about a topic
that I just happened to hear as kind of part
(02:00):
of a conversation. I was talking to some guys and
one of them mentioned the concept of assignment versus calling,
and I thought, what a cool topic. And I'm going
to kind of give you a really neat example to
show this. But sometimes we get our calling and our
assignment mixed up. Our calling is ultimately what God wants
(02:23):
us to do with our life. It is our purpose.
It's the reason that we were placed on this earth.
Assignment assignments are those things that we do on the
way there. Okay, So it don't make more sense here
in just a moment, but I want you to remember
our subtitle, which is don't wear the crown too early, okay,
(02:47):
And our base scripture is going to be out of
First Samuel sixteen and seventeen if you want to go
back and read it yourself. But let's talk about kind
of the gap between the dream and the duty. Have
you ever felt like Guy gave you a big calling,
but your current assignment feels very small, Like you've got
a king's dream but a shepherd's job. Maybe you're anointed
(03:10):
to lead nations, but right now you're just leading a
toddler who won't eat their vegetables. You know God has
more for you, but you're stuck out in the pasture.
Welcome to the space between assignment and calling. David understood
this space. Well, Okay, think about this. He was anointed
(03:30):
to be king, but he was assigned to be a
shepherd for a period of time as preparation to be king.
And here's the key. He did not confuse the two.
So let me give you a few points here to
consider as we're thinking about assignment versus calling. Because I
(03:51):
am positive that I have listeners out there who feel
like you're stuck in a role and you're going, God,
I know, Oh, this is not what you've called me
to do. Why am I here? Well, I think today
is going to answer that question for you. And I
spent much of my life in confusion between assignment and calling,
and that's why I wanted to share it with you today.
(04:15):
Your assignment is what you do. Your calling is who
you are becoming. When Samuel annointed David, oil was dripping
off his head and his dad said, okay, great, but
the sheep still need to be fed. Now that is humbling.
Imagine being told you'll be the next CEO and the
next day your boss says, hey, can you go make
(04:35):
some copies? But David didn't complain, He didn't say do
you not know who I am? He went back to
his post, back to the sheep, because he knew something
that most of us forget. The pasture is part of
the palace process. If you're too big for your assignment,
you're too small for your calling. You've ever seen that
(04:57):
intern who starts the job and already wants the corner office.
And this is an epidemic today. I'm telling you, I
see it all the time. They've been there forty eight
hours and they're already talking about executive leadership strategy and
you're kind of sent in there, going, buddy, you don't
even know where the printer is. Well, that's us Sometimes
with God. We want the promotion, we want the influence,
(05:19):
we want the platform. But God says, can you be
faithful in the pasture. First, we don't want to wear
the crown too early. David knew he was destined for
a crown, but he didn't grab for it. He waited
for God's timing. If David had stormed the palace early,
he would have missed the process that made him a
(05:39):
king worth following. You can't microwave maturity, and you can't
door dash destiny. Some things have to be slow cooked
in obedience. Psal seventy five six and seven says promotion
comes neither from the east nor the west, not from
the south. God is the judge. He puts down one
(05:59):
and sets up another. God's timing isn't just perfect, it
is protective. We want to be the best version of
a shepherd that we can be. When David was in
the field, he didn't slack. He didn't just watch the sheep.
He protected them with his life. First, Samuel seventeen thirty
four and thirty five says, your servant has been keeping
(06:21):
his father's sheep. When a lion or a bear came
and carried off a sheep, I went after it. Now,
if I'm honest, if a bear takes one of my sheep,
I'm saying, well, that one's gone, But not David. He
fought the bear. He killed the bear and went back
to his harp like nothing ever happened. Why because he
took his assignment seriously. Excellence is where you are. A
(06:45):
friend once told me Sean, I want to be a preacher,
and I said that's awesome. How's your small group going?
And he said, well, nobody comes. I said, then preach
like the angels are setting in the front row. If
you can't serve faithfully in front of three, that's not
going to trust you with three thousand. David's excellence in
private gave him credibility in public. If you want to
(07:07):
slay giants later, you better be killing lions now. The
assignment builds character, and the calling requires it. God wasn't
just teaching David how to lead sheep. He was teaching
him how to shepherd people. He was teaching him how
to stay calm and chaos, how to fight for the vulnerable,
how to worship through the lonely seasons. That's what assignments do.
(07:30):
They build the kind of character that your calling will demand.
If God gave you your character before your character gave
you your calling, I'm sorry. Before your character was ready,
it would crush you. Calling before character will not work.
The palace without preparation becomes a prison. James one four says,
(07:50):
let perseverance finish its work so that you may be
mature and complete, not lacking anything. It's like lifting weights.
The resistance is what builds strength. You can't get stronger
without pressure. So when life gets heavy, when the assignment
feels hard, don't say why, God, Say what are you
building in me? God? Your assignment is the gym where
(08:12):
your faith muscles are built. Your calling is the race
where those muscles were made to run. Don't confuse visibility
with value. You might feel unseen in your current season,
like nobody notices your hard work. But let me tell
you something God sees. Matthew six 's four says, then
your father, who sees what is done in secret, will
(08:35):
reward you. Nobody saw David practicing his slingshot in the pasture,
Nobody saw him writing psalms to the Lord. But one
day the whole nation saw him drop Goliath. Here's the pattern.
Hidden seasons precede historic moments. So if you're in a
hidden place, thank God. That's where he shapes kings and queens.
(08:57):
We need to stay humble and let God do the lifting.
When Saul was chasing him, David had a chance to
take the throne by force, but he refused. He said
in One Samuel twenty four to six, the Lord forbid
that I should do such a thing to my master,
the Lord's anointed. In other words, I'm not going to
kill my way to the crown. If I have to
cheat to get it, I'll have to cheat to keep it.
(09:20):
David trusted God's timeline. He didn't hustle into his destiny.
He honored his way into it. In the corporate ladder,
people will climb over each other to get ahead. David
teaches us a different way. Let God open the door,
because when God opens it, no man can shut it.
Sometimes God delays your promotion so your character can catch
(09:42):
up to your title, or he keeps your business small
so that you can be prepared for when it is larger.
One Peter five six says, humble yourselves under the mighty
hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time.
Your assignment may change, but your calling won't. David's a
asignment change many times. Shepherd, musician, armor bearer, warrior and king,
(10:05):
but his calling never changed to love and serve God
with all his heart. Your assignment might change seasons of parenting, business, ministry, leadership,
but your calling is consistent to clorify God wherever you are.
Colossians three twenty three says, whatever you do, work at
it with all your heart, as working for the Lord.
(10:26):
Be the best version of a shepherd, a teacher, a banker,
a mom, a mechanic, a leader that you can be
because excellence in your assignment honors God and prepares you
for your calling. The shepherd who became king still called
God his shepherd. When David did finally become king, he
wrote in Psalm twenty three, verse one, the Lord is
(10:48):
my shepherd. Isn't that beautiful? He never said the Lord
is my subject. He never said the Lord is my assistant.
He said the Lord is my shepherd. He remember who
led him through the pasture, the palace, and the pain.
One day, when David finally put on the crown, it
fit not because of the gold, not because of the growth.
(11:10):
It's because he was ready. His heart had been shaped
in the shadows. Maybe today you're still in the pasture,
still wondering why it's taking so long, But the pasture
is where God grows kings and queens. Don't rush the process,
don't despise the season. Your assignment is your classroom, your
calling is your graduation. And when the time is right,
(11:32):
God will say, now you're ready for the crown. So
let me give you a few key takeaways here. Assignments, prepare,
prepare you for your calling. Don't skip the pasture. Be
faithful where you are. God's watching how you handle the sheep.
Don't wear the crown too early. Let God promote you
(11:52):
in his timing. And your calling is who you are becoming,
not just what you were doing. So I thought this
was so important so that we could be patient as
God takes us through the various stages of life. And
I pray that this speaks to you today. When closing,
I want to remind you that on October twenty eighth,
we have our national ninety four X Faith at Works
(12:15):
Summit here in Tulsa at Oral Roberts University. If you
would like to attend, please go to ninety four xmovement
dot com, click on the summit button, and if there's
any issue with you being able to afford to come,
don't worry about it. Just put in the coupon code
Regent with a capital R, ninety four X with a
(12:35):
capital X, and it will totally be free to you.
I'd love to meet you and love to see you
at our summit. Please let me close the side in prayer. Father,
thank you for the season that we're in, whether it's
visible or whether it's hidden. Teach us to be faithful
in our assignments, to serve with humility and excellence. Shape
our hearts so that when you open the door we're
(12:57):
ready to walk through it. Help us not to work
our crown too early, but to grow into it with
your grace. We love you so much, Father, in Jesus' name. Amen,
and I want to thank you all so much for
joining this edition of the ninety four X Kingdom Driven
CEO
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