 I want to talk to two different kinds of believers right now. I want to talk to those of you who know that there is a call of God on your life. And I want to talk to those of you who believe that you've lost or missed the call of God on your life. Make sure you listen to this message. I'm talking about how the Holy Spirit is the protector, the call of God on your life. That's the message for this edition of Spirit Church here on the Encounter TV Network. But first, Stephen Mock DeZuma is here. He's going to lead us in some very anointed worship. And then we're going to get right into this message. Here is Stephen Mock DeZuma. Found his life through your command. For this spirit, I surrender. Breath of God, come breathe within me. For this spirit, I surrender. Breath of God, come breathe within me. For this spirit, I surrender. Breath of God, come breathe within me. For this spirit, I surrender. Breath of God, come breathe within me. For this spirit, I surrender. Breath of God, come breathe with me. For this spirit, I surrender. Breath of God, come breathe with me. For this spirit, I surrender. Breath of God, come breathe within me. The Holy Spirit isn't going to fail you. He is going to do everything in His power to make sure that you fulfill the assignment that God has placed upon your life. He's your partner. He's your advocate. He's your help. He's your companion. He is not just with you in the good times. He is not just with you when you're the best version of yourself. The Holy Spirit abides with you even when you mess up. The Holy Spirit abides with you even when you lose strength, especially when you lose strength. You see, when we respond to the call of God, the enemy responds to our response. There is always an opposition to those who are pursuing the call of God on their life. There is this fear in Christianity. There is this fear among those who are pursuing that call of God that they might have missed their call or they might have lost their call because of some mistake that they've made in their past. I'm talking to those of you who think you've missed the call of God or lost the call of God. I'm talking to those of you who know there is a call of God on your life because even if you don't feel you've lost it or you've missed it, at some point you may come to this place where you feel like giving up. At some point you may come to the place where you feel like you've been disqualified. So even if you've never experienced that sense of loss, even if you've never experienced that uncertainty about the call of God, you need to hear this because this will help you to stay rooted. It's important that we as ministers stay focused. We as those who carry the anointing stay focused. I'm not just talking to pastors. I'm talking to evangelists. I'm talking to teachers and prophets and apostles and those with gifts that serve in the church. We need to stay focused and realize that no matter what our task is, whether it's in an official ministry position or whether it's just living for Jesus, when we're anointed and doing something for God, it's possible still that we can go astray. The flesh is so prone to straying off, to leaving its place of purpose. The flesh is so easily distracted. The flesh is so easily lured in to other things. Now I want to look at the book of Jonah because in the book of Jonah we see that there is a prophet that God has called and he calls into the city of Nineveh. But instead of going to Nineveh where he is to preach the gospel, he flees, he gets in a boat and he purposely, intentionally leaves the call of God. Now not all of us have gone to that extreme where we fought the call of God and tried to go the other way. By the way, I love what Jesus says to Saul before he became Paul in the New Living Translation. He says, he basically tells them, it's pointless for you to resist my will. There's no reason for you to do it. It's not going to work. So there are these seasons though where we may feel distracted, where we may feel distant or maybe you are someone who's gone on that extreme where you've purposefully, intentionally, stubbornly resisted the call of God. This is what Jonah did. He was a prophet of God yet here he is resisting the call of God. So the scripture says that he is supposed to go to Nineveh, instead he goes to Tarshish and he leaves, he abandons ship, so to speak. He leaves his call where he's supposed to be going. And the scripture says in Jonah chapter one verse three, but Jonah got up and went in the opposite direction to get away from the Lord. I thought that was interesting. I thought, why would he want to get away from the Lord? But some Bible scholars say that it's possible that Jonah didn't want to preach to the Ninevites because of the history that they had or because of the way the people were, how violent and how wicked. Whatever the reason, Jonah's resisting, he's not wanting to pursue the call of God on his life. And so if we go down to verse four, we find that the Lord prevents Jonah from running, from fleeing. Now you know Jonah, most of you know Jonah, and you've heard Jonah's name mentioned along with the whale. You hear Jonah and the whale. But to me, I find something else much more interesting than Jonah and the whale. I'm more interested by Jonah and the wind. Look at what the scripture says in verse four. But the Lord hurled a powerful wind over the sea, causing a violent storm that threatened to break the ship apart. I love that because remember, as I discussed in a series that I did called Symbols of the Holy Spirit, one of the symbols for the presence of the Holy Spirit is wind. The Holy Spirit is the breath of God. He's the wind of heaven. He is that corrective force in our lives. So here we see this wind from heaven, from the Lord. It proceeded from the Lord, go across the sea and knock Jonah off his course of rebellion. I thought this was amazing because we see an analogy, a symbol, a parallel of the presence of the Holy Spirit in action in our own lives. When we try to go astray, the Holy Spirit moves and destroys our means of rebellion. I love the fact that the wind was threatening to break the ship apart. What does this tell me? It means God will destroy whatever he has to destroy to get your attention. Now I want you to hear what I'm saying and hear me well. God is too merciful to leave you in comfort that distracts you from his will. God is too merciful to let you carry on with what you prefer. God is too merciful to allow you to pursue your own ambitions and dreams to forsake his will. God was merciful to Jonah. He sent a wind, the Holy Spirit, to correct his course. Now there are many other things that happen in this portion of Scripture. Those aboard the ship discover that Jonah was the cause of the storm. The Lord reveals that and they basically, Jonah tells them, just throw me over. They throw him over. We know the story. The whale comes and saves him and then the whale takes him ashore, regurgitates him onto the shore. And then in Jonah chapter three, verses one and two, we see that Jonah gets a second chance. The Scripture says, then the Lord spoke to Jonah a second time, get up and go to the great city of Nineveh and deliver the message I have given you. We see here that God didn't remove the call from Jonah because he ran from it. God chased him to make sure he fulfilled it. The Scripture says that the gifts in the call are without repentance. God has not removed your call. God has not removed your gifts. God has not forsaken you. Those who run from God, they fear that God has forsaken them. When they are the ones that have forsaken God, if they only knew that if they were just to turn back to him, he would accept them. He would embrace them. You see, correction is not rejection. It's positioning. When God corrects you, it's not because he hates you. It's because he loves you. He is determined to get you to fulfill the call that he has placed on your life and he doesn't fail. He's, I love the fact that it is a strong wind, a powerful wind that came from heaven. This wasn't a weak wind. You see, the will of God is not some weak force. The will of God is sheer power. The will of God is what holds all things that exist in reality. The will of God is what holds it all together. It's the stability. It's the foundation. It's the source for anything and everything that you can imagine. Your breath is sustained by the spirit. This universe down to every molecule is held together by the spirit. It is the spirit of God which sustains all, which holds all. And that powerful will of God, that powerful force, that unavoidable, irrevocable, unchangeable force, the will of God is what's over your life. It's not some weak thing. It's not some fragile piece of glass that if we drop it, it's done. The will of God is stronger than you, I promise. The Holy Spirit is more persistent than you, I promise. The Holy Spirit, thank God, is more persistent than you are stubborn. He's more patient than you are rebellious and he will win so you might as well stop fighting him now. He will get his way because you can't change his mind and you can't overcome his power. The Holy Spirit is going to use you. The Holy Spirit will get glory from your life. The Holy Spirit will glorify Jesus through what you do, whether you want it or not. It's the case with Jonah and it's the case with you. Once God has called you, he has marked you. Now it's true that our actions can delay that call. It's true that our actions can cause us to lose time. It's true that our actions can keep us from fulfilling that will of God for the time being. But the truth is that when you are in that place of rebellion, God doesn't just say, okay, I'm done with him. God pursues you. He will send the powerful wind to correct your course just like he did with Jonah. So God calls Jonah to Nineveh, Jonah flees, instead goes to Tarshis. Everyone knows, again, that it was Jonah who was the cause of the storm so they throw him overboard, the whale comes up, it regurgitates him, and then he finds himself being called again a second time. The Holy Spirit, listen, he's trying to help you. Listen to him. Now Jonah, like I said, was eventually restored. And after he goes and preaches to the Ninevites, Nineveh repents. You see, people think they remain forever disqualified because they think it's about them when it's not. It's about souls. It's about lost souls. Ministry, I love, I heard a pastor say this and the way he worded it, it was perfect. Ministry is not a reward. It's a responsibility. You see, the reason we think that we're disqualified forever from ministry when we made a mistake is because we view ministry as a reward, as a status, as something that, and while there is some honor given to those in ministry, that's not primarily what it is. Ministry is a position of service. Ministry is a responsibility. Ministry is an act, it's a rescue mission. It's an act of service. It's an act of humility. So we think we're disqualified, why? Because we think it's about us. When it's not about us, it's about them. God wants to save the lost and he needs to use those he created. That's how he made it. That's how he decided it would be. God decided that the gospel would be spread through us and that's the way it needs to be done. So there are those of you in different places. Some, you're in a rebellious place. I imagine very few of you are watching because if you were really that rebellious, you wouldn't be watching this or listening to this right now because you're trying to avoid the call of God. Perhaps you just stumbled across this, maybe you are in rebellion and you just so happen to stumble across this and God is speaking to you now. It's not too late for you. Those of you who know that there is a call on your life, remember what I'm saying now and listen to those little corrections of the Holy Spirit because he will correct you with a still small voice. Don't ignore him. Don't let the little problems become big mistakes later on. Just listen to his voice. So I want to talk to those of you specifically now who feel you've lost the call, who feel God can't use you or you missed something important. Maybe you look back on a decision you made in career or college or not or this job or not or living in this state or not or living in that country or not or being with this person or not or going to that church or not. You can replay it again and again and again and again, but it's not going to do anything. Your mistake is your mistake. What you missed is what you missed. You're not going to do any good for yourself or anyone around you by living in shame. Shame doesn't solve anything. It's time now to respond to the call. I remember when I was about, I think six or seven years old, I got really angry with my parents and I know it was probably something silly. It wasn't a big deal, but I remember the way I felt inside. I felt so angry. I felt so, how do I word this? I felt so alone. I wanted to disconnect from them. I felt alone. I felt angry. And I told myself, you got to picture this six or seven-year-old me. I'm angry and I said, that's it. I'm done with this family. I'm done with my parents. I'm going to run away. And I remember when I was that age, there was a certain parameter that my parents had set for me to play in. I was only allowed to be in certain parameters. I couldn't go past this house this way. I couldn't go past that apartment complex that way. I couldn't go up to the main road that way. I was only allowed to go so far. But I remember I was so mad, I said, I'm going to break every rule. I'm going to rebel. I'm going to get away from them. And I remember to this day, I walked as far as I could. I passed the apartment complex. I wasn't supposed to pass on foot. I passed another house that I wasn't supposed to pass on my bike. And I walked all the way to the end of the block on the street corner, all the way to a stop sign. That's right. I ran away to a stop sign. I had a few toys. I had a few items. That was it. I was done. And once I got to that sign, I remember feeling so guilty, so ashamed, so scared. I thought, what have I done? And I'll never forget my mother came down the sidewalk, grabbed me by the hand, and just walked me back home. She didn't say anything. She didn't yell at me. She just came and got me and brought me back home. You know, I went to that house years later. This was actually just probably about a year ago I drove by. And I saw the old house, just for memory's sake, I went to go look at it. And then I continued to drive. And I thought, there's the stop sign. And I ran away to. And I looked at the distance and I thought, I really didn't go as far as I thought I did as a kid. And that's what I want to tell you today. You really haven't gone as far as you think you have. You say, brother David, you don't know what I've done. You don't know how dark it feels. You don't know how much agony I've sensed over my mistakes. I understand you might have made big mistakes, but God has bigger grace. You may feel like you're a million miles away from God, but a single moment of repentance can bring you all the way home. If Jonah, who was stubbornly resisting the call of God, ended up fulfilling his call, then how much more will you, who is pursuing the call of God, or who is concerned that you might have missed the call of God? How much more will you be able to fulfill that call? You're protected. There's a powerful wind setting your course. He is the Holy Spirit, the protector of your call. That is it for the lesson. I want to pray with you now. Father in Jesus' name, I pray for those right now receiving this prayer. And I ask, Lord, that you would begin to draw again those who have gone astray, those who feel they've missed it or they've lost it. Father, thank you for your correction. Now help them to put down shame and embrace the ministry and the call that you've given to them. And Lord, for those who've never been in that season, let this message serve to them as a constant reminder to not stray away. Strengthen us, fill us with your power, I pray. Help us, Holy Spirit, fulfill the call of God in the name of Jesus. I want you to say it because you agree, say amen. Well, that is it for the lesson. I want to welcome now the new members of Spirit Church. There you are up on the screen. We love you and we are praying for you. I always say that because I always mean it if you like information on how you can join the Spirit family and use the information at the bottom of the screen. Spirit members get a weekly email from me with a fresh teaching, a fresh word from heaven, and a song from Stephen Moctezuma. He does a new worship song every single week. Also, you can reply to that email that we send to you for prayer support from our ministry staff. And also, when you join Spirit Church, you're joining the Spirit family. Now, over 4,000 members strong. We have over 4,000 members from all around the world. I want to get to your comments now. And these comments are actually from Stephen Moctezuma's cover of the worship song Breathe Upon Me. If you'd like me to possibly read your comment on next week's edition of Spirit Church, then be sure to comment now. Nico Morales Street Miracles writes, I love this song. Thank you so, so much. So bless. Marisol Doneza writes, Love this praise and worship song. It is so touching to my soul. Preacher Man George says, This is one of my favorite songs of all time. It's top five. I'm sure that everyone can say they fell over the power of the Holy Spirit just by listening to it. Jocelyn Tabalina writes, Amen. I really miss this song. Thank you so much. God bless you more and let the anointing of God be with you always. Amen. Well, Jocelyn, you know, Stephen Moctezuma is very gifted at doing this. He takes the older songs and makes them sound new again, and then he takes the newer songs and puts his own unique spin on them. So be sure to go and check out, if you haven't already, Stephen Moctezuma's worship playlist here on the EncounterTV network has over 100,000 views on it as far as the people who've gone through the playlist. And it's perfect for those of you who are looking for something to service the background for your prayer time. Stephen is anointed. Gabriela Hernandez, the final commenter writes, Amazing worship, may our Father keep blessing you and using you for the glory of his name. We want to keep content like this coming to you. Stephen Moctezuma's worship, our miracle services, these teachings that I do, our live broadcasts, some of you even checked out our, what is it called, a vlog that we did. We want to keep the content coming to you, and in fact, our ministry is expanding now more than ever before. Our events are growing. Most of our events now, in fact, all the most recent ones have been standing room only. At several, we've had to turn people away, so we need to start getting bigger venues. I'm telling you guys, the stadiums are coming soon. Our broadcast reach is growing. Our social media accounts are growing. Our YouTube channel is growing. What does this mean? It means we're able to win more souls than ever before, and you can be a part of it. Help us win souls and build believers through events and media by giving a one-time or monthly gift. Now, don't go anywhere. I want to read a verse to you. Proverbs chapter 3, verse 27 says, Do not withhold good from those who deserve it when it's in your power to help them. In other words, if you're able to do something good, just do it. Many of us are so concerned with waiting for the right moment that we miss opportunities all the time. Some of you are waiting for the perfect financial conditions to begin giving you this ministry. You're saying, when I get this job, or that promotion, or that raise, or when I pay off that debt, then I'll be able to help. But the scripture says to seize these opportunities when it's in your ability to do it. Some of us, we have these resources, they're there, but we just don't want to do it yet because we're not quite ready, or we think we're not quite ready to take that step. But instead of over-spiritualizing all of these different things, what we need to do is, in fact, just give generously to the gospel. We need to be people who say, you know what? Despite my situation, despite my circumstance, I am going to support the gospel. Why? Because I don't want to withhold good when it's in my power to give it. So here's my challenge to you. Give a one-time gift or become a monthly ministry supporter. For those of you who can give a one-time gift, I'm asking you to do 100, do 50. Some of you can do 1,000, 5,000, or more. There are some wealthy people watching. I want to challenge those of you who are wealthy. Use your wealth to support the gospel. Use your wealth to win souls. Some of you could do $100,000 like that. I know it because we've seen very large gifts come into our ministry before, and we've used it to expand the kingdom. So those of you who are watching, whatever you can do, whatever God puts on your heart, if you want to give a one-time gift, give a one-time gift. Don't delay. Don't withhold it. Do it now. Also, if you'd like to become a monthly ministry supporter, our partners help us structure the ministry. Why? Because those monthly gifts help us predict what's coming month to month from our donors so that we can more efficiently carry out the mission that God has given to us. If you want to become a monthly partner, and you'll partner with me on a monthly basis for $30 or more, that's $30 or more a month, I will send you either carriers of the glory, 25 truths about demons and spiritual warfare, or encountering the Holy Spirit in every book of the Bible. I'll sign it. I'll send it as my initiation gift to you and thanking you for being my partner. So I want to thank all of you who are giving. If you'd like to give, use the information at the bottom of the screen. There's also some options on our YouTube channel. When the video ends, there's a button for you to click. But I recommend just using the information at the bottom of the screen. Go and partner with me today. Go and give a one-time gift a day. Help us win souls. Help us continue to expand this ministry. Great breakthrough is coming to our ministry and to your life. That is it for this edition of Spirit Church here on the EncounterTV Network. Until next time, remember, nothing is impossible with God. Also, help me win souls by spreading the gospel through events and media. Make a one-time donation or become a monthly supporter by clicking on the donate link now.