 There comes a point in ministry when suddenly everything begins to change. There is breakthrough. There is abundance. There is a new level of influence. There is promotion and all of it comes seemingly in a sudden moment. But those who experience that kind of breakthrough in ministry, those who experience that next level of their call, are those who have been faithful. They have passed the test of faithfulness. And I believe I'm talking to someone right now who is about to pass that test, who is about to get their breakthrough, who is about to go to the next level in ministry, and you are about to experience multiplication, abundance, influence, and promotion. But you have to pass this test. I'm continuing my series, Seven Trials of the Called, and I'm talking on this edition of Spirit Church here on EncounterTV about the test of faithfulness. But before we get into this lesson, Steven Mockezuma is here with me. He's going to lead you in worship. Now remember, open your heart, open your mind, and then we're going to get into this lesson. I truly believe this. Listen, I believe that someone is watching who is on the verge of a breakthrough. You're right there. Hang in there. Here is Steven Mockezuma. When I'll swim because nothing else can take you to feel the warmth of your way. Help me find a way and bring me back to you. You're all. So this is part four of my series. I talked to you in the first part about the test of service. Part two was the test of hiddenness. Part three was the test of discouragement. And now here, part four, I'm talking to you about faithfulness. And as we go through these tests, I'm highlighting parts of the life of Joseph because he really exemplified the call of God fulfilled. He really exemplified one who passes their spiritual, God-given test. And so this test, faithfulness, this one is a little more difficult because there are those who think that they are passing this test, but actually failing it without realizing it. And I'm going to get more into that in just a moment. But first, I want you to go to Genesis chapter number 39 and I'm going to read just three verses for you. And these three verses are powerful when you really meditate upon them and you consider the life of Joseph and you consider the situation he was in. Remember, he had favor with his father. He was sold into slavery by his brothers. That's betrayal. That's discouragement. But he continues to be faithful to the dream that God had given to him. He continues to be faithful to what God had shown him. And this is where we find Joseph. Genesis chapter 39, beginning at verse number one, where the scripture says, when Joseph was taken to Egypt by the Ishmaelite traders, he was purchased by Potiphar, an Egyptian officer. Potiphar was captain of the guard for Pharaoh, the king of Egypt. The Lord was with Joseph, so he succeeded in everything he did as he served in the home of his Egyptian master. Potiphar noticed this and realized that the Lord was with Joseph, giving him success in everything he did. Now I want you to think about this. Joseph was sold into slavery. He was not in a good place. He was in a place now where he was separated from his family, where he was seemingly further from the dream that God had given to him. He didn't want to be there. He wasn't there by his own will. Circumstances had dictated to Joseph where he was in that moment. Yet Joseph faithful to the spirit of God within him, Joseph faithful to the nature of God, which is excellent, which is service, which is humility continues to serve in his fullest capacity so much so that he receives favor from Potiphar. So we see here that Joseph continues to serve even in his season of discouragement, even in a place where he doesn't want to be, even in a place that he was forced into being. He is faithful. He is consistent and he does such a good job in the House of Potiphar that he finds favor. Now this is the test of faithfulness. He gave his best. Now this is a little bit different than my talk about discouragement, which was from last week. I'm talking about faithfulness. Now here is why people think they're passing the test of faithfulness when they're actually not. Faithfulness is not just consistency. But consistency with excellence. You see, it is possible to be active, but not effective. It is possible to be busy, but not productive. It is possible to do something without having your heart in that something. I think about the ministries, the ministers, the organizations that put something into practice, but over time cause quality to be taken from it because of their lack of excitement or because of their lack of passion or because of their lack of reverence for what they are doing. And the truth is we all get tired. We all get drained. I myself get tired. In fact, I'm teaching this. I'm not even on California time right now. I just got back from ministering in Europe. And so I don't even know where I am, what I'm doing, but I'm giving my best here with this lesson. And so there are times when we get tired. There are times when we get drained. There are times when we feel like we've given all that we can give. There are times we feel like the well is dry and that there's nothing left to pull out from there. But that is when we must call upon the Holy Spirit and ask him to empower us unto faithfulness. You see, God looks at how we treat what he has given us. God looks at how we're working with what he has given us. God looks for how we steward the treasures that he has blessed us with. And if we are being faithful to steward those treasures, if we are being faithful to serve in the capacity that God has anointed us to serve, then he will take notice of that. Now, Joseph gave his best, but faithfulness isn't just activity over time. It's excellence over time. Now some will try to skip this process. They say, I don't like the idea of having to remain faithful in places where I don't want to be faithful. I don't like the idea of having to be consistent when I am discouraged, of having to be consistent when I am tired, but this is what God has empowered you to do if you'll allow him to empower you to do it. When we give our best, we are being faithful. When we serve to the fullest capacity, we are being faithful. Faithfulness cannot be had in hours, in months, or sometimes even years. Sometimes God thinks in decades. I think of Moses who was tending to the flock of his father in law, Jethro for 40 years. I think of David who also tended to a flock long before he was king. I think of Jesus who didn't really begin in ministry until he was 30 years old. I think of all of the people who went through processes. I think of all of the people who went through tests and time in order that God might use them. You too are being processed. You too are being challenged. You too are being looked at and tested by the Lord. He's watching to see what you will do with what he has given to you. He's watching to see if you will continue in giving your all to what he has for you. You may be saying, Lord, I want what's next, but God won't give you what's next until you give your all to what is now. And when you've given your all to what is now, then God looks and takes notices and says, I'm going to promote that one. Jesus said that he who is faithful little will be given much that when you are faithful to what he has already given to you. That's what Jesus was talking about when you are faithful with what you have now. That is when God takes notice and says, I'm ready to give them more. Now, I remember in my life, because remember this series in this series, I'm tying in my story too. I remember in my life, there was a season where I did feel like quitting. I talked about this last week when I talked about discouragement. But because I persisted in doing what God had called me to do, there came seemingly out of nowhere. Now you're going to love this. You're this out of nowhere. It seemed was a breakthrough in ministry. I can't tell you what I did differently. I still preached the best that I could preach and it wasn't doing much at the time. I still continue to do what I could do, especially in media and ministry, but there wasn't much that was happening. Still, I persisted. I was faithful and I wasn't just consistent. I was consistent with excellence. That's faithfulness. I didn't just preach sermons consistently. I preach the best sermons I could preach consistently. I didn't just do television tapings or at the time internet tapings. I did the best internet tapings I could do. I didn't just write blogs. I wrote the best blogs that I could write. I didn't just put on events. I put on the best events that I could put on. You see, excellence is not having the best of everything. It's doing the best with everything that you have. And out of nowhere came this breakthrough. Out of nowhere came what seemed to be this fresh wind of the Holy Spirit that breathed upon the ministry and caused it to move forward, caused it to accelerate. I'm telling you everything changed within a matter of weeks and I couldn't identify why. You see, God will let you exhaust all of your effort. God will let you exhaust all of your emotions. God will let you exert all of the force that you can exert. Try everything that you know to try. He'll let you try all the strategies. He'll let you try to enact all your plans. He'll let you try to fill your way through it, think your way through it, pray your way through it and study your way through it and push your way through it and nothing will happen. Nothing will change. But God likes to do that because he wants us to know who is the source of the breakthrough. God likes to wait until the last minute because when the miracle finally arrives, he wants you to know who did it and who deserves the glory for having done it. He'll let you exhaust yourself so that you can look back and say, I was doing everything I knew to do and it was not working. Then suddenly something happened. Suddenly something changed. God breathed upon the work. And it's not again that God, and I think I said something similar to this in one of the past three lessons. It's not that God is standing around waiting in cruelty saying, I'm looking at this one right here and I'm going to wait until they're ready or I'm going to wait until they've exhausted just because I want to. No, God wants to bless you. God wants to be able to trust you with the way to your matters of ministry with more powerful anointing, with greater influence. But he's not going to give something to you that's going to crush you. No, he's going to use the process of faithfulness that you might gain the strength to carry all that he wants to give to you. Faithfulness is the process by which we become people who can receive what God wants to give us. And so I look back at that moment in ministry and there have been multiple moments like that in ministry. Some of you remember when I did the Sid Roth program. Now there were other things in the ministry that I thought, this is it. This is going to be that breakthrough. This is going to help us reach more people than ever. And even in this last season, we've tried many things to try to reach more people and they don't always work. So I had tried different programs. I'm talking about television programs. I had tried different partnerships. I had tried different events just to try to see if we could push the ministries reach a little further. I always want to do something more to win souls. I'm never really satisfied in that regard. More souls, more souls, more souls. That's what I'm all about. And so we had tried all of these different things and there were several times when I thought this is going to be it. This is going to bring the breakthrough. This is going to be what causes us to go to the next level and it didn't come like I thought it would come. It didn't happen like I thought it would happen. And that's how God wants it. He wants it to be that way because he doesn't want us to be able to say that we figured it out. He doesn't want us to be able to think that we saw it coming. He wants to surprise us. He wants to show us that he makes a way where there seems to be no way that he himself is the source of breakthrough. So there we were. We did the Sid Roth program and all of a sudden I think this was more than a year ago now that we did that program and still today it's been almost a year still to this day. I can tell you right here right now we are still riding the wave that hit when we did the Sid Roth program. Now that doesn't happen for everybody who goes on the Sid Roth program. Not everyone gets that big breakthrough from that program but for us it was just the perfect alignment of all the different things and we still to this day are receiving from that one moment. But you see it took almost 15 years to lead up to that moment. It wasn't that we just came out of nowhere or was suddenly it was for almost 15 years we were working and we were serving and we were trying and we were doing all that we could to better the ministry to do more for God to reach more souls than ever before until suddenly all of that preparation had led us to that moment. Now had I been on that program two years earlier three years earlier five years earlier I would not have been prepared to minister the way I ministered on that program. It was all the years that had led up to it I would have been too nervous I would have probably choked but all the years that had led up to that moment is what caused us to be able to seize that breakthrough and so God will give you moments of breakthrough if you are faithful but it's not that faithfulness itself is what gives us the breakthrough. No God is the one who gives the breakthrough but faithfulness is the positioning of yourself to say God I'm ready for a breakthrough and you show that you're ready for a breakthrough not just by being consistent not just by doing things on a regular basis but by doing things with your all pastor are you still putting your best into your sermons are you still keeping your church clean are you still starting your services on time. Are you giving your all writers are you just throwing together something to write because you got to meet a deadline or are you really pouring your heart and your soul onto that page teachers of the word are you pulling sermons from online or are you digging into the word and putting hours into the master craft of teaching the word of God worshippers are you just listening to worship songs and then going out and performing them as you heard them or are you practicing them and letting them get into your heart and finding time in prayer and finding time in the word so that the songs can come out of your heart too. Whatever you do in ministry my question to you is are you really giving your all are you really giving your best or are you just as they say going through the motions and if you're just going through the motions that's not faithfulness you could say God I've been doing this for so long how come you haven't given me breakthrough. Well you've been doing it but have you been doing your best for all that time that is the real question when it comes to faithfulness God looks for faithfulness. The power is not found in the struggle. Powers found in surrendering and trusting God and saying Lord I'm going to do my best not because I think it's going to give me something because I want to bring glory to your name I want to bring honor to Jesus I want to give my best Lord because you gave me your best and I will do it consistently not one week my best the next week not not this month my best and next month not not this year my best and then after six months I lose the passion for it no I'm talking about faithfulness Joseph if anybody could have stopped trying it was Joseph he was a slave yet he continued to act like a son. He was a man who was under oppression yet he continued to live in the freedom of excellence they treated him like a slave but he still acted like a dreamer are you being faithful faithful to the call that God has placed on your life are you positioning yourself for that breakthrough or are you just going through the motions are you being entitled give all that you have to give and leave the results up to God and suddenly you will find there's a shift there's a momentum change be faithful pass your test you could be on the verge I'm telling you you could be on the verge of a breakthrough I want to read this verse to you and I'm going to wrap this up Galatians chapter six verse nine says so let's not get tired of doing what is good just the right time at just the right time we will reap a harvest of blessing if we don't give up don't give up there are no exceptions to the promises of God if you do what God says you will receive what God promises if you don't do what God says you will not receive what God promises this is the law of faithfulness this is the law of persistence and excellence that if you will continue to do what is good if you will continue in it you will say with me say I will reap a harvest say it again I will reap a harvest I want I really want you to say this say it out loud say I will not think it say I will reap a harvest you're going to reap the harvest it will happen those who reap the harvest are those who stood faithful those who don't are those who did not stay faithful it's that simple but remember faithfulness is not just consistency it's consistency with excellence it's persistence with your best it's giving all that you are moment to moment day by day continually and as you are faithful God will bless pass that test of faithfulness well that is it for the lesson I want to pray with you now I want to believe that God is going to touch your life and that he'll give you the strength that you need to continue in faithfulness listen to me minister of the gospel listen to me whoever is in ministry part-time full-time just getting started been in it for years listen to what I'm saying faithfulness is always rewarded by God always there are no exceptions I want you to stretch your hands toward mine I'm just going to give you the strength today so Holy Spirit I pray in the name of Jesus that you would touch that one receiving this prayer now I pray Lord that you would anoint them and strengthen them with the power of the Holy Spirit Holy Spirit you are the spirit of grace you are the one who empowers us unto good works and so I pray precious Holy that you would be faithful to empower you would touch that one receiving this prayer now and fill them afresh with your power touch them anew with your hand and let them sense your presence again father I thank you for the anointing that's not flowing the anointing is flowing he's refreshing many of you he's inspiring many of you to keep going father I thank you for the anointing of the Holy Spirit I thank you Lord for each life being touched in Jesus namely pray I want you to say if 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 we are praying for you and I always say that because I always mean it if you like to know how you can join the Spirit family and go ahead and use the information at the bottom of the screen right here you can join the Spirit family it's absolutely free I'm going to send you a fresh teaching every single week right to your email inbox and on top of that you can reply to that email for prayer support from our ministry staff and you'll be joining a spiritual family that gathers from all around the world in spirit so there are over 2,000 members now of the Spirit Church family and we're so excited that you're going to become one of them and so I want to now read your comments from last week's video the seven trials of the call and this was on the test of discouragement here's what you guys said about the test of discouragement Jamie Piano 18 writes another great lesson that I needed this series is so amazing I am loving it I constantly pray for you and your ministry because God has used you to reach me and I am so grateful your book carriers of the glory is also helping me understand how God works in general the Holy Spirit is drawing me closer to him so that I can fully know him I'm so glad that the book carriers of the glory becoming a friend of the Holy Spirit is blessing you I poured my heart and my soul into that and it is the message of my heart friendship with the Holy Spirit very important Isaiah Cineo writes thank you very much brother David for this wonderful message from the Lord God bless you more writing from Kavit Philippines will God bless you Isaiah thank you for writing to me the next commenter writes thank you for the teaching watching from Botswana South Africa through YouTube men lasenti writes yes brother David I can say this series is really helping me and I feel the Holy Spirit is talking to me through you I was in a state of discouragement but praise God for enlightening me through this powerful and wonderful teaching of yours may God bless you amen another commenter writes this video was awesome David I was genuinely encouraged by it through many afflictions God has strengthened me and I know he'll continue to do so I won't be overwhelmed by discouragement or give up that's what I want to hear and the final commenter Annie's inspirational writes another great teaching thank you so much for this series the Holy Spirit is really using the series to encourage me I prayed the Holy Spirit would continue to lift you and this ministry above expectations in Jesus name God bless you and God bless you and it really is his ministry and you know if you know this ministry you know that my heart is very simple I want to win souls and I want to build the believer the primary message for winning souls is the uncompromised gospel of Jesus Christ and the primary message that I preach to build the believer is the Holy Spirit I love to preach on the Holy Spirit so help me do this help me continue to reach more many of you know don't turn out the video some of you've never got this far into the video before and I want you to see what this is and others you know what I'm talking about but I want you to see this update many of you know we started a campaign of sorts just a few months ago and our goal was to reach 1,000 new $30 a month supporters well here's where we are in that campaign look at this this is how close we are to gaining 1,000 new $30 monthly supporters these are not one-time donors these are people who sign up and say I'm going to give you $30 a month for the preaching of the gospel and they stay with us most of our partners stay with us for years so when you sign up remember this is a long-term commitment you're in this for the long haul you're saying I'm going to stand with you and I'm going to go with you to the nations through my support and I'm going to support the giving I want to support the ministry is in this campaign for one primary reason that is souls and we win souls through it's very simple media and events media is television and YouTube and podcast and blogs and books and events are a miracle services me speaking at churches our conferences so many of those things so here's what we're going to do we are right now raising that monthly support for those two wings of ministry the monthly support will enable us to one do more events more often in more places I want to start coming to the Philippines I want to start coming to Nigeria I want to start coming by the way I was just in England I was in the Netherlands and I was in France and we were making ministry connections trying to get things going in Europe so we are really on the move and this is because of your support we would not have been able to do this had this been six months ago we probably would not have been able to do that but because our monthly support has grown we're now able to go and reach out I have an event coming up this weekend I'll be in Philly after that we go to San Francisco after that we go to Central California after that we're coming to Oklahoma and we have more and more events being planned we're thinking about Colorado we're looking at Nigeria we're looking at Ghana we're looking at the Philippines as I just mentioned we're looking at Australia we're looking at the Netherlands I mean you name it we're looking at it but here's where we need your support that monthly support is going to go to help us do more events more often in more places and second we're going to be able to get our new ministry facility we're almost there as you know we've been looking at facilities I have several people going all different ways looking for just the right property now here's what I need not just your financial support here's what I need you to do I need you to pray that we find the right property because this is a big decision we're now getting to the place where we actually have to start looking because the support's coming in thank God but we got to make a wise decision here because this will affect us for years to come so the building has to have parking so that when you come you can attend it has to allow for public assembly it has to be in a quiet place that's also easy to find so there are a lot of different qualifications for this building that we need to have but I know we're going to find it and your support is coming in so here's what I need you to do become a $30 month supporter help us get this new facility so ultimately can we can win more souls and do more events in more locations now if you sign up to become a $30 a month supporter right now I'll send you either carriers of the glory or 25 truths about demons and spiritual warfare I'll sign it I'll send it to you and that'll be our thank you for becoming our partner our office will contact you and welcome you on as a new ministry supporter do that today we're so close to our goal but that monthly support is what helps us take care of the monthly cost you know the rent or the mortgage the security the maintenance the cleaning all of that the insurance those are all monthly costs the utilities the electricity all of that monthly costs that we need to raise so that we can step in by faith now we're going to do it very very very soon so join in sign on and then don't quit stay with us because if you're a monthly supporter we're depending on your support if you're monthly supporter stay with us don't even think about canceling it say I'll cancel everything else before I stop my giving to the gospel well if you're watching this on YouTube you can wait until the very end a link is going to appear it's going to be a red button you can click right on it and that link will lead you to give a one-time gift or monthly support if you're watching this on the app wait for the video to end and then right after you'll see options where you can partner with David or donate to the ministry if you're watching this anywhere else besides YouTube or the app just use the information at the bottom of the screen go and become right now don't wait do it right now well that is it for this edition of Spirit Church until next time remember nothing is impossible with God