June 8, 2024 • 26 mins
God bless you, grace and peace. Welcome back to Soteria Prophetic Ministries. In this episode, we explore the evidence of your call as a minister of the Lord Jesus Christ through five key signs.
First, we discuss the importance of being sent and the burden to see souls saved. Drawing from Matthew 1:21, we highlight the significance of being mantled with the mission to preach the gospel and minister salvation. This calling drives you to share the Word of God and testify of His goodness.
Next, we delve into the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ, which sets you apart in your ministry. Based on Mark 1:22, we examine how true authority manifests in your prayers, preaching, and overall ministry, bringing signs, wonders, and divine confirmation.
The third sign is the anointing of the Holy Spirit, as outlined in Luke 4:18-19. This anointing empowers you to preach the gospel, heal the brokenhearted, and bring deliverance. We emphasize the multifaceted nature of this anointing and its role in your boldness and effectiveness as a minister.
We then explore the gift of prophecy, which allows you to hear and speak forth God's Word. Using the example of Jesus and the woman at the well, we illustrate how the spirit of prophecy can reveal hidden truths and bring healing to those you minister to.
Finally, we discuss the evangelistic mantle that accompanies your calling. This burden to see people saved and draw them to Christ is a hallmark of your ministry. We encourage you to use every opportunity and platform to minister and lead others to salvation.
We pray that this message has been a blessing to you and look forward to sharing more insights at the next appointed time.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
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God bless you, grace and peace. Welcome back to Soteria Prophetic Ministries.
I'm going to talk to you for a few moments about, let's see how I want to title this.
I'm going to talk about five signs that point to the evidence of your call as
a minister of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Five signs. Now, there are many.
I don't want you to get stuck or form a boundary to read around five,
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but I'm only going to give you five signs that point to the evidence that you've
been called as a minister of the Lord Jesus Christ.
It is an honor to be chosen.
The Bible says, for many are called, but few are chosen.
We're all called to a greater or lesser degree to be a witness to the Lord Jesus Christ.
Now, whether that means in your own home, in your community,
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in your workplace, in your broader community, region, nations, or what have you.
So we all have a metron or a sphere of influence that God has given us to be
a witness, to testify of his goodness,
to show forth the power of God as demonstrated in our lives,
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and to make disciples, right?
But then there are some, we're all called to do that, But then there are some
who are chosen out of that to take on the mantle of ministry.
Another word for mantle is the burden or the weight of the work of the ministry.
So I'm going to give you five signs, just five, that point to the evidence.
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Because some of you may be saying, you know what, I feel like I'm called.
I can't tell you how many people I've come across in my life,
ministry life as well. The Lord called me. The Lord called me.
The Lord called me. Well, again, many are called, but few are chosen.
It's not enough to be called, but have you been set apart?
Has the Holy Spirit of God set you apart for the work of the ministry?
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All right. First thing I want to talk about is coming out of Matthew 1, verse 21.
And I want to point to being sent. Sent.
Some of you hear that the kind of the terminology, make sure you're a sent one
and not a went one, right?
Went one, meaning those that just kind of took up their own assignment,
a self-made or a manufactured or a counterfeit assignment, and they just gone out there, right?
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And are trying to endeavor and engage in the work of the ministry.
Well, we're going to talk a little bit about that. So Matthew 121,
and she will bear a son and you shall call his name Jesus, for he shall save
his people from their sins.
So one of the hallmarks, one of the evidentiary signs of being called is you will have a burden.
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You will be sent, right? Mantled.
You will be equipped with a burden to preach the gospel, right? To save.
This is a mantle to minister salvation.
That's before the prophetic, before the apostolic, because a lot of us get it.
One of my spiritual sons was talking about being activated. If we all want to
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be activated and be released to do something, right?
We want to prophesy. I don't know what we want to do.
But the first sign is what Jesus, what the Word of God declares in Matthew chapter
one, she will bear a son, his name will be Jesus, and he shall save.
So one of the first signs that point toward your evidence as being called as
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a minister is you're going to have a burden to want to see souls saved.
Not prophesy to them, not make them members of your church, not have them join
your network, not have them buy your book, which there's nothing wrong with
none of those things, hear my heart.
But what I'm saying is that first drive or Your passion, that's why you hear
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people talk about the passion of Christ, was to see souls be saved.
So one of the first signs that you've been called is you want to see people
saved and you have been sent, whether you're ministering to them at home or
on the phone or wherever your platform,
wherever your pulpit is, you want to see people saved, right?
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You want to save people from their sins or you want to be that agent that the
Holy Spirit can use to minister salvation. Jesus Christ does the work, right?
And then along with that comes that proclamation or that unction to preach.
Preach as you are led or as you are given utterance by the Holy Spirit. That's in Mark 1 38.
And he said to them, let us go into the neighboring towns that I may proclaim, right?
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And they're also for it was for this I came forth.
So as a minister, you've got a burden to see people saved.
And you also have an unction or an utterance or a release in your spirit to
preach or to to minister or to proclaim or to speak forth, right?
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So that people can hear the word of God. Faith comes by hearing,
hearing by the word of God.
And then right up underneath that, still talking about the first,
this is just the first sign, y'all. All right. Number one, you say you've been called.
Okay. So then in that, do you have a passion to see people saved?
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That's got to be your number one passion because why else would God need you to minister?
He wants you to minister means to serve, to be a servant.
And so he wants you to be a servant in the kingdom of God and also to be a servant
unto the people of God so that you're ministering to them the precepts that
are necessary for salvation.
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Get them saved. He said, for this is why I came forth to minister the word of
God, to preach the word of God. And in Matthew 18, 1, he says,
and I came to save that which was lost.
So again, first sign of many, but I'm only going to give you five,
is you have a passion to save or to see people be saved. Let me clarify.
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You've got an unction or an anointing, a release, an utterance to proclaim or
preach or minister or speak the word of God. Are you always testing about his goodness?
You're always talking about the goodness of God and you're drawing people in
so that they can hear the word of God like Rahab, right?
And her faith, when it was activated, she received salvation and God saved her
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and her whole household.
And then you also, your burden is to save the lost.
Lost so you're not saving saved people
and I say that because many times we
say we're called but then we only we're only driven to minister to the saved
people like we don't want to go into the hedges and highways we don't want to
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which I'm going to get to that evangelize we don't want to go into those places
that are dark and scary we want to be safe well God is not calling you to be be safe, right?
He's not chosen you to be safe.
He wants you to go out and seek and say that which was lost.
So second sign that points to the evidence that you've been called is the authority.
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Now that you've called, you've responded, God chose you, and you're manifesting.
Ministering salvation, you're preaching and proclaiming, and you're ministering
to the lost, you also need the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ.
You got to minister with authority.
You got to preach with authority. You got to pray with authority.
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You have to exercise the work of ministry with the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Those signs and wonders has to be authorized.
The sons of Sceva, some of you may be familiar with that passage where they
tried to duplicate, and we see that a lot, don't we? We see these counterfeit things happening.
And they tried to duplicate what they saw the apostles do.
And those demons said, Paul, I know. And I figured who the other person they
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said they knew, but who are you? And they were attacked.
There are many right now who have, again, the went ones, did not,
first of all, have no passion to see souls saved at all.
They're just, I don't know, have a different agenda. It's not a kingdom agenda. It's a self-made.
Or a personal agenda. And so they're operating out of these counterfeit spirits,
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counterfeit authority.
The true authority in Mark chapter one, verse 22, the Bible says,
and they were astonished, right?
The sign of the authority of Jesus Christ brings astonishment. It shocks people.
It makes them, it causes them to be in amazement. And again,
not at you, but at the power of God, right?
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They were astonished at his doctrine
for he taught them as one that had authority and not as the scribes.
So if you've been set apart, you've been called for the work of the ministry,
there has to be manifestation or evidence of the authority of Jesus Christ.
Like when you pray, does heaven move? When you minister, are hearts convicted?
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When you exercise in any other area of ministry, is there a movement of God?
Is there a confirmation?
Is there an angelic or spiritual, godly spiritual activity?
Or is it just noise like Apostle Paul talked about? Is it just rumbling sound?
Is it just a tinkling noise? So the authority will set you apart from those
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who have not been authorized.
In other words, you will be able to engage in aspects of ministry history and
you'll see signs and wonders.
The Bible says, follow them, which believe those who have been authorized.
Okay. And this is nothing you've got to conjure. And you know what I'm saying?
You don't have to do anything weird or spooky.
It's the authority. Jesus Christ himself will confirm. The Lord will confirm his word, right?
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And with that, there is, I don't want to get ahead of myself because I want
to talk about this boldness.
But when you know that you're speaking with the authority of the Lord Jesus
Christ, you don't operate in fear.
That's why the Bible says God has not given us the spirit of fear, right? But a power.
In other words, authority, authority, authority.
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So we don't speak regardless of what it is God has us ministering.
We don't speak out of fear or cowardice or of doubting.
You know, we speak confidently. We speak boldly. Why? Because we have been authorized.
Have you ever used someone's debit card? And like sometimes I'll give my kids,
my adult children, my debit card and say, hey, go and pay this bill or go fill
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my, you know, because I don't, I don't like to put gas in my car.
So I say, hey, can you take my card and put some gas in it or what have you?
And I'll give them my card.
Well, there's no fear when they're using my debit card because I've given them authority, right?
They have my password. They've got the PIN. They've got the zip code,
all the information that they will need in order to ensure a successful transaction.
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I've given them the authority as opposed to someone else who would take my card
and use it without my authority.
Guess what? but the card is blocked, sell, decline, and there may be some criminal
ramifications and legal sanctions that follow because you've operated out of
order. You have not received permission.
You have not been graced or granted to do that work.
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And there are consequences, people of God, when we operate outside of our grace
or beyond those boundaries that God establishes for us. Okay.
And so along with that authority is also the word exousia, which is like, it's a Greek word.
And it means with force, with great capacity, competency, freedom, or mastery.
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Now, and it doesn't mean you have to be loud because, you know,
sometimes we get it twisted.
And we think that because a person has a very loud, thunderous voice,
oh, that person is operating in the anointing. That's not necessarily the case, right? Right.
We find that when Elijah was on the mountain, you know, going through some emotional
things or what have you, the Lord spoke in a still small voice.
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So if we say that the manifestation of the anointing on someone's life or the
authority of Jesus Christ on someone's life is because they are loud and they
have this thunderous, baseful voice, then the scripture comes to contradict that.
Because, gee, the Lord spoke in a still, small voice. And so we don't want to
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assume that because someone is
speaking eloquently and their words are heavy-weighted or heavy-dropping,
some people just have a real heavy, strong voice.
We bless God for that. I don't. I have very tender vocal cords,
and I inherited that from my dad.
I can sing a couple of songs, and if I get into a real good vamp,
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the next few days, my voice is hoarse.
If I start praying and I'm getting into the, you know, the meat of my prayer,
the heart of my prayer and that wheel of prayer is turning and my voice begins
to intensify because the Holy
Spirit now is making an utterance and intercession, I can lose my voice.
So I have very tender vocal cords.
But beyond that, I know that I operate in the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ.
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So we don't have to holler and yell because God is not deaf and we're all intelligent people.
Right. As an educator, we teach classroom management.
How do our students learn? They learn by engagement.
They don't learn by the teacher standing, screaming and hollering at them.
So you learn by being taught.
Right. You learn by being able to listen. Again, faith comes by hearing.
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I need to be able to hear and understand and articulate what you're saying. OK.
One of the third and I'm almost I'm wrapping up a third key that points to whether
you've been called. right?
How do we tell whether a person has been called?
This is kind of my third key in directing toward the evidence of the call is the anointing.
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We talked about the authority, but we also need the anointing, right?
We need the anointing. We need the spirit of God.
The Bible says in Luke 4, 18 and 19, the spirit of the Lord is upon me. Why?
Because he has anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor.
That's the first...
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Purpose of the Holy Ghost upon a minister is to anoint you, which means to empower
you, which means to equip you to preach the gospel to the poor,
the poor in spirit, not financially poor, but poor in spirit, right?
In other words, those who have a very low level understanding of who God is,
a very basic generic level.
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Oh, I know who God is. Oh, God is good. He's good all the time. Poor in spirit, right?
That's all they know. And that's okay. You build on that foundation.
So the Lord, he has anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor.
He sent me to heal. I want you to listen to this, right? This is in Luke 4, 18, 19.
And it's also in Isaiah. So when you are anointed as a preacher,
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this is what that anointing is for.
And I know we stray away from a lot of this stuff, y'all, but this is the word of God.
Okay. This is how it works. This is how it's supposed to work as an apostle.
That's my job to make sure I don't care how far you strayed away.
Way, you got to come right back to these precepts.
The anointing on a preacher's life, on a minister's life is to preach the gospel to the poor.
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Again, the poor in spirit, those who have a very basic, the babes in Christ, right?
The new converts, you're going to preach the gospel to them, right?
You're going to heal the broken hearted.
Again, you're going to heal the brokenhearted. That means it's going to come
an anointing of the counselor, right?
The Prince of Peace. So we're not anointed to destroy people.
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We're not anointed to call their sins out and expose them and embarrass them.
And I know the scripture says, rebuke before all the others may fear.
But then there's some steps that we take before we get there, right?
And we got to watch if we're acting out in those spirits and we need to we need
to look within and see why, what's driving me to humiliate people?
What's in me that needs to be fed to destroy people?
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So there's an anointing to heal the brokenhearted. There's an anointing to preach
deliverance to the captives.
There's an anointing to minister recovery of sight to the blind.
There's an anointing to set at liberty those that have been abused or bruised, right?
And to preach the acceptable year of the Lord, seasons and times, times and seasons.
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That's Luke 4, 18, 19. So again, how do I know I'm called?
Oh, I had a dream. The preacher at the conference told me there's a calling
on my life. What do I do? Well, you need to answer these questions.
This is how you survey, right? If you have been genuinely called,
do you have these traits, these virtues operating in you?
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If not, then it's time to get on your knees and pray. It's time to get into the Word.
It's time to get under some good Bible teaching so you can grow and develop
and not just be called, but be
chosen and set apart for the work and be released to do the work of God.
So again, I just want to follow up. That anointing is a multifaceted anointing, right?
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We hear many say, touch not my anointed, do my prophets no harm.
In other words, that anointed is all encompassed in this Luke 4, 18, 19.
Don't touch those who operate in these graces. Don't, because you are hindering
the work of God and you make yourself an enemy of the cross and that,
trust me, friends, you don't want to be on that side. Okay.
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To follow up with that, that anointing brings that boldness.
That's what I wanted to kind of, I was segwaying here earlier,
that there's a boldness that comes, that anointing makes you bold.
The anointing operates in boldness.
So if you're still operating in fear, then you got to seek the Lord about the, where's my anointing?
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Where is the grace to do this? Because why am I still fearful?
Because if I'm fearful, then I'm trusting in my strength and I haven't tapped
into the empowerment of the Holy Ghost.
That means there's some fasting that needs to take place. There's some deliverance
that needs to take place, right? Because there's still some soulish things that are in the way.
And you'll never be able to operate at the fullness of the anointing that God
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has released upon you and made available to you if you're still operating in
fear and doubt and unbelief. Those are works of the flesh.
So there is a boldness. Jesus Christ himself preached with with boldness.
He didn't cut corners. He was blunt, right?
Paul was blunt. Peter was blunt. These folks, they were so blunt that people
were ready to kill, right?
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But there were others who sorrowed unto repentance. Their heart was so convicted
by the word that they said, what can I do to be saved?
That word cut them, right?
So you're going to be able to speak frankly.
You're not going to sugarcoat it. You're not going to paint it up.
You're not going to add to it or take away. You're going to tell it just like
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the Holy Spirit of God gives it to you.
You're going to speak it with boldness. You're going to speak it with precision.
You're going to speak it with skill.
All right. My fourth point that points toward that evidence of the call is the gift of prophecy.
I didn't say the office. We're not talking about that. I'm talking about the
gift of prophecy. Can you hear God?
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That prophecy, if you divide that into two words is prophet,
which means to speak forth, right?
Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God comes forth.
Every word that proceedeth or comes forth, there's a speaking forth.
That's what prophecy means.
In other words, you are your mind because you're filled with the Holy Spirit and your mind is open.
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You've put on the mind of Christ and you're hearing what God is saying.
You're receiving what he is saying and you're releasing it to the people.
John 4, 16 through 19, gosh, and 25 through 29, Jesus said, go and call your husband.
Remember, he was talking to the woman and she said, I have no husband.
Jesus said, I know you don't have a husband. I'm paraphrasing for the sake of time.
And he said, you had five and the one that you have now is not yours.
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So you did speak truthfully.
So the spirit of prophecy was able to reveal to Jesus this woman's personal
life, even to the amount of relationships, husbands that she had,
even to the husband that she was with, that God didn't put them together.
He said, so yeah, you're being honest. He was able, by the spirit of prophecy,
he was able to say to her, yes, you have been honest with me, right?
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And then she says, sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. And she said,
I know that the Messiah come, which is called Christ.
When he's come, he will tell us, Jesus said, I am he that you're speaking to.
And then it goes on. And then she went and told everybody, come and see a man
which told me all the things I ever did. Is this not the Christ?
Because she came in contact with the spirit of prophecy that began to open her heart.
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This, many times I know when I'm ministering, and I can tell when I'm looking
at my congregation's face or kind of the reactions, that the spirit of prophecy
has manifested in my message and is speaking to the hearts of people.
Now, listen, I don't know what's going on in my natural mind, right?
But as you're ministering, the spirit of prophecy will begin to speak and touch
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the hidden, hidden, dark, deep places of a person's soul, and it begins to unlock and bring healing.
Remember, that's one of the manifestations of the anointing,
to bring healing, right, to the brokenhearted.
And that's what Jesus did. It's not always in three days you're going to get
a car, get ready, get ready, which again, there's nothing wrong with that.
If you need a car, pray the Lord will bless you.
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But what I'm saying is there are deep things that people are going through.
And if you're chosen, not just called, if you're chosen as a minister of the
Lord Jesus Jesus Christ, as you are ministering, whether it's a conversation at Starbucks,
whether you're in Walmart, Target, at the hair salon, the spirit of prophecy
is going to come into that conversation and you're going to begin to minister.
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And you're going to be able to share things that will touch that person's heart
that they've never told you, that they never, you know, probably share with anybody else.
But the spirit of prophecy will go straight there and God is speaking forth
and he's talking to that individual through you.
Lastly, what is another sign that I'm truly called? What is evidence?
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What is an evidentiary sign that demonstrates or confirms that I've been called as a minister?
My last point, again, there's more than five, but I'm giving you five because
this is a lot to digest, I'm sure.
Some of you may have to listen to this teaching a few times and take your notes
and take your scriptures and begin to pray about this, right?
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And just see, God, you know, has my vocation been fully formed?
Have I been called? Am I chosen? Have I been truly set apart?
And if so, are any of these things being manifested in me?
So my fifth point is you've got the boldness to proclaim, right?
You want to see people saved.
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You have this anointing. You've got the authority.
You've got the prophetic operating
in you, right? Doesn't mean you're a prophet or nothing like that.
It's just the Spirit of God is a testament of Spirit of Prophecy.
It's a testimony of Jesus Christ.
But along with that, to close me out is there is an evangelistic mantle that
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will rest on you. And it goes right back to my first point.
You're going to want to see people saved You're going to want to see them experience
the same relationship with jesus that you have,
The bible says in luke 5 11 So they pulled up their boats on the shore left
everything and followed him like you want to get to that point There should
be a burden in you that as you're ministering as you're serving as you're engaging in conversation,
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That the holy spirit of god is using you to the point people will abandon whatever
they were doing and would just sit and listen and even follow you.
Hey, where's your church? Or tell me more about your God.
Or what can I do to be saved? What can I do to be baptized?
There should be some type of hook in your ministering to where you're drawing people in.
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The Bible says, with love and kindness, have I drawn them?
You're not just having empty vein conversations, but you're having conversations
that are purposeful and that are life-changing, changing if you've been chosen, right?
And so when Jesus preached, he preached from the side of a boat.
So it doesn't matter what your platform looks like. You use whatever opportunity,
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whatever door, whatever platform pulpit God gives you, you use that to minister to the people.
And you catch men, you become a fisherman, you catch them.
If you've ever gone fishing, you don't catch fish with a lot of noise. It's quiet.
That's why a lot of folks like to go fishing because it's quiet.
They can think. They bait their hook and they cast it and they sit and they wait.
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So it takes patience. It takes silence. It takes meditation and prayer and it takes skill.
You got to know which waters have been fished out.
You got to know when the fish are feeding, right? Where the schools of the fish are.
So I'm going to leave that with you, just those little five keys,
five points that can point you toward helping you answer those questions.
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Am I called? Am I called to the ministry?
You probably are, right? The harvest is plentiful, but the labor is a few.
And we're praying as leaders, as apostles, prophets, and pastors,
we're praying that God sends in. That's my prayer every day.
God send laborers in because the work is so great.
But then it's not enough to be called people of God. God, there's another step
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to where you go and you commit to the work and you do the work for the work
and God chooses you and he sets you apart.
Okay. I pray this little message has been a blessing to you and I look forward
to coming back to you at the next appointed time.
God bless you, grace and peace. Welcome back to Soteria Prophetic Ministries.
I'm going to talk to you for a few moments about, let's see how I want to title this.
I'm going to talk about five signs that point to the evidence of your call as
a minister of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Five signs. Now, there are many.
I don't want you to get stuck or form a boundary to read around five,
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but I'm only going to give you five signs that point to the evidence that you've
been called as a minister of the Lord Jesus Christ.
It is an honor to be chosen.
The Bible says, for many are called, but few are chosen.
We're all called to a greater or lesser degree to be a witness to the Lord Jesus Christ.
Now, whether that means in your own home, in your community,
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in your workplace, in your broader community, region, nations, or what have you.
So we all have a metron or a sphere of influence that God has given us to be
a witness, to testify of his goodness,
to show forth the power of God as demonstrated in our lives,
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and to make disciples, right?
But then there are some, we're all called to do that, But then there are some
who are chosen out of that to take on the mantle of ministry.
Another word for mantle is the burden or the weight of the work of the ministry.
So I'm going to give you five signs, just five, that point to the evidence.
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Because some of you may be saying, you know what, I feel like I'm called.
I can't tell you how many people I've come across in my life,
ministry life as well. The Lord called me. The Lord called me.
The Lord called me. Well, again, many are called, but few are chosen.
It's not enough to be called, but have you been set apart?
Has the Holy Spirit of God set you apart for the work of the ministry?
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All right. First thing I want to talk about is coming out of Matthew 1, verse 21.
And I want to point to being sent. Sent.
Some of you hear that the kind of the terminology, make sure you're a sent one
and not a went one, right?
Went one, meaning those that just kind of took up their own assignment,
a self-made or a manufactured or a counterfeit assignment, and they just gone out there, right?
(02:22):
And are trying to endeavor and engage in the work of the ministry.
Well, we're going to talk a little bit about that. So Matthew 121,
and she will bear a son and you shall call his name Jesus, for he shall save
his people from their sins.
So one of the hallmarks, one of the evidentiary signs of being called is you will have a burden.
(02:49):
You will be sent, right? Mantled.
You will be equipped with a burden to preach the gospel, right? To save.
This is a mantle to minister salvation.
That's before the prophetic, before the apostolic, because a lot of us get it.
One of my spiritual sons was talking about being activated. If we all want to
(03:12):
be activated and be released to do something, right?
We want to prophesy. I don't know what we want to do.
But the first sign is what Jesus, what the Word of God declares in Matthew chapter
one, she will bear a son, his name will be Jesus, and he shall save.
So one of the first signs that point toward your evidence as being called as
(03:33):
a minister is you're going to have a burden to want to see souls saved.
Not prophesy to them, not make them members of your church, not have them join
your network, not have them buy your book, which there's nothing wrong with
none of those things, hear my heart.
But what I'm saying is that first drive or Your passion, that's why you hear
(03:55):
people talk about the passion of Christ, was to see souls be saved.
So one of the first signs that you've been called is you want to see people
saved and you have been sent, whether you're ministering to them at home or
on the phone or wherever your platform,
wherever your pulpit is, you want to see people saved, right?
(04:16):
You want to save people from their sins or you want to be that agent that the
Holy Spirit can use to minister salvation. Jesus Christ does the work, right?
And then along with that comes that proclamation or that unction to preach.
Preach as you are led or as you are given utterance by the Holy Spirit. That's in Mark 1 38.
And he said to them, let us go into the neighboring towns that I may proclaim, right?
(04:41):
And they're also for it was for this I came forth.
So as a minister, you've got a burden to see people saved.
And you also have an unction or an utterance or a release in your spirit to
preach or to to minister or to proclaim or to speak forth, right?
(05:02):
So that people can hear the word of God. Faith comes by hearing,
hearing by the word of God.
And then right up underneath that, still talking about the first,
this is just the first sign, y'all. All right. Number one, you say you've been called.
Okay. So then in that, do you have a passion to see people saved?
(05:23):
That's got to be your number one passion because why else would God need you to minister?
He wants you to minister means to serve, to be a servant.
And so he wants you to be a servant in the kingdom of God and also to be a servant
unto the people of God so that you're ministering to them the precepts that
are necessary for salvation.
(05:44):
Get them saved. He said, for this is why I came forth to minister the word of
God, to preach the word of God. And in Matthew 18, 1, he says,
and I came to save that which was lost.
So again, first sign of many, but I'm only going to give you five,
is you have a passion to save or to see people be saved. Let me clarify.
(06:08):
You've got an unction or an anointing, a release, an utterance to proclaim or
preach or minister or speak the word of God. Are you always testing about his goodness?
You're always talking about the goodness of God and you're drawing people in
so that they can hear the word of God like Rahab, right?
And her faith, when it was activated, she received salvation and God saved her
(06:29):
and her whole household.
And then you also, your burden is to save the lost.
Lost so you're not saving saved people
and I say that because many times we
say we're called but then we only we're only driven to minister to the saved
people like we don't want to go into the hedges and highways we don't want to
(06:51):
which I'm going to get to that evangelize we don't want to go into those places
that are dark and scary we want to be safe well God is not calling you to be be safe, right?
He's not chosen you to be safe.
He wants you to go out and seek and say that which was lost.
So second sign that points to the evidence that you've been called is the authority.
(07:14):
Now that you've called, you've responded, God chose you, and you're manifesting.
Ministering salvation, you're preaching and proclaiming, and you're ministering
to the lost, you also need the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ.
You got to minister with authority.
You got to preach with authority. You got to pray with authority.
(07:36):
You have to exercise the work of ministry with the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Those signs and wonders has to be authorized.
The sons of Sceva, some of you may be familiar with that passage where they
tried to duplicate, and we see that a lot, don't we? We see these counterfeit things happening.
And they tried to duplicate what they saw the apostles do.
And those demons said, Paul, I know. And I figured who the other person they
(08:00):
said they knew, but who are you? And they were attacked.
There are many right now who have, again, the went ones, did not,
first of all, have no passion to see souls saved at all.
They're just, I don't know, have a different agenda. It's not a kingdom agenda. It's a self-made.
Or a personal agenda. And so they're operating out of these counterfeit spirits,
(08:22):
counterfeit authority.
The true authority in Mark chapter one, verse 22, the Bible says,
and they were astonished, right?
The sign of the authority of Jesus Christ brings astonishment. It shocks people.
It makes them, it causes them to be in amazement. And again,
not at you, but at the power of God, right?
(08:43):
They were astonished at his doctrine
for he taught them as one that had authority and not as the scribes.
So if you've been set apart, you've been called for the work of the ministry,
there has to be manifestation or evidence of the authority of Jesus Christ.
Like when you pray, does heaven move? When you minister, are hearts convicted?
(09:05):
When you exercise in any other area of ministry, is there a movement of God?
Is there a confirmation?
Is there an angelic or spiritual, godly spiritual activity?
Or is it just noise like Apostle Paul talked about? Is it just rumbling sound?
Is it just a tinkling noise? So the authority will set you apart from those
(09:29):
who have not been authorized.
In other words, you will be able to engage in aspects of ministry history and
you'll see signs and wonders.
The Bible says, follow them, which believe those who have been authorized.
Okay. And this is nothing you've got to conjure. And you know what I'm saying?
You don't have to do anything weird or spooky.
It's the authority. Jesus Christ himself will confirm. The Lord will confirm his word, right?
(09:55):
And with that, there is, I don't want to get ahead of myself because I want
to talk about this boldness.
But when you know that you're speaking with the authority of the Lord Jesus
Christ, you don't operate in fear.
That's why the Bible says God has not given us the spirit of fear, right? But a power.
In other words, authority, authority, authority.
(10:16):
So we don't speak regardless of what it is God has us ministering.
We don't speak out of fear or cowardice or of doubting.
You know, we speak confidently. We speak boldly. Why? Because we have been authorized.
Have you ever used someone's debit card? And like sometimes I'll give my kids,
my adult children, my debit card and say, hey, go and pay this bill or go fill
(10:38):
my, you know, because I don't, I don't like to put gas in my car.
So I say, hey, can you take my card and put some gas in it or what have you?
And I'll give them my card.
Well, there's no fear when they're using my debit card because I've given them authority, right?
They have my password. They've got the PIN. They've got the zip code,
all the information that they will need in order to ensure a successful transaction.
(11:01):
I've given them the authority as opposed to someone else who would take my card
and use it without my authority.
Guess what? but the card is blocked, sell, decline, and there may be some criminal
ramifications and legal sanctions that follow because you've operated out of
order. You have not received permission.
You have not been graced or granted to do that work.
(11:22):
And there are consequences, people of God, when we operate outside of our grace
or beyond those boundaries that God establishes for us. Okay.
And so along with that authority is also the word exousia, which is like, it's a Greek word.
And it means with force, with great capacity, competency, freedom, or mastery.
(11:44):
Now, and it doesn't mean you have to be loud because, you know,
sometimes we get it twisted.
And we think that because a person has a very loud, thunderous voice,
oh, that person is operating in the anointing. That's not necessarily the case, right? Right.
We find that when Elijah was on the mountain, you know, going through some emotional
things or what have you, the Lord spoke in a still small voice.
(12:05):
So if we say that the manifestation of the anointing on someone's life or the
authority of Jesus Christ on someone's life is because they are loud and they
have this thunderous, baseful voice, then the scripture comes to contradict that.
Because, gee, the Lord spoke in a still, small voice. And so we don't want to
(12:25):
assume that because someone is
speaking eloquently and their words are heavy-weighted or heavy-dropping,
some people just have a real heavy, strong voice.
We bless God for that. I don't. I have very tender vocal cords,
and I inherited that from my dad.
I can sing a couple of songs, and if I get into a real good vamp,
(12:48):
the next few days, my voice is hoarse.
If I start praying and I'm getting into the, you know, the meat of my prayer,
the heart of my prayer and that wheel of prayer is turning and my voice begins
to intensify because the Holy
Spirit now is making an utterance and intercession, I can lose my voice.
So I have very tender vocal cords.
But beyond that, I know that I operate in the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ.
(13:12):
So we don't have to holler and yell because God is not deaf and we're all intelligent people.
Right. As an educator, we teach classroom management.
How do our students learn? They learn by engagement.
They don't learn by the teacher standing, screaming and hollering at them.
So you learn by being taught.
Right. You learn by being able to listen. Again, faith comes by hearing.
(13:32):
I need to be able to hear and understand and articulate what you're saying. OK.
One of the third and I'm almost I'm wrapping up a third key that points to whether
you've been called. right?
How do we tell whether a person has been called?
This is kind of my third key in directing toward the evidence of the call is the anointing.
(13:54):
We talked about the authority, but we also need the anointing, right?
We need the anointing. We need the spirit of God.
The Bible says in Luke 4, 18 and 19, the spirit of the Lord is upon me. Why?
Because he has anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor.
That's the first...
(14:17):
Purpose of the Holy Ghost upon a minister is to anoint you, which means to empower
you, which means to equip you to preach the gospel to the poor,
the poor in spirit, not financially poor, but poor in spirit, right?
In other words, those who have a very low level understanding of who God is,
a very basic generic level.
(14:39):
Oh, I know who God is. Oh, God is good. He's good all the time. Poor in spirit, right?
That's all they know. And that's okay. You build on that foundation.
So the Lord, he has anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor.
He sent me to heal. I want you to listen to this, right? This is in Luke 4, 18, 19.
And it's also in Isaiah. So when you are anointed as a preacher,
(15:00):
this is what that anointing is for.
And I know we stray away from a lot of this stuff, y'all, but this is the word of God.
Okay. This is how it works. This is how it's supposed to work as an apostle.
That's my job to make sure I don't care how far you strayed away.
Way, you got to come right back to these precepts.
The anointing on a preacher's life, on a minister's life is to preach the gospel to the poor.
(15:24):
Again, the poor in spirit, those who have a very basic, the babes in Christ, right?
The new converts, you're going to preach the gospel to them, right?
You're going to heal the broken hearted.
Again, you're going to heal the brokenhearted. That means it's going to come
an anointing of the counselor, right?
The Prince of Peace. So we're not anointed to destroy people.
(15:47):
We're not anointed to call their sins out and expose them and embarrass them.
And I know the scripture says, rebuke before all the others may fear.
But then there's some steps that we take before we get there, right?
And we got to watch if we're acting out in those spirits and we need to we need
to look within and see why, what's driving me to humiliate people?
What's in me that needs to be fed to destroy people?
(16:10):
So there's an anointing to heal the brokenhearted. There's an anointing to preach
deliverance to the captives.
There's an anointing to minister recovery of sight to the blind.
There's an anointing to set at liberty those that have been abused or bruised, right?
And to preach the acceptable year of the Lord, seasons and times, times and seasons.
(16:32):
That's Luke 4, 18, 19. So again, how do I know I'm called?
Oh, I had a dream. The preacher at the conference told me there's a calling
on my life. What do I do? Well, you need to answer these questions.
This is how you survey, right? If you have been genuinely called,
do you have these traits, these virtues operating in you?
(16:54):
If not, then it's time to get on your knees and pray. It's time to get into the Word.
It's time to get under some good Bible teaching so you can grow and develop
and not just be called, but be
chosen and set apart for the work and be released to do the work of God.
So again, I just want to follow up. That anointing is a multifaceted anointing, right?
(17:19):
We hear many say, touch not my anointed, do my prophets no harm.
In other words, that anointed is all encompassed in this Luke 4, 18, 19.
Don't touch those who operate in these graces. Don't, because you are hindering
the work of God and you make yourself an enemy of the cross and that,
trust me, friends, you don't want to be on that side. Okay.
(17:42):
To follow up with that, that anointing brings that boldness.
That's what I wanted to kind of, I was segwaying here earlier,
that there's a boldness that comes, that anointing makes you bold.
The anointing operates in boldness.
So if you're still operating in fear, then you got to seek the Lord about the, where's my anointing?
(18:03):
Where is the grace to do this? Because why am I still fearful?
Because if I'm fearful, then I'm trusting in my strength and I haven't tapped
into the empowerment of the Holy Ghost.
That means there's some fasting that needs to take place. There's some deliverance
that needs to take place, right? Because there's still some soulish things that are in the way.
And you'll never be able to operate at the fullness of the anointing that God
(18:25):
has released upon you and made available to you if you're still operating in
fear and doubt and unbelief. Those are works of the flesh.
So there is a boldness. Jesus Christ himself preached with with boldness.
He didn't cut corners. He was blunt, right?
Paul was blunt. Peter was blunt. These folks, they were so blunt that people
were ready to kill, right?
(18:46):
But there were others who sorrowed unto repentance. Their heart was so convicted
by the word that they said, what can I do to be saved?
That word cut them, right?
So you're going to be able to speak frankly.
You're not going to sugarcoat it. You're not going to paint it up.
You're not going to add to it or take away. You're going to tell it just like
(19:09):
the Holy Spirit of God gives it to you.
You're going to speak it with boldness. You're going to speak it with precision.
You're going to speak it with skill.
All right. My fourth point that points toward that evidence of the call is the gift of prophecy.
I didn't say the office. We're not talking about that. I'm talking about the
gift of prophecy. Can you hear God?
(19:32):
That prophecy, if you divide that into two words is prophet,
which means to speak forth, right?
Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God comes forth.
Every word that proceedeth or comes forth, there's a speaking forth.
That's what prophecy means.
In other words, you are your mind because you're filled with the Holy Spirit and your mind is open.
(19:56):
You've put on the mind of Christ and you're hearing what God is saying.
You're receiving what he is saying and you're releasing it to the people.
John 4, 16 through 19, gosh, and 25 through 29, Jesus said, go and call your husband.
Remember, he was talking to the woman and she said, I have no husband.
Jesus said, I know you don't have a husband. I'm paraphrasing for the sake of time.
And he said, you had five and the one that you have now is not yours.
(20:18):
So you did speak truthfully.
So the spirit of prophecy was able to reveal to Jesus this woman's personal
life, even to the amount of relationships, husbands that she had,
even to the husband that she was with, that God didn't put them together.
He said, so yeah, you're being honest. He was able, by the spirit of prophecy,
he was able to say to her, yes, you have been honest with me, right?
(20:41):
And then she says, sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. And she said,
I know that the Messiah come, which is called Christ.
When he's come, he will tell us, Jesus said, I am he that you're speaking to.
And then it goes on. And then she went and told everybody, come and see a man
which told me all the things I ever did. Is this not the Christ?
Because she came in contact with the spirit of prophecy that began to open her heart.
(21:03):
This, many times I know when I'm ministering, and I can tell when I'm looking
at my congregation's face or kind of the reactions, that the spirit of prophecy
has manifested in my message and is speaking to the hearts of people.
Now, listen, I don't know what's going on in my natural mind, right?
But as you're ministering, the spirit of prophecy will begin to speak and touch
(21:24):
the hidden, hidden, dark, deep places of a person's soul, and it begins to unlock and bring healing.
Remember, that's one of the manifestations of the anointing,
to bring healing, right, to the brokenhearted.
And that's what Jesus did. It's not always in three days you're going to get
a car, get ready, get ready, which again, there's nothing wrong with that.
If you need a car, pray the Lord will bless you.
(21:45):
But what I'm saying is there are deep things that people are going through.
And if you're chosen, not just called, if you're chosen as a minister of the
Lord Jesus Jesus Christ, as you are ministering, whether it's a conversation at Starbucks,
whether you're in Walmart, Target, at the hair salon, the spirit of prophecy
is going to come into that conversation and you're going to begin to minister.
(22:05):
And you're going to be able to share things that will touch that person's heart
that they've never told you, that they never, you know, probably share with anybody else.
But the spirit of prophecy will go straight there and God is speaking forth
and he's talking to that individual through you.
Lastly, what is another sign that I'm truly called? What is evidence?
(22:26):
What is an evidentiary sign that demonstrates or confirms that I've been called as a minister?
My last point, again, there's more than five, but I'm giving you five because
this is a lot to digest, I'm sure.
Some of you may have to listen to this teaching a few times and take your notes
and take your scriptures and begin to pray about this, right?
(22:47):
And just see, God, you know, has my vocation been fully formed?
Have I been called? Am I chosen? Have I been truly set apart?
And if so, are any of these things being manifested in me?
So my fifth point is you've got the boldness to proclaim, right?
You want to see people saved.
(23:08):
You have this anointing. You've got the authority.
You've got the prophetic operating
in you, right? Doesn't mean you're a prophet or nothing like that.
It's just the Spirit of God is a testament of Spirit of Prophecy.
It's a testimony of Jesus Christ.
But along with that, to close me out is there is an evangelistic mantle that
(23:29):
will rest on you. And it goes right back to my first point.
You're going to want to see people saved You're going to want to see them experience
the same relationship with jesus that you have,
The bible says in luke 5 11 So they pulled up their boats on the shore left
everything and followed him like you want to get to that point There should
be a burden in you that as you're ministering as you're serving as you're engaging in conversation,
(23:51):
That the holy spirit of god is using you to the point people will abandon whatever
they were doing and would just sit and listen and even follow you.
Hey, where's your church? Or tell me more about your God.
Or what can I do to be saved? What can I do to be baptized?
There should be some type of hook in your ministering to where you're drawing people in.
(24:12):
The Bible says, with love and kindness, have I drawn them?
You're not just having empty vein conversations, but you're having conversations
that are purposeful and that are life-changing, changing if you've been chosen, right?
And so when Jesus preached, he preached from the side of a boat.
So it doesn't matter what your platform looks like. You use whatever opportunity,
(24:34):
whatever door, whatever platform pulpit God gives you, you use that to minister to the people.
And you catch men, you become a fisherman, you catch them.
If you've ever gone fishing, you don't catch fish with a lot of noise. It's quiet.
That's why a lot of folks like to go fishing because it's quiet.
They can think. They bait their hook and they cast it and they sit and they wait.
(24:58):
So it takes patience. It takes silence. It takes meditation and prayer and it takes skill.
You got to know which waters have been fished out.
You got to know when the fish are feeding, right? Where the schools of the fish are.
So I'm going to leave that with you, just those little five keys,
five points that can point you toward helping you answer those questions.
(25:24):
Am I called? Am I called to the ministry?
You probably are, right? The harvest is plentiful, but the labor is a few.
And we're praying as leaders, as apostles, prophets, and pastors,
we're praying that God sends in. That's my prayer every day.
God send laborers in because the work is so great.
But then it's not enough to be called people of God. God, there's another step
(25:44):
to where you go and you commit to the work and you do the work for the work
and God chooses you and he sets you apart.
Okay. I pray this little message has been a blessing to you and I look forward
to coming back to you at the next appointed time.
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