 Hello, this is David Digger Hernandez and you're watching Spirit Church here on the Encounter TV Network. The seasons in life when you feel spiritually dry can become the seasons that bring about unprecedented spiritual growth. When you thirst after the presence of God, nothing will stop you from seeking His face. In the presence of the Holy Spirit, there is refreshing because He is a life-giving river. That's what I'm talking about here on this edition of Spirit Church. But first, Stephen Moctezuma is here with me. He's going to lead you in some very anointed worship. And then we're getting right into this message here is Stephen Moctezuma. The scripture says in John chapter 7 verse number 38, Anyone who believes in me may come and drink. For the scriptures declare rivers of living water will flow from his heart. When he said living water, he was speaking of the Spirit who would be given to everyone believing in him. The Holy Spirit is that river of life. The Holy Spirit is that flow from deep within that never runs dry. The Holy Spirit is refreshing. The Holy Spirit is life-giving. Wherever the river of the Holy Spirit flows, there is abundant growth. There is abundant life. Now, we often find ourselves in seasons, however, when we feel as though we are spiritually dry. And it's easy to become discouraged in these seasons because we may look back and say, well, this doesn't look like I'm growing spiritually. It seems as though now everything is just going to be derailed. All the moments I spent in prayer, all the time I spent in the Word, all of the hard work I put into ministry, it's all going out the window now. But that's not the truth. You see, those seasons when you feel spiritually dry can actually become times of unprecedented spiritual growth. Now, I want to show you someone who found themselves in a spiritually dry season. Psalm chapter 42, we find King David. He's in this place where he's thirsting after the presence of God. And while we should always desire the presence of God, the reality is that we don't always desire him. Sometimes we become distracted. Sometimes we become just consumed by everyday life. So God uses, though he may not send every circumstance, God uses circumstances to cause us to thirst after his presence. So when you begin to feel spiritually dry, you become spiritually thirsty. And that spiritual thirst causes you to seek God like you never did before. Let's read Psalm chapter 42, beginning at verse number one. This is just such a powerful scripture. Now, this means a lot to me because if I'm just being transparent with you, I find myself in seasons where I feel spiritually dry. You may say, even you, David Diger Hernandez, you feel that sometimes. I'm telling you I do. I'm being honest with you. I'm being open with you. Though I commit myself to prayer, though I commit myself to the Word, sometimes life just causes me to feel distant from God. Sometimes life causes me to feel spiritually dry. Now, I don't live my life based on those feelings, but I do allow those feelings to inspire something in me. Now, ministry responsibilities begin to weigh on me. I have a full time staff. There is content that constantly needs to be put out. People who are hungry for the power of God. I have this pool of people in my everyday life. My wife often tells me you need to learn to say no to people more often because my phone is constantly ringing. From the moment I wake up, my text messages are just, it's just not possible to get to everyone. Now, I'm not saying this to brag on myself. I'm not saying this so that you can say, oh, wow, you must be very popular. Oh, wow, hats off to you. You must be very busy. Trust me. That's not why I'm telling you this. I have no desire to be looked at in that way. But I'm telling you this because I want to be honest with you. I want to be transparent with you. I'll wake up and I'll see just texts and I know already at the start of the day, there is no way I'm going to get to all of those texts today. I'll look at my email and I'll say there's no way I'm going to get to all of those emails today. People pool and the thing about being in the healing ministry is that most people contact you when they're at their most desperate moment. So each one of those emails, each one of those texts is often something that's very desperate, something that's very urgent, something that's very important. And I have to choose which urgent need to ignore. I have to choose which urgent request to ignore for that day because there's just no way to get back to everyone properly. So ministry pools on you. People pool on you. People ask for help. People ask for advice. And while it is my joy to help people, I have to admit sometimes I can be a little bit overwhelmed and say, God, how am I supposed to do this? I have a wife. I have a daughter. I want to make sure I'm investing time with them. In fact, that's one of my greatest joys in life is spending time with them. My travel schedule keeps me busy. I rarely have time to just settle in. I can't tell you how often I've missed a birthday party or a wedding or a get together or a family reunion simply because I was traveling or out of town or out of the country. Ministry responsibilities, yes, can begin to weigh. You throw in a travel schedule with a film schedule. Our ministry now, I think, releases new content or more than one piece of content every single day on dozens of different platforms that go global. And so here we have ministry responsibilities. I have the pool of people. I have the pool of friends. I have the pool of family. I have the travel schedule. I have the media schedule. And while I'm a blessed man and I count it all joy, I'm by no means complaining. I must admit to you that it can tire me out sometimes. I was just saying to Steve the other day, I said, Steve, sometimes I feel like the well has run dry. I feel like I have given everything I know to give. I've preached everything I know about the Holy Spirit. I've preached everything I know about healing. I've preached everything I know about prophecy and prayer. But each time I go back to the word, each time I get back into the presence of the Lord, each time I once again find a deep place of prayer, like something springs up within me. That's that river that never runs dry. The Holy Spirit giving me this divine energy that constantly moves me forward. The Holy Spirit moving in me and causing me to see the Word of God with fresh eyes each time that I read it and causing me to experience the presence of God in ways I never imagined possible. And I say to myself, well, I've committed myself to prayer. But even then, sometimes my prayer life feels dry and the Holy Spirit is faithful even then to come alongside and bring refreshing where there is dryness. Verse four, my heart is breaking as I remember how it used to be. How often I wish that I could go back to the days when I was praying four to eight hours a day. But the truth is that 30 years old now at the time that I was praying four to eight hours a day I was 12, 13, 14 years old. So life didn't give me as many responsibilities and the Lord understands the Lord knows and there are special seasons that He allows us to set aside like that. But sometimes I wish I could go back to the simpler times where it was there was no ministry. There was no there were no platforms. There were no cameras in my face. It was just me and Jesus. And again, I do want to emphasize I'm by no means complaining. I'm just telling you this so that you can hear this and go, oh, He deals with it too. I'm going to tell you how I deal with this. I'm going to tell you how I get through these dry seasons, these weary seasons, these, these seasons where I'm tired and I'll be honest with you, I've just been tired lately because, you know, our ministry just built this brand new TV studio. We're launching this whole new level of excellence. We're adding more events than ever before. And I had to just pause and take a break and say, Lord, I was just a few days ago, I just took some time off and I did nothing but spend some time with my wife, my daughter, and I sought the Lord. And I'll tell you when I did that, when I pulled away just for that, a little moment, though I prayed daily, though I read the word daily, there was something very special about just clearing the whole schedule for the day and just getting along with the Lord. I tell you, there was this freshness that came over me. I felt like that river ran through me and filled me with life again. And I kid you not, I must have written down in one day a dozen different things that were revealed to me in Scripture that can all each become their own series. And I thought, there's that river of life flowing again. He truly is the river of life, the well that never runs dry. And so I think of this verse, my heart is breaking as I remember how it used to be. But the truth is this changes now. He doesn't stay heartbroken thinking about the past because God doesn't want us to stay focused on the past. God wants us to move forward into the greater things that he has called us to do. I walked among the crowds of worshipers leading a great procession to the house of God, singing for joy and giving thanks amid the sound of a great celebration. Why am I discouraged? Why is my heart so sad? I will put my hope in God. In other words, he's saying there's no need to be discouraged. There's no need to be sad when my hope is placed in God, my Savior and my God. Now I am deeply discouraged, but I will remember you, even from distant Mount Hermon, the source of the Jordan and the land of Mount Mazar. I hear the tumult of the raging seas as your waves and surging tides sweep over me. Now he's getting lost in the presence of the Holy Spirit. But each day, I love that, each day the Lord pours his unfailing love upon me, and through each night I sing his songs, praying to God who gives me life. Each day, each day the Lord pours this upon him. The Scripture declares that the mercies of God are new every morning. Do you realize that God has divine energy for you? God has power for you? Not just for yesterday, but for today and tomorrow? You don't have to grow spiritually tired. You don't have to burn out. You just need to get away in the presence of the Holy Spirit. You just need to jump back into the river. Verse 9 says, Oh God, my rock, I cry. Why have you forgotten me? We know God didn't forget David, but he's writing this because this is how he felt. Why must I wander around in grief, oppressed by my enemies? Their taunts break my bones. They scoff. Where is this God of yours? Why am I discouraged? Why is my heart so sad? I will put my hope in God. I will praise him again, my Savior and my God. Think about that. I will praise him again. If you're tired and you're weary, just praise him again. If you feel empty and dry, just praise him again. If you're consumed by life's daily responsibilities, then just praise him again. Put your mind back on him. Get back into the river. Pool away just for a moment from all those things that vie for your attention and jump into the river of God. Stop sipping from the river and dive in. Stop limiting the move of the Holy Spirit in your life and jump into the river. Only those who are in the river can flow with the river. Give up control. Give up your plans. Give up your agenda. Give up your way of doing it. Break away from all that life is throwing at you and just jump into the river. This is something the believer must practice to daily get into that river. Do you know what sustains me? Do you know what the secret is? Do you know how I'm able to continue to do all of this without ever burning out and I don't burn out? It's because I get into the river. It's daily time with the Lord. It's daily surrender to the Holy Spirit. And when the Holy Spirit is in it, when that river is flowing, ministry is not a burden. It's a joy. People are not a burden. They're a joy. The love of God flows through you. The joy of God flows through you. The river of life brings refreshing to your soul. So my encouragement to you, get into the river. Let them touch your life in a fresh way again. All you have to do is call upon the Lord, just for a moment. Leave things where they are. Focus your eyes on Him and begin to praise Him again. Begin to worship Him again. Begin to just let Him touch you. You know, there are days that I'm so tired I have to tell the Lord, Lord, I don't have the strength to even seek you today. I need you to come seek me. And He does because He is faithful, because He is that life-giving river. That is it for the lesson. I want to pray with you now. I want to pray that the Holy Spirit would daily continue to refresh you and that you would never know what it is to burn out, that you would never know what it is to quit, that you would be given that divine energy that comes from the river that flows from deep within. Father, in the name of Jesus, I pray that that mighty river of God's power would begin to flow unstoppable, clearing the path and causing all of the sin and the shame and the guilt and the chaos and the confusion to be washed away. Rescue us, God, from ourselves. Rescue us from the chaos. We jump into the river of the Spirit and we say, precious Holy Spirit, take control. We give it to you in the name of Jesus. We pray. And I want you to say it because you believe it, say amen. Well, 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. I always say that because I always mean it. If you'd like information on how you can join the Spirit family, go to davidhernandezministries.com. When you sign up to the Spirit family, you're going to get an email from me every single week with a brand new teaching, a brand new worship song from Stephen Mock the Zuma, and the best part you can reply to that email for prayer support from our ministry staff. Sign up today. It's free davidhernandezministries.com slash Spirit Church. Now to your comments and these comments are from last week's teaching, How to Pray, part two of two. Last week and the week before that, I went through the teachings of Jesus concerning prayer and I showed you what Jesus taught about prayer and how it can transform your life. When you can understand what Jesus taught about prayer, it will bring breakthrough to your prayer life like never before. So I encourage you go back and watch those teachings. And while you're at it for watching us on YouTube, be sure to subscribe youtube.com slash EncounterTV, like, comment, share, all of those wonderful things that help you interact with us. And when you do subscribe, be sure to click that notification bell so that you receive notifications of all the content that's coming your way. And if you'd like me to potentially read your comment on this week's edition of Spirit Church next week, then go ahead and leave a comment in the comment section right now and I may read it next week. Now to the comments. Again, this is from How to Pray, part two of two. Claudia Sayuri writes, I'm willing to put Christ first. Thank you, Pastor David, for your ministry and great worship. Jesus moment writes, this is very helpful for giving other people isn't easy but not impossible. God bless EncounterTV. I also like Steven's ETV hat. You can actually get lots of EncounterTV merchandise at davidhernandezministries.com slash shop. We have hats, hoodies, sweaters, shirts, all sorts of different things, books, Stevens worship song. There's a lot of stuff on that I think even study notepads and you got to go check it out if you want to see all that's on there. The next commenter writes, Brother David, I felt a tangible cold wind sensation while Steven was singing the anointed worship. The anointing flows to the video. Praise and glory to Jesus and to the Holy Spirit of the Lord. Well, this is the Holy Spirit's channel. He's free to move to the content however he wishes. And Kim sees Shahra writes, once again, this is an answered prayer. Pastor David, I have emotional scars which hinder me from releasing forgiveness and this teaching is the confirmation of what God has been wanting me to do. Daily God teaches me a lesson about forgiveness and surrender. Your life and ministry truly bless me, Pastor. Also, praise God for using Steven and Nick and bringing us worship songs that always touch our hearts. God bless you and love you all. Well, thank you for writing into us. This is just one example of lives that are transformed all around the world. Look, I'm going to be very real with you, okay? I always like being real and honest. So I'm just going to level with you. Our ministry is expanding. Like, and I mean rapidly, the needs of the people are so great and I'm telling you, we get thousands and thousands and thousands of people who are being touched by the power of God through this ministry. But as we expand, we need to also invest in the ministry itself financially so that we can continue to grow properly. Look it. I want to make sure to do things led by the spirit. I want to make sure to do things in wisdom. Jesus even said, you don't go building a tower before you calculate the cost. In the same way, we don't go expanding the ministry before we've calculated the cost because we need to be good stewards of the resources that God has given to us. We don't want to waste anything you send to us. But right now, our ministry is experiencing rapid growth and there are opportunities here. We're in a business park. Like I said before, this is a wonderful TV studio that we've built and we already have dozens of ministries coming to us and saying, help us produce TV programs and we want to do it for as many of them as possible. We are already using this studio to full capacity. We are already filling up the venues that our events take place in. This ministry needs to expand. Listen to me. I know that you normally don't watch till the end some of you, but I need you to hear me. Please hear my heart. If you've enjoyed the teachings, if you've enjoyed what you've received from this ministry, at least hear me out. At least hear my heart. This ministry is expanding. Our media is expanding. We're reaching now more than ever before. Our events are expanding. If you've come to a ministry event, then you know that every single one of our events runs out of seats and we have to turn people away. Listen, at the miracle services, there are lines. Hours before the services ever start, people get into their seats and we run out of seats before the service even begins and we have to turn many people away. Do you know what it takes to seat more people? Larger buildings. Do you know what it takes to rent larger buildings? More finances. Now some would say, why don't you just charge registration? I don't ever want to charge registration because that means that some people who don't have finances can't come in. So we have to rely on the generosity of people who give freely, like in the Bible, not a registration be demanded. We're not making people pay for the content or pay for the events. Then people with no finances wouldn't be able to experience the power of God in that way. No, we need to give freely. But the ministry functions off of offerings and that is biblical. That's what Paul took up on offering in the Corinthian church all the time. And Roman says, how will they hear unless someone tells them and how is someone going to tell them unless they are sent? Our studio here, we're already expanding here. You know there are opportunities to take over more units next to us and we're going to take those over. We're going to build even more production facilities so that we can produce even more content not just for our ministry but for dozens and dozens and dozens of other ministries that need that help with expanding their media. Look, it's time to grow. So here's what I'm calling on you to do. Yes, give a one-time gift. That's wonderful. The one-time gifts really help us. They sustain us for the month. I think we have to bring in like $70,000 a month just to break even as a ministry. And we do it every month and the ministry has zero debt and it's wonderful what God is doing. But in order to expand, we need more partners. So I'm calling on you, my ministry friends, those who've been receiving. It's time to partner now. It's time to become a monthly giver. It's time to sew into this regularly. You can give $10 a month. You can give $30 a month. You can give $50 a month. You can do $100 a month. Do what you can. Even if it's just $5 a month, do something monthly. I'm asking you to sign up to become a monthly supporter of our ministry. Go to Davidternandezministries.com slash partner right now sign up. When you sign up and become a partner for $30 a month, I'll send youAwether Carriers of the Glory and Countering to Holy Spirit in every book of the Bible, or 25 truths about demons and spiritual warfare. I'll sign it and send it to you as my initiation gift just to say thank you. If you give $100 or more a month and become a monthly partner $100 a month, I will send you all three as my gift. But look, it's not about what you get, it's about us partnering together to expand the work of the ministry, to expand the Kingdom of God. So if you've been blessed by this ministry, now is the time. It's time to begin partnership. I know the Lord is speaking to you. So again, go to davidhernandezministries.com slash partner and do that today. Well, that is it for this edition of Spirit Church here on the Encounter TV Network. Until next time, remember, nothing is impossible with God. Thank you for watching Encounter TV. Don't forget to subscribe and click the notification bell. Also, help us spread the gospel of Jesus Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit. Make a one-time donation or become a monthly supporter by clicking on the donate link now.