 When you are born again, the Holy Spirit comes to live within you. You become a host, a carrier of His glory and presence. And when the Holy Spirit comes to reside in the believer, He gives to that believer the desire for prayer. So every true believer, everyone who has turned from their sins and toward Christ has received the Holy Spirit and has a genuine desire to not only pray, but to increase that prayer life. There's not a single person sitting here or watching online that is a true believer that doesn't want to pray more. I've never talked to a true Christian who said, I don't wanna go deeper in my prayer life. I'm satisfied right where I am. So how do you go to those places of prayer that are deeper? How do you increase your prayer life? And what do you do when you don't know what to pray? Many believers have trouble in prayer because of distraction. When they go to pray, suddenly then all of the responsibilities of life are vying for their attention, pooling them away from the presence or at least from the acknowledgement of God's presence. Other believers struggle with doubt that doubt sometimes manifests as shame. Sometimes believers don't think that God hears them because of some mistake that they made because they think that relationship with God is a points-based system and that if they're not doing so well, that God just completely ignores them. Or they wonder if God truly will answer them. Or they wonder if God truly hears them. Or they wonder if their prayers have any effect. So distraction, doubt, but really the problem I'm going to be addressing tonight is this issue with not knowing what to pray. Say this, say, teach me Holy Spirit. And you watching online, whether live or in the replay, I want you to write those simple words. Teach me Holy Spirit. Well, he's the only one who can. I can stand up here and give you truths about prayer from the scripture. But that will simply be information until the Holy Spirit makes it revelation. And the difference between information and revelation is transformation. When the Holy Spirit causes that information to become revelation, then your being becomes transformed. So write it in the comment section. Teach me Holy Spirit. Let that be your prayer. Now what exactly do we pray? What exactly are the words that we speak because if you're like me when I first gave my life to the Lord, I would hear these stories from these amazing men and women of God who would talk of how they spent five, six hours with the Lord. Now eventually I did develop that at a young age, but when I first began to hear this concept, I would wonder what do you pray for all that time? What exactly are you saying in those moments because if you're like me, then you understand that there is sometimes this struggle where you don't quite know the words to speak. You don't quite know what to do with yourself. Or maybe because you don't sense that unction or you don't sense the presence or you don't sense that tangible touch of his power, you hesitate with your movement forward in prayer. And there can be some weeks where you're praying, you're reading the word and you feel like you have momentum in the spirit. Your faith is high. Your flesh is low. Your prayers are powerful. You sense his presence with you. You feel as though God is close. And then all of a sudden, there seems to be this blockage like this brick wall in the spirit and you just come up against it. And many times believers, when they get to that point, they don't know what to do. I'm gonna show you how to never, ever, ever run into that wall again. I mean, it will never be a problem again if you apply these truths. So first we must understand the difference between spontaneous prayer and scheduled prayer. The scripture says in 1 Thessalonians 5, 16 and 18, rejoice evermore, pray without ceasing and everything give thanks for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you. Here the scripture is talking about walking in this constant awareness of the presence of the Holy Spirit. Many Christians refer to this as the practice of the presence of God. In other words, I keep at the forefront of my mind the thought of the reality of his presence and his nearness. And when I live in the reality of that presence, when I live aware of the fact that he is surrounding me then it changes the way I behave. It changes the way I talk. Changes the place as I go. It changes my pace. You know, it's very difficult to be loving and gracious at a fast pace. And so when you live in this awareness you walk in this constant fellowship with God and this really is what most believers practice. This is the constant prayer. Prayer throughout the day. When you're driving to work, you're talking to him. You're sitting down at a meal, you're acknowledging his presence, thanking him for providing what's at the table. You do this all day, every day as you're getting ready, as you go to the store. When you're at work stressing out, sometimes you might just throw up a prayer and say, Lord, you have to give me patience with these people. And that's a reality that everywhereness of God is omnipresence. So that is spontaneous prayer. It's just throughout the day. It's a constant state of awareness of his presence. But then where most of us find neglect or where most of us neglect is this area of scheduled prayer. Because while you can talk to God at any moment, at any time, there is something to be said about removing distraction and devoting that time just to the Lord. Matthew chapter six, verse six, for those of you taking notes, I'll say again, I gave you first Thessalonians five, 16 through 18 for spontaneous prayer. And then scheduled prayer is Matthew six, six. But when you pray, go away by yourself, shut the door behind you, and pray to your father in private, then your father who sees everything will reward you. This has to do with shutting the door, removing distraction, and practicing the discipline of scheduled prayer. Yes, we understand that the presence of God is with us all throughout every day, but we cannot forget the ceremony of his presence. The sacredness of reverence. This is something I believe that's lost on our culture, generally speaking. There are pockets where you'll find that this is still practice, but generally speaking for the most part, this is something that's lost on our culture. This idea of sacredness. We've come to know about the omnipresence of God and we've come to know this reality of him always being with us. And because of this, many of us are of the impression that we do not need to devote time just for prayer. But this is the scheduled prayer. Now, those who are organized think that spontaneous prayer is a little weird. And those of us who are more spontaneous think that scheduled prayer, well, that's just too religious. But there will be something about the nature of Christ that contradicts something in all of us. All of us can be more like Jesus in one way or another. And so, if you want the fullness of a prayer life, you need both spontaneous and scheduled prayer. Spontaneous prayer will bring forth longevity. Keeps you in the race. Scheduled prayer will produce depth. This is why you can see believers who have been Christian for decades. And they hang in there. They're there all the time. They're living holy lives. They love the Lord because they have this practice of constant prayer all throughout the day, acknowledging his presence. That produces longevity. But sometimes you'll see that they've been around for a while, but there's still no depth that's been developed. And this is because they practice spontaneous prayer without taking the time to dig that well deeper. Prayer is both a well and a river. It's a flow to everyday life. And it's also stopping to take a drink from the depth of the earth. Now what I'm focusing on here specifically is what to do in that scheduled time of prayer. We must acknowledge the Holy Spirit's role in prayer. If we're going to get unstuck. This is what the Bible says in John chapter three, verse six. That which is born of the flesh is flesh. And that which is born of the spirit is spirit. So that which begins in the spirit cannot be sustained by the flesh. Sometimes the Holy Spirit will do a work in us, begin it, and little by little we become more self-reliant. And then we find ourselves completely relying upon the flesh without ever realizing that we left the dependency of the Holy Spirit, our dependency on him to be clear. This is the difference between praying in the flesh and praying in the spirit. It's possible to pray ineffectively. Jesus said when you pray, don't pray like the hypocrites, why? Ineffective, they don't get much out of it. There are people of false religions of the world who pray consistently, but it's ineffective. And I promise you if they get into a bad enough situation, even atheists pray. Doesn't mean they're walking in this deep relationship with God. No, you and I have the privilege of true prayer. Only God's children who believe in Christ Jesus can truly practice and receive all the benefits of fellowship with God. But it's important to note first that all true prayer begins in the spirit. The Holy Spirit is the initiator of prayer. I cannot work myself into something spiritual. I cannot gain by emotion or intellect what can only be given by the Holy Spirit. It must come from the well deep within. Prayer must be that overflow of that relationship with the Spirit himself. All true prayer begins as a desire of the Holy Spirit. Galatians 5.17 says this. The sinful nature wants to do evil which is just the opposite of what the Spirit wants. We all know this, don't we? It's the daily battle. And the Spirit gives us desires that are opposite of what the sinful nature desires. These two forces are constantly fighting each other so you are not free to carry out your good intentions. The flesh and the Spirit desire the opposite of one another. You ever noticed that you can stand in a worship concert? I mean worship service. And sing the songs, enjoy the lights. You can put on some great light shows in the church world today. Great productions. I thank God for worship leaders like Steven Montezuma who worships in the Spirit. It's not a show, it's a presentation for God. You ever noticed that it's possible to get into the hype of the music? To get into the emotion of the song? Lights, the sound, the production? Let me be very clear with you. Your flesh can sing but your flesh can't truly worship. Oh it's great to hear when someone expounds upon the word. Spirit doesn't even need to be involved in that. There are people who devote their lives to studying the Bible. And it's exciting, it's thrilling. They gain knowledge of this amazing book. You can read the word in the flesh. You can sing a worship song in the flesh. You can volunteer at a church in the flesh. Your flesh won't fight any of that. The devil fights you when you read the word but your flesh fights you when you begin to pray. Why is it that you can do all these other things but the moment it comes to being still and praying that the flesh starts to squirm? It's because prayer is the death of the flesh and it does not wanna die. And this is why the scripture describes what it describes in Galatians. That the spirit is resisting the flesh and the flesh is resisting the spirit. So then when you sense that desire to go and pray where did you get that desire from the Holy Spirit? You didn't give yourself that desire. The Holy Spirit gave that to you. Without the Holy Spirit not only could we not be spiritual. Without the Holy Spirit, we wouldn't even desire to be spiritual. And so the spirit pulls you into the places of prayer. The spirit invites you to go and be alone with God and the flesh fights. The flesh resists. The flesh says, no, I'd rather have Netflix. I'd rather scroll for another 20 minutes. I'd rather relax. I'd rather take a nap. I could go on listing things that the flesh would rather do. But the flesh would rather do anything else but pray. And this is why. Because they are at war with each other. Because to live in the spirit is to shrink the power of the flesh. When you say yes to the spirit, you are shrinking the flesh. Every time you obey the desire of the spirit rather than the desire of the flesh, the flesh becomes a little bit weaker. Whatever strengthens my spirit weakens my flesh. So they desire opposite of each other. And this is that contention that's created where they're fighting the flesh is saying don't pray and the spirit is saying pray, pray, pray. And when you're really walking in the flesh, you can barely feel that pool to prayer. This is why it's important that we live by God's word. Look at what Matthew chapter 26 verses 40 and 41 say. Then he returned to his disciples and found them sleeping. Couldn't you men keep watch with me for one hour? He asked Peter, now watch this verse 41. Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. Wow, do you realize that as often as that's quoted that very few people understand that when the scripture says the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak, it's in the context of the conversation of prayer. Your spirit wants to pray. You know you do. You like the idea of going deep. You like the idea of fellowshiping with the Lord. You like the idea of living in that constant awareness of prayer and his presence, but the flesh pools. And the more we say yes to the flesh, the harder it becomes to say yes to the spirit. And the longer that we've been saying yes to the flesh, the longer that process becomes to get us back to the place where we're saying yes in the spirit. But the Holy spirit is calling us to make that commitment to be people who say no to the flesh, to subject it, to take authority over the flesh, to say no to myself, to say no to my desires, to say no to my apathy, to say no to my anger, to say no to my doubt, the flesh will fight you. Fight back, say fight the flesh. Write that in the comments. Fight the flesh, fight the flesh. When you don't wanna wake up to pray, tell yourself fight the flesh. When you wanna speak out, fight the flesh. When doubt begins to creep in, fight the flesh. When it's time to pray and read the word and there's something else that's offering, it's time to you, something else that's calling for your attention, fight the flesh. And the more you do this, the easier it becomes. Now the Holy spirit, as I said, will be the one to give you the desire. Now of course, think about this. You can pray whenever you want, but you want because the Holy spirit gave you that want. You ever wonder if God's angry with you? You ever wonder if he's gonna ignore you or maybe you're not on good terms with him? Sometimes we treat God as if he's impatient. And sometimes we imagine that he's just kind of tolerating us, like okay, I'll hear you, but you are on your last leg here. Okay, yeah, I'll forgive you, but you are this close. That's how we picture it. But remember that you wouldn't have the desire to pray if it weren't for the Holy spirit. Therefore, the desire to pray is itself an invitation to prayer. Think about that. That desire to pray is itself that invitation to prayer. So what do you do? When you come to pray, your flesh has been fighting, you finally close that door, finally on your knees seeking the Lord, and your mind is wondering, do I sit, do I stand, do I pace, can I lie down? Do I pray out loud, do I pray in my mind? Should I pray in tongues? Can I pray in tongues in my mind? Is there a certain pace to pray? Do I rebuke demons first and then ask for forgiveness? Do I do that at the end? Do I pray for others? Do I pray for me? Can I ask God for something? Do I worship Him? Do I just sit here and wait? Do I be silent and try to see what I should hear? Do I open the Bible, point my finger at a page and hope that God randomly speaks to me through a verse? There's all these things that go through your mind. What do I do? Once I've shut that door, what do I do? What do I say? And what is it? All these people are talking about when they say, oh, I was fellowshiping with the Lord for four hours. And you might be thinking, well, what were you saying? What exactly were you doing? I'm gonna give you exactly what they're doing, what we do when we pray for hours. When you don't know what to pray, number one, wait. Psalm chapter 80 verse 18 says, so will not go back from thee, quicken us, and we will call upon thy name. This is the pause that gives you a moment to hear the instruction of the Holy Spirit. See, sometimes when we come into the prayer room, we have our agenda and we view prayer as if it's just a venting session with God. Now, as I'm gonna show you in a moment, there is a time to do that. But when we come in that way, and we come driven by our emotions, driven by our frustrations, then we've already begun prayer in the flesh. This is why you have to take that moment. When you go before the Lord, you've gotta wait. You know why you wait? Because it's in the waiting that the flesh dies. It's in the waiting that the flesh starts to become weak. You ever notice, sometimes when you go to pray, especially if you haven't prayed in a while, you go to pray, the first thing you wanna do is go back out, finish it up, why? Because the flesh is fighting you first, and when you wait, the flesh begins to die. The flesh is the most impatient person you know. It does not want to wait because waiting weakens the flesh. So number one, you wait. There are different streams in the river of prayer, and this waiting is the pause that allows you to find the flow of the spirit for that moment. There are seven realms of prayer that you'll find as you wait. So I'm talking about point number one here. What to do when you don't know what to pray, number one is wait. And under this point on waiting, I'm showing you what you're waiting for. Seven directions you can go. Number one, adoration. John 4.24 says, for God is spirit, so those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth. That's one component of prayer is worship, adoration. I'll touch more on this in a moment as a main point unto itself. Number two, supplication. This is the prayer request. Philippians chapter four, verses six and seven. Now I've covered this specific point a few weeks ago, but I think for the new ones here, as well as the ones watching online, I need to cover this again. So it's important that we lay this foundation. Philippians four, six and seven. Don't worry about anything. Instead, pray about everything. Why? Because you're praying. Everything. Why? Because worry is how your flesh prays. Tell God what you need and thank him for all he has done. Then you will experience God's peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus. When do you experience God's peace? You experience God's peace after you've given him your prayer requests. Now very, very quickly, can we grab a backpack from the back room, please? Very quickly. And I wanna show you something. I just put them on the spot. Britain's gonna go get it. And here's one here, okay, Ishmael. Let me see that. Look at that, fast-acting. You mind if I go through it on camera? I'm just kidding. Have you ever gone hiking in the heat? So you know that this would be burdensome. It would create sweat marks. And after a few hours of walking, this would begin to hurt. Depends upon what you have in there. And it doesn't matter how light the bag is because if you've been walking for a long time, it becomes heavy over the distance. Now here is how most believers approach the mountain of God with their worries, their cares, their concerns. How will I feed myself? Are my children going to be okay? That's what's in this bag. Are my children gonna be okay? Will I make enough for rent? What about my health issues? What about my emotional issues? What about the trouble in my relationships that I'm having? What about my prayer life? What about that struggle with sin? All of that. The question's too theological. Is God angry with me? Have I gone too far? Some believers carry. Is this the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit than I did? Strange, strange doctrines the enemy throws at you and twists them. Not that the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit isn't real, but he'll use biblical truths to torment you sometimes. Let's say you carry a burden. You come to the mountain of God and we find that we're not gonna be able to go to the top. I can't get to the top of the mountain if I'm carrying this. So this is what God says, give me the bag. That's what the prayer request is. It says, tell God what you need and thank him for all he has done. Verse seven says, then you will experience his peace. So, if anyone ever told you that God isn't concerned with blessing you, if anyone ever told you that God isn't concerned with your health, if anyone ever told you that God doesn't care about the details of your life, they don't know our God and they don't know the God of the Bible. That's a religious spirit and they're wrong. You are not immature for asking God of your prayer request. You are not unspiritual. You are not full of doubt. You are not ungrateful. In fact, the scripture says, tell him what you need while thanking him. So it's possible to ask even when you're grateful. So here's the problem though, here's what we do. Say, Lord, you know, I need this, I need this, I need this. We place the bag at his feet. That's refreshing, I'm good now. We are filled with his peace and we say, thank you, Lord, I appreciate it and we walk the other way. That's when the prayer request becomes an issue. Please remember church that peace is not the conclusion of prayer. It's the beginning of it. So once you've unburdened yourself with this prayer request, supplication, this should be a part of your prayer life and don't let any religious person tell you that the prayer request doesn't have a place. It absolutely does. It's very spiritual because it's putting the bag in God's hand and now you're free to climb the mountain. The problem comes when we experience that peace from having the bag removed from our shoulder and because we get the peace, we think it's over and we move away when peace is actually the starting point because when you don't have that bag and you're filled with peace, now you can climb to the top of the mountain. Believers cut short and they settle for that emotional relief. Ah, I feel better. Now I'm moving on with my day. No, no, no, no. Once you feel better, you've just begun. Because your mind is clear. Emotions are calm. Now you can focus on His presence. So number one, adoration. Number two is supplication. Number three, confrontation. This is spiritual warfare. James 4-7, submit yourselves then to God, resist the devil and he will flee. We see it in the Lord's prayer. The Bible says in Matthew 6, verse 13, and don't let us yield to temptation but rescue us from the evil one, from his influence. Now here, what is the enemy doing? He's tempting you. Remember, last week I talked about the various strongholds and how the enemy can attack the believer and how he cannot. Notice that in spiritual warfare, again it comes down to these areas in the mind, temptation being one of them. Lord, don't let me be swept up in temptation but deliver me from the evil one. That warfare prayer is a component of your prayer life. So number one, adoration. Two, supplication. Three, confrontation. Are you receiving this tonight? You online, let me know so far how the Lord is speaking to you through this message. Number four, contrition. This is repentance. We see also this in the Lord's prayer in verse 12. Give us today the food we need. Or verse 12 says, and forgive us our sins as we have forgiven those who sin against us. Repentance is a component of prayer. Number four, meditation. Now, don't get freaked out at that word. I don't mean it in the New Age sense. In fact, they stole it from scripture. Worldly meditation is the emptying of your mind. Why? Because then the enemy can fill it with his influence. There's a spiritual dynamic. And that is that spiritual influence will always fill spiritual vacuums. This is how we surrender to the holy spirit areas of our lives. We say, holy spirit, fill me. And he says, I can't, you're too full of yourself. And then we remove our influence from it and he fills it. That's the benefit of being spirit filled is that as we surrender these areas, he fills it with himself. And if we don't, it's filled with us. But Psalm one, one to three. Oh, the joys of those who do not follow the advice of the wicked or stand around with sinners or join in with mockers. Watch this verse two. But they delight in the law of the Lord meditating on it day and night. They are like trees planted along the river bank bearing fruit each season, not some seasons each season. Their leaves never wither and they prosper in all they do. Not some of what they do all. That means when you're one who meditates on the word and by the way to finish the point I was making just a few moments ago, worldly meditation says empty your mind, godly meditation is filling your mind with the word. Do you know what meditation is? It's simply repetition in thought. If reading the word is eating the word, the meditation is digestion. It's how you receive of all the spiritual nutrients of what you ate. And so those who live in this way in prayer meditating on the word, you repeat the word of God again and again and again. That is a part of prayer, believe it or not. Meditating on the word, that's part of fellowship with God. And when you do this, you live in a way that is prosperous. That's what the Bible declares. I don't care what the world says about the economy. I don't care what the world says about it systems. We live under the system of God's kingdom. And the Bible says, we bear fruit each season. That means I bear fruit when there's no recession and I bear fruit when there is recession. I posted it just a few days ago on my social media telling people be ready because in the next few days they're gonna announce the recession. And the reason they can announce it on a certain day is because economic reports come out quarterly. And so really as you have the economy shrinking over a certain amount of quarters then you can announce it officially as a recession. So all they're gonna do is put an official label on what's already been happening but I guarantee you people are gonna freak out. It's all they're doing. They're giving it an official title. Okay, now it's officially a recession. They're not announcing, hey, it got worse today. It's just putting a label on what we already know is a struggling economy but even in that we prosper. Why? Because we meditate on the word where people of the word, where people founded on the principles of the kingdom. This is part of fellowship with God and it adds substance to your prayer. Oh my goodness, have you ever heard like a, we call them the church mamas. These are, I shall say experienced women so we don't, some say old, I say experienced. Experienced women. Remember Steve, we had two, like those prayer warrior women in our church in Paramount and these are people who just pray, I mean that is all they do. Pray, pray, pray, pray, pray, pray, pray. And you look at their Bibles, it's always the same. Marked up, notes everywhere, papers falling out. Why? Because they're in the word and you'll notice the difference between when someone has the word in them and when they don't, when they have the word in them as they pray it just kind of pours out. And then others, the words note in they kind of just pray very superficial prayers even the way people worship. I can tell the difference if you're in a worship leader in the word and a worship leader who's not because a worship leader in the word when they speak in between the songs there's this substance pouring out. And that word adds substance to your prayers. That's number five meditation. Number six, intercession and I'll touch more on the word in a moment, briefly. First Timothy two, one, I urge you first of all to pray for all people, ask God to help them intercede on their behalf and give thanks for them. Here the scripture is commanding us, giving us the responsibility of praying for others. This is intercessory prayer. I recommend, and now this isn't Bible I'm giving you, this is a personal opinion I'm giving you based on the Bible. So this is in principle biblical but I don't wanna add legalism to this but this is something I recommend that helps. Have a prayer list of people, of leaders, of things in your life and move down that list every time you pray. The Bible tells us to pray for others because of there's power when we pray for others. The scripture wouldn't have us do that if there was no effect. So intercession is another form of prayer. It's another stream in the river. Number seven, appreciation, which is thanksgiving. Psalm 100 verse four says enter his gates with thanksgiving, go into his courts with praise, give thanks to him and praise his name. Enter his gates with thanksgiving. If I thank God for what he's done and what he's given and the Bible calls that praise then that means to complain is to do the opposite. Do you realize that some of you have this great struggle in your prayer life because you've conditioned yourself to complain and complaint does exactly what worry does. It clutters the mind. Praise does exactly what the prayer request does. It unburdens you. Now that you know the substance of prayer and I'll tell you these just one more time. These are the different streams in the river of prayer. I call them the seven realms of prayer. Adoration, supplication, confrontation, contrition, meditation, intercession, appreciation. Now that you know the substance, think about this, if you just devoted 10 minutes to each one, you would be praying for more than an hour a day and you could easily, easily, easily go 25 minutes of worship. You could easily do 15 minutes of just meditating on the word. You could easily cover five minutes of praying for everyone in your life. You could easily cover 15 minutes of just thanking God for everything he's given you. Now in these moments, you may not feel that sensation of his power. You may not feel the manifested touch on your physical body all the time. Rest assured, it is impossible to accomplish nothing in prayer. For every moment you are praying, you are changing whether you see it or whether you feel it. Now I used to stress about the order. Which one do I owe you first, Lord? Where do I begin? Now this is why I say it's important that you wait because when you go into the prayer room and you pause and you're sitting in that river, when you wait, it's like you're just letting go and he'll take you on whatever stream he wants. Sometimes I'll get in the prayer room and the first thing I start doing is binding every devil, praying against every demonic influence. Other times I'll go into the prayer room, I wait and the Holy Spirit pulls me into just thanksgiving. Lord, I thank you that you are worthy of worship. I thank you that you're able to do exceedingly, abundantly above all I could ask or even imagine. I thank you that you've forgiven me. I thank you that you've blessed me. I thank you for my wife and my daughter and my friends. I thank you for blessing the ministry. I thank you for my ministry friends who come on Thursday nights. I thank you for a ministry team, Lord. Lord, I thank you that even though my health is not always perfect, that on some days I have good health and that's what some people have to pray. There's always a reason to thank God. Fill it with that. Sometimes I'll go into the prayer room, pause and suddenly I'm pulled into worship. Now worship is actually number two when you don't know what to pray, worship. Second Corinthians 318 says, so all of us who have had that veil removed can see and reflect the glory of the Lord. And the Lord who is spirit makes us more and more like Him as we are changed into His glorious image. We're gonna practice this in just a moment. This is more than just a teaching. We're gonna practice it and you online, you're gonna practice it with us like in the next couple of minutes here. You're gonna see the difference. Okay, so that's worship. Worship is simply beholding Him. Worship removes the clutter from the mind and puts your focus on the Lord. Worship is to just look at Him. No, really, worship is the intensity of focus and attention on Him. That's why idolatry is an oh, I worship this person or I worship that idea. Idolatry is just becoming obsessed with something. Obsession is idolatry. Whether it's with a person, an idea, a philosophy, a movement, an organization, obsession is a form of idolatry. When you worship, you focus on Him and the Holy Spirit begins to cultivate that intensity of love for Him. So number one, you don't know what to pray, wait, and He'll guide you into one of these streams. Number two, you don't know what to pray, worship, a powerful man of God told me, if you have an hour to pray, worship for 40 minutes. And number three finally is the word. First John 514 says, and this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. Now what does that mean according to His will? How do you know God's will? How do you know God's ways? How do you know God's nature and His mind? His word. When you pray the word, it's a yes every single time. Every single time it's a yes. Why? Because you're praying His will. Why would God say no to His own will? He's just waiting for someone to come into agreement with Him in the earth. It's the way He's designed it. He can move otherwise, but that's the way He's chosen to do it. The word shows you what to pray. Pray the scriptures, pray the Psalms. The word within you ignites your prayer life. You'll notice the difference. When you begin to pray the word, it's like your prayers are lit on fire. When you begin to pray the word, it's like this this unction, this power, this force behind what you're saying. This is why it's important to pray the word because to pray the word is to pray His will. And to pray His will is to come into perfect alignment to be hurt and He will establish that which you prayed. Now I told you a few moments ago, I wanna practice something. Even as you're sitting here, there's a lot of flesh dying. Even as you're watching, there's a lot of flesh dying. You see, these teachings aren't for the new convert so to speak, unless they're really, really hungry. We're talking substance here. We're going deeper in the spirit here. Now what I want you to do, this will be the altar call and then I'm gonna take an offering you're gonna give and we're gonna pray for those who need healing and deliverance. You online too. We're also gonna pray for you. You're watching live on the replay. Now is not the time to turn off the video because you got, I'm gonna challenge you to do something here in worship. Remember I talked about that clutter in the mind. It just distracts you. That's the flesh. So what I want you to do right now, you don't have to stand because I don't want you to start focusing on how your legs are hurting. I want you just to sit in your seat, close your eyes. You don't even have to lift your hands. You can if you want, but I want you to be totally undistracted right now. This is what I do when I go into the prayer room. Troubles of life are weighing me down. Close my eyes. What does that mean to behold him? It means to look at him in the spirit. How do you look at him in the spirit? It's the meditation of the word. To meditate on the word is to see him in the spirit. Meditate on the word is to see him in the spirit. So Lord, the same, close your eyes. Forget the distractions, Lord. We don't deserve your grace or your mercy or your kindness. You are patient. You don't deal with us according to our sins. You separate our sins from your mind as far as the east is from the west. Thank you for your mercy. Thank you for your grace. Thank you for the blood of Jesus. Set upon that cross. Thank you for the resurrection. Thank you that on the cross you proved your love and in your resurrection you proved your truth. Thank you that every good thing comes from you, the father of lights. Thank you that your love is expressed in the fellowship with believers. Thank you that your love is expressed in our family and our friends. Thank you that your love is expressed through creation. Thank you. All creation declared. Your goodness, your majesty, you are majestic. Your glory is wonderful. So beautiful you're frightening. So glorious we tremble. We are fixated on you. Now in this moment, I want you to realize how focused you were on him just now. How nothing else was coming to your mind. You do the same now. Begin to speak out loud. Speak out loud. Just tell him. You can thank him. You can worship him. You can praise him. You can come against demonic influence. You can pray for others. You can pray the word. You can wait on him and pray in the spirit, whatever it is and you watching online do the same thing, do the same thing right now. Come on church begin to lift your voices. Begin to lift your voices and do. Do as he leads, do as he leads. The things of this world pass away in the mind. Thank you, Frank. Look for. You online, live or unreplayed, just begin to write your prayer requests in the comment section. Facebook and YouTube comment section. Use it for your prayer request. Let's make it a prayer wall right now. Go before the Lord, go before the Lord. Sing it again, turn your eyes upon Jesus. The shirt in his presence. Lord, cause us to ascend a greater realms of glory. The things of gross strange we dip in the light. How many of you just completely disconnected from this earth right now? Let me see your hand. Do you see what I'm talking about? Now, do you see how it's easy to do that for a good two or three hours? I'll tell you, it'll get to the point where the flesh will get so weak. It'll just be like, I'm done. Okay, just pray, just pray. And there won't even be a desire to leave. In fact, you'll have to pull yourself away from the prayer room. I'm telling you, I promise you, you'll get to a point where you're like, I just want to stay here. And you're like, oh, but I have to go to work eventually. You know, you'll say, well, I have to, I have to feed the kids at some point. You know, it'll be like this. It'll be a fight to leave, not a fight to go in. But you have to practice these truths of scripture. Now I want to show you something. And this is again, for those of you here and those watching online, stay with me just a few more minutes. I want to talk to you about something. Proverbs chapter 11, verses 23 through 25 says this, and Tim, you can put the graphic on the live stream. It says, the godly can look forward to a reward while the wicked can expect only judgment. Then verse 24 says, give freely and become more wealthy. Be stingy and lose everything. The generous will prosper. Say that out loud, the generous will prosper. Those who refresh others will themselves be refreshed. We have to fight the flesh in the area of withholding resources, we have to. And the reality is is that some of us were seasonal givers. In some seasons we have the flesh in check. And then in the seasons where we're listening to the news too much, listening to the world too much, listening to the fear mongering too much, we start to tighten up again. And then out of our fear, we withhold and we miss out on the blessings of God. If there was an opportunity, God was looking to give to someone in the earth. And he had an opportunity available to increase someone's resources. And he's looking down on the earth and saying, I want to bless someone with this opportunity. I want to increase them. Do you think he's going to first look at givers or non-givers? He's going to look at the givers first. I'll never forget when we had an usher who had just got saved. Like he was his first time ushering because he volunteered to become a church usher. He's holding the basket for the offering and they told him to pray. Now, before then I'd never heard anybody pray when he prayed. I had always heard people pray, Lord, bless the giver and bless the non-giver. And I understand there's some truth to that, okay? I'm not saying that God is cruel and vindictive and he's going to wipe you out because you didn't give money to a church. It's not what I'm saying. But there's some truth in God blessing both the giver and the non-giver, of course. This new convert, nobody told him that that's what we prayed. He's up there holding the basket and they said, brother so-and-so, will you please pray for the offering? He said, okay, he prays. He says, Lord, I pray you just bless the giver and convict the non-giver in Jesus' name. And everyone kind of looked up at each other like, did he just pray what we thought he prayed? And you know, I'll say this, I do pray God convicts the non-giver. I do pray the Holy Spirit convicts those who withhold because I want them to experience the fullness of the blessing of God when it comes to finances. So the flesh is saying, log out, log out, log out, turn off the video, go somewhere else. But the Spirit is saying, be generous. And the same is true of those of you in this room. I'm not telling you to do anything I don't practice myself. I've been in binds, trust me, where it doesn't make any sense to give, where I'm saying, Lord, if I give, how do I know you'll meet the need? And the Lord had to reveal to my heart that if I'm worried in that way, it's because I trust my resources more than him. I trust the number in my bank account more than I trust God. That's dangerous. The Bible says, we either believe the Bible or we don't. Give freely and become more wealthy. Be stingy and lose everything. The generous will prosper, period. The generous will prosper. And I believe that even as the world begins to fill the tightening of the economy in the coming months and maybe in coming year, I believe that for those who live by faith, those who live generous lives, that even in the midst of that, we will walk in miracles and opportunities. Do you believe that? I believe that with all my heart. I'm not, I really, I'm not worried about it. I get calls from people all the time. I'm nervous, I'm scared, text. Did you hear this? Did you hear that? I said, you know what? Don't even send me those links anymore. I'm walking in a different realm. I'm not walking in fear. Faith over fear. Faith over fear. Fight the flesh. Fight the flesh. I'm gonna ask the ushers to come now and pass out envelopes. Now, there are a few ways that you can give. Those of you watching online, you can go to davidherdandisministries.com slash donate to give a one-time gift. Those of you here, you can use the QR code. There's a QR code on the envelope and there are QR codes on these screens. I recommend if you're giving by debit card that you use the QR code, then you don't even have to fill out an envelope. But if you're going to give by envelope, that I'd recommend using the envelope for checks and cash so you can attach your information to that giving. And those of you online, you can give any currency from any country. There's multiple ways to give through our form. There's Apple Pay and PayPal and Google Pay and all of it. But all there at that one link, davidherdandisministries.com slash donate, you'll see your options. And as you're giving I ask you to consider all the things that this ministry is doing because this is a general offering. It's going to go toward the general work of the ministry. But as you give consider that we're still building the studio, which we are just a few hundred thousand dollars away from finishing that off, it started the goal was 2.75 million. And now we're a few hundred thousand dollars within reaching that goal. That's miraculous, especially in this season. But consider all that we're doing. Consider the live streams, consider the events, consider the studio, consider the impact, consider the souls that are being reached. Give a one-time gift and God may lead some of you even to become monthly supporters. That's all of that's majorly helpful. But I'm asking you to be generous, be generous. Don't listen to the fear mongering. Don't listen to what the world is saying. We are of the kingdom of God. And as you're giving, I can see the giving coming in from Facebook and YouTube. And in fact, I'm getting names here on my phone. Believe it or not, I actually see when you give online, I see the name of every giver that gives us online. Now, I don't know how much longer I'll be able to do that. It's getting to the point where I'm going, my goodness, they're constantly giving from around the world. But for the time being, as it is in this season, I'm able to see names. So I see Darian and Tenia and Mehretah. I see Angelica and Angel and Sovereign and Isaac and Musi and Julie and Patrick family and their dear friends, Jason and Kingsley and so many others who are giving one time gifts. And these are all people giving at davidhernanisministries.com slash donate. Many giving one time Arthur, thank you so much. And I see Jung Jung and I see Rosa, Deanna, many different gifts coming in from many different parts of the world. Some of you are partnering monthly. Thank you for your support. We truly appreciate that, that sort of support. I don't take it for granted in you here either. We don't take you for granted either. But do consider, as I said, those things we're doing. We need a lot of resources to finish this project. Maybe you're watching online, maybe you're here in person and God is leading you to do something extravagant, something above and beyond for that project. Contact our ministry. Now is the time, now is the time because they're gonna be finishing up in the next couple of months. The contractors saying, hey, we're ready to move forward with the next phase. We don't wanna put it on hold. We want to finish this out so that we can begin doing the work that God called us to do from that studio. But I wanna pray as you give, those of you giving in person and online, that God would protect you in this next season. I'm serious, we need to pray for God's protection in this next season. And as you give, that you would be joining your faith with our ministry to believe that God will protect you in this next season. So Father, I pray, first of all, Lord, give your people victory over fear. I rebuke the lies of the enemy coming in through television. I rebuke the lies of the enemy coming in through links and social media. Lord, even though we do not deny reality, we know of a greater one. And Father, we thank you that in every season, you are in control. And so Father, I pray that you would protect your people, that as the world begins to become afraid that your people would be full of faith. Lord, even in this season, let there not just be survival, let there be a thriving of your people. Lord, bring opportunities and ideas and protection in the mighty name of Jesus, we pray. I want you to say it because you believe it, say amen. And all of God's people said it again. And all of God's people said it again. And all of God's people said it again. Amen. I believe it. I believe it. Faith over fear.