Everything You Need to Know About the Anointing of the Holy Spirit

So I want to talk to you about the beautiful anointing of the Holy Spirit. And I say beautiful because there is a beauty to the anointing. We're going to cover what is the anointing, what does the anointing do, how do I access the anointing. This is the big one right here: how do I protect the anointing on my life from impurity? So this is for those of you who want to be used by God, or maybe God is already using your life And you want to know how to protect and to keep that anointing pure. We're going to talk about that as well. How do I restore the anointing upon my life if I feel it's been lost? Maybe you feel you lost the call. Maybe you feel that the anointing has been weakened on you. Maybe some compromises, some things you've allowed, have allowed the influence of the anointing to be disrupted. That flow through your life is not the same. I want to show you that it's not only possible to have that anointing restored on your life, I'm gonna show you how to do that through the scripture. So we're talking all about the anointing of the Holy Spirit today. We're gonna go deep, we're gonna be thorough, we're gonna comb through this topic with great reverence. And really, as we go to the scripture, I believe you're gonna receive truths that you'll receive them and you'll use them for the rest of your life. These are truths that I've learned from mentors. These are truths that I've learned from experience in ministry. These are truths that I've learned from the word, from the Holy Spirit. And I've just compiled many of the main points concerning the anointing in this one message. And it is gonna be thorough. And I believe that as we move through this, that you're gonna have a lot of moments where you go, okay, I see it now, or I understand that now. And I truly believe God wants to use your life. I truly believe it's important that you understand the truth of the anointing because this is the power of the Holy Spirit. This is how God operates through you and touches people around you. So if you're ready, let's get right into it. First, what is the anointing of the Holy Spirit? And of course, what does it do? Let's look to the word. In the Old Testament, we saw this ceremony where men of God, prophets of God, would smear anointing oil on certain individuals. That word anoint means to rub. And whenever a prophet or a priest would anoint something in the natural, they were rubbing oil onto an item or pouring oil onto an individual. But in the spiritual, what was happening was God was smearing his nature on that individual. God was imparting a piece of himself to that person. So in the Old Testament, we have the shadow. The shadow is the ceremony. The substance is the power of the Holy Spirit. And looking to the Old Testament, looking at the representations, looking at the symbolism, we actually catch a glimpse into the supernatural realm. For as men were anointed with oil in the Old Testament, so you and I today are anointed with the Holy Spirit in the New Testament. For example, we look at King David. 1 Samuel chapter 16, verse 13 says, so as David stood there among his brothers, Samuel took the flask of olive oil he had brought And anointed David with the oil. And the Spirit of the Lord came powerfully upon David from that day on. Then Samuel returned to Ramah. So when the oil was poured onto David, it represented the marking of God. God was announcing to the world through his prophet, this is my man. This is my chosen vessel. This is my servant. David was being set apart. David was being sanctified. David was being backed by the authority of heaven. God was vindicating David. God was endorsing David. He was anointing him with the Holy Spirit for a certain purpose. When God anoints a life, that life is set aside. That life becomes sanctified. This might be why sometimes you feel like an outcast. This might be why sometimes you feel like you don't fit in. This might be why sometimes you feel like you're not quite connecting with everyone and everything around you. It's because God has by design disconnected you from certain places and people and maybe even from certain belief systems and certain streams because he has set you apart for a certain purpose. He's placed you for a certain task. God has smeared his nature on you. God has rubbed his nature on you. His essence, his power, his authority, his backing. It's being placed on your life when you're anointed. It was the backing with divine authority. I want you right now, if you want that, write it in the comment section, whether you're watching live or whether you're watching the replay. I I want you to write two simple words, anoint me. Just write it, make it your prayer. Say, God, anoint me. Anoint me for your glory. Anoint me for ministry. Use my life in whatever way you want to word it. Just tell him that you want him to use your life. Just ask him for the anointing right now. Ask him to rub his nature on you unto a purpose. Tell him, Lord, spend my life for your glory. Just make yourself available for the anointing of the Holy Spirit. Write that in the comments. Now, in the Old Testament, we see that kings were anointed. Uh, 1 Samuel 16:1-13 is an example of this. Number 2, prophets were anointed. That's 1 Kings 19:16. Priests were anointed. That's Exodus chapter 28, verse 41. Special holy items and places such as altars were anointed. You can see an example of this in Exodus chapter 29, verse 36. So again, this was ceremoniously done. People would either rub or pour oil onto a person or onto an object, and whenever the oil touched that person or that object, that person or that object was considered holy. Set apart, set unto a divine purpose. And so you and I today have the substance of that shadow. So in the Old Testament, they had just oil. You and I today have the power of the Holy Ghost. And that's not to say that the Holy Spirit wasn't moving in the Old Testament, but again, there was a shadow and a substance. Look at what the Bible says in Acts 19:12. This is a fascinating reality about the anointing and one that people often overlook. The anointing has a tangible quality to it. Sometimes you may come to our services, or perhaps you've seen the video clips, and this is probably the most controversial aspect of our ministry. Whenever we draw criticism— yes, we draw criticism when we pray for the sick. Yes, we draw criticism when we— when I teach on speaking in tongues. Yes, we draw criticism when we point to the supernatural working of the Holy Spirit in this ministry. But probably the most controversial aspect of this ministry is the slaying power of the Holy Ghost. You'll watch sometimes our videos or the services of the live streams, and people who will come on the platform sometimes won't even be able to stand. The power of the Holy Ghost will overcome them in such a way that physically they are unable to stand up. This is the power of the Holy Ghost. Now, some might question that and say, well, I don't understand it. And it doesn't mean they're questioning it from, from a cynical place, and it doesn't mean they're, they're denying the Holy Spirit as a person or that they're coming against God. Some people genuinely just wonder, I wonder why that is, or, or is that biblical? Well, the Bible talks about a tangible quality to the anointing of the Holy Spirit. And again, this is an often overlooked quality concerning the anointing. The anointing is tangible. What does that mean? It means you can touch it. You can feel it. You, you can sense it on your being. We have people reporting all the time, even just watching these live streams, just during the teachings alone. Sometimes people say that they're starting to feel a heat come on their body, or, or some people— most people report like an electric sensation moving up and down their bodies. And you can actually see this when you tune into a live stream. If you actually tune in live, you'll see at the beginning there's this intro, like a countdown counting down to the live stream. And in that countdown, you'll see footage of people being touched by the power of the Holy Ghost, they'll fall over and they look like they're being electrocuted. And people wonder, what is that? That is one manifestation of the anointing of the Holy Spirit. And the anointing does have that physical, tangible touch to it. So again, Old Testament was the shadow, New Testament is the substance. Watch this, Acts 19:12. This is incredible. When handkerchiefs or aprons that had merely touched his skin were placed on sick people, they were healed of their diseases and evil spirits were expelled. So people were healed and delivered just one touch. It was the anointing that did it. It wasn't ritual, it wasn't technique, it wasn't knowing the night— the right things to pray or the right things to say. It wasn't a system that was applied. It was simply the power of the Holy Ghost. I remember one time I was attending a conference And I had placed my Bible on the chair to save my seat. Sometimes, you know, in church, people, we all know not to steal, but I think one of the most stolen things is the seat that you save at church. And so I had saved my seat with my Bible, and this was during a season of fasting and prayer where I was really encountering these tangible touches of the Holy Spirit's power. And again, the tangible touch doesn't come all the time, but there are certain moments where it does. And so During this particular week, I was really walking in this, uh, this under this umbrella of the tangible anointing, and I could sense it on my physical body. So I put my Bible down to save my seat, and then I come back and I realized my Bible was gone. And I was looking around for where it had gone, and one of the girls in our youth group comes up to me, says, hey, I noticed you left your Bible on the seat. And I'm thinking, well, yeah, I was trying to save my seat, but never mind. She was being nice, she was doing me a favor. She says, well, I just wanted to give this to you because I thought you might have lost it. She says, but something really weird happened. I said, what's that? She says, when I went to go pick up your Bible, the moment I grabbed it, I felt like someone electrocuted my arm. She said, and I felt like this tingling sensation all over my body. So what, what is that? And I'd explain to her, that's the anointing of the Holy Spirit. Now, this is not to glorify a person. We all know that this is the Holy Spirit. I always tell people, it's not me, it's who's around me, it's who I'm friends with. It's that spirit that comes onto the platform with me in these meetings. He's real. He stands next to me in these services. He stands with you as you pray. He's sitting with you right now as you're watching this live stream. He's present with you. His power is there and it's tangible, and sometimes you can sense it. Mark 6:13 says, and they cast out many demons and healed many sick people, anointing them with olive oil. There we see something to be said of the oil. There's this tangible touch, there's this exercise of faith. Not that it's the anointing itself— we know the oil— or not that it's the oil, excuse me, I should say not that it's the oil itself. We know that the oil itself does not necessarily contain the power. It's the act of obedience through faith that releases the power of God. And God tells us in his word to use oil sometimes when doing ministry, and that act of faith in obedience to his word releases the power that can be felt. There's a real substance that comes on. Now, there are three different expressions to the presence of God that you'll see in the scripture. Like, for example, in Psalm 139, The psalmist writes of the omnipresence of God. Where can I go? Where can I escape from your presence? That's the omnipresence of God. 1 John 2:27 talks about the indwelling presence of God, the anointing within you that is in you, and he does not leave you. So there's the omnipresence of God, which is the everywhere presence of God. There's the indwelling presence of God, which is in you. And then there's the manifested presence of God. This is the tangible touch of his presence, and this is not the presence of God showing up, because the presence of God is always with you. Rather, this is you becoming more aware of that which is always there. For example, people say things like this when they go to church: man, we prayed, we worshiped, and the anointing just fell. And I understand the terminology. Don't feel bad if you use that terminology. Sometimes, as someone who was raised in a Pentecostal church, sometimes that terminology still will slip out of my mouth and I'll say, oh, the anointing fell, or the anointing is falling, or the anointing showed up. And really what we mean by that is that people became aware of the tangible presence of God. So, so really, the manifested presence of God, or the tangible presence of God, the tangible touch of his power, is simply your awareness of the omnipresence of God. It's when I shift my focus to be more aware of that which is always there that I begin to sense and to feel. This is why during seasons of fasting, sometimes you'll feel it more. This is why during seasons where you have more time to commit to prayer, you'll feel that more, and others will feel it on you. It's not because God is coming closer. It's because you're living in a greater awareness of the presence of God. James 5:15, another example of the oil in use in the New Testament, resulting in an actual demonstration of power that's tangible. James 5:15 says, are any of you sick? You should call for the elders of the church to come and pray over you, anointing you with oil in the name of the Lord. Such a prayer offered in faith will heal the sick, and the Lord will make you well. And if you have committed any sins, you will be forgiven. Why does that work? Again, not because of the oil itself, but because the oil represents the power of the Holy Spirit. And whenever you step out to act in faith In obedience to the word of God, the power of God will meet. Let me say that again because somebody needs to hear that. Whenever you step out in faith, in obedience to the word of God, the power of God will back that action. And so that's what we see happening with the oil. Now the Bible also says in Acts chapter 10, verse 38, something very powerful. Now see if you can make the connection here. Remember, in the Old Testament, oil was poured on individuals or smeared on individuals. That power came upon a life. And in the New Testament, we see something something going on here that alludes to that. Look at this, Acts chapter 10, verse 38: And you know that God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power. So here God anoints Jesus of Nazareth. So in the Old Testament, they smeared the oil or poured the oil on the top of people's heads. Here we see God smearing his nature on the physical body of the Lord Jesus, and he carried that tangible touch of power. We saw this with the woman with the issue of blood, where she comes up behind the Lord, touches the fringe of his robe. He turns around, he says, who touched me? The disciples say, Lord, everyone's touching. He said, no, someone touched me with intention, and I felt power go out of me. That is a demonstration of the tangible anointing, the tangible touch of God's power. The prophet's bones that resurrected a dead man. We saw it with handkerchiefs. We see it with shadows in the book of Acts. This is a reality. What an amazing reality that is, that the very power of God, that mighty creative force which caused the world to come into existence, the very same which flows through the body of Christ, that virtue that touched the blind and the deaf, causing them to see and to hear. The very same power that instantaneously expelled forces of darkness from the bodies of those who were possessed by devils. This is that anointing. It's real. You can feel it. It is on you. It is in you. You have that. You carry that substance. That was shown in the shadow of Old Testament teaching. The Old Testament was the shadow. The New Testament, we see the substance. The anointing is not charisma. The anointing is not personality. The anointing is not good preaching. It's God's power. I'll use my life as an example. Because anyone can see that my personality is not necessarily something that in and of itself is interesting. What adds to it is not me, it's the anointing. In your life, I'm sure you've seen examples of this where you often look at how God is using you. Maybe you see how God uses you in ministry, or maybe you see how God is using you to touch those around you, and you just know this can't possibly be me. It has to be the anointing. And be aware of that. Stay mindful of that fact. I try to keep that ever before my mind. It's not you, David. It's not you. It's the anointing. It's the anointing that makes the difference. The anointing is that power. So that is the smearing of God's nature, and it comes by the Holy Spirit. And when he anoints you, he sanctifies you. When he anoints you, he sets you apart. When he anoints you, he backs you with his authority. When he anoints you, he endorses you with his presence. He marks you. You stand out. You're not just one of the regular folk. You're not just a part of the crowd. You're not just going with the flow. In fact, I've struggled many times in my mind where I say, Lord, I don't even know where I necessarily fit in. I'm too Pentecostal for the Baptists, and I'm too Baptist for the Pentecostals. Well, that's— the Lord told me that's because there's a balance of word and spirit. Sometimes I don't know what, what stream do I even fit in? What category do I even belong to? And maybe you feel that way. Maybe you're like me in that sense. I'll tell you what we belong to. We belong to the person of the Holy Spirit. We belong to him. We belong to his word. That's why you're different. That's why you stand out. That's why it's so difficult to see where you fit in. Sometimes maybe you feel like you're a puzzle piece that maybe just not at the right puzzle. And that's because God has created something unique unique for you to fulfill. That is because you're a friend of the Holy Spirit. That's the stream I belong to. I'm a friend of the Holy Spirit. I'm a lover of Jesus. I'm a lover of the word of God. Simple, simple. Not being sidetracked by this and that, but focused on the person of Jesus. Walking in that anointing comes when you're focused, when you're grounded on his word, when you're grounded in prayer, when you love his presence. And that's you. He's rubbed his nature on you. He's given you that, that, that marking. He set you apart. That's why you're different. That's why sometimes you feel like you don't belong. You're anointed of God. He set you apart. So what does this anointing do other than set you apart, other than mark you? Other than God endorsing you in that way. You know, he's announced you. And this is why when God anoints you, you don't have to go around announcing, I'm anointed, I'm anointed, I'm anointed, I have authority, I have authority, I have authority. Listen, if you have to talk a big game, it's probably because you lack power. That's just the truth. If you have to talk a big game, it's probably because you lack power. And I'm saying that because we as the people of God must walk in humility. If you constantly have to remind people that you have authority, if you constantly have to remind people that you have power, then it's probably not there because the anointing is self-evident. God will promote you. God has marked you. Leave that to him. Now, I want to do away with the misconception. There's maybe something you've heard concerning the anointing. I'm going to address it right now, and I want to hopefully help to reform some of the thinking that you have concerning the anointing here. Let me make this absolutely clear. There is only one anointing, and that's it. In certain streams— I'm going to throw myself in there because, you know, I, I fell into this thinking. And, and when I say certain— let me just say this— when I say certain streams, I'm not trying to divide the body of Christ. I'm trying to help you identify certain sources of teaching. And for me, because I grew up charismatic Pentecostal. And because I still pretty much identify as a charismatic Christian, I know that in my stream, so to speak, in my movement, in, in the churches that I'm a part of, we have lingo sometimes that just doesn't align with the word. And it's not that we mean something unbiblical, but the way we describe it sometimes can be unbiblical. And I'll just tell you this, we sometimes teach about the anointing almost like there's all these different anointings to collect. You know, like the collector's edition prophetic anointing. Well, I got a prophetic anointing, but did you get a prophetic anointing from such and such conference on during this year, during this type of revival? That was a certain anointing that was on that certain movement for that certain conference that you could only get there. I'm thinking like that people are treating the anointing like they're, they're NFTs or something, like you got to collect this one and that one, and this one's a special edition. Oh, I got the prophetic anointing, I got the deliverance anointing, I got the healing anointing. But I still got to go find the prosperity anointing. That one is hard to come by. Did you guys see where it was? Maybe they have some more in stock. They sold out here or there, right? And so we start to visualize the anointing like there's all these different types. I need the deliverance anointing. I need the healing anointing. I need the preaching anointing. I need the prophetic anointing. Oh, I want the apostolic anointing. Well, you have an apostolic anointing, but do you have an evangelistic prophetic healing anointing? That's a totally different one that maybe you should try to find. And And what happens is we start to chase all of these imaginary anointings that are not even there. And because we're chasing anointings that don't exist, we're not tapping into what God has actually given to us. There is no healing anointing. There is no healing glory. There is no deliverance anointing. There is no deliverance glory. There is no prophetic anointing or prophetic glory. It's all one anointing. The glory is simply the full weight of God's presence, the weightiness, his, his, his, his there-ness, his presence, him being there. That's the glory. Okay, and so the same is true of the anointing in that it's simplistic. It's so simple. I think sometimes we, we mess ourselves up and we get all caught up in these things that we don't need to get caught up into. Why? Because the one anointing brings healing. The one anointing brings deliverance. The one anointing will stir you to prophesy whenever God wants you to prophesy. You know, I don't identify as a prophet. If you were to categorize me in the fivefold ministry, I know exactly who I am. I'm first and foremost an evangelist, a soul winner. That is, that is fundamentally who I am in ministry. Added to that, God has added a teaching gift, a healing gift, and the gift of faith. That's my gift set, if you will. But I identify as an evangelist. Now, sometimes in a service, if you've been to our services, sometimes there will come moments where this flow just breaks through and I'll just start prophesying. And Steve, you've been with me several times. I don't do the guessing games. And I'm not saying this to brag on myself. I'm saying this to say that the Holy Spirit speaks so clearly. Why? Because I'm not trying to make it happen. He just does it. And I'll literally stand there for 10-15 minutes saying, there's somebody here, you're going through this, you've been through this, you, you're like this. I give them a whole description of themselves and what they're going through. And then I'll wait 10 minutes till they stand up and admit that it's them, because I'm not guessing. I'm not just guessing that somebody here may be going through it. I say, I, I tell them all the time, I know that I know that I know that the Holy Spirit is saying this. So we're going to wait for you. And finally, after fighting, someone will come forward. And it happens every time like that. Now again, this has nothing to do with me. Why? Because I'm not a prophet. That's not— that is not my, my office. That is not my, my, my calling. I'm not called to be a prophet per se, but because the anointing is present, it's the Holy Spirit's function, it's the Holy Spirit's ability. There are times when that prophetic unction will come on me, not because of who I am, not because I'm someone special, but because of the anointing. And that's you too. You will find yourself functioning and flowing in gifts that maybe you didn't even identify with that particular gift set. And you know, it's, it's something that the Holy Spirit does. Now let me just clarify here, I'm using myself as an example because I want to share these experiences with you. Please understand, I do not want to give the impression that I'm trying to exalt myself. I'm telling you my experiences with the anointing. And I want to be very clear that there's only one person we glorify here, and that's the Lord. He is the anointed one, and that anointing comes from the nearness to his presence. So there's no healing anointing or deliverance anointing or preaching anointing or prosperity anointing or prophetic anointing. It all has to do with one anointing. Now, there's nothing wrong with this kind of terminology when we say, oh, there's a real healing anointing here. What we really mean is right now the Holy Spirit is healing people. When we say, oh man, there was a prophetic anointing that showed up, what we really mean is that that was the direction that the Holy Spirit took the service in, a prophetic direction. So it's okay to use the terminology as long as we have a biblical understanding of what we're actually describing. It's kind of like gasoline. One type of fuel causes many cars to operate. So there could be a van, There could be a Hummer, there could be a Lamborghini, there could be— what's the, the fuel-efficient one, Steve? The, uh, the fuel-efficient— the one that's really quiet. Electric. Well, so electric is one of— anyway, you guys know that— the one, the, the one, the little one. Anyway, you know what I'm saying. The fuel-efficient one. Um, there are multiple different types of cars, sizes, shapes, colors, purposes, like a sports car That thing is meant to go fast. I have a friend who used to own a really expensive sports car, and man, that thing would go fast, but it would run out of gas rather quickly. And then there are some cars that are meant to be fuel efficient. They're meant to go the long haul. Now, they may not be as fun to drive, but they're very fuel efficient. So we have all these different types of vehicles, all different colors, all different purposes, all different builds and operations. All operating on one thing: gasoline, fuel. In the same way, the anointing on my life will cause me to operate very differently than the anointing on your life. Not because it's a different anointing, but because you're a different person with a different gift set. So I was at the gas station today filling up my vehicle and loving those Texas gas prices. And I'm filling up my vehicle, and I noticed that there's a bunch of cars there, and I looked and I saw all different types of vehicles. Now we were all filling up, and we all had a different driving experience when we drove off that lot, but it was the same thing. It was the gasoline. In the same way, when the anointing comes on you, it may look very different than when the anointing comes on me. When I say comes on, I mean kicks into a manifested operation. I don't mean that it literally comes on you. Again, there's that terminology. Now I have a friend who is, um, you know, in, in the prophetic ministry, and when he comes under this flow of the anointing, he gets very like hyperactive, right? Just starts moving, and, and he even dances sometimes in the prophetic and starts— he's just like moving with the music and dance. When I come under this flow of the, the anointing, I get very still, very quiet, very serious, and that's a different flow. Why? Because I'm a different person with a different gift set. It's a different flow for you too. So this one anointing causes many different unique gifts and ministries to operate. And now we say things like, oh, he's so anointed, or she's so anointed. What do we mean by that? Well, what we mean by that is he or she is currently functioning or operating in a high capacity in the power of God. Now look at what the anointing does here. Luke 4:17-19. The scroll of Isaiah the prophet was handed to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where this was written. Watch this. Now, this is powerful. The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, for he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim that captives will be released, that the blind will see, that the oppressed will be set free, and that the time of the Lord's favor has come. So here we see that the anointing causes several things. It causes one to proclaim, it causes deliverance, it causes healing, it causes freedom, it brings forth blessing and favor. The anointing is what makes the difference. I remember one time I was attending a Bible conference. It was like a 5-day conference, Monday through Friday. I wish more people would do more of those instead of 2-dayers. Because I like going and just receiving the word all week. So Monday through Friday, I remember each night they had, you know, a different worship team, a different guest singer to do the offering, and then a different preacher. And I remember during the offerings, it was almost like they were just trying to fill time so they can pass the buckets around. And they just had these different singers up singing to different tracks, all of them very talented. I'm not trying to be critical by any means, but I'll never forget, I think it was the Thursday night singer One of them just stood out. Now, this woman didn't sing as skillfully as the singers who had gone before her. I think she even missed a couple notes. But man, when she began to sing, you could sense the weight of God's presence fill that entire room. It was the anointing. The anointing is what makes the difference. The anointing is what breaks the bondages. Look, I can come to you and I could act like I have all the answers, but it's not intellect that breaks the bondage. I could come to you and I could maybe preach up a storm or make you laugh, but it's not charisma or personality. Anointing that breaks the bondage. Maybe I could come to you with some interesting doctrine, teach you something you never knew, and show you the scripture from an angle that maybe you never saw it. Even if I could do that, it's the anointing that breaks the bondage. I'll never forget when I was in youth group. This was when I— probably the first 2, 3 years I started preaching, somewhere around that time. And I remember there was this girl in our youth group who was just having a rough time. And I remember watching different youth ministers go to her and try to counsel her and help her and pray with her. I mean, there was death in her family. She was depressed and anxious. There was so much chaos coming at her from all different directions. I don't want to give too many details, but there were, there were so many major things happening in her life And you could just see this weight on her. And I remember watching as different people went to her and prayed with her, and it just didn't seem to break anything. This girl had grown up in church. She had gone to all the conferences. She had gone to youth camp, the worship events, the revival meetings, the prophetic services, the healing services, the Bible seminars, anything you could think She had been there and she had done that. All that the church had to offer, all the events, all the different types of ministry expressions, and still I saw that heaviness on her. Now I never got the chance to pray with her because I didn't know her that well. I just kind of watched from a distance. This was at the beginning of the ministry. I didn't have the wisdom to go and try to make that connection. But you know, I do remember going back home and I said to the Lord, Lord, give me the kind of anointing that could even break her bondage. Give me the kind of anointing that could break even the difficult things. And I didn't know it at the time, but what I was really praying was, God, let that anointing be so intense on my life. Let that anointing be so powerful, so strong, that even the toughest cases don't stand a chance against that anointing. It wasn't a kind of anointing that I was praying for. Now I realize what I was praying for was, God, Let me walk in the fullness of what you've given to me. Now I want to show you how to access that anointing. I'm going to show you from the scripture right now. I want to show you how to walk in that, how to truly come to a certain level of the anointing. And there are levels, there are levels of the anointing. Don't believe anyone who tells you otherwise. There are levels to the anointing. If you can grow in something, then there are levels to it. And I want to show you how to access this anointing or activate this anointing in your life. But first, if you believe that more Christians need to hear about the anointing, if you believe that we don't have enough teaching on the anointing, then I want you to help me spread this message by simply leaving a like on this video. If you're watching live or on the replay, I want everyone right now just to gently click that like button so that we can see this message spread even further. I'm serious, that little act, believe it or not, will make a difference and will help us to reach more people. How to access the anointing. It's important to first realize that this anointing I'm speaking about is already in you. Wait a minute, David, didn't you just say there are levels to the anointing? Well, these two thoughts are not contradictory to one another. Though it may seem that way at first. On one hand, we know that we have the anointing. On the other hand, we know that there are levels to it. Now, how can that be? I mean, if God deposited the fullness of the Holy Spirit's power in me the moment I was saved, how could it be that there are levels to it? How could it be that there's something missing that I haven't quite tapped into yet? Well, I'll show you. First, let's look at John 7:38. Verse 38 and 39, watch this. The one who believes in me, as the scripture said, from his innermost being will flow rivers of living water. But this he said in reference to the Spirit whom those who believed in him were to receive, for the Spirit was not yet given because Jesus was not yet glorified. Here Jesus is talking about the life of the believer. The believer will have rivers of the Spirit flowing through them, from them, from the innermost part of their being. What does that mean, innermost part of their being? Well, 1 Thessalonians chapter 5, verse 23 gives us a glimpse at the nature of man. You have a body, a soul, and a spirit. Your body is your earth suit, your senses. It's how you experience the world around you. Your soul is your mind, your will, your emotions. Your mind, what you think. Your will, what you desire. Your emotions, what you feel. But your spirit is your innermost connection with God. Your spirit is that which is already linked with the Holy Spirit. In your spirit, you're already one with God. In your spirit, you already know his word. In your spirit, you're already connected. You're already holy. You're already righteous. You're already walking in the fullness of power. The key then is getting that which is in you to flow out of you. And this is what I mean by having the anointing but then needing to access it. So when I talk about activating the anointing or accessing the anointing, I'm not talking about applying little tricks and tips or maybe some secret that you didn't know. There's really no secrets in the spirit realm. Sometimes I use the word secrets, but what I mean by that is just keys, keys that we see in the Bible. It's not a secret, it's right there. So when I talk about accessing the anointing or activating the anointing, I'm not talking about getting something that you don't have. There's no way that man could ever do anything to produce the anointing in his life. There's nothing you can do to bring about the anointing. It's just the presence of the Holy Ghost. So that anointing is in you the moment you receive Christ. The moment you are born again, that anointing comes to dwell within you. 1 Corinthians 6:19 says, don't you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who lives in you and was given to you by God? You do not belong to yourself. So the anointing, the Holy Spirit, dwells in you. Romans 8:11 says, the Spirit of God who raised Jesus from the dead lives in you. And just as God raised Christ Jesus from the dead, he will give life to your mortal bodies by this same Spirit living within you. So The anointing of the Holy Spirit dwells in me. The anointing of the Holy Spirit is like a well or reservoir that rests deep within my spirit. So the key then is not receiving the well but drawing from that well. The well is already in you, but you have to daily draw from that well, not so that you can receive the anointing but so that you can access it. The same thing is true of your bank account. There are funds in your bank account. Prayerfully, there are funds in your— even if there's not much, there are funds in your bank account. Okay, now how do you get that out? Well, you need an access point. Maybe your phone is linked to it and you pay through payment portals on your phone, or you use a debit card, or maybe some of you still use checks. Those access points are accessing something you already have. Now let's say you lose your debit card. If you lose your debit card, you didn't lose your funds, you just lost your access. In the same way, the anointing rests within you, and there are seasons of life where your access becomes weakened. It's not that God took his Holy Spirit from you. It's not that God lifted that power from off of your life. I'm going to cover that very, very detailed in just a moment, talk about how to protect the anointing on your life. And then especially those of you who feel you've lost the anointing, or even to some degree have weakened the anointing on your life, I want you to watch until the end because I'm going to be addressing that at the end. And that's very, very important that you watch it, even if you're not there in your spirit life right now. At least watch it so you're armed against the lies of the enemy for the future. But I'm talking about the fact that that just because you've lost your access doesn't mean you've lost the substance. And there's a big difference. When I say you lose your access, what I mean is you're not using that which God has deposited in you. So what then is the key to walking in this anointing? What then is the key to going into higher levels of this power? And by that, I don't mean receiving more of the anointing or more potent anointing. No, there is no more potent anointing. The fullness of the anointing is in you now. And God did not deposit a baby Holy Spirit, a junior Holy Spirit, a smaller Holy Spirit, or a new convert Holy Spirit in you. He gave you the same Holy Spirit who's in Christ. He gave you the same Holy Spirit who was in the disciples. He gave you the same Holy Spirit who was in the writers of the Gospels, the writers of the Psalms, and, and the poetic books and so forth, right? He gave you the same Holy Spirit. So you have that. You have that power. You have the fullness of that. The key then is accessing that which has been deposited in you. How do you do that? It's so simple. It's simple, but it's not easy. It's surrender. I'll never forget one time I was teaching pastors and Christian leaders, and I was doing a teaching on the power of God, and I'm standing up there and I'm teaching this simple message, and I'm asking, how many of you want the power of God? They began to cheer and clap. So how do you— how many want to know how to access that power? They're cheering, they're clapping, they're excited. So I'm going to give you one key. You do one thing and this power will flow through you. You do this one thing and this anointing will be on your life. You do this one thing and God is going to raise you for his glory. You do this one thing and you're going to stand out with favor. You do this one thing and your ministry will be distinctly marked. People will look and know there's something different about your ministry. You want that? People are clapping, cheering, amen, yes. I said, there's one thing you have to do, and I could tell you in one word: die. The whole room got quiet at that point. I don't mean literally die. I'm talking about a spiritual death. I'm talking about leaving your dreams, your plans, your will for your life— let it fall by the wayside— and picking up the cross of obedience to the word of God. What is picking up the cross? What is sacrifice? Well, first and foremost, you gotta, you gotta sacrifice your sin. There's this misconception that God doesn't want us to give us his sin. You do. You do need to give that up. That's part of what the crucified life is. That's, that's a part of the crucified life, is crucifying sinful desires. So you say, well, how do I put myself on the cross? Well, stop sinning. That's one way. The other way is when your will contradicts God's will, to choose God's will even when it hurts, to choose God's will even when it costs you something. That's what it means to surrender. Well, surrender is not a feeling, you know. Surrender is not a feeling. If surrender was a feeling, Jesus would have never prayed, Lord, if it's possible, let this cup pass from me. Because I promise you, when he prayed that, he did not feel like going to the cross. No, no, no. Surrender is not a feeling. Surrender, my friend, is obedience to the word of God. Surrender is obedience to the voice of the Holy Spirit. You want to surrender? Do what the Bible says. You want to surrender? Do what the Holy Spirit says. That is surrender, and that surrender is the key to accessing the anointing. As it applies to a service, at the services that we hold around the world, I make it a point to clear my mind and focus on the word, focus on the Holy Spirit. You know, there's a part at the beginning of the service where I'm just worshiping the Lord. Now, I'm not a great singer, but in those moments, my eyes closed, hands lifted, I haven't even really looked at the crowd yet. I'm just worshiping, just seeking the face of Jesus, forgetting about everyone around me and just saying, Lord, Whatever you want to do, tell me and I'll do it. And that's it. There's no secret to it. There's no other method. It's just obedience. No, no, Brother David, there's got to be more. You got to tell me more. And see, we want like these superstitious answers. We want to hear like, well, there's a certain realm that you have to access and You pray for 7 hours on a Tuesday in the evening and you'll start to see, you know, golden clouds around you. When you see those golden clouds, ask for the angel Michael, and Michael will bring down a bucket of— who knows what he's bringing. See, we want to hear all these, these, these things that just like, give me the specifics. Why? Because, because we want, we want superstition to make up for what we lack in discipline and obedience. Wow. I want to say that again because I sensed a strong push from the Holy Spirit on that. We want to make up for with superstition what we lack in discipline and obedience. It really is what some would label the boring things. Now, I know reading the word is not boring. I know prayer is not boring. I know developing your character is not boring, but some people view it that way. I don't want to hear about reading the word daily. I don't want to hear about daily prayer. We already know that. Tell me the real deep stuff. And sometimes what people mean by deep is weird. What, what deep stuff exactly are you talking about? You know, I've seen miracles. Tumors disappear, people come out of wheelchairs, paralysis healed, people on their deathbeds raised to fullness of health. Why? It's not anything I did. It's not because I, I conversed with some angel or I had some Well, you know, I prayed and fasted for 21 days to go into the dream world and access the glory in some vision. Those are all wonderful. Dreams are great, visions are great, angelic beings are helpful. But when it comes down to it, it's surrender. Surrender, my friend, not superstition, is the key to the anointing. And you'll see the difference. I don't even have to make the case. You see the difference. You see that there's substance. There's a focus on Jesus. There's a peace and a joy and a foundational standing on the word of God. Why? Because it's so simple that sometimes we miss it. Now again, there's nothing wrong with supernatural experiences. I love those. I love going into visions. I love angelic encounters. I love encounters in the glory realm. But sometimes I think we, we imagine that the deeper, greater levels of power are going to come from those things when they don't. The deeper, greater levels of power come from simple obedience. You want the anointing? Just stop gossiping. You want the anointing? Stop living in that secret sin. You want the anointing? Forgive that person who offended you. You want the anointing? Start keeping your word so God can trust you with his reputation. You want the anointing? Start preaching scripture and not trends of the day. You want the anointing? Then obey the Holy Ghost. You want the anointing? Be a good spouse. Husbands, don't be harsh with your wives. Wives, honor your husbands, as the scripture says. You want the anointing? Treat your children right. You want the anointing? Walk in humility. Say no to pride. Say no to ego. Focus on Jesus. It's simple. Oh no, no, no, no, we want to hear, we want to hear the exciting things, right? And again, the only reason you'd have to pursue those things is because you're lacking in the basics. Again, some people perceive those as boring. Don't talk to me about discipline, talk to me about those supernatural realms that I can go into and find the— that's not where you'll find it. In fact, you access those supernatural experiences without being grounded by obedience to the word of God, and you will lose your mind. I, I sensed a strong anointing when I said that right now. There are people— listen to me now— there are people who've lost their minds because they tried to navigate the realm of the supernatural without the basics of obedience to the word of God. The word will keep you grounded. Obedience to the word keeps you grounded. Obedience to the voice of the Holy Spirit keeps you grounded. You won't find the anointing in superstition. You'll find it in surrender. That's how you access this anointing. When, when there's that press against your will, when God's plans are starting to disrupt your plans, when what you want is different than what God wants, when, when your vision for your life starts to contradict God's vision for your life, That's where you'll find the anointing, when you obey him over your own desires. When there's repentance, when there's character, when there's Christ-likeness, Christ-centeredness, when there's a centering upon the word, that's where you'll find the anointing. You're not going to find the anointing in the weird. You're going to find him in the word. And then when you begin to live this way, not only is there power, but there's character to go along with that power. Not only is there supernatural manifestation, but you're grounded. And guys, you can see the difference. I'm gonna tell you this right now, I can see the difference in the ministries that are Jesus-centered, Bible-based, and ministries that are not. You can see the difference. I'll say this, for example, um, wonderful ministry who, uh, who I, I watch every now and then, um, Michael Koulianos in, in Orlando, Florida. I think of people like Pastor William McDowell, Orlando, Florida, because we're going to be going there, so these pastors are on my mind. What's going on there? There's a centering upon Jesus, so you get the supernatural without the strange. And by strange, I mean the flesh, the stuff that people add. I mean, I can go on naming— I'm not here to name a bunch of ministries, but just those just popped to my mind. Why? Because there's a difference. And then there are some who, yeah, they move in the supernatural, but there's just something weird, something off, something toxic, something, something, something's not right. Or, or maybe there's, there's confusion and division and fighting and gossip. And what's that from? That's from accessing certain levels of power without being grounded in surrender. So that's just, that's just something I want you to take note of, because, because you, you can access certain levels of power through the strange, but, but there's nothing like the power you access in surrender. Why? Because when it's Jesus-centered, Bible-based, Spirit-filled, there's, there's a peace that comes with it. I'll be honest with you, I've gone to some people's services and I leave just weirded out, freaked out, like really, like something in my, my, even physically I react like I just don't feel right about it. And it's, and it's nothing short of just, that was the flesh. I could just say that. I'm just, I'm grieved in the spirit going, that's the flesh. That was just weird. That was just, that was all about man. That was all about, you know, that was focused on what Jesus does and not who he is. And, and, and I'm telling you how to access the anointing, and you can see the difference in ministries, guys. I'm telling you, I'm telling you, you can see it. There's just something quite— that's not quite right, something off, something missing. And, and if you want to walk in a ministry that, that truly is walking in the power, but then there's also a, a grounding to you, there's a peace about you, people aren't confused around you, and there's not all of this chaos that goes with you, and there's not just this strangeness that people can't quite put their finger on— that comes from being grounded. Grounded in the Holy Ghost, grounded in surrender, obedience, obedience. So how do you protect this anointing? Well, it's important that we do, first of all, because there's— there are fewer things more precious than the anointing that God places on your life. Fewer things more precious than the anointing. Now I say that because, you know, I think we, we, we forget what God has given to us. He's given us something precious to carry. And I don't know about you, but I don't want to sacrifice the anointing on my life for anyone or anything. Hear me now. No temptation is worth the anointing God placed on your life. No sin is worth the anointing that God placed on your life. No relationship is worth the anointing that God placed on your life. No blessing is worth the anointing that God placed on your life. We must cherish the anointing. Protect and honor the anointing. We must be those who guard this precious gift that God has given to us. So how do you protect this anointing? Because by protecting the anointing, you intensify the power of God on your life. Let me say something here. In the world, there's this saying where people say, to each his own, to each his own. And the world has this saying, and basically what they mean by that is moral relativism. In other words, everyone can be right about their beliefs, right? To each his own. You believe this, I believe that, to each his own. Well, even though in the church we don't admit it, we actually do have our own belief system that's very similar to the world's belief system, except the church doesn't say to each his own. The church doesn't say there are many truths. The church doesn't say, well, you believe that and I believe this, and you go on living how you want. What the church says is, well, I'm not convicted about it. And it's our very own form of worldliness in the church. But let me ask you, since when was it ever about your convictions and not the Holy Spirit's? Since when was it ever about your standards and not the standards of scripture? Since when was it ever about your beliefs and not Bible beliefs, what the Bible actually teaches? You see, by saying, well, I'm not convicted about it, what we've done is we've given ourselves our own standard by which we live. So I want to call you now to a higher standard. Some might say I'm being legalistic, and legalism is how people who are living in sin mark those who preach holiness. So whenever I preach on holiness, people who are convicted say that's legalism because they want to reject the message of holiness. But God is a God who is holy. Be ye holy, for I am holy. So I'm going to give you some pointers here on how to protect that. And as you live at a higher standard, you will walk in a greater intensity of the power of God. You may say, well, 'Well, you know, it doesn't really necessarily have to be this way,' or 'I didn't really believe it was that wrong,' or— but look, we're not living by the world's standards, are we? If you want to walk in power that no one else carries, you're going to have to live a life that no one else lives. You're going to have to raise your standards. Now, that may be good for them and where they're going and what God called them to, but where you're going and what God has called you to requires that you go to a higher standard. Going to higher places. The power of God upon you is directly related to the purity within you. The power of God upon you is directly related to the purity within you. Is any sin or compromise or belief or blessing worth the anointing on your life? No, it is not worth the anointing. So you want to go to this higher standard, you want to protect this anointing. Let me show you. Number 1, you have to avoid the satanic. The satanic is real. Now you may say, David, I don't really operate in the satanic and I stay clear of that, but sometimes Christians invite satanic things into their lives and they don't even realize it. Like this whole New Age movement that's taking Gen Z by storm. By the way, there is a movement taking Gen Z by storm that's New Age in nature. You just have to go on TikTok to see that. And people talk about manifesting things and meditation and pulling on the universe for your blessing, and all of that really is nonsensical. But it's amazing to me how many Christians actually embrace such nonsense and pretend that it's biblical, not realizing they're operating in the satanic. They're actually weakening the power of God upon their lives because there's a mixture in the spirit. So avoid the demonic. The Bible says in James 4:7, So humble yourselves before God, resist the devil, and he will flee. In order to resist the devil, you must first humble yourself before God. But you have to be careful of what you see, what you hear, what you say. All of these things affect the anointing, or I should say it this way, all of these things affect the operation of the anointing on your life. There is nothing that you do that is without consequence.. I love the way Pastor Phil Muncy puts it. He says, in every deed there is a seed. In other words, every action is you sowing into your future. Are you going to want to reap what you're sowing in your actions today? We must avoid demonic power. We must avoid the satanic. And I can't believe I even have to teach on this, but hey, Paul the Apostle addressed this in many instances, in particular in 1 Corinthians, about staying away from pagan power. Why? Because believers are drawn to this, because they're drawn to the supernatural by nature. But you must avoid these things. Not only these things, another thing that's satanic straight out is sin. I wonder how many people are destroying tomorrow's public ministry with today's private sin. I want to say that again. I wonder how many people are destroying tomorrow's public ministry with today's private sin. You're, you're creating habits in your life that may look small now but they will destroy you in the future once they've grown into their fullness. There's no action that doesn't affect you in some way. So avoid the satanic. Number 2, avoid the secular. Now, the satanic and the secular are, are, are subtly different than each other. There's a subtle distinction between the two because the satanic will directly contradict the word of God and the the nature of the Holy Spirit. The secular doesn't always outright contradict the word of God, but it will always contradict the nature of the Holy Spirit. I'll give you some examples. The satanic says you don't need the church, you are the church. But the secular says, uh, maybe sleep in a little bit because you deserve to rest. See, both of them are trying to get you to do the same thing— forsake the assembly of yourselves. But But the satanic comes at it very directly. The secular is very subtle. Another example, the satanic may say something like, oh, read that book on Satanism so you can study about demons. Okay, that's satanic, a very satanic temptation. But the secular may say, well, you can fast forward that part of the movie and just watch the rest. It's not that bad. Secular. So the satanic is very direct. The, the secular is very subtle. Now again, I'm not talking about legalism here. I'm talking about outright things that affect you, that affect you, that tempt you, that can destroy you because they tempt you. Avoid these things. But we must avoid the secular. I've told this story before, but one time I was getting ready to minister at a church in Chicago. We actually were doing our service there, and before the service, get this, I'm just ironing my shirt for the service that night. And as I'm ironing— sometimes the Holy Spirit does this to me— as I'm ironing, this heavy weight of the glory of God comes into the room. And I feel this, this tangible touch of his presence, like a strong sense of the glory of God in the room. And I can feel him on my physical body. When I feel the anointing come on me real, real heavy, I get very, very still, and I sometimes even start to rock back and forth, almost like there are ocean waves that are moving me back and forth. And I can literally feel this weight come on me, and it was so beautiful, like it was a beautiful heavenly Jesus-centered experience, and I loved it. And so I'm saying, Lord, I want to take this to the service tonight and minister under this. And so what began to happen is there were some distractions in the room, like with the TV. I had to turn it off, and I'm just worshiping I get ready, I go down to the lobby. I met Steve and a few of the ministry team members down in the lobby, and I get there, they're all just having these casual conversations, not talking about anything that's particularly evil. I mean, they were talking about like sports and where they were going to go eat after the service, things like that. But I remember that as I was standing there hearing this chatter, that sensation that I sensed on my body began to weaken, almost like a blanket that was being lifted. Again, the anointing was not being taken from me, but the, the realization, the sense of that tangible touch of God's presence was dissipating. It was weakening. So I walked away from them toward the, the center of the lobby, and there was this TV that had this show that was on the screen. Nothing directly demonic, nothing directly sinful, just like— I think it was like a news show. I forget what it was. It was, it was, it was, it was harmless. I would not have been bothered if my daughter Aria was there watching whatever was on the TV. It was nothing harmful, nothing demonic, nothing overtly wrong. But I remember that as that TV was playing, I could sense this weakening of that tangible touch on my physical body. And I began to think, oh my goodness, even this is weakening it. So I go back to where the guys were standing and I tell Steve, Steve, listen— and we had, we had Uber drivers back then— I said, Steve, listen, I'm gonna put my headphones on. I need you to talk to the Uber driver so we don't seem like we're a bunch of rude people. And just, I'm not gonna talk to anybody. I just need to focus. So I sat in the back seat and I'm just staring at the seat in front of me, have worship music playing. I don't always do this. You probably think that's strange, but that's what I had to do to protect whatever it was I was sensing. And so I'm just kind of rocking in this wave of the anointing and I'm just sensing this on my physical body. Physical being. And as I look out the window, I saw signs for restaurants, advertisements for like lawyers, and very, very harmless or seemingly harmless things. And I remember just sitting there in the back seat, just looking at some promotion for like 10% off, you know, chicken and family, family meal. Just the mundane everyday surroundings of the world began weaken this power that I was sensing on my body. Now, I'm not saying you have to isolate like, like a bunch of, um, hermits. I'm not saying you have to go away into the hills, lock yourself in a tower, and fast for the rest of your life. What I'm saying is the secular can disrupt the flow of God's Spirit in your life simply because it's distracting. And it was as if, it was as if the very mundane nature, it was as if just the mundane things itself were an insult to the glory of God. Now, I'm not saying that I don't— I go to restaurants, I took my daughter to the park yesterday, and, you know, I participate in things that are not sinful, that are just everyday things. But the problem is these things can become distractions. These things can sidetrack us because we want a little entertainment, a little bit of rest, a little bit of recreation. These are good in and of themselves. You need them. You should participate in them. Don't be a weirdo and say, I can't go to the park because the anointing on my life. No, don't, don't do that, okay? That's just weird. You're not going to get more power that way. This is just an illustration of how sometimes there are moments where you have to go and just be alone with Jesus, and you can't let the distractions of the world pile up so much that they completely cut you off from these expressions of God's power. Mark chapter 5, verses 37 through 40 says this. Then Jesus stopped the crowd and wouldn't let anyone go with him except Peter, James, and John, the brother of James. When they came to the home of the synagogue leader, Jesus saw much commotion and weeping and wailing. This is Jesus going into the home of Jairus, and Jairus's daughter obviously had died, and the family is now weeping. Verse 39, he went inside and asked, why all this commotion and weeping. The child isn't dead, she's only asleep. So he makes this declaration of truth, and verse 40 says the crowd laughed at him, but he made them all leave, and he took the girl's father and mother and his three disciples into the room where the girl was lying. Of course, we know the rest of the story. Jesus raises her from the dead, but what he had to do first was remove distraction. Why couldn't Jesus just do the miracle right then and there with everybody mocking? Think about that. We're talking about Jesus, the Son of the Living God. Why couldn't he just do the miracle? Because the atmosphere of faith was being disrupted by the distractions. And you have to be like Jesus. There may be some people, some things that you have to kick out of your house before you see the resurrection. There may be some things that you have to remove from your home before you see the flow of that power moving. That's what this scripture is teaching us, that there, there is a distraction that can disrupt the flow of God's power on your life. We see it happening in the life of Jesus, and he had to remove certain people. Who do you have to remove? What do you have to remove? May not be— laughter is not evil, but Jesus removed those who were laughing. Why? Because of the place it was coming from and because what it was doing. To the flow of the anointing. How much time is wasted? See, we're so worried about demons and demonology. I'll tell you this, I believe in demons. I believe demons attack the church. I believe— you've seen, we practice and teach deliverance, all that. That's all wonderful. We should be, we should be casting out devils on the regular. All believers should be. But watch this now. Even though I believe that demon possession is a problem, can I tell you what a bigger problem in the church is? It's demon obsession. And we're so focused on how Satan is going to find some secret way into our lives that we actually just end up losing ground to the regular mundane things. If, if you're going to be taken out, if the anointing on your life is going to be disrupted, it's usually not going to come because you played with the Ouija board. You shouldn't play with the Ouija board, but what I'm saying is most Christians aren't playing with Ouija boards. Most Christians aren't sacrificing animals. Animals. Most Christians aren't pulling out satanic books and casting incantations. But you know what most Christians are doing? They're just wasting time watching Netflix. They're wasting time with, with, uh, with, with things that don't matter— watching TV, scrolling through Instagram, watching YouTube. Yeah, avoid the satanic, but you know what you really need to be on alert for is just the distractions of everyday life. I remember one time there was a prophetic flow, a prophetic anointing— just kidding, there's a prophetic flow. If you watch the whole lesson, you know why that's funny. Now there was this prophetic flow to the service, and I began to prophesy, and there was this clarity, man. I was— I don't know if you remember that, Steve, that, that service on a Wednesday night at Paramount. I was flowing in this prophetic anointing, calling people out from the back, and it was beautiful what the Holy Spirit was doing. I was just along for the ride. And I'll never forget, I'm looking around the room and I could literally see people's stories. It was— this has happened maybe like 3 times in my entire life where the prophetic was that clear. And I could see people's stories almost like over their head. It was just, it was just a very supernatural experience. And I'll never forget, this girl just comes in, she walks in. I think she had like keys on her purse. That's just the The keys are jingling. She walks all the way in from the back door, all the way down the aisle. Everyone's looking at her. She inches her way in and then just plops down on the front row where she had her seat being saved, starts chatting with her neighbor like, oh, thank you. Oh, good to see you, shaking hands with a couple more people, and then starts looking to see what God will do. The moment she walked in and sat down, I was distracted and that prophetic flow broke. I watched her, she sat down, and I said, "Well, the Holy Spirit's released me tonight. God bless you all. I'm gonna turn it back over to the pastor." And I hand it back over, and I was this close to calling her out, but I thought, "She probably, the poor girl, it would be so mean to do that." But my flesh wanted to call her out, but I was like, "Okay, okay, okay. It is what it is." And I learned that day that nothing kills the anointing quite like distraction. Demons can't really do much about the anointing, 'cause they're so powerless against it. No, demons can come to distract, you know. Sometimes people don't come— people who have demons, sometimes they'll come into your service not for deliverance but to distract. And you have to know the difference between the two, because people who come in to disrupt meetings when they got their demons with them, sometimes they don't want— sometimes they want deliverance, sometimes they don't. Sometimes they're there just to distract and manifest for the next 3 hours so that no one can hear the word, so no one's faith can be built, so no one can worship, so no one else can receive prayer. So sometimes they come for deliverance, sometimes they come to distract, and I'll tell you, that's what kills that flow of the anointing is distraction. This is why we're so careful when you come to our services, we're so careful to honor the presence of the Holy Spirit, to cultivate an atmosphere where the Holy Spirit can have absolute freedom to do whatever he wants to do, and so that other people aren't distracted. It's not that distraction scares the Holy Spirit. It's not that distraction keeps the Holy Spirit from moving. It's that distraction keeps people from receiving because we are so fickle. Our focus can be so easily destroyed. Our attention can be so easily robbed. And it's again, not that the Holy Spirit is afraid of distraction or is disrupted by distraction. It's that we can't receive when we're distracted. So you come to our service, the seats are laid out just so. The lighting is dialed in, the music and the sound is on point. The, the flow of seating from the parking to the seating, we try to keep a real nice smooth flow from the service. We don't allow any distraction, people getting up and disrupting. People sometimes try to get up and prophesy. I'll tell them, just please sit down, or the Holy Spirit doesn't interrupt himself. Please have a seat, and the flow continues. Why? Because we honor the move of the Holy Spirit. So be rid of distraction and avoid the secular. I'm talking about how to protect the anointing on your life. Avoid the satanic, avoid the secular. Oh, this third one, I'm going to give you this third one, and then I want to talk to you about how to restore the anointing if you feel that it's weakened or been removed from your life. We're really going to hit that head on. And watch it even if you're not in that season of your life. Maybe there are some, you feel the anointing has been weakened or you feel you lost your call, you need to watch, continue to watch, and you need to hear that final point. Or maybe you're not in that season, but there may be something that happens one day that causes you to feel that. I want you to be armed with the truth to protect the future of your ministry. Okay, number 3 on protecting the anointing. Number 3: avoid selfishness. Now this one is key. Because God will not share his glory with anyone. Isaiah 42:8 says, I am the Lord, that is my name. I will not give my glory to anyone else, nor share my praise with carved idols. God will not share his glory. I remember one time it was after a service, and if you've been to our services, you know that as often as we can, Steve and I and the team, when the service is over, will stand up by the altar and we'll pray for anybody who wants prayer. So when the cameras go off and we say good night, the live stream's done, I'll step off the platform, stand in front of the stage, and we say, anybody who wants prayer, come. And we'll be there for sometimes 3 hours, and the line will wrap all the way around the building inside. It'll go inside and sometimes even out the door, and we'll stay there for 3 hours if we have to We will speak with each one, pray with each one. Why? Because I think that's what Jesus does. But I'll never forget one service in particular. I was just super tired. I was exhausted, and I just wanted to go back to my hotel room and go to sleep, or eat something and then go to sleep. That's usually what we do after a service. And I remember just thinking, no, there are some people who drove hours to be here hoping to get prayer. The The least I can do is just pray with them and believe God with them, join my faith with them. So we stay there, and this woman comes up and she says, "You know, I didn't go on the stage to testify, but God healed me." I said, "Oh, that's wonderful." And she grabbed my hand, she looked me in the eye, she said, "Thank you. Thank you for my healing." Now usually when somebody tells me that, I'm very quick to say, "Don't thank me, thank Jesus. I had nothing to do with it." I just pointed you to him and he did it. Okay, I'm not the healer. Jesus is the healer. I'm very careful to say that lest God remove miracles from our ministry. So very careful to constantly give that glory to God. So this woman— I like what this one missionary, I believe, said, that what she does is as people compliment her, she collects them, and at the end of the day she says, it's like I'm giving a bouquet to God of compliments. Moments and say, here, these belong to you. I thought that was beautiful, so I thought I'd share it. But anyway, so this woman thanked me, and then she just walked away faster than I could get a chance to reply. She says, I don't want to, I don't want to interrupt, but you know, I, I didn't go on the platform. God healed me. Thank you so much for my healing. God bless you. And she walked off, and I went to talk to the next person, and deep in my spirit I'm going, oh my goodness, something, something, something's not right. I should have, I should have corrected that. And so I'm talking to people, 4 or 5 different people, and I'm trying to get my mind off of what that woman had said. But in the back of my mind, people are telling me their stories, their how they need prayer, and in the back of my mind I'm thinking, that woman thanked me and I didn't correct her. So I said, please wait here. And I told my staff, that woman who was just here a couple minutes ago, please go find her. They caught her, they were able to find her. I went to her I went up to her, I said, ma'am, you probably know— I was under such heavy conviction. I'm telling you, this is the standard God holds me to, because if I want to keep seeing miracles, I gotta, I gotta stick to his standard. I remember I was under such heavy conviction. I went there, I said, ma'am, I know you know that Jesus is the one who healed you, but I just had to correct it. Please don't take it the wrong way. This is not against you. You thanked me for your healing. You need to know I had nothing to do with it. And then I went back to the line of people waiting for prayer, and all that conviction lifted off of me. Now you may say, well, that's legalism. The Lord knew. But wait a minute, that's a standard I'll keep. I, I will protect that standard. Why? Because I need to protect that anointing. Because that's how it starts. Isn't that how it begins? Always something little something we kind of just excuse and say, oh, no big deal with that. For me, that was something I wasn't going to allow. I will not budge on that line. I will not move on that line. I have to be certain that the people know that I am not their healer, that Jesus is their healer. I have to be certain of that. And in order to be certain of that, I got to make sure I keep saying it. I will never say anything to point it back at me. I can't, because God will remove the miracles from our meetings things, lest I— if I, if I touch that glory, he will remove the miracles. God will not share his glory. Now something begins to happen with selfishness. Becomes about self-promotion, competition. Now especially those of you in ministry— every believer needs to hear this, but especially those of you in ministry, please hear this. Two things begin to happen when you start to wander into selfishness. 2 things begin to happen when you begin to lower that standard. Watch this now. Number 1, jealousy fills your heart. When you start to fall into the trap of self-centeredness, selfishness, and ego-centered ministry, you fall into jealousy, and ministries cease to be your partners and they start to be viewed as your competition. Please hear me now, people of God. There are people who will speak out against fellow brothers and sisters in Christ. There are people who will pull away from other ministries purely because of jealousy. Now, I'm not saying that all criticisms are unfounded all the time, but there are times that I've seen it over almost 20 years of ministry. March of 2022 will be 20 years of ministry for me. And I've seen it over and over. In denominations, this happens. In church fellowships, this happens. In television ministry, in radio ministry, in internet ministry, in social media ministry, every kind of ministry, every type of culture, this happens. The moment it becomes about you and your glory, your success, and your call and your anointing, You're in danger. God did not raise you to promote you. He raised you to promote his message. God raising you is not about your calling, not about your gifting, not about your anointing. It's about his work. And the moment we shift our focus and begin to become selfish and self-centered and egocentric, jealousy begins to fill your heart, and you begin to attack others because of jealousy. And when someone else succeeds, you view it as a threat. When another ministry falls, you celebrate it because that means that in some way that somehow adds to your success. The truth is, the success of others doesn't take away from your success in ministry, and the destruction of others doesn't add to yours. It just satisfies the ego jealousy. This leads to gossip. This leads to attacking other ministries publicly. That's dangerous, people of God. Please hear me. That's— and look, I've been tempted to do it. Sometimes people speak against me, I'm tempted to speak out. Sometimes I'll hear things and I'll know that it's just— but the Lord says, let me deal with it. Now, I'm not talking about heresy. I'm not talking about you know, someone got up and started saying that they were Jesus and that there's no such thing as hell, or that, uh, you know, you can go on sinning and God won't punish you. Okay, that I would call that person out, right? I'm not afraid to call out false religions and things like that. That's, that's not what I'm talking about here. There is a time and a place to do it, but I'm talking about sometimes among our brethren, we look for excuses to attack them. So any little thing that comes up we attack. What is that coming from? It's coming from a place of jealousy. Now here's the danger. Please hear me. When you do that, when you begin to attack others out of jealousy or gossip out of jealousy, you lose something on your ministry. Others begin to notice there's something that was lost. Something that changed. Maybe they had peace when they used to hear you, and now there's no longer that peace. Maybe they, they, they— now there's a cloud of confusion around you, or, or, or there's just this, this real anger, this vitriol, this, this bitterness that pours out of you. And, and, and really you don't even see it because jealousy always leads to bitterness. Well, what happened in Acts chapter 8 when Simon the Sorcerer wanted the power of the Holy Spirit? He wanted something good, but he wanted it for the wrong reasons. He tried to buy it because he was jealous of the apostles. He was jealous that the apostles had influence. He was jealous that other people looked to the apostles with awe. He was jealous that it could visibly be seen that when they laid their hands on people, that they received the Holy Spirit. So that bitterness comes from the place of jealousy. And now when you preach and you teach, It's anger, it's bitterness. There's this ugliness or weight on us, this cloud over you, and you can't even see it, but others can. When you preach, when you worship, when you pray, when you teach, there's something that has been weakened on your life. People of God, please hear this: there's something that's weakened on your ministry when you attack other people. And that comes out of jealousy. That's all that is. I mean, look, for example, I have wonderful friends in ministry and we disagree greatly on many different things, but we still love each other. We still honor each other. I'll— you'll still see not everyone even who comes on my broadcast that I bring to you I don't even necessarily agree with everything they teach, but because they're Christ-centered, because on the important things we agree, that's all that matters, isn't it? Look, I have friends who, who don't even believe in the gifts of the Spirit in operation today. Now you may say, Brother David, that's impurity taking away from the anointing. Well, not for me, because it doesn't affect me, because I know the word and I stand firmly enough on what I believe. They don't sway me. I, I have friends who come over for dinner who, who love the John MacArthur commentary, who don't believe in speaking in tongues, who think that being slain in the Spirit is not of God. But you know what? They still come over and we still have fellowship and we're still united. Why? Because of unity in the body of Christ. I'm not talking about uniting with heretics. I'm not talking about uniting and just approving of everyone and kind of like this sloppy grace where everybody's right, let's all get together. No, no, no. I'm talking about the fact that if we agree on the important issues, the central issues, we shouldn't attack one another. If we agree on Jesus, who he is, that he resurrected, the word of God, these important things, why can't we just have the spiritual maturity to unite in Christ? Why not? And so that begins to happen when you're self-centered, and that begins to weaken your anointing because now it's about ego, it's about self, it's about your promotion, about how popular you are, about how celebrated you are. And the moment others come along that seem to be threatening that, there's an attack. Dangerous. The second thing that happens when you begin to go into these self-centered perspectives. Second thing, this is very dangerous, you get off message in pursuit of growth. Now what I mean by that is when God called you and anointed you, he put his word in you. For me, for David Hernandez, the goal of course is to spread the gospel, win souls. But you know what the assignment is that God gave to me? Very clearly he said to me, I want you to introduce my Holy Spirit to your generation and his healing power. He said both, but he told me very clear, very direct, and I followed that ever since. I want you to introduce my Holy Spirit to your generation. So what do I teach on? The Holy Spirit, the anointing of the Holy Spirit, prayer in the Holy Spirit, how the Holy Spirit protects your call, how the Holy Spirit strengthens your spiritual gift, how the Holy Spirit deposits spiritual gifts, how the Holy Spirit speaks to the gift of tongues. So I can go on all day listing just topics on the Holy Spirit. Why? Because I love them so much. Now, do I teach on other things like healing and the call of God and, and the names of Jesus? And yes, of course, but always it's going to come back to me that central message is the message of the Holy Spirit. So for you, God has given you an assignment, a specific assignment. In order to become dynamic, you must first become specific. The problem comes when you become self-centered and you start chasing success instead of obedience. Hear me now. When you start chasing success instead of obedience, what begins to happen now is you start to get off message. You start to change what your focus is. You weaken your anointing. Watch this now. And everyone can see it but you. That's why this is so dangerous. Don't trade your calling for clicks. Don't trade the vision that God gave you for the views that the world can give to you. Don't trade your calling for clicks and don't trade the vision for views. Don't chase trends. Chase what God has given you. I know some who began in ministry, God gave them a very clear message, and today they don't even believe in Jesus anymore. They got to teaching different things and they got pulled into it. They don't even believe that Jesus is Lord anymore. They don't even believe— well, Jesus was just a great teacher. That's what they say. They say that about the Lord when they— then when they preached Christ and him crucified, and then in order to chase viewership and clicks and social media growth and ministry success and bigger crowds, they veered off onto something that God did not anoint them to specifically carry to the body of Christ. They, they left their assignment. And when you leave your assignment, you lose access to your anointing. I want to say that again: when you leave your assignment, you lose access to your anointing. Why? Because God gave you the anointing for a purpose. Again, I'm not talking about losing the anointing. I'm not saying the anointing doesn't cover it all, but God anointed you for a specific assignment. When you leave your assignment, you lose access to the anointing. You don't lose the anointing, you lose access to it. And I clarified that earlier of what that means. Think about a debit card and a bank account. Funds are still there, but you lost the card. And so you weaken the anointing. Everyone can see it but you. And here, this, this is so scary. You can function for a season like that. There are— there is a season in ministry where maybe it'll work for a year, 2 years, 3 years, but eventually God removes your influence. I'm serious. People who leave their assignment, they go chasing views and trends and, and, and things that God never called them to. And what happens is they go chasing these trends And yeah, you can function like that for a while, but eventually God will remove your influence. How do I know this? Well, I experienced this for a season in my life. I remember there was a season where people— the criticism— you talk about criticism— the criticism was so heavy against me. I mean, just from everywhere, and people who I thought loved me just coming against me because of of the supernatural, because of the way the Holy Spirit moves in our meetings, because of the healing miracles. I've been called everything in the book— false prophet to fraud to, to scam artists to even worse names that I can't repeat here. And so for about a 6-month season, I remember I kind of just softened it up on that. I try to become more diplomatic. I said, maybe I'll soften it. And I thought I was using wisdom. Here's the scary thing. I thought I was using wisdom when in fact I was cowering before criticism. I'll admit it, I was being a coward. Now, some people don't do it because criticism. Some people do it for clicks because, oh, there's more, there's more, like the shiny object. There's more here, there's more here. Here's the problem: once you get off message, you have to stay off message to sustain that growth. Once you get off message, you have to sustain that growth through staying off message. And it's very difficult for someone to taste some of that, some of what the world calls success, and then to say, actually, I'm going to go back to what God called me to do. Because now they're seeing it, but, but it doesn't last. It doesn't last. You preach only worldly trends, guess what? Your ministry and you will be just a passing trend likewise. So these two things happen when you begin to walk in selfishness and, and you begin to, to, to leave that, that place that God has called you to, you begin to develop jealousy and attack other ministries openly. And, and it becomes a competition. It's a fight for who has the more subscribers, the more followers, the more views, the more clicks. That's an ugly, ugly, toxic thing you don't want to be a part of. Don't ever let yourself go there. Stay pure. And in that purity, there's power. And in that power, there's favor and there's growth. And then what begins to happen is when you become self-centered as you get off message. So these things can damage you. So to protect the anointing, avoid the satanic— I'm talking about sin and things that are directly evil— avoid the secular— these are distractions of the world— and number 3, avoid selfishness. Selfishness will distract you by causing you to operate in jealousy or will cause you to get off message because it's all about self. Now I want to show you How to restore the anointing on your life if you feel like it's weakened. Maybe you feel like you've lost the call of God. Maybe you feel like there was something that you had, but now it's missing. Something's lacking now. Something's not quite right. It's not the way it was before. I want to show you how to get back to where you were, and not just to where you were, but to come back even stronger than ever before. You don't have to just settle for coming back to where you were. God wants to take you back to where you were and then some. It's possible. I'm going to show you how to do it from scripture, but before I do, make sure you're subscribed. First-time viewer, or maybe you've watched a few of our videos, make sure you're subscribed to Encounter TV. Click that notification bell when you do subscribe. I release teachings and sermons on the Holy Spirit, prayer, spiritual warfare topics such as these. We also do live streams like this, and we also live stream our encounter services from all around the world. At those Encounter Services, the power of the Holy Ghost moves. People report feeling the power of God just through watching it. God saves, heals, delivers, and gives refreshing to his people at those meetings. We live stream those. So you're looking for a ministry that's both Spirit-filled and biblically balanced, then make sure you're subscribed to Encounter TV. And now I want to show you that it's not too late for you to restore the anointing on your life But before I do that, I want to check in with the chat.

And chat, you guys have been amazing so far during this whole live stream. I've been, I've been viewing your questions as well as your comments, and you guys have just been so talkative. And this topic again has just been blessing everybody, and I know you guys are being blessed. There's still more to come right now, so continue to write with us, comment, and leave your questions down below in the chat.

Anything the chat is saying, comments maybe that are standing out to you, Steve?

Sure, let's take a peek here. Uh, this one's very interesting. Uh, this comes from our friend Frankie. Frankie said, thank you, Pastor, for this message. You're hitting it right on the head with these topics. I've been seeing a lot of these trends lately, and your message right now has been speaking to me. So people have been really touched here. I can go ahead and look at another question or another, uh, comment here. And this one comes from our friend— wow, they're flying by, by the way. Everybody's been commenting so quickly here. I see Victoria saying, Father, take more of me and give me more of yourself. Thank you, Lord. Uh, we also see another comment here, and this one's really interesting. This one has been kind of trending in our comment section: don't trade the calling for the click. That one's been trending a lot.

Maybe we should do like a Maybe like a post, Tim, on Instagram. Don't trade your calling for clicks. Don't trade the vision for views. Stay on message. Well, thank you, Steve, for that water break. I appreciate it. I can't believe how long I was talking there. It's the anointing that makes the difference. Okay, I want to talk to you now about how to restore this anointing on your life. This is so important. I wanted to build to this because I talked to you about what the anointing is, what the anointing does, How to access this anointing, how to protect this anointing. But now I wanna talk to you. If you feel like you've lost something on your life, maybe you feel like there was a weakening of power. Maybe you feel like you were operating at a certain level in your calling, and now for some reason you can't quite put your finger on it, but things just aren't the same. Maybe there was a fall into sin. Maybe there was some compromise. Maybe there was some division. Maybe you did allow yourself to get into sin, to jealousy, to competition, to getting off of message, all of those things. I'm going to show you it's possible to be restored. You might feel disqualified from being used by God, or maybe you're not there in that season, but this is for everyone. If you feel like you've lost the anointing or the anointing has been weakened even a little bit, and even if you feel like spiritually you're doing well and you're flowing as you should be, everyone should hear this. Because if you're in a place where you feel disqualified, this is for you because it's going to help you come back to grace. But if you're in a place where you feel like everything's going smooth, there may come a day where you do something or allow some compromise to weaken that. I'm not saying it, I'm not declaring that, I'm not trying to speak that over you by any means, but that may come. You need to be armed with this truth, and you need to be armed with this truth so you can help others be restored in the power of the Holy Ghost. Father, please touch people through this word. Please touch people through this word. Okay, there are different degrees of the weakening of the anointing. Maybe you had an outright fall, and maybe it was a public disgrace. Maybe you're watching and you fell into sin. Some sexual sin, some money scam, some drug habit that resurfaced, or maybe there was an issue in your family, or, or something that just absolutely destroyed your ministry, maybe your marriage, your family, your life, your mind, your emotions. And you're at this place now where you just don't see how you ever get back to where you were. Or maybe there's just some compromise in your life. Maybe it's not been a full collapse, but you're losing your balance. Maybe you haven't fallen, but you're losing your spiritual balance. You can feel there's this weakening in your spiritual life. You're missing days of prayer, not as committed to the word as you used to be. Maybe it's not an outright disruption of the anointing. Perhaps, my friend, it's just a subtle weakening of the operation of the anointing in your life. Perhaps, my friend, it's just a subtle weakening of that flow of power through you. First of all, I want to show you this to encourage you. John 14:16-18. You're going to love this. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate who will never leave you. He is the Holy Spirit who leads into all truth. Who what? Who will never leave you. I'm going to say it again. Who will never leave you. He is the Holy Spirit who leads into all truth. The world cannot receive him because it isn't looking for him and doesn't recognize him, but you know him because he lives with you now and later will be me in you. No, I will not abandon you as orphans. There is a damaging teaching that I used to teach, that I used to believe. It is a damaging teaching that's floating around the body of Christ. There's this idea that if you're in ministry and you mess up, or you're in ministry and there's some compromise, or if you're a leader or you're spiritually doing well, and that if you mess up, that God forsakes you or rejects you, that somehow there's this place where you come where even if you repent, that God's cursed you and he's forever abandoned you. That is something I used to teach. That is something I used to believe. Not only is it damaging, it's not biblical. Yes, I understand that the Lord does reject certain people. Yes, I understand that there are certain things that need to be recovered, like your reputation, when you lose something in ministry. But this idea that you can come to the Lord saying, Lord, I'm sorry, please restore my life and ministry, that he'll reject you and say, sorry, I set you to the side, never again for you— that is an outright lie. And people who believe that are deeply emotionally damaged, and they live with the psychological torment that's on them for the rest of their life. It's not true. This idea that he calls you and if you don't, and if you somehow make a mistake in the calling, that's it, he's done, not going to use your life anymore, putting you to the side. That's not true. The Bible says that he loves you with an everlasting love. The Bible says that the Holy Spirit will never leave you. Yes, his judgment comes upon those who sin, but remember this: God's judgment is for the sake of restoration. Old Testament stories being used to drive home these points that are not even biblical Old Testament stories. For example, like Saul. Oh well, he disobeyed God and God sent an evil spirit to him, and that was his fate for the rest of his life. Look, you know what? You know, I believe even in the Old Testament that God was a God of grace. Just look at how he dealt with the children of Israel whenever he sent judgment. Why did he send judgment? To correct their course. I believe that God did send tormenting spirit to Saul, He did send those tormenting spirits, but he didn't send those tormenting spirits just to send them. God sent those tormenting spirits to Saul as a last resort to get him to repent. I believe that with all my heart. What makes me say that? Well, the nature of God and how he deals with people. So then even judgment and punishment is for the sake of correction. Even judgment and consequence is to get you back on course. So when God sends judgment, he hasn't cursed you and forever put you to the side. Now, it could be debated— can someone have their conscience seared? Can they be reprobate in their heart? That's a whole different debate. But if you're coming to the Lord and saying, Lord, I need restoration, Lord, I need you, he's not going to reject you. He's not going to say, no, I'm sorry, I'm done with you. We imagine like we have to make up for this. People tell me things all the time like, well, you know, I just feel like the way I've been living, I'm so distant from God. I'm not— I've just been walking away. I feel so far from God. I'm thinking, he lives in you. What do you mean you're distant from God? See, no matter how far you've come, no matter how far you've gone in sin, no matter how far you've gone in compromise, no matter how far you've gone, a single moment of repentance can bring you all the way home. I want to say that again. No matter how far you've gone, a single moment of repentance can bring you all the way home. We imagine that there's like this checklist that we have to make up for all the sins, all the wrongdoing that's piled on our heads, that God's keeping track of it. And that when we finally come back to him, he says, okay, yeah, I accept you. Yeah, I embrace you. Yeah, I forgive you. 'But man, you're gonna have to go through a long road. You're gonna have to really prove to me that you want my love. You're gonna have to really prove to me that you want my anointing. You have to really prove to me that you want me in your life before I start interacting with you again.' No, when we return to the Lord, he's not begrudging our return. He's not looking down over the balconies of heaven with his arms folded going, 'Hmm, look who decided to show up.' No, it's as the father who ran to the prodigal son, he He sees you off in the distance and he runs to embrace you and he throws you a party. We have to get rid of the superstitious religious mindset that says that when you've fallen or when you've sinned or when you've compromised even a little— now you shouldn't sin and compromise a little, not at all, that's not what I'm saying— but we have to get it out of our heads that when God brings you back, that he's going to bring you back but on certain terms and conditions. He's going to bring you back but he's going to keep you at arm's length. He's going to bring you back, but he's not going to quite love you or favor you like he once did. No, that's not true. That's nowhere in scripture. When you come back to him, he's ready to restore. Now, of course, there's things you have to restore, like your reputation. If you've done something that's major, if there's been compromises, yeah, you have to develop new habits. But we can at least rest in the fact of knowing that God will wipe the record clear. Let's go and look at the first key to restoring the anointing. Number Number 1, you have to repent. 1 John 1:9 says, but if we confess our sins to him, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all wickedness. Now look at this verse. If we confess our sins to him, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all wickedness. Notice here that this is two twofold. The forgiveness of God has twofold nature, has a twofold nature. Number 1, he is faithful. Number 2, he is just. Now watch this. He's faithful in that he does it consistently. He's just in that he does it justly. Now let's focus first on just. He's just to forgive us our sins. Why does it say he's just? What that means is that he has the right to do it because of the finished work of the cross. In other words, he's not just pardoned you, he's legally pardoned you. Kind of like if someone's up for parole, right? And they're granted their freedom in the middle of their sentence. That's the legal way to do it. But if I go in and break someone out of prison, that's the illegal way to do it. That's not a just way of setting someone free from prison. Prison, you have to go through the system in order to get them out of prison justly. Or someone's exonerated, or someone maybe has years reduced for good behavior. That is a just way to forgive them, to pardon them. Now, if I go breaking open the brick walls and with a big truck and pull them out, and we get out of there and we have a helicopter come lift us out, okay, that is not just. That's unjust. And what's going to happen is they're going to go to jail, and I'll probably go with them. But God forgives you in a just manner, meaning he's done it through the legal system of heaven. He's done it in accordance to his own just nature. He's forgiven you justly, and he has the right to do so based upon the finished work of the cross. And he is faithful. What does this mean? Means he forgives you consistently. Consistently. Yes, God forgives repeat mistakes. That's a fact. Now someone might say, well, Brother David, you can't tell people that. You can't tell them that they can continue to sin and God can forgive them because then they're going to go on sinning. Well, think about this. This is why Paul the Apostle had to clarify by writing, what shall we say then? Shall we go on sinning? Is that what I'm saying? No. In other words, the grace of God is so good that people sometimes misunderstand it to mean that you can go on sinning. So even Paul the Apostle talked so freely and so powerfully about the grace of God, even Paul the Apostle had to clarify. He listed these things. Yeah, all your wrongdoing forgiven, past, present, and future. All the sins, even consistent sins, even sins that struggling with the flesh. Yeah, God can forgive all that. God can help you when you're struggling with the flesh. God will faithfully forgive you. And even Paul the Apostle had to clarify, but that doesn't mean you should go on sinning. And that's the truth of the matter, is that the grace of God is so abundant that people misunderstand and think that they can go on sinning. So let me be clear, you should not go on sinning. That's what John writes. He says, don't sin, keep yourselves from sin. But then we see in the scripture here, but if we confess our sins to him, he is He's faithful to forgive us. In other words, he will do it consistently. Well, I knew better, so now I just have to deal with it for the rest of my life. Well, wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute. God's grace— hear me now, please, this is for someone watching— God's grace even applies to those who knew better. Whoa, what a thought. God's grace even applies to you. Do you think that you're so good at sinning that you could exhaust the abundant evidence of God's grace. Again, I'm not saying you should go on sinning. True believers will strive for holiness. True believers will work toward holiness. True believers will do everything they can to live holy lives. But we don't live holy to be saved. We live holy as a thanks to God because we are saved. So don't misunderstand what I'm saying here. You can't just go on sinning. And I'm not saying go on, do there's no consequences. Oh boy, are there consequences to sin. But what I am saying is we have to be rid of this notion that somehow if we fall or compromise that God brings us back but like on certain terms and conditions. Or I'm one of the church members again, I'm back in the fold, I'm a child of God, but I'm marked as one of the children of God who fell. And people carry these things, but we have to first repent of this sin. We have to go to him and confess it. What does it mean to repent? Repent literally means to change your mind. In the context of biblical teaching, repent means to change your mind, or a change in mind that results in the forsaking of sin. In other words, I'm coming into agreement with God. God, I agree with you, this is wrong. I agree with you, I should not allow this in my life. I agree with you, that this small sin, seemingly small sin, doesn't belong here. Because sometimes we try to justify things. Sometimes we try to say things like, well, it's not that big, or it's not really damaging me that much. And see, we say that we don't do that, but we do that. Everyone justifies their own sin, unfortunately. Now, some have become more mature and gotten better at resisting sin. Written, but everyone tries to justify their own sin in their own mind. Your flesh will fight you on that. Your spirit may say, no, this is wrong, but your flesh will say, well, it'll try to bargain with you to say, well, no, maybe not for you. And so we must come into this agreement with God and say, okay, God, not only do I agree with you that this is wrong, but I agree with you that this shouldn't be allowed in my life. Because sometimes we'll repent and what we actually mean is, okay, I'm not going to do it ever again until I'm really, really tempted to do it, then I'll just do it again you can forgive me. That's not repentance. Repentance is to go and live with the intention of, I'm never going to do this again, not in any form, not to any scale, not a small form of it, not a big form of it, not a form of it 6 months from now. Because I think sometimes that we get religious and it works both ways. You see, sometimes religion is what keeps record. Religion will say, well, I had I've had 6 months of sin, so I'm not good with God right now. He doesn't love me. I need another 6 months of sin and then I'm good. But the problem is when you view it like that, and this is very nuanced, so please try to ask the Holy Spirit to help you understand this. Religion keeps record. So when you keep a record of all your wrongs against yourself, you end up going, well, I'm not right with God, or God is far from me because of my past sins. Maybe you repented, maybe you received forgiveness, but because you have this long list of things that you've done that are wrong, you say, well, there it is, God's distant from me. That's record-keeping. But it also works in the reverse. Sometimes— watch this now— people will say, well, I've had 6 months where I've done so good. If I sin now, it's not really a lifestyle of sin, it's just a one-time thing. I'm just struggling now, and so if I do it, it's it's okay. You see then how record-keeping doesn't help you either way. So the key then is to repent in the biblical sense, to change your mind, say, okay, I'm done with that thing. I'm not going to allow it in my life, not at any moment, not in the future, not 6 months from now, and not even in a small measure. I'm going to repent. That's number 1. Number 2, you have to return. Now this is different. And this is where most people get stuck. Let me show you something. Revelation chapter 2. I'm going to read verses 2, 3, and 4, and then 5a, the first portion of verse 5. I know all the things you do. I have seen your hard work and your patient endurance. I know you don't tolerate evil people. You have examined the claims of those who say they are apostles but You have discovered they are liars. You have patiently suffered for me without quitting, but I have this complaint against you. You don't love me or each other as you did at first. Look how far you have fallen. Turn back to me and do the works you did at first. Many people know how to repent. Very few people know how to return. Here's what happens. You fall into sin, or maybe it's not a full-on fall, maybe it's just compromises in your life. You begin to take on guilt and shame and record-keeping, and you view your walk with God as a performance. And you say, well, I'm this far from from God. I'm 100 miles from God. And if I, if I don't sin today, then I'm only 90 miles from God. And if I don't sin on Tuesday, then I'm 80 miles from God. If I don't sin on Wednesday, then I'm 70 miles from God. But if I sin again on Thursday, I'm back to 100 miles from God. And see, that way of looking at it, you'll never find freedom. Never. Because what happens is— and maybe this happened with you, maybe you were in ministry, maybe you had a leadership position, maybe you were doing doing well, you were seeing miracles, flowing in the gifts. Maybe you're not where you used to be, but here's what happens. You mess up, you commit that sin, or you live in that compromise— maybe not outright sin— and now you wear your old wrongdoing like a jacket, and you put that jacket of your past and wrongdoing, and you embrace it as a part of who you are now. And now I have this jacket and yeah, I can— maybe I'm back in ministry, but I still have the jacket. Yeah, I'm preaching now, but remember, you have the jacket. I'm the preacher who had that fall. Or yeah, I'm back teaching Bible study, but remember, I had that season of compromise. Or yeah, I'm wearing— I'm back in ministry, I'm doing as I should, but now I had that 6 months where I didn't pray, so God took away a gift, and now it's never coming back the same way again. And no matter what you no matter what you do, you always see yourself through the lens of that wrongdoing. And so even if you repent, you have a very difficult time returning to where you once were. There's this thing called social anxiety. I think I might have a little bit of it. Some people say, oh, be anxious for nothing, Brother David. Okay, I'm working on it. But, but, you know, like I'll go to like a gathering with people or a birthday party, or even sometimes the green room, at these TV ministries. People think that I'm there and confident. No, no, I'm in the green room looking around people who are there, I'm going, "I should not be here. These are some giants in the faith and I should not be here." Right? There's like no confidence I get around other giants in the faith. But anyway, that's a different story. But the social anxiety is, I'll go and I'll shake someone's hand, "God bless you," and in my mind I'm going, "Don't come across as a young, arrogant evangelist. Don't come across too friendly because they're gonna think you're fake." Don't be too serious, 'cause then they're gonna think you're mean. Don't be too short with the conversation, they're gonna think you're trying to cut them off. Don't talk too much to them, 'cause they're gonna think you're trying to use them for their influence. And no matter what I do, I'm thinking, oh my goodness, and I leave that meeting or that service or whatever it was, I leave it in the car, huh, Steve, I'll be asking you, Steve, did I come across this way? Steve, did I talk too much? Steve, did I, or whoever's with me at the time, sorry Steve, it's more often than not you, like, was I talking too much? Did I talk too much, did I not talk enough? And it just kind of sticks in my head. And the problem is, I'm over there leaving that conversation going, "Oh my goodness, they thought I was arrogant." Or, "Oh, they thought I was too friendly and fake." Or, "They thought I was too engaged in conversation." "I talked too much." "I didn't talk enough." "I was too close." "I was too distant." And back and forth in my mind. And they're leaving and they're not even thinking about me. I guarantee you they're not even thinking about me. And so I do this to myself sometimes. I'm getting better at not doing it. I do this to myself. And what I'm doing is I'm trying to see other people's perception of me. And the problem is those of you who've made mistakes, those of you who've had compromises, you may not want to wear that jacket, but you think that everyone's thinking about your past. You think that everyone sees you through the lens of your past mistakes. You think that everyone's holding it over your head. You think that everyone sees that jacket on you. You think that though you've come back and you're doing well again, that all the people in the church are going, oh, here's this guy, or here's this girl again. And what you're doing is you're seeing a false perception through other people's eyes, and because of it, you're wearing the shame, you're wearing the mistake, you're wearing the compromise of past mistakes. Sometimes the belief that you're somehow marked, that you just— you just— yeah, you're back. Yeah, you've repented. Yeah, you're living holy, but you just can't quite get back into it. Even when you preach and teach, you're not as confident as you used to be, because now when you preach and teach, you're just thinking, oh my goodness, I'm preaching and teaching, but everyone's just thinking about my past. And so other people say, oh, something's lost on him, when it's not that you lost the anointing, it's that you lost confidence in the anointing. It's not that you lost your calling, you've lost the belief that you're called. Let me say that again, the Holy Spirit just gave that to me. It's not that you've lost your anointing, it's that you've lost the confidence in the anointing that God gave you. It's not that you lost your calling, it's that you've lost the belief that you're called. And that right there can disrupt the flow of the anointing in your life because you haven't learned to return. You, you, you sometimes— that belief that you're marked from your past, you're marked by your mistakes, and that will cause you to live and think and feel like you're rejected of God when you're not. You need to just get up and say, I am forgiven, I am restored. If any man be in Christ, he's a new creation. You need to step boldly back into the call, boldly hold me back into that restoration and say, I am who God says I am, not who people think I am. I am who God declares I am, not what my past says I am. I am who I am in Christ, not who I was in sin. And that confidence comes back and it completely restores— not just restores, but you come back with the fresh power. Some preachers watching this right now, maybe you did have a fall. Your sermons are not the same, your preaching is the same. And people whisper, oh, see, they lost something. Oh yeah, they're back, but something's not quite right. I rebuke those religious spirits and liars in the name of Jesus. It's not that you've lost the call, you just lost the confidence in the call. And because of this, you shrink back and you wear it, and that perception of yourself becomes the perception that other people have of you. You need to be free of that. People don't return to the prayer life because of the guilt of the missed days of prayer. People don't return to the word because they are frustrated that they lost time in the word. They don't return to holiness because of their blemished record. Some people can't even live holy because they think they got this record against them. Do you know how frustrating it is to try to pray and all you're thinking about is all the days you missed of prayer? How frustrating it is to try to study the word and all you're thinking about is all the days that you didn't study the word, so why even bother now? Or maybe you have a blemished record and you can't move forward because you're so focused on that blemished record. I, I can't even function now. It's too piled high against me. It's just all over me. It's, it's weighing on me. I can't get past that. You don't have to, because he removes your sin from you as far as the east is from the west. He completely wipes your record clean. Yes, repent, but also return. Return to prayer despite the guilt that you fill. Return to the word despite the frustration of lost time in the word. Return to holiness despite your blemished record. Repent and then return. I'm seeing people in the comments saying this is so eye-opening. I'm telling you, this is the truth. The truth will set you free. You think you lost the anointing? No, you didn't. You just lost the belief that you're anointed. Now, I'm not talking about living in sin. I'm not talking about living in compromise, because remember I told you first you need to repent. Yeah, you do need to repent. Yes, sin will destroy you. But once you have repented, it's time to return to that confidence in who you are in Christ. Number 3, realize, realize that you're forgiven. Realize that you're anointed of God. Realize that you've— you're wearing his righteousness like clothing. You're not wearing the jacket of your sin, the shame of your sin. You're wearing the robes of righteousness now. Psalm 103, listen to this, what powerful portion of scripture here. Look at this, Psalm 103:8-14. This will liberate you. The Lord is compassionate and merciful, slow to get angry and filled with unfailing love. Watch this now, this is powerful. Verse 9, he will not constantly accuse us nor remain angry forever. So if it's the Lord who's not— so not— it's not the Lord that's accusing you. So if it's not the Lord who's accusing you, who do you think it is? It's the enemy, or it's yourself accusing you of something that God completely forgot about. Sometimes the conversation looks like this: God, please forgive me for this sin. And God says, I've forgiven you of that sin. And then we walk around, we keep the shame, and we come back, God, please, I'm serious, forgive me of that sin. And God says, what sin? Because he's wiped it clear. He will not constantly accuse us nor remain angry forever. Oh, verse 10. This is so powerful. He does not punish us for all our sins. He does not deal harshly with us as we deserve. And oh, we deserve to be dealt with harshly. For his unfailing love toward those who fear him is as great as the height of the heavens above the earth. As my grandmother used to say, I love you higher than the mountains and deeper than the sea. Verse 12. He has removed our sins as far from us as the east is from the west. The Lord is like a father to his children, tender and compassionate to those who fear him, for he knows how weak we are. He remembers that we are only dust. Your sin does not surprise him. His calling on your life is not so weak that you can derail it if you're walking with him. He makes room for those mistakes by his grace. And one of the most difficult one of the difficult things about returning is actually realizing that you're restored. It's the psychology of regret. But we need to understand that grace is for those who knew better as well. Grace is also for those who knew better. So number 1, repent. Number 2, return. Number 3, realize that forgiveness. Number 4— and by the way, realize means to make it a reality. Number 4, reach ahead. Once your soul has been restored, it's time to reach. Now, only the Lord can determine the time frame of your reaching ahead for more ministry. Just let him heal you, let him restore you, and then come back full force. Don't even wear it back. There will always be people who comment and who come against you and who, who whisper and who gossip. Forget about them. There's going to be people who criticize you even if you never had any mistakes made. So just get used to it. So don't see yourself through the lens of the critic. See yourself through Christ and his grace. Only the Lord can determine the timeframe here, but it's time now to reach ahead, reach ahead to the future in God. Not just restore me, Lord, to where I used to be, but Father, take me to where I used to be and then catapult me to a greater future than I ever imagined. When we are weak, then he is strong. His grace more than makes up for our mistakes. Philippians 3:13-16 says, no, dear brothers and sisters, I have not achieved it, but I focus on this one thing: forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead. I press on to reach the— I'm going to pray for you right now. I press on. Let me read this again, then I want to pray for you. Philippians 3:13-16. No, dear brothers and sisters, I have not achieved it. But I focus on this one thing: forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead, I press on to reach the end of the race and receive the heavenly prize for which God through Christ Jesus is calling us. Let all who are spiritually mature agree on these things. If you disagree on some point, I believe God will make it plain to you., but we must hold on to the progress we have already made. Get back in ministry. Get back to serving. Get back to reaching the world. You see, the belief that God won't restore you is actually kind of a self-centered belief, because the reason people believe that God won't restore them is because they imagine that their calling was about them. But God doesn't restore you just for for the sake of you. God restores you because there's a world that needs to be won. Let the people debate, let the people whisper, let them gossip, let them argue about which fire truck to send while the building is on fire. You go now and reach ahead. So Father, I pray that we would honor the anointing in our lives. Even now, I believe there's going to be an impartation of the anointing. An impartation. That's what this moment is, an impartation of the anointing. Father, I thank you that the precious oil is flowing. Thank you for fresh oil, fresh oil, fresh oil falling on your people now. Mark us, Lord, and use us for your glory. Let us declare your word and heal the sick and drive out demons and bring refreshing to your people. Let it be done in the name of Jesus. Let it be done in the name of Jesus. Right now, some of you are sensing that beautiful anointing here. There's a beautiful anointing that's being poured out on God's people right now, right here, right now. Lift your hands, receive it. Ask him to fill you. Come on, Father, in the name of Jesus, pour it out. Pour it out, pour it out, pour it out. Fresh, fresh, fresh. I thank you, Lord, that your anointing is now present, that that beautiful grace of the Spirit begin to flow now. Thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Jesus. Somebody's eyes have just been healed. I give you the glory, Lord. We honor you. Somebody's eyes just— in fact, you're wearing glasses and your vision just became blurry. That's because you don't need the glasses anymore. Take them off. You'll begin to see clearly. Father, I thank you. We give you the honor, Lord. Touch your people, I pray, in Jesus' name. Amen. I want to share something with you. I want to share something with you that's important. 2 Corinthians chapter 9, just a few more minutes, and then after this we'll get to our Q&A. I'll just hang out in the chat with you for a second. 2 Corinthians 9:6-12 says this. This is Paul the Apostle, and he's writing on money. He's talking about finances. Yes, the Bible talks about money. Remember this: a farmer who one who plants only a few seeds will get a small crop. So the measure that you give is the measure you get back. This is the principle of kingdom finances. But the one who plants generously will get a generous crop. You must each decide in your heart how much to give, and don't give reluctantly or in response to pressure, for God loves a person who gives cheerfully. Now watch this, and God will generously provide all you need. Then you will always have everything you need and plenty left over to share with others. Watch this. Now, this is the part where people usually start to log out of the stream. I challenge you, just hear the word on this because this is still the word of God. The Bible teaches that we must decide in our hearts by advice of the Holy Spirit, not in response to pressure, not out of reluctance, instruments, how much we're going to give, and that God will generously provide all that we need. Now watch this. Here's the promise: then you will always have everything you need and plenty left over to share with others. Not sometimes have some of the things you need. You will always have everything you need. What a promise. And plenty left over to share with others. I like that part better. So God is promising that your bills will be paid, you'll have groceries, you can pay the rent, and on top of that, that you'll have resources left over to bless others. So not just money for your groceries, money for someone else's groceries. Not just money for your rent, but money to help those who are behind on rent. Not just gas for your car, but money to help people who can't put gas in their car. That's the flow of generosity. As the scriptures say, They shall freely give. They shall, they share freely and give generously to the poor. Their good deeds will be remembered forever. Wow. For God is the one who provides seed for the farmer and then bread to eat. In other words, God's the one who gave you the resources in the first place. The problem is that God gives you seed to sow and most of us eat the seed. God says, here's some seed, you can sow it. And we say, thank you, Lord. And then we eat them like sunflower seeds. But you're not supposed to eat the seed. You're supposed to plant the seed. In the same way, watch this, in the same way, he will provide and increase your resources and then produce a great harvest of generosity in you. So the Bible clearly says that when we sow that seed, he will, this is the Bible, this is scripture, he will provide and increase what? Your resources. That's a promise from the word. That as you give to the gospel, the resources you have are going to be increased. That's the word of God. I'll read it again just so you can get it in your spirit. For God is the one who provides seed for the farmer and then bread to eat. In the same way, he will provide and increase your resources and then produce a great harvest of generosity in you. Yes, you will be enriched in every way so that you can always be generous. And when we take your gifts to those who need them, they will thank God. I'm talking about souls here. Paul's talking about the church that they're going to take the resources to, but in this context that you're giving, it's about souls. How much are they going to rejoice that we've taken the message of salvation to them? So two good things will result from the ministry of giving. The needs of the believers in Jerusalem will be met, and they will joyfully express their thanks to God. Well, in the context of you giving to this ministry, I'm not taking resources to Jerusalem. We are taking these resources and investing them, the donations, into this ministry to further the gospel message. The Bible says he'll increase your resources. See, there's always that hesitancy in our hearts. Some of us hesitate, don't we? I know because there have been seasons in my life where I'm a little hesitant. You know, the world makes us afraid by talking about economic decline, or the decline of the dollar, or the instability of nations, and all, you know, food shortages, this shortage, that housing crashes, whatever the world is talking about. The world will always be in chaos, but there is no chaos in the kingdom. The systems of the world are unpredictable, but the system of the kingdom, that's reliable. So when we give generously, we're participating in God's kingdom finances. And that flow of generosity produces something in us. He increases our resources. The Bible promises that. So there's that little part of us, right, that hesitates. Even now, as you're hearing me, you kind of have this pull. I want to give something, but oh, you think about what's in your bank account and what you have to pay. Or you think about how long is it going to take me to make the donation? Or what's this going to cost me? What if I miss out on this or on that? You know, it's the beginning of the month, we're still kind of planning the first half of the month, we're still kind of planning. Look, the Bible promises that if you will allow that generosity to flow through you, that God will increase your resources. We have a project happening right now at the ministry, and actually I can pull up where we are on this. The last time we talked, I believe we needed about $950,000. I think it's down to like $800,000-something. Thing that you guys are giving. We need to raise the resources to complete our ministry production studio here in Austin, Texas by May 15th. Now, God is going to meet this need. The money is going to come in. The only question is, will you be one who participates with the move of God? There's revival happening. There's glory on this ministry. There's glory in our meetings. There's favor on this ministry. So God is going to meet this need. If he has to talk to some millionaire in the middle of nowhere, God's going to speak to who he has to speak to. But you have an opportunity to participate in the favor. You have an opportunity to participate in what God is doing. This is his project. This is his ministry. This is his work. So by you giving to this ministry at davidhernandezministries.com/expand, you're giving to God's work. You're giving to the kingdom. As I said, he will meet the need, period. It's gonna happen. We're gonna meet the goal by May 15th. We need to raise an additional about— I think it's like $800,000. Don't quote me on this exactly because it changes constantly as the people give, and I'm— we may need a little more than I'm saying, but the last I checked, I believe we needed about $870,000 to $885,000, somewhere there. Could be a few thousand more, could be a few thousand less. The bottom line is this is moving. This is happening. We're at 68% funded for Phase 1 of this goal. We need $2.75 million for the first phase of the goal, and we're at $1.875 raised. So we need $2.75, we are at $1.875, just under $1.9 million raised for this project. What an incredible journey. This is a miracle in the making. As I said, it's going to come to pass. This ministry is reaching thousands of people. Let me just read kind of a little report, if I can pull it up here, that I sent. There were some philanthropists who wanted— by the way, pray also that God would send people of great wealth to fund this, this project. Let me show you here. And this is a letter I had to write to some philanthropists who were interested in possibly sending some funds our way. We are impacting hundreds of thousands of people every month. We have over 500,000 subscribers on YouTube, over 700,000 followers on Facebook, over 100,000 followers on TikTok, and over 120,000 followers on Instagram. Additionally, we have about 100,000 people on our emailing list, and our app has been downloaded over 25,000 times. These numbers mean only one thing: lives transformed. Look, Christians should own infrastructure. We should own our own data centers. We should own our own internet infrastructures. We should own our own properties. We should own our own networks. We should own our own apps. We should own our own technology. We're reaching big. So be a part of what God is doing again by going to davidhernandezministries.com/expand. That is how you can be involved. Now, Tim, do we have that video queued up for Project ETV? He's going to cue it up right now, and I want you to see this. This is going to give you the vision for this ministry and what we're doing. And then I want you to give. DavidHernandezMinistries.com/expand. Ask the Holy Spirit how you can sacrifice. Ask the Holy Spirit what you can do. I'm asking those of you who are wealthy, give according to what God has given you. Don't hold back. Those of you who are not wealthy, give according to what God has given you. Don't hold back. Everyone that is participating is doing something for the kingdom of God. Watch this. Countries around the world have now reported more than 1 million coronavirus cases. More than 3 billion people have been asked to stay at home. Protests started at about noon today in Seattle but turned destructive right away. The Bible says, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life. Jesus said, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father but by me. Jesus is the only way to God. We are witnessing the greatest miracle of all, the salvation of the soul.

Creation cries out for a move of the Holy Spirit. It's time to take the gospel of Jesus Christ and the power of the the Holy Spirit to the nations of the world. The harvest is ready. God has given David Diga Hernandez a plan to reach the masses. As this ministry continues to experience rapid growth and favor, we now turn our sights to the next phase of the vision. We are building a new media center in Austin, Texas. We have the keys to the building and we've already begun to build. This media center is more than just a building. It's a heavenly stronghold, a victory for kingdom expansion and advancement of dominion. Not only will this be a place that produces Spirit-filled media that touches the nations, but this will also be a place of gathering, prayer, and the home of our own data center. Which will help us to back up our own video platform so that we aren't subject to the whims of worldly big tech companies. This will be the Holy Spirit's video platform. Dare to believe big with us. Put a little faith in a big God and watch what he will do. You can be a part of something that changes everything. Even in these chaotic times, God's church is victorious.

Get involved by going to davidhernandezministries.com/expand. We've secured our building, and now we need to get to work. Help us build this next-level soul-winning work. I need your help. Get informed about and involved with this project by going right now to davidhernandezministries.com/expand. With over 1.2 million followers and supporters from across our various platforms, we can make this God-given vision a reality if everyone, including you, does their part. There's a remnant that's going after the soul of this generation. Together in with our God, we can do this, for nothing is impossible with God.