God Promised Me Something 21 years ago... it's finally happening

I'm David Diga Hernandez, and I'm an evangelist. I am a 3rd-generation preacher, 4th-generation Christian who was born again at the age of 11. And once I was saved at the age of 11, I made a commitment in my heart to pursue Jesus with everything in me.

Me and Pastor David go way back, and when I mean way back, I'm talking about children's church way back. I actually first met him, I believe, He was 6 years old and I was 5 years old and we met. And I remember as young kids growing up in church, the little cliché church brat, right? We were always hanging out. We played cars together, we played tag together.

We always had fun together. Very, we were both pretty creative, but he's always creating worlds and drawings. And I remember we'd do, make a, towns out of Legos and clay and always using our brains, making movies. And he's always— I remember at a certain point he started using the camera a lot. That's why he's always making videos, editing and stuff.

So when I was saved, the Holy Spirit began to work in me, drawing me into prayer, drawing me into the Word, transforming my nature. And eventually this developed into a burden for the lost, where I began to consider the situation of those who don't know Jesus. Everything in me wanted them to know, still wants them to know what I know about Jesus. I want the world to know Jesus.

I remember he started preaching to youth, and I remember him just going around all the different churches that we were connected with preaching. And I remember thinking like, man, he's very young to start that. And to me, in my mind, I'm thinking, you know, because we were somewhat still teens, I'm thinking, this guy is on a roll already. Like, I got to catch up somehow.

With my brother, it felt like it was a real gradual thing. It went from like watching these things to like doing youth lessons at the— at our youth ministry to traveling to different ministries and different churches. And, and I remember being a part of those things, and it was almost like little by little it just got bigger and bigger and bigger. And he, you know, he got better at what he was doing.

Naturally, this Eventually developed into a media ministry because I saw that the lost needed to hear the gospel. I read in scripture how we as believers are called to carry the gospel to the ends of the earth. This is the Great Commission. Jesus commanded us to do this. And so I began to look at the harvest field and say, how can I best serve in the harvest? What is it that I can surrender for God's use? And one of those gifts I believe that God has entrusted to me is for media. The Holy Spirit showed me the media ministry, the events we would do around the world. He even gave me the structures of how we were to operate as a staff, as a ministry, who to bring on and when, what team members were needed and when.

And I always remember talking with him and kind of making jokes like, that'd be cool one day if we did ministry together. How that looks, have no idea. But little did I know, God already had it all in plan. And I remember When Pastor David asked me to start doing live worship before he preached and before he did his messages, and I thought, man, oh man, hopefully I don't embarrass you. And again, he's my brother till the end. You know, when you're partnered with someone that's your family like that, it's a no-brainer. I'll do the music, he'll do the preaching.

And we were just the duo. I remember when he started filming at the church and Started getting a crew around him to help. I remember seeing him get into ministry, get his mind on ministry in our younger teenage years. And obviously he's not stopped since then.

I saw the blueprint. I saw the shadow of what was to come. Now, I didn't necessarily see every step in how I would get there. Everything God calls us to do will always require faith. But I did see in my spirit arenas being filled In the United States, this meeting is being recorded.

This is a beginning concept of how things will be, but we've, we've already made changes from this.

Ishmael, is there gonna— are there gonna be any other singers besides the choir?

Well, it's everyone from Orlando plus, uh, about a 7 to 8 person choir.

That what Johnny said, that the cameras will, will be more than 50 feet, so, right?

I know Pastor David likes to see his main camera, so I'll have a chat with him to see what he's comfortable with, because I know he likes to look at the camera 1 main shot and then address the online audience, because that's something he doesn't want to lose too. That's priority. I'll figure out what we could do.

The Lord really blessed me with a great team. I was answering a few questions here and there that the team would bring to me, like, how do you want the lighting? How do you want— and For the most part, I just said, whatever you think is best.

So right now I'm working directly with Ruben, with Lawrence from Technical Event Partners, as well as John Hall and Jeremy. And really what we're trying to do is we're trying to make sure all the details are taken care of.

Going into this new event that we're doing in an arena in Anaheim, in California, it was exciting, but also like a little bit like a For me specifically, it was a bit, um, a lot of paranoia involved.

The thing about this event that's very different from our previous ones is when you enter into an arena, the production level goes way up.

4 by 40, that's substantially bigger than what we had in Orlando. Orlando, for reference, was 48 by 24. So this is drastically bigger, and most importantly, based on a I think Johnny's comments was that it needs to be deeper.

I think the most challenging task right now is getting all of our numbers and our needs situated with our production.

Because we're dealing with an even bigger, uh, bigger space, a little bit more logistics when it comes to like these other requirements are involved with the contracts. Like you got to have certain union workers involved, you got to have, um, certain requirements involved. Like when it comes to fire hazard, you got to have like a fire watch involved because we're going to Put on like haze and lighting and stuff. So a bunch of more little details that people wouldn't pay attention to.

And then you got to remember too, you're, you're pulling in all different departments, right? So you're working with TEP and saying, okay, we want this size. Then we're also calling Tim saying, Tim, how big of an LED wall do you need?

How—

where, where do we want the lights to be? How much space do you need from the wall, from the drums, to Pastor David Ministry, to Steven?

As we get closer to the event day, I'm getting all the band there. I'm getting all the staff there. Some people are driving in equipment. I'm making sure all of that's prepared, arranging all the rentals that we're going to be using, arranging all the volunteers that are getting there on time to meet and make sure that, you know, we're ready for the event. When it comes to David and Steven's particular schedule, you know, making sure that they're there on time, they're not, you know, possibly dealing with delays or anything.

Our job is to make sure all these responsibilities sync together to create the best event that we have, the most excellent event that we can provide for people, but ultimately for the glory of God, right? So that is the hardest part. The hardest part is making sure we're all in sync and the communication is there and everybody knows who's doing what so that nothing falls through the cracks.

Where are we?

Right now we are at the arena at the Anaheim Convention Center, and the team is preparing for the service. They have to set up lighting, staging, cameras, audio, the chairs, and then of course we'll get our volunteers in here once everything is set up, go over the flow in terms of getting people seated and so forth. So looking forward to a great service, though there's a lot that goes on behind the scenes You do not see once the livestream starts that it's actually days of preparation and a lot of hard work that goes into these services.

What am I doing? I'm basically getting ready to hit the road. Gotta get all this equipment to Anaheim by Wednesday. We ask you, Lord, for traveling mercies to watch over us. Keep your hand on us, Father God, as we drive from here to our destination. Father God, we thank you in the mighty name of Jesus. We pray all these things.

Amen.

Amen.

Let's get it right.

God gives responsibility in proportion to how well you steward what he's already given to you. And so looking back at the timeline of the ministry, I can see various different phases that were So on that progressive timeline, that movement, that spiritual journey, there are key highlights, key moments that brought accelerated growth. We first began doing media through Charter Cable, and then it was social media, stepping out in faith to do that, raising the finances to get the equipment to properly communicate what was happening at these different places that I was preaching. And I think that's a great point. And then the next step of faith. The Lord began to challenge us to really, with excellence, begin to do our own meetings. Now, as an evangelist, I was preaching in churches, I was preaching at other people's conferences, and this is typically how it goes with itinerant ministry. But the Lord then began to challenge us that it was time to step out and begin to do our own events.

As the ministry started growing and we started expanding, It was almost like I was watching a movie, but I was in the movie because there'd be these moments where I remember singing just for a few people, and then I remember singing for a couple hundred people, and then I remember one of the first times it was almost about 1,000 people.

We got to a point where we just couldn't do events at churches. We were outgrowing the churches. We were coming to a place where we're like, yeah, we could continue to have them at the church. It's cost effective. It's Great, it's cheaper, but we're turning people away all the time.

We were inviting people through social media to come and be a part of these events, and then we were renting these third-party venues like conference centers, hotel ballrooms, and so forth. And the people began to fill them. It was their spiritual hunger. It was their love for Jesus. And really, we saw the people of God embrace what God was doing at these meetings. This is amazing what the Lord is doing because it's one thing to go and preach at a conference, and that's what we often would do. When people come to these events, they're not coming for me. I'm, I'm more aware of that than anyone. They're not coming to hear Steven do worship, though he does a beautiful job with that. People are coming to these services because the presence and the power of the Holy Spirit The power of Jesus and the power of the Holy Spirit are both so evident in these meetings. They come for Jesus. They come for the power of the Holy Spirit. They come to encounter his presence. And that is why they gather. This is a movement. This is the Holy Spirit's movement.

All right, guys, what's happening today?

Uh, today is load-in day, setup day, soundcheck day. Everything's happening today.

It's got to get done today.

Everything related to media, the staging, setup, all preparation work before the event. So that's all day today. Today's Thursday.

All right.

It determines how the rest of the week goes, so it has to go well. So far, it's going well.

We're playing the hurry up and wait game right now where we're setting up as much as we can, but we can't really do anything until the truss and The arena goes up because safety and whatnot. It's 9:38 PM. We are way behind schedule. Workers were arriving late. The trussing that you see above me did not go up until about 5 PM, late enough to where we couldn't start our camera setup, and it's pushing back our sound check that was supposed to happen at 9.

Right.

It's 9:38. So we're trying to do the best that we can. We're trying to roll with the punches. The event's still going to happen and it's going to be great.

Oh my gosh.

Okay, so this is how, this is how important timing is.

Our trucks pull up.

They don't let our trucks in for about an hour, hour and a half. Now, for most people, it'd be like, okay, we're an hour and a half late. But you got to remember, an hour and a half late pushes everything back an hour and a half. And so TEP started basically an hour later than usual, than they were supposed to. And because that happened, the guys that were supposed to do the stage at 4 o'clock were told they couldn't get in until 5 o'clock. And then when 5 o'clock came around, they had already moved to another job, so they couldn't get here till 6:30, which pushed us back another hour and a half.

Right.

And so now we're here. But because that one guy wouldn't let our trucks in on the time we're supposed to get in, we are now pushed back an hour and a half to where we push soundcheck and line checks to the next day.

Because of the trussing was— Uh, it didn't, it didn't go up at the time we wanted to. We were not able to get an Ethernet line to test the internet, so we're gonna have to head in tomorrow around, uh, 9:30 AM to test the internet. But it's kind of scary because we're gonna need to test the internet the day of the event, and that is not up to standard. This is crazy.

It's not working?

Yeah, that's good.

I want you to really, really understand that when you get on the stage, just be so thankful. And I'm always so thankful in my heart, every single moment I get to sing, every single moment I get to minister. To be thankful is, I think, to touch God's heart. And when we touch his When you're pure of heart, glory falls.

Amen.

So I pray, Father, that your glory even now rests upon our hearts, God, because we know the Holy Spirit is already moving, already working in this place. So Father, let us come before the throne pure of heart, clean of hands, God, and let's worship and honor you in the mighty name of Jesus. We love you and we thank you. We all agree.

Amen.

Amen.

All right, G. All right, go back to your place.

We're at the end of setup right now. It's been a tedious and drawn-out setup.

Are we back on schedule?

Yes, we are back on schedule. We're actually ahead of schedule right now, thank God. But it's just a good time to kind of take a big step back. And just see where we need to dial in on the details. So we're about to head into lunch and we should be good.

Well, we just got done practicing for about almost an hour and a half for the service tonight. And I can tell you right now, as I was practicing, as I was getting things dialed in, I could already feel the glory of God.

In the room.

I know the Holy Spirit is indwelling within us, but just a tangible touch of the Holy Spirit's power already in the room now. Oh man, it's gonna be an incredible night.

What are you feeling knowing that you are about to step into what God had told you when you were younger?

I was excited, but I was very much aware that it was not about me. God loves you.

For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whosoever believeth in him shall not perish but have everlasting life.

What Jesus did on the cross through the shedding of his blood, through the giving of his life, Was a sacrifice made for you.

God did not create you to live with addiction. God did not create you to live in depression. God did not create you to live with fear and anxiety. God did not create you to live in unrighteousness. God did not create you to be bound by darkness. God did not create you to wander without purpose. God did not create you to live without joy, to live without peace. God created you to love him and be loved by him. And because of his love for you, he sent his Son Jesus to bring you back home.

There is nothing like the look The sense of relief and joy and peace comes on them once they've received Christ. Nothing like that in the world. That is my favorite part of ministry, seeing someone walk up to that altar call one way and moments later be so different that you can see it on their countenance. And to see that in Mass, it was— I was at a loss for words, which is, which is rare.

Spiritually speaking, I would ask you this. If you want something large in the future, how are you handling what's small now? Are you taking care of what you have now with excellence? Are you, are you putting your all into what you have now? Let's say you say, well, one day I want to preach to thousands. Okay, well, how would you preach to 10? How would you preach to 2? Would you put the same amount of effort into a lesson that you would for a Bible study of five people that you would for a crusade of thousands? Because if you wouldn't, maybe you're not ready for that. Because I think what God does is He sees how we handle what's little. If you'll be faithful in the little and you'll take care of it, not that you're just going to do it, but that you're going to do it well and you can do it the best that you can, then I believe that God will bless you with the greater. So I would encourage you: stay faithful. Don't give up.

Keep going.

Keep the right heart and do what Jesus asks you. Do what God is asking. to do, but stay faithful in the little, and then God will get you ready for what's next.

One of the big things I, I try to always carry with me is humility, because as easy as I can get up there and start singing, I know that my, my gift can, can be taken away, you know. And so that's always in my mind too, is just being so thankful, being as humble as I can, and going before the Lord, because I mean, it's what I've been called to do. And I think my encouragement is always stay humble, always go to the feet of Jesus, and always be thankful.

To those who feel inspired by what God is doing through his ministry, I would say this: keep Jesus first. It's not just a cliché. Now, I understand he holds on to us, but I'm talking about your awareness of him, your obedience to him, your devotion to him, your time in prayer, your time in the Word. Keep that first, because when fruitfulness comes, if that's not there, the weight of what others would call success will crush you. The second thing I would say, don't grow weary in doing well. In due time, you will reap the harvest. This doesn't mean just keep being busy, because I think sometimes we confuse busyness with productivity. It's possible To be busy and unproductive. I'm talking about being focused, giving your mind, your heart, your soul, your physical energy to the cause of the gospel, to be disciplined, to become competent in your caretaking of God's ministry. And so I would say to you, as long as you are disciplined and as long as you are self-controlled, as long as you are focused and committing yourself over to stewarding God's ministry, Then the harvest will come. Productivity will come. You can be sure of that. And don't give up, because as a dear friend of mine says, it's gradually, then suddenly.