The River of God's Delights — David Davis

Hallelujah. We forgot to say Shabbat Shalom. What is a feast of the Lord? In the Bible they're called the feasts of the Lord. Shabbat is one of them. Have you feasted on Him today? He has a feast prepared for us in His house.

Last week I spoke about the feast of trumpets and days of awe and how many people have lost the awe of God and we need to get it back. And Danny was going to speak this morning, but this morning his wife called and said he's too ill to come.

So pray for Danny. It's wonderful what's happening at Kerem El, the congregation at Beit Yedidia that he oversees. You know the enemy comes after our leaders. We need to pray for our leaders. Danny's a point man in this country.

The River of God's Delights in Psalm 36

Turn to Psalm 36. The 36th Psalm. You know sometimes when you look at what's happening in our neighborhood in the Middle East, it can get depressing unless you know the Lord, unless you know His Word, unless you know this awesome one.

Now there are Russian troops in Syria and America says we don't like that. They won't do anything. There's Iranian troops on the Golan Heights. Only a few miles from here, don't worry about it. But when we see these horrible things happening, regimes fall and then they rise up again and they fall again.

Muslims slaughtering Muslims all over the Middle East. Muslims slaughtering Christians. Crucifying little baby Christians. Doing horrible things to young women. All these horrors are happening all around us.

But we have a God who knows about this and is going to do something about it. Psalm 36, verse 7. How precious is your loving kindness, O God, therefore the children of men put their trust under the shadow of your wings.

And they are abundantly satisfied with the fullness of your house, and you give them drink from the river of your delights. For with you is the fountain of life, and in your light we see light. There is a river of God's pleasures, a river of God's delight.

I was talking to somebody recently and said, have you ever experienced the delight of God? If you know the Lord, God is our Father. He's Avi Ad, the Everlasting Father. But he has a river of his delights for his children.

We just need to get in the river, hallelujah. It's the river of his presence. It's the river of his grace, his love, his mercy. We need to go deeper into experiencing the delight and the pleasure of God.

I'm looking at faces, I know a lot of you, and I see some people that just look so sad. If you would look up, he's the creator. He created you. He knows everything about you. He wants to crown your year with goodness.

We simply need to believe it. God's always a river of loving kindness, of mercy. This river of God's delights, in the middle of all the terrors that are happening, there's a river of God's goodness. In the midst of these heat waves, I read that these are unprecedented heat waves and sandstorms that have never happened in Israel before.

I stayed in my prayer closet for all day, a couple of days, not because I have an air conditioner in there. But I meet with the Lord there. And the Lord has something for us today, in the midst of all the problems, the heat waves and everything else.

I know about the blood moon. I know when it's going to happen. And I would suggest to you, don't concentrate on the blood moon. Concentrate on him. Hallelujah. Turn to Psalm 46. The river of God's delights.

The Peaceful River of Psalm 46

There is a river. Hallelujah. You know, my wife and I don't get to swim very often. But in August, when we were in Binyamina, we actually went to a swimming pool and paid 35 shekels to get in the water.

It was amazing. I mean, it was so hot, and there's my wife flowing in the water. And a gigantic Muslim was teaching Muslim children how to swim in the same pool. And I thought, this is the river of God's delight.

We can all become one. So go swimming more often, but do it in the Holy Spirit as well. Okay, Psalm 46. During the Hezbollah war in 2006, we read this every week. Let's read verse 1. God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.

Do you believe that? If he's your refuge and strength, a very present help, why aren't you going boldly to the throne of grace and getting more grace? Verse 2. Therefore, we will not fear, even though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea, though its waters roar in our trouble, though the mountains shake with swelling, there is a river whose streams make glad the city of God.

Hallelujah. In the context of calamity, in the contrast of a raging environment all around us, hatred, murder, terrible things that are happening all around the nations that surround us. In the midst of this, there's a peaceful river.

Hallelujah. I want to stay in that river. I want to go deeper in that river. I want more of the Father's delight. I want to delight him more every day. How many fathers are here? How many mothers? Oh, good.

What about the rest of you? If you're a child, there are people sitting in this meeting whose children are in the army right now. But when your child calls you and says, everything's okay, and I did something good, and the officer said, very good, it delights the father, delights the mother.

My son called me, and he cares about me. We need to know that we're delighting the father when we're walking with him. Let's get back to basics. He created you. Why? To be his child. That's what the father did.

So many people don't know the father's heart, the father's love. He created you so that he'd have spiritual children. Hallelujah. There's a peaceful river. Some of the great men and women of God that I've had the privilege to know, all kinds of problems can be happening.

And you know that this person always has the peace of God. That this woman always has the peace of God. I remember when Gwen Shaw was here, and we were downstairs praying to finish this building. The peace of God was all over that lady, all running out of that woman.

She knows that she's pleasing the Lord over what she's doing. The Lord wants you to get into the river of the father's delights, and don't get out. Just go deeper. We should have stayed there longer. Oh, we went back a couple days later, but these ultra-Orthodox people had rented the place, and they wouldn't let us in.

May all those poor religious Jews one day find the river of God's delight. Amen? Turn to Ezekiel 47. The river of God, there is a river in the midst of all the turmoil. Whatever you're going through with a person, with a child, with somebody, if you will get to the secret place and get in the river, He will fill you up with His goodness, and you will feel His delight, and you'll watch the father move.

Returning to the Temple and the Source of the River

Ezekiel 47, verse 1,. And He brought me back to the door of the temple. There was water flowing from the threshold of the temple toward the east from the front of the temple, which faces east. The water was flowing under the right side of the temple, south of the altar.

He brought me back to the temple. Why wasn't He at the temple? The Lord is saying to us He wants to bring you back to His house. He brought the great prophet back to the temple. He brought me back to the place where the water was flowing under the altar.

He was taking him to the river of life. Hallelujah. Sometimes the Holy Spirit wants to take you someplace. He wants to take you into the secret place. We don't go, and it grieves the Holy Spirit. Or we're in our secret place, and we're hearing from the Lord, and we get up and leave before He wants to say, I had something else to tell you, but you're too busy.

Listen, when you really know the Lord, He will bring you, He will lead you, He will take your hand like a father, and bring you to the place where He wants to meet with you. Rivers of living water flowing.

Water flows. Rivers flow. Elijah sat at that little brook, that little stream. It wasn't a pool. It wasn't a swamp. It was fresh water moving. And he sat there every day, just sitting there, getting more and more of the Spirit of God.

The Lord wants us to know that He's trying to bring us back to the place where the river flows. I can't tell you how many people have come here to this building, to a meeting, and they'll say, the river's flowing here.

I remember when Jack Hayford was here. He's a wonderful father to the fathers all over the world. And he started to walk out here, and he comes running back up here. And he says, the river's flowing. The river's flowing here.

It's going out to the Middle East. It's going out to Galilee. It's going to the ends of the world. The river's flowing in this place. That doesn't mean you need to come to this place all the time. You need to get to the place where the river will flow, and feed you, and purify you, and change you.

Hallelujah. My prayer for all of us is this new year, with all the terrible things that are happening, it's going to get worse for Israel. It's going to get worse for America and Russia, too, because of what they're doing to Israel.

Do you know that America is about to release a hundred billion dollars to Iran? This American administration will be the biggest supporter of terrorism in the world. The Iranians have already gone to Russia and ordered all the weapons.

The weapons are on the way from Russia. But we have a river. We have a river. The river of peace. Praise the Lord. Get in the river. Stay in the river. Look what happened. You know what happens here. This river that came out and was flowing down the mountain, it was flowing toward the Dead Sea.

This river will even take garbage out of places and take it out and it's finished. This river even purifies the Dead Sea, which is a picture of death. This is a supernatural river. But he brought me back to the temple, and the water was coming from underneath the altar.

What happened on the altar? Animals were sacrificed. There was blood. We need to come back to the cross. We don't have crosses around here because of what so-called Christians did to Jews for centuries.

We need to be a crucified people. We need to be a crucified people. We need to die to our flesh and get in the river and come up in the water of life. Hallelujah. Newness of life. Let's look at let's read verse 2.

Being Led Through Increasingly Deep Waters

He brought me out. He brought me out. So he brought me in. He brought me back. Now he's taking me out. This is a picture of a believer really being led by the Holy Spirit. Hallelujah. The Lord was the prophet wasn't doing this.

The Lord was saying, come on. He comes from the cross. He comes from the altar. It's living water. Now, come on, son. I want to show you some other things. He brought me in, and he brought me out. If you soak in the river long enough, you'll be so saturated, he'll take you, and miracles will happen.

Hallelujah. Running water. Getting deeper and deeper and deeper. I love this. Okay, look at verse 3. He brought me through the waters, and the water came up to the ankle. He brought me to the door. He brought me in.

He brought me out. He brought me into the water itself, and the prophet's walking around in the water up to his ankles. It's a picture of our walk with the Lord. Are you walking only with water up to your ankles?

That's like a woman who doesn't want to get in the water and just puts her feet in. I'm not mentioning any names. I was watching some kids at the beach, and the little girls were going, and the boys were just flinging themselves in.

But look, the Lord, it's like the father taking his son to get in the water. Come on. No, it's not. He's guiding him. He brought him in, he brought him out, and he brought him through. He will lead you through the river of life.

Hallelujah. It gets deeper and deeper, the ankles. How deep is your walk? If you haven't been in a secret place today, if you haven't heard from the Lord before you came here, you're walking around in the ankle-deep water.

The Lord wants us to go deeper and deeper and deeper with him. Oh, brothers and sisters, the secret place, it's the holy of holies. He has made access for us. Only the high priest could go there on Yom Kippur.

We can go there every day of the year. Hallelujah. He gave it to us. And we reject this gift of getting in the presence of God and hearing his voice and being filled with his spirit, over and over, getting deeper and deeper and deeper.

Supernatural increase. Look what it says. Up to the ankles, and he brought me through up to the knees. What do the knees represent? Barachayim. You say it. Barachayim. Yeah, that's what I said. I say Shalom, and an Israeli says, what part of America are you from?

He got beyond that. Look, your knees, the root of blessing comes from knees. Barachay is blessing. The water is coming up to his knees. This is a picture of a believer who's getting deeper in his prayer life.

Deeper in the Word of God. Deeper in loving the Word of God. You know how deep the Word of God is? It's higher than the heavens, and it's sitting there in our secret place. Go in there and get it. Eat some of it.

Get some of it. It's supernatural power. All this stuff that's happening around here, turn off the news and get on your knees and get a Bible. During the Holocaust, World War II, Reese Howells was in Wales and was starting to bring all these Jewish immigrants from Germany.

You know where he heard to do that? In the secret place. On his knees. He would put his Bible there and get on his knees and just say, talk to me. And the Lord would say, go and get Jewish orphans and bring them to Wales.

When you study this, the water gets supernaturally higher and higher and higher and higher. One time, David Wilkerson told me, when they started Times Square congregation, the Lord said, what do you want?

Do you want a wave of revival to come in and go out in five years like most of them do? Or do you want a continual reviving? That's what I want for this place. It just gets deeper and deeper and deeper and deeper.

The more we worship the Lord in our worship watches, the more people pray in the cave, this place was made so that the river would flow. The knees, humility. People that get blessed are humble. They're on their knees.

I love to read biographies of some of the great men and women of God. This one man, I forget who it was, but in his prayer closet, his prayer room, he had a rug. And there were two spots where it was worn so that the rug was gone.

It was where he knelt all the time. Get into the water up to your knees and be humble. Then the water goes up to his hips, hips are where your strength is. That's why Jacob, that rascal, had to have God dislocate his hip.

And that's when his name was changed to Israel, hallelujah, when he was finally humbled. Your power is going to come from the Holy Spirit. It's not by power, but by my spirit, says the Lord of armies.

Going deeper with the Lord. Then it gets too deep and all you can do is swim. I don't swim so good anymore. It must be this metal hip that I have. It's like an anchor. But I'll tell you, I can get out there and I can float.

I can paddle around. She's swimming like a fish and I'm floating around. But listen to me, we're both in the river. Whatever it takes, get in there. Hallelujah. When you do this, when you get into the river of life, I mean, every day is part of your lifestyle.

He says, have you seen this? The angel says, do you get it? What I'm saying to you this morning, do you get it? Do you really want to go deeper with the Lord every day, so that you'll be transformed from glory to glory?

Hallelujah. The Lord wants us to get in the river and stay in there. Now, look at verse seven, or verse six. He said to me, son of man, have you seen this? I want to underline it again. Have you really seen what this is about?

I know we all love Ezekiel 47, but it's so much deeper than having a surface understanding of it. When you will do this, when you'll get deeper with the Lord every day. You know, we were with a group of people from China and a couple of other places this week.

I told those people what Christians had done to the Jews that culminated in the Holocaust. These people from China had never heard this. There was supposed to be a lunch break. They were all on their face weeping.

So the woman takes them to lunch and said, why aren't they crying? They're weeping about the Jewish people. You know why these people from the Far East are like that? They're humble, and they're hungry.

That's what we need. They provoke me to jealousy. I didn't even realize what was happening until the pastor came and said, look, they're all weeping. I didn't even realize that. I was going to go up and have lunch.

Fruitfulness and Healing Along the River

When you allow the Holy Spirit to take you through the river, there will be fruit in your life. You will see the effects of the waters. Verse 7, I returned there along the bank of the river. There were very many trees on one side and the other.

This is the results or the effects of the river. Trees. You know, our children should be trees. Our kids should be olive trees sitting all around the table with the mother and the father. When you walk with the Lord and get deeper and deeper, you will have trees in your life.

You'll just see them supernaturally growing. I'm looking at some people in this meeting. I knew them when they were living on the street. I met them when they were in jail. Now they're young leaders. Young trees sprouting up around here.

Glory to God. It's what it's all about. And it's Jew and Arab together. I'm looking at them right now. God is able to do this. If you get deeper in Him, it splashes over on other people and trees start to sprout up.

You know, Eric Benson, who is the director of House of Victory. Where is he? Oh, there he is. He just had the holiday of a lifetime. I mean, he was sending Facebook pictures of they were climbing the Alps, and they were on boats, and I don't know what in Switzerland.

We stayed in Israel where it was so hot. What are we doing here? But then I talked to Eric before he came back. You know what he said? I miss the guys at House of Victory. He met his wife at House of Victory.

His beautiful wife. He met her in a meeting at House of Victory. He was with his beautiful daughters. One just graduated from high school, and he said, I miss the guys at House of Victory. This is why House of Victory is being blessed.

Because the people that work there, they walk through the river, and they get deeper and deeper and deeper. And I know Eric Benson. He's come a long way since when I met him. And Eric Eric's going, don't tell him.

Somebody came out here from New York and said, what did you do to him? I said, I didn't do anything to him. He got in the river. That's what it's all about. Hallelujah. These trees that grow up. Look at verse 8.

Everywhere the waters go, they enter the sea, and when it reaches the sea, the waters are healed in the sea. Ooh, hallelujah. This is a healing river. Healing waters. Look at verse 9. It shall be that every living thing that moves, wherever the rivers, plural, go and live, there will be a great multitude of fish, because these waters go there.

They will be healed, and everything will live wherever the river goes. Can I hear a hallelujah? Everywhere the Everything is healed. Everything. Not just your hip or your back or whatever. Not just your body.

Everything around you. You are a person that's carrying the Lord's healing with you. Now it says rivers. Lama. Why? Why does it all of a sudden say rivers? There was one river. You know what I believe?

Now, I have read people say all kinds of weird stuff about this. I believe it's the double portion. That the deeper that you go, more than one river flows. It just starts flowing. And it's a picture of miraculous growth that only God can do.

But it all comes from under the altar. The altar is the cross. That's where the life comes from, through Yeshua. Hallelujah. Look at verse 11. But its swamps and marshes will not be healed. They will be given over to salt.

Avoiding the Swamps of Bitterness and Self-Focus

A swamp. You ever been to a swamp? There's snakes in there. The swamps get all kind of filth and garbage and junk in there. I don't want to get in a swamp. If you don't walk in the river, if you're not allowing the river of life to flow through you, if you're not getting to the source, the fountain of life every day, Yeshua, you could end up not being in the middle of the river, but being over here in a swamp.

A swamp is a place of bitterness. A swamp is a place of people that have not been healed emotionally. A swamp is a place that's dirty. There's no living water in it. Listen to me. Beloved, don't get in a swamp.

A swamp of unforgiveness. You will not be healed. There's healing in forgiveness. Don't get in a swamp. Sometimes a swamp is, people are just self-focused on their self. They're in a swamp rather than in the wonderful river of life.

Complaining about everything. The government, the pastor. That never happens here. At least not until this meeting is over. You don't want to be in a swamp. Frank, you're not in a swamp, thank God. You need to get in the river more though.

I heard an amen, hallelujah. It flows only from the sanctuary, verse 12. Along the bank of this side and that, the trees are for food. They will not fail their fruit. They will bear fruit every month.

It's consistent because their water flows from the sanctuary, and their fruit will be for food, and the leaves for medicine. The river of God's pleasures. You know, I've been focusing on, this is the river of the pleasures of the Father for you.

I know it's the Holy Spirit, and it comes from the cross, it comes from the Son, but the Father has this river of wonderful, wonderful delights that he wants to experience with you. When I met him after all the years, I couldn't find him.

The Father's Compassion and the Invitation to Come

I read Luke, chapter 15, and it says, while the son was still a long way off, the Father saw him, felt compassion on him, and ran out. That's what the Father did to me. I didn't know that God, our Father, had that kind of love for me.

I went to a bookstore and read every translation I could find to make sure that was true, that the Father ran out. He did, and he still is. He's saying to us this morning, will you come into the river of my pleasures, my delights for you?

You know, the Lord just says, come. He's so gracious, just come. Just come to me. You are weary, come to me. Come to me, let's stand. Hallelujah. If you know you have not been in the river of life the way you should be, if you really want more of the river of the Father's love, of the multiplication supernatural of the Holy Spirit, and you're desperate for a swim in the river of life, but you want to say, Lord, I want to be consistent so that it's happening all the time, that the trees will have, my trees will have fruit on them.

So this is a simple invitation. Come to the river. If you want to come, come. Just get out of your seat and come up here. Just come to the river of God where the life is. Bo Kadima. Just come. Everyone that wants more of the Holy Spirit, more of the Father's love, you just come.

It's an unending, it's an unending supernatural river of life. Hallelujah.