The coming year will be a pivotal point for Christians. The changes it will bring will include a split within the church in which people fall away from the faith and their love will grow cold. There will be plenty of slander, conflict, and offense, and people will compromise their values; however, we’ll recover from that. On a global level, governments will team up and become allies in preparation for the anti-Christ, whose mission it will be to destroy God’s church; on a personal level, there w...
Jul 14, 2025•1 hr 8 min
God wants to empower us. Specifically, He wants us to be able to break free from addictions, cravings, and lasciviousness. Submitting to a change in identity—from who the world tells us we are to who Christ says we are—delivers us from addictive behavior. Seeing ourselves the way God sees us through Jesus changes our thinking, which subsequently changes what we do. Looking to Christ is the only way to find freedom from our sins. To support the ministry financially, text “CDMPodcast” to 74483 or ...
Jul 07, 2025•1 hr 5 min
Being conscious of our sins is not the way God wants us to live. By contrast, being aware of how God sees us in Christ—innocent and free—lets us focus on our righteousness. We are forgiven because Jesus has dealt with our sin. We are not what we do; bad behavior does not separate a person from God, but rather the sinful nature of a person before they get born again. Living under the law always creates guilt and self-condemnation for failing in our self-efforts to perform good enough to please Go...
Jun 30, 2025•1 hr 5 min
What we focus on dramatically impacts the quality of our lives. An awareness of sin, and the shame and guilt it brings, comes from the knowledge of the law. It causes believers to see themselves as unworthy and condemned because of their failures, and makes them think they must work to get into heaven. By comparison, being aware that we are innocent comes from knowing that Jesus has redeemed us and made us righteous. We will never experience the freedom grace brings if we remain conscious of our...
Jun 23, 2025•1 hr 6 min
The devil is always actively working to destroy us. One of the ways he makes inroads in our lives is by getting us to be more aware of our sins and shortcomings instead of our righteousness. God sees born-again believers as innocent and acquitted of all accusations the enemy has made against us. We must therefore be more conscious of what Jesus has done for us under grace than sin, and the shame and guilt that accompanies it. Focusing on grace instead of on the law shows us that we are no longer...
Jun 16, 2025•1 hr 3 min
An awareness of sin is Satan’s number one weapon to keep believers stagnant and paralyzed in one place. His strategy is to constantly remind us of our mistakes so that he can control us through guilt and shame. This spiritual paralysis is not a good place to be because being conscious of sin keeps us from receiving the liberty that Jesus gave us. The battle started in the garden of Eden when Adam and Eve sinned and went from being innocent to feeling guilty, ashamed, and afraid. This led to the ...
Jun 09, 2025•1 hr 13 min
Deceiving ourselves comes with serious consequences. Telling ourselves a lie so often that we eventually believe it blinds us to the truth by producing a false view of our circumstances. Personally, it damages relationships and stunts our personal growth; in leadership, it leads to poor decision-making because leaders may overlook problems or crucial feedback. Failing to deal with self-deception keeps us from growing and developing spiritually. By comparison, seeing the truth of God’s love and h...
Jun 02, 2025•1 hr 5 min
Deceiving ourselves trips us up on our spiritual walk. When we deceive ourselves, we are blind to the assumptions we make and think we are right when we are actually wrong. Much of this is delivered through the pulpit; wrong doctrine deceives us so that we do not see the truth of God’s love and grace. Our success in life hinges on knowing our true identity as His righteous children. God wants to show us that we are His reflection; understanding this prevents us from being deceived. Letting the H...
May 26, 2025•1 hr 14 min
God has great plans for our lives, but those plans are blocked when we deceive ourselves. Deceiving ourselves makes us spiritually blind to the truth of a situation; this is something God wants to deliver us from. Self-deception springs from the fall of man in the garden of Eden, and our sinful nature that resulted from it. The devil works through this and tries to convince us that our identity is based on our bad behavior instead of on God’s Word concerning our righteousness. What was true unde...
May 19, 2025•59 min
The most dangerous thing about self-deception is that when we are operating in it, we do not even know that we are being deceived. Failing to be true to what we believe is right causes us to rationalize and make excuses. Being true to our sense of what the right thing is relieves us from having to explain our actions; if we are false to our belief, then our excuses make the wrong thing that we are doing appear right. Deceiving ourselves causes a disturbance in us that we cannot reconcile because...
May 12, 2025•1 hr
To experience God’s best, it is important not to live in deception. This especially applies to us because believing the wrong thing causes us to deceive ourselves. Operating too long in deception can harden our hearts and lead us to believe a lie. We are all susceptible to this; God therefore wants to work with us to help us stop fooling ourselves. Letting Him guide us in this area keeps our spiritual eyes open so that we can see the dangers of associating with the wrong kinds of people and avoi...
May 05, 2025•1 hr 3 min
One thing we can count on as Christians is that we will encounter trouble and tribulation. There is no escaping this; however, in the midst of the suffering, we must learn to depend on God as the one who brings us through it all. This helps us to navigate through all the stress that life throws at us. The very nature of His grace demands dependence on Him; grace from God, and our faith in Him, must become inseparable. Trusting God to this degree means that instead of asking Him to take away the ...
Apr 28, 2025•1 hr 25 min
When we pray, we demonstrate our trust and reliance on God. Praying with the right motives does not involve loud wailing and constant repetition to impress others; it is our way of having a private conversation with Him. Prayer reminds us to always acknowledge God’s involvement in everything concerning our lives, and that we cannot live apart from Him. It requires our acknowledgement that we are helpless without God, but confident in His ability and willingness to supply our needs. Prayer reflec...
Apr 21, 2025•36 min
As God’s children, our heavenly Father has made a commitment to take care of us. This extends not just to our finances, but to every other area of our lives as well. When we have a need, we do not have to strive or toil to take care of it ourselves; we can simply respond to God’s promise to handle it. This gives us peace and assurance that we can depend and rely on Him for everything. Trusting in God more than in money gives us the proper perspective on financial giving; it allows us to bless ot...
Apr 14, 2025•1 hr 14 min
We live in a world of people accustomed to depending on themselves and their own abilities. As born-again believers, however, we are called to live godly; this requires total dependence on God. A godly lifestyle is free from doubting His wisdom, love, goodness, and provision. Unlike what religion teaches, this means to have faith in Him, and not in what we know intellectually. We apply this in a practical way when we deliberately seek God’s will and let it govern our lives and everything we do. ...
Apr 07, 2025•1 hr 9 min
We are in a spiritual battle with Satan. In this fight, our enemy always concentrates his attacks on our thoughts. Whatever happens in our minds translates into our lives; therefore, how we think determines whether we win or lose in life. Wearing God’s Word like armor to protect us is the key to winning in spiritual warfare; it does not involve fighting to win, but standing firm in the victory Jesus has already won. Our thoughts are powerful weapons; however, carelessness in our thought lives gi...
Mar 24, 2025•1 hr 6 min
Believers are in a spiritual battle with Satan, who is constantly attacking our minds. Our thoughts determine the course of our lives; we therefore must be aware of what we think. The devil wants to disrupt our lives with suggestions that contradict God’s Word; God warns us to be vigilant of his attacks. Our mentality makes the difference between success or failure; this is where the fight takes place. If we do not have an organized system of thought, we will always be at the mercy of those who ...
Mar 17, 2025•47 min
The devil is constantly lying to us. Although he is a defeated foe, he continues to come up with strategies to make us think otherwise. The weapons he uses to kill and destroy us and to get us to accept defeat are deception, distraction, discouragement, and suggestion. Religion is the area he prefers to focus on; specifically, he wants to keep us following the Law of Moses. We fight back and win by changing our way of thinking from religious tradition to the truth of God’s Word. What was true un...
Mar 10, 2025•1 hr 9 min
Believers are under constant attack from the devil. Although Jesus has already defeated the enemy through His finished works, Satan continues to focus his attacks on our minds in an attempt to convince us that those works have not been finished. He uses fear and intimidation, with the intent of introducing doubt as to whether God’s promises will come to pass for us. Our thoughts carry great power; this is why we must think about what we’re thinking about. Satan is sneaky and devious; he tries to...
Mar 03, 2025•1 hr 9 min
To get a clearer picture of God, we need to understand His unearned, undeserved favor toward us. His grace goes far beyond simply forgiving our sins; it is His way of dealing with those who receive Christ. Grace provides assurance, stability, and direction in the lives of believers. It is not something reserved for when we eventually get to heaven; it immediately begins working in our daily lives the instant we believe and accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior. The beauty of grace is that it is ba...
Feb 24, 2025•1 hr 12 min
Believers have received the gift of righteousness and salvation from God. Just like any gift we receive, this was something we did not have to earn; it was given to us when we believed in Jesus Christ. It is permanent, and came because of our faith in what He did, not because of anything we do. In light of this, we must be careful not to be confused by any doctrine that says otherwise. We were instantly saved and made righteous when we believed; this is our standing in Christ. However, our earth...
Feb 17, 2025•57 min
As believers, it is important that we know the truth about our salvation: we were saved because of our faith in Jesus Christ. we did nothing to earn it; it was given as a gift from God. This directly contradicts religious thinking, which tells us that we must work hard for our redemption. Because of what Jesus has done and our belief in it, we have already been made the righteousness of God. This is our stance in Christ, and nothing we do can change that. However, the ongoing transformation of o...
Feb 10, 2025•1 hr 8 min
Believers are under constant attack from the enemy. There is a battle going on in our minds as to what we do—or do not—believe; the danger of not believing God’s Word is that it opens the door for the devil to condemn us. To feel condemned is to feel inferior, as if we are not good enough and do not measure up. Condemnation leads to fear; however, fear tolerated is faith contaminated. Feeling like we are inadequate causes us to focus solely on ourselves instead of on God, and brings us into self...
Feb 03, 2025•58 min
As Christians, we must understand the nature of the spiritual warfare we are in. The devil has already lost and we are fighting a defeated foe; our fight is now all about how to receive what Jesus died on the cross for us to have. However, most people are not even aware that a battle is even going on; some do not believe that Satan even exists. If we do not know he is real, he takes advantage of our ignorance to attack our minds with contradictions to God’s Word. The war actually takes place in ...
Jan 27, 2025•38 min
Believers are engaged in spiritual warfare. We have a real enemy straight from hell who is determined to kill us; however, although we need to know how to do battle, we do not need to fear. The devil’s ultimate objective is to get us to walk away from God, but he cannot do so when we stay vigilant and watchful for his strategies and sneak attacks. It is critical to understand that although we are saved, we still must fight. Standing solid in the Word of God gives us a tremendous advantage; we ar...
Jan 20, 2025•31 min
Life is not the sum total of just the physical things we can see. Christians are in a spiritual battle with Satan, who is determined to make our lives miserable and kill us. With this in mind, we must not blame God for the bad things that happen. The enemy is constantly lurking in the background, waiting for an opportunity to work evil in our lives; he is willing to lie to us with his suggestions if it means he can lead us away from God. We combat his tactics with a thorough knowledge of God’s W...
Jan 13, 2025•54 min
In these last days, Satan is battling for our hearts and our faith. He has been working hard to undermine God and build a foundation of deception to make us spiritually blind; the last thing he wants is for us to live under the direction of the Holy Spirit. The enemy works through the spirit of mammon attached to money; he lies to us and tells us he can give us things that only God can give us. His plan is to get us to rely on money more than on God. Mammon hates generosity and giving, especiall...
Jan 06, 2025•1 hr 10 min
A proper understanding of salvation requires that we differentiate between our standing and our state as believers. When we got born again, our redemption was fully accomplished because of the finished works of Jesus Christ. This is our stance, which allows us to stand before God holy and righteous as if we had never sinned. However, although we have already been saved by grace, the outward manifestation of our righteousness is a constant and ongoing process of completion. This is our state, als...
Dec 30, 2024•1 hr 11 min
On our Christian walk, we are gradually becoming more and more like Jesus Christ. Despite our progress, however, there is still a gap between who God says we are and what we see in our everyday lives; although He says we are the righteousness of God, sometimes we still do unrighteous things. Our faith in Christ is a critical component in this; we must believe what God says we are, even when our lives are not reflecting that yet. Our belief in our redemption contradicts what religion tells us, wh...
Dec 23, 2024•1 hr 7 min
The devil has always been a thief. As believers, we must be on the alert for his attacks; one of the first things he tries to steal that God gave us is who we are in Christ. He did this with Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden, and unsuccessfully tried again with Jesus in the wilderness; he tries it with us through guilt, shame, and condemnation. Because of what Adam did, we are born into this world already spiritually dead; being born again gives us new life and makes us new creations just like ...
Dec 16, 2024•1 hr 6 min
