Devotions with Pastor Stanton

If you were planning to bring a man down, how would you begin? Most of us will begin with a frontal attack. A sudden blow. But the most dangerous attack in human history did not begin with a sword. It began with a...

You have heard it a hundred times this year. Maybe this week. "Look within." "Follow your heart." "Speak your truth." "If it feels right to you, it must be true." It sounds so good, doesn't it. It sounds like freedom...

Some of you have walked the floor of your living room at midnight, binding the darkness over your home. You bound Satan over your child's bed. You bound it over you marriage, your work and many other things. And you...

Most of us have a plan for when life gets hard. Some of us plan to out-think it. We read the right book, we find the right strategy, and we manage the problem. Some of us plan to out-behave it. We keep our vows, pay our...

In August of 1943, thousands of soldiers stormed a fog-covered island in the North Pacific, Japan Kiska. For days they fired into the mist. Men were wounded. Men were killed. And then they found out the enemy had left...

In everyone's house, there's a space where we feel like we're losing. You know the one. It's that room we don't mention. Perhaps it's a bedroom where conversation ceased weeks ago. Maybe it's the hallway outside a...

Have you ever prayed to be somewhere else? Maybe not out loud. But you have thought it. If I were out of this job. If my family were different. If the people around me were not the way they are — then I could really...

There are some places and seasons in life where following Jesus becomes extremely difficult. Maybe its work, maybe its family vacations, maybe even a conversation with a friend. You wish God would make that place easier...

Most of us meant to open our Bibles this morning. But then the phone lit up, somebody needed an answer or something had to get done. And before we know it, it is evening, and the Lord has received whatever was left...

Imagine somebody hands you a gift. Free. No catch. And you reach for your wallet anyway. What just happened to the gift? It stopped being one. The moment you pay even a quarter for it, it is not a gift anymore. It is a...

Here is something strange in this story that is easy to read straight past. Naaman came to Israel with a fortune, because he thought he had to buy his healing. He never spent a shekel of it. The cure was completely...

If God actually did something in you, how would you know? How do you know it was real? Not the emotion. Not the date on the calendar. Not the fact that some church wrote your name in a book once. Today, we will find out...

Here is a question that will tell you more about your heart than almost any other. When God answers, do you come back to thank Him? Not, do you feel grateful, I mean, has gratitude ever actually cost you something? An...

Have you ever been disappointed by how ordinary God's help looked? You were in real trouble. You wanted heaven to move. And what came was a friend with a verse. A sermon you almost skipped. A page in a book somebody...

Is there something in your life that you were counting on that has fallen apart? The career stalled. The savings drained. The plan collapsed. The person disappointed you in a way you did not think they could. Have you...