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Millard Kinnison on September 6, 2026

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SPIRITUAL CHEATING: WANTING GOD’S BLESSINGS WHILE GIVING YOUR HEART TO ANOTHER MASTER

By John Domino Sanchez Asis

You can sing to Jesus with your mouth, ask Him to bless your future, and still quietly give your deepest loyalty to something else. And perhaps the most frightening part is how long a divided heart can look religious before it finally gets exposed.

There is a kind of betrayal nobody around you may ever see.

No secret hotel room.

No suspicious messages.

No photograph that can expose you.

No human lover waiting somewhere in the darkness.

You can be sitting in church when it happens.

Bible open.

Hands raised.

Worship music playing.

You can whisper, “Jesus, I love You,” and genuinely feel something while saying it.

And yet another master may already have your heart.

Money.

Approval.

Sex.

Success.

Comfort.

A relationship.

Status.

Pornography.

Career.

Control.

Politics.

Possessions.

Your appearance.

Your reputation.

Your plans.

Even ministry.

Anything can become spiritually dangerous when something created begins occupying the place in your heart that belongs to the Creator.

And that is where this gets uncomfortable.

Because many of us do not actually want to abandon God.

We want something far more subtle.

We want God and the idol.

We want Jesus to save us while another master satisfies us.

We want God to protect our families while ambition owns our attention.

We want God to heal our marriages while lust keeps a hidden room in our minds.

We want God to bless our finances while money determines our worth.

We want God to give us peace while control remains our functional savior.

We want Christ when eternity is discussed, but something else when Monday morning arrives.

We want His promises.

His protection.

His forgiveness.

His heaven.

His blessings.

But sometimes, if the truth were dragged into the light, we would discover that we have been asking Jesus to finance a life in which He is not actually Lord.

And Scripture has a devastating name for this.

Adultery.

James writes:

“μοιχαλίδες, οὐκ οἴδατε ὅτι ἡ φιλία τοῦ κόσμου ἔχθρα τοῦ θεοῦ ἐστιν;”

Moichalides, ouk oidate hoti hē philia tou kosmou echthra tou theou estin?

A close rendering is:

“Adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God?”

James 4:4.

That first Greek word is brutal.

μοιχαλίδες — moichalides.

Adulteresses.

James is using the language of covenant betrayal. His point is not that every ordinary enjoyment of creation makes someone an enemy of God. Scripture itself teaches that God gives good gifts. The issue is a heart that embraces the rebellious value system of the world in opposition to its Creator.

This language did not appear from nowhere.

Throughout the Old Testament, God described His covenant people’s idolatry with the imagery of marital unfaithfulness. They belonged to Him, yet repeatedly chased other gods.

So when James reaches for the language of adultery, he is exposing something we desperately prefer to rename.

We call it “priorities.”

God calls us back to fidelity.

We call it “just trying to get ahead.”

Jesus asks who our master is.

We call it “something I need.”

God asks why we cannot surrender it.

We call it “just one weakness.”

The Holy Spirit keeps touching the locked door.

And maybe that is why you are still reading.

Because somewhere beneath your public Christianity, there may be a name you already know.

Something you desperately want God to bless...

but desperately do not want Him to touch.

Read that again.

Because your idol is not always the thing you openly worship.

Sometimes your idol is simply the thing you cannot imagine surrendering if Jesus asked for it.

Jesus said something that leaves remarkably little room for negotiation:

“Οὐδεὶς δύναται δυσὶ κυρίοις δουλεύειν.”

Oudeis dynatai dysi kyriois douleuein.

“No one is able to serve two masters.”

Then He makes the confrontation unmistakable:

“You cannot serve God and mammon.”

Matthew 6:24.

The Greek word translated “serve” is δουλεύειν — douleuein, from language associated with serving as a slave.

Jesus is not describing a casual hobby.

He is talking about mastery.

Ownership.

Allegiance.

The question is therefore deeper than:

“Do you believe in God?”

The demons believe that God exists.

The harder question is:

What actually masters you?

What controls your decisions?

What determines whether you feel valuable?

What are you terrified of losing?

Where does your mind run when nobody is watching?

Whose approval can make your day?

Whose rejection can destroy it?

What compromise are you willing to defend because obedience would cost too much?

What do you keep telling God He cannot have?

That is where this article stops being about “people out there.”

Now it is about us.

Because spiritual cheating rarely begins with someone consciously saying, “I reject Jesus.”

It often begins with a whisper.

“I need this too.”

A little admiration.

A little secret pleasure.

A little more money.

A little more attention.

A little compromise.

A little bitterness we refuse to release.

A little relationship we know is pulling us away from Christ.

A little habit we promise to quit later.

A little success so people will finally know our name.

Then slowly, almost invisibly, the gift becomes the goal.

The desire becomes the demand.

The preference becomes the master.

And eventually we are praying to God for enough blessing to keep feeding the very thing competing with Him.

That is the scandal.

A person can want the gifts of God without wanting the government of God.

We can ask Him for provision while worshiping wealth.

Ask Him for a spouse while worshiping romance.

Ask Him for influence while worshiping recognition.

Ask Him for ministry growth while worshiping numbers.

Ask Him for healing while worshiping comfort.

Ask Him for children while turning those children into the center of our identity.

Ask Him for success while secretly needing success to tell us we matter.

Even a blessing can become an idol when we love the blessing more than the One who gave it.

Jesus had already located the battlefield.

“Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

Matthew 6:21.

The Greek word for heart is καρδία — kardia.

In biblical thought, the heart is far more than sentimental emotion. It concerns the inner person—the center from which desires, intentions, loyalties, and decisions emerge.

Jesus is going after the throne room.

Your heart.

And here is where many religious people become very skilled at hiding.

We learn Christian vocabulary.

We know when to say “God is good.”

We know which worship songs make us emotional.

We know how to post a Bible verse.

We know how to look peaceful in church.

We know how to say, “I’m praying about it.”

We know how to explain away the compromise.

We know how to make bondage sound complicated enough that nobody confronts it.

But you can fool a congregation.

You can fool your spouse.

You can fool your followers.

You can even fool yourself for a terrifyingly long time.

You cannot fool Christ.

He sees what happens after the worship music stops.

He sees the browser history.

The deleted conversation.

The obsession with money.

The resentment.

The envy when somebody else succeeds.

The hunger to be admired.

The relationship you know is dragging your soul backward.

The secret fantasy.

The pride disguised as discernment.

The greed disguised as ambition.

The cowardice disguised as wisdom.

The addiction disguised as stress relief.

The self-righteousness disguised as holiness.

And before shame tells you to stop reading, understand something absolutely essential.

Jesus exposes idols not because He delights in humiliating sinners, but because He came to save sinners.

The Gospel is not God discovering that you are worse than He expected.

The cross proves He already knew the cost.

Jesus did not walk toward Calvary because humanity had finally become impressive enough to deserve Him.

He came for sinners.

He ate with scandalous people.

He touched the unclean.

He welcomed the broken.

He confronted hypocrites.

He called wanderers home.

He carried a cross.

He was crucified.

He died for sins.

And He rose again.

Grace does not say your spiritual adultery does not matter.

Grace says it mattered enough for Christ to bleed—and that His mercy is greater than the sin you finally bring into the light.

This is why repentance is beautiful.

Repentance is not God standing over a filthy person shouting, “Clean yourself before you come near Me.”

The Gospel announces that Christ came for people who could not rescue themselves.

Repentance is the turning of the sinner toward God.

It is the collapse of our negotiations.

No more excuses.

No more editing the confession.

No more calling chains jewelry.

No more asking Jesus to become one important relationship among many competing gods.

You come home.

Maybe you have spent years thinking repentance means God wants to take everything enjoyable away from you.

But what if the thing He is trying to take is the chain around your neck?

What if you keep calling it freedom because you have forgotten what breathing feels like?

The pornography promises pleasure and eventually demands secrecy.

Money promises security and eventually demands your life.

Approval promises belonging and eventually makes everyone your judge.

Success promises significance and moves the finish line every time you approach it.

Lust promises intimacy without covenant and leaves you hungrier.

Control promises safety and gives you anxiety because the universe refuses to obey you.

Bitterness promises justice while slowly poisoning the person carrying it.

An idol always makes promises it cannot ultimately keep.

Jesus does something radically different.

He tells you the cost.

“Follow Me.”

Die to self.

Take up your cross.

Lose your life for His sake.

And then you discover the great paradox of discipleship:

the Master who asks for everything is the only Master who gave everything for you.

Mammon never died for you.

Pornography never loved you.

Applause was never crucified for you.

Success never carried your sin.

Your career cannot resurrect you.

Your relationship cannot cleanse your conscience.

Your followers cannot defeat death.

Your possessions cannot stand beside your grave and command you to rise.

But Jesus can.

This is why Christianity is not merely adding Jesus to an already crowded heart.

Christ does not come as another decoration for the shelf.

He comes as Lord.

And perhaps the deepest question in this entire article is not whether you have ever said that Jesus is Lord.

It is whether there is anything in your life to which you are quietly saying:

“You can have everything, Jesus...

except this.”

That “except” may be revealing your master.

And if something inside you just became uncomfortable, do not run from that discomfort.

Bring it into the light.

David prayed after devastating moral failure:

“לֵב טָהוֹר בְּרָא־לִי אֱלֹהִים”

Lev tahor bera-li Elohim.

“Create for me a clean heart, O God.”

Psalm 51:10.

The Hebrew verb בְּרָא — bera, from ברא — bara, carries the sense of creating. David does not merely ask God to make him look more respectable.

He asks for heart-level work.

That is what some of us need.

Not better camouflage.

Not a cleaner Christian image.

Not another inspirational quote over the same secret chains.

A clean heart.

Maybe you have been asking God to change your circumstances while God has been confronting your allegiance.

Maybe you have been praying, “Lord, why haven't You given me what I want?”

And somewhere beneath that prayer is another question:

“If God never gives me this, will He still be enough?”

That question can expose a throne.

If the answer is no, pay attention.

If losing something would make you believe life is no longer worth living, pay attention.

If obedience to Jesus feels unacceptable whenever it threatens a particular desire, pay attention.

Not because every strong desire is automatically idolatry.

But because strong desires become dangerous when they become ultimate demands.

There is a difference between saying:

“Lord, I deeply desire this.”

and saying:

“Lord, I must have this in order to be whole.”

Jesus is not competing to become one ingredient in your wholeness.

“In Him” is where the New Testament repeatedly locates the believer's life.

And this is where the emotional rollercoaster turns.

Because maybe you recognize yourself.

Maybe badly.

Maybe you have been spiritually cheating for years.

Maybe your lips kept saying Jesus while your life kept crawling back toward another master.

Maybe you promised Him after the last relapse.

Then failed.

Promised again.

Failed again.

Cried.

Repented.

Went back.

And now shame whispers:

“Don't bother coming home this time.”

Listen carefully.

That voice is not the Gospel.

The Gospel never says sin is harmless.

But neither does the Gospel say Christ is powerless.

“If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

1 John 1:9.

The Christian hope is not that faithful believers never stumble.

The hope is Christ.

His blood.

His righteousness.

His resurrection.

His intercession.

His grace that teaches us to renounce ungodliness.

His Spirit who transforms His people.

And when you fall, the answer is not to make peace with the mud.

Come back to Jesus.

Again.

Not casually.

Not pretending repentance is permission to schedule the next rebellion.

Come honestly.

Bring the idol by name.

“Jesus, I love money more than I want to admit.”

“Jesus, I need people to admire me.”

“Jesus, I keep returning to lust.”

“Jesus, I have made this relationship more important than obedience.”

“Jesus, I am terrified of surrendering control.”

“Jesus, I have wanted Your blessings more than I have wanted You.”

There is something terrifying and liberating about finally telling God the truth He already knows.

You do not confess to inform Him.

You confess because you are finished hiding.

And this is where scandal begins turning into grace.

Not because the scandal was imaginary.

Because Jesus entered it.

Peter denied Him.

Thomas doubted.

Paul had persecuted His people.

The woman at the well carried a complicated relational history.

Zacchaeus had become rich through exploitation.

The thief beside Jesus was dying under judgment for his crimes.

Christ did not rewrite their stories by pretending the previous chapters had never happened.

Grace wrote something their sin could never have written.

Redemption.

That is our theme because it is the heartbeat of the Gospel:

From Scandal to Grace, Because Jesus Rewrites Everything.

Not because Jesus makes sin cute.

Not because grace excuses rebellion.

Not because repentance is optional.

Jesus rewrites everything because the crucified and risen Christ can forgive what we cannot undo and transform people who cannot transform themselves.

Your worst chapter does not have authority to write the final sentence.

Jesus does.

But do not misunderstand grace.

Jesus did not die merely to make you comfortable while you continue sleeping beside your idols.

He died and rose to reconcile sinners to God.

Grace forgives.

Grace also transforms.

Grace welcomes prodigals home and then teaches them how to live as sons and daughters.

So maybe tonight there needs to be a funeral.

Not a physical one.

An altar of surrender.

The secret relationship.

The hidden account.

The pornography.

The obsession.

The dishonest business practice.

The unforgiveness.

The addiction to applause.

The identity built around possessions.

The dream you have commanded God to fulfill.

The version of yourself you are desperately trying to make everyone admire.

Put it down.

Not because created things are necessarily evil.

Because Jesus is better than anything we turn into a god.

There may be tears.

There may be withdrawal from habits.

There may be accountability conversations you have avoided.

There may be boundaries that feel brutal at first.

There may be apologies.

There may be restitution where appropriate.

There may be numbers you have to delete.

Apps you need to remove.

Places you should stop going.

Patterns that need disrupting.

There may be professional pastoral or clinical help needed in some struggles.

Repentance sometimes becomes visible.

Not as payment for forgiveness.

As fruit of a heart turning home.

And if you are reading this while thinking, “I have gone too far,” look again at the cross.

The cross is not a monument to people who almost managed to save themselves.

It is the announcement that sinners needed a Savior.

Paul writes:

“If anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation.”

2 Corinthians 5:17.

Not improved camouflage.

New creation.

The risen Jesus still rewrites stories.

He can take the adulterous heart and teach it faithfulness.

The greedy heart and teach it generosity.

The lustful heart and teach it purity.

The proud heart and teach it humility.

The wounded heart and teach it forgiveness.

The frightened heart and teach it trust.

The divided heart and draw it toward wholehearted devotion.

And perhaps one day you will look backward at the thing you once thought you could never surrender and realize:

It was never keeping you alive.

It was keeping you captive.

Jesus was not trying to empty your hands because He hated you.

He was teaching your hands how to receive what idols could never give.

Himself.

So before you scroll away, sit with one question.

Who has your heart when nobody is watching?

Do not answer for Facebook.

Do not answer for your pastor.

Do not answer for your spouse.

Do not answer with the sentence a Christian is supposed to say.

Answer before God.

If this exposed something you have been hiding, you do not need to describe your private sin publicly. But you can mark this moment honestly.

Comment “no more hiding” if you are ready to bring what is hidden before Jesus.

Comment “Jesus forgive me” if this confronted an area you need to surrender.

Comment “I’m still fighting” if you have fallen but refuse to make peace with the chains Christ is calling you out of.

Or simply comment “pray for me” if you are exhausted and need other believers to stand with you.

And when somebody else comments, do not turn the comment section into a courtroom.

Pray for them.

Encourage them.

Point them toward Christ.

We have enough places where wounded people are publicly executed.

Let this become one place where sinners are called to repentance and reminded that there is mercy at the feet of Jesus.

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