Unholy Emotions: How Captured Thoughts Rewire the Heart, the Mind, and the Life
Stagione 1
di Kevin Ortiz
You have prayed about it. You have repented of it. It is still there at three in the morning. Unholy Emotions argues that fear, anger, shame, lust, envy, and despair are not random weather. Each one grows from a thought you accepted without examining it and rehearsed until it felt like truth. The fight is not at the feeling. It is at the gate, before the feeling forms. Kevin Ortiz takes you there with Scripture, a Thought Audit at the end of every chapter, and a 40-day plan to take one lie captive and replace it with one verse. The mind working against you can be rebuilt. God said so, and He does not command the impossible.
Sometimes you wake up carrying a heaviness you cannot explain. Nothing obvious is wrong, yet anxiety, anger, fear, or sadness is already there. Through the story of Cain, we see God asking, “Why are you angry? Why has the expression of your face fallen?” The emotion was visible, but God went deeper, pointing to something “at the door” that Cain needed to recognize and rule over. What we feel may be the output of something that has been developing beneath the surface for a long time. Our inner life is shaped by what we repeatedly experience, believe, rehearse, and absorb. But not every struggle is purely spiritual; sleep, illness, medication, grief, hormones, and emotional wounds can also play a role, and seeking appropriate help is not a failure of faith. The invitation is to stop hiding or simply fighting the feeling and instead bring it honestly before God. What is standing at your door? Naming it is the beginning of learning how to walk in freedom. To read Unholy Emotions, go to Unholy Emotions: How Captured Thoughts Rewire the Heart, the Mind, and the Life on JesusPOD: https://jesuspod.com/api/share?type=podcast&id=Xii9RpNkhFiYWqsVNksY
A stronghold can be an argument or conclusion that has been repeated so often that it stands higher in our minds than what God has said. The call is to bring every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ.The story of Eve shows how a simple question can become an argument against God's Word, while Jesus shows us another way: “It is written.” When a thought comes, we can ask, Is it true? Is it Christ’s? Where is it taking me? Instead of hosting thoughts that lead us away from truth, we can recognize them, confront them with Scripture, and refuse to let them become our master. Freedom begins when we stop treating every thought as truth and learn to take it captive. To read Unholy Emotions, go to Unholy Emotions: How Captured Thoughts Rewire the Heart, the Mind, and the Life on JesusPOD: https://jesuspod.com/api/share?type=podcast&id=Xii9RpNkhFiYWqsVNksY
We carefully check the ingredients of what we put into our bodies, but we often accept thoughts without examining what is feeding our minds. Philippians 4:8 gives us a way to test our thoughts: are they true, honorable, just, pure, lovely, of good report, virtuous, and praiseworthy? James 3 adds another important test: wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceful. Not every thought that brings comfort is healthy, and not every thought that brings discomfort is wrong. To read Unholy Emotions, go to Unholy Emotions: How Captured Thoughts Rewire the Heart, the Mind, and the Life on JesusPOD: https://jesuspod.com/api/share?type=podcast&id=Xii9RpNkhFiYWqsVNksY
Not every thought that enters your mind is necessarily yours. Scripture points to different sources: your own desires, the influence of the world, spiritual opposition, and the Spirit of God. James 1 shows how our own desires can become temptation, while 1 John 2 describes the pressures of the world. Ephesians 6 reminds us that spiritual forces are also involved. The key is learning to identify the source instead of automatically accepting every thought or blaming yourself for thoughts you never wanted. Peter’s response to Jesus shows how easily a thought can sound loving and reasonable while still pointing away from God’s purposes. At the same time, not every struggle is spiritual attack; sometimes the issue is an appetite we have been feeding, exhaustion, or another ordinary human need. The goal is accuracy: take responsibility for what you choose to house, while refusing to carry guilt for thoughts you never chose. To read Unholy Emotions, go to Unholy Emotions: How Captured Thoughts Rewire the Heart, the Mind, and the Life on JesusPOD: https://jesuspod.com/api/share?type=podcast&id=Xii9RpNkhFiYWqsVNksY
Knowing the right thing does not always mean living it. Romans 12:2 shows that lasting transformation comes through the renewing of the mind. Like a path worn into a field by repeated footsteps, our thoughts and reactions become familiar patterns, but they can also be changed. The old path may remain for a while, yet as we repeatedly choose a new way, the new path becomes stronger and the old one begins to fade. To read Unholy Emotions, go to Unholy Emotions: How Captured Thoughts Rewire the Heart, the Mind, and the Life on JesusPOD: https://jesuspod.com/api/share?type=podcast&id=Xii9RpNkhFiYWqsVNksY
Spiritual growth is not an instant event; it is a trained capacity built through repeated use. Hebrews 5:14 describes maturity as having our spiritual senses exercised through practice. Just as repeated footsteps create a path, repeated thoughts and responses strengthen familiar patterns in us. That means falling back into an old reaction does not erase the progress already made. A lapse is one walk on the old path, not a return to zero. David’s experience with the lion and the bear shows how God often builds strength in ordinary, unseen moments. Before facing Goliath publicly, David had already been practicing courage in private. In the same way, the small choices nobody sees are preparing us for the moments that will test us. Do not let one failure become a verdict about your future. Keep walking the new path, because transformation is built through faithful repetition over time. To read Unholy Emotions, go to Unholy Emotions: How Captured Thoughts Rewire the Heart, the Mind, and the Life on JesusPOD: https://jesuspod.com/api/share?type=podcast&id=Xii9RpNkhFiYWqsVNksY
What happens to us does not automatically determine how we feel about it. Between the event and the emotion, our minds quickly interpret what the event means. The story we tell ourselves can turn an ordinary message into fear or a difficult situation into despair. The twelve spies in Numbers 13 saw the same giants, but ten saw themselves as grasshoppers while Joshua and Caleb included God in the equation. The facts were real, but the conclusions were different. To read Unholy Emotions, go to Unholy Emotions: How Captured Thoughts Rewire the Heart, the Mind, and the Life on JesusPOD: https://jesuspod.com/api/share?type=podcast&id=Xii9RpNkhFiYWqsVNksY
Lot’s story shows how dangerous gradual drift can become. He looked toward the well-watered land, chose it, pitched his tent near Sodom, eventually lived there, and finally sat in its gate. Each step seemed small, but over time he became deeply attached to what he had once only observed. The invitation is to examine what we regularly allow through the front door of our soul and notice what it is teaching us to rehearse. You may not be able to control everything you encounter, but you can learn to guard what you allow to stay. To read Unholy Emotions, go to Listen to Unholy Emotions: How Captured Thoughts Rewire the Heart, the Mind, and the Life on JesusPOD: https://jesuspod.com/api/share?type=podcast&id=Xii9RpNkhFiYWqsVNksY
Fear can make us experience a tragedy before it ever happens. We imagine the accident, the loss, the hospital room, or the worst possible outcome, and our bodies respond as though the disaster were already real. But fear is often a rehearsed story rather than a revelation. Second Timothy 1:7 reminds us that God gives power, love, and self-control, while 1 John 4:18 shows that perfect love casts out fear. The question beneath fear is often not simply, “What if this happens?” but, “If it does happen, will God still be with me?” Elijah’s story shows that fear is not always answered with immediate correction. When he was exhausted and overwhelmed, God first gave him sleep, food, and water. To read Unholy Emotions, go to Unholy Emotions: How Captured Thoughts Rewire the Heart, the Mind, and the Life on JesusPOD: https://jesuspod.com/api/share?type=podcast&id=Xii9RpNkhFiYWqsVNksY