Chiseled Ep 108 - How to Win in Spiritual Warfare - Chris Cahill

Chris Cahill was drinking with colleagues one evening while traveling on a business trip when he had an epiphany. His hands prevented him from taking a glass of scotch that was offered to him, as they had many times before. So, he returned to his hotel room, where he spent the night reading a copy of Gideon's Bible, obsessing over a pastor delivering a sermon on YouTube, and meeting Jesus in the bathroom mirror. The next morning, he quit his job and took an immediate flight home to Florida.It's a good thing he did, too, because even though this ex-Marine and hard rock drummer had a highly successful financial career, his wife was about to leave him with their two kids.Looking back, Chris laughs that he dared say to his wife in that moment, honey, I have changed, but in fact something had. He and his wife decided to go to church. Picking one out of the blue, they ended up at the church where the YouTube pastor preached.From there, Chris dove into Christian doctrine. He spent months of 14-hour days learning. He became a pastor and a counselor, and he and his wife dedicated their lives to helping others. But after several years of serving, their personal savings had run out and it was time for Chris to find a paying job."It's hard when you're doing ministry when you all of a sudden (you have to leave) .... You feel like you're turning your back on God," he said.Amazingly, the financial firm where Chris had first started working after college was looking for a new owner. He went back to work there but changed his entire strategy for managing a financial planning company."I used to be a businessman who was Christian ... When I came back to the office, I said, 'Look,' — to myself and God I said — 'Look, I am now going to run this place like a ministry.'"He did just that, building his practice on serving others without expectation. He succeeded beyond his imagination. Many of his clients now also worship with him.Chris, who has written 11 religious-themed books, has spanned the gamut on Christian theology from Orthodoxy to Roman Catholicism to Protestantism. Throughout his various studies, he has learned that bickering over how to practice faith is a trick meant to keep us from interacting with God."The devil's work is to keep us entrapped in our own biases," Chris said. "He's got us so busy and distracted ... that we're not focusing on the real in-depth relationship that (we) have."Chris said that spiritual warfare is a theme in his book, The Great Deception: What is Truth?, a "Dan Brown meets Indiana Jones conspiracy" about how to fight our biases and find the path to worship in ways that brings us closer to God.Chris is an awesome storyteller, hugely energetic, and fun to listen to. When you hear his takes on God, the devil, and finding yourself, I'm willing to bet that you're going to want to read his latest book. Fortunately, it's available on Amazon. In the meantime, you're going to get a real pick-me-up from our conversation in this week's episode of Chiseled.