Daily Thunder Podcast

This is the twenty-seventh installment in Eric Ludy’s epic summer Daily Thunder series entitled Spiritual Lessons from WW1. This episode looks at the ANZAC (the Australian/New Zealand Army Corps) in WW1. In April 1915 they received their first commission. It was an impossible one—Gallipoli. Everything went wrong on the mission and the ANZAC were stuck in a miserable situation for eight long months...

We all have an altar in our lives upon which we continually offer sacrifices and worship—our hearts. In this message, Nathan not only discusses the key problem with our hearts as altars but gives the simple solution for how our hearts can be places of worship and sacrifice unto God alone.  For more information about Daily Thunder and the ministry of Ellerslie Mission Society, please visi...

This is the twenty-sixth installment in Eric Ludy’s epic summer Daily Thunder series entitled Spiritual Lessons from WW1. This episode explains the elaborate art of distraction that the Kingdom of Darkness wields as one of its chief military schemes against the Church of Jesus Christ. Just like Kaiser Wilhelm II (Germany’s King during WW1) waged a distraction campaign against the United States (fr...

Altars have been used throughout history as a place to commune with God, sacrifice to Him, and worship. But altars have also been the place where idolatry is celebrated. In this message, Nathan discusses seven aspects of altars throughout Scripture, reveals the greatest altar ever found, and talks about our need for an altered altar. For more information about Daily Thunder and the minis...

This is the twenty-fifth installment in Eric Ludy’s epic summer Daily Thunder series entitled Spiritual Lessons from WW1. This episode investigates the German decisions to violate previous agreements they had made at the Hague Peace Conventions in 1899 and 1907 in order to win the war. For the Germans, victory was an end that justified any means necessary to reach it. How should a Christian approa...

This is the twenty-fourth installment in Eric Ludy’s epic summer Daily Thunder series entitled Spiritual Lessons from WW1. This episode unpacks the idea of “going over the top” in battle—a concept made famous in the trench-styled warfare of WW1. But the fun twist to this message is how it explores “going over the top” as a Christian. Using the Christmas Truce of 1914 as its muse, this message show...

Humans have the strange propensity to take good gifts from God and turn them either into gods or treat them as garbage. In either case, we exchange the gift for idols. Returning to the metaphor he used last episode from the book “Sipping Saltwater,” Nathan further discusses idolatry in light of how we treat areas of our lives as either god, garbage, or gift. This practical message will n...

This is the twenty-third installment in Eric Ludy’s epic summer Daily Thunder series entitled Spiritual Lessons from WW1. This episode examines the personal experiences of a young German soldier and his experiences in the Battle of Ypres in October 1914. This young man’s nobility, self-sacrifice, and sincerity are touching, earning him two Iron Crosses for his bravery under-fire and the admiration...

This is the twenty-second installment in Eric Ludy’s epic summer Daily Thunder series entitled Spiritual Lessons from WW1. This episode explores the formation of what will become known as the Western Front in WW1. A war of movement will quickly devolve into a war of entrenchment with a series of desperate battles in a territory known as Flanders. The baits the Christian to this very same territory...

This is the twenty-first installment in Eric Ludy’s epic summer Daily Thunder series entitled Spiritual Lessons from WW1. This episode dives into the man steering the military operations of the Germans in the very first month of the Great War—Helmuth von Moltke. Moltke is an average man in a very un-average situation. He finds himself at the helm of something so big, so grand, so weighty—with cons...

God has offered us unlimited fresh living water … yet we have chosen to guzzle saltwater. The reason many of us feel spiritually thirsty and depleted is because we have turned to our saltwater idols rather than the fountain of Living Water. In this episode, Nathan Johnson uses a metaphor from the book “Sipping Saltwater” to talk about our propensity to chase after the very things that ma...

This is the twentieth installment in Eric Ludy’s epic summer Daily Thunder series entitled Spiritual Lessons from WW1. This episode explores the Battle of the Aisne that unfolded in mid-to-late September of 1914. This one battle has so many rich pictures of the Christian faith and our battle against our evil Foe. So often, we as believers accept stalemate in the territorial battles of our souls an...

We often have more faith in the power and strength of the enemy than we do in our God. Rather than live in the reality that God is truly God, we submit to fear, lust, pride, or a host of other idolatrous attitudes and behaviors. In this message, Nathan Johnson examines a strange event in the Gospels where Jesus and His disciples stand at the Gates of Hades and reveals that darkness has n...

This is the nineteenth installment in Eric Ludy’s epic summer Daily Thunder series entitled Spiritual Lessons from WW1. This episode focuses on the unexpected revival of the French military strength in the hour of their greatest need. Utilizing the principle of “thanksgiving”—this message shows how obedience in the Kingdom of Heaven, even when it seems strange, leads to an unexpected surge of migh...

This is the eighteenth installment in Eric Ludy’s epic summer Daily Thunder series entitled Spiritual Lessons from WW1. This episode returns us to America in 1914 and lays another foundation stone in the drama embroiling the United States at the time the Great War breaks out. US President, Woodrow Wilson, becomes a chief character in the landscape of WW1 and by the end of the war will prove possib...

The people of God have always been surrounded by a culture of idolatry. Though the gods and their worship were called different things over the generations, God’s people have always had to stand against the tide. Today is no different. We too are surrounded by an idolatrous culture and we are called to come out from among them and be separate. In this episode, Nathan Johnson discusses th...

This is the seventeenth installment in Eric Ludy’s epic summer Daily Thunder series entitled Spiritual Lessons from WW1. This episode zooms in on one of the most extraordinary moments in the war—when Joseph Joffre confronted Sir John French on September 5, 1914 and begged him to join the offensive against Germany at the First Battle of the Marne. The participation of the BEF (French’s forces) in t...

We, as Christians, are called to serve God alone and remove the idols from our lives. But what is idolatry and why are we called to remove them? In this episode, Nathan Johnson dives into God’s command against idolatry, explains what idolatry is, and why it is absolutely essential to remove them from our lives.  For more information about Daily Thunder and the ministry of Ellerslie Missi...

This is the sixteenth installment in Eric Ludy’s epic summer Daily Thunder series entitled Spiritual Lessons from WW1. This episode exposes the strange phenomenon of Sin’s inability to slow itself and put on the brakes. This fatal flaw in Sin’s make-up is leveraged by God as one of His chief means by which he awakens the soul to His glorious salvation. This idea is demonstrated in a powerful way t...

This is the fifteenth installment in Eric Ludy’s epic summer Daily Thunder series entitled Spiritual Lessons from WW1. This episode explores the feigned motives of Germany and France in WW1 and then contrasts them with their actual motives when the bullets started flying. As Christians, like Germany and France, we often have ulterior motives, too. We can say our life is about the Glory of Christ w...

We are called to a simple but radical devotion to Jesus Christ. He is to be Lord of our lives and we are to love Him with all we are and all we have. In this episode, Nathan Johnson talks about our ever expanding and exclusive devotion to God and how He must have first place in our daily activities, thoughts, words, emotions, relationships, future goals, and every other area of our lives...

This is the fourteenth installment in Eric Ludy’s epic summer Daily Thunder series entitled Spiritual Lessons from WW1. This episode takes us to St. Petersburg, Russia in 1914 and some strange goings on in the royal palace. It involves an insecure King, a fretful Queen, a sickly boy, and a Mad Monk. It is a story that is both bizarre and powerfully convicting. For like Nicholas and Alexandra, many...

Many think that the final statement of Moses in the Shema—to love the Lord with all your might—refers to loving God with our muscles and physical strength. Yet, while Moses is concerned that you love God with the physical aspect of your life, the Hebrew idea of “might” or “strength” of your life again goes beyond what we presume—it includes everything you have like your possessions, mone...

This is the thirteenth installment in Eric Ludy’s epic summer Daily Thunder series entitled Spiritual Lessons from WW1. This episode takes us to an unexpected war theater in the Wild West. The story of surging conflict in 1914 is going to take us all the way to Mexico. And the intrigue runs deep as Germany labors to stir up animosity between the United States and Mexico in order to keep the U.S. d...

Last Saturday we released a "Bonus Listener Insights" episode on Eric Ludy's current WW1 series that utilized the voices and input of eight regular Daily Thunder listeners from around the world. The episode was a rousing success. So, this week we tried it again, but with a different spin this go-around. This particular installment utilizes sixteen students from Ellerslie's current five-week traini...