If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit.
Galatians 5:25
Hi there! I’m Nate, and this space is essentially my open catalog for scripture studies and day-to-day snippets from my life as I learn to live by the Spirit of God. If you find anything here to be at all edifying, praise God! I try to post 2-3 times per month and update the Highlights section often, so check back regularly to stay up-to-date. I hope you enjoy our time together.
What And Who Is This For?
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Howdy! Welcome to my blog. As someone who grew up in a Christian and then sort of Hebrew Roots and then sort of Messianic Jewish household, I had a lot of confusion and frustration towards faith when I was younger. As a teenager and younger adult, I was very rebellious and hypocritical in my professed faith. I had a very incomplete understanding of and appreciation for the Gospel and the God who gave it to us. The things I share on this blog are my attempt to clear up those areas of confusion, make up for lost time, and help others who may be in a similar place with some of the same issues.
Some things you can expect to see here will be my own studies on certain topics, music that I find to be conducive to worship, some of the resources that I like use for research, and whatever else I happen to come across as I move forward and grow in faith.
I’m NOT here to preach at you or sell you anything. I’m just a guy trying to live my life in a way that is pleasing to God, and I want to help you learn to do it with me.
If you have any topic or site suggestions, please feel free to send me a message through the contact page.
Highlights
These sections are for videos (songs, studies, episodes, etc.) that I find edifying. Think of it as a revolving door of highlighted content and media that I hope will bless you.
Psalms, Hymns, and Spiritual Songs
Good morning! Or afternoon. Or evening. Whenever you happen to be reading this, I hope you are having a blessed, lovely day. This week, I wanted to share the song My Savior My God by Aaron Shust. It is a special song to me–I try to only share songs that are special to me–because I rediscovered it last year while I was being severely chastened by God. I’ve written about that experience elsewhere, in some of my earlier articles and my About page, so I won’t repeat all of the details here. It was a difficult experience, but it was also one of the greatest direct expressions of love my Heavenly Father has ever shown me; I was challenged, emotionally and physically strained, and stressed beyond belief with a new job and a baby on the way.
In the middle of all that, He stopped me cold and showed me my need to repent of a lot of things.
This song is, in a way, a crystallization of that experience, succinctly outlining the desperate yet hopeful feelings I had at the time and culminating in a heartfelt, simple chorus:
My Savior loves, my Savior lives, my Savior’s always there for me,
My God He was, my God He is, my God He’s always gonna be!
Through that time, I wrestled with a lot of scriptures–notably the warning passages in Hebrews–and felt a lot of fear as the weight of my sins pressed onto me. Through the encouragement of my father and father-in-law, though, I found great comfort in the second to last chapter of Hebrews, chapter 12, which says:
“4 You have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood in your striving against sin; 5 and you have forgotten the exhortation which is addressed to you as sons, “MY SON, DO NOT REGARD LIGHTLY THE DISCIPLINE OF THE LORD, NOR FAINT WHEN YOU ARE REPROVED BY HIM; 6FOR THOSE WHOM THE LORD LOVES HE DISCIPLINES, AND HE SCOURGES EVERY SON WHOM HE RECEIVES.” 7 It is for discipline that you endure; God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father does not discipline? 8 But if you are without discipline, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. 9 Furthermore, we had earthly fathers to discipline us, and we respected them; shall we not much rather be subject to the Father of spirits, and live? 10 For they disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but He disciplines us for our good, so that we may share His holiness. 11 All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.” (Hebrews 12:4-11)
I felt it would be appropriate now, nearly a year later, to revisit them and share some of what God did for me. It also ties nicely into the most recent post currently available, which is about confession and repentance. If you are going through a hard time right now, examine yourself and ask: “Is this connected to some unconfessed sin? Am I being disciplined?” To be clear, I am NOT suggesting that all hardship is the result of a personal, unrepented sin. I only want to encourage you to examine yourself to see if it may be the case. Don’t wait to deal with it; there’s no time like the present, and every hardship is an opportunity to draw nearer to God.
Words of Life
This section is for sermons/drashes, podcast episodes, teachings, testimonies, and other edifying words that I have come across and wanted to share with you all. I will do my best to make sure that what I share is always doctrinally sound, but I of course encourage you to pick up your Bible and inspect everything for yourself.
Hello, there! This week, instead of sharing a bunch of podcasts and teachings, I want to share something with you that has been helping me quite a bit over this past year.
As you are probably aware by now, I mostly grew up in a believing household with parents who loved God and wanted dearly to serve Jesus as faithfully as they could. They still do, nearly twenty years after they first gave their lives to Christ. Unfortunately, while I absorbed many of the principles and proof-texts over the years, my knowledge of scripture had a lot of holes in it.
I could tell you—generally—what was right and wrong, but not necessarily why, and I just didn’t take it as seriously as I should have.
Over the last 12 months, I have made a point to study the Bible regularly and often, through reading it, listening to it, and listening to others teach through it throughout the week. It has been extraordinarily edifying. I have learned names, made connections, and grown in areas that I was painfully weak in. I have also developed a reverence and love for God that I never had before.
This week, I want to encourage you to pick a book of the Bible—one that you’ve never read or haven’t read in a while—and read it from start to finish.
If you can’t read it, listen to it. Take notes. Meditate on it. See where it challenges or encourages you. Ask questions. Don’t settle for a “this is what it means to me” kind of conclusion; dig for concrete answers.
If you are willing to listen—really listen—to what God has to say, then I can promise you it will be one of the most productive things you do this week.
Unfortunately, I have slacked off on this over the last two weeks—I still read with my family most evenings, but haven’t spent as much time reading independently—but I have recently gone through Amos, Obadiah, Philippians, and 1 Corinthians. Each of those is a great place to start if you are unsure about where to begin—particularly if you haven’t read them in a while. You might go to the Psalms and look into the circumstances that inspired one of them. You could look at the book of Judges, see God’s faithfulness and judgment toward an unfaithful people, and ask, “Why does He put up with them? What does that mean for me?”
Whatever the case, let the text speak for itself and immerse yourself in it. You may be surprised by how refreshing it is and how thirsty you have been.