Nathan Olson
As I look back to my baptism as the time the Lord rescued me, I can’t remember a time without Jesus’ presence in my life. However, I can clearly remember asking for Jesus to make me His child when I was 4 years old. My mom and I had been going through a picture booklet of the good news of Christ and when it got to the part about Jesus’ death, I definitely needed an explanation. For me, the concept of having someone die for my sin seemed unreal. I knew I had done wrong in my life, but why would God come and sacrifice Himself for me? As I asked my mom this question, she merely responded saying, “Nathan, the reason is because He loves you so very much…in fact He loves you without end”. Still not fully comprehending what this meant, I proceeded to ask her what this great love without end would look like. I could hardly believe it when she told me it meant that God loved me even more than my own mom and dad did, in fact there was never a time that God didn’t love me. This kind of love that I began to experience and the hope and mercy that is found in Jesus Christ has radically directed my life ever since.
This love of God and the hope found in having Christ living in me has ultimately been the central thing that has really made a difference in who I am today. This love received from God has ultimately brought about an increased love for other people, especially those all around the world. A verse that has stuck out to me as a personal challenge is from 1 John 4:19, which says, “We love because he first loved us”. Therefore as God has so loved me, He has put in my heart a love for others around me as well. An clear result of this love of God is my passion for telling others about the love that I have within me. In the last 4 years I have spent almost a year overseas with the primary focus of telling others about Christ. However, this love for people and feeling the need to tell others about Christ just where I’m at has been something that God has been developing in my life by His grace as well.
Another way in which God has been making a difference in my life has been by showing me that He is there for me at all times. He brings a sense of hope and deliverance from whatever it might be that I am going through and is the fortress I can run to. A key truth that God has showed me along the way in my walk with him about being my hope is from Zephaniah 3:17 which says, “The Lord your God is with you, He is mighty to save.” Over the years being a follower of Jesus this verse has proved true over and over as the Lord is always there and at times when I have put my hope in him, my strength is renewed. This is a God that does not grow tired and weary, but is faithful and ready to pick me up when I fall.
In being a Christian, one of the biggest blessings for me is the process of failing. As God has called for me to live a life according to a perfect standard, a standard I know that I will never reach, sometimes trying to be Christ-like seems pointless. As Paul writes in Romans 7:19 “For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing.” Trying to meet up with God’s standard with my sinful nature right beside me is like trying to race on foot against the fastest car out there, knowing that every time you will fall short in comparison to the distance the car will go. Many times for me in my life, there have been many points of failures and times where I have definitely missed the bar in what Jesus calls me to. However, the encouragement in being a follower of Christ is that no matter how many times you fall or mess up in life, Christ is there just as much to bring you back to him. His forgiveness is just as unconditional as His love, and He never falls short of bringing us back to exactly where He wants us to be.
Therefore, in my walk with God, the top three things that God has revealed to me form my childhood has been the love, hope, and forgiveness that He can offer. He has ultimately been the biggest blessing in my life and has changed me to be more like Him.
