Chapter 5: Surrendering Me

NO TURNING BACK GIVING ALL OF ME THIS TIME: Gosh i wish it was that easy. haha. Its not, and I am living proof of that. Recently, my father (my best friend) has been taking me to a deeper place of daily surrender. I do believe there comes a time when God wakes us up to say "Hey, you can no longer do this own your own." Well that time came for me around September of 2009. I had tried quite the variety of things to satisfy myself.

By the way, may I confess to you random blog readers... I am so unworthy of writing or even talking about the father to you, but i want someone to know just how much grace and love He has shown to me. Well that variety of things never satisfied. Trying to find acceptance by knowing as many people as possible. Having sex with a girl that you knew would probably not be your wife. Finding acceptance in her. Drinking to "make the problems better" haha. No, honestly just to fit in. I tried it all... Tried to even do all the right things like not drink, not have sex, say the right words, read my Bible, say a few selfish prayers.

Gosh... i was so broken and I am still broken. And finally someone (well ultimately God through this someone) took the time to tell me that everything that I ever did was already taken care of... someone told me that everything i went through... (from a broken heart, loneliness, to a broken family)... that someone said that stuff had purpose nathan. It was not just wasted. Its nothing you should want any other way. Someone besides you is in control. N0w... lets rewind... in eighth grade i was "emotionally saved" i guess you could say i realized i had sin and could not remove it and only Jesus could. But that was just that. I did not know what to do after that. I honestly can say my life did change after that. I did so much of the right stuff. I depended on God when times got tough. I did a devotion every night. Then times got so hard that I started drinking and doing other things to satisfy myself.

I want to suggest that I did not really even know what being a Christian was really about. Yes, I looked great on the outside after that eighth grade experience, but it ended bad because I did not know that I had to die myself, surrender my all, give up my dreams, give up my desires, become best friends with the person that made life for me possible, do the right things because I am so freaking in love and not out of obligation, and realize how messed up and broken I really am and in that realizing the ocean of grace I have been thrown into. I myself(my sin) murdered Jesus. My sin beat nails into his hands. Mocked him. Laughed at him. Turned my back on him. I had not grasped any of those truths until September. Honestly, its nothing I can explain because it was not me at all. It was completely God and God alone revealing these things to me. And its been the greatest blessing ever.

Loosing all of yourself and surrendering to a bigger story than our tiny little ambitions... honestly does not sound like fun to pretty much anyone.. but let me tell you these past few months have been the greatest Joy getting to know the most wonderful person to ever know. By greatest Joy let me warn you... I in NO WAY mean life is all perfect, because its not. Falling in love with Jesus is in no way easy, but i PROMISE you his love for us makes it worth it all! Worth it all for His Father and our fathers GLORY! Salvation is in no way about you or in no way about me. Its about a God that wants to be praised. A God that is soooo Jealous for You!! He wants you and me. Not just 50%... every single thought, desire, dream... He wants it all, because He wants those thoughts, desires, and dreams to be HIS. He wants to make you HIS. All of you. All of me. The God of everything wants YOU and ME..... helllo.... seriously is that not the coolest thing ever?

Let me say it again...GOD (the creator of everthing, the maker of the stars, the light of the world) yes... HE WANTS YOU! and only He can make that real to us. So lately... whats been going on with me is just honestly not saying "hey God take this day from me and make it yours." Just not a complete place of surrendering me daily. He has convicted me of that, and it has been beautiful. Next week maybe the next hour... I may stumble.. I may make my schedule to busy... but gosh its so humbling to know that He is still right there. Waiting to pour his glory down on us. He is waiting with love and grace. We just have to keep letting Him in. Its rest for us to do so. Its life for us to do so. Its joy for us to do so. And most of all its Glory for Him.

Wow... i have not really been that random with this blog which is really random in itself haha. However, I would like to give a random shout out to a Great Curly Headed Friend of mine who i talked about this with today. You know who you are! I have not forgotten about the vines, ill go back some random day. Just keep coming back... who knows it may get more random.

Download or Listen to: I Surrender by Kim Walker

Chapter 4: The Abandoned House Edition

WARNING: DO NOT TRY THIS ON YOUR OWN. YOU WILL DIE. So today i have been so excited about blogging and the opportunity to share with you something really cool i heard about a month ago. I would like to confess that sometimes while writing i think to myself... what can i say to make people think i am cool... but i would like to pause and just say i am not telling you any of this to make me look cool or better or anything crazy like that. I come to you random people as a servant wanting somebody to read and crave a relationship with this God who has completely changed my life and turned it upside down. I do mean that. How could anything in this life change someone's lifestyle and why of thinking? Well i cannot really offer an answer thats of this world and so very common to us. I would like to suggest that God, the same very God that made you exactly the way He wanted you, can do just that. Transform the way you think, look at people, treat people, treat yourself, how you act, and most of all transform who we think we are. About a month ago i believe, I heard a guy named Rod Mays( i have no clue if that is spelled right and it could be Rob) speak and one really cool think he talked about was.... When God comes into our lives it is like... God walking into an old abandoned house or temple and He is constantly repairing and making the house beautiful. Random people... we are broken.. just as broken as a house that nobody cares about. A house that has been deserted and left for the vines to take over. Use your imagination if you have one... Sin(the very thing that separates everyone of us from God. We have no way to God bc of our sin. Bear with me...there are some of you who know we do.) is what has caused us to be in this state of abandonment... and that very sin is those consuming vines that take control of everything. So now you are seeing a house. A house left broken down in ruin with vines all over it. Stick with me Randomneers. haha. Dont ask me what that means. Lets act like this house can actually be alive. So now we have a living house... What is nathan on?? just coffee i promise.. but seriously now.. we have this abandoned house. Can it fix it self? Can someone who knows nothing but sin fix their sin? Think about... Can you? Can i? We sure try to, or at least i have. But i failed every time i tried and i am sure some random person out there knows exactly what i am talking about. Jesus is the only way to our Father in heaven. He is the way to God. We do have a way. But in no way is that way ourselves.... but we sure want it to be. Imagine... A man dressed in white, beautiful beyond compare, perfect in every single way, perfect in love, perfect in grace... walking through the woods and seeing an old shabby house overtaken by those vines. He walks up opens the door. (At that moment He was nailed to the cross.) He took on this old broken house and wanted to restore it. Wanted to make it beautiful. Wanted it to be HIS. Wanted to see it shine because of what HE DID and is going to do. He could have easily built a beautiful mansion but instead he choose to take upon himself the brokenness of that old house. That house is you! That house is me! Jesus came and was nailed to the cross for our brokenness. Our sin. Our imperfections. Thats why He came. He came so we could be restored just like that house so Our father in heaven may be glorified! Sooo.... like... this Jesus dude comes in our lives and our lives just become awesome and perfect.... haha yeah i wish! No... we are seen as perfect because we are seen as Jesus himself standing before our father! Now for the physical part because of course we are forced to live in this broken world. No other option sorry guys. When Jesus comes in the door of our lives he fixes, heals, restores, and equips us step by step. Just like when that man walks in that old house. He has to fix and restore it room by room. Leak by leak. Broken board by broken board. Tearing those vines down that we have let consume our lives. Its a constant transformation that only Jesus can do! and when we loose our selfish ways and desires Jesus then can make us beautiful! A beautiful restored house. NO longer without an owner. No longer without a father... But now being a child of the most marvelous King of all Kings and seen completely Beautiful. How awesome is that? I think it is so exciting! I hope you do too. I really want to talk more about the vines next chapter because for some reason we like to hang on to them. I am off to RUF... wish i could write so much more.. Random fact... I have a tattoo. Random i know.. Come back for more!

Abandoned Homes coming soon...

Chapter 3: Interruption of Beautiful Randomness

Abandoned homes? Yeah, i'll save that for later. Coffee and the King are great this morning. Last night was a pretty thrilling night. Reformed University Fellowship, probably the best thing that ever hit the ole miss campus (Sorry Eli!), is where you would have found the fellow of randomness last night. Les, the RUF director, talked about adoption into God's family. God's children have security, assurance, intimacy, and most of all they have an inheritance. Can you imagine being a co-heir with Jesus (the man who came down from on high to be thrown on a cross by your sin and somehow rose from the dead)? Can you imagine actually being a heir of God himself?? The King of Kings, The Lord of Lords, The one who named the stars, the one who called the earth into motion, the freaking beginning and the end!! Is it possible that we could maybe inherit God himslef??? Something to ponder on! What is that feeling that keeps us longing for security? What is that feeling of wanting to be loved? What is that feeling of wanting to do the right thing but completely just doing the opposite? "Come to me!" -Jesus says. "Come follow me and i will give you the sweetest rest, but to follow me you must loose yourself." We crave that security and intimacy from something outside ourselves. Where will we turn to get it? The God who longs to be your father, or the things of this broken world. People that follow this completely random blog... this guy (me mr. random himself) wants you to know this world has nothing to offer when it becomes our security. Drinking, Sex, Talking about people simply for conversation sake, Money, Family, relationships, clothes, etc... I have been there. I still go there sometimes... They do not satisfy! I am going to scream that... THEY DO NOT SATISFY!!! They will not give you anything but a temporary satisfaction setting yourself up for failure, but only God can make that real to us. And when He does it is BEAUTIFUL. He will make you even feel Beautiful. Are we willing to let Him? Are we willing to die? (DIE???? Did he really just say that?) haha. No, i am not suggesting suicide for us random people. I am talking about the DEATH of our selfishness, Self, and Sin. Will we let God wake us up to that? Will we be willing to suffer a death like Jesus himself? To the literal random thinker... Nooo... we are not having a big crucifixion party this weekend. Nooo... we are not going to pull out the whips and beat each other for the sake of the Gospel. But what i am talking about is... Coming down from on high and actually realizing that our small little selves have to surrender our small little ways of satisfying ourselves! Are you really satisfied?? And even though we are so small and sooo broken... God himself knows everything about us. He made us. He holds your breath. But are willing to admit that we cant make it, and we NEED Him?? Something to think about! Something to maybe even Rejoice about it?? I think so. Now, what will it look like when we do surrender ourselves? Remember those abandoned houses? Come back to find out... Do you want to know? Are you curious? Philipians 3: 7-11... Did you read it?? Maybe it has a little to do with what I have been talking about. Romans 8: 12-25... is it true that we can be adopted by God himself? Maybe so... let God show you! Only He can awaken us. Have a rockin day full of crazy randomness. Sorry for the Chapter of Interruption... but maybe just maybe we needed this random interruption.

Chapter 2: Coffee and The King

I have been brain storming for hours of how to make this interesting and what i was going to talk about, but i have truly failed haha. To all of you who love a great piece of literature... See you later! Coffee is something I have grown a liking for since i came to college. Test keep us young folks up in the wee hours of the night, and for the old fellers heck they just need it to survive, i guess. Need that extra boost in their lives. Who knows? Coffee is so hot. I mean seriously. Have you ever just tried to take a sip and felt like you stuck your tongue on the stove? I have. I have also gotten so distracted that my coffee has sat for so long... you would have thought i ordered a frappuccino. I want to suggest that when we are excited to get into Gods word that our relationship with Him becomes on fire like that cup of freshly poured coffee. This excitement is nothing we can conjure up with will power on our own, but instead its excitement from the Spirit of God. Have you ever woke up just wanting to talk to God? Have you ever read a verse in the Bible, and you were like that makes complete sense now? Have you ever been able to love that person you just dont really care for? Maybe that is the Spirit of God. Isn't that exciting for us? Now, I am not a biblical scholar. I am so far from that. Me saying i am a "WIZ" at the Bible would be like my 4 year old nephew telling you "I am master at Calculus." Yeah right. So what i am saying may or may not be valid. I am trying to pitch that when we smother that excitement we have been freely given with things of this world... (busyness, schedules, relationships, and so much more)... that our relationship with God suffers, and it becomes like that cold coffee. Just boring. I am not in anyway saying that God has changed or has left any of us when we face that problem. I am simply trying to throw out a thought that maybe we are smothering ourselves with too much of the world

and not letting God breathe in us through His Word. Good thing He is in control of everything. Right? Because if the King

of every living thing is in complete control our relationship with Him is in his hands. I mean ultimately our relationship with Him is completely for His Glory alone. So i wonder why sometimes we think we get to" wear the pants." Heck i think that sometimes, but it is just a lie from the enemy (He is definitely for another chapter because there is no true warmth he is stirring up in me.) You know, i really love abandoned homes. Random, i know. Come back to see why i think they are more than a site to see. But back to this coffee... lately i have been going to meet Jesus at different coffee places in Oxford. It has been so exciting for me to do. Just getting to know more about who I am falling in love with. I was at square books drinking a "dollar coffee" and I read this verse and loved it... Philippians 3:7-11... Check it out! I am so sorry this has been so jumpy and may not have made any since to you haha. But this is what i wanted to share and until next time I'll be chilling with Coffee and The King.

Nate

what warms my heart coming soon...

Chapter 1: Father

Remember the ol' American "Way" i spoke of? Well let me just say my father has a strong liking for what is one reason some families are torn apart in America: Alcohol. We, Americans, just love our alcohol. Whether that is right or wrong is definitely not for this chapter. However, after reading this i do not see how you will be able to conclude that alcohol is a problem solver. This chapter should honestly be named "A Father for the fatherless." My father has always supported me in any crazy or dumb idea i could dream up. Playing for Duke. Yep, he bought the goal and ball. Becoming the next Billy Gilman...Yes, he even sent me to Nashville and even to Vaught-Hemingway for the National Anthem. He has been there with wallet wings wide open my whole life. That honestly has been a blessing. On the contrary, I do not know him, and he doesn't know me. Not even the beginning of knowing who I am. What i care about. Back to the alcohol... random interruption. Can you imagine having to lock your room door in your OWN house scared of the man who was suppose to protect you? Can you close your eyes and just imagine a family at 3 o'clock... The father busting in the house drunk yelling about things that were honestly just uncalled for. I have always been the person in the family to clean, cook, or whatever you want to call it. Hey, my mom was in school at the time and dad was just gone "supporting the family." I always here that. So back to closing your eyes... The house you picture is spotless (at this point in typing i now realize that your eyes can't be closed while reading this...awkward for me) but for some reason the drunk thinks that "the trash is never taken out and its the boys responsibility in the house... its the least i could do for the family" so therefore i get yelled at. The father almost hit his son after telling him "he should man up." ( I find that funny being that i have never been taught by him to even be a man in the first place.) Luckily, the oldest sisters boyfriend overheard and came in and put a stop to everything. The mom was probably crying she always was not knowing anything to say. The other kids... probably had their door shut crying and listening to hateful things... At least that's what i used to do. So I always longed for a father that wanted to know me. Who knew everything about me. Who knew my heart. Who loved me without putting things like a glass bottle before his very child. I found that Father and He is my true Father now. Who is he? Psalm 68:5 says it best...."A father to the fatherless...is God in his holy dwelling." Also, Isaiah 63:16..."But you are our Father, though Abraham does not know us or Israel acknowledge us; you, O Lord, are our Father, our Redeemer from of old is your name." Do not worry if you are like whoaa... Isaiah and Psalm who? Well they are books that come from the greatest collection of words ever written. The Bible. The very word. The very breath of Father. The breath of Life to His children. That is just one of the many reasons that I am in need of a God, a father, and a redeemer( ill get to a redeemer later). Its worth coming back for one boring day. Did I mention that I am obsessed with heaters. Random, I know. What is warming your heart? Come back to find out what warms mine. Are there any grammar experts still struggling through the battlefield of these misplaced commas and so much more. (Thanks for hanging in there.)

Nate

who is my father coming soon...

apologies

I am in no way a writer, poet, perfectionist, or Poe. If you are an English grammar expert, you may want to go. (Glad you enjoyed the blog.) It is going to get ugly from here on out haha. I just simply want to share randomness in my life with you. I will take you on a journey most of all so we together may grow closer in love with the most wonderful artist of the universe. I love coffee, bracelets, interesting clothes, awkwardness, people, sunsets, music, abandoned homes, nature, books, bottletree bakery, peace signs, and most of all the creator of it all. Those are a few of the chapters of randomness, but i am sure there will be much more.
Before Chapter 1, I must tell you a little about the fellow of randomness. I am 19 years old, and time is a' flying. My grandma always says, "It was just yesterday when I could hold you in my arms." Yikes, kind of awkard. Now, I truly believe her. We are here for just a second, and then we are gone. Scary? I don't think so. Death does not bother me. Death is a part of who we are, but that is for another day and another chapter.
I grew up with two sisters (23,18) and a brother (14). My parents were perfectly happy. We truly lived the American dream. The American "Way" is more like what we lived in. My parents were not happy and eventually divorced last year. One more couple to add to the mountain climbing statistics. They are better off, and someone so much greater than us is in control. Praise the Lord. Literally. I have been through a lot, but hey... who hasn't? Life is hard. I do love the color turquoise. Random. I know.
I am not really sure what else you deserve to know just yet, but come back and find out who my father is.

Nate