{"id":3627,"date":"2019-06-06T14:00:09","date_gmt":"2019-06-06T14:00:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wpmu.azurewebsites.net\/nlt\/?p=3627"},"modified":"2019-06-06T14:00:09","modified_gmt":"2019-06-06T14:00:09","slug":"going-beyond-content","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.tyndale.com\/tyndalebibles\/going-beyond-content\/","title":{"rendered":"Going Beyond Content"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

For Nate, Christianity was just something you did\u2014you go to\nchurch, you try to do good, and you just live your life. He was happy. He had\nan amazing wife, two energetic and wonderful kids, and found fulfillment in his\njob as a police officer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cI complained to my wife that I didn\u2019t understand the Bible.\nBeing a busy dad, my job as a police officer, I had other priorities that I\nthought kept me too busy to spend time reading and studying it,\u201d said Nate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a gift, his wife bought him a Life Application Study Bible<\/em>. Though Nate thought it was a nice, he\ndidn\u2019t feel he needed to open it. It remained on the shelf as the busyness of\nlife continued until the flu knocked him off his feet and forced him into isolation.\nNate\u2019s wife quarantined him to his room for four days so it didn\u2019t spread\nthroughout the house. In boredom, he started looking for things to do when his\neyes landed on the Life Application Study\nBible<\/em>. With nothing else to distract him, he started reading.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cI opened it up and it changed my life. I read Genesis and\nProverbs and just couldn\u2019t stop\u2014it just spoke directly to me. I said, \u2018This is\ntruth.\u2019 Right there in my room I told God, \u2018I am going to be working for you. I\nwant you to use me.\u2019 I confessed everything, and because of it I was able to\nconquer a lot of stuff I had been struggling with for years,\u201d said Nate. \u201cI finally\nfelt joy, and I realized that joy came from reading the Bible and spending that\ntime with God.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nate just couldn\u2019t get enough of it. He was excited to read\nwhat\u2019s next and just wanted to consume as much of Scripture as he could.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSoon I realized I couldn\u2019t keep this to myself. I\u2019ve always\nbeen good with other people. It\u2019s why I\u2019m a police officer; I want to help others.\nBut this changed my view of other people. We are all made in God\u2019s image. So, I\nstarted to look for ways that I could reach out and give other people a nudge.\nHelp them find what I found,\u201d said Nate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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In just a few months, he had handed out fifteen Life Application Study Bibles<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cLife can be tough. No matter what we believe, we are going\nto face challenges\u2014God says that to us. What\u2019s different now in my life is I\nknow who to rely on, who can give me guidance,\u201d said Nate. \u201cWhen I give someone\na Bible I tell them, \u2018this worked for me. It\u2019s up to you if you want to use it\nor not, but it completely changed my life, and I\u2019ve found peace that I didn\u2019t\nknow existed.\u2019 You can\u2019t force people to read it, but I\u2019ve never had anyone turn\nit down when I\u2019ve handed them a Bible.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When one of his long-time friends was facing some dark\nmoments, Nate didn\u2019t hesitate. He reached out and shared his experience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cLike me, he believed in God, but he didn\u2019t have a\nrelationship with God. I was thinking what could I do to help? What could make\nhis life different? And it was like something hit me, it was a moment of\nclarity. Only God could help\u2014that\u2019s it,\u201d said Nate. \u201cI asked him, \u2018do you have\na good study Bible?\u2019 He just kind of looked at me. Then I said, \u2018You know I\u2019m\ndumb and can hardly read, but this one I understand. It\u2019s like God is talking\nright to me. It changed me.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nate mailed him the Bible and encouraged his friend to read\nit with him. He saw his friend\u2019s life transformed. He was even asked to read\nScripture at his friend\u2019s recent wedding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI pray the people who receive these Bibles open them and\nactually use them. That they let God speak his truth to them,\u201d said Nate. \u201cI\nhope it has the same impact that it had on me so others can be the light of the\nworld. We are to be disciples that make disciples. Use what God has given us to\nserve him,\u201d said Nate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cIn his grace, God has given us different gifts for doing certain things well. So if God has given you the ability to prophesy, speak out with as much faith as God has given you. If your gift is serving others, serve them well. If you are a teacher, teach well. If your gift is to encourage others, be encouraging. If it is giving, give generously. If God has given you leadership ability, take the responsibility seriously. And if you have a gift for showing kindness to others, do it gladly.\u201d (Romans 12:6-8, NLT)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Life<\/a>
Take a Look Inside the Life Application Study Bible<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Some exciting changes coming to the <\/a>Life Application Study Bible <\/a><\/em>this fall. Learn more <\/a><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For Nate, Christianity was just something you did\u2014you go to church, you try to do good, and you just live your life. He was happy. He had an amazing wife, two energetic and wonderful kids, and found fulfillment in his […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[24,8,12,21,10,4],"tags":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.tyndale.com\/tyndalebibles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3627"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.tyndale.com\/tyndalebibles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.tyndale.com\/tyndalebibles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.tyndale.com\/tyndalebibles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.tyndale.com\/tyndalebibles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3627"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sites.tyndale.com\/tyndalebibles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3627\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.tyndale.com\/tyndalebibles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3627"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.tyndale.com\/tyndalebibles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3627"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.tyndale.com\/tyndalebibles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3627"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}