Our God Who Pursues

 I shared before, but I was blown away by all that God showed me during the last study, Firm Foundations. I was anticipating another start of the year back-to-basics study like I've done several times in my life, but it was definitely NOT that! We started out with a promise from Hebrews:

“Now without faith it is impossible to please him, for the one who approaches God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.”  Hebrews 11:6

 I learned that God wants us to not only believe He exists, but also that He will bless us when we seek Him. I learned over the last two months that this is so true. The more I studied about Him, the more I trust Him, the more secure I feel in Him, the more peace I have, the more blessed I am! Over the course of the last two months we explored the nature of God in: the Trinity, God's Holiness, God's love, and God's Justice.  Then we looked at sin: What is sin?, Original Sin, and Human Depravity. We moved on to explore different facets of Jesus: The Incarnation, the virgin birth, His sinless life, the crucifixion, the resurrection, the ascension and His second coming. I learned words like "Hypostatic Union" and I was challenged doctrinally as I faced another question that was previously answered with "because." Then we considered aspects of the Holy Spirit: the Indwelling and the Fruit of the Spirit.  Turning to salvation we looked at: grace, faith, repentance, justification, and sanctification. Lots of big words that are worth learning about, even if it means looking at pictures of snakes! To firm up our belief, we learned about: the authority of scripture, the inerrancy of scripture and the sufficiency of scripture. When thinking about the Church we looked at the body of Christ and fellowship. And finally, we looked at these aspects of Christian living: Greatest Commandment, Great Commission and prayer and obedience.

 Phew! That was a lot! I couldn't believe how deep some of those studies went. I had to analyze why I believe what I do and back it all up with scripture. I solved some of my deepest conflicts that have bothered me for decades. God is good! He taught me so much more than I could ever ask or imagine. 

 Because of all that God has taught me so far this year, I'm SO EXCITED about the next study we'll be starting on Monday (3/3/25)! It's called Our God Who Pursues and you can buy it on Amazon or on their website. They have a kid's version if you'd like to study along with your little ones, it is a PDF download that you print at home. And this is a ministry, they are not out to make money. If you are unable to afford a journal at this time, but would like to join the study, you can download one here. This study is currently available in 16 languages, but they keep translating more all the time. They are committed to getting Bible study materials into the hands of women around the world and have translated studies into more than 40 languages. 

 This study will be looking at a few of the minor prophets from the Old Testament, which I'm looking forward to because it's not something I've studied much. It covers the topics of: Repentance and restoration, Trusting God wholeheartedly, God delivers hope and Honoring God. The prophets that are highlighted include: Joel, Jonah, Micah, Haggai and Malachi. I'll be posting about it here on Salty Zebra, but I'd love to have you join us and study along - maybe even join us on Facebook! You can do so by following the link from this QR code:

Here's the Thing: No matter what you're studying, I hope you're getting into God's Word daily. It's His love letter to us, and the more time we spend in it, the more time we spend with Him, the more we grow to be like Him. And what a wonderful world it will be when we are like Him because we see Him!


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