Category Archives: Psychology

Journal, Nathan Dooley, Psychology

Resolution Update 7-14-21

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What happened- I blinked and tomorrow became today! Time is unrelenting:

//2020 DRAFT//

  • Jesus Christ is my belief structure.
    1. What does that mean? (salvation).
      1. Human soul and God.
        1. Saved by grace through faith.
        2. How does faith work?
  • I love my wife—priority.
    1. She is the core/center of my responsibilities.
      1. I need structure.
        1. Public Journal/accountability
  • Job with hours to aid me on this trajectory.
    1. Not ideal, but blessed.
      1. I work nights and days.
      2. Best option at the moment.
        1. Aim for only nights if available.
        2. Or learn how to write, like, very good!
  • Psychology Professor—Jordan Peterson.
    1. Mentor/Maps of Meaning/(biblical skeptic?)
      1. I think Jordan’s strategy to understand ‘meaning’ is awesome!
  • My personality— understand and improve.
    1. 1 Peter 3:15 (but sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you, yet with gentleness and reverence;)
      1. There is a hope in the personality of a believer.
        1. My personality is wild; I want to understand it.
  • Skill/s to master:
    1. Writing.
  • Goal/s…
    • Is there more than one?
      • Where is the sacred ground?
        • What is this going to do?
          • How will this be effective?
            • What is the sacrifice?
              • Will the practice, preach?
                • What does it mean?
                  • When is it time to plant?
  • The seed is to sanctify Christ as Lord in my heart.

//2021 REVISED//

  • Jesus Christ is my belief structure.
    1. What does that mean? (salvation).
      1. Human soul and God.
        1. Saved by grace through faith.
        2. How does faith work?
  • I love my wife—priority.
    1. She is the core/center of my responsibilities.
      1. I need structure.
        1. Public Journal/accountability
  • Job with hours to aid me on this trajectory.
    1. Not ideal, but blessed.
      1. I work nights and days.
      2. Best option at the moment.
        1. Aim for only nights if available.
        2. Or learn how to write, like, very good!
  • Psychology Professor—Jordan Peterson.
    1. Mentor/Maps of Meaning/(biblical skeptic?)
      1. I think Jordan’s strategy to understand ‘meaning’ is awesome!
  • My personality— understand and improve.
    1. 1 Peter 3:15 (but sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you, yet with gentleness and reverence;)
      1. There is a hope in the personality of a believer.
        1. My personality is wild; I want to understand it.
  • Skill/s to master:
    1. Writing.
    2. Videography.
  • Goal/s…
    • Is there more than one?
      • Where is the sacred ground?
        • What is this going to do?
          • How will this be effective?
            • What is the sacrifice?
              • Will the practice, preach?
                • What does it mean?
                  • When is it time to plant?
  • The seed is to sanctify Christ as Lord in my heart.

The heart of this outline dates back before I started this blog, but was inspired to outline it here as a post when prepping for the new years resolutions of 2021. And Judging from the outline there was more going on with me than setting goals. I had questions, and a hope for some form of videography work:

  • Skill/s to master:
    1. Writing.
  • Skill/s to master:
    1. Writing.
    2. Videography.

Writing down the intentions of my heart was key.

While unpaid as a writer—for now; unpaid as a content creator—for now; it was very discouraging not to have the desired outcome of my writing, as well as “experimental”—mostly failed—YouTube channels I’d created over the past years.

However, what has been changing over time—the evidence surreal—is fear and doubt that plagued me with insecurities vanishing. Since the time of my posting this outline the fruitful result has become making money as a video editor. The work of God’s grace is becoming more and more evident in my testimony as I humble myself to His will, and the result of His labor is not in vain.

I press on, and I hope you will as well by making your first move; write down the intention of your heart. What is your plan? Before you write it, prepare your heart to throw it away, because God’s plan is infinitely better!

2021 UPDATED

  • [12/16/20] Jesus Christ is my belief structure.
    1. [12/16/20] What does that mean? (Salvation).
    1. [12/16/20] Human soul and God.
    2. [7/14/21] What is the relationship between a person’s soul and God?
      1. [12/16/20] Saved by grace through faith.
      2. [7/14/21] Featured photo of this post update is an example of my work in developing frameworks that workout abstractions and understand axioms for righteous behavior.
  • [12/16/20] How does faith work?
    • [7/14/21] This outline is proving an example of how faith works.
  • [12/16/20] I love my wife—priority.
    1. [12/16/20] She is the core/center of my responsibilities.
    2. [7/14/21] This has not changed although a much needed constant reminder.
      1. [12/16/20] I need structure.
        1. [12/16/20] Public Journal/accountability
          • [7/14/21] This post marks a good direction in structure and accountability.
  • [12/16/20] Job with hours to aid me on this trajectory.
  • [7/14/21] Trajectory of James 5:19-20
    1. [12/16/20] Not ideal, but blessed.
      1. [12/16/20] I work nights and days.
        1. [12/16/20] Best option at the moment.
        2. [12/16/20] Aim for only nights if available.
          1. [7/14/21] I’m currently working a night shift!
        3. [12/16/20] Or learn how to write, like, very good!
          1. [7/14/21] Still a work in progress, but progressive nonetheless.
  • [12/16/20] Psychology Professor—Jordan Peterson.
    1. [12/16/20] Mentor/Maps of Meaning/(biblical skeptic?)
      1. [12/16/20] I think Jordan’s strategy to understand ‘meaning’ is awesome!
  • [12/16/20] My personality— understand and improve.
    • [7/14/21]
    • Agreeableness: 85
      1. Compassion: 96
      2. Politeness: 45
    • Conscientiousness: 35
      1. Industriousness: 44
      2. Orderliness: 30
    • Extraversion: 99
      1. Enthusiasm: 96
      2. Assertiveness: 98
    • Neuroticism: 92
      1. Withdrawal: 72
      2. Volatility: 97
    • Openness to Experience: 75
      1. Intellect: 28
      2. Openness: 95
  • [12/16/20] 1 Peter 3:15 (but sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you, yet with gentleness and reverence;)
    1. [12/16/20] There is a hope in the personality of a believer.
    2. [7/14/21] See above…
      1. [12/16/20] My personality is wild; I want to understand it.
      2. [7/14/21] See above…
  • [12/16/20] Skill/s to master:
    1. [12/16/20] Writing.
      • [7/14/21] Still writing.
    2. [12/16/20] Videography.
      • [7/14/21] Continually developing my skill in the field – video editor.
  • [12/16/20] Goal/s…
    • [12/16/20] Is there more than one?
    • [7/14/21] Yes.
      • [12/16/20] Where is the sacred ground?
      • [7/14/21] It’s between the spoken and written Word given from the Spirit above to emerge from the soul beneath as truth.
        • [12/16/20] What is this going to do?
        • [7/14/21] …
          • [12/16/20] How will this be effective?
          • [7/14/21] Look from where you started to where you are, and analyze.
            • [12/16/20] What is the sacrifice?
              • [12/16/20] Will the practice, preach?
                • [12/16/20] What does it mean?
                  • [12/16/20] When is it time to plant?
  • [12/16/20] The seed is to sanctify Christ as Lord in my heart.

I pray this post will be a coach to you as it is for me, encouraging us as we strive toward our goals in faithful obedience to the Lord our God, and that the providence of God is not neglected when faced against the enemy. Be confident and take courage!

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Christian Soapbox, Journal, Nathan Dooley, Psychology

“…who takes away the sin of the world!”

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Read Me First

“The next day he *saw Jesus coming to him and *said, “Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!”—John 1:29

—(Elijah) John the Baptist 
Matthew 17:11 And He answered and said, “Elijah is coming and will restore all things; 12 but I say to you that Elijah already came, and they did not recognize him, but did to him whatever they wished. So also the Son of Man is going to suffer at their hands.” 13 Then the disciples understood that He had spoken to them about John the Baptist.

MY FOCUS

As I focus on these journal entry posts, I learn and understand more about myself and my deepest concern, the salvation of souls. Ever since I’ve heard and believed in the gospel, the question of whether someone is saved or not has always been at the core of my desire to understand. More on that in other posts.

In my previous post, which is a building block to this one, I wrote, “God didn’t create me to be good or evil, or even to be as in-between—under the curse of sin as a sinner while alive by the grace of God to exist separate from Him (And thank God for that!).” Which has compelled me to expound.

GOOD OR EVIL, OBSERVE:

  • Thinking about whether God created me to be good or evil?

I don’t think God created me to be good or evil, meaning there is a difference between ‘knowing good and evil‘ and ‘being good or evil‘. God saw all that He had made, then declared it ‘all‘ as … ‘very good‘; that didn’t mean that what He created innocent from the knowledge of good and evil to be limited by that innocence as programmed robots without risk, eating that fruit to have the knowledge of good and evil, of which existed altogether in harmony with the Lord God in the garden of Eden.

So sin existed in consequence of God warning Adam and Eve not to eat, or surely they would die (Genesis 2:17 but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.”), and since Adam and Eve ate that fruit we all die because God means what He says; God is Holy and Just to execute the punishment deemed worthy of those attributes against His enemies. When mankind disobeyed God, we became enemies of God that reaps the consequences of that disobedience, and so therefore, we all suffer death.

1 Corinthians 15:22 For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive.

CREATED AS A SINNER?

I’m confident that God didn’t create me to be a sinner, which was what I meant by “in-between”—forever separated from God in the prison of death and Hades if it had-been that Adam ate from the tree of life (Genesis 3:22 Then the Lord God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of Us, knowing good and evil; and now, he might stretch out his hand, and take also from the tree of life, and eat, and live forever”—) to live forever in the consequence of our due penalty and present state of death; It would be miserable if this world of suffering … is without end, (Revelation 1:18 and the living One; and I was dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of death and of Hades.).

Thank God for Jesus taking away the sin of the world!

  • Thinking about what it means to be separated from God?

I know that I’m separated from God through knowledge gained by experience in this flesh and blood of sin and death under the grace of God (1 Corinthians 15:26 The last enemy that will be abolished is death.) by guilt that is incapable of inheriting the kingdom of God (1 Corinthians 15:50 Now I say this, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable.). Truth testifies to the death that I am dying as the last enemy to God yet to be abolished by the return of Jesus Christ (1 Thessalonians 4:15 For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. 16 For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall always be with the Lord.).

SO AGAIN I SAY!

THANK GOD FOR HIS LAMB!

So all that to say that when Jesus took away the sin of the world at the cross as the Lamb of God, all entered into a new covenant of which saves us through faith.

The gift of God does not come without responsibility, that is to say, without repentance; repentance is experienced through much discipline by the Helper—the Holy Spirit (John 14:25 “These things I have spoken to you while abiding with you. 26 But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you. 27 Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful.). (John 16:6 But because I have said these things to you, grief has filled your heart. 7 But I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I am leaving; for if I do not leave, the Helper will not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you. 8 And He, when He comes, will convict the world regarding sin, and righteousness, and judgment: 9 regarding sin, because they do not believe in Me; 10 and regarding righteousness, because I am going to the Father and you no longer are going to see Me; 11 and regarding judgment, because the ruler of this world has been judged.).

Who is the ruler of this world?

I’ll leave that to build on in the next post.

Matthew 17:11 And He answered and said, “Elijah is coming and will restore all things; 12 but I say to you that Elijah already came, and they did not recognize him, but did to him whatever they wished. So also the Son of Man is going to suffer at their hands.” 13 Then the disciples understood that He had spoken to them about John the Baptist.

Christian Soapbox, Journal, Nathan Dooley, Psychology, Spiritual Insights

Lamb of God

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INTRODUCTION

Hi my name is Nathan, and welcome to my blog if we don’t know each other and it’s your first time here. This past Friday – Sunday (April 2-4, 2021) was not only a memorial time for me personally, but for this world even if the world hates knowing it (John 7:7 The world cannot hate you, but it hates Me because I testify of it, that its deeds are evil.).

How this is personal to me is what you’ll read as each of these particular posts with the featured photo describes my experience with the Lamb of God. There is so much on my heart and mind that needs worked out; the freedom to write whenever throughout the day is such an awesome exercise for doing just that, working out my salvation with fear and trembling (Philippians 2:12 So then, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your salvation with fear and trembling; 13 for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.). And so what is my hope by this exercise?

My hope is that you, the reader, will discover new insights along with me about the Word of God by our common devotion to Jesus Christ our Lord. If you love the Lord, you’ve come to the “write” place, and I’m so excited to go through the trials of discipline with you as we discover more of our Savior together until we’re resurrected to life with Him by the glory, wisdom, and power, of God.

LAMB OF GOD

“The next day he *saw Jesus coming to him and *said, “Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!”

—John 1:29

Now although the Bible doesn’t explicitly say from the book of Genesis that it was an innocent lamb slaughtered for the covering of Adam and Eve ( Genesis 3:21 The Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife, and clothed them.); I believe it was an innocent lamb—by the fact that Jesus was identified as “the Lamb of God”—that clothed Adam and Eve, symbolizing the grace of God later to be revealed as Jesus of Nazareth who took away the sin of the world by being slaughtered on that cross (Matthew 20:18 “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem; and the Son of Man will be delivered to the chief priests and scribes, and they will condemn Him to death, 19 and will hand Him over to the Gentiles to mock and scourge and crucify Him, and on the third day He will be raised up.”).

Why is the Lamb of God relevant to Adam and Eve?

The reason I believe the Lamb of God is relevant to Adam and Eve is because of the plan and process in which God accomplished to save us from our curse that eternally separates us from God, having been held captive to the rogue nature of a good serpent which manifests as … sin. I say “good serpent” to mean what God said when He created all things, and saw all things to be very good—including the crafty serpent in which He made (Genesis 3:1 Now the serpent was more crafty than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, “Indeed, has God said, ‘You shall not eat from any tree of the garden’?). Which then begs the question…

If God is good, and if God is Love, how was it possible for an eternally good creature, created by an eternally loving God, turn from it’s own created nature as good, to be evil by deceiving Eve?

The answer, discovered with faith in Jesus Christ, is learned by the experience of spiritual discipline, but found in the book of Ezekiel (28:14 “You were the anointed cherub who covers, And I placed you there. You were on the holy mountain of God; You walked in the midst of the stones of fire. 15 “You were blameless in your ways From the day you were created Until unrighteousness was found in you.). Unless created beings were created to be robots of self-awareness, it doesn’t make sense that I would have the choice to be evil or good.

Therefore, I know that I wasn’t born as a created robot of self-awareness by the fact that I have the knowledge of good and evil; I can do either good or evil, but the choice comes with a risk. God didn’t create me to be good or evil, or even to be as in-between—under the curse of sin as a sinner while alive by the grace of God to exist separate from Him (And thank God for that!). So by the Lamb (grace) of God, I have the freedom to be good or evil at will – by the knowledge of both – but again, not without risk. According to this verse Genesis 3:22 Then the Lord God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of Us, knowing good and evil; and now, he might stretch out his hand, and take also from the tree of life, and eat, and live forever”—; I can either be good, or be evil, as both of these archetypes are evident in my soul to breathe both influences.

By archetypes I mean Jesus Christ and Satan; Jesus Christ is good, and Satan is evil, both of which are alive in my life as the knowledge of the truth bears witness to the condition of my soul; truth is recognized by my awareness of the curse in me through Adam as a sinner dying in sin, having sinned against the Word of God from the very beginning in Adam.

All human flesh and blood of Adam and Eve since the very beginning does not inherit the kingdom of God—hence the Lamb of God. I have more to build on from here, soon…