Monthly Archives: January 2022

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How to use a GoDaddy Domain with an AWS load balancer

I have hosted domains on GoDaddy for a number of years now. While it provides web hosting, I have never used any of their hosting packages. For starters, I was keen on having a setup that gave me a lot more control than GoDaddy does. More to that, SSL certificates are a must-have for any web application today. While these are available, they come at a cost.

While there are plenty of options for web hosting, I’ve hosted applications on Amazon Web Services (AWS) for a number of years. With it, I had the level of control I desired but also got the bonus of SSL certificate management being done on my behalf.

The Amazon Certificate Manager (ACM) service from AWS allows one to get a free SSL certificate in a very hassle-free way. It has the added advantage of having the ability to generate certificates using wildcard domains. This means you can have an SSL certificate for example.com as well as *.example.com.

More to that, one doesn’t have to worry about renewing the certificate – ACM covers that on your behalf. One catch though is you can only use these certificates on specific AWS resources such as AWS load balancers. Another catch with AWS is pricing – it is generally pricier than the other options out there.

That said, if, like me, you host your web application on AWS but purchased a domain on GoDaddy, what do you do?

Well, there’s one option proposed here.

In addition to the accepted answer there, another option [and the one I use] is to create and configure an AWS hosted zone in AWS Route 53 following the steps below:

AWS Route 53: Creating a hosted zone
  1. Sign in to the AWS Management Console and open the Amazon Route 53
    console at https://console.aws.amazon.com/route53/.
  2. Select Hosted Zones then click Create Hosted Zone. More here on creating a hosted zone.
  3. You’ll need to ensure your hosted zone points to your load balancer. To do this, create an A record, leave the record name blank, select A – Routes traffic to an IPv4 address and some AWS resources, select alias and from the dropdown list returned, select your desired load balancer
  4. Lastly, go ahead and create a CNAME record and point it to the record you created in the previous step. If your domain is example.com, put www as the Record name, select CNAME – Routes traffic to another domain name and to some AWS resources for the Record Type and for value, put your domain – example.com.

Each hosted zone creates nameservers for you so on creating your hosted zone, your nameservers have the type NS in the hosted zone records. They are usually 4 of them. Get the provided name servers and update GoDaddy to use those nameservers for your domain.

Your GoDaddy domain will now be pointing to an AWS hosted zone which in turn points to your load balancer.

Jesus and John the Baptist’s unity in the Spirit

In the book of John, chapter 3, the Bible records Nicodemus, a leader in Israel, going to Jesus at night to do some consultation. Jesus drops profound truths on him and I believe he goes away with a lot to think about given the novelty of the things he is told. I picture Nicodemus on his way back home wondering about this “must be born again” phrase Jesus used.

Shortly after this conversation, Jesus takes his disciples and He starts baptising people.

John the Baptist has been baptising people in that area for a while, so much so that he baptised Jesus not so long before this. John’s disciples see Jesus baptising too and run back to their master to report: “Rabbi, that man who was with you on the other side of the Jordan—the one you testified about—look, he is baptising, and everyone is going to him.”

From their tone, I suspect they expected John the Baptist to go confront Jesus or probably start doing a better job at advertising his baptism services to attract more people to himself. They probably had some adverts for the ministry in mind.

Some notable ads might have read “John the Baptist, one baptismal dip and your life will flip”, “Don’t be fleeced. Come to John, the Baptist”

Like every good teacher though, John the Baptist instead drops some profound truths on them.

All this is in John 3. Reading the chapter, I was really fascinated by how similar John the Baptist’s words were, almost word for word in some cases, to those Jesus used only a few verses earlier while schooling Nicodemus. Here’s a comparison:

Message Jesus’s words (John 3:1-21) John the Baptist’s words (John 3:27-36)
 Jesus is from heavenNo one has ever gone into heaven except the one who came from heaven—the Son of Man The one who comes from above is above all; the one who is from the earth belongs to the earth, and speaks as one from the earth. The one who comes from heaven is above all.
He was sent by GodFor God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.



For the one whom God has sent speaks the words of God,

 

I’ll add Nicodemus’s words here just for comparison on this particular one:

John 3:2 “…we know that you are a teacher who has come from God
He testifies of things He has seen Very truly I tell you, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen He testifies to what he has seen and heard
 No one believes Him! ..but still you people do not accept our testimony. 12 I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things? …but no one accepts his testimony.
Anyone who believes Him has eternal lifeWhoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God’s wrath remains on them.

I find it fascinating how both Jesus and John the Baptist had clarity on what’s up even though they didn’t have a meeting to discuss and agree on these things. While both were teaching in these passages, they drew from the same ultimate teacher – the Holy Spirit. There’s a certain clarity & unity in message that comes from a close union with the Holy Spirit.

Do you know your place in the Kingdom? When, like John the Baptist, you are presented with an opportunity to throw shade at another ministry [or maybe just to compare your christianity against someone else’s], do you speak based on revelation or based on emotions?

The Holy Spirit is a wonderful teacher. I pray you and I grow as students, seeing things the way He does, united and speaking the truth He reveals.