Tag: School

Request for Help

I have one (1) month in which to write a 7-page church history paper on an individual who lived after 1500 AD.  There are no real requirements, other than that I have to reference at least one biography of the person and read at least one major work by the person.  And I’m stumped.

I really wanted to find somebody in the 20th century to focus on, preferrably within the charismatic tradition (you have to admit that’d be fun to write about), but I’m having some trouble finding somebody that will work.  Because I have only a month, I have to find a person who is well-known enough that I can get all the materials I need from my school’s library.  I just don’t have the time to  John Alexander Dowie was my first choice, and John Wimber was my second.  For Dowie, I couldn’t find anything by, and for Wimber, I couldn’t find anything about.  Can anybody offer a suggestion?

If I find I’m unable to do the 20th century, I’ll have to fall back to somebody “normal,” like John Calvin, or Jonathan Edwards, or even John Wesley.  (Heaven help me find a notable Christian of history with a name like Bill…)

Thanks be

Pulling my head out of the water long enough to give praise where praise is due:

Greek has been consistently kicking my butt. You know that [verse in Collossians](http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Colossians%202:15;&version=31;) where Jesus is depicted as a Roman general returning from battle, bringing back disarmed powers and principalities as a “public specticle”? Well, replace the principalities with me and Jesus with Greek, and you’ll get a pretty accurate gist of how I’ve been feeling about that class lately. I *love* languages, and Greek is pretty fascinating to me, but rote memorization has never been my strong point by any stretch of the imagination. (Remind me sometime to tell you about my experience in fourth grade with the multiplication tables…) I suck at it. I’ve got to have some interrelated network of ideas to hang things on, or they just slip right out of my mind. And with this class, the pace is just so fast that learning feels more like cramming – constantly. It just doesn’t let up for a minute.

I was getting to the point where I absolutely hated it. I was getting to the point where I was, you know, destitute; broken; desperate.

I was getting to the point where it actually occurred to me to pray. Continue reading “Thanks be”

First Greek Exam

“I looked upon the words under the cage door…and understood them.”

Last week was a downhill week for me in Greek. I like to think I have a great mind for words, be they English or any other language, but my mind has a very peculiar way of learning. Learning by rote is very very hard for me, whereas any kind of learning in context is ridiculously easy. For instance, in fourth grade I was supposed to memorize the multiplication tables, but I just couldn’t do it. I was the last person in my class to get it down, and if I remember right, It wasn’t until the school year was completely over. I finally ended up assigning personalities to each number in such a way that, when each was multiplied with another, it resulted in some kind of metaphysical combination of the two prior personalities. Suddenly, memorization was a zip.

So, ideally for me, learning a language involves handing me a stack of progressively more difficult children’s books, a lexicon, and a few simple grammar charts. Wait two weeks. Serve chilled. Continue reading “First Greek Exam”

Ahhh, Books!

The single most important factor for me in moving to the Boston area to go to seminary full-time was the prospect of, once again, having nothing else to do but go to school. I had tried every other way I could think of and it simply couldn’t be done. What is that saying? “No one can serve two masters.” In the same way, I couldn’t serve both work and school: I was constantly loving the one and despising the other. I needed a situation where I could confidently focus most of my attention on learning, or focus it on something else.

Actually, focusing on learning has always been much easier for me than focusing on anything else. Even at work, the only time I’ve been able to keep my focus on the task at hand was when it was pressingly urgent that I *learn*, and fast! The minute it was that I could confidently say that I *knew* my job, I could also confidently say that my job had lost all interest for me. In other words, the only way for me to *keep* my job was for me to find ways to make my job utterly *fascinating*, and so I consequently had little time or attention for school. (This also may explain for why I was found at school so frequently staring absently into space.)

Now, here it is. Finally, I am at a school whose sole purpose is to dedicate as much of its resources as possible to the study of the things I’m most likely to sit around thinking about anyway. Sigh… Continue reading “Ahhh, Books!”

Things

What is it about me that is so fixed on *things*?

When I was in high school, there was a time when my whole spiritual life was bound up in worship music. Part of this was because I was part of a group of friends that had formed a mini-culture around worship music as the highest expression of worship or ministry. Forget the low calling of the pastor, we wanted to be true spiritual leaders – worship leaders! But this was only amplified by the fact that I had just discovered a tremendous backlog of high-quality worship recordings, and there was a huge Christian book and music store just down the street. I was so addicted to the stuff that I don’t think I would have really believed you to hear that it was possible to worship God outside some kind of musical expression.

Since worship was solely an expression of adoration in my mind, it seemed to follow that the best form of expression of my love for God would be the most intimate, “powerful” encounter. Ideally, this was simply my own personal expression of “the gratitude and brokenness that comes from intimately knowing almighty God,” but better music obviously makes that kind of heartfelt expression easier, so my approach to worship gradually began to hinge on the quality of the music I was listening to.

In one sense, that was bad, because our worship should never have to depend on externals. In another sense, though, it was kind of fortunate because I had access to so much really good worship music. Insofar as worship *is* adoration, I was worshiping quite a lot, albeit with a sort of crutch. Continue reading “Things”

I’ve changed My Mind

I don’t want to go to school in Boston. I want to go to Seminary in [Anadarko](http://maps.google.com/maps?q=Main+st,+anadarko,+ok&ll=35.093506,-98.240843&spn=2.859375,5.973598&hl=en)

I’ve just gotten the lease agreement for what looks like the best deal for an apartment for us in the Boston exurbs. They require up front, first month’s rent, last month’s rent, and a security deposit equal to a month’s rent. That would be three months. I’ve talked them down to $799 a month for rent. $2400 would be slightly less than what I paid (each) for the first two cars I bought.

So… who wants to contribute to the Kyle and Valerie fund? Whatever isn’t spent on rent will go toward psychiatric treatment.