At 9am this morning, after dropping Bridgette off at work, my friend Andrew and I went to our precept of "16th Century Lutheran and Reformed Confessions" taught by the above pictured Dr. Bruce McCormack. Usually our precept consists of us asking questions, which he writes on the whiteboard and subsequently answers with interjections from us. It's enormously useful and informative. Today however, he spend the first 40 minutes going over the 16th Century Lutheran, 19th Century Lutheran and finally the (or his) current Reformed view of Kenoticism - Jesus' emptying Himself in the incarnation. It was BRILLIANT.
Now, that was great, but the truth is, that's not exactly why I'm in school. After that, we spent 10 minutes going over a few questions. What happened AFTERWARDS is why I'm here. Four of us stayed after class and we spent 40 minutes (making 3 of us late for our next class) chatting, talking, making this stuff practical, etc. Getting THAT from a professor is why I'm in school. To hear stories from a professor that shed light onto the material and onto what we do outside of the classroom... as he's sitting on the table crosslegged... priceless!
Yes, I'm here to read. Yes, I'm here to write. Yes, I'm here to learn. And in those 40 minutes, I learned SO much. THAT is why I'm in School...
5 comments:
Don, please clarify: are you saying your prof's lecture was okay, but you really wish he would spend more time making it practical?
Or are you saying the professor's teaching sparked some discussion among you and your classmates about practical Christianity?
Or are you saying you wish you were late for class more often? (ha ha)
Theory and Practice - I see a spectrum with these on opposite ends. All that we do related to our faith seems to fall along this spectrum. There is a time and a season for each. Most of us know to watch out to not get caught in a rut of one or the other. But most of us end up getting stuck anyway at some point.
Yes.
Prof's lecture was good.
Practical application was good.
But above all, it's the impromptu stuff that just happens outside the normal bounds that is what I love the most.
We need moments like that to keep us engaged. I know that there have been numerous discouraging moments here at PTS but it sounds like the McCormick party was the opposite.
Keep pressing on!
are you in town?
unfortunately, i just got your voicemail message from last week. my mc-phone barely gets reception in my apartment and it goes directly to voicemail... then, it doesn't tell me when i get a new message.
Stole my thunder.
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