Back at it Again! - Asbury Year Two

Greetings!

My summer at home in Indy is officially over.  I had a good summer, I worked as a standardized test grader for the first two months, and spent the end of the summer taking Free Methodist History and Polity online to help me as I work towards ordination with the Free Methodist Church.  I even got to preach at West Morris Church, which was a fantastic experience!
Now however, it's time to get back into the groove of things.  It’s the end of week one of the fall semester here at Asbury Seminary, which also means that according to my tradition, it’s about time for me to send out a Mara Report!  If you are curious, this is just a little life update about how my life is going and what my semester looks like so far.  As always, feel free to pass this on to anyone who is interested, and to read as much or as little as you want to know.

Big News!

I’m going to start with the big exciting news for me this semester. I’ve been invited to be the Lead Chapel Intern for the seminary chapel office this year!  I initially was invited to apply for and then join the chapel team at the end of last school year.  As I prepared to return to Kentucky after my summer at home, I was really looking forward to participating in the behind-the-scenes aspects of chapel, helping with planning, set up, and service during the services.  I even came back to Wilmore a few days early so that I could go on the chapel team retreat and get to know the leadership and other interns that will be part of the team this year.  The day after the retreat, right after I had finished moving my stuff into the dorm, I got a text inviting me to come by the office where I was offered and then accepted the lead chapel intern position!
I am super excited about all of it.  I’m still going to be doing all of the tasks of a regular chapel intern, but as the lead intern I will also be in charge of a lot of coordinating tasks, most notably scheduling the chapel interns for roles during chapel services and inviting students from our community to pray, read scripture, and help serve communion every week.  It’s quite the adjustment considering I am still trying to learn everything that is involved in each role!  I have a really good support system however.  I’m going to be working pretty closely with the worship coordinator in charge of our team and our director of chapel, the amazing Jessica LaGrone.  I’m really looking forward to working with them both, and with all of the other amazing chapel interns!

Classes

Inductive Bible Study

Big, unexpected news aside, classes for the semester started this Tuesday, September 3rd.  I’m taking three classes again this semester, two in person and one online.

In person class number one is Inductive Bible Study of Matthew, with Dr. Bauer.  Everyone on campus abbreviates it to IBS, which can cause some confusion for newcomers or non-seminarians who hear it!  IBS meets on Tuesdays and Thursdays.  There is one section of the class that meets 8-9:15am in the morning, but I lucked out and got into the 9:30-10:45am class section, so I get to have a slower start for my mornings.  Dr. Bauer is very well respected on campus.  He has a reputation as super knowledgeable, and that this class with him in particular is very rigorous, but will also teach you so, so much.  Having been in class with him twice now, I can see how that reputation is well-earned.  So far we are focusing on methods of Bible study – what does it mean to be “inductive,” rather than deductive, and why do we need a methodology for studying the Bible anyway?  He’s already laid down some groundwork of how important it is to start with the text and let it speak to itself before you start applying specific lenses and analysis, as well as making a point that methodology and the guidance of the Spirit should not be contradictory or competing perspectives, but should both be present in our reading of a Bible passage.
All of that makes my brain and my heart very happy!  I think that this class is certainly going to involve plenty of work, and plenty of brainpower as I absorb and learn the massive amounts of information Dr. Bauer is going to be throwing at us, but I also think that it’s going to be really valuable, and that his style of teaching is going to mesh well with my learning style.  That’s nice after some of the bumps I ran into last semester!

Care of Persons

Class number two this semester is Care of Persons, which is in person with Dr. Martin Mallory.  This may surprise a few people, since I was originally signed up for Church History part I instead, but when my Church History class got canceled about two weeks before move-in, I swapped in Care of Persons instead.

Care of Persons is taught through the counseling department.  It’s primarily focused on self-care and pastoral care and counseling.  M.Div students have to take either this class or Pastoral Crisis Intervention as one of our requirements.  I’ve heard good things about both classes, but there are a lot of students that really love to talk about how incredible Dr. Mallory is in this one, so I’m glad that I get to take Care of Persons with him.

The class meets on Tuesday evenings, 5-8pm, which is going to make dinner plans interesting.  One of the students suggested planning a schedule to bring in snacks every week, so I think that will be a nice bonus at least!  As for my impression of Dr. Mallory, (He asked us to call him Martin.  I’m working on it.), I think he’s going to be really cool to learn from.  He seems like he has a lot of energy, but he definitely also has a whole lot of experience with offering counseling and teaching these topics all over the world.  In our first class, he established that we are not going to be recording classes in any way, because he wants everyone to be comfortable sharing their experiences, even experiences that are painful or intense.  I think that this class is going to be very heavy duty on an emotional level, which I find a tiny bit intimidating, but mostly really exciting!  The professor is clearly very passionate about the topics we will be addressing, but also seems like a very experienced teacher, who is good at meeting students where we are at.  This is one of the reasons why I enjoyed taking psychology classes while I was getting my physics degree.  Anybody who spends that much time thinking about people tends to be pretty well equipped for a teaching position.

One takeaway I did find from this Tuesday, was that IBS in the morning with Care of Persons in the Evening, and chapel in between is a lot of information to take in.  I had already signed up for an online class specifically to avoid having three classes in the same day (again), but I have now also made the commitment to try to avoid doing huge amounts of schoolwork on Tuesday afternoons between classes.  I’ll probably use that time for things like meal prep or laundry, productive activities that still give my brain a little time to rest between absorbing massive amounts of (very cool) information!

Gospel Catechesis

That does lead me rather naturally to class number three, Gospel Catechesis, my only online class this semester.  In all honesty, I would rather be taking this class online, but I’ve decided that it’s worth it to me to take a class online in order to make my schedule less crowded and more flexible.

The class of Gospel Catechesis, as best as I understand it after a week, involves learning how to teach and foster spiritual learning and formation.  It’s not a class that I tend to hear a whole lot about on campus, but it’s also a topic that interests me a great deal. Based on the first week, I think that I will have a lot of reading and discussion posts to do for the class, which is nice in that it incorporates discussion into even an online class, but can be somewhat intimidating when I open a discussion forum, and find over one hundred unread posts in the thread.  I’m hoping to push my classwork for this earlier in the week this semester, “scheduling” my online classwork for Mondays now that Labor day is out of the way, so that I have a better chance of keeping up with the discussion a bit rather than coming into the conversation later, after I’ve made it through my busy Tuesday classes.  It’s a work in progress, but I’m looking forward to the class and the books we will be reading for it.

Seminary Life

Beyond the classroom and the chapel office, things are going well.  I’m still living in the same building in women’s single housing, but I’ve moved up a floor to live with three girls that I met and became friends with last semester.  Moving back in was a bit of a hassle, but I’m mostly settled in by now, and I’ve gotten to have a lot of fun interactions with all of my roommates.  I think that we are going to have a lot of fun this semester!

It’s also been fun just getting settled back into the campus community.  I have spent so much of the last two weeks catching up with friends from last year and getting to know some of the new students.  The lead chapel intern thing has been a helpful push to motivate me to go out of the way to get to know more people, and to make the new students feel welcome, but I’ve also had the chance to pick up where I left off with a lot of old friends.  It feels like a really nice balance!
One of my favorite things has been walking into both of my in-person classes this semester, and realizing just how many people I know in each classroom.  It really brings home the sense that I am a returning student this year, not a newbie, which is a very comfortable place to be!  Plus, second year is nice because I don’t have to know what I’m doing with myself after graduation.  I just get to dive back into an environment where I feel comfortable to learn and grow and enjoy my time in this place.  I’m excited to see what the rest of this semester and year will bring, and to see how God is going to work on this campus and in my life.

Spring 2019 - Off to the Races Again

Hello, and Happy Valentine’s day everybody!

It’s the start of a new semester here at Asbury Seminary, so I’m just typing out an update on how things are going.  In general - I had a great semester last semester, a wonderful winter break at home with my family, and I’m now excitedly jumping into a new set of classes, and you get to hear all about it!

J-Term

So, some of you may be a little surprised to hear that my Spring classes have just started in February, but that’s because Asbury has a J-term.  For 4 weeks in January the school offers intensive classes.  A few last the whole four weeks, but most are 1 week classes where you are in class every day from about 8 to 5.

I signed up for an intensive class this January called Women in Church and Society.  I really loved it!  My class met the last possible week in January, so we were expected to read all of the books and material ahead of time, and preferably complete all or most of the assignments ahead of time as well. I definitely didn’t manage that much, but I did do a lot, especially of the reading while I was home.  It meant that I had to spend a lot of time in the evenings after class finishing up homework.  The Intensive certainly lived up to its name!
Despite the intimidating pace, the class was a ton of fun.  My professor structured it as a discussion focused class, so we spent most of our time discussing the material we had read and the topics that we ran into on the way.  We had a great group for it too!  Our class was small, only 12 students, and it actually had more men than women, 7 to 5, plus our professor who is a woman.  Apparently she was as surprised as we were!  It was a good group though, and a really open and supportive atmosphere. Over the course of the week, everyone opened up about any number of personal experiences and sensitive issues, and it generated a lot of amazing discussion back and forth. We covered everything from Biblical understandings of gender and their historical interpretations to modern issues like women in the media, parenting and the workplace, and how American culture defines masculinity vs femininity.  A lot of the students in this class are currently serving as pastors in churches around the country, who came in to Asbury for this one week class, so it was really cool to hear them share about their practical experiences that most full-time Asbury students just don’t have yet.
For the last two days of class, everyone picked a research topic to present to the rest of the class.  I wound up presenting and then writing my final research paper on Islamic Feminism.  It was incredibly interesting, but also a very formidable challenge to learn about a topic that I knew nothing about going in.  I certainly wouldn’t call myself an expert now, but I’ve learned a lot about how Muslim women around the world are trying to understand and establish their roles in light of both their religious identity and egalitarian political and cultural ideals.  It’s a fascinating glimpse of a different world, and if you ask me about it some time, I would be happy to talk your ear off.

Bonus Break

Thankfully after a very exciting but also exhausting week of class, I had one week off before Spring classes started February 4.  I spent most of it finishing up my research paper, (my professor was able to push the due date back to the following Wednesday, thank goodness), and hanging out with one of my roommates, Kayla.  She had her birthday that week, so we celebrated by going out to see Mary Poppins Returns, and then coming back to make a cake. We had a lot of fun, and it was nice to get to hang out some without the craziness of classes hanging over our heads. 

Spring Semester

Finally, Spring classes started at the beginning of February.  Campus life certainly picked up as students flocked back to campus, and it was super nice to see people again and catch up with friends.  Soccer is even back in session, although I’m trying to be a lot more careful after I injured my ankle at the end of last semester.  It seems to be pretty much back to normal, the long break was a perfect way to give it a lot of rest, but I’m keeping a very close eye on it all the same.  Of course, the big excitement of a new semester is a new set of classes.  I’m taking thee again this semester, which is typical for seminary, and I think that they are going to be keeping me busy! 

TH601 - Theology of John Wesley

This seems very fitting, particularly since I
actually have this class today!

This is a class and a professor that I’ve been very curious about. My teacher for this class is known around campus as a big history buff and a huge Wesley fanboy.  I’ve really been hoping that that would click well with my own love of history.  After having a few classes with him, I think that we have somewhat different philosophies of how to do history, and how to handle personal bias.  I don’t think that this is going to be exactly the experience I was hoping for, but I think that I am warming up to him now that I have a little bit better picture of how his perspective influences his portrayal of John Wesley. 
I will say, I am very excited for the general topic of this class.  Since I don’t have much of a Wesleyan background myself, I don’t know much about John Wesley, aside from what I’ve picked up at a very Wesleyan seminary.  I’m already loving building a better picture of who this man was who found such a powerful and enduring movement, and I’m excited to understand more about his theology and how it influences modern denominational doctrines. 

OT501 - Intro to the Old Testament

Theology of John Wesley meets from 4 to 5:15 on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons, but Wednesday mornings I have to get up and get moving in time for Intro to the Old Testament at 8am.  This is a three hour class every Wednesday morning about the Old Testament, which is the equivalent of Dr. Keener’s New Testament class that I had last Fall. 
So far my professor, Dr. Cook, has been mostly focused on establishing our framework for understanding the history of the Old Testament.  We’ve talked a lot about why the Old Testament is still important, how the Bible was probably written, why Moses probably didn’t write the first five books of the Bible, and how scholarship over time has understood the role of the Old Testament, and the role of scholarship on the Old Testament.  Some of this is not super new to me, and some of it is.  We had to read about 50 pages for class this week on discrepancies in the Old Testament and how one scholar used them to date when the different books were written.  It was a very dense and difficult text, but I think it served a good purpose to make us think and look at how divine inspiration and human research and effort interact. 
I think that I’m going to like this professor and this class.  He has been doing an excellent job of presenting many different viewpoints respectfully, even as he explains why he believes the evidence supports his own scholarly opinion, and he seems very focused on encouraging us to question and understand what we know and why we know it.  I’m a fan of that!  I’m looking forward to seeing how this perspective is going to come into play as we shift to more of a focus on the actual Biblical text as opposed to its history. 

MS501 - Missional Formation

Finally, on Wednesday afternoons after Old Testament, Chapel, and lunch, I have my third class, Missional Formation.  I feel like, at least so far, this class has paired really well with Intro to the Old Testament, which is fitting since I have it on the same day and in the same classroom.  So far both classes have talked a lot about the overarching narrative and themes of the Old Testament, with Missional Formation naturally focusing in on the missional components.  My professor has spent a lot of time in the missions field, but he also clearly has spent a lot of time thinking about the larger perspective on missions, what mission means, and how missions interacts with all kinds of different fields of Biblical study, which is really cool.  I think he is also just a really good teacher, and he has already done a great job of pulling our class into discussions of missions on a theological and practical level.  I am going to admit that I’ve had a little trouble focusing in this class since it comes at the tail end of 8 straight hours of focused activity, but that doesn’t stop the class from being a good one, and I know a lot of people in the class who can help poke me if I start to drift away.

Really, it’s been fun this semester to realize how many friends and people that I know and recognize are in all of my classes.  I have people I eat lunch with and talk to before class starts, and run around and have adventures with on occasion.  There is a girl in my dorm who moved in over January, and as I’ve met her and talked with her, it’s been kind of a nice reminder of how far I’ve come since arriving last August.

Other Odds and Ends

Let’s see, what else has been happening. 
For church this semester I have switched it up and have been attending Calvary Free Methodist Church instead of Wilmore Free Methodist.  Calvary is about 20 minutes away, near Lexington, and it’s much, much smaller that the Wilmore church, but it’s got a great atmosphere and community, and I feel like I’ve already been able to make some really great connections.  I went to a women’s breakfast at the church last Saturday, and I kind of feel like they are just accepting me as one of their own.
It was actually kind of funny, I think it was only the first or second week that I’d been attending this semester, a church member actually backed into my car in the parking lot!  It did absolutely no damage, I think he must have just barely tapped it, but he wound up inviting me out to lunch with him and his family to apologize.  There’s one way to get connected!

I’ve also already gotten to serve in chapel again this semester.  Instead of reading the scripture, I was invited to pray for chapel this past Tuesday.  Dr. Tennent was preaching again, the next section of his spirit-filled life series.  I really enjoyed preparing and giving my prayer, and was happy with how it went.  I wrote out a rough draft of what I wanted to say, and then sent it to the chapel office to make sure that it sounded good.  I got some great feedback, both compliments and recommendations, including from Jessica LaGrone, the director of Chapel who I just have so much respect for as both a human being and as an amazing, amazing speaker.  I’m very happy in case you couldn’t guess.

Today is a Thursday, so I don’t have a whole lot going on.  I’m typing this in the library before I have to go to class at 4.  It’s nice to have a slower day after my non-stop Wednesdays.  Lunch today was rather eventful however.  For valentine’s day, the cafeteria was handing out certificates for free food for people who either asked someone out on the spot, or who sang to their significant other.  For some reason people were not super anxious to do either of those things in front of the entire cafeteria, but over the course of lunch we were treated to some lovely karaoke, including an epic Timon impersonation for, “Can you feel the love tonight,” and one of the girl’s at my table breaking out in a “My Friends” version of “My Girl” to win a family Pizza party for our family of friends.  Talk about Valentine’s Day fun!

I hope that all of you are feeling the love today, and that you enjoyed reading about my Seminary Adventures, season 2!
May God bless you and keep you, and make His face shine upon you.

Welcome to Asbury Seminary

Asbury Seminary is about here.

Greetings all!

So, some of you probably know this, and some of you probably don't, but I have a tradition that often at the beginning of a new semester, or something big happening in my life, I will write up a great big email that I call a Mara Report. It's typically about what I'm up to, how everything is going, and what I think of my classes etc. I send it out to my family and others who might be interested. Two years ago, when I went on a summer missions trip to Greece, there were a lot of people who wanted to hear about how I was doing, so I turned the Mara Report into a public blog format, as you see before you.

This post is not about Greece, but it is about a really huge transition in my life. I started seminary this week. There are a lot of people who have been a part of my journey to get here, and a lot of people who might want to just peek in and see how I'm doing, so I decided to bring this back to the blog format, and let everyone who wants to hear about this latest transition in my life.

As I have always told my email Mara Report recipients, you are welcome to pay as much or as little attention to this as you want. (I think that my rough draft was about 5 pages long, so I really am not going to criticize anyone who doesn't make it though the whole thing.) I tend to get a lot out of just typing all of this, but if you are curious about how my first two weeks in Wilmore, Kentucky has gone, this is what's happened and what I think about it with all the juicy details.
I'm not sure how much I will continue to post to this blog, given the seminary workload, but I will try to post at least occasional reports to let people know how I'm doing.

Move In

Mom and I packed up for the big move the last weekend in September. Mom came down to Kentucky with me to help me move. We left Sunday, August 26th after church, Mom in the van packed full and me in my Camry that had all of about three bags in the trunk. Dad helped with the "van tetris" and did a very impressive job. The drive went smoothly, and Mom and I arrived in Wilmore at about 7:30pm. We got some food and spent the night at the Asbury inn, which is connected to the Seminary. The next morning we got up. and I drove up to the dorm at 9am on the dot for move in. I got checked in, saw my room, and got my student ID. There was a whole crew of student volunteers there to help haul boxes, and the actual move in part of things went ridiculously quickly. I honestly think that we might have spent more time standing chatting with some of the movers than it took to actually get everything in.

I'm living in Bettie Morrison Hall, a single women's seminary dorm. I have three roommates, and we each have our own room and bathroom, as well as a shared kitchen and living space. I'm really happy with my room. It feels really big and airy, with a high ceiling and a huge window. It took me awhile to settle in, but now it's already started to feel like home.

On Monday, (move-in day), Mom and I set up the furniture and basics in the room, and then made a Walmart run to pick up anything extra we needed and to stock my pantry. While we were there, we actually ran into my cousin, who lives in Wilmore and works for Asbury University, the undergrad school. It felt really cool to just run into her running errands! By the time we got done with everything and back to my apartment it was about 4pm, and I was exhausted, so Mom headed out pretty soon after, and I just crashed in my new room!

Look! Here's a picture of me in my new room!

Tuesday was a pretty laid back day. I mostly spent it settling in and getting to know my roommates a little bit. My three roommates are Kayla, Stacie, and Elizabeth. Kayla and Stacie are returning students, and lived in this apartment since at least last year. Elizabeth, like me, is a first year M.Div. student who just moved in on Monday. I had met Kayla a couple of times over the summer since we knew we would be roommates, but Stacie, who arrived Tuesday afternoon, was new to me, and I didn't even know that Elizabeth was coming! They are all pretty great though. Kayla has been really good about wanting to make us welcome and show us around. She is another redhead, and she has just been really nice. Stacie is quite a bit older than me. She's mentioned her grandkids a few times, so we are clearly at very different stages of life, but she is also very friendly. She actually made dinner for everyone tonight, and likes sharing stories about her life and her family. As for Elizabeth, she and I have been getting along like a house on fire! We went to orientation together, and it's really been nice to have someone whose in the same boat as me in the same living space. Overall, I'm really happy about my living situation for this year.

Orientation

After two days of moving in and settling in new student orientation started first thing Wednesday morning. Elizabeth and I walked over to campus together, and sat at the same table. Each table was grouped together for a TAG group, which I think stands for something, but basically meant that we had a built in group of people to go to the different events with, and one, or in our case two, group leaders that could help show us around. There were a lot of different talks for all of us newbies, like Asbury 101 and and the Transition Talk. Some stuff was more informational about the campus and the seminary, and some was more about social and spiritual issues we are likely to run into. One of the more intriguing events was called Global Classrooms, and was designed to help expose students to the challenges that international students face by modeling classrooms from different continents and cultures. All of it was helpful and most of it was interesting and even funny.

Mixed in with the more informational talks were also social events and opportunities to get to know other students, old and new, as well as meeting various professors and staff people, and learning about the different clubs and activities on campus. I’ve already connected to the brand new Ratio Christ chapter forming at Asbury Seminary, (that’s an apologetics club that I was involved at at Purdue), and I’m planning to check out several other groups in the next couple of weeks.

Overall, orientation was a blast! My tag group got along super well, and I just had a lot of fun with everyone I met. One of the highlights of whole thing was dinner at the president’s house Wednesday night hosted by the seminary president, Dr. Tennent, and his wife. Everyone ate out on the lawn, but was then encouraged to look around the house and grounds. One of my new friends turned out to be an undergrad music major, and after we ran into Mrs. Tennent in her music room, they both played some for us on the piano, and then Mrs. Tennent showed us some of her other instruments. I think my new friend actually jumped for joy when Mrs. Tennent invited her to try the hammer dulcimer out!

Adventures

Orientation Only lasted Wednesday and Thursday, but I kept the adventures up over the weekend. Friday I ran around the county with Elizabeth, and we wound up at someplace called high bridge park at sunset which was just gorgeous. Saturday I went to a single housing bonfire (despite the heat) for all the mens and womens single dorms, and got to hang out with lots of other students I had or hadn’t met. I think I may have spent at least a whole hour talking to one girl who shares my love of science fiction literature. So happy. Sunday I went to the nearby Free Methodist Church for the first time with my roommate Kayla, and them my family came over to see my new place and bring a load of anything that I had managed to forget at home. Monday was labor day, and I mostly spent it resting up, and getting ready for classes to start the next day.

First Week of Classes

Once Tuesday hit, it felt like my seminary career was starting in earnest. First thing for me was the convocation held at the Asbury Seminary chapel Tuesday. I wasn't sure what to expect but apparently the first chapel to the year is a big event. All the faculty was there dressed in their academic robes and various amusing hats, and Dr. Tennent gave the sermon. I've been to chapel three times now, it's held Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays, but I have to say, every single speaker has knocked it out of the park. I'm not sure if podcasts are available of chapel services, but if you want to read an awesome sermon for lifelong learners, I did find Dr. Tennent's sermon on his webpage.
http://timothytennent.com/2018/09/04/my-2018-opening-convocation-address-a-spirit-filled-and-sanctified-community/
My three classes this semester are really clustered together, Tuesday afternoon, Wednesday morning, and Wednesday afternoon, so after chapel and lunch were over on Tuesday, it really felt like I was off to the races!

Class 1: NT520 - Introduction to the New Testament

My first ever Asbury Seminary class was called Intro to the New Testament. This class is taught by Dr. Keener, a professor who spoke at Purdue my senior year at a symposium on miracles, and I have been pumped ever since hearing that I would be having him for class!

I have to admit, it took me a little bit to settle into the pace of the class. My professor gave a very brief introduction, and then jumped into the material at full speed! Once I got used to the speed and not even trying to write everything down, (I am so glad his powerpoints are online), it was really fun. Dr. Keener has literally written the six hundred page book on the New Testament. He knows his stuff, and delights in sharing what he knows with the class. Best of all, Dr. Keener just has such a heart for the gospel. Everything he had to say was just so earnest, and it bled through with his heart for what matters about all of this.

The whole experience was just so satisfying, and really felt like confirmation that I’m in the right place, surrounded and poured into by people who are passionate and knowledgeable about God and His word.

Class 2: CD501 - Vocation of Ministry

Wednesday morning at 8am I had my second class of the semester, vocation of ministry. My roommate Elizabeth is in the class with me, so we went over together. It’s in the same room as my intro to the New Testament class, so I knew exactly where to go. A few people have warned me that this class may seem a little bit basic, and I think that I can see how that fits. At least to start out, we are talking a lot about calling, what it is, if we are called, and what our callings look like. It sounds like there are usually at least some students who get to seminary and really need to wrestle with this issue, but considering how much thought and prayer and study I put into even getting to seminary, I feel like there is going to be a lot that feels like review, at least for the first unit. Other units deal more with issues that may arise in ministry and church cultural diversity, and sound a lot more exciting to me.

My favorite part of this class though came up at the end, after we’d gone through the syllabus and course expectations etc. Everyone in our class was assigned to a 5 person covenant group, which is basically a small group, and given the last hour of class time to meet. In the future we will meet with our groups once a week, and don’t have to show up to class until 9am instead of 8am. My group is going ahead and meeting at 8 just to keep things simple. I really like the group of girls I’ve been assigned to. Students are grouped by gender to help people be more comfortable, so I’ve got four girls who I met and swapped stories with. The group that I’m in had a lot of fun sharing our journeys to Asbury with one another and then just chatting about everything from learning from preceding female pastors to what classes we have had so far. It was a lot of fun, and it seems like an awesome group to just go through the class and the semester with.

Class 3: TH501 - Basic Christian Doctrine

The Wednesday chapel speaker was the amazing and energetic Bishop Swanson of the United Methodist Mississippi conference, and then it straight to lunch and then my last class, Basic Christian Doctrine. Basic Christian Doctrine is really different than what I expected. I've been calling it intro to theology in my head, (which it kind of is), and I think that on some level I've been expecting this class to be really heavy duty, intense, and serious. My first experience during the first class of the semester however has really challenged that picture. My professor spent the first two hours just getting to know us, and getting us to know one another. He had everyone go around and share name, where we are from, church/denomination we are with, and what we do for fun. More than that, he spent time over each person’s answer, picking something to comment on or interact with about. There were lots of jokes and it was a really relaxed atmosphere. This class has quite a few Free Methodists, plenty of board game enthusiasts, and exactly two girls, including me. That felt a little bit funny coming from my all-girl small group in my last class, but it's not too surprising given how many more male than female M.Div students are on campus. Considering I was outnumbered about 1:6 in my Purdue physics program, it honestly feels more than a little familiar. Overall, I think that this class is going to cover a lot of ground this semester, but also have a lot more fun and jokes than I was expecting, and I’m thrilled! I think that I trust this professor to handle all kinds of complicated and potentially controversial topics as they come up with both respect, and a healthy sense of humor that will prevent anybody from going to war over different doctrines of atonement.

Conclusion

Thursday and Friday gave me a little bit more breathing room since I didn’t have any more classes. On Thursday the speaker for chapel was Jessica LaGrone, the director of chapel, and she gave one of the most beautiful sermons I think I’ve ever heard. Beyond official events, I did some productive things, like getting class reading done at the library, and some fun things, like explore the thrift store under Wilmore’s First United Methodist Church. My room looks a lot more settled now, and I feel pretty good about both my workload for the coming week, and the number of people I know to talk to and have fun adventures with. I know that there is a lot more in store for me in the coming semester, and the coming several years, but I’m really happy about how the start of my Asbury career has gone. I feel comfortable, I feel at peace with where I’m at and how I’ve gotten here, and best of all, I feel so, so excited about what God is and will do in my life.

Thank you so much for reading this. Please be sure to keep me in your prayers! I’m off to an awesome start, but I also know that there will be plenty of ups and downs ahead. If you are reading this, then you’ve almost certainly been part of my journey to get to this point, and I am so grateful to you, and to all the people who have knowingly or unknowingly supported me on my way.

May God bless you and keep you, and may His face shine upon you, but most of all, may God be at work in your life to help you grow ever deeper in your relationship with Him.
Amen

Return

A quick update for everyone. I left Athens Tuesday morning in the wee hours, and now after almost 24 hours I am home safe and sound, back home again in Indiana. I was flying delta, which in case you haven't heard had a complete meltdown Sunday night. It made all of the airports I passed through considerably more chaotic, but I made it through without missing any planes. I had two layovers in Paris and Minneapolis, and my Paris to Minneapolis flight was heavily delayed, but it gave me some extra time to get through security and I was able to reschedule my connecting flight afterwards well in advance. Everything worked out, and now I'm home and ready for bed! Goodnight everyone!

Countdown

The countdown in my head has officially begun. I'm typing this Saturday night, and I only have 9 more days left in Greece. I don't know when I will have the Wi-Fi to post this, (our router is down), but whenever you read this I will be even closer to leaving, to flying home. The clock is ticking in the back of my brain, and it's so weird to think that I'm getting close to the end of this grand adventure.  Back in the states my family has already gone back to school, and summer is slowly preparing to draw to a close for me as well...

But not yet.
Part of the penultimate trend in my thoughts is due to how many people have already left. Of the five intern girls who were together at our maximum, Danae and Kayla have already left, and Bri is preparing to leave Monday morning.
On the other side of the scales however, we have gained one extra intern, Susie, a young elementary school teacher from northern Ireland. It's fun how much a different accent livens our apartment up. She got here Sunday, and she's here for three weeks, so she will be leaving just a few days after Betty and me. In the meantime she gets to put up with us dragging her around Athens to show her all the cool places we've found over our stay.
She also gets to discover new places with us. This week we finally got to go on our two official Kenn tours. Kenn is the short term team supervisor for helping hands. He's a retired firefighter from California with a bible college degree, who knows an incredible amount about the bible and the cultures where it was originally written and read. Since about week three he's been promising to take us to see the Roman agora and mars hill where Paul would have visited on his trip to Athens. He's also been promising us a day trip to Corinth, where 1st and 2nd Corinthians are addressed. This week, we finally worked out our schedules to do both.

Disclaimer, you may want to have acts 17 and 18 handy for some of this.
Tuesday after work was mars hill, where Paul preached in Athens. It was the four of us interns (Bri, Betty, Susie, and I), Kenn, and a group of three ladies from Nebraska that are also at helping hands for a few weeks. We started at the bottom at the Roman agora. We learned the word "stoa", a covered walkway or porch such as in an outdoor mall, which was also a feature of the Jewish temple. We saw the area where Paul probably really met the court of religious leaders since their meeting place had probably been moved downhill by the time of Paul's arrival. Then we climbed up mars hill to see the plaque where people act like Paul preached and to enjoy the view of the city and the acropolis. Finally, just for fun we hiked up the hill next door to enjoy the sunset before getting dinner. It was a lot of walking, but I enjoyed it, and most of all I enjoyed Kenn's teaching.  All the way up and down Kenn was telling us about the bible. He was talking about the old testament and how Jesus and later Paul used old testament imagery. He discussed greek and Roman culture, and what the city was like when Paul arrived, what specific thing he saw and why he said and did some of the things he did.
Today (Sarurday) proceeded we went to Corinth, and it proceeded in a similar fashion. The biggest difference was that we had all day, and instead of two hills we climbed one mountain. It was hot work, but the view was incredible.  Kenn has clearly put a lot of thought and effort into understanding scripture, and he offered such richness out of verses that never stood out before. To be able to look around at the street where the Corinthian synagogue was located, to read acts 18 again and wonder which of these houses   Paul stayed in, that was a really cool feeling and it was all the better for learning from Kenn that Corinth marked the first place where Paul started a church that was not part of the synagogue. The first time that the news were called out rather than the gentiles were called in. It is a shift that I had never noticed, and might never have noticed without Kenn's experience. The whole day was a blessing.

Greece has taught me a lot of cool things, but as it begins to wrap up, I realize anew just how much I am bringing home with me. So many new experiences and new understandings that I can't wait to share with all of you in person back at home.  The clock is ticking his countdown, but I don't care because I am still going to choose to look forwards with joy to what God has waiting around the bend for me to learn about Him.

A Dramatic Change of Heart

There are a lot of things that need done on a typical day at helping hands. Some jobs are assigned by habit. Lisa, (one of the Lisas at least), is the undisputed authority of the baby room. Other duties, such as staff devotions, are rotated among the permanent and semi-permanent staff.  Today I finally had my turn at one of these rotating jobs, planning and running the lesson for the kids room.

In some ways it's less significant than it might sound. I've helped in the kids room plenty of times, and I've even helped others plan and prep the classroom activities. Overall it's a very low pressure job. Tell a bible story (via interpreter), have a craft or activity for the kids to do that's somehow related, and then let them play games and just keep the peace until their parents are ready to go. We do a lot of coloring, cutting, and glueing in general.

I signed up a couple weeks ago, so the fact that I would be doing a story had been in the back of my mind for awhile, and as I sat down to plan my lesson, I realized that the story that was on my heart to tell was the conversion of Saul. It's not to most common of Sunday school lessons, but it's a story that I really enjoy, and that I really wanted to share with the kids at helping hands.

I didn't have everything ready the night before, but we have an hour and a half on Tuesday morning to get things ready before everyone arrives. As I was discussing the story with Bri, I mentioned how dramatic it is. Saul is the epitome of a villain, zealously hunting down Christians to arrest or kill them. And then, despite all narrative expectation, Jesus appears to him, not to curse or kill Saul, but to redeem Saul, and send him out into the world as the first and ultimate missionary of Jesus' resurrection. It's so dramatic, I wondered if we could somehow get the kids to act it out, and them Bri said that, "Hey, isn't one of the other volunteers a theater major?" Sure enough, we hunted down Mallorie, a soon-to-be theater major who is part of a short term team from New Jersey, here for two weeks, and the next thing I know, Mallorie and I are planning out how we are going to perform a skit of the conversion of Saul for twenty or so kids.
It was so fun!  I had been a bit anxious about my story choice. The conversion of Saul is rich, and dramatic, and meaningful, but it's not simple, and it's not particularly easy to explain or hear sometimes. With a skit though, I felt like we were doing the story justice, and at the same time doing something more fun and interesting to the kids than a simple story book.
Calvin, one of the guys from the New Jersy team, was our Saul, Mallorie played Ananias, the man who Jesus sends to heal Saul, and I was the narrator/disembodied voice of God. That's not a job description you get to use every day. Cavin did a great job, and was a great sport about kind of getting dragged into it without a lot of preparation. Mallorie was so helpful planing everything out, and getting excited with me about it, and I think she had a lot of fun putting on a face paint beard. As of me, this was exactly what I wanted to do for my lesson. We had head coverings for the two actors, two chairs for Saul's house in Damascus and Ananias' house, and I had a pair of flashlights to be the "bright light" and my cupped hands to be a booming voice from heaven. I think our skit was over 80% narration instead of dialogue, and the run time was probably at least 25% made up of "Saul" stomping around and grunting. It was simple. It was sloppy. It was literally thrown together in less than an hour, and the kids were enthralled. I was a little too focused on pacing my words for the translator to watch the kids closely, but for once I didn't notice anyone fidgeting or bouncing in their chair. They were watching. Our translator was a ten year old Afgahn girl, whose dad helps around helping hands and sometimes leads the kids lesson himself. She was really nervous about the whole thing, but she did a wonderful job, and I am so proud of her.
Once our skit was over I summed up the message a little bit, and then passed out supplies for our craft. We colored paper plates to make masks of Saul. One side was angry Saul, before he met Jesus, and the other side was happy Saul, afterwards. The kids finished that somewhat sooner than expected, and we played games for awhile and then wound up watching tom and jerry at the very end. Slapstick us universal.

I had a lot of fun putting everything together, but more than anything else I hope the kids understood the message I was trying to share. God can forgive anyone. He doesn't just grudgingly accept sinners, he chooses to seek out even people who hate Him, who are angry at Him, so that He can change their heart and use them to do His good work. In Athens I've heard a lot of stories about Jesus appearing to Muslims in dreams. It may seem strange to us, but in Muslim culture, that is one way that God is at work, revealing himself to His children. Saul's journey: from proud and angry and rule-focused, to overwhelmed and blinded by Jesus' decision to chase after and love him, to joyful follower of the Lord, Saul's journey reminds me a lot of what hundreds and thousands of Muslims are experiencing right now. I hope it resonates also in the hearts that heard it. God is at work here in Athens and everywhere in the refugee community, pursuing His children I order to change their hearts as only He can do. How blessed am I to get to perform however small a role in His great story.

Compare, Contrast, and Cooking

Hi everybody. I know it's been a while since I've posted. I know this because it's apparently been so long that mom felt the need to text me a ladybug emoji to "bug" me to update. When mom breaks out a ladybug, you know I must be late. It's only been, what, a week, almost two. Wait, two full weeks? Really? Oops, that's longer than I meant.  So basically, sorry it's been awhile, but I'm fine, and I'm back. So, on with the blogging!

First of all, we are all officially back at helping hands. Some of went back Faros today as a Thursday, our flexible day, but most of the time we are back in the groove, working at helping hands all week and exploring Greece over the weekends.  This weekend was actually kind of quiet for me because I wasn't feeling super well, but I also wasn't feeling super miserable, so I stayed home and did nothing but rest all afternoon on Sunday, and that helped a lot. Then Monday of course was the Fourth of July. (Speaking of which, happy belated Independence Day to everyone back in the states!) Monday is already a helping hands meeting/fellowship day, so the entire team went to Kenn and Lisa's apartment for meeting first, and the proud tradition of burgers, pitch in, and chitchat afterwards. It's actually rather funny, since at least half of the team are Finnish, Greek, or some other nationality, and many have never even set foot in the states! They were all wonderful sports, and tagged along for the fun. Some of the Finnish kids were probably the most patriotic people there, playing around with the small American flags and singing along to pandora patriotic radio.
The interns contributed by bringing desserts.  Bri, Danae, and Kayla all got up Monday morning (earlier than me, but that's not saying much!) and made one pan of brownies and a couple of containers worth of red and blue cupcakes with white icing. The cupcakes were even gluten-free, so that Bri could enjoy them.  The results were lovely, and pretty tasty too!  The brownies were darker, rather than super sweet, but they were rich, and went great with Lisa's home-made ice cream. Yay! The cupcakes on the other hand were so sweet that they were hard to finish, but good enough that you wanted to try. They tasted just like sugar cookies in cake form.
After dinner we went up to the roof to enjoy the view. We didn't have any fireworks, alas, but we did have he natural beauty of God's splendid sunset to enjoy.
It's so funny to celebrate the Fourth of July, the American holiday of all holidays, when I'm in a completely different country, but it also feels kind of appropriate. I may be far from home, but my freedoms and heritage as an American absolutely came with me. For one thing, my perspective on all the new cultures I'm experiencing, both greek and middle eastern, is intrinsically shaped and shaded by my past experiences in America. Discovery of something new by default seems to imply comparison, if only to establish that this is something new. It is not the same as anything discovered in the past. For example, I've had chicken, and pita bread, and French fries, and lettuce before, but I never had a real greek chicken gyro until I arrived here. New experience, but one that I can also compare by noticing that gyros serve the purpose of burgers or fast food in the states. They are everywhere, cheap, and portable, while McDonalds is is a relatively rare sight. Comparison. I think that it's interesting, without ruining the interest or excitement of discovery. "What is different?" seems like the most fascinating and enjoyable questions for a traveler, arriving or returning, and it is a question that bridges countries rather than separates them. This is the beautiful country I come from. This is the beautiful country that I get to visit. ISN'T IT COOL!!!

Ok, past the philosophy and on to a completely different topic, I did try something new this week at helping hands. I finally worked in the kitchen. I've popped into the kitchen to help on different days, but this past Tuesday was the first day that I specifically volunteered for the kitchen to be there all day. Usually I've been with the kids, the babies, or just a floater, so kitchen was change. First observation: it's a lot less social. Kind of a nice break. Second observation: it's a lot of work.
Tuesday is a meal day, so I was helping regular cook Donna and her regular helpers Kristi (Finnish, staff person) and Ella (Greek, volunteers weekly) dish up a full meal. The oven is out, so we were serving "sandwiches", fries, feta, and two hard boiled eggs with the normal non bread and greek salad (aka, veggies). Not what I would call a typical sandwich, but tasty all the same. That meant boiling something like 300 eggs, frying a huge mountain of fries, and once things were cooked, dishing three different components onto 130 plates and topping them with the equivalent of a soft taco shell. My assistance with the hot cooking part was limited with so many experts around, but dishing up was a little hectic. In a lot of ways I just asked for a job and then did it, weather that was dishing out bread, sweeping the floor, or chasing Ella away so that I could carry the heavy rack of plates from dishwasher to table to dry, because she apparently has a bad back and those plates are heavy! It was exactly the sort of meaningful grunt work that I enjoy doing, and it was fun, but it was definitely strange to be so secluded. I saw the whole group of refugees at a glance maybe twice when I stepped out of the kitchen for something. By the end of the day when we were finished cleaning, there were only a few families and maybe half an hour left. The biggest interaction I had was picking a 2-year old girl up so that she could look over the balcony railing at the cats down in the alley with me. It was cute. It was also maybe five minutes of complete seclusion with the two of us and a lot of cat noises. Fun times.
Overall, different is the word I keep applying to my day in the kitchen. I enjoyed it a lot, and will probably do it again, but I also probably won't do it every day for the rest of the trip. After all, I came to both help, and learn, and I also like being out and about where I can meet new people and learn their lives a little bit better every day.