Musings of a Seminary Grad

Introduction Time runs ever on and on. The semester is half-way over, and a blog series (see Post 1 ) that I intended to cover in about a month has stretched into two. It often astounds me when I look back over a week or a month to think that I lived every hour of each one of those days. As a teacher I reflect on the forty-odd hours spent in each class every semester: in the midst of those days, hours, and moments, am I intentionally living out the truth about Jesus Christ? First John is a letter written to churches in distress over false teachers who, though they have gone out from the churches themselves (1 Jn. 2:19), yet pose the thread of leading the members astray into false teaching (1 Jn. 2:26). In response, the Apostle John urges these believers to test their teachers to determine whether they are legitimate spiritual guides or mere heretics in disguise (1 Jn. 4:1-6). The practical outworking of this letter is three tests for true teachers, each of which I have develo...

Introduction It is truly a blessing to teach redeemed students at a Christian university. In scrolling social media, I frequently find reels made by today’s public high school teachers; the disciplinary, behavioral, and attention-holding challenges they face are truly astounding, and not all of them can be attributed to the culture or age group. In contrast, my students are consistently courteous, polite, diligent, and grateful toward each other and me. This is not primarily due to their intentional upbringing, conservative values, or the constructive environment; above all, their positive deportment is evidence of the Holy Spirit at work in their lives, and it makes teaching that much more of a joy. This post is the third in a series on lessons I learned about teaching over this past summer. As I was preparing to teach a class on the New Testament books of 1-3 John, several truths impacted me specifically with regard to my profession as a college teacher. Thus far, I have written ...