School Notes

School is going well and I'm learning a lot of stuff. Here are my random notes, with some commentary.....

Class one: I think there are 12 guys and 8 girls….we’re catching up! It beats last year with about 10 guys and me. Do the math: there are a lot more students this year than in any of my previous classes. In the second class, I think we’ve lost one of the girls. We’re still gaining on them!

Okay....fact....even though there are girls, I still mostly sit with the boys at meals, although one girl has come to join us, and sometimes at breakfast a couple of the other girls are there. Last night I tried sitting with the girls and ended up in Biblical Counselling world. On one side of me the girls were sharing proposal stories, complete with "That's so sweeeeeeet / cuuuuuute" and on the other side the boys were....sharing proposal stories (although with less gushing). Today I return to my place with the Biblical Studies boys.

I really, really love being a student. It’s a bit strange not being the one writing all over the whiteboard, but I like learning. Teachers are supposed to be the worst students, but I think that’s only true if you have a poor or even a mediocre teacher. With a good teacher, it’s easy enough for me to be a student. I will admit though: there have been times in the past (not here mind you) when it has been hard to keep my mouth shut because there were so many better ways to teach the topic and I can see the students’ minds wandering off. For a teacher, though, watching a good teacher work, either as an observer or a student, is actually a pleasure. I get to learn about the Bible and watch a master teacher and pick up pointers on how to be a better teacher as well.

Part of it is that Abner's teaching style matches my teaching style, so watching him is like watching myself! Dr. Hutchison is different, more direct and lecturing. He's still really, really good, though.

Sometimes it’s hard to see how the dating forward from the OT and the dating backwards from the NT are going to mesh, but when you do your homework, they do. It’s always surprising, but it shouldn’t be because it’s all God’s Word so of course it works!

Learning the chronology keeps Christ’s life in the time-space continuum; it keeps it real.

Contrary to popular belief, if you look at the Greek or Latin, “Christian” does not mean “little Christ” (which is what people used to tell me). It means “of the party of Christ” which means that we do everything to promote Him.

My computer clock is in Alberta time and I don’t want to change it to California time because I’ll forget to change it back. The only problem is that I thought class was almost over but there was still another hour.

Okay, there you are. There's more, but this is long enough. Also, some of it is stuff that I need to think about and that may end up as a post of its own.