Support team building is an important ministry time for us because it gives us the opportunity to help people get a glimpse of ministry beyond what they normally see. I think it’s important for people to see how their support of missionaries has a real impact on spreading God’s word throughout the world. When people are able to see what God is doing it motivates them to be even more involved in international ministry.
In early February we had a chance to share our vision for ministry in Slovakia with a small group in Naperville, IL that has been faithfully praying for us. Over the last few weeks I’ve enjoyed a couple of preaching opportunities; one in Davis, IL (our sending church) and one at First Free in Rockford for their spring missions conference. In May, June, and July I’ll be teaching on the plot of the book of Acts or “the gospel to the ends of the earth” in both Rockford and Naperville.
Would you be interested in having us talk about missions with a group? It might be a small group, a Sunday school, a home school co-op, or just a group of people interested in missions or Slovakia. We’re even pretty flexible in terms of talking about missions in a way that would support your group’s vision and goals.
A lot of people are praying for our financial support and we appreciate that very much. The PhD may or may not be done by July but the only thing that determines whether or not we return to Slovakia in August is our financial support. Our current monthly support level is 65% of the mission’s minimum requirement. We also have a minimum reserve that we must maintain with the mission in order to be able to move overseas and we are well below that amount.
Please keep praying. - If you would like to be a part of our prayer team, please let us know.
- If you would like to make a contribution to our financial support, whether a one-time or monthly gift. Please see this article for more information.
In a couple of weeks Jana will be finishing up her third quarter teaching Music Together for the families of students and faculty at Trinity. She's had a great experience so far. Each quarter (except for the summer) she had enough students to offer three classes. That's the max that her limited license allows. More importantly, she's gotten good feedback from her families and she can see some progress in the kids herself.  It's also fun to see how much they enjoy the program. One of the parents related how they took their daughter (about 1 year old) to story time at the local library. As the children were gathering around the story teller and the program was about to start, the little Music Together fan started to clap and sing the song that begins every Music Together class, "Hello Everybody." I guess it pretty much spoiled story time when she found out they weren't going to be singing together.
The summer semester in Slovakia is now in its fourth week. Due to changes in the schedule I'm only teaching my Introduction to the Old Testament class (two sections-one for resident students and one for external). This is a critical introduction class, meaning we deal with issues like authorship, dating, and historical setting and background for the various books of the Bible; but I also use the class as much as I can to teach my view on reading the Old Testament (and the whole Bible, actually) as a whole with a beginning, middle, and end. Since the thrust of my dissertation is on this topic, it's fun to bring in some of the things I've been learning myself.
This is a bit of a significant semester for me because it's my last scheduled semester teaching classes in Slovakia from the States. If all goes according to our hopes and plans, I'll be teaching my next classes in person! Oh, how I hope.
The dissertation writing phase is taking longer than I expected. The amount of front end research I needed to do for my topic has been way over the top. On the other hand, it's been good research and I've finally come to the point where I can see how it's all going to fit together and that extra research is going to make my dissertation that much more solid.
For those interested, I'm working on the plot of Genesis. Plot is the way the events of a narrative are put together into a unified, organized whole. Because of that, understanding the plot helps you understand how the various pieces of a book like Genesis fit together. I think I can give you an interesting example.
Try this. Read Genesis chapter 37, skip chapter 38, and go right on to read chapter 39 (chapter 37 begins the Joseph narrative, chapter 38 is the story of Judah and Tamar). If you left out Genesis 38, you would never miss it. If that's true, then how does the story of Judah and Tamar fit in with the overall Joseph narrative? Is it there because that's where it fits chronologically? Probably not. Is it just there just because-for no real reason at all?
I think if you read for plot then you discover there's a very important reason that Genesis 38 is placed where it is. Plot is the organizing principle that helps determine how the parts are put together into a whole so understanding the plot of Genesis helps us understand the function of Genesis 38 in the broader Joseph narrative and in the book of Genesis as a whole.
Another thing about plot is that it creates the connection between the reality that the text describes and the literary shaping of the text. That means that by understanding plot we get a step closer to understanding how the text can be both literary (narrative that is shaped similar to the way fictitious narrative is shaped) and historical.
Part of the reason the research phase has taken so long is that the topic of plot is connected to the idea of mimesis (Aristotle called plot the mimesis of action and mimesis is the representation of reality in art). Mimesis is a topic that goes all the way back to Plato and has a huge and variant tradition in Western culture. I found that most people who deal with plot in Biblical studies don't go back to mimesis but that it's foundational for understanding how plot works and for understanding how it impacts biblical theology. - My most recent series of theology posts has been on the creation account in Genesis 1 and the "gap theory." The introductory post is "Genesis and the Big Gnab Theory." From there, click on the series title>> for all posts in the series.
|
Connecting to Facebook
