I have been teaching seminary classes off and on for a few years now (back as far as 2009... 2008 if one includes student teaching). With a ThD now, I have been seeking to be a better teacher in seminary. Typically, I get pretty good reviews in classes... partly because I typically have been teaching …
Category: Education
Dissertations and the Quest for Boredom
I don't really know why dissertations are so soo sooo boring. It seems to me that most dissertations (I have read enough to have an opinion... but not enough to be an expert) fit into one of two categories: A. Take an interesting topic and make it boring. B. Take a boring topic and make …
What do you have going for you?
I used to be big on Spiritual Gifts. I got training in them, read books on them, and led training on them. I have kind of dumped that to a large extent. Reasons? 1. So much of doctrine of Spiritual Gifts is simply made up. How many spiritual gifts are there? When do you get …
The Power of Weakness: Part 3
In the previous posts I have developed four categories of missions based on relation to violence and power. Of course the categories are dependent on how the terms are defined. For the purpose of the categories, violence has to do with acts that may be violent in a classic sense, but may also include methods …
A Healthy Mind, and the God Who Is
Although I do missions work, and teach missions in seminary, my primary day-to-day job is as an administrator of a pastoral care and counseling center in the Philippines. As such, I read more books on counseling and pastoral care than most in missions. A recent one I have been reading is "Theology & Pastoral Counseling: …
Oral Transmission and “Rida Rida Ranka”
I would like to use an example. I am a 3rd generation American of Swedish ancestry. When I was young, my father would say a Swedish nursery rhyme to me. He could not speak Swedish, although he knew more Swedish than myself. He learned it from his father who knew Swedish somewhat but not fluently, …
In Search of… the “Radical Middle”
When I worked at a Summer Camp, oh... 30 + years ago, our camp director liked to give this illustration. “Suppose you are walking along a a trail the winds along half way up a very steep mountain. On one side of the trail is the mountain face and the other the sheer cliffs that …
Answering Your Child’s Questions. More Important Than You Think
My son is now a college student studying Psychology. Today he said to me, “You know Dad, I was reading an article that said that children ask a lot of questions but that as they move on into adolescence and beyond, they ask far fewer questions. I don't know. I think I'm different. I really …
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Can Christian Missions Training Become a Weariness to the Bones?
So what is the right amount of training for a missionary? Here in the Philippines, I see many people go off on missions (or come here on missions) with little to no training. This is especially true of bivocational missionaries or self-funded missionaries. In some cases people go on missions with an adequate amount of …
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Personal Reflections on Educating Myself in Missions
"Passive acceptance of the teacher's wisdom is easy to most boys and girls. It involves no effort of independent thought, and seems rational because the teacher knows more than his pupils; it is moreover the way to win the favor of the teacher unless s/he is a very exceptional teacher. Yet the habit of passive …
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