To Abide

           Although my original purpose in creating a blog was simply so that I could pass my Honors Orientation class, I've found that sharing my thoughts has been instrumental in helping me to process my own questions. So with my first semester of college behind me and two weeks of Christmas break ahead, I have plenty of things to ponder and a great amount of time in which to ponder them. 


          The greatest of these things is the idea of abiding. More specifically, abiding with God. 
         
          In my Writing from Faith class, I was suddenly made aware that the word "abide" is "Christianese" and should not be used because it narrows the audience that is impacted by  writing. My professor told my class again and again that, "Christianese turns off unbelievers and makes believers stop engaging the idea that you are presenting." So I've been left wondering when did abiding cease to be an action of obedience and become cliche'? 


         As evidenced by my past posts, the idea of resting in God's presence and abiding in Him is not a new concept to me, but rather something that I've struggled to do successfully for a long time. I've wrestled with the question, "How exactly are we supposed to abide in God's presence as we are instructed to do in John 15:4?" 


        In this verse, Jesus said, "Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me" (KJV). Rereading this, it struck me for the first time that abiding isn't something that we alone are told to do, this is also something that Christ is doing in us. We aren't left on our own to strive to abide in God; we've received a promise that when we make an effort to spend time with God, we will be filled with more of Him. 


        For me, the greatest thing that hinders me from making time with God a priority in my life is worry and stress. It's easy for me to focus only on the things that I have to accomplish during the twenty-four hours of a day and completely forget to rely on Him for my strength. 


        But, I've realized that if I'm stressing, I'm not trusting.


        I'd like to share a couple of lines from the book by Sarah Young, "Jesus Calling" that have expressed this idea more poignantly than I am able. 
        
        "Take time to be still in My Presence so that I can strengthen you. The busier you become, the more you need this time apart with Me. So many people think that time spent with Me is a luxury they cannot afford. As a result, they live and work in their own strength - until they become depleted.... How much better it is to walk close to Me, depending on My strength and trusting Me in every situation" (p 378).


      As for me, I have to choose daily to not be cliche' about abiding, but make a conscious effort to listen to and talk with God and read His Word. Surrendering my stress is not easy, but I believe it is worth the struggle to trust, to rest... and ultimately, to abide.
       


        

“Scandal of the Evangelical Mind”

Simply attending a Christian college does not do the work of applying Noll’s “life of the mind” concept. Noll says, “An evangelical life of the mind is the effort to think like a Christian – to think within a specifically Christian framework – across the whole spectrum of modern learning.” The individual alone is responsible for thinking as a Christian in whatever vocation or field he or she goes into. The university is not required to teach in such a way that every student learns how to use their mind for Christ. It may be the faculty’s goal or hope, but it is the individual’s choice what and how they learn while in college, even a Christian college. While a Christian education may help one learn how to think well in a Christian framework, one does not automatically fulfill the requirements of an “evangelical life of the mind” by attending a Christian college. Perhaps the assumption that it does has led to the “scandal of the evangelical mind” of which Noll speaks.

Questions:

1). How does the idea of an evangelical life of the mind connect to the concept of creation, fall, redemption.

2). How can one practice redemption of the evangelical mind in everyday life?

 “Is Thinking Good for Its Own Sake?” 

        According to Williams, “To say that something is intrinsically good means that nothing else is needed to justify it or make it good.” I believe that something is intrinsically good when it is valuable even if it does not have a practical purpose.

My list of 20 intrinsically good things:

1. quality coffee

2. coloring pages

3. chocolate

4. painting

5. candlelight

6. peace

7. flowers

8. swings

9. crafts

10. literature (defined as the best expression of the best thought)

11. bubbles

12. Christmas lights

13. faith

14. horses

15. dress-up

16. exploring

17. cookies

18. traditions

19. traveling

20. dancing

        One of my favorite memories of a time that I experienced something intrinsically good was my first visit to Pour Jon’s coffee shop. A group of my closest newly-made friends and I decided to go for coffee late at night. Walking in the door, I was overwhelmed with a feeling of wonder over the authenticity of the environment. The first thing that my senses registered was the intense smell of fresh coffee. I breathed deeply, enjoying the way it instantly relaxed my shoulders and relieved the tension caused by adjusting to college life. Vintage light bulbs hung from the ceiling, casting soft light over the booths; the red brick and plaster walls were covered with Sharpie drawings of every kind as well as the signatures of faithful patrons and famous quotes. Because of my love for coffee, it was a memorable whimsy moment.

Questions:
1. How does the idea of whimsy connect to the inherent goodness of things?
2. How can we use our personal strengths and gifts to share intrinsically good things with others?

       

“Banking Education”

Although I attended a private Christian high school, I occasionally encountered an approach to education that was very similar to the “banking” method that was described by Paulo Freire in chapter two of his book The Pedagogy of the Oppressed. The students were sometimes, perhaps unconsciously, viewed as “banks” in which knowledge was deposited. However, unlike Freire’s ideas, I don’t believe that any of my teachers consciously held any of the sinister intentions which Freire so soundly opposes. Nevertheless, in some classes, “Education [became] an act of depositing,” as Freire states (p. 72). Rather than “controllers” subjecting the “oppressed”, I think my teachers focused on the input of information so that we would have information with which to reason for ourselves. That was the heart behind their actions anyways.

 Sadly, in the process of presenting that information, some classes became one-way narrative where the teacher was the only one with valid information to give. Any questions asked, the students were expected to answer but strictly with textbook answers. Now, not all of my classes were like this, indeed some were just as challenging as my college courses now because they made me think, but as a whole, this is the type of education I experienced.

Please don’t get me wrong, I loved my high school years. I still do.  But, looking back on several classes I took, including Bible classes, I’ve come to realize that many times, I wasn’t expected to really engage the material and wrestle with the ideas presented, so much as I was required to absorb and then reiterate as much of the course material as possible without ever questioning why a certain fact was important or what the long-term implications of such-and-such a belief are. This realization simultaneously saddens my heart and makes me determined that as a future teacher, I will do everything in my power to help my students engage with and reason through class material.

Questions:

1) What makes education at JBU different than the “banking” system, if anything at all?

2)What are some practical ways that we (as education majors and future teachers) can help students reason for themselves in our classes?

True Learning- Multiple Ways to Learn

I decided to overview Evergreen State University in Olympia, Washington. The academic program consists of one comprehensive “program” rather than several courses. Everything from math to physics to economics is covered under the instruction of a team of professors. This program is new and fresh every year. The goal of this style of learning is to grasp how different disciplines intertwine and affect one another. No letter grades are given for coursework. Detailed evaluations are given by the professors and are put on transcripts rather than traditional letter grades. Students are also involved in evaluating their own work. Students are also able to “create their own course of study” through a program called “learning contracts” which enables them to “explore whatever and wherever their curiosity leads.”

This approach may help me learn more thoroughly because it would force me to critically analyze my work as a part of the grading process. However, as for “ungraded” work, the idea may sound wonderful on first impression, but, I predict that a positive evaluation from a professor could easily replace grades as a student’s motivation for performance without bringing about an essential change in the type of learning in which he or she engages. It would be just as easy for a student to go to class at Evergreen simply to get a quality evaluation for their performance to go on his or her transcript as it is for students in other schools to strive only for a “good grade.”

For me, the very act of reading John Tagg’s article “Why Learn?” in combination with researching another college’s methods of teaching has motivated me to re-new my focus on being a student who sets learning goals and not just performance goals.

Questions:

1.) If there are several successful ways to learn, why are only a few ways implemented into schools(in all levels)?

2.) What are some practical ways that we can become students whose understanding of course work is qualitative and not just quantitative?

Joining a Story  

While joining a story already in progress is one of the scariest things that I’ve had to do in college so far, I believe it is also one of the most necessary and rewarding. Let me explain what I mean.

As Donald Miller has made perfectly clear in A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, everyone lives a story. Whether it is good or bad depends entirely upon him or her, but there is no escaping it; every human being on earth lives a story.

Sometimes the hardest part is choosing to make our stories interconnect. We get perfectly comfortable living our story, unconnected from people outside our bubble of familiarity.  Reaching out and joining someone else’s story is just plain hard. It’s not comfortable and most of the time it’s terribly awkward. But, it is so worth the effort.

Imagine what life would be like if you had never reached out. To anyone. Never risked rejection or pain.

What would your story be like then? Thinking about this brings to mind the movie It’s a Wonderful Life. We rarely realize what an impact our lives have made until we stop and imagine how the lives of the people around us would be different if we had never been born. Sometimes we never fully realize how God has used our story.

The stretching and sometimes painful process of joining the stories already in progress around us adds to our own story. It adds depth, and beauty, purpose, and eventually, pleasure. The risk of joining an unfamiliar group of people is inherently rewarding, although it may take time for those rewards to become evident. Through reaching out, you meet new people, contribute to their unique story and in return, your own story is enriched by their presence. So take the time to risk, to reach, to live a good story

Called by One; Living for One?

    

   As an individual who is constantly tempted to live as if I have to measure up to the expectations of those around me, Os Guiness’ reply to his world, “I have only one audience. Before you I have nothing to prove, nothing to gain, nothing to lose. (p 71)” evokes an overwhelming desire in my heart to be able to say the same thing. These audiences for whom I perform consist of my parents, siblings, professors, and friends, not to mention American society.

    Since my early years of childhood, it has been an up-hill battle for me to place these outward expectations in their proper place, subjected to the standards of God. Indeed, in reading “Rising to the Call” I realize the world’s standards should not only be placed below God’s standards, they should have little or no influence on the way I live. By “the world’s standards”, I mean any outside standard or expectation that does not receive its authority from God.

    Living for an audience of One as a student at a Christian university is a struggle. It is deeply rooted in us as students, especially as honors students, and as humans to strive for the approval of others, specifically those in leadership. The expectation to excel both in class and out is almost tangible on campus. I’ve found that the desire to live for God as my only audience is not enough to overcome these pressures.  The grace of God is required in order to live for an Audience of One.

   I’m struggling to accept God’s grace in this area as well as many others. My tendency is to try to earn it, which then defeats the purpose of it being grace. So for now, I’m learning to graciously receive grace as a gift so that I can live more fully for Him.

Questions:

1.    What are some ways that we can practice looking to God rather than our world for approval?

2.    Os Guiness says “Faith therefore means restlessness.” (p 87) I’ve never heard faith described in this way; how can I reconcile this with the church definition of faith, which seems to be “belief in God”.