What is the point of learning? – Steve Garber’s Journey (Part I)

Steve Garber, author of "The Fabric of Faithfulness" (IVP)

Last week I had the opportunity to hear “the one and only” Byron Borger (owner of Hearts & Minds Bookstore) spend a night informally chatting with his good friend Steve Garber, director of the Washington Institute and author of Fabric of Faithfulness: Weaving Together Belief and Behavior (IVP. 2007).  What did Byron and Steve explore on a Friday night over coffee with a 100+ friends from South Central PA?*

Steve started by sharing his story of growing up in the large agricultural valley of San Joaquin, California, and how the orientation of the Appalachians confuse him.  With a smile Steve remarked

“Jesus choose to be incarnate in a place much more like California than here” [i.e., Pennsylvania].  Note:  He mentioned this more than once ;-)

Not surprisingly, Steve quickly turned to worldview:

About the time I met my wife I heard the word “worldview” for the first time, about 17 or 18 years old.  My whole world could be made sense of by what was true. …  If faith could shape anything, then it had to shape how I treated girls.  …. I was drawn into what it would mean to relate to women. … I found it hard to find anyone who agreed with me. …

With Valentine’s Day just around the corner, that’s romantic material for Emerging Scholars.  Don’t worry, more to come on this topic ;-)

To wrap his mind around “worldview,” Steve dropped out of college.  First he lived in a commune in the bay area of California for a year.  With his father being a University research scientist, Steve traveled between campuses thinking through what his life was going to be about, “seeking a better reason to be in college than passing a test and doing it again. ”

Steve wanted to know “What is the point of learning?”  While spending a year at the commune in Palo Alto, he wrote for the commune’s magazine and listened a lot.  He began to see behind every person he met and experience he had that

how we answered “Who am I?” wasn’t a silly, stupid thing.  

Eventually Steve went to L’Abri to answer the question “Who am I?”  He was looking for a place he “could ask an honest question and get an honest answer.” 

Take a few minutes to consider/discuss with a friend, colleague, InterVarsity staffworker, faculty mentor.

• How does my faith inform how I treat men, women?
• What is the point of learning?
• Who am I?
• Where have I found a place to ask honest questions and get honest answers?

"The Fabric of Faithfulness" Cover

More notes, reflections, and challenges from the evening “in process.”  They’ll be followed by an on-line book discussion of Fabric of Faithfulness: Weaving Together Belief and Behavior (IVP. 2007), i.e., something along the lines of our Your Mind Matters (John Stott. IVP) series .  So if you’d don’t have a copy of Fabric of Faithfulness: Weaving Together Belief and Behavior, time to order/borrow one and start reading ;-)  Note:  I particularly recommend the new expanded edition.

*Note: For Byron’s summary of the evening and Saturday’s conference, visit Reflections on a local Summit: Your Work Matters to God.  Thank-you for all your good work Byron and Steve!  I truly enjoyed the evening.  Keep pressing on in the upward hope of Christ Jesus.

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