Why does a book of the Bible spend so much time on a king who isn’t following God? Check out Kathy Cooper’s study notes for some ideas. Read more…
Daniel: Notes for Bible Study Groups, Part 3
“There’s a difference between being functional in a culture and assimilating into that culture.” —Carl EllisRead more…
Daniel: Notes for Bible Study Groups, Part 2
How do Daniel and his friends respond to efforts to assimilate them into Babylonian culture? And also to a crisis for all the wise men of Babylon? Kathy Cooper shares notes for Bible study groups. Read more…
Book Review: The Road to Character
Summary: David Brooks explores the issue of character development through the hard-won pursuit of moral virtue, exemplified in the moral quests of people as diverse as Augustine and Bayard Rustin, Frances Perkins and Dorothy Day.Read more…
The Courageous Christian Scholar (Scholar’s Compass)
Often, in the Old Testament, the familiar refrain, “Be strong and courageous,” is given by God to such leaders as Moses and Joshua. Biblical courage is not psycho-babble; it is based on the presence and favor of God, on behalf of His people, and is predicated upon God’s promises in the present concerning His future intervention.Read more…
Diligence in the Life of the Christian Scholar (Scholar’s Compass)
What is diligence? Related English words give us some clues as to what diligence is, words such as: endurance, perseverance, persistence, or to be committed and tenacious. Read more…
Vocatio Christ: The Contours of Our Callings Part 2 (Scholar’s Compass)
It seemed like the whole world was on fire when C.S. Lewis stepped into the pulpit of the Church of Saint Mary the Virgin in Oxford in the autumn of 1939. Only a few weeks earlier Germany had invaded Poland, provoking declarations of war from Great Britain and France, igniting the great conflagration that would be the Second World War. Across the United Kingdom out of a sense of duty and urgency young men were enlisting in the armed services and citizens were preparing for the war effort. And Lewis, the great Oxford don, had been tasked with addressing a room full of anxious young men beginning their autumn term at Oxford University.Read more…
Vocatio Christi: The Contours of Our Callings (Scholar’s Compass)
“Follow me.” With these two simple words Jesus turned the worlds of Peter, Andrew, James and John upside down. Jesus called them away from the life that they knew in order to be apprenticed into a new Way, a new Truth, a new Life. He extended this call to Matthew the tax collector, to a rich young ruler, and to many, many more. Some followed. Some didn’t.Read more…
Missio Dei: The Context of Our Callings (Scholar’s Compass)
What, if anything, does my spiritual life have to do with my work life? Better yet, what does my spiritual life have to do with my life’s work? Is my specific vocation incidental or irrelevant to my spiritual formation? Or do these aspects of my life converge somehow? Similarly, are evangelical witness and the integration of faith and scholarship mutually exclusive concerns, one activity being suited to dynamic extroverts and the other to bookish introverts? Or is there a way in which these go together?Read more…
A Spirituality of Graduate School: Mission and Formation (Scholar’s Compass)
Greg Thompson once said in my hearing, “Mission without spiritual formation and virtue is impossible. But spiritual formation without mission is solipsistic.” Read more…
Book Review: Mind Your Faith
Ideas have consequences. The Holocaust began as an idea, argues David Horner*. Thinking well and loving God with our minds is thus an essential calling for Christians. Horner dedicates Mind Your Faith: A Student’s Guide to Thinking & Living Well to helpingRead more…
Christian Devotional Classics: The Imitation of Christ
All men commend patience, although few are willing to practice it. – Thomas ‘a Kempis Thomas à Kempis Thomas à Kempis (c. 1380 – 1471) lived in the midst of the crisis of the late medieval period. Although there had been relativeRead more…
Faithfulness In the Preparation
When I first realized that the taking the Graduate Record Exam © was on my horizons, I trembled a good bit. As my friends burned, sold, and threw away their textbooks after finals, I ordered two test preparation books andRead more…