This day next week I commence a three year Degree in Theology in Belfast Bible College.
Why?
There are many answers to that question. I could start by saying that I already hold an undergraduate degree in Fincancial Mathematics and Economics, but it's as useful for my career advancement as a piece of paper with the words "I'm not that good, but please hire me anyway" written in crayon.
This may sound like sour grapes, but I'm not overly upset that I don't get to crunch numbers at a computer five days a week. Nevertheless, I do wish that my degree was worth something. I regret not applying myself to the course. Enthused or not, talented or not, there is a responsibility on each of us to work as hard as we can in whatever we do. To quote the French economist and philosopher Arsene Wenger,
Coming out of secondary school with good Leaving Cert results, I thought I had enough talent to live on it alone. I didn't. Not even close. What's more, I still don't. I often wish I was more talented. I wish I was smarter, I wish I could memorise tons of great quotes, I wish I could articulate my thoughts in a clearer way, I wish I was a better soccer player, I wish I could do what Clive Carroll does with an acoustic guitar, I wish I could write like David Simon, I wish I was funnier. But I'll tell you what I don't wish - I don't wish that I worked harder.
My life since college has been confusing, through every fault of my own. But a couple of years ago a glimmer of hope emerged. I sat at the feet of Dr Arden Autry -- now Scholar in Residence at First United Methodist Church, Tulsa, Oklahoma -- and passion for something began to enter my bloodstream after a long hiatus. Bad habits die hard, but at least in the area of academic study I did something I hadn't done in a while: I worked. Hard. After eeking my way through four years of Financial Maths and Econmics, getting grades that resembled a selection of temperatures from a spot of cold-ish weather in Massachussetts, I once again had numbers on an end-of-year transcript to be proud of.
Unsure of what exactly to do after the year of Biblical Studies, however, I slipped into old habits once more. I knew what I wanted to do in general (something to do with the Bible), but the desire to take the path of least resistance is not easily surrendered. The grace of God prevailed, however. This is no absract statement, but one with skin and bones, flesh and blood.
The question that began this post was "Why?" Why am I commencing a Degree in Theology? One of the answers is a simple, straight-forward one: My parents. Without their genorosity and grace I would be doing no such thing. I feel like I don't deserve to be doing this course. I have wasted too many years, spent too long in the wilderness to come out of it like this. I'm sure my parents feel partly like fools as they send me to Belfast. To many I'm sure they look like fools. But such is the risk of grace. No doubt the father felt a fool as he threw a party for his prodigal son. No doubt the townspeople thought he had lost the plot. The logic of grace can find no justification in the natural mind. Charismata -- the stuff of grace -- is of the spirit.
That being said, with the grace that has been given to me I now have a fresh responsibility. Talent (and talents, in the New Testament sense of the word!) have been supplied. What will I do? A tatoo on my hand reading "Remember Arsene Wenger" might not be a bad idea.
Richard Hays lays the path before me in another way. Though of course not addressing me directly in the video posted below, I can perform an act hermeneutical gymnastics and hear his words as words spoken to me:
The strange, new world of the Bible has sunk its teeth into me. But "serious Christian study" comes with a price. Nothing less than all of me is required.
Of course, Hays's words apply to all of us who identify with Jesus, and to all aspects of our lives. Only yesterday was I reading about Peter's great confession followed quickly by Peter's great correction. He gets that Jesus is the Messiah, but "may it never be" that Jesus should have to suffer and die. Jesus's response is harrowing: "You don't have in mind the things of God, but the things of man."
So much of modern Christian life is lived though the mind of man. We expect certain comforts, certain securities, a way of life that is far removed from taking up a cross and following Jesus to certain death.
Even -- or perhaps Especially -- as I approach a degree in Theology I can have expectations in complete antithesis to the gospel. Oh how I want to be learned, thought of highly, an authority - all for the sake of ego. The way of the cross stands as a stumbling block to these ends: It is the way of self-empying love, humility, servanthood.
I don't want the fruit of three years in Belfast to be either a stick with which to beat people or shiny object with which to dazzle those "uneducated" Christians. I want this three-year experience to be an instruement of God's "troubling grace" - a grace that shapes me into a person who loves well.
To paraphrase one of the world's leading theologians, I can have all the theological knowledge in the world, but if I have not love then I am nothing.
Why?
There are many answers to that question. I could start by saying that I already hold an undergraduate degree in Fincancial Mathematics and Economics, but it's as useful for my career advancement as a piece of paper with the words "I'm not that good, but please hire me anyway" written in crayon.
This may sound like sour grapes, but I'm not overly upset that I don't get to crunch numbers at a computer five days a week. Nevertheless, I do wish that my degree was worth something. I regret not applying myself to the course. Enthused or not, talented or not, there is a responsibility on each of us to work as hard as we can in whatever we do. To quote the French economist and philosopher Arsene Wenger,
Nobody has enough talent to live on talent alone. Even when you have talent, a life without hard work goes nowhere.
Coming out of secondary school with good Leaving Cert results, I thought I had enough talent to live on it alone. I didn't. Not even close. What's more, I still don't. I often wish I was more talented. I wish I was smarter, I wish I could memorise tons of great quotes, I wish I could articulate my thoughts in a clearer way, I wish I was a better soccer player, I wish I could do what Clive Carroll does with an acoustic guitar, I wish I could write like David Simon, I wish I was funnier. But I'll tell you what I don't wish - I don't wish that I worked harder.
My life since college has been confusing, through every fault of my own. But a couple of years ago a glimmer of hope emerged. I sat at the feet of Dr Arden Autry -- now Scholar in Residence at First United Methodist Church, Tulsa, Oklahoma -- and passion for something began to enter my bloodstream after a long hiatus. Bad habits die hard, but at least in the area of academic study I did something I hadn't done in a while: I worked. Hard. After eeking my way through four years of Financial Maths and Econmics, getting grades that resembled a selection of temperatures from a spot of cold-ish weather in Massachussetts, I once again had numbers on an end-of-year transcript to be proud of.
Unsure of what exactly to do after the year of Biblical Studies, however, I slipped into old habits once more. I knew what I wanted to do in general (something to do with the Bible), but the desire to take the path of least resistance is not easily surrendered. The grace of God prevailed, however. This is no absract statement, but one with skin and bones, flesh and blood.
The question that began this post was "Why?" Why am I commencing a Degree in Theology? One of the answers is a simple, straight-forward one: My parents. Without their genorosity and grace I would be doing no such thing. I feel like I don't deserve to be doing this course. I have wasted too many years, spent too long in the wilderness to come out of it like this. I'm sure my parents feel partly like fools as they send me to Belfast. To many I'm sure they look like fools. But such is the risk of grace. No doubt the father felt a fool as he threw a party for his prodigal son. No doubt the townspeople thought he had lost the plot. The logic of grace can find no justification in the natural mind. Charismata -- the stuff of grace -- is of the spirit.
That being said, with the grace that has been given to me I now have a fresh responsibility. Talent (and talents, in the New Testament sense of the word!) have been supplied. What will I do? A tatoo on my hand reading "Remember Arsene Wenger" might not be a bad idea.
Richard Hays lays the path before me in another way. Though of course not addressing me directly in the video posted below, I can perform an act hermeneutical gymnastics and hear his words as words spoken to me:
If you're going to follow Jesus on the road to Jerusalem -- or, if you're going to embark on serious Christian study in this place -- be prepared to pay the price. Not just the price of your tuition, though that's challenging enough. But the price of wholehearted devotion to a cause so compelling that it will demand your whole life.
The strange, new world of the Bible has sunk its teeth into me. But "serious Christian study" comes with a price. Nothing less than all of me is required.
Of course, Hays's words apply to all of us who identify with Jesus, and to all aspects of our lives. Only yesterday was I reading about Peter's great confession followed quickly by Peter's great correction. He gets that Jesus is the Messiah, but "may it never be" that Jesus should have to suffer and die. Jesus's response is harrowing: "You don't have in mind the things of God, but the things of man."
So much of modern Christian life is lived though the mind of man. We expect certain comforts, certain securities, a way of life that is far removed from taking up a cross and following Jesus to certain death.
Even -- or perhaps Especially -- as I approach a degree in Theology I can have expectations in complete antithesis to the gospel. Oh how I want to be learned, thought of highly, an authority - all for the sake of ego. The way of the cross stands as a stumbling block to these ends: It is the way of self-empying love, humility, servanthood.
I don't want the fruit of three years in Belfast to be either a stick with which to beat people or shiny object with which to dazzle those "uneducated" Christians. I want this three-year experience to be an instruement of God's "troubling grace" - a grace that shapes me into a person who loves well.
To paraphrase one of the world's leading theologians, I can have all the theological knowledge in the world, but if I have not love then I am nothing.
No comments:
Post a Comment