Some of you have asked, just what exactly it is that I'm (Matt) studying. Well today, I'm going to try and answer some of that.
First of all. Regent is a pretty academic place. Professors are smart. Like, I-learned-German-to-read-Hegel-in-his-native-language smart. Who is Hegel? No idea. But people at Regent could probably tell you loads. Last week, I was having a conversation with a history prof about a paper I had just finished for another prof in which I identified the major themes that shifted culture from accepting moderate alcohol consumption to demanding teetotalism. I was trying to tell him which books I read for my research and couldn't remember one. He told me the author and title, and then proceeded to tell me that this particular author was the expert in the field and it was a good thing I included his work. What I'm trying to say is people take academics seriously.
The problem is, well, I'm not exactly an academic. I'm not trying to belittle myself. I know I'm smart. I have a card in my wallet that tells me so. But I'm not an academic. Academics do this stuff because they love it. But I don't love reading high level criticism, German philosophers and early church fathers. Learning Greek over the summer and fall nearly killed me, and lets not even talk about Hebrew.
Academics for me is a tool. I'm learning so that I can answer with confidence the heart level questions people (including me) have. And some of the things I've had to learn to be able to answer those questions have been crazy hard (see above paragraph for examples). But the reward is pretty fun.
Some of the topics I've studied:
- Athanasius- Bishop of Alexandria, defender of trinitarian orthodoxy, chief contributor to Nicene Creed, and friend of the Desert Fathers (earliest monastics)
- Late Medieval Mystics- Bonaventure, Teressa of Avila and John of the Cross
- Reformed Baptist understanding of the Eucharist
- 20th Century Revivalism- Pentecostals and Billy Graham
- History of the Christian Pastor
- The Chicago Statement on Hermeneutics
- Assimilation Ministry in a local congregation
- Shifting attitudes to alcohol in the church: a move toward abstinence
- Charles Spurgeon's Pneumatology (doctrinal beliefs regarding the Holy Spirit)
For each of these, I probably read 6-10 books or articles. Which is just enough to start grasping the real ideas.
Anyways, along the way I've picked up some specific tools like biblical languages, exegesis (figuring out the details of the text), hermeneutics (figuring out how to interpret the exegetes [people who do exegesis]), and some good old fashioned academic skills like researching and writing.
After this semester, I'll have completed 64 of my 90 credits. Each credit hour represents about 45 hours of work. By the end of summer school, I'll have just 18 credits left to graduate. Most of those final credits are electives, since I've front loaded the hardest classes. That gives me plenty of time to job hunt, which I'll start doing sometime around Christmas.
Well that's it for now. I hope you've enjoyed this edition of me typing at a kitchen table about things.
