Some Sad Farewells

Over the last week or so there have been lots of goodbyes. Different people say their goodbyes differently. Some cry, some try to slink away quietly. I think I'm a "celebrate, say nice things, then don't look back" kinda guy.

I've felt really loved and supported by so many friends up here as we've undertaken our move home. Suds devoted an afternoon to hanging with me yesterday. A raft of people shared breakfast with me this morning. The Wrights have said "Yes" to every single favour we've asked of them and more. I think Sparky probably holds the most-hugged award, although Pete's a close second. The boys at Shenkin were their usual exuberant selves as they wished us well.



So many good memories.

These Didn't Make It

It turns out I was pretty optimistic in estimating how much our little car can hold.

These guys didn't make the grade.


I kinda consider it a victory that only so few things have to be left behind. The process of packing the car was like a massive game of tetris; and once I was confident that I could fit all of the important stuff, it even became pretty fun. Laugh out loud fun, in fact. Or maybe I'm just tired and silly.

Please pray that our heavily laden little vehicle makes it all the way to Hobart without a fight. Jen arrives tomorrow night. The journey begins early on Wednesday morning.

The Last Box

Here's the last, lonely box. And now it, along with all it's friends, have departed our little house forever.


I think I felt a greater sense of relief and finality as the removalists' truck drove away than when I finished my last exam. How odd. I suppose even as I finished exams I knew the grueling task of packing-up our things was ever present.

Not any more. Now we're pretty tired. We're cleaning. And saying a last few goodbyes before Hobart life resumes.

Finished.

At 5:15pm today I finished all the academic requirements for my BTh.

Woohoo!

(For no particular reason, here's a picture of Robert Doyle, one of the members of faculty. Spot the smiling Masters in the background).


There was a dinner for all exiting students afterwards.

I'm going to bed now.

Doctrine Awaits

Just one more... the end is nigh. (Doctrine on Thursday)

This afternoon we sat the New Testament exegesis exam. Nick commented, just before we started, that there had been more laughing around the college today. I wondered if it was because people felt more confident. Nick said, no, people are just increasingly tired, and with tiredness comes silliness, in spades.

Nick was right.

The format of today's NT3 exam was novel, and I kinda like the changes. In the third section we were given a pair of sentences (in Greek, with no verse numbering or reference), each taken from different parts of 1 Corinthians (or Luke-Acts, if that's your thing). We then had to talk about the significance of those two sentences for the theology of the whole book.

One to go, people.

Tumbleweed in the Study

Akos had his Social Ethics exam yesterday. It was his last. He's finished.

*sniff*

It's lonely in my study this morning.

Two More

'When one catches the power of Paul's vision of the human plight... one can hardly imagine that it was eclipsed by the Jew-Gentile relationship'
How does an understanding of Paul's anthropology affect one's assessment of the so-called new Perspective on Paul?

That was one of the three questions that I knew how to answer, did answer, and did a fairly mediocre job of answering in this afternoon's New Testament Theology exam. Ah well.

The exam was pretty good in terms of the questions that were available. And, thankfully, I was feeling fine--my cold has all but gone, now. Praise the Lord! I was even able to get some study done over the course of the weekend, despite feeling rather headachey and yuck :(

Tomorrow we'll complete the New Testament pair, with Exegesis (i.e. translation and commenting on the meaning of short passages). And then there's just doctrine, on Thursday.

I can almost see the end of it all!

Over the Hump, but...

... I have a mild fever, and feel pretty rubbish. I blame Nick, even though we've only spent a few minutes together recently ;)

But, on the bright side, I'm now more than half-way through exams. Three subjects down (4 exams), two subjects to go (3 exams).

Ethics was three hours long and involved writing five essays. The compulsory question was about bringing biblical ethics and pastoral sensitivity to a rather messy divorce/remarriage kinda scenario.

Monday/Tuesday is New Testament, and they've changed the exam for this year so that translation (from Greek) is worth very little in the scheme of things; I actually have to have intelligent things to say, rather than just memorising the NIV.

Please pray I get better and learn some intelligent-sounding things :)

Worth a Listen: Ethics

A bunch of my friends went to the New College Lectures this year. I didn't go. I had other things on that week.

But I've now listened to all three of the lectures and I recommend you do, too. Pithy, thoughtful, very listenable, even moving at times. And not just for total nerds, either.

Check 'em out here. They're entitled, Bioethics And Future Hope, by Prof. John Wyatt.

The Rest of my Hebrew Days - Day One

I just did the first Hebrew vocab training of the rest of my life. No tests to study for. No set texts to master. Just for the value of it.

I got 4 words wrong (of 111).

I've yet to figure out what a reasonable target is for vocabulary learning (over the long term) in Hebrew. I'll try to increase my vocab to some fixed number of uses in the OT (e.g. learn all words used 50 times or more in the OT). And then I reckon I'll try to have some passages/books that I've mastered down to the hapax (single occurence of a word).

Any advice?

Counting in Subjects Makes me Feel Better

My mate Pete pointed out to me that if I count-down to the finish, in subjects, rather than actual exams, it makes the end feel closer. So,

Two Subjects Down, Three to Go.

The end feels closer already :)

Today was the second exam for Old Testament, and I think it went remarkably well. The uncertainty was all about which passages we'd have to comment on. Basically, passages I liked came up.

Here's one of them now: It's Ezekiel 36:16-32.


Ethics is Thursday.

I Sat the OT3 Theology Exam, and I Survived

It's true. I'm alive.

Immediately before every Old Testament exam I am absolutely convinced that--if I were the one setting the questions--I could set an exam that is fair, but which I couldn't even pass.

The questions weren't as horrible as I feared. In fact, I think I did fine. (And thankfully, I'll probably never set exams.)

Here's one of the questions, which might interest you next time you're watching a Sunday night doco:

To what extent has the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls challenged the assumption that the Masoretic Text* should form the basis of modern Old Testament editions?

My answer was basically:

• The Dead Sea Scrolls sorta complicated the picture a bit (by giving us a whole lot more to work from in terms of different textual traditions).
• But mostly they strongly reinforced our view of how awesome the Masoretic Text is... they showed it was almost perfectly preserved for nigh-on a millenia.

Tomorrow is the Old Testament Exegesis exam. i.e. a whole lot of translating, and some commenting on short passages in Hebrew.

* The Masoretic Text is basically the most important source for our Old Testament Bibles.

Six to Go, and Counting

My Philosophy exam was today. Here's one of the questions:

'Evil is tragic, awful, painful, and personal, and it should be acknowledged as such. If a theodicy urges us to forget or ignore that fact, it loses its relevance for addressing the relentless pain of the world'.

In what sense can you agree with this statement as the compassionate response to the 'problem of evil'?

A pretty cool question, I reckon.

I think I did fine in today's exam. What's got me concerned is the Monday/Tuesday Old Testament onslaught. Monday is the theology exam, Tuesday the exegesis (i.e. translating and commenting on specific passages). Pray that I fill my head with the right stuff! It's seriously frightening.

Seven

Exams kick-off tomorrow arvo and conclude on the 19th. I will sit seven exams.

Please pray for us (me, my family, and my classmates). It's always a pretty stressful and draining time. Writing the exams is only part of the experience, of course; there's all the study in between, the fear of falling sick, trying to remain a normal human being in the home rather than acting like a study-cyborg.

Old Testament is (for me) the most frightening of the papers because the examinable material is just so vast. The others will be hard, I'm sure, but don't pose an obvious threat to life itself :)

Emotions, Angst, and Worldview-Change

I'm studying for my philosophy exam at the moment, and in particular I'm looking at worldviews - how we come to them, how our thinking relates to our experience, that sort of thing. I just read this little bit and wanted to share it with you:

Healthy emotional life which knows and expresses appropriately the full range of emotions is crucial in worldview formation. [...] Unresolved issues in personal or communal life can cause an enormous split between what is in fact done and what is confessed in faith. When such a split becomes a way of life, incongruities become increasingly difficult to live with and pressure builds up for resolution. The painful pressure and turmoil can lead to delusions and schizophrenia; more commonly, release occurs through a modification or adjustment of the vision of life. Through rationalization and other defensive postures we adjust our view of life in an effort to restore peace and unity. When our vision of life is contaminated, both faith and praxis are threatened.

Olthuis, James H. 'On Worldviews' Christian Scholar's Review. 14/2 1985, 153-164.

When we think about informing and shaping our (or someone else's) worldview with the gospel, it's easy to think of it as an information exchange, pure and simple.

It ain't necessarily so.