Our Monday Classes went well! We have all day monday classes: 10:30-11:30 (every other week), 12-2:30, 3-5:30, 7-9:40.....so it's a long day.
For our first class with Dr. Coe, one of the books we are reading this week is Surrender to Love. It talks about how the definition of Love IS God. As His creation, made for experiential love relationship through Jesus, His redemptive presence moves toward us. Though sin and disfunction plague us from pure vision, He desires surrender to His perfect love. It talks about fear and how that affects our ability to be loved. Fear has many faces. God invites surrender and freedom, but we do not believe ourselves to be afraid (which ends up preventing freedom!). When we have experienced love that we've been hurt by (imperfect love) then Love can turn into the object of fear. But Love is the antidote for fear, so it becomes a cycle. He desires reverential intimacy recognizing His holiness (which we've failed to do)- for unconditional love demands surrender. Here are a few quotes from the book:
- "Take a moment and try a simple exercise. The results will tell you a great deal about the nature of your spiritual journey. Imagine God thinking about you. What do you assume God feels when you come to mind? When I ask people to do this, a surprising number of people say that the first thing they assume God feels is disappointment. Others assume that God feels anger. In both cases, these people are convinced that it is their sin that first catches God's attention. I think they are wrong-and I think the consequences of such a view of God are enormous..."(beginning of Ch.1)
-"He offers his love as the one thing in the universe capable of freeing us from our fears."(p.37)
- "Ultimately, problems in surrender and obedience are problems of knowing God's love. They are problems therefore of the heart, not the will...God is exquisitely concerned about our deepest fulfillment."(p.66)
For Dr. Russell's class we began reading Playing with Fire. So far, the book begins with explaining that God's Word has transformative power, through the Holy Spirit, that our heart's should "burn" as it penetrates and purifies our sin, and human-centered worldview "glasses" that distort God.It encourages knowing God's word so that it transforms the heart, not just the head. Here are a few quotes we underlined:
-"This books is committed to the biblical perspective that hearing or reading God's Word and applying it accurately to our lives (doing the Word) will make us into the very thing that God ultimately created us to be...He begins the process by drawing us to Himself (John 6:44). He invests Himself in the process by giving us the Holy Spirit to dwell within us and progressively change us (Rom. 8:12-14). And He culminates the process by resurrecting and perfecting us to be with Him forever in an immortal body (1 John 3:1-3). This process transforms us from sin-stained rebels to eternal showcases of God's grace (Eph. 2:1-10)." (p.19)
-"..we tend to view all other persons and things (including God) as existing to meet our needs! Of course, this is not only utilitarian, it is also narcissistic. We look through a lens that distorts God's and the world's purposes as being for our fulfillment and satisfaction."(p.27)
-"In the church in the West, we have significantly contextualized the gospel for those who have [the existential] set of glasses...For example, we begin most of our [gospel] presentations with this perspective 'God loves you and offers a wonderful plan for your life' However, such a misunderstanding of God's role...makes us vulnerable to the charge, 'But I don't need God to make my life meaningful and fulfilling. I'm doing quite well on my own, thank you!' Additionally, this perspective pictures God as primarily being in the business of creating individual plans for personal fulfillment for every individual who responds to Him. Is this really what God has revealed about His concerns?" (pg. 28)
We have also been reading Spiritual Theology, a systematic theology of the christian spirituality. The book tries to meld the headiness of theology with the practice of daily living. He emphasizes that a good spiritual theology must include the spiritual practices of the entire world (i.e. the people in asia desire a warrior-God because they are under opression, while in America, we desire a vulnerable God, since we lack sincere relationships), it must be wrapped up in the death, resurrection and glory of Jesus, and it must be charismatic, (open to God moving in unbelievable, surprising and amazing ways in ordinary life). Here are a few quotes we liked:
- "Pentecostal spirituality is not just a twentieth-century reality that has to be reckoned with because it has become so widespread. Rather, it encapsulates an essential component of the Christian tradition that the mainstream largely ignored in the past. It must take its place as an essential part of a comprehensive spiritual theology...ideally, then, there should be no distinction between charismatic and non-charismatic Christians; every Christian should be both a charismatic and an ascetic" (p 39)
- "When we think of God in trinitarian (that is, relational) terms...God is not longer the object but the agent in our worship, mission and social action. Worship becomes 'the gift of participating through the Spirit in the (incarnate) Son's communication with the Father."'In other words, to understand the Christian life as relational is to acknowledge that 'we pray, and yet it is not so much we who pray, but Christ and the Holy Spirit who pray for us and with us and in us' (Rom. 8.26, 27, 34)." (pg 62)
We did 2 Prayer Projects this last week. Taking about 1 hour, praying and asking Jesus to shed light on parts of ourselves in these areas. We will talk more about Prayer Projects in our next post, but here were the topics:
1. What are your thoughts/feelings starting this program?
2. What are the ways your parents intentionally/unintentionally raised you? What ways were unintentional that affected your character? What was good? Bad? What ways were intentional? Healthy/unhealthy? Do you wish your parents were more intentional/unintentional in raising you?
Week 2
This week, we will be reading the following, if you want to read along with us!:
Surrender to Love (whole book!)
Spiritual Theology (1-100)
Playing Fire (ch.4)
Biblical Interpretation (ch. 2 & 3)
This week, we will post what our prayer projects are, so if you have time, you should do them too!
So interesting and I love it!! Josie
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