A New Beginning

I have started my new semester with mixed feelings. I am very excited for most of my classes thus far. Church History this semester looks like it should be a much better class than last semester. I still have yet to start my last class since the lecture time is not until Thursday. I am also trying to switch my Radical Reformation class with a class called "The Search for a Christian America." The class is designed to explore the relationship between the Church and the State throughout American History, and this is intriguing to me especially during the 19th century. Unfortunately, the precept time on Friday interferes with my Hebrew lecture, so at this point I cannot add the class. However, there's another student in the class with the same predicament, and we are hoping that the professor will be able to work with us since we are both very excited about the class. I should know by Friday whether something has been worked out or not.

I am also beginning the process of looking into church placements for next year. I have four churches in the area that my field education advisor has looked into for me, so the next month will involve visiting those churches and seeing if any of them would make a good fit. Three of the four sound like they would be very good placements with good pastors. I will post more on them once I have had the chance to visit with them and the pastors.

It has been a bit stressful getting readjusted from break, especially being on campus last week but without work. By the end of this week I should be back into the swing of things, but for now it is a bit difficult. The lack of reading assignments due to less classes is also contributing since I have essentially finished all the reading I have to do for this week.

So the excitement continues. I'm starting to think more about starting/restarting the ordination process. It has been a bit complicated (probably more than it has needed to be) mostly because of my own hesitancy. Unfortunately (in my perspective), my last two years at APU did a lot to destroy my trust in the church, which has been difficult to overcome. Being at Princeton has done some to restore it, and I think the sites that my field ed. advisor has picked will do more. Still, I continue to wrestle over whether God is really calling me to be in a pastoral position and whether that calling is meant to be in a church setting. Though I feel fairly confident about the former, I am still skeptical about the latter. One of the things that I'm continuing to struggle with as well is whether I am being called specifically to the ministry of the Word and Sacrament. A few people that I have talked to have encouraged me to think of that more broadly than simply working as the head pastor of a church, which has been helpful to think about ordination in a more constructive way.

I realize that I could be doing much of this questioning as an Inquirer in the process, but that has been a little complicated as well. I am wrestling over whether Arcadia Pres. is really the best place for me to be under care. I realize that is probably a little shocking to some, and I'm not going to go into detail here since I feel it would be inappropriate. Reflecting on past events and experiences, I feel it is something I need to seriously consider.

Once I have my schedule more solidified I'll update more on my classes. It looks to be a very interesting semester.

A Week of Rest

I am finally on inter-semester break. I'm looking forward to have some time to regain my bearings, and really spend some quiet time with friends I've made out here. I was thinking about going down to West Virginia for a few days with some people but decided that staying around campus and working was going to be better.

I picked up a book on the Civil War for some "for fun" reading this week. It's called "Battle Cry of Freedom" by James McPherson, who is an American History professor at Princeton. It won the Pulitzer prize and is a one volume history of the Civil War. What makes that impressive is that most other scholars who write about the Civil War use multiple volumes to cover it, with 7 volumes not being unusual. So I'm very excited to jump into this book. It's written in narrative, which should make it more interesting and engaging.

Other than that, I'm planning on taking this time to explore, though with the turn in the weather, I may be confined in doors. This morning it was 23* before wind chill, which brought it down to about 10*. It was reminiscent of the cold in Florida in 2001 with the marching band. Hopefully it will warm up a bit this week.

I went to an Episcopal church this morning to "kill the heathen" (as my friend Christine was telling me to do). I hadn't had much of a chance to go to church while in NJ in December or during finals. It was an interesting experience. The church is right across the street from the seminary, and the building was built in the 19th century. It was a good service, my first at an Episcopal church. I'm finding that I really enjoy more liturgical services. I suppose that would make me fit well in an East Coast Presbyterian church as they're more liturgical.

I'm also going to invest in a bike when I get the money. I need a little more mobility than I currently have and they're so much to see around the area that having a bike will afford me the opportunity to get out a bit more. There are a group of students who go riding, so that will be good to find some of the good bike routes.

Finally, I was able to meet up with Andy Lucas while he was at the seminary. It was good to see a familiar face, and discuss seminary life.

Hopefully I'll be able to update a bit more in the coming weeks. It's a relief knowing that when I wake up tomorrow, I won't have to worry about class or finals.

Officially finished with the Semester

I am now officially finished with my first complete semester of seminary. I turned in my last set of papers and took my last final exam this morning and now wait in tension wondering how well I did. Finals turned out to be much more reasonable than I was expecting. Since I really had no expectations, I simply assumed the worst, but was pleasantly surprised at most of them, especially Systematic Theology. Church History was of course a terrible final, but that class is finished and I don't have to worry about it anymore. Hebrew on Saturday went well having just gotten off a plane 10 hours prior to that final. By far the best final I took was Systematic Theology. It wasn't that I felt most prepared for it (I didn't start studying for it until last night); it wasn't that it was an easy final either. It was simply helpful. One of the professors, Bruce McCormack, started out by gathering the whole class, and making sure we all knew what the exam was about and answered all our questioned. He kept the mood light and more importantly he helped us understand that the final was supposed to be a helpful exercise rather than torture. The goal was to take what we had learned and apply it (what a novel idea). Then he prayed for us and I cramped my hand after two and a half hours of writing. But approaching the final that way made it much easier to get it through.

Anyway, I am going to spend the next week and a half resting, getting a head start on reading, and spending time roaming around. It'll be nice to have a real break finally without the stress of finals.

The Church as Public

As part of one of my classes (named in the title), I had to write a 500 word essay on my understanding of the public nature of the church. This class has been my favorite class by far this semester, and though it has been very challenging, it has helped me grow both in stretching me intellectually and spiritually. So I thought I'd share that essay. It's by no means comprehensive or definitive; there is still quite a bit to be thought about and worked out. However, I think this paper present an adequate summary and appropriate spring board for further thought. So I present to you my final, exactly 500-word (which I am very proud of) essay on the public nature of the church:

The public nature of the Church can be characterized by the twofold nature of witness. The Church is the community of believers who are witness to and are witnesses of the actions of God in the world. These believers witness because they recognize and accept that they are recipients of God’s grace, intended for the whole world, accomplished through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

In its first meaning, the Church is a witness to God’s action in the world. She functions as one who actively observes and recognizes God’s action in the world and in her community. This is characterized both by what is witnessed in the Church (e.g. worship, preaching, baptism, Eucharist, etc.) as well as outside the Church. Thus the community of believers is never content to remain within the walls of a building as this denies the truth that God is active in the world. Rather, affirming the truth that the veil of the Temple has been split, the Church engages in the task of witnessing God’s action in the world. Through witnessing God’s action, the community of believers is uplifted, refined, and humbled by the grace of God available to the world.

This first task is only fully completed when the second task of witness is fulfilled: being a witness of God’s action. In this sense, the Church gives its testimony of God’s reconciling action to and for the world. By being a witness to God’s action, the Church adequately testifies about God’s involvement in human history to the world. Actively engaging in this mission, the Church joins God in the reconciliation of the world, being privileged to share in the divine task by witnessing to God’s reconciling work.

The Church is moved to this witnessing task because she is a recipient of grace and becomes a witness of grace. Regardless of whether a Christians believes they are actively engaged in witness, by affirming and accepting the gift of grace they bear the responsibility of the witnessing task to the eyes of the world. If the Church is to testify that God is offering grace to the world yet she does not testify about those actions or witness them herself, serious doubt is cast upon those who claim to follow the God who is for the world and also placing doubt in those seeking this God. Thus the Church engages in witness both to affirm God’s action for the world and to remain true to its claims.

The Church is not the true Church if it fails to engage in either aspect of witness. If the community fails to be a witness of God’s action, it is reduced to a human community that preaches about human action. The community that fails to testify about God’s action does not affirm that it has truly received grace or that God gives grace to the world. Only when this community is a witness to and of God’s grace and action is it the true public Church.

Passing of a Dodger Great

I was very sad to learn of the passing of Johnny Podres. Not exactly one of the players who cracks my all-time favorites, simply out of ignorance, but learning about his past through his obituary, watching videos of him pitch, and hearing the memories of those who knew makes me sad that I didn't know much about him. Vin Scully mentioned him quite often during broadcasts and I know he was at least one of the Dodger heroes in Brooklyn, especially during the '55 World Series. Very sad to hear.

Finals are almost finished and once I'm done with them I will post again. For now, it's back to the books.

At School Again Safely

I made it back to school safely. Once again I had a bit of a hectic flight back, but it worked out much smoother this time and I actually arrived in Newark earlier than I was anticipating. I shall fill in the details later. For now, I am going to finish my Hebrews exegesis project, study a little bit of Hebrew for my final later this morning before I get a few hours of sleep.

My Wild Ride Home

I think I finally have the energy to fully relive my flight home in writing. Christmas was great and spending time with family was great, and I'm really glad I actually made it home to spend that time with family.

So let us start at the beginning. I left Princeton at 12:30 p.m. EST and got to the airport at 2:00. Before leaving I had upgraded the seat on the second leg of my flight, so I was looking forward to that. My flight was scheduled to leave at 5:25 and when I checked my luggage, my flight was still on time, though the agent warned me that that could change at any time. Bad omen. So I decide to get something to eat before going through security and waiting at the gate (Newark is weird in that you go through security when you want to get to your gate, not when you first enter the airport; doesn't sound safe or logical to me, but that's just me). So I go through security, which is rather painless, and arrive at my gate. Let the fun begin. At about 3:15, they announced that the flight leaving at 3:25 had been canceled. There was no announcement that the flight had even been delayed, it was simply canceled.

I went to the agent to see if any information was available on my flight. This agent was what made my time in Newark actually enjoyable. He said he wasn't sure what was going to happen to our flight because of the mismanagement happening at Milwaukee. It wasn't weather problems or computer glitches that were causing delays but poor management at the various airports. So we were basically stuck in the waiting game. Our plane was stuck in Milwaukee and was only doing a roundtrip flight between the two cities, so if it made it to Newark, it was going to head back to Milwaukee.

At this point I called up my friend Christine, who lives in the Milwaukee area. She told me that if I got stuck in Milwaukee to give her call, and since it was looking that way, I decided it was good idea to give her call. Thankfully the offer was still good so my goal became getting to Milwaukee. Meanwhile, I was checking with the agent to see what options I had and to continue to get information. He was letting me look at the screen where he was getting his information from. He called up Continental airlines to see if he could get me on a direct flight to LAX, which like everyone else was overbooked.

Finally at about 6:30, we found out that the flight in Milwaukee had pushed out from the gate, and was getting ready to head out to Newark. I had met another guy there who had been waiting at the airport for two days waiting for a flight to Milwaukee. We headed off to one of the sandwich places in the terminal (still inside security) to celebrate. We had a good conversation and I found out that he was a youth leader for a few years. He was also a new father of 7 months and his baby boy is very cute. It was a nice break in the mid of the craziness. A half hour before we were even certain that we were going to leave Newark.

Before the flight left, I had also talked to the agent about switching the second leg of the flight, so that I had a seat on a flight home. He booked me on the next flight out of Milwaukee for LAX that next morning at 8:00 and I was told I would have a guaranteed seat. So things seemed to be falling in place. Our flight finally got off the ground at about 8:30, over three hours delayed. I arrived in Milwaukee after a fairly peaceful flight, and Christine's family picked me up at the airport.

At her house, we called Midwest airlines again so that I could be sure that I had a guaranteed seat on the flight. The woman over the phone told me that yes, I did have a guaranteed seat, so I was able to sleep 2 hours fairly peacefully until I needed to be up again to go to the airport. I arrived in Milwaukee at about 10:30ish CST and got to bed about 3:00 CST.

We left for the airport in freezing temperatures with a pretty good snowfall going at 6:15 a.m. CST. When I arrived at the airport, I did curbside check-in, got everything checked in about 2 minutes and things were looking good. I was told again that I had guaranteed seat on the flight, so I was pretty relaxed. Christine and I got coffee in the airport before we got to security. After that, I went to the gate and waited for the LAX agent to arrive. I needed to redeem my flight coupon for a boarding pass at the gate.

The LAX agent arrived and I went to redeem my boarding pass ... and I'm told I don't have a guaranteed seat on the flight. I was very upset and it was looking like I was going to be stuck in Milwaukee another day (not a bad thing though; I just wanted to get home). I was first on standby, but the way things had been going with other passengers, I was not getting my hopes up.

Thankfully I managed to get a seat on the plane, but it was not an upgraded seat; quite the opposite, I was almost toward the complete rear of the plane. No matter really; I was just glad to be getting home.

The flight was delayed by 40 minutes before they started boarding. I got on the plane and waited for take off. After a half hour I was still waiting. An hour passed, and we were still at the gate. An hour and half, same story. Finally, after two and a half hours of sitting at the gate for various different reasons (getting passengers on board, waiting for a fuel truck, air controller delays, asking passengers to give up seats for three free round-trip tickets to let other passengers on board) we finally took off (at 12:00 CST). Everyone on the flight, including the pilot, was edgy (though the pilot was tactfully and discreetly so)

At about 1:50 p.m. PST we touched down at LAX. Everything after that was pretty smooth, surprisingly enough. We got out of LAX quickly, and I headed home.

So that was my exciting trip home. I'm just got off the phone with Midwest airlines and they're going to look into my flight and see what sort of compensation I'm going to get. Once that's finished, I can finally put this thing away and just relax and enjoy my time at home. Here's hoping getting back to Princeton is not anywhere near as hectic.