Good morning by the grace of God. Happy Tuesday to you all. It is a beautiful sunny morning here. It is not quite cool enough mornings to feel like fall yet, but thank the Good Lord it is not hot during the days anymore either. I went to my one class today, so other than chapel and intermurals I have the rest of the day to get caught up on reading. We start intermural flag football today which I am pretty excited for. For those of you who don't know how intermurals work at the seminary, I will briefly explain. We ended orientation weekend with a field day, I believe I told about it in my posts, but it was where some of the second and fourth year guys got to watch or basically scout us first years. Than they set up I believe six captains who draft all the people who sign up for intermurals. Then once you are drafted to a team, you stay with that team for every sport all year long. I think it's an awesome way to do it. I was drafted to team two named the Walls of Jericho. I personally wonder if that means were going to fall, but I didn't pick the name. So we start today and I am excited just to get some exercise in some friendly competition. I am also a referee for intermurals, but I don't actually referee today. It pays pretty well and I am signing up for any and every job in any department I can right now. So far, besides IM referee, I have also been hired as a cashier for breakfast on Mondays, general labor which I will explain, and am also working symposium as the guy who sits at the desk and registers people as they show up. I also want to go talk to buildings and grounds and see what random jobs they haven't filled yet. General labor is a great job, but it's not consistent hours each week which is really what I need. However, anytime there are events on campus, I will be called in to help set up and tear down anything that is required for that event. I am also able to work as usher, bartender, and valet parking for these events. I have my first bartender gig the 25th of this month. I am hoping for some good tips. General labor also includes snow removal which I am ready for!!!!! So basically, I will not actually be working that many hours each week, but I am getting my name in with several different departments as a guy who is willing to work, not too proud to do any job, and sign up for the work as soon as it is made public. So I am hoping that gets me a reputation that will eventually lead to a good job with more regular hours, but we will see. The Lord's will be done, all trust in Him.
But like I said, other than chapel and IM's, I have the rest of the day for homework. I am actually going to be a good student for once and write a paper that isn't due until next Thursday today. I don't believe I have ever wrote a paper this far in advance. However, I still have a little portion of the book left to read before I can begin writing. Then I need to read another book, and write a paper on that one for Monday too. Class this morning was Lutheran Mind, which is the class I have to finish the book and do the paper for next Thursday. We are on a very interesting subject right now, which I have found out will be a very popular theme throughout our entire seminary experience. So it makes sense that they are hitting us with it the second week. The topic is on theology of glory versus theology of the cross. It sounds confusing, and when you first start looking at it, it took me a while to grasp the concept. However, the book we are reading really helped. It is the book On Being a Theologian of the Cross by Gerhard Forde. It is a really good book looking at Luther's Heidelberg Disputation which is Luther's whole beginning foundation of the theology of the cross versus the theology of glory. If you want to read the book, which I would suggest you do, it's only 115 pages, but you can buy it for only like ten or fifteen bucks, and it will change your entire thinking on God for the better (if you agree with Luther)! As long as it is only one or two of you, I would even be willing to mail you my copy once I am done with it. We can work out a rental system :). See there is the broke grad student in me trying to make a little money again. I am not really going to explain what the difference between these two theologies are, because it is not an easy task to do it simply and briefly. I will; however, put my final paper on the topic up here once I have had it graded and know it correctly explains the concept.
My next paper is on the book Loving the Church You Lead for Pastoral Ministry. I haven't even started that book, but it is also a shorter quick read. So at least the one paper, and reading a majority of the second book is my goal for today, we will see how far I actually get with the football game among the many other distractions. Chapel is going to be a little different today too, so I wanted to talk about that. Instead of everyone meeting in the chapel for service like every other day, they assigned every student, faculty, staff, and family member, which I imagine was quite the list, to small groups of fifteen or so to meet in an assigned classroom. Then each group is given a text and is to have their own Bible study/ discussion. I think it will be cool for several reasons. One, I will hopefully meet new people, two, it forces us to be involved with our chapel time rather than just sitting in the pew and listening, and I am curious to see what the other guys have to say about our text. One thing I always kind of had pictured in the back of my mind that is coming out to be quite true is the fun of just talking with my peers here. Anytime I get into a discussion with my peers, wither it is a small or large group, there are always so many different points of views and back grounds that it is fun to hear what they have to say and easily a learning experience for all of us. We grow off each other just as much as we grow in our classes. I was hoping that would be the case, and it is so I thank the Lord for it. I will try to remember to let you know how our small group chapel goes either later today or tomorrow.
Since I am not going to talk about the theologies of glory and the cross, which was our class topic and really the only thing my mind can seem to think about right now, I had to think of a topic I wanted to talk about instead. I decided since I was on my soap box about devotions yesterday, I would look at part of my own devotion for today and see what the text was. From the Portals of Prayers for today, the text is Micah 6:6-8. I hope you open your Bible and look it up. Coincidentally it also falls in perfect with the theology of the cross topic, but again my brain is on that topic right now. If you don't look it up (shame on you) but it talks about what can we offer to God that is a good enough offering for what He has done for us. Then verse eight ends with the fact that we can never offer enough to God, and that is why He doesn't ask or require us to. He knows we have nothing to offer Him, I mean He is God, anything we have came from Him. The only thing we can do is "love mercy and to walk humbly with your God." Now I know I skipped the part of act justly, but I am so focused on theology of glory right now, I don't want to go into works and our actions. I would rather just purely focus on the second part of loving mercy, and walking humbly with God if you would graciously allow me to do so. The best part of salvation is the fact that it is completely free. It is already completed, nothing we do or say now changes it or has any effect on it. Christ Himself proclaimed "It is finished!" on the cross. His death and resurrection was the final act of all salvation. We did nothing to deserve it, we played no part in completing it, and we still play no part in it being ours. We simply accept the gift our Lord offers to us. Now we can say thank you and share that gift with all, which is the act rightly part, but the main message is the fact that God gave us this present. It's kind of like at Christmas time, there are a lot of groups and organizations that will go shopping for a less fortunate family and buy them gifts. The group and organization really knows nothing about these people other than the ages and sexes. They buy the gifts and give them to this family. The family has no idea why they were chosen out of all the other less fortunate families, and they can not really offer anything back to the group or organization. That's the point. The gifts are free with nothing expected to be returned. The text in Micah is saying the same thing. We are the less fortunate family receiving the gift and God is the organization giving the gift. Only instead of some toys or school supplies, the gift was our eternal salvation, and the cost wasn't money but the life of His only own Son. It truly is the greatest gift we will ever receive, and the only thing we can do is accept it, love the mercy Christ has shown us, and walk humbly with our God praising Him every step of the way.
Dear Heavenly Father,
We thank you so much for the many blessings You give us each and everyday. We thank you especially for the gift of our eternal salvation. The gift is completely free to us, but it cost You Your One and only Son's life. We can never fully understand how You can love us sinners enough to have paid such a high price for us. We ask that You help us to fully accept Your gift, walk humbly with You, and share Your gift with every one we meet. All thanks and praise be to You, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.
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