As we enter April and Good Friday and Easter are only a few away, it seems a good time to share some experiences from a recent unit I taught on the atonement. I hope this four-part series proves helpful for you in your teaching, but I also hope it serves as a way to prepare your heart for the remembrance of Christ’s sacrifice and the … Continue reading Teaching the Atonement, Part 1: Discovering Discord in My Students
In their pursuit of the American dream, many often speak of jobs and careers that will help them achieve their goals. What we have lost in this pursuit, however, is the older notion of vocation. A vocation, a calling, has much richer and deeper biblical roots than careers. One of the important roles of classical Christian education, I believe, is recapturing the notion of vocation, … Continue reading A Vocation of Education for Teachers and Students (Reflections on B. B. Warfield’s The Religious Life of Theological Students #5)
For all of its incredible benefits, classical Christian education can be dangerous. If we educate students to be excellent thinkers and communicators but they fail to learn virtue, we have created monsters. Among these dangers, I think two lie before students in classical Christian education with special respect to their faith. The first danger is that students learn a lot of truth about God but … Continue reading Bringing Christ to Class (Reflections on B. B. Warfield’s The Religious Life of Theological Students #4)
In the previous post in this series (The Character of the Teacher) we considered the high calling of the classical Christian educator. In this post we focus on the character of the student. Many students at classical Christian schools still struggle with the sacred and secular distinctions that are so stark in government education. Despite being told that their faith informs every aspect of their … Continue reading Faithful Learning (Reflections on B. B. Warfield’s The Religious Life of Theological Students #3)
Classical Christian education is, and ought to be, a rigorous endeavor. And not just for the student. Teachers, too, have a high calling to be learned. I remember when we first started our school nearly seven years ago—I was halfway through my PhD in Old Testament, and one of my first realizations was how much I didn’t know. The more that I learn, the more … Continue reading The Character of the Teacher (Reflections on B. B. Warfield’s The Religious Life of Theological Students #2)
In his excellent short essay, The Religious Life of Theological Students, B. B. Warfield gives advice to the theological student about the kind of person he or she should be. Too often our focus on theological education is merely the information to be learned. But Warfield argues it is just as, or more important, that the proper formation is happening in the student. As I … Continue reading B. B. Warfield on Theological Education (Reflections on B. B. Warfield’s The Religious Life of Theological Students #1)
“Stuff and nonsense can be fun,” says Mary Poppins in the new Mary Poppins Returns, and I couldn’t agree more. More and more as I grow older, I feel the weight of worldly responsibility. Bills to pay, meetings to schedule and attend, a family to care for, and a feeling of inadequacy for all of it. I sympathize with Michael Banks in the movie because … Continue reading Stuff and Nonsense: What Mary Poppins Taught Me
