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Spring Break is here! Wow, I have not uttered those words in over ten years and I'm just as excited as I was back then. Last week when I was thinking about this post, I had already begun my reading list, to-do list, cycling schedule and boy was I tired.
To be honest, seminary has been an absolute blast and other than my husband, I have not told a soul about this new journey. So I thought, what a wonderful opportunity to share a little about what I've been doing over the last couple of months.
What Seminary Are You Going To?
If you missed my post back in November, you can read it HERE. After only two short months of working at Tallowood Baptist Church, I had the honor of being admitted into Baylor's Seminary called, George W. Truett Theological Seminary. Though the main campus resides in Waco, Texas, Houston has a campus downstairs of my office building. How awesome is that?
After a barrage of butterflies in my belly, essays and recommendations, I am happy to announce I am a Baylor Bear with plans to graduate with a Master of Arts in Christian Ministry.
How's Seminary Going?
Some people detest going to school but I am not one of those people. I enjoy a new spiral binder with lined paper and freshly sharped pencils. I thoroughly enjoy the first day of class when I can meet everyone, be the class clown or break the ice.
And in January, it was not any different.
I enrolled in Spiritual Formation taught by my mentor (she's unaware of this) and colleague, Dr. Shawn Shannon. As usual, we went around introducing ourselves and went over the syllabus.
Over the course of the semester, we will be ingesting four books among other readings, teachings and comprehensive reviews. We have been encouraged to learn more about one another, exchanging idiosyncrasies and personality traits. We will be giving lessons on spiritual disciplines and memorizing scriptures. Most of all, we are learning to love one another and to love God.
What Are You Learning?
As noted above, learning to love one another and loving God is the ultimate goal but in order to do so, we recently completed the first of four books this semester called, Invitation to a Journey by Robert Mulholland. His main points include the definition of spiritual formation which is, "the process of being formed in the image of Christ for the sake of others." From there Mr. Mulholland dives deeper into part two of the book which includes information about the correlations of spirituality and personality. Part three begins focusing on spiritual disciplines and in part four, he wraps up with the importance of corporate and social spirituality.
Our midterm consisted of the entire book of Invitation to a Journey as well as the scripture we choose to memorize on the second day of class. I had not ever thought of it but I believe there is some type of correlation in scriptures we memorize first. I could be wrong but the overzealous option I chose was John 15:1-8,
Surprisingly, I did quite well on my first midterm and truth be told, I should definitely work on memorizing scripture more!
Last week we began reading a few chapters in Richard Foster's Celebration to Disciplines and I'm sure it's going to be filled with wisdom and knowledge on some of the important disciplines such as fasting, solitude, meditation and prayer.
What's Coming Up Next?
Looking ahead, we'll be finishing out the semester with Discovering Our Spiritual Identity: Practices for God's Beloved by Trevor Hudson, developing a Rule of Life with the guidance of The Spiritual Discipline Handbook and finishing up a book review on The Common Rule by Justin Whitmel Earley. Last but not least, the final exam.
As for now, I'm thoroughly enjoying every Monday evening with my peers as well as my week off! God has been supernaturally downloading so many wonderful things in me such as dreams, visions, revelations and testimonies that I can hardly keep to myself. This adventure has been wonderful thus far and I'm excited to see what next week brings! Until next time ...
Sic 'em bears,
