One Semester Down!

Well, I made it.

Academically, this surely will not have been the hardest semester of my postgraduate experience, but it will probably come to be the hardest one logistically.

The actual truth of the matter is that my semester ended eight days ago. But for the last week or so, we’ve been frantically packing our apartment so we can move to campus just after Christmas. I feel fortunate enough to blog about it all now that I’m with family to celebrate Christmas or Winter Solstice or whatever it is that we celebrate this time of year (more on that tomorrow).

But starting next semester, I won’t have to wake up so early for my early classes! I’ll still wake up early, and hopefully go through the gym routine before classes begin, but I’m most excited about not having to waste time (and gas) on the drive to and fro. That will free up time to do coursework at a more reasonable hour, cook dinner more often, sleep longer, devote some time to a community ministry and hopefully have a free weekend every now and then for some recreation. Like all of that will ever happen like I imagine.

To recap from the year that was, all of my classes ended excellently… a 4.0 semester! I certainly didn’t expect that, but I’ll take it and try to repeat it again in the spring. Two of my classes – Greek and Old Testament – essentially continue in the semester to come, and to that I will add the history of the Church of God movement (I’ll call it CHOG History) and “Christians and Old Testament Theology,” which has interested me throughout the past semester of Old Testament class. It will be exciting to interact with the beliefs of the Israelite fathers and prophets and understand how Christians can more faithfully apply that to a well-rounded base of faith.

Other than the big post-Christmas move, I have two major personal goals during the break. Those are…

1. Read for fun! I have been reading Jesus the Riddler by Tom Thatcher for the greater part of the semester, and am almost finished with it. It has been a great read, even if my wife has ridiculed me for enjoying such “boring” books. The good news is that I’ve also checked out Thatcher’s other book, Why John WROTE a Gospel. I have another about the history of Messianic expectations, but I probably will not get to that until next semester.
2. Apply for funding to go to Israel this coming summer. Through a fellowship, Anderson University funds a student to travel to Israel for an archaeological dig each summer, and I want to get that either this summer or next… but preferably this summer. I have picked out an interesting dig site (Tel Hazor) and need to fulfill the application requirements, including an essay, before January 15.

And besides those things, it would be nice to add some new and fresh content to the blog for the new year. I’m sure I’ll hammer out a blog post or two once I’m settled in Anderson!