Archive for September, 2009

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Attending Seminary Means Living In a Foreign Land

When I went to seminary, it entailed a move from Florida to Texas. There was a shift in geography, but there was also a shift in culture-a pretty dramatic shift, as anyone who’s moved to Texas will probably tell you. I grew up in South Florida. I was a native Floridian, which was pretty unusual. [...]

September 28th, 2009 | Mark | 6 comments | Continued
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My First Semester Shock, or Seminarians Without Chests

I approached seminary with many of the common illusions seminary students have. I thought it would be a spiritually vibrant and intense time, full of people who were overflowing with passion for Christ. Boy was I surprised. My first semester, I enrolled in Hebrew class, like many beginning M.Div.-ers. I made friends with some other [...]

September 21st, 2009 | Mark | 14 comments | Continued
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Seminary Syllabus Strategy #4: A Study Plan for Each Major Exam

Similar to creating a writing plan for papers, you should block out dedicated study time for major exams. If you do this now, at the beginning of the semester (and stick to your schedule), then you won’t be pinched to find time to study. It’s pretty simple: Reserve study blocks beginning about a week before [...]

September 14th, 2009 | Mark | 1 comment | Continued
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Seminary Syllabus Strategy #3: A Writing Plan for Every Major Paper

Seminary will give you plenty of practice writing papers. By the time I graduated with my M.Div, I could easily write ten pages about nothing. (Some would allege that my sermons are exactly that…but I digress.) Writing papers on the scale that seminary requires can be daunting if you haven’t done it before. Ten page [...]

September 6th, 2009 | Mark | 3 comments | Continued