Course Selection Day!

I already mentioned how much I had been waiting to receive that phone call from Southern to see whether Courtney and I were going to be accepted as students for the Fall semester (yes, part of me always thought that there were many, many reasons why they would not accept us...). Since that call, the next day that I have been looking forward to in this seminary journey - that is today, Course Selection Day!

Nothing special about today, really. After all, I had already spent hours looking into the course requirements for my degree and already had my entire degree planned out. I already knew which cores and which professors I wanted to pick and the order in which I wanted to take my courses. After I was finished with mine, since there were still a few days until course selection day, I decided to do the same thing for Courtney's program and try to help her out with her courses. (How kind of me!) Once I was done that, I decided to do that for one of the programs that Courtney is still considering (not very strongly... but still a possibility) as well.

Then finally today came, and I got to log in and spend all of 60 seconds clicking and dragging the courses I wanted to take for the fall semester. Now I'm all registered! (it was a little anticlimactic really...). Again, it reminded me very much of my course selection for my undergrad, except a lot less stressful, and there was no need to click "sign in" right at 12:00AM to try to reduce the chances that you were going to be locked out of the system for 20 minutes until someone else logged out. So here is the product of the 60 seconds of excitement right after breakfast this morning:

MDiv. (Biblical and Theological Studies)

(Fall 2013)

• Elementary Greek (Dr. Plummer) --> (yes I'll do some Greek again...)
• Leadership and Family Ministry (Dr. Stinson)
• Introduction to Church History I (Dr. Haykin)
• Theology of the New Testament (Dr. Schreiner)
• Introduction to Missiology (Rev. Pratt)

I get to take Leadership and Family Ministry as well as Introduction to Missiology with Courtney, so I am really looking forward to that! Doing school together sure will be interesting, and very different from what we're used to now!

The Southern (Wake Up) Call

There are very few phone calls that I remember receiving that were as eagerly awaited and as exciting as the call I got on the evening of February 12th, 2012 from Louisville, Kentucky. That was the call I had dreamed of receiving for years, when I would finally hear "we are happy to inform you that you have been accepted to study at Southern Seminary". I had already started dreaming and thinking about what life in seminary would be like, what it would be like to meet and study under great professors and scholars such as Dr. Albert Mohler Jr., Dr. Russell Moore and Dr. Thomas Schreiner. August couldn't come fast enough! I was on my way to teach some violin lessons and, needless to say, my mind was not really focused on music or my students very well.

In a sense, this call made me feel a lot like how receiving an acceptance letter from McMaster University made me feel just a few years ago - that feeling of relief, and dreams coming true, and something so great finally being so close, is probably something we can all relate to. Maybe it wasn't a phone call or a letter that has made you feel unusually and uniquely overjoyed, but chances are that you can relate to the feeling I'm trying to explain. For you, likely, it wasn't seminary and you might be thinking that this excitement about seminary sounds  a little obsessive. If you are, you are not too far off from the truth.

The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary

I think part of me has been obsessed with seminary for a few years. I've always enjoyed school and reminisce about studyig and learning at least once a week (even though I really enjoy the working life). People I know who feel called to go to ministry and decide to go to seminary are some of my present-day spiritual heros. The combination of going back to school and being prepared and equipped by the Holy Spirit through pastors and professors to serve the Lord in full time ministry is that one season of life I often can't wait for.

My wife often says to me, "don't wish away your present" - often in a very 'be careful', wise, and gentle way. God has really used her in my life to help me see this very temptation in my life with regards to school in seminary. Throughout the past year I have gotten a few wake-up calls and warnings in this area of my life. I have realized more and more and been able to apply to my life more and more the idea that ministry preparation does not begin nor end with seminary. The purpose of the seminary is the glory of God through preparation for the service of God. Seminary will only be as beneficial as I can see past the seminary to the call of the Lord in my life. It would be foolish and downright pathetic if one of the tools God wanted to use to refine me became an idol in my life. Let us not wish we had what we don't and were where we aren't. Let us not wish away, in discontentment and envy, our present blessing from God for the hope and assumed joy in something future the Lord doesn't have for us (yet, and might never). .