A Great Intensive...Surprisingly

I found myself too busy to blog all last week as I was absorbed in church history from 9:00 in the morning to 4:30 in the afternoon each day. Most of my classes this summer were intensives...and I dreaded each one. That format is terrible for learning because you are mentally exhausted by about 2:00 each day, causing the final 3-4 hours to be a total waste. The professor is forced to cover an immense amount of information in a small amount of time and is not able to do any of the material justice.

Church History was a different story, however. The professor, Craig Barnes, is a part-time professor at Pittsburgh Seminary and a part-time Presbyterian pastor. He was incredibly knowlegable, had the heart of a pastor, and possessed an uncanny ability to tranfer this ancient information into life-transforming practicality. He was able to bridge the gap of time to make these ancient thoughts and ideas relevant once again for our current church culture. I even find myself excited to get to work on my research paper for his class...and let's just say that doesn't happen often.