\u201cThe most awesome learning feat on the planet – a child\u2019s acquisition of spoken language – occurs in the absence of any formal instruction.\u201d — George Leonard<\/p>\n
\u201cYou don\u2019t know what you don\u2019t know. That\u2019s why continuing education is good.\u201d \u2013 Bill Day<\/p>\n
“A man who carries a cat by the tail learns something he can learn in no other way.” — Mark Twain<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen [the Sanhedrin] saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus.\u201d \u2013 Luke, commenting after the \u201ceducated men\u201d quizzed the two disciples<\/p>\n
\u201cYou could possibly consider that Peter\u2019s and John\u2019s \u2018graduate school\u2019 was their 3 years of walking with Jesus.\u201d \u2013 Jeff Walling<\/p>\n
\u201cI never let my schooling interfere with my education.\u201d — Mark Twain<\/p>\n
\u201c[In graduate school] we all seek to integrate the best biblical scholarship with real ministry challenges because it takes more than good intentions to transform lives to the glory of God.\u201d \u2013 Evertt Huffard<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve been putting off typing these thoughts\u2026perhaps mostly due to fear that I am not objective about the subject (which I fully acknowledge that I am not)\u2026but I desire to be known in this area and have the rich feedback that I oftentimes get from you. <\/p>\n
I\u2019m going to begin graduate school in the not-to-distant future. It\u2019s an awesome privilege and opportunity to stretch and grow. But I am still struggling with the idea that it is the best use of my time. It\u2019s definitely good use of my time, but I\u2019m wondering if it is the best use of it. <\/p>\n
Let me start with my fears\u2026 <\/p>\n
I\u2019m afraid of the demand it will be on my time (Evertt Huffard said to plan on 1 full day a week).
I\u2019m afraid of it taking me away even more than I already am from \u2018people work\u2019.
I\u2019m afraid of really loving it and wanting to dive into it more than into people.
I\u2019m afraid of the new relationships I would forge through it replacing the ones I need to continue to invest in locally.
I\u2019m afraid of the discipline it would take.
I\u2019m afraid of losing my status as \u201cunqualified, but chosen\u201d in the eyes of man (see Luke\u2019s quote above).
I\u2019m afraid of being seen as a typical preacher-type.
I\u2019m afraid of disappointing people due to my increasing inaccessibility.
I\u2019m afraid of the frustration that will come inside the inevitable tension between \u201cneeding to study\u201d and \u201cneeding to be with people\u201d. <\/p>\n
Let me go on to my excitement\u2026 <\/p>\n
I\u2019m excited about the demand on my time, giving me a more tangible, explainable excuse for why I\u2019m inaccessible to people.
I\u2019m excited about learning more, and learning more about how to learn more.
I\u2019m excited about the new relationships I would forge through it.
I\u2019m excited about the discipline it would demand of me.
I\u2019m excited about how it would help me be a better preacher.
I\u2019m excited about learning what I don\u2019t know about it that I should be excited about. <\/p>\n
As I re-read this, noticeably missing from my list above is any fear or excitement concerning my family. It\u2019s because I\u2019m just totally clear about the priority of my family above all else. I\u2019m willing to live and die for my family, so of course I\u2019m willing to fail graduate classes for my family, as well as lose my \u2018job\u2019 for my family. As long as I stay true to that, graduate school does not benefit or hurt my family in any significant way. So I have no fear, nor excitement, in this decision concerning them. This struggle, for me, only affects my \u201cworking hours,\u201d so to speak. <\/p>\n
Ultimately, all my fears and excitement aside, I guess the question that I\u2019m looking to answer is this: <\/p>\n
Will there be a significant improvement in my effectively winning the lost to Christ by going to graduate school? <\/p>\n
Tough question to answer. I\u2019m open to suggestions (even guesses) on how to attempt an answer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u201cThe most awesome learning feat on the planet – a child\u2019s acquisition of spoken language – occurs in the absence of any formal instruction.\u201d — George Leonard \u201cYou don\u2019t know what you don\u2019t know. That\u2019s why continuing education is good.\u201d \u2013 Bill Day “A man who carries a cat by the tail learns something he […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pO6nf-9","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brianmashburn.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brianmashburn.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brianmashburn.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brianmashburn.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brianmashburn.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.brianmashburn.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brianmashburn.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brianmashburn.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brianmashburn.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}