Your answer to number 2 brings up an interesting point, especially in these times when many seem hard set against entertaining the possibilty of God. I’ve read and seen ideo testimonies where someone strongly against Christian beliefs who would seemingly never be influenced otherwise claims to have been overtaken by a ’spirit’ or vision that changed their minds. And this also seems to have occured to Paul. It’s encouraging to know there’s always possibilities with God even when our reasoning doesn’t seem to be effective.

Your answer to number 3 got me thinking. Yes, it seems all reason should lead back to God. Yet we see people twist reason so much to lead away from God. I think we have to qualify that the reasoning be sound or wise, or at least spirtiually so, in order to lead in the right direction towards God.

It is possible, but not thorough. When we use the Bible as the sole source of theology we are missing a whole another outlook, or view of the archeological, psychological, and timetables that are relevant to today’s society.

The Bible is not just a whole bunch of stories; there are factual statements of many events in many people’s lives. The Bible is a collection of events in the lives of many people, and many stories are relevant to today’s problems in our lives.

One would not realize that if they used JUST the Bible, and not relevance resources within our ability to utilize.

2. Some Christian apologists (often called classical apologists) believe that using the Bible to convince an unbeliever of a Christian worldview is impossible because the unbeliever does not believe the Bible. Do you believe that this is true? Discuss.

I don’t believe that it is true for one reason, everything is possible with Christ, and the Holy Spirit that moves within us, and those around us. Yes, even the unbelievers can heed to or not heed to the Holy Spirit. We can also show by our actions, behavior, and attitude in all things.

3. Philosophical theology seeks to understand the world using nothing but what all people have in common for our reasoning capability. If someone you know did not believe the Bible but was searching for truth, how would philosophical theology be beneficial?

By allowing our selves to be a living sacrifice for our Lord, and Savior, and as we pick up our cross to follow Christ with His examples, commandments, and His sacrifice, we will show philosophically who Christ is by our attitude, and behavior in ALL things to those around us.

4. Historical theology seeks the contribution of past saints to formulate theology. Some people do not seek the contribution of past saints, thinking that Christians do not need tradition, since it has misled us so many times.
a. How is this attitude arrogant and fallacious?

When we rely solely on our own understanding without the counsel of peers, or past experienced individuals we are driving in the dark without realizing we should have had headlights on the car.

b. How is this attitude wise and cautious?

It could be considered wise and cautious if we are seeking Christ, and getting to know who God is without any outside influence. If that was true, than we have only ONE source of information to seek the knowledge we need. That is the Bible that conveys that information to us and nothing else. If we are told what things were like, and who Christ was without reading the Word about it as well, than we have only other people’s reinterpretation of who Christ is, and the Word. If we listen to others and research the Word for factual existence, we can get an accurate view of who Christ really is by research, and close encounters of our selves, or of others.

5. Systematic theology seeks to draw from all sources of theology. How does doing theology systematically help make the doctrine of God (for example) more complete?

By comparing all sources and showing beyond the shadow of doubt because of all the evidence that God is real, and loves them is a way of showing His completeness.

a. Systematic theology is the process of understanding the text, the life, the history, the implementations of Christ on our lives, and how it is relevant to our lives today.

As our Lord is alive, and our hearts crave for His love, grace, and continuing forgiveness in our lives we will continue to strive to know Him, and continue to crave Him in our lives today.

6. Review Subjective theology. How have you experienced Subjective theology in your own personal life?

I am still a little hazy on Subjective Theology because I was not able to find any reference to the title. But after googeling the phrase I came to understand it as when compared to what Christ did for us in history vs. what the actions of Christ does to us today within our soul because of His actions in history.

a. How have you experienced Subjective theology done in a small group?

Yes, as we share and experience Christ within each of our lives, we can feel the Holy Spirit move within our hearts, and reaching out to us through others, for us to reach out to each other while sharing.

7. It was said during the lesson that when reading the Bible “it does not matter what it means to you. It matters what it meant.” How is this true? Discuss.

While studying the Bible we have to study the Bible objectively as well as subjectively so that we may get what the Bible is really saying to us. Not what others tell us it says.

We have to study the Bible by
a. What did it mean in history?
b. What is the grammatical interpretation?
c. What is the contextual interpretation?
d. What is the literal interpretation?
e. Compare it to the sources available to you?
a. IE: New Testament vs. Old Testament vise a versa
f. What are the “Timeless principles”?
g. What is the “Timeless truth” of the scripture?
h. How does it apply today?
i. How does it apply to me?

8. Discuss the difference between asking…
a. What does a Scripture mean to you?

When asking, “What does a Scripture mean to you?” is it asking the literal interpretation of the Scripture.

b. How does a Scripture apply to you?

When asking, “How does a Scripture apply to you?” it is asking the individual how a particular scripture applies to their life, and how it may apply to their life later, or should it apply. It makes us interpret it to our needs, our lives, our desires, and our fears, hopes, etc.

9. Review irrelevant theology. Read Acts 1:26. The Apostles cast lots in order to replace Judas as an Apostle. How might an irrelevant theologian apply this passage?

Irrelevant theology is a mystery to me, as I could not find in the workbook, nor the required books that was assigned. I googled the phrase and came up with several items on this. As the lots were cast it could be taken out of context by an “irrelevant theologian” and used against the Word of God by misconstruing the verse into an approval of gambling, or that it was just by chance that Mathais became the 12th Appostle and not God ordained.

a. Give some other examples of how irrelevant theology might be practiced.

If I am right about “Irrelevant Theology” it could be practiced by other religions as they would take things out of context, and twist it to their desire, not God’s.

10. Review Eisegetical theology. Give some examples of how you have practiced this type of theology.

Same as #8, and #9 for why I am still a little cloudy on the definition. In order to understand certain Scriptures I have applied it to my life trying to interpret the way it may apply to my life and to others. Since there are many verses that may or may not apply to my life at this time. Then there are times where the Scripture may just be a metaphor, and not an actual literal meaning.

a. Why do you think that we often interpret Scripture this way?

In order to understand Scripture and its application to our lives we attempt to find the relevance in our life rather than see the connections in the Old Testament, and New Testament verses.

#2. If someone does not believe the Bible, using the Bible would be a very difficult place to begin discussing theology. Usually two drastically different opinions can lead to escalating a disagreement to the point of arguing. You first have to start on common ground and build from there.

#3. Using reason is a good way to get someone to think deeper for the “why’s” and “how’s” that are all around us. This will all eventually lead back to God in one form or another.

#4a. We must draw on history not necessarily “tradition”. This attitude can be arrogant because we can look back and see where tradition has failed to bring people to the knowledge of Christ. Tradition does not equal salvation. We must be humble and not “know it alls”.

#4b. Because traditions in and of themselves are not necessarily wrong. If you go to church regularly as a tradition, that is not wrong but for some this tradition equates to salvation. We must weigh and view what God says is important and not what man thinks is important.

#5. You can draw upon many sources to come to a conclusion. History, the Bible and nature are all intertwined to “see” God.

#6.a. I can see how this could easily happen in a small group setting. Many people agree to avoid an argument or conflict.

#6b. Not personally, that I can recall.

#7. Not everything in the Bible will be relevant to our lives and we cannot cling to promises not directly meant for us. If Christ healed a sick child, it doesn’t mean every child will be healed even if the parents have great faith.

#8a. What is means to you implies feeling and feelings can change, but the character of God never changes.

#8b. How can you apply the basic principle(s) to your own life or what does the scripture tell us about God’s character.

#9a. You must always have 12 elders.

#9b. You must always worship on “Saturday”. You must take communion “every week”.

10. I always want to see how every passage applies to my life. I am still waiting for my barns to be full and last time I checked my wine barrels were not overflowing. But our family has been greatly blessed by God, so how can we not be thankful!

Re: Your answer to number 4, good point, and it’s also at least for most of us tradition that pointed us to scripture to begin with. We weren’t born knowing it was special - to the contrary we were born with impulses that would tend to steer us away from scriptural principles, lol.. Typically someone initially had to drag us to a church service and / or give us a free Bible, lol. I think if they are both well applied, then scripture and tradition are mutually supporting and complimentary - I realize this may be stating the obvious, but I mean this in contrast to the thought that one is mutually exclusive of or opposed the other as is sometimes thought.

I think your answer to number 6 brings out a great point that we need to demonstrate to others that we have really thought seriously about what we believe before we should expect them to take us seriously. Why should anyone be convinced to believe as we do if our beliefs aren’t important enough to us to put the thought into it?

1. It is not possible to use the Bible as the only source of learning about God because ourselves and many others have experienced the same God for many years, and therefore have more to add. However, this information can be fallible. The Apostles themselves, certainly had credible knowledge of God, and what they have passed onto the first generation of church fathers has incredible relevancy.

2. I believe that outside evidence must be presented to validate the claims of the Bible, but without Biblical claims and stories, people really have no place to start. Not to mention, the truths of the Bible are timeless and ubiquitous, so everyone should be able to relate–even if they do not admit to it.

3. Using philosophical theology can relate to people because it takes advantage of our God-given reasoning capability. We can use outside philosophers to suggest truths that everyone knows is true, and then say ‘hey, God told us so many years before, why don’t we just trust him for what we have not yet reasoned for ourselves…’

4. The idea that we do not need tradition is actually unbiblical. (2 Thess 2:15) Paul suggested that we hold to teachings passed by word of mouth. It is wise to corss-check everything with Scripture, however, because tradition is can be fallicious.

5. Systematic theology is valuable because it considers all sources of information and does not give biases to any, while confirming all truths with Scripture. By leaving the Word as the rock, we can build our houses upon it. (Mt 7)

6. I grew up in a culture and academic environment that was overly free for anyone to believe whatever they wanted. ‘It’s all good, man!’ My culture and Jewish friends accept me because I believe differently–but how dare I tell them that they are lost… In small groups subjective theology is something that is easy to do to alleviate conflict.

7. It matters what the Bible meant when it was written. This is important to keep in mind to exigitate–put the passage in historical context to determine what was meant by a specific passage. Or else it would be very easy to confuse God’s will today.

8. What does Scripture mean to me is my interpretation of what God was saying to the specific audience in the specific context through the specific author. How it applies involves taking the often larger principle and comparing it to a modern situation to determine how it applies. The two decisions must be made seperately.

9. An irrelevant theologian would interpret Mt 1:26 to mean that in order to choose Church elders today, we can just cast lots and let God control the dice to fall on whomever God would choose to serve. Irrelevant theologians would say that God told the Israelites to not eat pork, and therefore we should not either. Irrelevant theologians would continue a foot washing like Jesus did. They might say that we have to be poor fisherman in order to be Christians. They might say that we have to have house churches today because that is the way the 1st century church was.

10. Eisegetical theology is reading into Scripture what we want it to say. It is hard to avoid because we all have biases and experiences that we might truly think are willed by God, but are taking the scriptural references out of context and we don’t want to admit we might have been in error. Sometimes we do it out of ignorance and sometimes to justify our actions. I used to address issues that bothered me at times when loved ones were weeping or rejoycing. While it is biblical to address issues that bother us (Mt 18:15), when someone is especially joyous or sad, is probably not the right time.

My wife was my volunteer (she was the only one who was interested enough to invest the time - what a GREAT woman!).

What is theology?
“Studying about God.”

How does a person come to an understanding about God?
“From church, from their parents, from Sunday school, from what they read in the Bible, and from how they see God move in their own life.”

What common mistakes do you think that a person commits with regards to the Bible and theology?”
“They let teir feelings decide if they are going to obey what they read and what they are taught instead of taking God at His Word. And, they let their emotions decide for them if what they are hearing someone teach is the truth or not without studying it for themselves.”

***We then went through the categories of theology and walked through the theological process charts. My Case Stuy Volunteer (okay, my wife…) responded:
“Until you became my pastor, I always read the Bible and figured that whatever God was saying there applied to me somehow. I used to sit in church and, whenever I heard a message about some sin or something that we needed to do differently, I was convinced that God intended everything in that message for me, and all I had to do was figure it out and I would be okay. I would go to the altar and ask for prayer, and I would stay there, asking God to speak to my heart and show me just what it was I needed to do. I was exhausted! Now I know that we have to study the context of what the text is saying - who wrote it, what did they mean when they wrote it, how did the people they wrote it to understand it, what was going on when it was written, why was it written when it was, and all of that. Then we have to find out how the Church has taught about these things, what different views of the passage or the truths there are, and which of those makes the most sense within the context of what we have learned already and what we have read today. THEN we find out how that applies to us today. You always tell us, ‘Nothing is in the Bible for no reason. There is always something to be learned, even if it is just to help us understand the nature and character of God better.’ So, I guess you need to see this as a confirmation that you have been doing it right, huh?”

1. Possible, though highly improbable. Being able to dissociate our own experiences, emotions, prior teachings heard, prior studies done, and the like, is extremely unlikely. It takes a great deal of discipline and a constant purposing to take the text as it is written and exegete it, then extract the “timeless truths” through systematically examining the text, and then determine the life application for today and do all of this “objectively”. This has been my intended approach for over twenty years, and I (drawing on the experience mode) find it difficult many times.

2. Not impossible, but it makes the task more difficult. Finding common ground (using the philysophical theological model) is a much more effective approach because in this post-modern/post-Christian society, we have to start from the point of “What is truth,” before we can get into “Who is man,” and “Who is God.” This is a new approach for me, one that I have only been attempting to employ for the last couple of years. I do try to incorporate the Bible whenever the person I am interacting with states a Biblical truth or concept by encouraging them with somthing like, “You know, the Bible says almost exactly the same thing that you just said…”

3. The same answer applies, really.

4. This is arrogant and fallacious in that it immediately negates what they got right, including what the closest to the source (as in the case of John and Jesus) passed on to the next “generation”, and so on. It is wise and cautious in that we cannot accept at face-value everything that has gone before - there have been far too many heresies and just plain wrong teachings for that to be a good idea.

5. Systematic theology can make the doctrine of God (for example) more complete by incorporating all of the knowledge/truth sources we can get ahold of and give us a more well-rounded and complete picture of who God is, what He has done, how He has done it, why He has done it, and what we are supposed to do about it. As just one simple example, without extrabiblical sources for understanding much of the context of the ancient texts, how God describes Himself would simply be lost or misunderstood. We would miss the richness and the relevance of how the Scriptures portray Him.

6. When I first came into fellowship with believers, and before I accepted Christ as my Lord and Savior, I attended a Bible study looking for some very serious answers. What I got instead was a bunch of unknowledgable know-it-alls whose approach to what was supposed to be the Truth-Source (the Bible) was completely subjective. It turned me off. And, their uncertainty about what the text itself was saying proved my suspicions - Christians were idiots who had no idea how to think for themselves; all they did was parrot what they heard from somebody else. Once I came to understand who Jesus Christ is and what I was supposed to do about that knwoledge and then was called into ministry, I knew part of what He was calling me to do was to teach people how to think and how to study the Bible so that there would be no reason for people like I was to think of them as idiots.

7. If we do not start with the foundational premise that what the Bible said when it was written is the foundation for any and all truth to be derived from what it says, then we really have nowhere to legitimately go with claiming the Bible has any real meaning at all for us today. As Michael says in the video, “Read Moby Dick…”

8. Asking, “What does the Bible mean to you,” makes every point of view valid, whether it really is or not. Asking, “How does the Scripture apply to you,” starts from the premise that there is a transcendent truth that can be known and that has meaning for our lives today. Not all viewpoints are valid - only those that conform to the truth (which is the greatest lack in our society today - or, one of them).

9. Staff openings would need to be solves only through the casting of lots; we would always need to have twelve men doing all of the ministry; we could only choose form among those who had been with us from the beginning, and on and on. The problems with this are obvious, and these rules would have to be adjusted and changed as time went on, which would then invalidate the theology of the text all together. Then what would our Irrelevant Theologian do? Look at the Word-of-Faith Movement and you will see how they have had to make these same kinds of adjustments over time.

10. Early on in my ministry experience, I ventured for a short time into topical teaching. You want to talk about eisegesis! It didn’t take long before I was in great conflict over what I was reading and the point I was trying to prove in my message. It was far to easy to “agendize” my messages, trying to make a point, and hurting people while dishonoring the heart of the Word. I got “saved” out of that pretty early, for which I and countless others are deeply greatful.

I agree with your answers to number 2 and 3 in that for most arguments we base our faith on, it would be at least difficult to convince someone who doesn’t fully trust the Bible to begin with. Fortunately some apologetics can work with what is claimed in the Bible - i.e. new findings in archeology that confirm Biblical claims, etc - to help lend arguments based on the Bible’s credibility. And also being able to demonstrate some reasoning independently from other sources can help corroboration.