D
My first 50+ years was with uneducated pastors and preachers, and I'm still unraveling that mess! I am still having to undo a lot of bad teaching and to learn the most rudimentary biblical concepts! At this point -- at age 68 -- I don't think I will ever be through dealing with reeducation!
One of my most recent studies before last night's -- which is not even close to finished by any means -- the person of the H Spirit. As hesitant as I was, that was followed up by biblical examples of tongues -- a study I am dragging my feet on.
Before these, I started studying, again, Law, law, works, and sin. And last night, I was up all night with a biblical study of the end of time.
Some of these are simple concepts for most who have been students of the Bible, yet I have been such for 54 years, and I feel like a novice, because of spending so long with bad teaching. Sometimes, it is just plain disheartening.
It is fortunate that where I attend now, leaders and teachers are educated, or they are neither leading or teaching. I just wish I could attend all the classes, but I am fortunate to get one a week.
One of my most recent studies before last night's -- which is not even close to finished by any means -- the person of the H Spirit. As hesitant as I was, that was followed up by biblical examples of tongues -- a study I am dragging my feet on.
Before these, I started studying, again, Law, law, works, and sin. And last night, I was up all night with a biblical study of the end of time.
Some of these are simple concepts for most who have been students of the Bible, yet I have been such for 54 years, and I feel like a novice, because of spending so long with bad teaching. Sometimes, it is just plain disheartening.
It is fortunate that where I attend now, leaders and teachers are educated, or they are neither leading or teaching. I just wish I could attend all the classes, but I am fortunate to get one a week.
(I know, you wroite all that and I got the part where you're hesitant on tongues. lol)
I recently started reading Acts. Really recently, since I'm only on Acts 2, but because of that bad teaching I did get, I'm just now trying to put the pieces together on what happened right after Pentecost. The dudes -- fishermen and tax collectors -- were speaking clearly to a bunch of people not-from-around-these-here-parts, so I got curious on which languages they were speaking. After all, if you think about Jerusalem today, there are only three languages I can imagine being spoken in that area -- Hebrew, Arabic, or English. (And I suspect I hooked onto English because I only speak American, so any time I've ever understood anything anyone from that part of the world said was when they could speak English. I really don't know if English is a common language in that part of the world.)
So, I'm having fun. (Why study, if we're not having fun doing it? lol) The last couple of days I've been taking each group of people mentioned in Acts 2 to figure out who they were, how far away from home they were, and all to see if they would be speaking the same language or not. Bonus learning happening to. I'm getting where Parthians lived. And Elamites. And Mesopotamia was.
Just wanted to give you a heads up. You don't have to stick to courses to study. Just read something in the Bible that gets you curious and then go off on that. Sometimes learning badly, gives us a good reason to sink our teeth into the truth on our own. Ends up studying that day of tongue-talking has broaden my understanding more than I expected it to.