Much To Be Grateful For

Greetings faithful readers!


Since the G-force beginning of the school year, Providence has been more than generous which means life has been almost unbearable. In fact, the addage, "To whom much is given, much will be required" has taken on a whole new meaning the past few months.

The Worldview Class is going strong! I'm sorry I didn't update you all about this sooner. By God's grace, we have 10 students who are joining us this year. They are all doing remarkably well under the strain of an truncated calendar. This week, we move into the Biology section. I'm excited because we're now moving into the Ephesians study.

My church has me preaching every 3-4 weeks. This is an amazing commitment. My hat is off to all the pastors out there who put together solid content on a weekly basis. Both the challenges and the experience are both incredible opportunities. Our preaching team is starting an Advent series this week and then we're going into John's gospel starting January.

Rowan (who most of you will know from IPS) launched a ministry to reach out to young ministry leaders a few years back. I'm working as the conference administrator for next year's event. It's so amazing to see the people involved and what God is doing through them across the country and the world.

Even with all of that going on, I'm still enjoying the brief reprieve I get every Monday afternoon working with my two music students. James and Rachael are both progressing amazingly. We set the bar pretty high at the beginning of the year and they both are growing by leaps every week.

My friend, Jon, is in a classroom team putting on the Perspectives course. I joined late in the year but started taking the course for credit. He's working diligently to bring the class out to our church and I'll probably be working along side him in the spring.

Looking at all this has thrown my constant ingratitude into sharp relief. In fact, last night I was thinking over the parade of obligations that's standing in the middle of the street, trumpets and mallets in hand, noticing that all I did was complain. As it turns out, when I complain about God's blessing, I treat the blessing like it's a curse.

But the fact of the matter is that God is incredibly generous. God is doing an amazing work and he invites us to join in the task. God gives much, requires much and provides everything.

Yet even in this cycle of blessing, I can be cranky. Even in this place of God's work, in God's time with God's provision, I can be a ungrateful.

The work isn't going anywhere, but the joy belongs to those who are thankful.

So today, dear friends, I'm looking at the blessing and thanking God for His kindness.

Happy thanksgiving!

Canceling the Worldview Class…Maybe

It’s with great hesitancy that I’m announcing the possible cancellation of both Worldview Class sections for the 2011-2012 school year (see the original invitation post here).

To keep a section open, we need 15 students per section, but currently that number is far below what we need in order to launch the class. In light of that, we’re going to give it another week.

If we can have 15 students registered by next Wednesday, we’ll keep that section open. If not, then I’ll trust the sovereign hand of God as He guides the school year in what I’m sure will be delightful, new direction.

Either way, we’ll make the final decision next Wednesday (8/31).

If you want to join us this year, send me an e-mail (david@worldviewclass.org) or give me call (503.201.7631).

For those of you who may be waiting for next year, all I can say is that canceling class this year will seriously jeopardize the chances of a class next year. So I strongly recommend signing up for this year.

Click here to see the details for this year's class and, as always, you can find a whole crop of details at http://worldviewclass.org If you can’t find what you’re looking for, just contact me.

This class has received immense support from all of our families and I can’t thank you enough for your prayers and encouragement.

I hope to be working with you this year!

-David

(cross-posted at worldviewclass.org)

Preachers

A horrible preacher says,
          "Love me!"
A bad preacher says,
           "Don't hate me."
A good preacher says,
           "Don't hate God."
A great preacher says,
           "Love God!"

Announcing the 2011-2012 Worldview Class!

As of Friday, it’s official: The 2011-2012 Worldview Class is open to registration!

You can see the announcement at WorldviewClass.org (click here).

Over the past four years, we’ve worked hard to make this class an invaluable context for students to learn about the Big Ideas of our time.

Watching a student see, experience, argue for and against concepts like ex nahilo creation, dialectical materialism, metaphysical monism etc is a thrill that never gets old. I’m excited to launch out into year five and experience the adventure with a whole new class of students.

A few highlights about what we have planned:

• A shorter class calendar. After trying the 36-week calendar, I’ve decided to make the tough decision and cut the whole thing back to 30 weeks. It was painful to cut 12 hours of class time out of the syllabus, but this will allow us to start mid-September and end mid-May.
• We’re keeping everything. Even with the shorter schedule, the core assignments are staying. That means we’re going through the whole Understanding the Times curriculum: 11 tests, 11 essays, 581 pages of reading and over 24 hours of video. And we’re keeping the WV Class distinctive, too. That’s 60 hours of in-class discussion and lecture, our private, teacher-moderated online forum, 226 Bible reading assignments, and a whole pile of extra credit options. Not bad for 30 weeks.
• Affordability. Increased expenses have forced a $50 increase in tuition.  That’s an extra $25 per semester, but we’re keeping all the discount and scholarship options. If you want to take this class, I want you to take this class and I don’t want finances to be the deal-breaker. We’ll do whatever it takes to make this class financially possible.
• The Leadership Training Course. Today, I’m officially announcing the inaugural year of our second year program: the Leadership Training Course.  Every year I get requests for a follow up to the Worldview Class. It’s taken a few years to design one that actually met a need but after about 2 years of planning, I am pumped to try this out with a select group of alumni students. You can learn more here. (If you've taken the Worldview Class before, check your e-mail. There's a poorly formatted e-mail invitation waiting for you.)

To celebrate the up-coming year, I'm dedicating this weeks worth of blog posts to all things Worldview, so stick around!

This is going to be a great class. Sign up, tell your friends, bring your friends and post a smiley in the comment section --just for kicks. :-)

Happy Monday!

NCFCA Rule Changes to Apologetics (Round 2)

I noted the changes to the Apol rules last October. Yesterday, another update was posted to the IE page.

For those of you who are tracking the NCFCA's revamping of the IE events, below is a compared document showing a mark-up of the changes to Apol

(NOTE: Because only the .pdf file was posted, I had to convert it to .docx for the comparison. So a few of the mark-ups might be a bit screw-ball).

With my brother's wedding in a week, I don't have time to offer commentary right now,but I'll try to get to it in the next few weeks.

Until then, leave a comment and tell me what you think!

2010-2011 Apol Rule Changes

Telling It Like It Is

I think this approach might get users to create better passwords:

(Click to view full)

Open Query #83

How much of your summer reading have you done?

NCFCA announces changes to Apologetics

Teresa Hudson, president of the NCFCA announced changes to the up-coming speech season. last Sunday (question for the webmaster: can we get an RSS for News feed?).

Included in the announcement was a "reworking" of the Apol topics. She writes,

In recent years, many of you have requested a reassessment of one of our most loved events, Apologetics. As a result of that review, Apologetics will be undergoing some reworking of the subject matter in order to provide fresh research topics for those that have been participating in the event up to this point and to cover ground not previously addressed in the first edition of topics. The revised topics will be available on the NCFCA website by early August. Because all the categories and topics are worthy of study, we will leave the existing question list up until the new list is ready to post.

Most of you know that I was included in the many who "requested a reassessment" (actually, I requested a full-on revision, but "baby steps to the elevator"). So for those of you who are wondering, no, the up-coming changes aren't mine. But in the past few weeks, we did have a couple conversations/e-mail exchanges about how to improve the event that went really well.

We'll have to wait and see how the changes turn out. Personally, I think it'll be good.

When the updated list is released, I'll try to get some notes up for you all.

In the mean time, what do you think? Which topics would you like to see added? Removed? Kept? If you were in charge, what would you do?

(HT to Sarah)

"...To The Church's Impoverishment"

In James Boice's commentary on Ephesians, he makes the following remark concerning 4:11-13:

"Another reason for the rise of clericalism is the tendency of laypeople to sit back and "let the pastor do it." Stott quotes a remark of Sir John Lawrence to this effect: 'What does the layman really want? He wants a building which looks like a church; clergy dressed in the way he approves; services of the kind he's been used to, and to be left alone.' Thus do laymen abandon their God-given tasks and the professional clergy pick them up...to the church's impoverishment."

Boice, James Montgomery. Ephesians: An Expositional Commentary. BakerBooks. 1997. p142

Expectations

I'm always telling my students, "Profundity stands on obvious' shoulders." That simple principle has been illustrated yet again by the (I suppose somewhat embarrassing) fact that my communication has been transformed over the past few months by this comic: Click Here.

Ideas Have Consequences

Best Blog Description Ever...I think

I moseyed over to Jon's blog (a very dear friend of mine) and noticed his blogroll widget included a one-liner description of my blog.

I don't know, dear readers. Is this a compliment or not?

David Knopp Turns 2!

And we're back!

Thanks for sticking around while I enjoyed some time off. I thought we should get things rolling again with a look at some blog stats.

In typical Knopp fashion, I completly forget to celebrate this blog's birthday on May 22! Sad day, but not uncommon for my humble corner of the internet. So in honor of this unmomentous occasion, here are some stats about what happened in the from May 2010-May 2011.

In its second 365 days, this blog has had...

...128 Posts
...300 Comments
...1,957 visitors.
...5,109 visits.

Number of Countries Represented: 56
Number of States Represented: 51 (including Washington DC)

Top 5 States:
5. Utah
4. Virginia
3. California
2. Washington
1. Oregon

Top 5 Posts (blog)
5. David Livingston Quote
4. Apologetics Posts
3. Osama bin Laden and Proverbs
2. Don't Party in the Streets
1. On Beauty


Top 5 Lables
5. Blogging
4. Worldview Class
3. Real Life
2. NCFCA
1. Just for Fun

Top 3 Private Referrals (Active)
3. Story of a Seemstress
2. Whatnot and Whatnot
1. Ted Bradley

Top 3 Public Referrals
3. Blogger.com
2. Twitter.com
1. Facebook.com

Just about 2 of every 3 visitors are coming back. In fact, half of those coming back, have been here at least 10 times before. You guys are amazing.

Thank you for your all your comments, links, referrals, encouragement, and continued support. You all are the best!

The Declaration of Independence

"We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. — And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor."

An Unintentional Sabbatical

I was just visiting a friends blog when I noticed the widget that said I hadn't blogged in 4 weeks.

Time flies when you're having fun.

I've been on an unofficial and, actually, unintentional blogging sabbatical. The past few weeks, I've been cranking out some projects recently --mostly worldview related but a few others as well.

I cannot wait to tell you all what's cooking around here, but it will have to wait another week. I'm speaking at the OCEAN conference this weekend and then taking a much-needed week of rest.

After that this blog will be back into its usual rhythm.

Thanks again for stopping by. I'll see you all in a week!