ALOHA! Greetings from the 50th state! My wonderful wife, Emelda, and I have been married for 10 years. We are both from Friday, July 6, 2007
Some Stuff About Me...
ALOHA! Greetings from the 50th state! My wonderful wife, Emelda, and I have been married for 10 years. We are both from 
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
congrats on getting your blog done and thankyou for being part of this class.
steve taylor
Tom, I did this assignment thinking it was to be 500 words; then I reviewed the syllabus and discovered differently. So sorry that this is so long. I thought about condensing, but then I though you may appreciate the constructive observations. God bless you.
Tom, I commend you and stand amazed at your incredible reflection. You pulled the classroom experience directly into your assignment. You have taught me, in that what I presumed was an assignment of words, you grasped the need for creativity and images within your work. In particular, you used the signpost and stoplight mages to communicate your message. You also unlocked your creativity, opened and closed your reflection with a unique spin of the Creation narrative. Your work highly impressed me.
The usage of image in your reflections sends the message concerning imagery – that is: that you get it! You have grasped Steve’s teaching and embraced concepts that have become increasingly obvious in our world – the rise of the image and the fall of the word. Indeed, images express meanings within our culture, as is demonstrated by traffic signs, restroom doors, and Olympic venues. Images speak whole sentences, represent huge concepts and operations, emerge as icons, and have proliferated into every aspect of life.1 You have caught the wave of the present and future as you insert images into your communications.
You demonstrated that indeed you were made in the image of God as you engaged beautiful creativity2 and you masterfully juxtaposed the Creation narrative of Genesis 1 and our recent class and instructor.3 You brilliantly engaged the art of DJing and proved yourself a successful Bible and culture DJ. You contrasted the obvious cultural component of the present, the class and instructor, and placed it into the historic biblical text. In a few creative words, you framed yourself, Steve, and the class into the Bible genre, and the reader felt tension and excitement to reconcile the two verbal images that you verbally inserted into a single frame. It was great!
Your past, present, and future (three point reflection) reminds me of the life cycle that mandates change. The challenge for change produces both excitement and concern,4 and it appears that you have already begun the transition in your communications.
As you feel challenged to lay aside your prejudices, fears, and prejudgments and to do a better job of sitting, staying, listening, relating, connecting, and engaging, you may want to focus on your sermon as an “environment” of wondering and imagination.5 In your reflections, you already proved yourself and created wonder by inserting questions and engaging the reader. Your imagination came through with your creative work of DJing and imagery.
Concerning your apprehensions about the texts carrying multiple meanings, you may find comfort in knowing that the Hebrew sages have suggested for many years that Old Testament texts carry at least four levels of understanding. In basic Hebrew hermeneutics, scholars typically deal with multiple meanings to the texts.6
As you advance in your quest to communicate the gospel, it appears that you have already crossed the threshold into far greater effectiveness. You apparently had understood your mission and ministry that were stated repetitively – “communicate.” As you pursue your calling, your message will connect and you creatively communicate using the tools and gifts that God has given you, the impressions with which the Holy Spirit will grace you, and the practical methods that you picked up in class.
1 Michell Stephens, The Rise of the Image, the Fall of the Word (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998), p.59.
2 Steve Taylor, The Out of Bounds Church (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2005), p. 61.
3 Ibid., p. 139.
4 Olive M. Fleming Drake, Spirituality To Go (London: Darton, Longman and Todd Ltd, 2005), pp. 116, 117.
5 Christine McSpadden, “Preaching Scripture Faithfully in a Post-Christendom Church,” Ellen F. Davis and Richard B. Hays, eds. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2003), p. 131.
6 http://www.crosscurrents.org/levinas.htm; see also James Trimm, Jewish Hermeneutics, Netzarim Publishing.
Post a Comment