Students Grasp of Biblical Theology

This one went as expected...

Every now and then I like to write about how my students (and today my group Bible study) respond to certain topics. It helps me solidify areas where I need to improve, and I hope it will help you learn from my mistakes and experience.

What do I mean by Biblical Theology?

For this post, Biblical Theology (BT) simply means seeing or expressing how different biblical texts address a similar topic or idea.

Biblical Theology simply means seeing or expressing how different biblical texts address a similar topic or idea.

Today I’ll write about my observations from teaching different groups and attempting to get them to engage with BT. The last lecture day of my OT 1 and 2 classes include a sort of tie in to biblical theological themes from the semester. I teach these courses at the college and seminary level. This past week I also asked my group Bible study to think in these terms so I’ll include them here too.

College Students

Today I feel like going from youngest to oldest (and I’m the one writing), so we’ll start with college students. I had two college level classes this semester, for a total of about 70 students. In this group I had to prod the class in a few ways to get them to grasp what I meant. Then, a few women who were able to tie themes from Esther into other Biblical texts, and these students showed an excellent grasp of the concept. In another course I again had a few women and one man who were able to engage at this level of making connections across the biblical canon. Many of the students struggled with the idea. After class I had a few students tell me that they had only read many of the biblical books for the first time this semester, so I think that accounts for some of the struggle. Since the women seemed to do a better job overall than the men, it might also be due to higher order thinking still developing in many men at that age. These are just ideas, not certainties.

Seminary Students

As soon as I asked the question about connecting the main ideas from the texts of Zechariah and/or Malachi to other biblical texts the students started listing ideas, some of which were extremely insightful. Both men and women engaged this topic, and nearly the entire class had ideas. It was a very striking contrast to my college level class. Based on the sort of responses I got, I will work these sorts of questions into future lessons for seminary students in OT survey courses! I think it’s possible that age has a little to do with these students abilities. But, I’m also thinking it has to do with the fact that these students have largely engaged with the biblical text more frequently and for a longer period of time (a longer life). Perhaps familiarity with the canon increases one’s ability to make textual connections? I think so.

Group Bible Study

This is a group of adults of varying ages who have been believers for a while and read their Bibles regularly (I think). I knew BT questions would require using a muscle many of them had not exercised often, so I prepared some other verses that expressed the same ideas and then asked questions deductively to try and get the group to see what ideas were present in the series of texts and how they expanded on the ideas. It did not go as well as planned… I think I bear some of the responsibility as the leader. Also in terms of tiredness - because this semester I had already worked 36 hours in three days by the time Bible study rolled around. Once I pushed enough, a few folks gladly chimed in. But many looked at me like I was speaking Hebrew.

Conclusion

Overall I was encouraged at the way in which many people can see and express connections across the biblical texts about how those different texts address similar ideas or themes. I don’t think I emphasize this strategy enough in my discipleship efforts at church. I firmly think that part of loving God with our mind involves developing a well-formed mind which is able to think about BT and express these concepts to other people in the church (or academic settings). What I’ve learned in thinking through teaching the past week is that I should work at finding more ways to encourage this sort of thinking. I believe it will help my top learners grow and challenge my other learners as well by showing them what is possible for them to do also. My goal would be that those who I lead are able to think about how to apply these biblical concepts in their life at work, at home and in the community.

Postscripts

From time to time I make posts like this about what how my students responded to different topics. One of those is:

Other times I tend to write more about technology that can aid in discipleship. One of those recent posts is: