Lincoln Christian University

Recent theological work on foundations of Christian education has explored a wide range of important systematic theology topics (e.g., sanctification, ecclesiology, pneumatology, Trinity, the nature of Scripture). An area that has not received much attention is eschatology. How do understandings of Christ's promised return impact the focus of educational ministries in the church? What is important for us to learn in this time of waiting? This paper focuses on biblical images and themes associated with waiting for Christ's return and key issues that should have an impact on Christian educators' ministry efforts. It explores how eschatological views give direction and shape to the church's teaching ministries.

Herodes als Kompositionsfigur im lukanischen Doppelwerk.

Spiritual formation is one of the recognized benchmarks of higher education that is Christian. A communal commitment to spiritual formation is indeed part of the Christian higher education community's DNA, and is in fact reflected in the criteria for accreditation in both the Association of Biblical Higher Education (ABHE) and the Association of Theological Schools (ATS). However, as many Christian institutions of higher education begin to engage in online instruction, even offering entire degree programs online, how can they affirm their campus's commitment to the spiritual formation of students? This article addresses the question of providing intentional Christian nurture toward spiritual formation in online degree programs. The aim of the article is to inform participants of the challenges and opportunities for student spiritual formation in online degree programs so as to better equip participants to develop Christian nurture initiatives for online students from an informed perspective. To do so the article includes two parts: (a) the development of a theoretical matrix for online spiritual formation, based principally on precedent literature and the experience of the two authors; and (b) a survey of actual Christian nurture and spiritual formation models specifically designed for online programs.

This article argues that John 7.15 claims neither literacy nor illiteracy for Jesus, but rather that Jesus was able to confuse his opponents with regards to his scribal literacy. According to the Johannine narrator, Jesus' opponents assumed he did not ‘know letters’, but also acknowledged that he taught as if he did. This article also suggests that the claim of John 7.15 is historically plausible in light of first-century Christianity's corporate memory(ies) of Jesus' literacy.