Surprised by Oxford

Surprised By Oxford, Carolyn Weber

I loved this open, honest and sometimes raw autobiographical account of one woman’s gradual coming to faith over her first year of doctoral studies at Oxford.

Written by a literature scholar, it is full of poetry and abounds with literary references, so will delight those who love the written word. Yet, because the subject matter is so important and life-changing, it raises the writing to a whole new level.

Structured around the calendar year of study, Weber openly walks us through her questions, doubts, uncertainties and challenges as she considered who God is, what he has done and how faith and reason can co-exist and complement one another.

I found there was something here for new converts, searchers, old converts, and those who grew up in the faith. It is of particular help for both those who are highly educated and yet wonder if there is more to this life; and also for those who walk alongside them to understand that faith can come gradually, with the asking of many questions and voicing of many doubts.

It is clear that God placed her in Oxford to learn of Him that year. She had intelligent, educated friends and lecturers who were Christians. A fellow student clearly presented the gospel to her and helped her think more deeply about her ingrained beliefs and challenged those that did not stand up under scrutiny.

Here are some of her words along the journey:

“The morning after I heard the gospel, however, I woke up with what felt like a hangover. Little would I know it was of the spiritual kind that accompanies the inevitable dawn that life is not, perhaps, what we previously thought it was. And we cannot go back to pretending. What a headache to be caught in that liminal space! Literally.” (p100)

[About the bible] I devoured it, just as a best–selling book (which, coincidentally, it has always been). Even the long monotonous lists. Even the really weird stuff, most of so unbelievable as to only be true. I have to say I found it the most compelling piece of creative non-fiction I had ever read. If I sat around for thousands of years, I could never come up with what it proposes, let along how it intricately Genesis unfolds towards Revelation… No wonder this stuff causes war, I though as I read, between nations and within each of us.” (p103)

“Life is messy. Life is beautiful and terrible and messy. So why would we expect a faith in this life that is easy to understand? Why expect a gift wrapped up neatly within the tissues of our brains and tied with a nice bow of material clarity?“ (p178)

“To be one person one moment: lost. Then to be another person the next moment: found. It is the difference, as the saying really does go, between night and day. Outwardly I seemed the same, but inwardly everything had changed. I went to the window and watched the birth of the dawn. Everything, every thing appeared in this better light, this brighter light. (p270-1)

This book was a very special read, I highly recommend it.

Keep the Faith

Keep the Faith, Martin Ayers

What do you do when as a Christian you have doubts about your faith? Do you hide them away, hoping no-one will notice? Do you long to ask for wise advice, but are unsure where to turn and who to trust? Do you decide to investigate what non-Christians think, to see if that makes more sense?

The first step is realising that many Christians have doubts. I would suspect that all of us at some time or another have asked:

• Is this really true?
• Can I believe the bible?
• Do I really believe that Jesus is the son of God and the saviour of the world?
• Do I really need a saviour anyway?
• Why do so many nice, intelligent people think Christianity is a crutch and am a fool for being a Christian?

As Ayers says:

An atmosphere of unbelief surrounds us, in which declaring you are a Christian seems equivalent to admitting you’ve decided that thinking is inconvenient and you’d like to get by in life from now on without using your brain. In this environment do you ever ask yourself, “What if I really have gone mad?” (p14)

This little book will help you to think logically through doubt. It will help you to see what the alternatives on offer really are and whether that is where you want to go. It will not deal with specific doubts per se, but it will equip you with a way forward when dealing with doubts when they arise.

Ayers points our two major problems with doubt – it erodes our thinking which then affects our actions. So, he wants to arm the believer first with right thinking and then with helpful actions.

In addressing our thinking about doubt, we need to acknowledge that no-one sees anything from an unbiased point of view – the atheist, the Christian, no-one. Many atheists will acknowledge that they do not believe in God, because they do not want there to be a god. Unbelief is a matter of faith as much as belief is. If you want there to be no God, you will structure your argument around that. If you want there to be a God, you will organise your thoughts around that.

There is no neutral ground. What you believe or don’t believe has such a profound effect on your life that it’s impossible for anybody to be objective. A Christian is naturally going to be more sympathetic to arguments in favour of Christianity than somebody who hates the God of the Bible (p64)

I found this reminder that none of us are bias-free helpful, as well as the reality that we all follow a world view with a potential agenda. Along the way he points out some of the problems of choosing not to believe in God or Christianity, one of which is that we end up with a very bleak view of humanity, for there is no reason to attach any value at all to human life.

The second part moves on to our actions in the face of doubt. Ayers want us to do three things when facing doubt: remember the Fall, remember your Redeemer and remember the stakes.

Remembering the Fall means understanding how the Fall has skewed all our thinking, people do try to suppress the truth. When we have doubts, we should see what we think the alternative is and compare it just as critically. We should beware of getting caught up in small details of doubt and letting them become larger than they need to be. We should go back to the basics and remind ourselves of the fundamentals of the faith, one way he recommends we can do this is to teach children the faith. Also, we can ask for help from others and stay involved ourselves,

the further you move away from Jesus Christ and his body on earth, the church, the more your doubts will grow. You will enter a vicious circle until, if you’re not extremely careful, you’ll drift away altogether. (p90)

One of my great sadnesses over the years is seeing people do this. Starting with some doubts, they move away from God, his word and his church to try figure things out for themselves. Sadly, more often than not, they never return:

there’s no neutral territory you can slip into for a while to give you a chance to make up your mind. If you drift from the light, you drift into the darkness (p91)

He also calls us to remember our Redeemer. Check if there are idols in your life pulling you away from Jesus and helping fuel your doubts:

If you are struggling with doubt, and you are considering giving up on being a Christian, you would only give it up to live for something else. Whatever that is, whatever you choose to live for instead, death would be the end of it. Nothing else has an answer to death. (p113)

Finally Ayers encourages us to remember the stakes:

This is vitally important. The stakes are life or death. There is a kind of drifting from which there may be no way back. The clear challenge of the Bible is to keep the faith. In an environment of unbelief, it can be difficult to keep going. But keep going we must. (p137)

There are a couple of limitations of this book, mostly I agree with what Dave pointed out in his macarisms review.  I’ll let you read that, rather than rehash the same things.

All in all though a very good, short book addressing doubt for Christians. If you find yourself in that category, I hope you find it helpful. I did.

Catechism update

A month ago I shared some catechisms that we were considering using as a family. We were starting to teach them to the children and so I had adapted some simplified versions for children.

One month in and I have made some changes, so I thought I'd tell you about them as some readers were interested in the catechism idea also.

1. We have started working through Training Hearts, Teaching Minds, by Starr Meade (mentioned previously). She has created a set of weekly devotions around each question of the Westminster Shorter Catechism in Modern English.

We read it with Mr 8 and Miss 6 at the end of the day, and we are all enjoying it and learning lots. Each daily reading takes 5-10 mins to read and talk about, so it's very manageable.

To go alongside it, I have produced a document of just the questions and answers as she has them (in modern English), which is quite manageable. Mr 8's goal is to learn them as we go through - at the rate of 1 per week, he should be fine.


2. I realised my previous Family Catechism with all it's 146 questions was way too complicated for younger ones. Not only that it had some emphases I wasn't happy with. Maybe I am more Anglican than I thought!?

As we are going to work through Training Hearts, Teaching Minds with them all once they can handle it, they didn't need to get into all the details of the commandments, etc, at this stage.

However, I still like the idea and having started to learn some of it, I realised what they were capable of when the language was simpler and more familiar.

So in a burst of energy I have created a Simple Family Catechism. It is only 60 questions, and I think it represents some of the main things I want the kids to learn at this stage, keeping the general format of the Shorter Catechism as the guide.

I would love to know what you think of it.

Teaching the faith - resources

On Monday I talked about using a catechism to teach our children the faith.

I have come across a book which helps us to do exactly that.

Training Hearts, Teaching Minds by Starr Meade is a book of family devotions based on the Shorter Catechism.

She has arranged 6 daily devotions around each of the 107 questions of the Shorter Catechism (which she has adapted into more modern, accessible language). If you do it with her timetable it will take 2 years. However, I imagine it's the type of resource you use in bits and pieces. Perhaps you decide the first 20 questions are your goal for this year, or something like that.

Because the language is so accessible, you could also make this version your 'family catechism' and learn one per week and talk about it at the same time. We may indeed switch to that at some point.

We have not started this book yet, but once we have a bit more of our family catechism under way - we will stop and work on some of them in detail for a while, possibly with just the older children. I'll let you know how we go!


Another resource, along the same line is Bruce Ware's Big Truths for Young Hearts: Teaching and Learning the Greatness of God. Ware is professor of Christian Theology at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. When his daughters were young, he would sit with them at night and teach them the same material (yet simplified) that he he was teaching his students.

He has turned those times into this book. There are 3-4 pages per topic, covering topics (which are all broken into smaller sections) such as:

- God's word and who God is
- God as three in one
- God is creator and ruler of all
- our human nature and sin
- the person and work of Jesus Christ
- the Holy Spirit, etc, etc

It is essentially a doctrine course for children and youth. Having looked through it (although we haven't used it ourselves yet) - it seems appropriate to read and explain to primary-schoolers or perhaps something you could give to a teenager. My guess is that parents would learn a massive amount from reading it too! It looks like exactly what we learnt at bible college, but in much more manageable language.

Does anyone else know of any resources that help teach the faith to children?

Catechism

I said on Friday that we have decided to teach our children more pro-actively about our faith.

A few weeks ago I reviewed a book which planted in my mind the idea of teaching our children a catechism. This was fortuitously followed by a conversation with a friend who has started doing the same with her family, and then another with a friend who was taught it as a child.

A catechism is a method of teaching using questions and answers which are learnt.

One of the well known catechisms of the reformed Christian tradition in the Westminster Shorter Catechism. Shorter being relative and in comparison to it's longer sister. It still consists of 107 questions with full scripture references in the answers, the first one of which you may have heard before:

What is the chief end of man?
A. Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever.

Some clever souls have devised simplified versions for children: I have found the Catechism for Young Children and The First Catechism. They are both similar, but do have slightly different emphases. So I have compared them both and made our own. If you would like to have a look - you can view it here.*

I realise it doesn't look that much simpler - there are 146 questions. However, it's a long term project. I expect it will take a few years, assuming times of learning and some breaks.

At the moment we are aiming to learn (memorise) 5 questions a week.** So far so good, and the kids are loving it. They question me, they question each other and we are learning the answers together. (each has their own laminated copy to read)

On the first night we did it they were so excited and keen we talked about and started learning the first 8 questions:

1. Who made you?
God.

2. What else did God make?
God made all things.

3. Why did God make you and all things?
For his own glory.

4. How can you glorify God?
By loving him and doing what he commands.

5. Why are you to glorify God?
Because he made me and takes care of me.

6. Is there more than one true God?
No. There is only one true God.

7. In how many Persons does this one God exist?
In three Persons.

8. Name these three Persons.
The Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

There is a huge amount in just that! Number 3 was a great one to talk about: Why did make you?
- Was it because he needs you? No.
- Because he wanted you in his image? No.
- Why? For his own glory.

What a great lesson we self-centred humans need to learn - the sooner the better. It is a great joy to hear my almost 4 year old sing out 'For his own glory!'.

I'll show you a few other resources for teaching the faith on Friday.



* As with any prepared material, there is some you will agree and disagree with. As we go through it, I am already modifying a few of the questions and answers - either to simplify the language, or to further clarify the answer.

** They have been so keen we actually learnt 35 in the first 10 days or so, so it might not take as long as I thought!

Teaching the faith

The realisation that I am already doing my ideal job, combined with some recent reading, has again convinced me that as parents we are the ones responsible (under God) for teaching our children about the Christian faith.

My primary job is to raise our 3 children to know and love Jesus. Of course, how they respond to that in their own time will be up to God choosing to convince them and them responding to him.

If I am too busy with other commitments to do this well, I am making unhelpful choices for our family. It's been a helpful reminder to me as I take on talks, seminars, catch-ups with other women, etc - all good things, but still not my primary role.

Also, while I am extremely grateful for those that teach our children in their programs at church, it would be irresponsible of me to assume that what they are taught there is all they need to know. Could you become adequately educated about the bible and matters of faith with ~1 hour input per week?

It is our job to teach our children the faith.

Part of this is by modelling it. (I have talked about this in a previous series)

But I am more and more convinced that it is also about actively teaching it.

Over the last 8 years, in our family the teaching has been based around reading the bible to the children at their appropriate stage, talking about it and explaining it where necessary.

It is becoming clear that they know all the stories in the children's bibles. Of course they continue to learn from them and we will always ensure that bible reading and some study of the bible is part of their daily routine.

Now, however, we are turning to the bigger picture. We want to teach them a Christian framework. We want them to grow up thinking as Christians and from God's point of view. To that end, we are now turning to more actively teaching them about God and the faith.

On Monday, I'll tell you how we have started.

Atheism

Thanks to a friend linking it on facebook, I stumbled across this editorial in the LA times by Charlotte Allen: Atheists: No God, no reason, just whining:

I can't stand atheists -- but it's not because they don't believe in God. It's because they're crashing bores...

What atheists don't seem to realize is that even for believers, faith is never easy in this world of injustice, pain and delusion. Even for believers, God exists just beyond the scrim of the senses. So, atheists, how about losing the tired sarcasm and boring self-pity and engaging believers seriously?

An interesting read.