EXTRA-Ordinary!

August 5, 2021 | by: Bill Burns | 0 Comments

Posted in: Guest Writers

The first Sunday after John Calvin returned to Geneva from temporary exile in his native France, he is said to have returned to preaching from the precise point in the scripture text where he had left off prior to his fleeing the Swiss city-state some four years earlier. That’s one long, “Now…where WERE we?!”

Calvin strongly believed in the power of the “ordinary means of grace,” such as the preached word, the sacraments, and prayer. These are called the ordinary means because, well, they are the normative ways the Church is to be nourished in our faith. Since Calvin’s time, many churches, Oak Hills included, have engaged in what I like to call, ‘extra-ordinary means’ to help edify the Church. One of those extraordinary means is our Adult Christian Education classes (aka Sunday School for a fair number of you). ACE is an opportunity for us to take a moment to delve into the riches of God’s Word and see more closely and learn more about the Word we hear preached each Lord’s Day, and hopefully that you are imbibing on a regular basis in your own personal devotional studies. It’s also a great way for you to get to know some of the folks you sit next to on Sunday mornings and to hear and learn from their questions and grow through their engagement with scripture in a more focused setting.

We are relaunching ACE next month on September 12th, so we hope you will take advantage of this extra-ordinary means to be built up and edified in your Christian faith. It hasn’t been quite so long for us as Calvin had to wait, but if you’ve been attending Oak Hills since before March, 2020, you may recall our Adult Christian Education series, “The -Ologies” had just started a new class in the series, this one on the study of last things, otherwise known by theological nerds by the three-dollar word, “Eschatology.” We got through the first class, and then all heck broke loose. That was a long time ago, now. So…we’re going to restart that class from the git-go. So, if you missed it first time around, here’s your chance to get in on the ground floor!

Don’t let three-dollar words scare you off. This class is for YOU! You should mark your calendars and keep an eye on the Touchpoint for this and other Adult Christian Education classes in the future. This go-round, let’s learn about how eschatology is a vital, encouraging, hope-filled area of study that will help you love the Lord of the Harvest and long for His will to be done, on Earth as it is in Heaven.

Bill Burns

 

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