I’m going through Joshua in my current seminary studies. I was struck this morning, Father’s Day, by this passage from the commentary, Josha: No Falling Words. Enjoy.

“It’s too bad much of the church has lost this vision of God or Christ as the warrior who fights for his people. Too many of us regard this conception as substandard, by which we mean it does not fit our sentimental twentieth-century graven images of what God ought to be like. The imagery seems too violent. And we do the same thing for the Lord Jesus, with perhaps not a little help from church school materials. The popular image of Jesus is that he not only kind and tender but also soft and prissy, as though Jesus comes to us reeking of hand cream. Such a Jesus can hardly steel a soul that is daily assualted by the enemy…No mild God or soft Jesus can give his people hope. It is only as we know the warrior of Israel who fights for us (and sometimes without us) that we have hopeof triumphing in the muck of life.”

Taken from Joshua: No Falling Words, Dale Ralph Davis, page 82.

A 12-year dream for me is about to come true. My course work with Reformed Theological Seminary begins May 1st. I’m focused on a certificate in Old Testament studies and hope to eventually work my way toward an M.Div.

It’s about time I educated myself.

I started on the reading assignments yesterday. I read two chapters of an introduction to Old Testament. I’ve got over a hundred pages to do by this weekend, also focused in Old Testament with the book, He Gave Us Stories, by Richard Pratt. I’ve actually read this book before, and liked it very much so I’m looking forward to digging into it more as a student.

Even though it’s distance education it still feels a bit strange to “go back to school” after 27 years. I’m a bit nervous, but looking forward to it.

I decided to go “back to school” to prepare for future ministry and also help me augment my current ministry with Eagle TV. I’m doing a lot more teaching now, and hope to increase that part of my activity.

I’ve wanted to attend RTS for nearly 12 years. But each year I checked on it there was something that kept it just out of my reach, health issues three years ago, financial trouble a few years before that, conflicts with ministry at various times. This is the first year that everything seemed to match up to make it possible for me to get started. I’m so thankful. My schedule is much more reasonable now, giving me time after working at Eagle each day to devote to study.

Your support helps me pay for the dream, so thank you for all that you do in supporting our ministry, and now, my education.

BTW, if you haven’t given in a while and would like to help with a gift of support then please visit www.thomasterry.com/gift.

I am traveling to Albuquerque on Saturday to spend a week meeting with folks, including some time encouraging a new family that will be moving to Mongolia this summer from the Duke City. After my time in Albuquerque is complete I’ll make a quick run back to Tucson to pack up for my return trip home to Mongolia.

I’ve been in the States for eight months, minus the three weeks I spent in Ulaanbaatar in January for Rochele’s wedding. Needless to say, I’m looking forward to getting back home, being with my wife and youngest daughter Whitney, and getting back to work.

About a month after I return to Mongolia I’ll be starting some distance education classes on Old Testament Studies through Reformed Theological Seminary (RTS). I’ve wanted to attend RTS for the last twelve years and this was the first year that my schedule and finances would permit it. Why am I taking seminary classes with RTS? To prepare for future ministry of course, and to augment my current ministry with Eagle TV.

During the last week my course materials have been arriving. Stacks of books, software, and audio lectures are sitting on the kitchen table waiting for packing day. Among the many books, almost half of them are for Hebrew studies. Needless to say, language isn’t one of my strong suits. Mongolian has been more than a little tough for this full-time working guy. I’ve no little trepidation about taking two classes in Hebrew. In 1993 I took six months of Arabic and did pretty well. I’m hoping that the magic will come back, so to speak, for the Hebrew studies. One of the things I enjoyed about Arabic was that is was a completely different animal from English, not just in sentence structure, but also the characters. There was something about that that actually helped my study. The characters can’t be confused with anything English, unlike Mongolian where an H is an N, and a P is an R, and so on. I’m hoping the same thing that happened to me with Arabic will also happen with Hebrew.

By the way, don’t ask me to translate anything from Arabic. I’ve lost almost everything I knew, which was just an elementary level anyway.

Looking forward to being in Albuquerque for a few days.

Congratulations for me. I was accepted this week into the virtual campus for Reformed Theological Seminary (RTS). I’ve been wanting to take courses with RTS for nearly 12 years and finally the door was opened to me—so I stepped through.

My course work will focus on Biblical Studies for this go around. The work I’ll be doing will be applied toward an Master of Divinity degree later.

My work at Eagle TV has changed significantly over the last year, so I finally have the time to devote to study. Yeah, it’s “one more thing” for me, but it’s a good thing.

My studies will start in May.