I am currently reading...

Paul and Palestinian Judaism. This is not a lay-person book. I am still steeped in the world of academia and so the books I read still tend to lean in that direction. That doesn't meant that I don't read less technical books (I read just a couple of weeks ago Come to the Table by Hicks). But the book I'm reading now by E.P. Sanders is a fantastic book for anyone pursuing New Testament studies. As much as I dislike the pedagogy of current preachers to focus primarily on Paul, it is important to understand and try to view from various angles the man who was a trampoline for Christianity in the first century c.e. The focus of the book is a meticulous reassessment of modern (and past) scholarship on 1st and 2nd century Judaism and Paul's understanding of that religion. Sanders maps out the problems New Testament scholars have had with Paul's arguments against Judaism. From there he proceeds to tear down the arguments of those scholars on how to rectify the situation. I am only 100 pages into the 550 beast but I have loved every page so far. Someone might wonder what an Old Testament guy like myself would be doing with a primarily New Testament book. And that's a fair question. Sanders though, like some of his predecessors, uses much of the late b.c.e. literature and early c.e. literature (that is Second Temple literature) to assess Judaism of Palestine in the first century. He reviews Mishnaic literature (both haggadic and halakic) as well as Deuteronocanonical books (i.e. 4 Ezra, Ben Sirach, 1 Enoch, etc.) and Qumran texts to establish what Judaism (at least Tannaitic Judaism) was like then. The main reason for the book is to discredit the argument by countless New Testament scholars that Judaism was a religion of works righteousness. Unfortunately that idea has been passed along (and down) to countless Christians who have bought into the idea that Judaism was a crappy religion and that it never focused on the heart of its adherents. If you are interested in a fair (but scholarly) treatment to the alternative then I highly recommend Sanders' book.

Growing up

I'd say so far in our marriage not much has happened that has really made us feel "grown up." While getting older certainly does at times, being only 24 we're still young. However, several things recently have made us continually realize that we are older and decisions are hard. Three in particular come to mind when I think about making us feel grown up. (1) We're moving. Although we have moved before, this one in particular is significant. When we decided to stay in Abilene and go to ACU for graduate school, we decided to remain in relative comfort. We know a lot of people out here, we were able to continue with jobs we currently had, etc. Now we're moving to a brand new place, albeit close to our families. But we're moving as a married couple for the first time. So the first one is multi-faceted. We're moving as a married couple for the first time, and we're moving somewhere where we have never lived before. (For further details on this move see the previous post.) (2) Full-time job. For the first time one of us is going to have a full-time job. And what usually accompanies a full-time job? Correct. Benefits. For the last year (and almost a half) we've lived without health insurance. Now this is no fantastic feat because I know people have gone much longer than that without it. But that aside, we're growing up. Rachel is doing something that her mom didn't do because she chose to stay at home and home-school her 5 children. Rachel didn't watch her mom go to work. But she is growing up all the same with this job. And I'm growing up watching and cheering her on from the sidelines. (3) We bought our first vehicle. We decided a couple of weeks ago that purchasing a second vehicle would probably be in our best interest. However, we were thinking of buying in a couple of months, not last week. We realized that with moving and new jobs (see #'s 1 & 2) it would be necessary to have 2 vehicles. But we also figured we could wait until we got to Longview before we bought (and we could have). But such is life as an American. We found what we wanted and had to have it. We started looking (actually my mom did and sent me about 50 emails) and realized that we like the look of the Mazda Tribute/Ford Escape. Consequently, Kyle and Larissa have a Tribute and we really liked it when we rode in it last summer. Thus, we already knew what they are like and so were convinced we wanted a smaller suv. So we set about looking and found one in Abilene. We went and looked at it, yada yada yada, 2 days later we bought it. This purchase was the first one we have made without actually having the money for up front. This is a scary concept to me. I don't like the idea of paying for something with money I don't have. But that's the way it's done.

Anyway, we both thought getting married would be a huge step and make us feel more grown up. But we've talked about that together and realized that we really didn't feel that differently after we got married. It actually just felt more natural to be married. But going through these last few months has been hectic and fun. We have felt overwhelmed, excited, nervous, frustrated, and lots of other emotions similar to the ones listed already. The point is, I realized that growing up doesn't happen at one moment ever year (i.e. Birthday), but it happens at various times, in various ways, and to varying degrees. While that's not profound or new, it has helped me understand my place (for now) amongst all the other things going on in my life. And if what I am experiencing is growing up, then I like it.