Well, today I get to dress up like a penguin and do something honorable and humbling. As I place my daughter’s hand into another man’s hand, I proclaim to those gathered and to the Father that He is Worthy of Praise and Adoration. I hope that He will be honored and glorified. Marriage is His institution, after all.

For the past few weeks many have come up and asked me how I am doing. Perhaps to encourage me to reflect; perhaps out of concern. I have been showered with many exhortations of, “Good Luck” and other well-meaning well-wishes.

I suppose some are expecting my head to pop off and roll around. It might. But, I have been ruminating and reflecting on this day for some time. I know what is to happen and while my heart breaks inside, it also celebrates the highest institution ever devised between two people. I am not sad. I am overwhelmed with the emotion of years of cultivating a little flower plant given to my wife and I almost 27 years ago – a child, a little girl. (We, who were told before we were married that we should never expect to have children, have been blessed with three.)

Now, it is time to see her off on her own journey of love and devotion, tears and laughter… Into this sanctifying event is rolled up a picture of the ultimate marriage.

I reflect upon the inspired letter of Paul to the Ephesians. In the fifth chapter, the Apostle draws a parallel between the relationship of Christ and the Church to that of a husband and a wife.

In the current political climate, it is sad that a discussion of marriage has to be qualified. But, let it be known that God only recognizes marriage as being between an unmarried man and an unmarried woman who both have a right to be joined in matrimony.

Yes, this is not a new problem. It was there in New Testament times as well. And part of Paul’s message was a calling back to those times where those individuals at Ephesus had come out of a sinful life and had become married to Christ.

Often the passage from Eph. 5:22-31 is used to teach about marriage, and well it should. But, that is not the only emphasis of the passage. Perhaps it is not the main emphasis.

There is the message of the Bridegroom and how He is Head of the Church, and how the church (the Bride) is to be subject to Christ. The action of the husband is one of sacrifice, nourishment, and cherishing. The application from this is that all other marriages should be pictures of Christ’s love for the Church and the Church as honoring Christ, which ultimately glorifies the Father.

And, while I think that I know well what this beautiful, God-ordained institution means, I can only see a glimpse of its glory. Yes, I may be unable to hold back the tears tomorrow. But, I am not sad. My daughter is now to be loved and to love in a way that exemplifies the Church.

My prayer has been and continues to be for the blessings of the Father on this holy union. I request that my brothers and sisters in Christ join with me in that prayer.

I tried several apps. One looked really slick on the iPad, but when the map made on the iPad transferred to the laptop, it was horrid! Others looked OK on the iPad and worked really well (functionally), but after transferring lost some of the look and editing ability.

There are free versions of apps for the laptop and pay versions. I ultimately settled on Mindjet’s MindManager. Plus, their iPad app is free and works very well.

Anyway, I began taking notes of sermons being preached and learned how to take notes in mind map form. It was so liberating! As you may know, all preachers do not preach in an orderly fashion. With mind-mapping tools, you can write thoughts and move them around later.

Then, it hit me. What if I could teach the inductive class using mind-mapping software? That was another challenge. But, in this week’s lesson, I think I was able to demonstrate the usefulness of mind-mapping in using the inductive method. And, ultimately, mind-mapping is inductive in nature.

As always, it was work as is all good Bible Study. But, the rewards are many. It really helps me focus and highlight the things that are key…

Here is a snippet of my chart. Click for the full pdf.

Spiritual maturity amidst turmoil. James, the brother of our Lord, writes to encourage the brethren to consider how they look at the world around them and how they could demonstrate Christ in their daily lives.

Sometimes, there are words that could be used for the main study but that don’t flow through the particular chart being made. For instance, the word, ‘hope’ is a theme that definitely runs through all of Scripture and indeed through Titus. But, it is not, to me, to be emphasized in this chart. But, it can make for an interesting side study that adds to the main study.

In this segment, hope is referred to in the context of eternal life. Certainly important, but not in the main study. So,we can add to the right side of the chart. Often, you can find another scripture that embellishes the word (Scripture is its own best commentary), in this case, hope from 1 Peter 3:15 “but sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you, yet with gentleness and reverence; ”.

The subjects similar in scope to hope in this segment are subjection and good deeds. They are presented in the same vertical alignment on the chart. For, subjection, the scripture reference is Rom. 13:1. For good deeds the scripture reference is Matt. 25:34-40.

Also, in this segment are ‘things’. So those are presented on the right side in a different vertical alignment and a different color. There are authoritative things (2:15), trustworthy things (3:8), good and profitable things (3:8), and unprofitable and worthless things (3:9).

And, finally, in the first paragraph, there are characteristics of God and works of God. These are presented in a comparison chart format, also on the right side.

The SD tool in Logos 3 is a bit more powerful than the one currently in Logos 4 (for the moment). The Logos team really listens to their customers and I am hopeful that they will soon fix some of the issues (they are minor, but issues nonetheless). Regardless, if you have Logos 4, you can install and use Logos 3. And, if you don’t have at least the Scholar’s package in Logos 4, which would include the SD tool, you can still purchase the SD tool for about $20. Well worth it.

Here is a pdf of what we worked on last night. SD Text Flow Titus 2-15-3-7

In the Agassiz article, the student looks at the fish from many angles and makes some very keen observations about the construction of the fish, after discovering that he could do a better job by drawing the fish. And, this proved successful for mostly the outer construction – the fins, the eyes, etc. The student thinks he has done a pretty good job, but is disappointed to learn the Dr. Agassiz was not impressed, so much so that he chides the student for missing an obvious feature.

So drawing the fish had helped the student see things he had not seen before, but he still had not looked closely enough. The text of the Bible can be that way, too. And, so the Surveillance Worksheet is one way to start drawing the fish, so to speak. It makes a segment of study the focus since you are not saddled with a large book, or distracted trying to stay on the same page. There is plenty of white space to make those initial observations. You feel less concerned about writing in the Bible since you are writing on a piece of paper. You can use many different colored pens and pencils for identifying points of emphasis and lists, comparisons and contrasts. But, you can’t really move the text around and organize it in groups.

So, it makes more apparent the need for the Analytical Chart. Because, in it you actually reconstruct the text and can group it in an organized fashion.

Here is a cutaway from the Analytical Chart showing a couple of examples. I have emphasized by using color – blue in one example and red in the other. There is no significance especially to the use of particular colors – they are just to differentiate.

The blue color happens to highlight the references to time – ‘long ages’ and ‘time’. I have arranged the text so that they appear in line with each other. The other example uses red to highlight the progression in terms – ‘word’, ‘proclamation’, and ‘commandment’. ‘Word’ is a general term; ‘proclamation’ is a step up in intensity; ‘commandment’ is much higher in intensity.

Further, arranging the text in this way allows you see the primary and secondary cores. The core is the part of the sentence that involves the main subject, the verb, and the object.

F.F. Bruce has observed that in the Old Testament, there is no indirect speech¹F.F. Bruce, The Books and the Parchments (3d ed.; Westwood, N.J.: Fleming H. Revell Co., 1963), p. 45.. However, in the New Testament, there is an abundance of long sentences with secondary clauses. In the case of the example below from Irving Jensen’s Independent Bible Study, the core is revealed in the  phrases in dark blue.

Notice, too, that the verses have been arranged in a way that enables one to analyze the text. Remember that the Bible is literature, and it is the best kind. It has all types of literature within it. When you take the time to really study and apply yourself to the task of analysis, the rewards are many.

“But if you bear the name “Jew,”

and rely upon the Law,

and boast in God,

and know His will,

and approve the things that are essential,

being instructed out of the Law,

and are confident that you yourself are a guide to the blind,

• a light to those who are in darkness,
• a corrector of the foolish,
• a teacher of the immature,

having in the Law the embodiment of knowledge and of the truth,

you, therefore, who teach another, do you not teach yourself?

You who preach that one should not steal, do you steal?

You who say that one should not commit adultery, do you commit adultery?

You who abhor idols, do you rob temples?

You who boast in the Law, through your breaking the Law, do you dishonor God?”

(Rom 2:17-23 NASB)

Another beautiful example is found in Ephesians 1:3-14. In this example, the core runs throughout the passage. It is reconstructed by placing the core in the middle.

We plan to talk a bit more about this as it occurs in Titus Segment 1 after this week’s lesson… stay tuned.

Of course, Bible study can be tedious if you let it. But, above all it is fun! I love it. I can’t wait to study. But, it is work, very hard work, but rewarding work. And, one important key is to use all the eyes God gave us. This point is ever so forcefully made in the story, The Student, The Fish, and Agassiz.

So, early on, after seeing that many were hesitant about marking in their Bibles, we used a piece of paper with the segment of study on the left side of the sheet (landscape mode) and blank space on the right side. This was designed to allow the student to make observations, notes, lists, comparisons, etc. – anything that put down on paper the observations that were being made as they are being made. This was intended to free the mind to make more observations as the thoughts flowed.

In high school, I took Latin for 3 years. No, really, I did. And, I had one of the most influential teachers ever-Margaret Hardwick. In her eighties, she was as sprightly as her slight frame would allow. She was sharp as a tack and you could not pull anything over on her. She taught us much about life as well as Latin. Anyway, she always made us take out a sheet of paper before every class and we were to entitle it our Talking Paper. This was where we would ask questions in class while she was lecturing without interrupting her – by talking on paper.

At the end of class she took up all the papers. At the time, I thought this was crazy. But, later I saw the value in it. She could get feedback from students and in a way where they were not demeaned by classmates for actually participating in class. And, she could tailor her teaching accordingly. There is a Latin phrase, nullius in verba, also used as the motto of the Royal Society, which means, ‘in the words of no one’. I suppose this would properly characterize the concept of the observation worksheet – to see what is there, to investigate thoroughly, to make informed conclusions. One of her sayings was,

“The more you know you know, the more you know you don’t know; the more you know you don’t know, the more you know you need to know.”

So, the observation worksheet may be an offshoot of Mrs. Hardwick’s Talking Paper.

Alternatively, and after many years of teaching this method, with a significant number of my own observation of how students choose to take notes and mark up text, I have moved into using a different method of text markup. This is a combination of using various techniques and methods and the contributions of others.

I use something now I call the Surveillance Worksheet. We were going through the Jonah series and at the end of the Second Segment; I decided it was time to modify the observation worksheet.

The Surveillance Worksheet, being the next evolution of the observation worksheet, is also very similar to the observation sheet used by Duvall and Hays (Grasping God’s Word) of which I am only vaguely familiar. I don’t want to misstate their method. But, I do wish to acknowledge that it has influenced my thinking. The point is – make observations, lots and lots no matter how seemingly insignificant.

The Surveillance Worksheet has the segment in double-spaced type in the center of the page (also landscape mode). The student is encouraged to make any notes, any things that stand out, or seem strangely placed, etc in the midst of the page (above, below), using circles, or highlights, underlines, anything to emphasize.

Then, the student is to come back to them later after going through the text until it is believed that the initial standouts have been noted. Then, each noted item should be investigated, researched and, if reasoned to be significant, made more permanent. If an item is not initially deemed significant, don’t discard it so quickly. Surprise may came later, when after exhausting seemingly all attempts at determining significance, it is found to be indeed significant. There was a reason, after all, that you marked it the first time.

So, we will walk though it in the Jonah series in the Third Segment. 

In those early days, a web designer had to be very concerned with the size of the graphics on each page because of the tremendously slow (by comparison) download and connection speeds (we used dial up which depended on your modem- nobody could pick up the phone while you were online – woo-hoo! fun it was!). So we used a program by Adobe called ImageReady. You had to import your image that you were hoping ImageReady would not destroy into ImageReady. What it did (it was powerful for its time) was to reduce the image size by taking away bits of the graphic’s information. This would ensure it could be downloaded easily by the browser and the user could see what you had worked so hard to produce. The removal of image information reduced its quality, so you would incrementally reduce image quality until you couldn’t stand it anymore to reach a compromise between image quality and file size.

All of this meant that web pages in those days, in order to be visually appealing, had to be very creatively crafted. But, they were sparse at best. Now, with cable speeds and high-speed DSL, this limitation on file size is virtually gone (within reason). So, the time to build a graphically rich web site has been nagging at me for some time.

Also, having had a lot of experience with WordPress in the past couple of years, and especially with the release of v3, everything fell into place. I just had to get my nerve up and dive in.

My son, Josh, has become a very skillful designer using Photoshop and Illustrator. So, I floated the idea (more of a challenge)  to consider making the new logo. One of the design elements to best express Bible Study to me, on the old site, was a puzzle piece. So, I wanted to have that element incorporated into the new design. I also wanted to have the letters ‘i’ and ‘b’ (for inductivebible) visibly prominent or even part of the puzzle piece. Josh toyed with this for a few weeks. We talked about many possible designs. He would work on prototypes off and on, but none really satisfied. Then, one night very late, his inspiration hit him and he said he had an idea. The next day he emailed me the design. I was blown away.

So, now the pressure was really on to get going on the new site. So, I installed XAMPP lite and WordPress 3 on a local intranet and began working…

And so, as I continue to work, please feel free to move around… Some of the furniture might be in a different place when you visit again, but the coffeemaker will still be on the counter.