First Week of the Semester

We have completed the first week of the new semester on the Guam campus. We were excited to have several new students enroll that we were not expecting. I don't have a final count yet on how many students we will have, but we should have that soon. We are still busy shuffling students around in the classes making sure they get into the right classes to get them through their programs on time. I am teaching two classes. One class (pictured - they are taking their first memory verse quiz) Survey of General Epistles has eight students - all men. I think this is the first all-male class I have ever taught at PIBC. Three women dropped out of it because of conflicts with other courses they needed. My father-in-law will be leading the lecture-discussions for the next four weeks as I travel. My other course is a partial distance education course, Exegesis in Genesis. We have 37 students in that class. 22 are Guam campus students, 10 will be taking it in the Chuuk Teaching Facility and 5 more in the Palau TF. I will lead 8 classroom lecture discussion sessions on each of the the three sites, but most of the discussion and class work will be done on line. This week our on-line discussion deals with views of origins, creation-evolution and intelligent design. I really enjoy the distance education classes because the students come to the class from all over and there is a very wide age range. It is great to see them exposed to a wide range of perspectives.

I also need to comment on chapel today. It was one of those days that reminds me why I am here. (We do sometimes forget in the busyness of running a school.) The Chuukese Christmas mission team to Saipan was in charge of today's chapel. After some Chuukese songs, two of our male students gave the message. Keiny talked about how he saw God do miracles in people's lives through their humble efforts and urged the students to go out and fulfill the Great Commission because Jesus promises to always be with us. Then Calvin, talked about how the trip was conceived, planned and executed by the students without help from the faculty and staff and eloquently exhorted the student body to take personal responsibility for obeying the call of Christ and serving others. All I could say was AMEN!