What classes do I have? Glad you asked! I am taking 5 classes this semester for a total of 10 hours. Seminary (Master Level) work is a little different that undergraduate work in that most of the work is actually done by yourself outside of class. So 10 hours of being in class per week plus 20-30 hours outside of class is about the amount of time I will spend each week. The courses I am taking are Cooperative Program, Written Communications, Systematic Theology 1, Introduction to Church History 1, and Personal Spiritual Disciplines. The Cooperative Program course is an online course required of all Students that tells about, (drum roll please) The Cooperative Program! Basically I watch the videos and take a simple quiz. They should all be this easy. The bad part is that I do not get any credit hours for this class.
     Written Communication is a writing class I get to take it because I got a C in my undergraduate course in composition. I don't really mind though as I could use a refresher on footnotes, endnotes, bibliographies, etc. Writing papers in Seminary is a big part of what I will be doing. I will get 2 hours of credit for this class.
     Systematic Theology (3 hours Credit) is one of the "big three" that will be most challenging. We spent the last two weeks just defining what it is and what it is not, and why we should even concern ourselves with it, after all many would say "why not just study the Bible"? The truth that we learned is that everyone has a "theology" (concept of what God is like), but that theology is probably tainted by other things than the Bible. Systematic Theology helps us understand what the whole Bible says about doctrines in the Bible so that we can apply them to our everyday lives. For example, we will study the "Doctrine of Man", the Doctrine of the Holy Spirit", etc. There are other types of "theologies" which contribute to our systematic theology, such as Exegetical Theology (theology of a select passage of scripture), Biblical Theology (theology of a book of the Bible, group of books, testament, etc.), Historical Theology (theology of the church through the ages) and Practical Theology (putting what we believe in practice).
     Intro to Church History is the history of the early Church up to the time of the Reformation. This is a 3 hour course. More later on this.
     Personal Spiritual Disciplines is a study of the book, Spiritual Disciplines of the Christian Life and our instructor is the author Donald Whitney. If you remember WWJD at FBC then PSD is WWJD on steroids.
     I realize some of these courses may seem "heady", but they really are very practical and will set a firm foundation for any Christian. Hope to share more soon and if anyone has questions, please leave a comment!