CURRENT NEWS, GALLERIES AND COMMENTARY

September 6, 2006: Dr. Paul Wright, Executive Director

When the war in Lebanon began in mid-July, Israelis were confident that a quick strike would silence Hizbullah and I was fairly sure that our enrollment for the fall semester wouldn’t be adversely affected. Then, as action escalated and the “quick strike” turned into a war that dragged on into mid-August, I began to think otherwise. In the end I was surprised—not wildly, but pleasantly. While a few of our incoming students elected to postpone their JUC plans to next spring or fall, the large majority arrived right on schedule, eager to begin studies here on Mt. Zion. With everything was added up, the numbers showed that our enrollment has actually increased by 70% over last fall. It is a result, I think, of the commitment of our associated schools and of many, many persons who are confident that a JUC experience is not only valuable and worthwhile, but can be done safely and well, without compromise or undue changes to our curriculum and plans. It is also a testimony to God’s faithfulness in keeping the light for a solid evangelical school of higher learning burning brightly in Jerusalem, and of the prayers of thousands of our supporters and friends.  

We are now into our second week of the semester and so far everything—classes, field studies, off-campus ministries, formal and informal times of service, fun and growth—is proceeding according to schedule. Allow me to share some specific information about the fall semester: 

• Fifty-two new students are enrolled.
• Our total enrollment for the semester program is seventy-one.
• Of the total, 18 are undergrads and 53 are graduate students, 14 of whom are beginning the MA program.
• The average age of our graduate students is 34 years, and they bring a good level of intensity to our programs. Several of these incoming grads are married, and we are enjoying the blessings of 7 young children, aged 6 months to 7 years, who enliven the JUC experience for everyone.
• Associated schools sending students include Bethel College (IN), Calvin College and Theological Seminary, Cedarville University, Colorado Christian University, Columbia International University, Dallas Theological Seminary, Eastern University, Gordon College, Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, Grace University and Wheaton College.
• Classes are full, interactive, exciting and effective for learning and growth.

We offer a special welcome to Cyndi Parker, who has joined the JUC family as staff, field study instructor and instructor in the short-term program. 

We also welcome two new instructors to the JUC family. Dr. Yigal Levin of Bar Ilan University is teaching History of Ancient Israel this fall, and Dr. Moin Halloun (head of the language department at Bethlehem University) is instructing students in spoken Arabic. 

Fall Semester 2006

Where are these students going?

Please Click the photo to go to the Gallery and find out.

Reading the Bible with Geographical Eyes 

As serious Bible readers, we want to know God better. Its an awesome thought, really, that the all-powerful creator of the universe chose to reveal Himself to the people who inhabit planet Earth, an infinitesimal speck in the vast darkness of space. The Bible tells us how God entered the world of flesh and blood--our world, really, although in a time long ago and a place far away from where most of us live--in order to redeem mankind. Over the course of centuries, we read, God spoke to a small band of eager yet stubborn people who clung to a narrow land hugging the southeastern shore of the Mediterranean. Abraham, Moses, David, Isaiah, Jeremiah--the giants of the past marked God's words well, but also looked to what the Apostle Paul called "the fullness of time" (Gal 4:4), when God would dirty His hands and feet in a small, noisy and very needy corner of the Roman Empire called Galilee. 

Unlike the sacred books of many of the world's other great religions, the Bible is full of stories of real people living in real places at real times. God's decision to communicate eternal truths through fallible human beings, to wrap His message around mankind's experiences with rock and soil and water, is both mind-boggling and humbling. It also suggests that we can better understand God's revelation to us if we take the time to learn about and appreciate the physical context in which it was given. 

The writers of the Bible knew the land in which God chose to reveal Himself well, for it was their home. They were intimately familiar with the rugged terrain of Judah, with cold winter rain and scorching desert heat, and they had experienced the relief offered by a small spring of water or the shelter of a crevasse in a mighty rock. They knew what it meant for the hills surrounding their city or village to be filled with enemy troops, or to lie down securely at night after a bountiful harvest. Time and again the Bible's historians, prophets and poets infused the divine message they had to tell with geographical information. In fact, such information fills the Biblical text--and the Biblical authors assumed that their readers knew even more.  

By carefully studying the geographical settings of the Bible, we are able to enter more deeply into the biblical world. It becomes possible to follow Joshua's army into the hill country of Canaan (Joshua 6-11), or to crest the hill on which David's Jerusalem stood and experience a bit of the energy of the Songs of Ascent (Psalms 121-134). Jesus must have climbed the hills above Capernaum often in the early mornings to gaze over the Sea of Galilee (cf Mk 1:35). By doing the same today, we can better appreciate Jesus' call to ministry, or our own place in the kingdom of God. 

Let's listen to what Jesus said, but also to what he did: 

Again he began to teach by the sea, and a very large crowd gathered around Him. So He got into a boat on the sea and sat down, while the whole crowd was on the shore facing the sea. He taught them many things in parables, and in His teaching He said to them: “Listen! Consider the sower who went out to sow . . . (Luke 4:1-3). 

Jesus met people where they were, and part of this "where they were" was a particular place at a particular time. While the eternal truths of the Bible transcend time and place, they are also rooted in it. We are called to live with one eye focused on heaven, the other on the ground--and in this "living in between" we do well to consider how those who graced the pages of the Bible did the same. It’s a fresh adventure, with something new every day.