Large Group #9 Debrief: Nuances Wrap-up

To close out the term and our Nuances of the Faith series, I found, pestered and blackmailed (just kidding) six of the large group regulars to each summarize one of the large group talks from our Nuances series. They each gave an overview of the major points of their respective talks, and then we broke into discussion groups to talk about questions that they provided! Since I didn't do any of the work this week, I just want to thank them. :-) Here's the lineup (links go to the respective previous blog posts):

Vivian Huang talked about Angry, But Not Sinning.

Ben Wang talked about God Speaks, But Confirm.

Grace Tang talked about Faith, Not Blind Faith.

Charles Tschirhart talked about Unity, Not Uniformity.

Katherine Lai talked about Fundamentals, Not Fundamentalist.

Tim Johnson talked about In the World, Not Of the World.

Thanks again!

Up next term: "Theology 101" including the Problem of Evil, Predestination and Free Will, the New Perspective on Paul, and much more. We will be having even more outside speakers, including a couple Christian Caltech professors! Keep Monday nights open; you won't be disappointed.

Large Group #8 Debrief: In the World, Not Of the World

Hi everyone! Last Monday, we had the fortune of hearing from our third pastor in six weeks, Pastor Nathan Lundgren of Oasis Church Pasadena. He gave the last talk in our Nuances series on "In the World, Not Of the World". The talk was peppered with questions, and Nathan was kind enough to write out all of his thoughts as well so I could share them with you. Keep reading for his transcript.

Large Group #7 Debrief: Fundamentals, Not Fundamentalist

Hi everyone! At large group on Monday, I talked and we discussed the extent to which Christianity needs to be extreme, and the sorts of errors that Christian "fundamentalists" fall into. Rather than merely debate definitions, we focused on what the errors are and how we can avoid them. We heard from two pastors, Mark Driscoll and Matt Chandler, reflect on these things. Keep reading to get my synopsis and those links.

Large Group #6 Debrief: Unity, not Uniformity

Speakers: Sam Elder and Pastor Jeff Liou of Lake Avenue Church

This week, we continued with our series Nuances of the Faith with a two-part talk, by myself and Pastor Jeff Liou of Lake Avenue Church, entitled Unity, Not Uniformity, based in Ephesians 4. I spoke about the need for unity in the church, drawing from verses 1-6, my own experiences here at Caltech and an article from Christianity Today. Jeff then spoke about the need for diversity, drawing from verses 7-16, his own experiences at Lake Avenue, and his studies at Fuller on race. Afterwards, we broke into three groups for discussion.

Large Group #5 Debrief: Faith, Not Blind Faith

Speaker: Sam Elder

Last night we continued in our Nuances of the Faith series with discussing the title subject: faith. The key question we struggled with was: Is faith supposed to be believing something in spite of the evidence? As you can guess from the title, my short answer is no. But then we're left with the question, what is faith?

Large Group #4 Debrief: God Speaks, But Confirm

Speaker: Pastor James Lee, My Father's House Church

Our first guest speaker came to large group today! Pastor James Lee, who recently founded a church in San Marino, was passing out fliers on campus a few weeks ago when he ran into Peter Ngo. Peter gave me his flier and I contacted him about speaking at large group. We met over lunch and this talk is a result of that discussion and related to a book he's written. (I bought a copy from him; ask me if you want to borrow.) These are the notes that I took.

Large Group #3 Debrief: Angry But Not Sinning

Speakers: Peter Buhler and Sam Elder

This is the first talk in a series called Nuances of the Faith, discussing the gray areas of Christianity. We believe the entire Bible is true and God's Word to us, but it's sometimes not so easy to understand, or seems to contradict itself, and we'll be focusing on those moments in this series.

This week, we talked about the emotion of anger. Should we as Christians be angry, or should we do our best to avoid it? And how do we deal with it? Keep reading to see what Peter Buhler and I (Sam Elder) had to say about it.