Regents breathes new LIFE into faith studies
If you want to do faith-based study without going to college, Regents LIFE could be your answer. And with several new courses planned for 2024 it’s a great time to check it out. Joel Turton gave Chris Rolfe a sneak peek
Have you ever wanted to study elements of your faith in more depth but without the commitment of a college course or undergraduate degree? Turns out lots of people do, and that sparked the launch of Regents LIFE late last year.
Regents LIFE, explains teaching and research assistant Joel Turton, offers a selection of bite-sized online faith-based courses designed to be accessible to all. “We had the idea towards the end of the last academic year,” he says.
“We wanted to do something different and new in addition to the undergraduate and postgraduate degrees and the Ministry Foundation Certificate which we already offer at Regents.”
Regents LIFE provides introductory-level courses to different aspects of faith that people can self-facilitate. “It’s quite different to doing a degree and very laid back. You can access the sessions online as and when you please, and each video is around 20 minutes long, with interactive elements and opportunities to reflect,” Joel explains.
Each course is taught by a member of the Regents team, he adds, with content centred around specific topics.
Currently, the line-up features seven courses: Being Pentecostal; Helping People Effectively; Learning from Experience; Autism and Discipleship; The Bible as Story; Following Jesus and Others Well and the latest course, which launched just last month, Adolescent Discipleship.
The popularity of Regents LIFE in its first six months has prompted the team to extend this offer, says Joel, meaning plenty more courses are planned for 2024 too.
“This month, there will be one about the apocalypse for the church – understanding Revelation in more detail. Then we have a couple more in the pipeline for March, April and May on self-leadership, Elim’s foundational truths and God’s power and presence in ancient Israel.”
And while course material has so far been provided by Regents, Joel adds that further courses involving other teachers could also launch in future.
Throughout the development of Regents LIFE, Joel has been working behind the scenes to film, record and edit the courses and assist with advertising and releasing them month by month.
Doing so, he says, has been beneficial to his faith.
“I’m learning along the way, which has been very valuable for me personally. “It’s been great to sit in on the sessions and think and reflect on some things for myself.
“I would definitely recommend any of the Regents LIFE courses!”
A taste of Regents LIFE
I was curious to find out more about Regents LIFE courses, writes Chris Rolfe, and decided to enrol on one myself. I signed up for The Bible as Story, taught by performing arts course leader Rich Hasnip, which takes students on a journey through the narrative of the Bible from Genesis to Revelation.
Session one, ‘In the beginning’, focuses on Genesis and, in 20 minutes, explores what you can learn about the Bible if you read or study it as a story. Here are four things I learned:
1. The author matters
If you read the Bible as a story, it’s natural to make a few assumptions about it, one being that it has an author. Scripture is a collaborative story, begun by one writer and picked up by others over the centuries. But there is coherence because behind these human authors, there is the single inspiring voice of God.
2. Don’t think Dickens, think computer game
The Bible may be a story that reaches far back into history and far ahead into the future, but it is also one which we are immersed in today. It’s about the reality humanity experiences in all its grittiest, sinful, as well as holy forms. It’s less like reading Dickens and more like joining a high-stakes computer game that is already actively in play.
3. Recurring plot themes begin in Genesis
Like any good story, the Bible has a plot with a beginning, middle and end, and several themes are introduced in Genesis which recur and develop throughout it. One example is God’s constant search for relationship with us as he asks, “Adam, where are you?” Men blaming women, the sexes at odds and humanity fleeing from God are other themes that begin in Genesis and recur as the story of the fall is played out right up to the current day.
4. Genesis is a scene-setter
Likewise, settings and people introduced in Genesis can be found throughout the Bible. Take the garden, mountains, the tree of life and thorns in Eden, which reappear in different ways in later chapters. And as with many other stories, characters are introduced early on who we will meet later, an example being in God’s promise to Eve that she will bear a son whose descendant will one day crush the serpent's head.
This article first appeared in Direction Magazine. For further details, please click here.
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