God Quest

Our most recent sermon series at church is following The GodQuest, which is basically a church-wide Bible study. There are weekly lessons, a book, and videos that coincide with the weekly messages at church. We are meeting weekly as a small group with the in-laws and some other church-goers. This study/quest was designed by Sean McDowell, son of the famous author, Josh McDowell. As I understood it, the God Quest is supposed to answer some of those really difficult questions that Christians and non-believers (those who may be considering Christianity) face about God, Jesus, and religion in general. (ex: Why does God allow suffering in the world?)

As I write this now, we are about 3 weeks into the study and I am less than impressed with parts of it, but it may be accomplishing what it is supposed too... Jury is still out. So, I am going to list my gripes and end on a positive note.

First of all, Sean McDowell is really, really irritating to watch and listen too. He is obviously passionate about what he is teaching, which is wonderful. However, I. can. not. stand. him. I think it has something to do with his eye-brow waggling and the way he emphasizes his words. And I find the setting of his videos to be pretty cheesy.

Secondly, this series was "advertised" (for lack of a better word) as having all of this great input from Biblical experts, which is does, kinda. I would much rather hear from the likes of Josh McDowell (who is not nearly as annoying as his son), Lee Stroble, and other experts, but they only get a 30-90 second snippet of the weekly videos. I would like more from them.

Lastly, I really don't feel like I have any answered questions yet. I have learned a lot of great facts, but the weekly questions that are presented have not been fully answered for me yet. Now, to be fair, we are only halfway through the series, but as it is going so far, I still don't feel like my questions are going to be answered.

I suppose though, that the point of this entire "God Quest" is to make people more actively seek to know God and know about God. This series has started lots of discussions at home about God, His plans and purpose for our lives, among other things. One of the main point that has been made is that those who often criticize the Bible have never sat down and read it and studied it, which is a valid point. So, I am going to embark on my own little "quest" to read through the Bible. I found a schedule to read through it in a year and am planning to follow it as much as I can. I have chosen to read through it chronologically, which makes the most sense to me personally. I am using a study-Bible too, so that I can read commentary as I go to further explain the context of what I am reading.

So there you have it. My thoughts on the God Quest.