Spring 2020/Fuller Online

IS502

Gutenson

IS502: PRACTICE OF CHRISTIAN COMMUNITY (4 Units: 160 hours). Charles Gutenson.

DESCRIPTION: Christian practices constitute the Christian life. The combined Christian practices of vocational formation, worship, community, and mission facilitate the integration of personal, spiritual, academic, and global formation into the vocation coherence of a Christian leader through reflection, relationships, and practices. IS502 is an integrative course that explores the identity and practices of Christian community as a people called, gathered, and sent by God. Together, professor and students study and enact historic Christian disciplines necessitated by this distinctive identity (hospitality, forgiveness, promise-keeping, truth-telling, gratitude, Christian formation, group spiritual direction, and global forgiveness/peacemaking) in order to form students who demonstrate capacities to cultivate a theologically reflective practice of Christian discipleship.

LEARNING OUTCOMES: (1) Students will have demonstrated capacities to critically reflect on their current and past experiences of Christian practices of community. (2) Students will have demonstrated through participation in local contexts the capacity to engage in activities and exercises related to Christian spiritual disciplines and practices of community. (3) Students will have demonstrated capacities to engage scripture, tradition, and contemporary resources to reflect theologically on historic and personal practices of community. (4) Students will have articulated how community practices impact their response to the Central Integration Question (CIQ) and will identify exercises, habits, and disciplines to embody these practices within their sociocultural context.

RELATIONSHIP TO PROGRAM LEARNING OUTCOMES: This course will provide students with further opportunity to develop and/or master skills in integrating theological and missiological content with life experience and context through engaging a variety of spiritual practices related to the practice of community, which is consistent with the SOT/SIS PLO “Students will have demonstrated capacities to cultivate a theologically reflective practice of Christian discipleship.” (MDiv, MAT, MATM, MAICS). The emphases on integration in this course provides introduction to the MAICS learning outcome related to critical thinking and integration (MAICS). This course may also contribute to various learning outcomes in the MAGL related to integrating theology and praxis in ministry and mission, and related to spiritual formation (MAGL).

COURSE FORMAT: This course will be conducted online on a ten-week schedule aligned with Fuller’s academic calendar for a total of 40 instructional hours. Students are required to interact with the material, with each other, and with the instructor regularly through video lectures, online discussions, reading, and other assignments that promote active learning.

REQUIRED READING: 800 pp. of required reading

A. Pohl, Christine. Living into Community: Cultivating Practices That Sustain Us. Eerdmans, 2011. ISBN: 978-0802849854, Pub. Price $20.00. Available as an e-book from the Fuller Library [178 pp. assigned].

B. Wright, Christopher. The Mission of God. InterVarsity, 2006. ISBN: 978-0830825714, Pub. Price $50.00 [101 pp. assigned; chapters available in ebook in the Fuller Library].

C. REQUIRED CORE PRACTICES: (available in e-reserves or as ebooks)

i. Hospitality/Inclusion

Pohl, Christine. Living into Community: Cultivating Practices That Sustain Us. Eerdmans, 2011. ISBN: 978-0802849854, Pub. Price $20.00 Available as an e-book from the Fuller Library. [pp. 1-16, 158-176 assigned].

Cha, Peter. “Constructing New Intergenerational Ties, and Identities among Korean American Christians: A congregational case study.” In Nieves and Priest (eds); This Side of Heaven: Ethnicity, Race and Christian Faith. Oxford, 2006. ISBN: 978-0195310573, Pub. Price $45.95; available as an ebook through Fuller Library. [16 pages].

Conde-Frazier, Elizabeth. “From Hospitality to Shalom” in A Many Colored Kingdom. Baker, 2004. ISBN: 978-0801027437, Pub. Price $24.00 Available as an e-book from the Fuller Library. [pp. 167-210 assigned].

ii. Truth Telling

The Danger of Silence (https://www.ted.com/talks/clint_smith_the_danger_of_silence)

Empire: Tell the Truth (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FYybTaTBdHs)

iii. Gratitude

40 Simple Ways to….(http://www.lifehack.org/articles/communication/40-simple-ways-practice-gratitude.html)

iv. Promise Keeping

v. Christian Education / Formation

Smith, James K.A. ”Introduction: Beyond Perspectives” and “Homo Liturgicus: The Human Person as Lover,” in Desiring the Kingdom. Baker, 2009. ISBN: 978-0801035777, Pub. Price $22.99 Available as an e-book from the Fuller Library. [pp. 17-35, 37-73 assigned].

vi. Forgiveness/Reconciliation:

Volf, Miroslav. “How Can We Forgive,” in Free of Charge: Giving and Forgiving in a World Stripped of Grace. Zondervan, 2006. ISBN: 978-0310265740, Pub. Price $15.99 [pp. 193-224 assigned].

Tutu, Desmond. “Without Forgiveness there Really is No Future,” in Reader in Contemporary Political Theology, Eerdmans, 2012; 482-502. ISBN: 978-0802864406, Pub. Price: $50.00. Available in eReserves [20 pages].

vii. Global Forgiveness/Peacemaking

Stassen, Glen. Formation for Life: Just Peacemaking and Twenty-First-Century Discipleship. Pickwick Publications, 2013. ISBN: 9781610979863, Pub Price $39.00. Available as an ebook from the Fuller Library. [pp. 3-26, 126-136, 137-146, 207-223, 250-259, 260-275 assigned].

viii. Group Spiritual Discernment

Smith, Gordon. Listening to God in Time of Choice: The Art of Discerning God’s Will. IVP, 1997. ISBN: 978-0830813674, Pub. Price $17.00 [pp. 42-147 assigned].

Additional resources will be added/substituted by the time class starts with the goal of assuring wide contextual perspectives on the various issues.

Biblical Texts: Deuteronomy [25 pp. assigned], Matthew [25 pp. assigned].

ASSIGNMENTS AND ASSESSMENT:

800 pages reading and videos (for example, weekly YouTube mini lectures), including at least 50 pages of biblical text (10%) [This assignment is related to learning outcome #3]. [40 hours].
Online and Vocation Formation Group (VFG) Participation: Students will participate in active learning to foster understanding of and capacity for engaging in theologically-informed reflection in the online classroom and through participation in Vocation Formation Groups. (20%). [This assignment is related to learning outcome #1, #2, #3 and #4]. [32 hours+8 hours].
Autobiography: Students will create an autobiography related to practices of community (15%). [This assignment is related to learning outcome #1]. [10 hours].
Four fieldwork activities and reflections. Details included in syllabus. (15%). [This assignment is related to learning outcome #2.] [20 hours].
Final Integrative Assignment: Integration paper that reflects theologically on the practices of this course and their implications for the student’s response to the CIQ and the exercises, habits, and disciplines in their current Rule of Life. (40%). [This assignment is related to learning outcome #1, #3, and #4]. [25 hours].

PREREQUISITES: None. IS500 strongly recommended.

RELATIONSHIP TO CURRICULUM: Meets a core integration requirement in the 120 MDiv and the 80 MAT, 80 MATM, 80 MAICS Programs (Fall 2015).

FINAL EXAMINATION: None.