Fall 2019/Fuller Online

IS501

Howard

IS501: PRACTICES OF WORSHIP AND PRAYER (4 Units: 160 hours). Evan B. Howard.

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 vocational coherence of a Christian leader through reflection, relationships, and practices. IS501 is an integrative course that explores the identity and practices of Christian worship and prayer as a people called, gathered, and sent by God. Together, professor and students study and enact historic Christian disciplines necessitated by this distinctive identity (Sabbath-keeping, confession, praise, communion, enacting the prophetic, gathering & sending, prayer, and reading & proclaiming the Word) 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 worship and prayer. (2) Students will have demonstrated through participation in local contexts the capacity to engage in activities and exercisesrelated to Christian spiritual disciplines and practices ofworship and prayer. (3) Students will demonstrate the capacities to engage scripture, tradition, and contemporary resources to reflect theologically on historic and personal practices of worship and prayer. (4) Students will have articulated how practices of worship and prayer 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 worship, 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 meets ten weeks online (which includes required synchronous and/or asynchronous participation in vocation and formation groups) for a total of 40 instructional hours. Students are required to interact with the material, with each other, and with the instructor regularly through online discussions, reading, and other assignments that promote active learning.

REQUIRED READING: 946 pp. of required reading.

The Holy Bible [50 pages of reading assigned]

Agamben, Giorgio. "Liturgy and Rule" section II of his The Highest Poverty: Monastic Rules and Form of Life. Stanford University Press, 2013. ISBN: 978-0804784054, Pub. Price $50.00 [25 pp. assigned]. Available on eReserves.

Howard, Evan B. Praying the Scriptures: A Field Guide for Your Spiritual Journey. IVP Books, 1999. ISBN: 978-0830822010, Pub. Price $16.00 [6 pp. assigned]. Available on eReserves.

Jones, Cheslyn, Geoffrey Wainwright, Edward Yarnold and Paul Bradshaw, editors. The Study of Liturgy. Oxford University Press, revised edition, 1992. ISBN: 978-0195209228, Pub. Price $72.95 [7 pp. assigned]. Available on eReserves.

Peterson, David. Engaging with God: A Biblical Theology of Worship. IVP Academic, 2002. ISBN: 978-0830826971, Pub. Price $26.00 [116 pp. assigned]. Available on eReserves.

Ray, Walter D. Tasting Heaven on Earth: Worship in 6th Century Constantinople. Eerdmans Publishing, 2012. ISBN: 978-0802866639, Pub. Price $28.00 [62 pp. assigned]. Available on eReserves.

Senn, Frank C. Christian Liturgy: Catholic and Evangelical. Fortress Press, 1997. ISBN: 978-0800627263, Pub. Price $55.00 [80 pp. assigned]. Available on eReserves.

Smith, James K. A. You Are What You Love: The Spiritual Power of Habit. Brazos Press, 2016. ISBN: 978-1587433801, Pub. Price $19.99. Available as a e-book from the Fuller Library [200 pp. assigned]

CORE PRACTICES

Sabbath-Keeping

Heschel, Abraham Joshua. The Sabbath. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2005. ISBN: 978-0374529758, Pub. Price $14. Available as a e-book from the Fuller Library [60 pp. assigned].

Students will also choose between:

Hambrick-Stowe, Charles E. The Practice of Piety: Puritan Devotional Disciplines in Seventeenth-Century New England. University of North Carolina Press, 1986. ISBN: 978-0807841457, Pub. Price $42.00 [15 pp. assigned]. Available on eReserves., and

Sparks, Maisie. “Rest Works: Quiet Times Fuel Grateful Activity,” chapter ten of Embodied Spirits: Stories of Spiritual Directors of Color, edited by Sherry Bryant-Johnson, Rosalie Norman-McNaney, and Therese Taylor-Stinson. Morehouse Publishing, 2014. ISBN: 978-0819228932, [11 pages assigned]. Available on eReserves.

Confession

Foster, Richard. Celebration of Discipline: The Path to Spiritual Growth. HarperCollins, 2002 (25th Anniversary Edition, originally 1978). ISBN: 978-0060628390, Pub. Price $25.99 [15 pp. assigned]. Available on eReserves.

McNeill, John T. A History of the Cure of Souls. HarperCollins, 1977 (originally 1951). ISBN: 978-0060655402, Out of Print [28 pp. assigned]. Available on eReserves.

Praise

"The Nine Ways of Prayer of St. Dominic" http://fisheaters.com/stdominic9ways.html [10 pp. assigned].

Communion

Hunter, Todd. "Taking Communion" in Giving Church Another Chance. InterVarsity Press, 2012. ISBN: 978-1458732125, Pub. Price $19.99 [14 pp. assigned]. Available on eReserves.

T.F. Torrance's "The Paschal Mystery of Christ and the Eucharist" in Theology in Reconciliation: Essays Towards Evangelical and Catholic Unity in East and West. Wipf and Stock, 1996. ISBN: 978-1579100230, Pub. Price $29.00 [7 pp. assigned]. Available on eReserves.

Gathering and Sending

Schmit, Clayton J. Sent and Gathered: A Worship Manual for the Missional Church. Baker Academic, 2009. ISBN: 978-0801031656, Pub. Price $22.00 [40 pp. assigned]. Available on eReserves.

Reading and Proclaiming the Word

Taylor, Barbara Brown. “Preaching,” chapter seven of The Preaching Life. A Cowley Publications Book, 1993. ISBN: 978-1561010745, Pub. Price $17.95 [17 pp. Assigned]. Available on eReserves.

Nouwen, Henri. Creative Ministry. Image Books, 1991. ISBN: 978-0385126168, Pub. Price $11.99 [20 pp. assigned]. Available on eReserves.

Prayer

Angela of Foligno. Complete Works. Paulist Press, 1993. ISBN: 978-0809133666, Pub. Price $27.95 [53 pp. assigned]. Available on eReserves.

Johnston, J. B. The Prayer Meeting and Its History. Pittsburgh United Presbyterian Board of Publication, 1870 (available at http://www.prayermeetings.org/files/PM_The_Prayer_Meeting_And_Its_History_J_B_Johnston.pdf) [40 pp. assigned].

Enacting the Prophetic

Woolman, John. The Journal of John Woolman. CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2013. ISBN: 978-1482013092, Pub. Price $9.99 (free Kindle edition). Available as a e-book from the Fuller Library [70 pp. assigned].

INTEGRATION RESOURCES - Video-lectures and reading-viewing assignments are often designed not only with information but with integration in mind. Integration will especially be stressed in the design of the forum prompts.

ASSIGNMENTS AND ASSESSMENT:

946 pages reading, including at least 50 pages of biblical text (@20 pages per hour = 42 hours; plus viewing). [This assignment is related to learning outcome #3] [47 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. (30%) [This assignment is related to learning outcome #1, 2, 3, 4]. [32 hours+8 hours].
Autobiography: Students will create an autobiography related to practices of worship and prayer. (2%) [This assignment is related to learning outcome #1] [2 hours].
Directed Exercises and Integrative Reflection: Students will participate in disciplines and exercises outside of the classroom over the course of the quarter related to the core practices of the course and reflect on these experiences in a way that integrates experience with course content. (30%) [This assignment is related to learning outcome #2 and #3] [25 hours].
Final Integrative Assignment: Integration paper that reflects theologically on the practices of this course and their implications for the student's response and the exercises, habits, and disciplines in their current Rule of Life. (30%) [This assignment is related to learning outcome 1,3, and 4] [20 hours].
Additional assignment(s), activities: Students will engage in fieldwork assignments, solitude retreats and other activities appropriate to their growing familiarity with the practice of worship and prayer (8%). [These assignments are related to learning outcomes #1-4] [26 hours].

PREREQUISITES: IS500 encouraged. Recommended in first year of study

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

FINAL EXAMINATION: None.