On Raising the Ceiling of Our Hope

Teach Me
Psalm 119: 49-72

I’m grading student papers, and one effect that has on me (alongside making me want to commit suicide) is to make me puzzle over what it is that enables people to learn. There are people who have read the Scriptures with fresh eyes, seen things they had not seen before, and seen things I had not seen (maybe through making links with things they had seen before or experiences they have had)—which is the way they get an A. There are other people who continue to write what their Sunday school teachers told them the Bible says rather than reading for themselves what the Bible says. There are people for whom discovering what the Bible says is an exciting adventure; there are others who simply want confirmation of what they already think...