Summer Lecture Series

July 7, 14, & 21

Rev. Dr. Sean Hayden, Tennessee Wesleyan University

All are invited – no ticket is required. 9:40 am Parish Hall.

Resources from Dr. Hayden are below:

Reading to Understand Bonhoeffer:

  1. His Life
    1. The biography I recommend is by Ferdinand Schlingensiepen: Dietrich Bonhoeffer: Martyr, Thinker, Man of Resistance.
    2. Martin Doblmeier directed a good documentary about Bonhoeffer.  I highly recommend watching that.  It’s available on Youtube or Amazon prime. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9vqxljH6Ok
  1. His Writings
    1. Discipleship (translated in a less reliable older English edition as “Cost of Discipleship).
    2. Life Together (on Christian community)
    3. Prayerbook of the Bible (on praying the psalms)
    4. His Ethics and Letters and Papers From Prison reward close reading but are difficult to access.
  1. Relevant Reading Mentioned in the Talks (This list will definitely grow!)
    1. On Social Development and History
      1. Donald Trauger (of Oak Ridge), From Horsepower to Nuclear Power: Memoir of an Energy Pioneer.
      2. Ian Morris, Why the West Rules—For Now (on Social Development Index). Also, The Measure of Civilization or Foragers, Farmers, and Fossil Fuels (same author)
    2. On literature that tries to express or diagnose these changes.
      1. ​Romanticism: Ralph Waldo Emerson’s essays “Circles,” “Nature,” and “Self-Reliance” are good starting point for Americans.  The German Romantics are a little harder to crack.
      2. Walker Percy’s Love in the Ruins is a hilarious and prescient look into the future, although some of the language around race and gender will feel dated (written in 1971).

Education at Church Street

All are invited to join in small groups and adult education at Church Street. Click here to contact Rev. Tim Best if you need assistance in getting connected to a class or study. You have a place here!

Adult Education and Sunday School at Church Street

Learn more about Church Street’s Sunday School groups and adult ministries here. If you have questions about which small group or Sunday School class best suits you, please click here to connect and discuss your needs with Rev. Tim Best. 

Understanding Our Spiritual Gifts

Have you taken stock of your spiritual gifts? There are a few tools you can use to assess and understand who God is calling you to be! The United Methodist Church has an assessment tool online. Click here.

Our youth department has a special assessment tool as well that anyone can review and use – take the Inventory first, then apply your answers onto the Assessment tool: