Teaching New Testament: The Finale

Today was one of those days. I woke up at 1.30 am to thank the Lord. Midnight 23rd April 1982 until the early hours of 24th April 1982 I encountered Jesus Christ in my room at Ilam-flats, University of Canterbury. "At midnight I rise to give thanks to You, O Lord." "Thank you, Jesus" I murmured to myself and fell back to sleep. But at 4.30am I was up again this time to prepare for my last NT 2 class for the Semester, in fact the last lectures of the academic year begun in July 2013. The class took some time to warm up but by the time I surveyed the whole book of Revelation in about 40 minutes, I felt the class warmed to me and numerous questions were asked before we went for the break at 10am. We returned at 10:25am after talking about Hebrew and Greek ancient manuscripts over coffee and I gave them a hand-out of the preface of Nicholas King's The Prophets based on the LXX. By the time I spoke about the 7 churches of Rev 2-3, I had little time left for anything else. A few more questions were raised and the class ended as the bell rang at 11:20am.

Quickly I said my good-byes to the class but the subject rep stood up and gave me a big card and I was very much moved by their gesture. I can't ask for more, lecturing on the book of Revelation on 24th April 2014 and bidding farewell to teaching NT in TTC with one final lectures on Revelation in my other elective offering next Tuesday. Twenty odd students wrote notes of appreciation in the Card and each and every one of these well-wishes will be treasured as marking another milestone in the ministry of teaching God's Word for the glory of Christ.