Emmuas Ministries: Covid-19 Update

Hello everyone. It is our sincere hope that wherever you are in this season that the Coronavirus has brought us into, that you are healthy and well. Please take a moment to see this update on what’s going on at Emmaus Ministries from our Executive Director, Caleb Ives. 

We wrapped up the New Testament session of the Biblical Narrative Series!

75 people attended a 7-week course covering the history and heart of every single book of the New Testament, and how those books fit in the larger narrative of Scripture.

Our School of Biblical Studies has adapted to a completely online format. 

While it is a different context than we had anticipated and planned for this year, we have been able to continue with our lectures, discipleship, and community engagement.

We will be hosting our first-ever totally online Biblical Literacy Seminar! 

Over the course of 4 weeks, we will be engaged in an inductive study of the book of Philemon with one of our local church communities. 

A new outreach component has emerged from Emmaus during this time of quarantine.

Over the last 4 weeks, we have gone “live” on Facebook with a daily devotion in the Psalms. This unexpected outreach has touched people in both our local communities and family circles and globally! We have reports from ministries overseas that are tuning in for this time of intentional meditation and encouragement.

Whether you are a partner with one of our staff members, an investor in the ministry, one of our alumni, or a participant of one of our programs in the past, we want to thank you for the part that you play in the mission to which God has called us. God bless you.

Why the Psalms are Important

There are a lot of messages of hope and help out there. This is a time when we need those kinds of words. 

But, if I’m honest with myself; There are a lot of days, hours, moments where I’m

Not. 

Okay. 

I don’t often feel anxiety, uncertainty and (let’s call it what it is) fear. I’m typically the strong, resilient, perseverant one. 

But, today is not that day. This week has not been that week. 

As I've scrolled through my preferred flavors of social media, I find equal measures of hope and despair. I don’t know how to find my center when my community, work, church, and even family have been in a state of constant flux. I’m disorientated, unsettled and honestly...

Exhausted. 

I’m tired and I want to avoid these feelings by thinking about something else. And yet, I can’t escape them, just as I can’t even escape my own home. It is in those moments that I am reminded of the type of resilience that is called for in this time. The same resilience that communities of faith have cultivated for thousands of years. The same resilience that is described in the book of Psalms. 

More than any other book of the Bible, Psalms reflects the spectrum of human life experience.

The poetry of this book speaks from the reality of our world, not as it is hoped to be, but as it truly is.  There is joy mixed with sorrow, praise held alongside pain, and despair mingled with hope. Collected within Psalms are prayers of orientation, disorientation, and new orientation. 

Isn’t that how life is?

We go through seasons when all seems right with the world. We feel a sense of gratitude for the constancy of love, life, and affection. These are the Psalms of Orientation. 

Inevitably life happens, and the reality of living in an imperfect, broken world hits us and we feel anguish, hurt and alienation. Our pain and suffering clash with what we had known to be true. The pain of that moment disorientates from what we thought was stable and true. These are Psalms of Disorientation. 

Psalms of disorientation deal with the raw reality of pain and grief. Unmasked and unfiltered. Humans need to express this and God desires to hear it. Your struggle in quarantine, your frustration with your living situation, or your sorrow at the widespread devastation of this pandemic, and your fear for your family, are welcomed by God. 

You are meant to share your unfiltered feelings with God. 

Psalms demonstrate that you need to process and not pretend or push away negative thoughts. 

The way of resilient faith recognizes we must deal with pain and suffering as it really exists, but we must also trust that prayers begun in hopelessness will not end there. God delights in surprising us with hope. Psalms of New Orientation reflect feelings of great joy when God breaks through our despair and evokes a sense of newness and reorientation. 

The subversive lesson of Psalms is that pain and praise are a conjunctive force for good and both are elements of faithful living. Psalms teach us that God has and will continue to give us space to be raw, real and honest.  Our cries of desperation and delight are welcomed. 

This is precisely why the Psalms are so important. 

This is why we will be spending some time on Facebook live in the coming weeks, helping us to pray through the Psalms in this way. Join us on Facebook at Noon every day next week for our journey through the Psalms. 

Written by Sarah Wise

Sarah Wise teaches for our School of Biblical Studies and manages many of the behind the scene components for our ministry. Sarah has a Masters of Divinity from Asbury Theological Seminary.

Merry Christmas from Emmaus- A year in Reflection

Merry Christmas everyone! It is absolutely unbelievable to think that we are just days away from another Christmas and only a few weeks away from a brand new decade! We hope that everyone is preparing for a holiday filled with family, food, and traditions that warm the heart with love and memories. Before 2019 comes to an end, we wanted to take some time to update everyone on the life of Emmaus. 

The Biblical Narrative Series completely exceeded everyone’s wildest expectations this fall. The staff came together and prayed to have 25 people in attendance for 7 Monday nights. We all thought that 25 people committing that kind of time to exploring their Bible would be such an exceptional experience. God blew our minds with 80 attendees from 11 different churches and 6 different denominations! We are nearly sold out for the upcoming session of the New Testament Narrative Series that will be beginning this spring. The life that has been breathed into this program has given the staff high hopes for its continued growth in the future! 

Our students in the School of Biblical Studies have journeyed through nearly the entire Old Testament. They headed into Winter Break this week with just one more unit to finish before they get to collide with Jesus and his disciples in the Gospels! It has been a wonderful semester building relationships with one another. There have been many laughs and just about as many tears as God’s word works its way from pages in a book to treasures in the student’s hearts.

Our newest staff members Kristi Marsh and Morgan Phaneuf have officially completed their first full year with Emmaus, and are constantly demonstrating how much of a gift they both are to this community! Both now have several book lectures under their belts and many hours spent in all the things that Emmaus has to offer. The staff grows beyond coworkers, beyond friends and into a family as we work together to fulfill the mission of Emmaus. We are so glad that Kristi and Morgan are a part of this family!

Kristi Marsh Teaching

Morgan Phaneuf Teaching

Speaking of family, the Emmaus team is losing an entire family, but it’s for an incredible reason. Lizzie Rogers, who has been a part of our teaching and support staff, will be leaving for God’s new adventure in her life this week. Lizzie’s husband, Trey--who is also an Emmaus alumni, a former staff member, and a current board member--has been called to be the lead pastor of a church in Lexington, Kentucky.

2019 has been one of the most exciting years in the history of Emmaus, and we are so excited as we look forward to everything that God has for us in 2020! In your end-of-year giving, please consider an investment into the staff of Emmaus. If you are already a partner with the staff of Emmaus, THANK YOU!  If not, would you please consider making a one-time or ongoing investment in the lives of our staff as we continue to serve in the mission to equip all people to engage their Bibles and be transformed by Jesus! 

Thank you for partnering with Emmaus Ministries! We can’t wait to see what God is going to do in 2020!

Biblical Narrative Series: Journey Through the Old Testament

Do you have questions about the Old Testament? Have you made the resolution to read through the Bible in one year only to stop in the middle of Leviticus? Who is Nahum? What’s a Psalm?  On September 23rd, Emmaus Ministries will be launching our Biblical Narrative Series and it’s all about the Old Testament! 

On Monday nights, for 7 weeks, from 6:30 to 8:30, we will be covering the entire Old Testament, book by book. Attendees will receive their own workbook that includes structural outlines of each book, full color maps and timelines. The sessions will be a lecture style format in which instructors will give the historical background and context that will help Bible readers feel equipped to more effectively engage in reading and studying the Bible. 

This is a completely new format for our Narrative Series and we are excited to share what we believe is the “new and improved” program. In the past, the Narrative Series has met once a month for during the course of a typical “school year” (from August to May) in an individual seminar style format, covering the entire Bible in thematic sections. This year, we are starting a more course style format, meeting during consecutive weeks with a series on the Old Testament in the fall and the New Testament in the spring. We hope that this format maintains momentum and makes the Biblical Narrative Series accessible for small groups, church groups, ministry staff and friends to do together. 

The heart of the Biblical Narrative Series is that attendees leave better equipped to engage their Bibles. It is our hope to take these unfamiliar books that were written in a different time to a culture that is completely foreign to our current day and make them come alive. It is difficult to feel like Obadiah is relevant to our lives today when you don’t know why it was written in the first place, or to whom it was originally written at all! However, with historical context and good application of the mindset of the original readers, these books become the living and active words of God. 

If you’re interested in signing up for the Biblical Narrative Series, here’s what you need to know:

When: Monday Nights September 23rd through November 4th from 6:30-8:30

Where: Canterbury Conference and Retreat Center 

1601 Alafaya Trail Oviedo, Florida

How: To pre register visit: www.emmausbibleministries.org/narrative

Cost: $50 to pre register or $75 at the door on September 23rd 

Back to School: A New Year

School is in session! Last week we kicked off the 2019-2020 year with our new School of Biblical Studies students! Over the next 10 months, we will journey with this class as they study every book of the Bible. 

Emmaus Ministries derives its name from the story of the disciples who met Jesus on the road to the city of Emmaus: Luke 24:31-32: And their eyes were opened, and they recognized him. And he vanished from their sight. They said to each other, “Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the Scriptures?”  It’s an absolute joy to walk with this group of people as they set out on their own Emmaus Road Journey. We know that as the year goes on, we will witness their hearts begin to burn through the study of the Bible. 

The first two weeks of class are seminar style, during which the students learn the method we use to study the Bible here at Emmaus. Our school teaches a variation of the Inductive Method, a way in which to study the scripture that seeks to draw conclusions only from the text. This approach sets aside any preconceived notions that a modern reader may have and focuses on the text in its original context. This is the lens through which our students view scripture and then move it into practical application to their lives today. Inductive Bible study has three steps: observation, interpretation and application. 

We use the Book of Jonah to teach the Inductive Method. This book of the Bible usually comes loaded with preconceived ideas, mental images, even songs and stories from childhood! Students are usually familiar with certain aspects of the story, they may relate it to God speaking to Jonah, or Jonah running away and getting swallowed by a “big fish.” Students often find that they have to let go of what they think they know about the story in order to inductively study the book. 

As the week progresses, The Book of Jonah begins to transform from the “familiar children's story” to a convicting, relevant, and timeless lesson about how God loves his enemies. It becomes a case study of what it looks like to truly repent and follow the Lord. For our students, Jonah is no longer just a story on a page, but a story that reveals truths about God's character in such a way that imprints something on their hearts. 

We are so excited to begin another year of studying the whole Bible and to watch as the students encounter Jesus throughout the whole of scripture. Our hope is that you’ll join us in this year while this class journeys through the bible. Please pray that our students meet Jesus with fresh eyes on open hearts. Our goal is that this would be not just scholarly school, but one of disciples that are growing, maturing and learning what it looks like to follow after Jesus.