Christian College Thought Paper

Christian College

Azusa Pacific University, University College

Christian College

        Attending a school can open and offer many opportunities. We as individuals are raised in believing that we should do well in school so we can either succeed or graduate, and continue on in life and eventually go off to college. From there we either may decide to pursue our career, or just continue where we may have left off and go into searching for a job. But what if we went to college where our dreams meant more than just attending our daily classes? What if not only we as humans discover ourselves, but we found our spiritual path as well? Of course we spend a lot of time searching for the right colleges that may fit our careers we desire for. Especially after graduation, this could be a very challenging task to deal with, which could also be very time consuming. If you actually think about it, the colleges of today don’t offer quite as much as we may have been looking for to begin our careers. They offer something quite divergent. Especially, in this day and time, and in this generation as of today, now we could simply take college courses online. When I came across reading “The Idea of a Christian College”, intelligently written by Arthur F. Holmes I discovered four themes. The four themes I had come across was understanding the student life, how liberal arts applies to life, how Christian colleges can inspire multiple parts of our education and the result of our future education with Christian Liberal Arts.

Summary of themes

As I mentioned the themes beforehand, I seem to understand what Arthur Holmes point was. The point Arthur Holmes was trying to get across was that he sees that several young people attend junior colleges or a university, in which may have been encouraged by their parents to attend in the first place. Without the students understanding, what college really is about instead of just the vocational goals or questionable social aspirations. Of course, many individual students attend college because they had no other choice, but to attend college.  To those that attend college, may look at it as a constant routine of their own that occurs day by day, but the main question is to those students that attend college, really know the true meaning or the purpose of going to college? Personally I believe, that some college students in this day and time need to attend college to have some type of college education to seek a job in their lives. On the other hand, other students that may not take college seriously may become uninterested eventually by their own peers. Or by other outside influences upon college life and they may end up spending their tuition money on unacceptable things that’s non related to school. I believe when this happens, some students may seem that spending time with friends or being social  becomes more important to them instead of focusing on their careers. Pursuing this further, Arthur Holmes themes seemed very attention grabbing . His other theme that I have discovered was how the liberal arts applied to life. What Arthur Holmes revealed, is that education should prepare us as individuals to adapt, and to think wisely, and be creative. He also stated that Liberal education contributes far more than it sometimes supposed to. Which means that we shouldn’t underestimate the importance of work in life. Liberal Arts is not only an academic subject that teaches literature and philosophy, or other professional technical subjects. Liberal education creates personal growth and dignity in each individual’s life that we may approach in our lives daily or as long as we live here on earth. This means since God created us and we’re an image of God, we must honor God and other people in all we do upon this world. With that saying, we must serve God and not serve him in the way we earn a living. Moreover, Arthur Holmes mentioned that liberal arts was a group of disciplines, meaning that it has something to with language and thinking. Along with the liberal arts theology and law did not only play an important role, but it also equipped people to serve the man above. Dealing with liberal arts is not only an important role in our lives, it is also important when it comes to religion. The reason why I say this, is because religion is considered as a liberal art and this is where Christian College Universities come in and play the part. Christian Colleges not only value the body God created, but it also teaches physical education in a way that is humanizing and liberating only if the values are moral or social. The main goals of what to get out of liberal education is not only self-understanding, but also understanding other people. The main focus here is to prepare males and females to participate in society, no matter if it is through marriage or citizenship being involved. On the other hand, the main idea or goal of a Christian College is to be inspired. Being inspired by liberal arts or attending a Christian University can change your feelings or beliefs on the college in general. The inspiration in a Christian College comes from being encouraged from teamwork and engaging in discussion or presentations with other students. Encouraging one another can help motivate and inspire one another, which can create inspirations for someone that may need to self –motivate. As for inspiring multiple parts of our education, a Christian College can teach us multiple things that we can carry on later in life. The things that a Christian College can teach us is how to bring faith into our lives. Bringing faith into our lives can guide individual people onto the right path of learning. It can also make people believe that we can do all things through Christ, that strengthens us as human beings. Another thing that we can learn from a Christian College is how to grow spiritually, socially, and emotionally. Growing spiritually, can bring us closer to God and makes us eager to want to read upon God’s words and be more involved in the bible more often. Meaning that if we get closer to God, we can create a strong relationship with God which could help us get through difficult or challenging moments of our lives. Socially on the other hand, gives us the opportunity to communicate among the community to discuss and evaluate God and all his positive doings or miracles he may have brought forth in peoples life. To sum it all up, a Christian College can support you emotionally. It can support you emotionally because it gives you a chance to connect your feelings and emotions with God. Also it can help you handle your emotions when you go into the real world if you’re dealing and communicating with other people in society. Moreover this can all help result to great expectations in our education and future.