How are you beginning to use this resource in your congregation

[Tonia J. Lindquist]

At Gethsemane so far will begin opening the council meetings with a BOF Bible Study with the idea that we will give tools to the committee chairs to also begin committee meetings with a bible study in 2009. We will start slowing and see what happens. Most folks are just hearing about our plans with the September newsletter.

[Scott Dunfee]

We will be using the chapter by Mark Allan Powell at our Fall Leadership Board retreat. We're planning an Advent/Christmas series--when we focus on the story of how the Word became flesh and dwelt among us-- to introduce some of the concepts in Book of Faith.

[Tonia J. Lindquist]

That is great. Augsburg is putting a Lenten devotion together that should be available in early 2009. Has your congregation signed up as an "official" Book of Faith congregation? If not, you can do so via the ELCA webpage. I'm the Synod Advocate for Book of Faith and we are just getting started in the Synod. I will be interested in knowing what kind of feedback you receive from your board after your retreat.

[erik]

Hi all: we have been using the BOF since October 5 in Adult education hour between services. We used the individual assessment as part of each opening and had lively discussion around the questions. For each Sunday till Advent we have used the four bible studies given in the BOF, interspersed with appropriate video clips from Mark Allan Powell's video How Lutherans Inerpret the Bible. The next year we hope to encourage students to purchase the BOF Study Bible. The study concepts (historiacl, devotional, literary, Lutheran) in the BOF are being used as we look at Advent texts. We are off to a good start, and I use the insights from The Crosssings Community and Ed Schroeder as a useful critique of the BOF effort.

[James Aalgaard]

At St. Paul we're still batting a few ideas around. There are some folks here that are looking for more Bible study and opportunities for getting together, and I've been wanting to do a little teaching/facilitation lately too. The ideas I have so far are:
1. a few house groups where hospitality and the BoF materials come together.
2. a second option for adults during the Ed. hour
3. online stuff for those in the congregation who like to do that kind of thing.

I notice that the Lenten resource is out, but not really ready to go for that. It would be good to see this website expand with more options. I know the initiative is an important one for the ELCA and so maybe a family of resources could be made available for download or free, just for the sake of the mission of the initiative. I like Augsburg Fortress, but it's easy to see how our church's publishing house wants to have market share in this very good emphasis.

[Tonia J. Lindquist]

I know of at least one Pastor who has put together some material for some classes so folks don't have to buy the book. We are working to get permission to either add it here or on the Book of Faith page at the Oregon Synod web site. We also hope that folks will add there ideas here. So lots of items are in the works. Take advantage of the other conversations on this social network- lots of ideas from folks in all sorts of setting. There is also a young adult group for the Book of Faith on Facebook.