I love the material I'm studying, but sometimes I really feel like I'm some kind of scholastic hermit. I learn all this wonderful material--conversation analysis, variation analysis, Markedness theory, studies in verbal aspect of the Greek NT, Speech Act theory, and many others--and I just feel that no one in the field of Biblical studies has any amount of appreciation for this type of material toward the NT because their agenda is to engrained and embedded within traditional scholarship on the issues.

I have to let out my growing disdain for theological studies of the NT when we are using that material to explain the NT Greek. That just has really grown to chafe my hide as I come to other approaches of linguistic study and find that many views are untenable according to the language of Scripture. At the same time, I can begin to see what the Apostle Paul talks about to Timothy that if he engrosses himself in the Scriptures then he will stay firmly established in the traditions that Paul taught him and trained in him to carry on to other generations.

I look forward to the days ahead, not knowing what they have in store, but a quiet confidence remains.