Suggested Lesson Schedules

 

In God's Time can be divided in a variety of ways for use as a textbook.  The existing chapter divisions yield an eight-lesson course:

1.  "Are We There Yet?"  (Introduction to eschatology)

2.  "First Things First:  The Bible"  (On the nature and authority of Scripture)

3.  "The History of the Future"  (Future expectation and prophecy in the Hebrew Bible)

4.  "Apocalypse Then"  (Introduction to biblical and inter-testamental apocalyptic writing)

5.  "All in the Family:  Daniel and Revelation"  (On the biblical apocalypses)

6.  "Jesus and the Things to Come"  (The historical Jesus and eschatology)

7.  "The Once and Future Kingdom"  (Early Christian eschatology; the tension between realized and future eschatologies)

8.  "Conclusion:  Hope Unseen" + "Appendix:  Not Left Behind"  (The place of eschatology in present-day Christianity)

This schedule can be shortened by combining the readings for weeks 1 & 2, both of which are fairly brief.  Weeks 7 & 8 also can be combined, although with a bit more difficulty.

If eleven (or more) meetings are possible, we recommend dividing lessons 3, 4, and 5 above.  These chapters contain quite a bit of material that might be unfamiliar to students.  Also, splitting these lessons in two allows additional time for reading the primary sources (e.g., 1 Enoch, Daniel and Revelation) discussed in each chapter.  A suggested division of these chapters follows:

"The History of the Future"  (pp. 30-43, on prophecy; pp. 44-58, on "the covenant future")

"Apocalypse Then"  (pp. 59-74, introduction to apocalyptic thinking; 74-93, 1 Enoch and other inter-testamental Jewish literature)

"All in the Family:  Daniel and Revelation"  (pp. 94-110, Daniel; pp. 110-129, Revelation)

(back)