How lovely is Thy dwelling-place,
O Lord of hosts, to me.
My soul is longing and fainting
the courts of the Lord to see.
My heart and flesh, they are singing
for joy to the living God.
How lovely is Thy dwelling-place,
O Lord of hosts, to me.
2. I need a method. I am a man in search of a method. Who knew? I am going to write an essay treating the hymnal as a singular symbolic unit and liturgical artifact. It seems I already do this according to my professor and it would help him (and perhaps some others) if I just wrote the essay that explains why and how I do this and what it is that I learn from this method and how it might be helpful to other liturgical theologians. Again, who knew?
3. This is the hard one and the one for which I am at present least prepared to write. You see, Baptist liturgy (Yes, I said it.) has historical roots...ritual roots and not simply theological roots from whence the latter Reformers invented Baptist liturgy...Though that is usually the story that we tell ourselves. The challenge is tracking the development of these rites because it was illegal in England to practice them. Illegal. You know, like exile-or-execution-for-sedition illegal. So, people went underground or abroad. This was before the time of Henry VIII and lasted until well after Elizabeth ascended the throne. England's monarchical claims to be the "Supreme Head of the Church of England" made it challenging to get the Reformation up and running. So, generations passed between the earliest English Reformers and the latter Reformers who would eventually be known as "Baptists." Everything in me says there's a thread to follow and that's what I am to do. Lord have mercy.
So, this little exercise helped...I'm still working it out, but these are my three papers and will, I hope, serve in the creation of my dissertation some day. We'll see.
Thus, if you are so inclined and would like to help. I'd like to see if one of these is worth publishing. Simply in terms of topics, what floats your boat or grabs your attention? 
