Back Again, Leaving Soon, Psalms, Ecclesiastes

Last weekend's visit to Lubbock turned out even better than I expected it would.

For one thing, Kevin Schaffer wound up traveling with me and Ken Danley. Kevin, a former member of Acappella, is the worship minister at the Central Church of Christ. We'd met once or twice before. But the car ride to Lubbock and back gave us the chance to get to know each other better.

Over the weekend I got to talk with, learn from, and worship with the following people: Terry and Charlotte Smith, Jeff Walling, Randy Harris, Mike Cope (who, if you hadn't heard, announced a transition this week), Scot McKnight, Greg Taylor, Brandon Scott Thomas, Randy Gill, Larry Mudd, and Tod Vogt. Rich stuff.

Spring Break is next week for us. I plan to get an early start, flying out to Connecticut later this week to spend some time with my kids.

- - - - - - -

This month, I'll finish out a Sunday-morning class on the Psalms that I've been teaching at Central.

Next month I'll be teaching a four-week, Wednesday-night series on Ecclesiastes at the Colonies Church of Christ here in Amarillo. I'm so looking forward to doing that class. For one thing, I'll have the chance to get better acquainted with the people at that congregation. And, this will also force me to go ahead and finish out some material on Ecclesiastes that I've been trying to put together for a long time now.

As a lot of people have discovered, Ecclesiastes is one of the more-interesting books of the Bible. To their credit, the people who put the Scriptures together decided not to squelch this dissenting opinion.

Getting ready to teach Ecclesiastes, I've thought about working through one of the newer commentaries. I've read the great, older works of Robert Gordis and Graham Ogden.

What newer books (or classics) would you recommend?