West Side Presbyterian Church
Seattle, Washington

Adult Ministry > Sunday AM Forum

Adult Forum - 2011

All are welcome to join in. Classes are held on Sundays from 9:40 - 10:40am (between worship services).
(Click here for list of Sunday School staff, teachers, helpers and class locations for 2 yr olds through high school.)

November/December Classes

SUNDAY, November 27 and December 4 - THE MEANING AND PRACTICE OF ADVENT with Pastor Bryan Burton - Join us today and next Sunday, December 4, as we explore the meaning and significance of Christians celebrating Advent, which means “coming” or “appearing,” and is a season of looking forward and of waiting for something greater. We will consider the practical ways we may celebrate the Advent/Christmas season through devotional study, the use of the Advent wreath and/or Advent calendars, and other traditions. This class is for all ages as we seek to prepare ourselves for the annual celebration of Christ’s birth as well as anticipate the time when Christ will come again.
Handouts: November 27
Class Location: Howell Auditorium

Fall Quarter Class (begins September 11)

Believing and Living Mere Christianity: Reflections on the Apostles' Creed,
Pastor Bryan Burton
We will be exploring what it means to believe and live what C.S. Lewis called “Mere Christianity” by focusing our attention on The Apostles’ Creed, a confessional statement of foundational Christian belief for Christians since the earliest days of the church. Increasingly we live in a time where few people in our culture know the fundamental truths of Christianity and increasingly it is a problem within the church as well. But we won’t stop at simply believing in the teaching of the Apostle’s Creed but will also engage in how what we believe shapes how we live. Beginning on September 11, a very significant day in recent history, we will be asking and answering the question “What does it mean to believe in the God of Christianity after 9/11?” In the following weeks we will look at The Apostles’ Creed in greater depth. No matter where you are in your Christian faith, this will be a great opportunity “to go further up and further in” (C.S. Lewis), discovering what it means to truly believe and to live out what you believe.
Class Location: Howell Auditorium
View class notes.

Summer Quarter Classes

9:40am Summer Quarter Adult Classes

SUNDAY, JULY 31 - DOMINICAN REPUBLIC MISSION TEAM. Our young people, just back from their mission trip working with Kids Alive and our missionaries Vic and Leslie Trautwein, will give their report.
SUNDAY, AUGUST 7 - Dr. TIM and MURIEL TEUSINK will tell of their work in Ethiopia with SIM. Tim teaches AIDS Prevention and Care courses at three theological seminaries. He has been Acting Chair of the Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital Board and president of the largest Rotary Club in Ethiopia. Muriel is Librarian-Educator at Bingham Academy and teaching leader at Bible Study Fellowship.
SUNDAY, AUGUST 14 - CARE NET of Puget Sound will present a report of their work providing alternatives to abortion and other ministries to young women at 6 area crisis pregnancy centers. Care Net of Pierce County and Life Choices of King County merged to form CARE NET of Puget Sound a couple of years ago. Kim Triller, Executive Director, Ben Edwards, Stewardship Director, and several young women who have benefited from this ministry will speak. CARE NET is one of the organizations supported by West Side’s mission budget.
SUNDAY, AUGUST 21 - METAMORPHOSIS is a brand new film by the makers of Unlocking the Mysteries of Life, The Privileged Planet, and other films making a scientific case for Intelligent Design. Throughout history, butterflies have fascinated artists and philosophers, scientists and school children with their profound mystery and beauty. Spectacular photography, computer animation, and magnetic resonance imaging open once hidden doors to every stage of a butterfly's life cycle -- from an egg the size of a pin head to a magnificent flying insect. How did these extraordinary creatures come into being? Are they products of a blind, undirected process? Or were they designed for a purpose by an intelligence?
SUNDAY, AUGUST 28 - YOUTHCOMPASS and PROJECT COMPASSION, Tom Speckhardt, Craig and Caleb Chamberlain, Seth, Drew, and Betty Campbell and Erich Fleck will tell of their work building a medical clinic in Albania along with 200 students from International schools in Europe.
SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 4 - BRUCE and CHRISTIE GRAHAM, our missionaries at the U.S. Center for World Mission in Pasadena will tell of their work. They travel occasionally back to India where they spend many years training leaders to evangelize Muslim communities. They both have major administrative roles at the U.S. Center.
Sunday, Sept. 4 - Bruce and Christie Graham, our missionaries at the U.S. Center for World Mission in Pasadena will tell of their work. They travel occasionally back to India where they spent many years training leaders to evangelize Muslim communities. They both have major administrative roles at the U.S. Center.

Spring Quarter Classes

The Good and Beautiful God
Sarah Kennedy
Have you ever caught yourself thinking: "God wants me to try harder;" "God blesses me when I'm good and punishes me when I'm bad;" "God is angry with me;" "Because this bad thing has happened, it must be because I deserve it or need to learn a lesson." You're not alone. We all have ideas we tell ourselves about God and how God works in our lives. Some are true, but many are false. This class will focus on James Bryan Smith's book, The Good and Beautiful God: Falling in Love With the God Jesus Knows. It will help us look at the narratives we believe about God, and at what Jesus actually reveals about the character of God. The class will include plenty of group conversation, some video clips, and opportunities to practice a few new spiritual disciplines if one so chooses. This class is great for anyone regardless of where they are on their journey of faith!
Class Location: Chapel | View class handouts.
Sacred Parenting
Bryan and Janet Jones, Scott and Madeline May, Steve and Ann Vander Hijde
What if one of God’s primary intentions for you as a parent isn’t about successfully raising perfect children, but about you becoming more holy? Following the very well-received Sacred Marriage series by Gary Thomas, which was viewed in the marriage class last fall, this six-week series will help you look at parenting from a different perspective, as a method of spiritual formation expressly designed by God to shape your soul in ways you cannot imagine. The second six weeks will utilize another new video series on parenting.
Class Location: Lewis Hall
Studies in First and Second Peter
Bryan Burton
The Apostle Peter, that great and often flawed leader of the disciples, once proclaimed that Jesus Christ was and is “the Christ, the Son of the Living God.” Jesus responded, “Blessed are you, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father who is in heaven. . . I tell you I will build my church and the gates of hell and death will not overcome it.” In this class we will seek to know who Jesus Christ is from the perspective of the Apostle Peter. Furthermore, we will seek to know who we are as the Body of Christ, the Church, and the ways in which Christ is seeking to build His Church through you and me, together with all of God’s people.
Class Location: Howell Auditorium | View class handouts.

Winter Quarter Classes

9:40 WINTER QUARTER ADULT CLASSES
January 9 to March 27, 2011

Desiring God
Betty Wallin and friends
This class will use a video series by John Piper, noted Minneapolis pastor, theologian, and best-selling author (over 2 million books sold). “The greatest news in all the world is that there is no final conflict between my passion for joy and God’s passion for His glory. The knot that ties these together is the truth that God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him. In the cross of Christ God rescues us from the house of mirrors and leads us out to the mountains and canyons of His majesty. Nothing satisfies us—or magnifies Him—more.”
Topics include: how our happiness depends on God’s pursuit of His glory, how joy in God overflows in love to meet the needs of others, how only joy in God can sustain us in times of profound suffering.
Class Location: Chapel

View customer reviews of the book (Amazon)
A Life Worthy: To Know Jesus Christ and Make Him Known
Pastor Bryan Burton
Ephesians was John Calvin’s favorite letter in the New Testament. As we have been reflecting on what it means to be the Church, the Body of Christ, over the last several months, we will further that exploration with a 12-week study on Ephesians. Eugene Peterson, one of the finest teachers of Scripture today, in his recent book PRACTICING RESURRECTION: A Conversation on Growing up in Christ, writes, “What I want to do here is engage in an extended and serious conversation with my brother and sister Christians around the phrase 'growing up in Christ.' And I want to bring an old and wise and trusted voice into the conversation, the voice of St. Paul. . . . The words he wrote are as up-to-date as anything we are likely to hear these days, and strategically crucial for what faces us." And that is exactly what we are going to do together.
Class Location: Howell Auditorium | View class handouts.

View customer reviews (Amazon)
God Heard Their Cry
Ron Rice
Filmed on location in Egypt and Sinai, Volume 8 and 9 is the latest of the Faith Lessons video series with renowned teacher and historian Ray Vander Laan, distributed by Focus on the Family. We have enjoyed all the earlier Faith Lessons in past years and these new videos continue to make the Bible come alive. In ancient times, nothing was bigger than Egypt’s mighty army, strong pharaohs, and multitude of gods. God’s people were no match against them. In the six videos of Volume 8 we discover how God answered the cry of his persecuted people and proclaimed Himself Lord to them and their oppressors. In Volume 9 we learn how God taught the Israelites what it meant to be part of a community that loved Him, and the lessons we can learn for our lives today.

View customer reviews - Vol. 8 & Vol. 9 (Focus on the Family)

Sunday, January 2 - NARNIA: THE VOYAGE OF THE DAWN TREADER -
In conjunction with the recent release of the latest Narnia film, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, we are featuring a Narnia Special at the 9:40 hour on Sunday January 2nd. We will view a preview and clips from the film, released to us by Grace Hill Media, and a video Why C.S. Lewis Matters Today, with a fascinating discussion of the role of both reason and imagination in understanding and sharing the Christian faith. Our resident C. S. Lewis expert will also discuss the lessons of the film.

View 2010 class list

West Side Presbyterian Church Seattle, Washington