The public is invited to join Bethel College seniors in diving into the biblical book of Isaiah with an experienced Old Testament scholar.
Bethel’s public Hartzler Bible Lecture series will be March 9 and 10, at 7 p.m. in the Administration Building chapel and at 11 a.m. in Krehbiel Auditorium in Luyken Fine Arts Center, respectively.
The endowed lectures are free and open to the public.
The speaker is Douglas B. Miller, Ph.D., professor emeritus of biblical and religious studies at Tabor College, Hillsboro.
The Sunday lecture, “The Book of Isaiah,” will look at some of the basics of Christian engagement with the Old Testament, also known as the Hebrew Bible.
Miller will give an introduction to the prophet Isaiah and the book named for him. Some questions he addresses are: What is a prophet? Why should we listen to prophets? What does Isaiah have to say to us today, particularly in regard to vocation, or calling?
The topic of the lectures comes from the capstone course taken by all Bethel seniors, Basic Issues of Faith and Life.
BIFL students read some common books, including one or more in either the Old or the New Testament of the Christian Bible. This year’s common biblical text is Isaiah.
The students also spend time talking in class about their vocations, what they feel called to, as they prepare to graduate and move into the wider world.
Accordingly, Miller’s Monday lecture is “Isaiah and Individual Vocation,” in which he will look at “two vocation lessons from Isaiah’s call” (found in chapter 6) and “two vocation lessons from the Lord’s servant in Isaiah” (chapters 40-55).
Miller is a graduate of Oral Roberts University, Tulsa, Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary, Elkhart, Ind., and Princeton Theological Seminary, where he earned a Ph.D. in Old Testament. Before retiring from Tabor College, he taught courses in Old and New Testament, biblical languages, Christian education, and faith in contemporary culture for 28 years.
He also wrote and taught courses for Tabor’s degree completion ministry program, taught seminary classes, and co-led trips to Israel/Palestine along with Bethel College faculty.
In addition to preaching and teaching adult Sunday school, Miller has published articles in church and scholarly periodicals and contributed essays to published collections. He served as general editor of Direction journal for 10 years; as editor of the history Tabor College: A Century of Transformation; and is currently Old Testament editor of the Believers Church Bible Commentary (BCBC) series as well as editor of the online Anabaptist Dictionary of the Bible project.
He is the author of the BCBC volume Ecclesiastes.
Miller was born in Iowa and grew up in Phoenix. He now lives in Hesston, and he and his spouse, Holly Swartzendruber, are members of Shalom Mennonite Church in Newton.
Bethel is a four-year liberal arts college founded in 1887 and is the oldest Mennonite college in North America. Bethel was the first Kansas college or university to be named a Truth, Racial Healing and Transformation (TRHT) Campus Center, in 2021. For more information, see https://www.bethelks.edu
