12 | theological name dropping

theological name dropping

whether it’s a student or a professor, it’s bound to happen. maybe it’s a conscious effort to prove you’ve been around the block, or maybe it’s the unconscious, innocent desire to cite who you’re quoting. either way, it’s one thing bible college student learn to recognize right away, if not for any other reason, that is happens every day.

name dropping.

you might think because my bible college is just minutes (or days depending on traffic) from los angeles, the kind of name dropping i’m talking about would be directed towards a celebrity.

like my seeing harrison ford at barney’s burgers in santa monica. but that’s not the point of this story.

you see, in bible college, no one cares about “wordily” celebrities. we care about theological celebrities. tozer, grudem, piper, chandler, driscoll, carson…

so when you professor walks in and says, “i was chatting with my buddy wayne [grudem], and he said…” you know you’ve hit the jackpot.

what’s more common around these parts is name dropping our local theological celebrities, specifically, francis. chan

now, there is no chance of francis reading this, but if he were to read this, i’m pretty certain he would hate my calling him a celebrity, so i must include this disclaimer: in no way do the people i look to for a bit of theological guidance act in any way, shape or form act like celebrities. but i, in fact, am referring to how they bear similarities in the way people respond to them.

still, i’m sure he’d hate it. so i suppose it’s a good thing he won’t read this.

name dropping. it happens. and at EBC, we love to refer to our schools founder, francis, quite frequently in our conversations. whether its a professor reminding us that he hangs out with francis, or a student who was able to corner him into a discussion, either way it lets people know, “oh yea, i’m that guy. i got the connections…”

all in all, name dropping is not a terrible thing, but to someone not used to those kinds of conversations, where we are around people who do get to talk with influential people in theological circles, it can be a little weird.

i do, however, see the irony in this entire post. in today’s post, i’ve name dropped about thirty times. i’m still not sure how i feel about that…

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3 Responses to “12 | theological name dropping”

  1. avatar
    el jefe September 14, 2010 at 12:56 pm #

    booyah!!!! I know Albert C. Alcorn – ya heard of him….

  2. avatar
    Ashlea Verdone February 25, 2011 at 12:18 am #

    Wow, awesome blog layout! How long have you been blogging for? you make blogging look easy. The overall look of your site is great, let alone the content!

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  1. Tweets that mention theological name dropping : Six Minutes of Banter -- Topsy.com - September 14, 2010

    [...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Albert Alcorn and Albert Alcorn, Albert Alcorn. Albert Alcorn said: new post over at six minutes of banter dot com: http://t.co/LNPyTiI http://fb.me/uPH8HGjG [...]

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