GROspiritually

Christian Blog, Bible Study, GROspiritually, Christian Growth, Biblical Essays, Dr Michael Ruth
Christian Blog, GROspiritually, Christian Growth, Biblical Essays, Dr Michael Ruth

A few words about the author of these essays. 

My wife, Susan, and I married after our freshman year in college. She was getting her degree in elementary education while I pursued a double in theology and history.

While in college, and for some time after – 13 years total, we were in pastoral ministry. 

During this time we became increasingly interested in the psychological dynamics of life. We began to see that theology and psychology are complimentary fields. We humans are both spiritual and psychological beings – psychospiritual in nature, as we like to say. We decided it was time for more education and together we went through grad school, getting degrees in counseling.

Being a glutton for punishment, I decided I hadn’t suffered enough. We resigned from the church and relocated to our current home so that I could pursue a second master’s and a doctor of philosophy, with a concentration in counseling.

(For those interested in such things, my doctoral dissertation, The Virulent Personality – followed by a subtitle consisting of tedious academic terms – proposed a new personality disorder and recommended it become a part of the DSM, the diagnostic manual of the American Psychiatric Association. The dissertation won an academic award for research.)

In 1990, Susan and I began our private counseling practice – Growth Resources – now in its 31st year. For some time I have had the desire to create a site dedicated to essays based on Biblical texts. But there was that old nemesis…time. Recently I decided to just begin, realizing that I would have to live with populating the site with posts as I could get to them.

So here we are.

We now have two sibling sites. The long-established GrowthResourcesOnline.com (GRO) addresses life issues from a psychological/counseling orientation… with spiritual accents. This site, GROspiritually.com, speaks to Biblical texts and life’s journey from a theological perspective… with psychological accents. 

A word about why I call the posts Observations on the Walk of Life. Simply put, they are just that. They come from my now 49-years-and-counting journey as a Christian, a journey that began when I was 13.

Being observations, the essays are personal in nature. They are not polemics, theological treatises, or exegetical exercises. I have enough academia in my other life. I have no interest in making these essays academic.

I want you to think of these posts as a conversation between two or three friends. I’m an introvert… two or three is plenty. 😉

Maybe we’re sitting together on the deck talking. Maybe it’s a casual conversation we’re having in the golf cart as we ride to our next shot. That sort of thing.

Well, that’s about it. I hope you enjoy the reads and find something that makes you think, feel, or act in such a way that is positive for you and enhances your own spiritual journey.

If you have any questions, or any texts or topics you’d like to have me address, drop me an email HERE and I’ll see what I can do.

Cheers,

GROspiritually, Christian Growth, Biblical Essays, Dr Michael Ruth

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