ROUGHLY EDITED COPY CONCORDIA UNIVERSITY EDUCATION NETWORK EXODUS DR. DAVID ADAMS INTRODUCTION Captioning Provided By: Caption First, Inc. 10 E. 22nd Street Suite 304 Lombard, IL 60148 800-825-5234 *** This text is being provided in a rough draft format. Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART) is provided in order to facilitate communication accessibility and may not be a totally verbatim record of the proceedings. *** >> Welcome to our study of the book of Exodus. My name is Dr. David Adams and I'll be with you throughout this course. Just a little bit about me: I was not born in a Lutheran Church of the Missouri Synod. My family is not originally Christian. I was an adult convert to Christianity. However, I attended Lutheran college and ultimately Concorida Seminary in St. Louis, Missouri, where I got an M.Div and later on STM from there. I went to Cambridge University in England where I earned a PhD in the area of biblical studies. My doctoral dissertation was on the concept of the presence of God in the patriarchal narratives. The patriarchal narratives are Chapters 12 to 50 in the book of Genesis. After finishing my doctoral dissertation, I served the church in a variety of capacities. I was a parish pastor in southern Illinois for a few years. From there I went to serve at the LCMS computer department, the office of information systems, where I was for a time director of micro computer services. I left there and went to teach at Concordia College in Ann Arbor, Michigan, where I was director of the preseminary program. And from there I was asked by former Synodcal President Barry to go to Washington, D.C., to serve as executive director of the LCMS office of government education. That office functioned as the liaison office between the LCMS and the Federal government of the United States. And so our job was to track Federal legislation, to work on court cases and otherwise to interact with other church groups who were engaged in the same kind of work. So I represented the LCMS in Washington, D.C., for five years. In I guess it was the year 2000 I left that work in Washington, D.C., and took a call as assistant professor -- excuse me; associate professor at Concorida Seminary in St. Louis, Missouri, where I've been until this day. As far as my theological interests are concerned, I have a considerable interest in Hebrew language and I enjoy teaching Hebrew, which I do for the seminary in St. Louis on a regular basis. I'm also very interested in narrative literature and the way that biblical narratives function. And I think you'll see that interest coming out as we work through the book of Exodus in this course together. Another interest of mine that was related to the subject of my doctoral dissertation is the theology of the presence of God in the Bible, especially obviously in the Old Testament. And that, too, is an important topic in especially the second half of the book of Exodus. So you'll see that interest of mine coming out in our study, as well. Of course in terms of biblical books, the ones that I work in most are the Pentateuch, Genesis and Exodus in particular. I'm working on a commentary on the book of Genesis for Concordia Publishing House and hopefully, God willing, that will be done within, I don't know, maybe another 50 years or so. My wife, Lisa, and I live in St. Louis, Missouri. And we've lived there for many years now. And hopefully we'll continue to serve Christ and his church in the St. Louis community. So welcome to our study of the book of Exodus. And I look forward to working with you as we examine this really central theological work in the Old Testament. *** This text is being provided in a rough draft format. Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART) is provided in order to facilitate communication accessibility and may not be a totally verbatim record of the proceedings. ***