Interesting landscape

The closer I am getting to graduation (May 8th) the more excited I am getting about what lies ahead.  Years ago, when I graduated from college,  I felt uneasy because I was watching my friends and colleagues getting various ministry opportunities literally dropped in their laps and I felt a bit inferior because nothing was coming my way and nothing did for almost 7 years.  I labored under the delusion that I was a second-class citizen even though I had a Bible college degree but was working in a secular job.  I felt for a long time that I had wasted my money and that my degree was worthless.  Many people were very patient and kind and listened to my whining about this situation.  Back then, not having a place to minister full-time was a real tragedy for me.  Now fast-forward almost 20 years and I am faced with the same situation that I was faced with in 1992 but with a bit more age and hopefully maturity.

We have been praying since the beginning of the year for God to direct our steps and to show us where He would have us to minister and serve.  I have also been looking on many websites that are available for the prospective ministerial candidate (churchstaffing.com and others).  We do not know what God has for us currently.

What I have noticed on some of these websites are a plethora of opportunities for those who are wanting to pursue youth ministry and those who are musically gifted.   I have also noticed that if someone wants to compromise their theology and/or musical standards that there are plenty of opportunities to minister in less conservative settings, but if one wants to remain fairly conservative both theologically and musically, the opportunities are quite scarce.

Nevertheless, we will keep praying for God’s guidance and I will keep searching the websites to see what possible opportunities are out there for our family.  The good thing is that if nothing is available by graduation, we can still stay right where we are and I can keep my job (with a definite schedule change).  We love serving at our church and enjoy the fellowship with God’s people.

A lot of people have been asking about SBTS.  I have not heard any further word and do not expect to until I take the GRE.  The delay in doing so has been a scheduling conflict (work and seminary) and financial ( the test is $150) but my goal is to have the test taken sometime before the end of March)  Once the test is taken and test scores are submitted to Southern Seminary (within 10 days), then I will expect to hear either way if I am accepted or rejected.  If I am not accepted, I will have a brief spell of disappointment, but will also realize that is the will of God for our lives.  Part of me would like to live in Louisville and have the ability to minister full-time in a church setting alongside of postgraduate studies, but I have to remember that I have to submit myself to the will of God and not my will.

Right now, I have a lot of reading, Hebrew translation and exegetical work along with some papers and projects that will definitely keep me busy from now until the end of April.  Please pray that God will give me the grace, strength, health, and financial provision to complete this part of the journey.

Seminary Starts Tuesday — My last semester!

If you could not tell from the title, the excitement is building for me as I get ready for my last semester here at Central Seminary.  I am excited after eight long years of study, that this part of my educational journey will be complete.  I have learned a lot about the Bible, about God, and about myself during this process.  I came here single and I am married and have one son.

This will be a challenging semester because I will be taking 9 credit hours.  When I first came to Central in 2002, I started off with 9 credit hours and now I will be finishing with 9 credit hours.  This will be a challenge because 9 credit hours is a lot of work especially at the graduate and post-graduate levels.  I will also be working full-time 40-45 hrs a week along with having my family responsibilities.

The classes that I will be taking this semester are as follows:

NT 572 – New Testament Biblical Theology II – A study of the theology of the Pauline Epistles.  I took NTBT I a couple of years ago (Gospels) and this was a good elective for me.  I am especially looking forward to this class.  It is taught by Dr. Jonathan Pratt, who I have had for other NT classes.

OT 701- Hebrew Reading and Exegesis – This is concentrating more on exegesis for sermon preparation.  My grades may not reflect it, but I enjoy Hebrew.  I just wish I could master it better.  I am looking forward to this course because it will force me to be a better student of the Hebrew language and of the Old Testament.  This class is taught by Dr. Roy Beacham.

ME 601 – Foundation of Missions – Like the title says, this is a foundational course in missions.  I look forward to this course because I know at some point we will be talking/discussing about mission agencies and since I was employed as an administrator of a Baptist mission agency, I look forward to contributing to the conversation as well as learning about other aspects of missions.  This is another elective that will complement the class I took in 2008 about Cross-Cultural Missions.  This class is taught by Dr. Jeff Straub.

ME 501 – Personal Evangelism – another elective course.  This course is about the study of evangelism in the life of the local church.  This course is taught by Lee Ormiston.

I also have 10 textbooks that I need to purchase soon.  I have been doing a lot of price comparisons and I will get those purchased once classes start to make sure that I have all the books I need and that the professors have not made any changes.

Please pray for God’s provision with regard to the tuition this semester.  This is by far the most expensive semester that I will have here at Central.

I am also in the process of finalizing my resume (I am waiting for the last of my references to grant me permission) and looking for potential full-time vocational ministry opportunities.  I am also waiting to see if I am accepted for post-grad studies at SBTS in Louisville, KY.  At this stage, I am not sure if I will be accepted at SBTS, but I am waiting for the official word.

All in all, this will be an exciting few months on the journey.  As a family, we will be learning about patience and the will of God during this time along with many other things that God has in store for us.  Pray that God will lead us to the right place of service for His glory.  Pray for us to be faithful to God.

2010 a pivotal year for our family…

2009 was a good year for us.  In spite of all the skepticism, we are thankful that we are both employed and we have a place to live and we are fortunate to attend and serve in a good local church.  What more could one ask for?  Well, I could think of a few things, but I will rest in being thankful for the things that I mentioned above.

However, 2010 could be described as a year of change for our family:

• After almost 8 long years, I will finally finish my seminary work here at Central.  I will graduate in May 2010 with my MDiv.  I will have an M.A. in Theology and an MDiv.
• We are currently praying and searching for opportunities to serve the Lord in full time vocational ministry.  I am working on finalizing my resume and looking at the possibilities of creating a website for this purpose.
• I have submitted my application for postgraduate studies at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary.  I am waiting to see if I get accepted.  If I get accepted, it would be nice to find a place of service in Louisville that would work well with PhD studies.
• We realize that there are no guarantees, and we could easily remain here because of no open opportunities, or not getting accepted to SBTS.

Please pray with us for the following:

• Last semester of seminary will involve a class load of 9 credit hours along with the tuition expense. I am trying to work as much overtime as possible in order to pay down as much as I can before the semester starts at the end of January.  This will be an expensive tuition bill.  We are praying for God’s provision in this area.
• The Lord’s clear leading in where and how He would have us to serve after graduation.
• The ability to reduce our debt and to be debt-free very soon.

Looking and praying for the will of God.

ETS – Is it worth it?

This week marks the annual meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society in New Orleans, LA.  My introduction to ETS was a few years ago during the Clark Pinnock/Open Theism controversy.  I decided to join as a student member later on but then let my membership lapse for two reasons:  1) I never really thought that I could participate in any meaningful way  2) The Francis Beckwith situation was discouraging to say the least.

I know of at least three professors from the seminary that I attend will be there this week.  I know at least one of the three is presenting a paper.

I was wondering if ETS would be a place where a student could be mentored or if it would be the equivalent of throwing him into a pack of hungry lions?  I ask the question because I know of three of our professors that are at ETS, but I am not aware (I may be wrong) of any of our students who either went with them or on their own to ETS.   At the same time, I have also been reading Dr. Russell Moore’s Twitter and Facebook updates and he has with him two doctoral students from SBTS that he is giving the grand tour of New Orleans, but I believe one of them is also presenting a paper at ETS.  I can imagine that there is a lot of informal teaching and mentoring that will take place during the time at ETS.  Which brings me back to my question and asks another one…. Why do Independent Baptists really fall short when it comes to a real mentoring type relationship?  We may be big on the teaching, dialogue and lecture, but fall woefully short when it comes to actually letting the mentee do something!  Are we afraid that the mentee will embarrass us or make us look bad?  Is the mentee not qualified enough?

I won’t even attempt to answer these last questions…. I have answers but I will wait to see what comments are posted in response to posing them in the first place.

Graduation is coming soon… then what???

Well as the title says… Graduation is coming soon.  For me it will be the culmination of a long academic career which has had two parts over a span of years (1988-1992) and then (2002-2010).  College was relatively easy, so to speak. I took anywhere between 12-16 credit hours and worked almost full-time along with ministry and other pursuits.  I was not an honors student, but I enjoyed college and what I learned.  I managed to put four years into four years and some summer school.

I took a ten year hiatus from academics and worked secularly and in vocational ministry from 1992-2002.  In 2002, I moved to MN to attend seminary and that journey started in 2002 and will culminate Lord willing in May 2010 with my graduation from seminary with my MDiv.  When I graduate in May of 2010, I will have earned my MDiv after eight long years of study.  What has taken me eight years to accomplish, some have done in three or four, but their circumstances were far different than mine.  During these last eight years, I got married (2004),  broke my left foot severely requiring surgery (2005), lost my mother and one infant son, Jonathan David (2006), saw the birth of my other son, Joseph (2006).  I was ready to quit after losing my son and mother, but I was glad for the encouragement that I received along the way from family, friends, and the local church who really ministered to us during these crisis points in our lives.  I am glad that others were there to help me not to quit and to finish the task that I have started.  Along the way, I have made some lifelong friends and have learned some things about myself !  I have had some tremendous opportunities of service in our local church.  I have also seen one pastor retire and a new one come on board during the last few years.

Well, what is next…. honestly I do not know, but the best part is that I am not worried about it.

I have completed and submitted my application for possible post-graduate work at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, KY. I still have to take the GRE.  I am not sure what my chances are in getting accepted.  That is in the Lord’s hands.

I am wondering what the next steps will be for our family, whether it is continuing in education or going off into ministry somewhere.

Will I pastor, serve as an assistant somewhere, go into teaching at the college or seminary level?  I am not exactly sure.  All I know for now is that I have some classes to finish up, get my resume tuned up and ready to submit.  Right now, it hardly seems possible that I will be graduating in approximately seven months, but the time will fly by and before I know it the day will be here.

I have already begun to pray about what the Lord would have us to do as a family and where we will serve.  Yes, I have a short list of “preferred places”, etc.  I had one those in college and none of those ever materialized either.

I am truly happy living where I am (geographically) and I truly love serving in our local church.  But I have trained for full-time vocational ministry and I am not sure if it will be possible to remain here to fulfill God’s call on my life in that regard.   I really like MN except for winter, but I always manage to survive, even though I am not fond of snow or ice.

I am reminded of the passage in Job which tells us, “…stand still and consider the wondrous works of God”

 

On Being a Pastor and a Professor – Part I in a series

Recently, I have been trading emails with Dr. Jim Hamilton who is an Associate Professor of Biblical Theology at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, KY.  During the course of our email exchange, he has been an encouragement to me in many areas:  my ongoing Hebrew studies, discipleship of children, and the topic we are about to discuss in this post.  I have never met him personally(yet) but I am thankful for his encouragement via email and his blog.

In addition to his responsibilities as a professor at Southern Seminary, he is also the senior pastor at Kenwood Baptist Church in Louisville.   With Dr. Hamilton and others serving as professors and pastors, I was intrigued and approached him with a host of questions and he was kind and gracious enough to answer my questions.  I am hoping to interview others on this topic, so stay tuned for more posts!

TL: How do you maintain balance in both roles?

JH: I listen to my wife, and my full time responsibilities are at the Seminary. I am a bi-vocational pastor, so that sets the agenda.

TL: How would you answer the issue that some would say that you are “double-dipping” (taking a salary from both entities)?

JH:I am a full time professor and bi-vocational pastor. My full time pay comes from the Seminary, and the church pays me a part time salary. I don’t see it as double dipping. It’s like I have 1 and 1/2 jobs. It seems to me that anyone with time, opportunity, and the willingness to shoulder the load could do the same.

TL: Does dual responsibility help/compliment or hinder?

JH: I think there is a nice complement between teaching the Bible to future pastors and then serving with other pastors/elders to shepherd a flock.

TL: Do you maintain one office or two?

JH: I have an office at the school, but I mainly work from my basement-study. I don’t keep an office at the church.

TL: How do you manage schedule conflicts?

JH: I am privileged to be part of the Seminary faculty, so that schedule takes precedent. I think of myself as doing the amount of ministry that a lay elder might do who had a secular job, but I also carry the majority of the preaching load. It just happens that my job overlaps nicely with pastoring.

TL: Which came first for you – Pastoring or Professor?

JH:Professor. I didn’t expect to pastor, but the Lord opened doors.

TL: How does the church feel about your seminary responsibilities?

JH: They knew the situation when they hired me, and they hired me as a bi-vocational pastor.

TL: How does the seminary feel about your church responsibilities?

JH: The school wants to see churches thrive, and so my superiors are happy for me to serve as long as the church doesn’t hinder my work at the school.

TL: How did you come to the church that you currently serve?

JH: The church was looking for a pastor, and I was looking for a place to serve.

TL: How did you come to the seminary?

JH: By God’s great mercy!

TL: Is preparation for either responsibility decidedly different or complementary in nature?

JH: I think they’re complementary in that that Bible is central to both. I see my task as understanding the Bible, living out the Bible, and teaching the Bible (cf. Ezra 7:10).

TL: Do you ever receive criticism from either constituency (church or seminary) about spending more time at one and not the other?  Is there a perception of neglect on either the seminary or the church’s part?

JH: Not so far.

Someone once asked me what my dream job would look like and I responded that I would love to pastor but also teach in a seminary if the Lord would allow it.  Thanks again to Dr. Jim Hamilton for taking time to answer these questions!

As always, comments are welcome

Picture credit:  SBTS

What I know and what I don’t

This will be a fairly brief post because I have a Hebrew exam to study for..

Over the next several weeks, several things will take place which will affect me and my family..

1) We will find out if we can stay in our current apartment.. last year they raised the rent $105 a month which has been a stretch for us, but we have made it by the provision of the Lord.  We really do not want to move if we do not have to.  We like it here and it is 15 mins from work and church which is a decent commute.  We do have a lead on another place to live, but the drawback will be the commute, we will be 30 miles one way – away from church, seminary and work.

2) We will find out if I will get a raise this year… last year I did very well on my performance review and received a healthy pay raise.  This year with the economy being in the state that it is, who knows.  I have told some of my colleagues that when my company announces its financial results on May 4 for the last quarter, then we all will have a greater picture of what will happen.  I am thankful to have a job during these stressful times.  It will be hard to keep pace when other costs are going up.

3) I did find out today that I only have 16 credits remaining and I will graduate with my MDiv in May of 2010.  I also heard (unofficially) that I was elected Senior Class President.    My class schedule will be a good load.  I will take one summer class, then in the Fall I will take Hebrew (2nd year) and a class on Dispensations, and Senior Seminar (a no-credit course where one gets prepared for doctrinal defenses in the Spring).  Not sure how I will be able to afford these last 16 credit hours, but again I will rely upon the Lord’s provision.

4) Now that I am much closer to graduation, people often ask, “What are you going to do once you graduate?”  The honest answer to this question is that I really have no idea.  I know what I would like to do, but I am not sure what the will of God is for me and my family right now.  I would like to pursue post-graduate studies at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, KY– but I have some work to do in getting my GPA up to the level they expect.  I would like to pastor and work on my doctorate if possible.  Only regret, is that I was not able to serve on a church staff during my time in seminary.  I feel like I missed out on a lot of opportunities in that area.

I have to go study for a Hebrew exam… more later

A conversation…

I would like to start a conversation here and maybe on another blog about some things..

1) I am within 1 year of finishing my MDiv.  What is the determining factor for either stopping with my  formal education once I receive that degree or continuing post-graduate studies (PhD. DMin, etc)?

2) Someone has said once you get to the doctoral level, it is not about what discipline you undertake or the seminary you attend, it is about who you study under in that discipline?

I am interesting in hearing from you…

Monday Update:  3) Here is another question that I am adding to the discussion/conversation

When and why did we go from “pastor” to “Senior Pastor, Administrative Pastor, Executive Pastor and this one gets me, “Preaching Pastor”?

Again, your contributions are welcome and encouraged!

Graduation 2008

I would write more, but we are leaving on vacation EARLY in the AM… Here are a couple of pictures from graduation.

A future seminarian!

Graduation 2008

On the eve of graduation

Tomorrow I will receive my M.A. in Theology with an emphasis in Biblical Studies.  It is an accomplishment that has involved a lot of my time and money.

I only have 20 hrs to go to finish my MDiv.  about another two years.

It has been good to be able to spend time with my wife and son without having to worry about an assignment, reading or a paper.  My dad is here in town from CA and he has also enjoyed some time with his grandson.

I will post pictures if and when they are available.