SEMINARY TRAINING: WHY AND HOW?

Many men who love the Lord deeply, who believe they are called to the gospel ministry, and who want to offer themselves in His service, are detoured in their active pursuit of the gospel ministry because they are intimidated by the thought of three or four years of seminary education. You may be one of them. In my experience, and in that of many aspiring servants of God I've counseled, the first hurdle to be cleared is identifying one's calling to the ministry. Unfortunately, instead of looking to seminary training as the unfolding and confirming of that call, most view it as an added barrier, more imposing than the first, and one to be endured rather than enjoyed.

Let's acknowledge that seminary does add significant time and financial demands. Should seminary training be required? Is it necessary? Is it valuable? Why not apprentice a young man to a local pastor for his training? Why such an academic environment?

In this chapter I wish to argue for a well-trained ministry, and in this day and age, that means a seminary training. I argue this not only because of the biblical example of training for office (consider the "university of Cairo" education of Moses and the "law school of Gamaliel" degree of the apostle Paul), but because of the Bible's explicit stipulations. We'll consider those in this chapter. At the same time, I want you to bear in mind that not all seminaries serve God's church equally well in their curricula; not all equip their students according to the requirements of Scripture. In my view, some do more harm than good. Prior to enrollment in any seminary, a student must review that school's curriculum and method. Failure to do so would be unwise, in view of the large commitment of time and effort involved.

Let's take a brief look at the biblical evidence that compels seminary training for preachers. Besides the examples mentioned above, you'll find no clearer explanation of what a pastor and preacher needs to know and to do than that given in Paul's letters to Timothy.

Throughout these letters, the Apostle returns again and again to the two poles that join to form the axis around which the gospel ministry turns. They are the twin charges to preserve the true doctrine and to preach and teach the Word of God. They give us good insight into what constitutes the skeletal requirements of a seminary curriculum.

In the first place, a pastor must be a servant who preserves the true doctrine of Christ, and teaches the church to do the same. You'd have to wear a blindfold to miss that emphasis in these letters. The first three chapters of 1 Timothy are doctrinal utterances expressed clearly and forcefully, and given so that "you may know how you ought to conduct yourself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth" (3:15). Catch that? Church and truth are inseparably connected: doctrine is at the heart of her life; she exists for the sake of its proclamation!

Beginning in chapter 4, Paul becomes specific in his instruction to the young pastor. He describes the apostasy and deceit that will characterize the "later times"-our times-and then says, in what appears to be repetition for emphasis:

If you point these things out to the brothers, you will be a good minister of Christ Jesus, brought up in the truths of the faith and of the good teaching that you have followed (v. 6).

Command and teach these things (v. 11).

Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers (v. 16).

It's clear what the inspired writer is saying. The survival of God's people in times of apostasy, now as then, when "some will abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits," depends upon the church and her preachers and elders holding fast to the doctrines and truths that Timothy had been taught and must pass along.

That point must not be lost behind the doors of seminaries. A faithful minister of God doesn't serve God's people by questioning biblical truths himself, nor by teaching others to follow his example of doubt. The church of God has enough trouble fighting the enemies of the world; it shouldn't have to fight within its walls against those who would challenge the historical events narrated in the biblical text, deny the virgin birth or the resurrection, question the existence of heaven or hell, or oppose the teaching of sin and the call to repentance. It shouldn't have to, but it does, and it must. Doctrine matters. Without orthodoxy of doctrine, both vertical and horizontal relationships are established on shaky footings. Without sound doctrine, the living of the Christian life degenerates into godlessness. Doctrine provides the roots for the tree, the foundation for the building, the strength for the body.

The same note sounds in 2 Timothy. In chapter 1, Paul calls himself "a herald and an apostle and a teacher" of the gospel. It is this gospel that he charges Timothy to "keep as the pattern of sound teaching," to guard as "the good deposit that was entrusted to you" (vv. 13-14). Here the apostle uses a pair of instructive metaphors. On the one hand, Timothy is to keep and preserve the biblical doctrines because they provide the "model, example, prototype, in the sense of standard" by which all truth and life are to be tested. If you construct a building, you use a blueprint. If it's not reliable, your building will be malformed. If it is an accurate standard, and if it's followed properly, construction will succeed. On the other hand, Timothy is to "guard the deposit entrusted to him." This metaphor suggests that the biblical faith and doctrine are a spiritual inheritance entrusted to the faithful church. It demands that Timothy then, and seminaries and pastors now, are accountable for the safekeeping of a sacred trust. Would that more seminary professors and ministers of the gospel were held to the same standards of responsibility for their handling of the truths of Scripture that legal trustees are for their handling of earthly trusts!

So, the first requirement for the training of faithful pastors, the first essential in a biblically obedient seminary curriculum, is faithfulness to biblical doctrine. Never has such a statement been more urgent than in our relativistic generation, an age in which true and false, right and wrong, are said to "depend upon your perspective," an age in which it is considered arrogant to think that Scriptural truth is absolute truth, truth that applies to everybody else as well as yourself. A preacher who doesn't tell the truth of Scripture about sin and salvation is a false prophet. A seminary that declares itself to be "open-minded" about doctrine isn't worth your time. But one that holds itself and its students to high standards of doctrinal knowledge and orthodoxy certainly starts off on the right foot.

In addition to preserving orthodox doctrine, a seminary must equip its students to preach and teach the Word of God. This is the other pole of the axis, the other requirement laid upon a biblical pastor. Not only must the doctrines of the gospel be held, preserved, kept, and guarded; they must be passed along, proclaimed, and applied to the faith and lives of the community of believers and to the world in every age.

Again, such a basic mandate as this one appears already in the first letter to Timothy. In 1 Timothy 4:13, Paul details for Timothy, youthful and apparently timid about performing his tasks, just how he is to communicate the gospel: "Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to preaching and to teaching." Note carefully that, on the one side, this verse binds the text of Scripture to the content of the truth, and on the other side, it binds the text of Scripture (what is read publicly) to the practice of preaching/teaching. Simply put, the kind of preaching and teaching that Paul expected Timothy to practice was the explaining and applying of the very words of the text of the Scriptures. Nothing else qualified.

That's why it is no surprise to find, in the second letter to Timothy, the characterization of a preacher as a "workman [laborer]…who correctly handles the word of truth" (2:15). In the immediate context, Paul has referred to God's church as a foundation. The metaphor pictures the preacher as a brick mason who builds on that foundation using the words of Scripture as his tools. When he handles them correctly, as he has been trained to do, he builds a wall that is plumb and therefore strong.

The point is made in different words a chapter later. Following a description of the last days as days of iniquity, Paul tells Timothy just how he is to confront ungodliness. He is to wield Scripture, which is a powerful weapon because it is "God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness" (3:16).

The skillful use of Scripture as the hands-on tool of the ministry is the principle that explains why you must attend seminary in order to be a faithful preacher/teacher. It's also the normative standard that tells a seminary how it ought to structure its curriculum.

• Paul commands Timothy to "teach" Scripture (2 Tim. 2:24; 3:16; see 2 Tim. 4:11). An aspiring preacher/teacher must master both the content of Scripture and the techniques of teaching it. He must be able, "with great patience and careful instruction" (4:2), to set the course for God's people in both doctrine and life. That means he must be trained in and become skilled at communicating the "what" and the "how" of faith and Christian living. A seminary must equip him to do that with courses that teach him how to teach.
• Paul commands Timothy to "correct, rebuke, and encourage," reminding him that Scripture is profitable for just such things. Simply put, preachers must learn how to "counsel." That doesn't mean modern humanistic psychology based on secular values; it means instead that they must learn how to apply Scripture to correct the erring, rebuke the sinner, and encourage the weak and faint-hearted. Such is the assignment in 4:2; that's what seminaries must equip their students to do.
• Paul enjoins Timothy to "preach the word" (4:2). As we saw above, this command lies at the heart of God's redemptive strategy. Correspondingly, training men to preach ought to lie at the heart of a seminary curriculum, pulsing through the veins of every course. A biblical seminary dare not relegate such a decisive task to the addition of a few "practical" courses tacked on to the stuff of abstract theology. Preaching must be the core of the curriculum. Further, Paul specifies that Timothy is to preach the Word. Accordingly, seminaries should teach-and aspiring preachers should learn-preaching that is textually-governed and thematically-organized. That's the kind of preaching that grips the heart and stirs the being to action. (You won't find this kind in the storytelling happy-speak so popular these days; the best that can be said about it is that it is eminently forgettable.) A student who cannot preach ought not to be let loose in the churches; a seminary that can't train men to preach with textual vigor and practical urgency ought to be shut down so that "its place knows it no more."
• Paul warns Timothy to "be watchful in all things, endure afflictions" (4:5). That means he is to be self-controlled, in charge of all his emotions and faculties, strong in faith. Every aspiring preacher must develop and evidence these spiritual qualities of maturity and perseverance. A seminary, accordingly, should be a spiritual greenhouse, nurturing personal spiritual growth, and wisdom in its students. That may sound obvious; it is, unfortunately, not always the case. Far too many students testify that a seminary career is a spiritual trial. I've heard complaints that in seminaries a devotional attitude is lacking, the Bible is treated merely as an academic resource, prayer life suffers, love for the Lord's church wanes. Such a spiritual atmosphere doesn't develop spiritual maturity; it withers the plant, root and branch. Before a student enters any seminary, he must ask current students about this facet of its life. If passionate love for the Lord and His Word does not characterize both the students and the faculty, avoid the place like the plague.
• Paul commissions Timothy to "do the work of an evangelist." That implies two related responsi-bilities. First, an aspiring preacher must work diligently for the saving of souls, possessing a passion for the lost. That being the case, the seminary must teach him to call people to repent and believe, not just invite them to go to church, and it must show him how to do that. Second, he must burn with the desire that Christ transform all of culture-the realm of powers, institutions, and ideas-with the gospel. Correspondingly, the seminary curriculum must provide good training in apologetics, so that the preacher will know how to use God's Word to "demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God" and to "take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ" (2 Cor. 10:5).

I think it's obvious that the curricula in many seminaries today are barriers rather than vehicles to an effective gospel-preaching ministry. Too many schools have chosen to be theological graduate schools instead of preacher-training schools that fit the instructions of Paul to Timothy. From what I've written above it should be clear that I'm not opposed to the academic; on the contrary, academic ability is one of the criteria I suggested earlier as a benchmark by which you can evaluate your calling. However, there is a parting of the ways between a school designed for theological post-graduate studies, and one designed to train and equip preachers. And among those few schools that aim to do the latter, there is a significant difference of opinion about what that training involves. The points I've stressed in these pages should enable you to discern the types, and among them, to identify the direction and focus of a particular institution.

This chapter has, we trust, made two things clear: first, that a seminary training is requisite for those who would preach, and second, that it ought to be training designed according to the patterns and emphases of the Pastoral Epistles. I hope I've convinced you of the former, and defined the broad shape of the latter. May the Lord grant you clarity of mind and heart in your musings, and, if He has chosen you to preach His redeeming Word, direct you to a school of the prophets that equips you to be a mighty warrior for His kingdom offensive.

* * * * *

We are in a war. Scripture testifies to that fact repeatedly (Gen. 3:15, Eph. 6:10f.). But those who are faithful to the Word of God-preachers and believers alike-are on the Victor's side:

For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power…(2 Cor. 10:3-4).

The one who is called "Faithful and True" has as his name "the Word of God." And he will rule the nations "with an iron scepter" (Rev 19:12-15).