In the Bible, we find a young man named Timothy. He grew up in a believing family. He came to love the Lord at a young age. Timothy couldn’t imagine a life where every waking minute wasn’t dedicated to the service of the Church.
One day, Timothy told his youth pastor about his burning desire for ministry. For the rest of his young life, his church looked forward to the day when they could send Timothy off to be educated at the Seminary in Jerusalem. After graduation, Timothy responded to a call from a small church in Africa that he’d never even heard of.
Timothy spent his first few years at that church learning the troubles of trying to lead older people. He held a few successful conferences leveraging his contacts back in Jerusalem to periodically get a “big name” to come out from the seminary there. He moved every 5-10 years beginning the same cycle and generally having a mostly uneventful ministry until he was in his mid-50s.
It was at that time, that Timothy committed a disqualifying sin. His congregation was crushed at the revelation of another fallen evangelical leader who seemed so solid for so long.
Do you remember that story? Does it represent how disciples have always been made since the earliest days of the Great Commission? Is that the Biblical story? Or the modern version? Remember in 2 Timothy 2:2 where it says, “Entrust these things to untested boys who seemed to be on fire for Christ in youth group somewhere else and got a certificate from a seminary you agree with,” right.
It’s Not a Bug. It’s a Feature of the Machine.
Many are asking why we see so many tragedies of formerly respected “Christian” leaders committing adultery, endorsing blatantly unbiblical ideas, or committing other “acceptable sins” at the highest echelons of church institutions (seminaries, denominations, etc.). Some portray cowardice and have private outbursts of anger without ever “officially” disqualifying themselves. But Scripture provides clarity.
Jesus focused His earthly ministry on the establishment of His worldwide mission with eleven men.
Eleven.
Consider that.
In His earthly ministry, our Lord substantially ministered to only eleven men in three years.
When Jesus said, “You will know the Truth,” what did He mean, if not…precisely…that? To be sure, we’re not “Mystics” – Jesus didn’t preclude learning from the Wisdom of saints before us. Neither does it mean planting churches without any oversight from the established body of saints. Going off on one’s own is the purview of cults and cranks. But Jesus also didn’t mean, “You will be able to pass some examinations and get a certificate for your wall which is prima facie evidence of your calling.”
We talk about the new covenant of Jeremiah and Ezekiel where the Spirit illuminates the Word to those He indwells, but we functionally deny His Power to do so. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard, “You should go to Seminary. You’d make a great pastor!” But what, then, do we do with Jer. 31:33-34 where God says that the indwelling of His Spirit will bring wisdom? Is that only eschatological? When Peter applies Joel’s prophecy, why do we think we get to apply a different hermeneutic? We neuter the concept where Romans 12:2 says those led by the Spirit will know the will of God of any functional meaning.
In contrast to Jesus’s disciple-making model, the current seminary system more closely resembles a secular education machine. Perhaps with good intention, Christianity said, “We can make the Institution Holy.” Instead of sanctifying the Darkness, we became the Abyss. We functionally endorse a credentialism that substitutes certificates and examinations for demonstrated wisdom instead of walking with each other and watching as God identifies His leaders through a life with Christ that would allow a man to lead people to Him.
A Weak Theology of Calling
When I go to gatherings where there are lots of evangelicals, I am surrounded by men claiming to be shepherds. To be sure, there are many faithful men there who are seeking Christ and love Him dearly. But when we discuss the subject of preaching, the inevitable question is always, “Where did you go to Seminary?” I always find this question to be a non-sequitur. In the Gospels and the book of Acts, we find the mark of the Christians was precisely that they were speaking Truth with authority, (apart from the imprimatur of Sanhedrin credentials). It was this mark of being “untrained” men with uncommon Wisdom that distinguished the saint in Acts as having been with Christ.
Leaders at all levels of Evangelicalism ask, “Without a Seminary degree, how would we know if you can pastor or preach?” To illustrate their myopically narrow view of Calling, I often ask, “You’ve been unwilling to spend meaningful time with the man. You’ve never accepted an opportunity to listen to him preach. How would YOU know if he can’t?” I think of Voddie Baucham telling of when he told his pastor that he was called to preach. His pastor said, something to the effect of, “Third Sunday in February, I guess we’ll all find out!”
To those outside of the system willing to see it, it’s pretty obvious that the “tools” for knowing Christ have replaced the evident observation of spiritual calling gained through doing life together. It is the Church God has tasked with “identifying” men whom God has called. But that’s hard work. It requires time, intimacy, and vulnerability. It may mean that an Elder may have to risk being betrayed. Like Jesus was when Judas did so. An American Evangelicalism saturated with comfort has no room for that.
A seminary may serve a useful function in the process of discipleship and education. The best of Western higher education was born out of the Christian worldview that God wants all Men to be able to Know Him and glorify Him by understanding how He works in Creation. Nevertheless, seminary cannot do what God has ordained the Church to do for the same reason a hammer cannot drive a screw. The Church is not called to cheer pastor-mills for Christianizing student-aid and secular Prussian-model education systems.
Had we known Wisdom and not merely known “stuff” about God, we might have seen that the greatest examples of “calling” in Scripture are not enthusiastic men declaring themselves to be “fit for” the ministry. There’s no evidence that “calling” in Scripture was ever characterized in an untested young man who wanted to make a career out of it. What we see in Timothy and Titus is that the Elders in the local congregation were responsible for knowing and developing those who were “able to teach” and the character of the men precisely because they had been living life in ministry for years—together.
Functional Magisterium
A seminary graduate years ago lamented that he was not out on the foreign mission field. He just “knew” that was his calling. I asked him to come help me with a ministry outreach that kept me busy until usually 1 or 2 AM on Sunday mornings. With a helper, I could get an hour or two of extra sleep. The graduate declined.
When I asked why, he told me in sincerity, “I can’t do that. My family and I stop doing anything at 6:00 PM on Saturday. We need to rest so that we can be ready to give God our full attention in worship Sunday morning.” I asked my friend whether he thought God chooses to give people special giftings in such a way that when they drop into the remote jungle, they’re suddenly more able to serve the needs of the lost (and worship) while tired. My question was not well received.
My friend could tell me all about what Scofield thought about Dispensationalism, but he had no idea how to respond when doing ministry at an apartment complex with a bunch of Muslims when a homeless man suddenly stabs one of their neighbors. He could tell me about the importance of a high view of worship, but he couldn’t see serving the Lost as an act of Worship. A man can rattle off all the books he read on the finer points of theology but doesn’t know what to do when real life gets messy.
Author and podcaster Jon Harris recently asked whether there is a pattern that is being missed when we look at tragedies in leadership like the recent revelation regarding Steve Lawson. There is. Both the Seminaries and the pew-sitters have elevated matriculation through a favorable Institution and credentialism to the level of a Functional Magisterium. The Church elevates “knowing about God” above “Knowing God.”
I heard someone ask whether the Reformation Study Bible would have to be reprinted because Lawson had some commentary in it. I pointed out that even the human authors of the Scripture were sinners, and then asked where exactly we would stop burning books if we started throwing out everything that didn’t have at least six degrees of separation from any sinner. The angst in the pews over whether we should throw out Steve Lawson’s Bible studies illustrates that we’re treating men with feet of clay and credentials as superstars instead of saints saved by Grace alone. Read Luther. He was pretty salty in his old age.
