Options for Learning

Basic Education for Christian Service
by Steve Hoke and Bill Taylor

Five basic formal schooling options are described below. Match the educational mode to your needs, goals, resources, personality, and learning style.

Inside the Undergraduate Classroom
1. Bible colleges. Bible colleges seek to develop Christian leaders who are mature in character and equipped with biblical knowledge. They have had a strong record of turning out men and women who serve as pastors, teachers, missionaries, and leaders in Christian ministry. Seventy-five percent of today’s evangelical missionaries received some Bible college training.

At a Bible college, you’ll find a large part of the curriculum devoted to biblical studies. You’ll learn to study and teach the Bible, how to preach, and how to participate and lead in Christian service. You’ll be tutored in practical areas like sharing your faith, planting churches, and nurturing young Christians. You will also find an emphasis on deep spiritual life and on your identity as part of a community of students and faculty committed to loving and serving God.

2. Christian liberal arts colleges and universities. Christian liberal arts colleges specialize in general education programs, seeking to give students a basic grasp of all the academic disciplines from a distinctively Christian perspective. The curriculum is based on the conviction that all truth is God’s truth. It links the study of God’s creation with the study of God’s revelation, helping you to develop a biblical worldview. Studying at a Christian college allows you to integrate biblical training with your academic field of study.

We live in a fragmented society that desperately needs an integrated view of life - a view that connects the fragments and offers meaning to life. Nowhere is this more important than in Christian ministry. No matter what their job description, unless believers possess an integrated, God-centered view of the world, they will have little to offer people of differing cultures. This is the special strength of the Christian liberal arts college.

3. The unexpected alternative. If you are already out of school, you may benefit from a pattern of study that can adapt to your present responsibilities and move with you to the field if you don’t finish before you go. A variety of colleges and universities now offer credit for the “World Christian Foundations” course developed by the U.S. Center for World Mission in Pasadena, California. The material is equivalent to a traditional year of Bible with mission perspective, but it is packaged for two years of intensive half-time study anywhere under the supervision of a local mentor. It incorporates a wide range of disciplines, from anthropology to hermeneutics, and science to linguistics, around the central theme of God’s unfolding purpose. It is as up to date as you can get in terms of the overall scope of God’s mission effort and is available for completing a B.A. or earning an M.A. And by enabling you to continue working while you study, WCF can help you avoid the debt trap that ensnares many would-be missionaries.

4. Secular colleges and universities. Secular colleges and universities (private or state) offer superb facilities, diverse academic majors, large research libraries, and a wide range of faculty specialization. Tuition is also greatly reduced for state residents (often about half the cost of private higher education). Active campus ministry organizations can enrich classroom study with discipleship, mentoring, and outreach opportunities.

In North America you have a menu of thousands of these tertiary-level schools. Some are small, tucked into a rural paradise or crammed in the inner city; others are gigantic, again either in rural or urban settings; they range in size from very small to medium to enormous. They can be private (religious or secular in orientation) or public (supported by state funds). In contrast to many other countries, the U.S. does not have a “national university” that is funded and guided by the federal education industry. Cost factors range across the spectrum, from a relatively frugal cost at certain state universities (perhaps US$9,000 per year for tuition, room, and board) to nearly US$30,000 per year at high-ticket private ones.

One very important point: no missionary sending group will release you if you have a high student debt. At a recent Urbana Student Missions Convention, I did a workshop on missionary equipping. In the question and answer time, a student asked me whether it mattered if he had a high loan debt following college. I said it did, and then I asked him what his debt would be. He blew us out of the room when he said, US$100,000. He was a computer science grad from MIT. I told him to get the best paying job he could find, live like a pauper, pay his debt in a short time, save money, and then go into missions. He might be able to do this in four years!

How should a Christian decide which secular school to attend if she or he also wants to go into missions? First, seek the counsel of people wiser than you, and that should include your parents and your pastoral team. Listen carefully to them; then pray. Secondly, check out the educational track record of others you know, particularly those who have gone from the university into missions. Third, check out the liberal arts programs that will teach you how to read, think, and write, or the more “marketable” ones that will give you a strong skill set in light of your academic interests. Fourth, investigate the options within your goals, desires, and finances, and then try to visit the schools.

Finally, select a secular school that offers the following for you: the right academic offerings and costs according to your learning capacities and family budget; the presence of vital campus and student-led Christian ministries, coupled by a strong student-loving church with a passion for God and the world, including that campus. We cannot overemphasize the critical role of solid, campus based Christian groups and vibrant, worshiping, intergenerational communities. Never minimize your church experience. In both the campus ministry and church, you will find teachers of God’s Word, disciplers and mentors, life friends, and perhaps a husband or wife with the same passionate goals in life.

Some young adults fear they will lose their faith in the secular college or university. To be honest, we have seen that happen, and it hurts; it may have a parallel to the gradual stagnation of faith that can occur in a Christian school where the tough issues are not faced. Don’t go into the university without the certainty that God wants you there. On the other hand, we maintain that if the Christian faith does not work at your university, then it surely won’t work in another culture. Learn to tell the powerful Christ-story in that university, and you will never forget the mistakes you make, the lessons learned, the exhilaration of seeing the Triune God at work in Spirit power! Make friends with the agnostic, the New Ager, the Buddhist, Hindu, Muslim, Marxist (they are still around), whether they be from your own culture or international students. Learn to listen to their story, and thus you gain credibility that allows you to share with them the Great Story and the way it has bisected your own life.

Moving on to Graduate Courses

5. Christian graduate schools and seminaries. Christian graduate schools are primarily concerned with biblical study and professional training for areas of Christian ministry. Graduate schools equip you with a specialty at a professional level. You can hone your professional skills in journalism, cross-cultural studies, health care, TESL, and so on.

Seminaries offer pastoral preparation in areas such as missions, theology, spirituality, preaching, Christian education, and church planting. Adequate professional training has become increasingly crucial for prospective long-term missionary candidates. Some believe seminary training is mandatory for the cross-cultural church planter. But the most critical issue is whether you can develop the character qualities and practical ministry skills demanded in the cross-cultural setting.

Missions involves many skills in interpersonal relations, networking and resource linking, cross-cultural communication and counseling, mentoring, and facilitating. However, increasingly, cross-cultural, long-term servants in the “less reached world” need legitimate vocations or skills for visas, as well as to “ground” ministry in the various marketplaces.

Each seminary has its own distinctive style and emphasis. Some are known for training gifted preachers. Others are known for their counseling or mission programs. Still others specialize in urban ministry or international studies. If you attend seminary, the school and its faculty will have a powerful impact on you and on the shape of your theological persuasions. Select a seminary that’s compatible with your particular calling or gifting.

A Rich Phase
Whatever avenue of training or study you choose, it can be a rich phase of your life. It’s a time when lifelong friends are made and life partners are often found. Surrounded by like-minded teachers and students, you’ll find freedom and support to test your calling and refine the direction of your life.

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December 27-31, 2009