Providing seminary without tuition can be a dangerous venture. Seminaries are useful tools for the church, since they provide men who have been trained in order to enter the pastorate. Seminaries are the fertile grounds from where biblical research and application yield the fruits of sharp minds, pastoral hearts, and fiery zeal. Nevertheless, when seminaries function as extensions of the church, there are risks involved.
Seminaries which function without charging students any tuition, can lead to less than ideal results if great care is not taken.
What is the danger? The danger is that people may think that since this training is free, it must therefore be of little value and importance. This is a danger to both students and professors. For students, even students with the best of intentions, the danger is that one may easily fall into a pattern of laziness and indifference with regard to their studies. For professors, the danger is that they will acquiesce to the sinful sloth of students without maintaining high standards.
Consider for a moment why this is such a dangerous situation. The intent of a seminary should be to raise up qualified leaders for the church. These men will be tasked with the ultimate goal of pastoring a church as an undershepherd of the Lord Jesus Christ. The spiritual health of congregations will rest on the shoulders of these pastors (Heb. 13:17). This is a matter of eternal importance! If laziness and dullness creep into the students of a seminary, great harm may befall the churches in that area since the future leaders will be ill-equipped—or non-existent.
Seminary studies should command the greatest attention of any subject, whether for the goal of entering a vocational ministry or merely for the purpose of personal sharpening. What other subject is as relevant to the eternal destiny of every man, woman, and child? Students should apply themselves zealously and diligently to their work, and professors should enforce strict standards of education to ensure that the deceitfulness of sin does not lull any person to spiritual sleepiness.
When students are paying high financial prices to attend seminary, or when they move across the country to attend a certain school, there are built-in costs which function as incentives to stay alert and to be diligent. When seminary is free and local, though, those human incentives are gone, and we must rely on the excellence of the subject and the importance of the outcome as inducements to spiritual zeal. Seminary, while it is not biblically mandated as a qualification for eldership, and while it is not the sole form of preparation, is important where it is available. Those who aspire to ministry or to greater sharpness should apply themselves if possible.
The danger, when things are free, is that we will value them lightly. It is possible to value seminary training lightly and to treat it as a matter of little importance. We know that this is possible because this is how some people treat the gospel. If the gospel comes to us freely—that is, we pay no price to participate in its blessings—do not some people regard it as a matter of little consequence? They do, though they should not. May we never be those who value something lightly because it is free. Let us instead look at the true nature of the thing, whether expensive or free, to see the value we should place on it. May God grant us grace to do so, and to do so biblically!
--Dean of Admissions
No comments:
Post a Comment