Here are a few more thoughts regarding training for pastoral ministry (Note past articles HERE and HERE).

In a few previous posts, I suggested that the local church was essential for adequate formal pastoral training. I don’t think local church involvement in formal theological training is merely a good idea. I believe it is essential. In other words, if all one has received is a degree from a formal theological institution without specific input, accountability, involvement and approval from a local church, more than likely, he is not ready to begin serving as a pastor. As I have stated before, I am pro-academy when it comes to theological training. There are areas of ministry of which the academy can train to a deeper degree than the local church. However, in my estimation, the number of such areas is few.

Just to throw a few more bones out to gnaw on, I want to propose some areas of ministry training that the academy can serve best and those they can not and should not assume for themselves:

WHAT THE ACADEMY DOES BEST

• Training in the biblical languages.

• Use of the biblical languages in the details of exegesis.

• Equipping a student for a ministry of professional scholarship (a teacher in a theological institution).

• Providing an environment of concentrated study and academic evaluation.

WHAT THE ACADEMY IS NOT DESIGNED TO DO

Determine if a man is qualified for, or called to the ministry. Even the best of theological institutions is not designed for (and should not be) evaluating a man’s life in terms of character and overall preparedness for pastoral ministry. Perhaps it is better to say that theological institutions may in fact recognize when a man is obviously unprepared for pastoral ministry, but they are not designed to determine whether he is fit and ready to serve as a pastor. As a matter of fact, the instructions regarding the qualifications for ministry in 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1 were written to local churches (again, the New Testament does not envision an environment for ministerial training outside the local church). Small group discipleship meetings with professors are not adequate. Institutions can determine whether a student is disciplined enough to turn in assignments, but they cannot evaluate him in the environment for which he is ultimately preparing. An institution can evaluate the borders of a man’s character – they can address potential red flags, but they are never in the position to see him at work in a church. A congregation should do this evaluation.

Both before and after seminary, I was often taken back by the attitude of a number of seminary students who felt that they were not only fully prepared to pastor a church but deserved a full-time, well-paying pastoral position, simply because they finished their academic training in a formal theological institution. Oh, the statistics of how many of these men split their first churches, don’t know how to patiently work with people, administrate, balance their time, and a host of other day to day ministry issues that an institution outside the local church cannot evaluate. Only a local church can and should determine whether a man is ready to be a pastor. Four years in a formal academic environment never has and will not be enough to evaluate if a man is ready to shepherd the flock of God. Biblically, such an evaluation requires a congregation (not merely a group of elders either – a whole congregation).

Teaching a man to preach. Homiletics has its academic side. The discipline of careful exegesis is critical. The mechanics of sermon development are essential. These can certainly be taught in an academic setting. But effective preaching cannot. In my seminary experience, I preached eight times (in four years). According to conversations with a number of MDiv students from other institutions, this was high. While I greatly valued the comments, critiques and input I received from professors and students, if this is all I had in preparation to preach every week in a local church, I would be woefully unprepared. No lay people had to hear the sermons I delivered in the academy. I received no input from the kind of people I would spend the remainder of my ministry days shepherding. The environment for preaching was nothing like that of preaching to a typical congregation. I did not have to preach or teach weekly. I did not have to preach in any other setting other than that of a seminary classroom – no funerals, weddings, camps, banquets, etc. Admittedly, I could not expect the institution to help me with any of these settings. Such settings are what the local church can uniquely provide. Because of my involvement in a local church during seminary, I preached in every one of the above named environments on a regular basis and received feedback from the “regular folks” that greatly impacted my approach to preaching. No man can learn how to preach to a congregation full of people, who are at every stage of spiritual maturity, by preaching to a handful of theological students. The theory of homiletics can be learned in a classroom but the practice of it cannot be left alone to an academic institution.

Preparing a man to counsel and administrate. I did have a course on administration and two courses in biblical counseling in seminary. They were very good classes and put some excellent resources in my hands. But honestly, they did not prepare me for the normal church settings in which I have been involved. Nor should they. I needed to be exposed on more than one occasion to real life counseling situations. I needed to learn how to engage people who needed biblical counsel. I needed someone to evaluate how I approached those who came in for help. No academic institution can prepare a man to understand what goes on financially and administratively in a local church. Nor should they. No other environment outside the local church can prepare a man for these things.

Teaching a man to lead people. Personal exposure to a good leader and opportunities to lead and receive evaluation are essential to learn principles of leadership. The pressure of making difficult decisions, learning who to talk with and how to talk with them about critical issues within the church, cannot be effectively learned in a classroom. You cannot read enough leadership books, nor hear enough lectures, even from an effective leader, to be adequately prepared to lead a congregation full of people with varied personalities and backgrounds. Only the local church can prepare this kind of environment.

All of this to say, we need some theological institutions who not only think that local churches are important in the formal training of men for pastoral ministry, but intentionally pattern their program to partner with multiple local churches to accomplish a full-orbed approach to pastoral training. I do mean to go beyond merely locating a seminary on the campus of a local church. This is a good start, but only for the few who have the privilege to daily walk side-by-side with the pastors who lead that church. What about the rest? They equally need significant involvement in local churches for their training to be even minimally adequate. I would like to see an institution that is willing to withhold a man from graduating until a local congregation concurs that they are fit for ministry (I know this is crazy). Or, is there an institution that will change their placement approach to put men in significant associate pastor or intern positions rather than senior pastorates before his graduation, if he has had no significant local church training and evaluation. Obviously I am referring to institutions that are training men specifically for pastoral positions, not merely handing out degrees in education, music, or recreational ministries.

I’m open to hear of any out there that you may know of. I think I know of one, maybe two. But where are the theological institutions that believe and state that what they offer is incomplete if their students are not merely involved in but formally trained through the ministry of a local church.

Stay tuned, more to come . . .