Training You Can Trust

By Mark L. Bailey

[Mark L. Bailey is President and Professor of Bible Exposition, Dallas Theological Seminary, Dallas, Texas.

This is an edited version of the address Dr. Bailey gave at his inauguration as fifth president of Dallas Theological Seminary on October 19, 2001.]

The coat of arms of the Fitzgerald family of Ireland shows the figure of a baboon carrying a baby, and underneath is the Latin motto, Non Immemer Beneficii. The story connected with this strange device says that long ago the father of the family was away at war and had left his household in the charge of one or two old retainers and some women servants. Suddenly the enemy came to the house, and all fled, forgetful of the little baby, the future heir of the family. A pet baboon noticed the baby, ran to the cradle, caught up the child, and ran with him to the top of the abbey steeple, holding him out for the people to see. The servants were all in terror, but the baboon carried the baby down safely to the ground. When the child’s father returned, he felt that he owed a debt of gratitude to the beast that had saved the heir of his house. So he set the monkey in the center of his knightly shield and placed beneath the motto, “Not unmindful of his kindness.”[1]

While I do not have such a family crest, I am not unmindful of God’s kindness in my life in bringing me to this moment. As I step into the role of president of Dallas Theological Seminary, I do so with a sense of honor and humility. I am honored that the board, in consultation with the administration, faculty, staff, and alumni, would believe that it is the will of God that I should serve the Lord in this way. I am also humbled by the outstanding legacy of leadership that threads its way through the years of our Seminary’s history.

Our heritage is observable in our presidents, faculty, and faithful alumni who serve the cause of Christ all around the globe. God has used the support and endorsement of our previous three living presidents to confirm my understanding that He has been behind this appointment. I express my heartfelt thanks for the encouragement and support of my esteemed colleagues on the faculty and staff.

In October 1900 John Knox McLean, president of Pacific Theological Seminary, Oakland, California, spoke at the Conference on Congregational Seminaries. He entitled his address, “The Presidency of Theological Seminaries.” In that address he noted the difficulty of a faculty member moving into the role of president. If that happens, “What will most probably result? Resentment on the part of fellow professors, corporate friction, personal irritation, all-around discord, and general chaos. He is more than likely to find himself a Joseph among his brethren, his best intentions misconceived and thwarted, left alone, stripped of his garment of distinction, in a pit, and with reason to count himself fortunate if he be not given over to the Ishmaelites or other Philistines.”[2]

Thankfully I have never felt beaten, abandoned, or sold into the hands of a Midianite band. For the encouragement I have received from the previous presidents, faculty, staff, and alumni, I am deeply appreciative.

To the members of Faith Bible Church of DeSoto, Texas, and especially to the staff, elders, and deacons and their spouses, I am indebted for their love and support over these last six years—truly our most enjoyable pastoral ministry. A final word of thanks is due to the most important counselors I have had—my family. Without them I would never have made the journey of Christian service this far nor enjoyed it as much. To them I owe the most.

The two eternal verities other than God Himself are the Word of God and the people of God. Dallas Seminary focuses on these core values of truth and relationships. Tonight and tomorrow night I want to address the proposition, training you can trust equips leaders you can follow. This evening I will direct my remarks to “training you can trust” and tomorrow evening I will speak on “leaders you can follow.”[3]

We are living in an age of shifting hermeneutical theories, intruding cultural philosophies, evaporating social ethics, competing worldviews, and ongoing threats of global instability. How can we best serve our generation in the task of theological training?

John Hannah, distinguished professor of historical theology at Dallas Seminary, identifies the challenge of theological understanding in our modern culture.

We live in a world where personality has more street value than character, where psychological wholeness is more valued than spiritual authenticity. We find ourselves in a world where pleasures are embraced without moral norms or a sense of social responsibility. Christian truth is attacked not so much for its particular assertions as for its fundamental claim that there is such a thing as binding, objective truth. The quest for truth has been replaced by the preoccupation with pleasure and entertainment. Thus we live in a world of the therapeutic and the psychological, where people are engaged in an endless pursuit of self-fulfillment and entitlement.[4]

In Pisidian Antioch, Paul stated that David “served the purpose of God in his own generation” (Acts 13:36). My prayer for the students, staff, and faculty of Dallas Seminary is that our school will always be characterized by the words, “they served the purpose of God in their generation.”

I would like to suggest six critical components that make up a trustworthy equipping environment. “Training you can trust” must be biblical in its authority, theological in its focus, spiritual in its nature, ethical in its effect, relational in its context, and missional in its purpose.

Biblical in Its Authority

To ascribe authority to Scripture is to acknowledge that it is the Word of God. What has been called the “formal principle of the Reformation,” summarized in the phrase sola Scriptura, affirms that only those beliefs and practices that rest firmly on scriptural foundations can be regarded as binding on Christians.

The commitment to the priority and authority of Scripture is an integral element of the evangelical tradition at Dallas Seminary. Scripture remains authoritative for the evangelical, whether a person accepts it as such or not. For example the truthfulness of the historical and objective sacrifice of Christ is not rendered untrue simply because some do not believe that God sent His Son as the provision for our salvation.

Our commitment to the Word of God seems foolish to many in our increasingly secular culture and even among many professing believers who are enamored with that culture. R. Albert Mohler Jr. speaks to this point when he says, “To surrender this ground is to surrender the faith itself.”[5]

Alister McGrath aptly echoes this sentiment. “The only way Christianity can free itself from the subservience to cultural fashion is to ensure that it is firmly grounded in a resource that is independent of that culture. The traditional evangelical approach is to acknowledge the supreme authority of Scripture as a theological and spiritual resource, and the contemporary task as interpreting and applying this resource to the situation of today. Evangelicalism thus addresses today’s culture without needing to become trapped within that culture.”[6]

The two most significant roles of Scripture are to reveal truth and refute error. The first speaks of the ability of Scripture to convey with divine objectivity the truth God has communicated. The second provides the answer to the ever-present tendencies of subjectivity on the part of its interpreters.

We must not confuse meaning with interpretation. The Bible is true whether we interpret it correctly or not. Postmoderns argue that the reader determines the meaning of a book. But that cannot be the case with the Bible. The meaning of the text of Scripture cannot remain endlessly open to the mental wordplays of its readers. The exclusivity of Jesus is offensive to postmoderns, but it is not negotiable for the faithful followers of Jesus Christ.

Everything around us is changing, and Dallas Seminary must change in some ways in order to stay effective—not change for the sake of changing, but for the very sake of fulfilling our mission. However, what must never change is our commitment to the truth of the inerrant Scriptures. One of our supreme commitments is to hold firm to the Word of God in a world of social change.

Theological in Its Focus

By theological focus I mean that the focus of our lives, our studies, our service, and our love should be directed toward God. In Psalm 96 the psalmist exhorted everyone to sing a new song of praise to God, to proclaim the message of salvation, to declare the glory of God to the nations, to fear God who is superior to all, to ascribe to God what is due to Him, to worship Him in recognition of His greatness and holiness, to tremble before Him in humility, to say to all the nations that God reigns, and to rejoice and be glad since God will one day execute justice in all the earth.

Ronald B. Allen, professor of Bible exposition here at Dallas Seminary, writes, “For more than seventy-five years Dallas Seminary has had a constant, overarching emphasis in its theology on the glory of God. God’s glorious work in the redemption of fallen humanity is not an end in itself; it is part of the larger picture of God’s work in eternity, which centers in the display of His transcendent glory.”[7]

This is obvious in the doxology in Ephesians 1:3–14, in which each stanza climaxes with the phrase “to the praise of the glory of His grace” or “to the praise of His glory.” Thus the celebration of our salvation results in the expression of worship.

John Frame relates these two themes of redemption and glory in this way: “Redemption is the means; worship is the goal. In one sense worship is the whole point of everything. It is the purpose of history, the goal of the Christian story. Worship is not one segment of the Christian life among others. Worship is the entire Christian life, seen as a priestly offering to God.”[8]

As Gordon Borror wrote, “The lesson which seems to require constant rediscovery is the fact that worship is not primarily a state of art but rather a state of the heart. By state of the heart we mean the driving desire behind the worship life of the believer.”[9]

Theological focus must be both doxological and Christological. “Doxological” means that the focus of our lives should be to know God better than we know anyone else and to love God more than we love anything or anyone else. This is fitting in light of God’s goal for human history, according to 1 Corinthians 15:28. When Jesus has established His millennial kingdom, “then the Son Himself also will be subjected to the One who subjected all things to Him, so that God may be all in all.”

“Christological” means that we honor and glorify the Son in all we do. “The Father … has given all judgment to the Son, so that all will honor the Son even as they honor the Father” (John 5:22–23). Thus the theological focus is the glory of God and the glory of His Son. In Jesus’ high priestly prayer He defined eternal life in doxological and Christological terms. “This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent” (John 17:3).

Spiritual in Its Nature

McGrath warns, “If there is any long-term threat to the future of evangelicalism, it may well be the lack of attention to spirituality.”[10] By speaking of spirituality in our training I mean the total integration of faith into everyday life. As Luther advocated long ago, spirituality is life in the world oriented toward God rather than life undertaken in withdrawal from the world. Jesus taught that we are to be in the world but not of it (John 17:15–16). Today the church too often withdraws itself from the world and yet it has become more and more like the world. Worldliness undermines our public witness for Christ. As developed especially in the Pauline Epistles, the biblical answer to the world, the flesh, and the devil is a dependent life lived by the power of the Spirit. “But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit” (2 Cor. 3:18). The ministry of the Holy Spirit is essential for living, service, and worship.

The Spirit is also essential if our witness for Christ is to be effective. As Paul wrote, “My message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in a demonstration of the Spirit and of power, so that your faith would not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God” (1 Cor. 2:4–5).

McGrath challenges believers to rediscover true spirituality in light of the great truths of Scripture. “The time has come to throw off the cult of dependency and move toward the development and rediscovery of spiritualities that will complement the great evangelical emphases on the sufficiency of the Scriptures, the centrality of the death of Christ, the need for personal conversion, and the evangelistic imperative.”[11]

Too many students today begin their studies as evangelicals and then, because of what they perceive as a lack of help in deepening their understanding of God through prayer and meditation, they turn to ritual and tradition in nonevangelical circles. 

John Waterhouse, founder and publishing director of Albatross Books, decries “the loss of spiritual energy, originality and creativity.”[12] As a result we turn to alternative spiritualities from sources less than orthodox and powerlessly disconnected from the Spirit. The Holy Spirit of God was sent by Christ to indwell and empower each believer with that same power that raised Jesus from the dead.

It is time to rediscover the true source of our power, to recognize that it is not rationalism, mysticism, emotionalism, traditionalism, or asceticism. As Paul wrote in Colossians 2:23, these have no power against the flesh. As people of faith we need to experience life in the Spirit that is rooted in a personal identification with the cross of Christ and the Christ of the cross.

Spirituality must be related to our worship of God. A theological vacuity exists in much of evangelical worship today. The culture of style and entertainment has supplanted biblical concepts of worship and God’s call to the church to be holy.[13] Worship has become far too user-friendly and far too little fear-inducing. Styles of worship must minister across the generations and encourage the new in Christ as well as the mature in Christ—from the wee ones to the wise ones.

“God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth” (John 4:24). God the Father is actively seeking such worshipers (v. 23).

Ethical in Its Effect

A few years ago Billy Graham was asked to reflect on evangelicalism’s past and future. Among the factors he advanced as keys to evangelical success in the coming years is obedience. “Few things discredit the gospel in the eyes of the world more quickly than moral and ethical failure by those claiming to follow Christ.”[14] Those who serve the Lord in leadership, and especially those who handle God’s Word, are held to a higher level of accountability than others who do not share that responsibility.

In the twelfth century Hugo of St. Victor linked disciplined thinking with moral self-scrutiny as two essentials in the preparation and contemplation of serving God. Such ethics are both personal and corporate.[15]

A sterling example of this was William Wilberforce, who served as a member of the English Parliament in the late eighteenth century. He had become a Christian through the influence of some of John Wesley’s early followers. Wilberforce’s Christian beliefs infused him with a strong sense of purpose. He found his mission in life sparked by his outrage over slave trade. His efforts to end slave trading began in 1787. Year after year his attempts in Parliament were defeated. Yet decades later, when Wilberforce was on his deathbed, slavery was abolished throughout the British Empire. His personal ethical response was used by God to alter a nation’s ethical direction.[16]

If we are to be salt in a decaying world and light in a dark world, we must respond correctly to the revelation of God. Moody has been quoted as saying, “The Bible was not written for our information, but for our transformation.”

Such an ethical obligation rests on Dallas Seminary, especially in light of our biblical eschatology. The apostles Peter and John both exhorted believers to lead lives of holiness in light of the Lord’s return. “But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, in which the heavens will pass away with a roar and the elements will be destroyed with intense heat, and the earth and its works will be burned up. Since all these things are to be destroyed in this way, what sort of people ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness, looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God” (2 Pet. 3:10–11). “Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we will be. But we know that when He appears, we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is. And everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure” (1 John 3:2–3).

Relational in Its Context

In a recent Christianity Today special edition on the role of seminaries one academician offered the following apologetic for the value of the seminary. “Seminaries undergird the mission of the church by the interrelated specifics of guarding the purity of the church’s mission, maintaining doctrinal purity (i.e. protecting against heresy), providing the church with sound leadership, shielding the church from negative cultural influences, renewing the church’s life and mission, and providing spiritual formation for church leaders.”[17]

We at Dallas Seminary must hold the following in proper tension for maximum effectiveness. (1) We must pursue the investigation of truth and the integrity of relationships. (2) We must balance our theology and our practice. (3) We must focus on the maturation of character and the acquisition of ministry skills. (4) We must expand partnerships between the Seminary and churches and parachurch ministries. (5) We must enhance the fellowship and mentoring of faculty and students. (6) We must improve the appreciation and coordination of the faculty and staff. (7) We need to take advantage of the unique opportunities that arise at the intersection of Christianity with culture. (8) We need to improve the dialogues within dispensationalism and in the broader evangelical world. (9) We should seek to penetrate the arenas of broader academia with the evangelical faith.

To be both biblical and relevant means that we must build bridges of relationships over which the truth can travel. We should hold our convictions with grace. But God has called us to be salt and light in the world in order to influence others both with the truth we believe and the manner in which we live. In so doing God will be glorified by our lives.

Missional in Its Purpose

Bennis and Warren write, “To choose a direction, a leader must first have developed a mental image of a possible and desirable future state of the organization. This image, which we call vision, may be as vague as a dream or as precise as a goal or mission statement. The critical point is that a vision articulates a view of a realistic, credible, attractive future for the organization, a condition that is better in some important ways than now exists.”[18]

Jesus said, “A pupil is not above his teacher; but everyone, after he has been fully trained, will be like his teacher” (Luke 6:40). By imitating Christ one’s life is changed. By following Christ one learns His methods and motives for ministry. By identifying with Christ the believer is called to the centrality of the Cross. And training by Christ results in obeying truths that will impact our lives.

The mission of Dallas Seminary is to prepare men and women for ministry as godly servant-leaders in the body of Christ worldwide. By blending instruction in the Scriptures from our doctrinal perspective with practical training in ministry skills, we seek to produce graduates to do the work of evangelism, to edify believers, and to equip others by proclaiming and applying God’s Word in the power of the Holy Spirit.

Conclusion

A good seminary education can provide an environment for biblical, theological, and ministry training, while allowing for personal reflection under the direction and encouragement of highly skilled and caring mentors that few people can find outside the seminary experience.

We at Dallas Seminary are committed to academic excellence with reliance on the inerrant Bible and within a context of spiritual nurture and modeling to assure preparation for effective ministry to a lost and hurting world. Our goal is for our graduates to reach people with the gospel of grace and help them mature spiritually, while cultivating their God-given gifts so that the church of Jesus Christ will be healthy and reproductive around the globe.

The unfortunate emergence of a purely cerebral education must be countered by a continued commitment to evangelism, an insistence that theology be related to pastoral practice, and an appreciation of the personal aspects of faith. We face the twin extremes of evangelical rationalism and unthinking emotionalism. My desire is that our Dallas Seminary theologians be evangelists and our evangelists be theologians, and that our scholars be pastors and our pastors be scholars.

May God help us to serve His purposes well in our generation. And as disciples instructed by Jesus, when we have done all we were commanded to do we should say, in the humility of heart enjoined by our Lord, “we are unworthy slaves; we have done only that which we ought to have done” (Luke 17:10). Non Immemer Beneficii! May we never be unmindful of His kindness and the grace that enables us to serve our sovereign Lord.

Notes

1. Aquilla Webb, “Gratitude a Debt,” in 1001 Illustrations for Pulpit and Platform (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1926), 97.
2. John Knox McLean, “The Presidency of Theological Seminaries. Should the Theological Seminary Have a Permanent President; And If So, What Should Be the Power and Duties of the Office?” quoted in Neely Dixon McCarter, The President as Educator: A Study of the Seminary Presidency (Atlanta: Scholars, 1996), 16.
3. The installation service on October 19, 2001, was followed by a celebration banquet the following evening, October 20.
4. John Hannah, Our Legacy: The History of Christian Doctrine (Colorado Springs: NavPress, 2001), 18.
5. R. Albert Mohler Jr., “Evangelical: What’s in a Name?” in The Coming Evangelical Crisis, ed. R. Kent Hughes et al. (Chicago: Moody, 1996), 39.
6. Alister McGrath, Evangelicalism and the Future of Christianity (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 1995), 63.
7. Ronald B. Allen, The Wonder of Worship, Swindoll Leadership Library (Nashville: Word, 2001), 21.
8. John M. Frame, Worship in Spirit and Truth (Phillipsburg, NJ: Presbyterian & Reformed, 1996), 11.
9. Ronald Allen and Gordon Borror, Worship: Rediscovering the Missing Jewel (Sisters, OR: Multnomah, 1982), 23.
10. McGrath, Evangelicalism and the Future of Christianity, 137.
11. Ibid., 121-22.
12. John Waterhouse, “The Crisis of Evangelicalism,” On Being 18 (September 1992): 4-8.
13. Mohler, “Evangelical: What’s in a Name?” 40.
14. Billy Graham, “Standing Firm, Moving Forward,” Christianity Today, September 16, 1996, 15.
15. “Hugonis de Sancto Victore Didascalicon de Studio Legendi: A Critical Text,” in Studies in Medieval and Renaissance X (Washington, DC: Catholic University Press, 1939).
16. For more information see David J. Vaughn, Statesman and Saint: The Principled Politics of William Wilberforce (Nashville: Cumberland, 2001).
17. Randy Frame, “Is Seminary Education Always Necessary for Pastoral Ministry?” Christianity Today, October 1, 2001, 84, 86.
18. Warren Bennis and Burt Nanus, The Strategies for Taking Charge, rev. ed. (New York: Harper & Row, 1996), 89.