I will be forever indebted to Dr. Graham for the fact that he gave so generously of his time to come to Louisville, and to give his enthusiastic support to what we were seeking to do right here on this campus.
As we commemorate three decades of the faithfulness of The Billy Graham School of Missions, Evangelism, and Ministry, we do so with eager anticipation for the future.
From its inception in 1859, The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary has existed primarily to educate, train, and prepare pastors for a lifetime of ministry faithfulness. Over the past 160 years, the commitment of Southern Seminary to train pastors, under the Lordship of Jesus Christ, has not changed. However, the context in which pastors are called to minister continues to change rapidly. Today, pastors face challenges such as the rise of secularism, the decline of religious participation, and the increasing complexity of social issues.
Come see what God is doing at Southern Seminary as the next generation of “soldiers of Christ, in truth arrayed” is readied for deployment. These students are serious, convictional, devotional, and joyful. They know the landscape of the post-modern world and they are determined to preach Christ and lead gospel churches. They match seriousness with sweetness. God is doing something marvelous in this generation and right here at Southern Seminary and Boyce College. Come see it for ourself, pray for us, and thank God for calling out the called in this generation. How kind of God to let us be a part of all this.
No one prepares you for how strange ministry is. How could they? To be strange is to be unexpected, odd, out of the norm. And personal ministry in particular traffics in the unknowns. It occurs at the heart of strange.
As we celebrate Dr. Mohler’s thirtieth anniversary as President of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, it is fitting to recognize the incredible work that he does to ensure his dedicated listeners wake up to a new episode of The Briefing each weekday morning.
In Southern Baptist life, we now enjoy the benefit of conservative leadership in our boards and seminaries, but it has not always been that way.
I had heard that the seminary in Louisville was the most liberal Baptist school and some had advised me to mark and avoid it. But a family friend had a connection to the school and he urged me to take a trip to Kentucky to check it out for myself. On that visit, I met Al Mohler for the first time. That consequential meeting changed the course of my life and began a vital friendship that continues to this day.
As I reflect on the occasion of our three decades here, I do so first with gratitude to the Lord for what he has done and then with amazement that I am blessed to be part of the story. The backstory is familiar to some of how we were living in suburban Atlanta when the presidential search committee at Southern Seminary began their work to nominate a new president.
Thirty years of leadership is an accomplishment in any job, but when that job is to help thousands of ministers remain faithful to the Word of God and preach it, the reward is greater than anything we can celebrate here on earth.
Mohler’s commitment to the founding mission of the Seminary inevitably led to a greater emphasis and focus on God’s overarching mission to redeem and reconcile those created in his image from every tribe, tongue, people, and nation.
In February of 1997, Mary Mohler met with a few wives of Southern Seminary faculty members to share a burden and a vision that wives of seminary students needed to be encouraged and trained, and in the fall of that year, Seminary Wives Institute (SWI) was born.
Confessions pervaded the life of the early church. It used them catechetically, liturgically, and apologetically. The early church would not know how to disciple new believers, perform acts of worship, or defend the faith apart from the use of confessions.
Emerging from the Puritan separatists in England, Baptists in every generation, and from a variety of theological traditions, have articulated their beliefs in published confessions to show continuity with orthodox Christianity and to give witness to their distinctive ecclesiology and practice.
Two distinct visions of Baptist identity had clearly emerged, one rooted in historic orthodoxy, the other in a highly individualistic doctrine of soul liberty. In the Northern Baptist Convention, only one could endure.
May the celebration of God’s work to use Dr. Mohler over the past thirty years at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary encourage you to delight in the goodness and grace of our God as we consider an example of Recovering Faithfulness.
Yet people ask us all the time, “Who are you? What’s a Baptist? How are you different than any other church or religious group?” One would hope that any church-going Southern Baptist could answer such questions with aplomb. But can they?
From the very beginning, The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary has been a confessional institution. Every professor must sign our confession of faith, the Abstract of Principles, agreeing to teach “in accordance with and not contrary to all that is contained therein.” This pledge has remained unchanged since 1859, but the history of Southern Seminary is a history with many twists and turns.
