From Vision to Reality –Nurturing Future Servant Leaders by Theological Education

The Church of today confronts multiple and real challenges. These challenges include an expanding pluralism, the blossoming multinational enterprises, an enlarging gap between the rich and the poor, the ageing of the world population, a financial and economic recession, the controversial gender ethics, and the disputed bioengineering science. The Church must face and resolve the question, where are we headed so that we can become the real salt, the true light, and the effective leaven of our times?

These mentioned factors and situations significantly affect the development of theological education. In turning our face toward the ever changing world, we affirm our belief in the commissioning of the Church by the Holy Spirit to shoulder God’s command for His world. The Church has to seek for the path and direction to move forward. She must stand firm on the Gospel of Jesus Christ in her search for new methods to share and to live the Gospel in the new age. At this juncture, the Seminary is determined to nurture and to equip the next generation of church leaders. She must listen to the real needs of the Church. By doing so, the Seminary develops servant leaders who have the spiritual strength of life renewal and the ministerial skill of faith that works. These are the people of God who can remain steadfast in the turmoil of the world and lead the Church within different contexts to share, to live, and to proclaim the Gospel of Christ Jesus.

The Hong Kong Baptist Theological Seminary stands on the tradition of Baptists, affirms the sovereignty of our God in Trinity, affirms the redemption of the Gospel of Jesus Christ for all people, and affirms the power of the Holy Spirit and the unity of the Church. All of these convictions shape the instruction, research, and pastoral education in the Seminary for the dual purpose of character formation and leadership development in our students. The heart of character formation is the actualization of a servant’s spirit in faith, love, hope, truth, and joy. The essence of leadership development is the practice of living the Word of God and leading with the Word through the cultivation of theological wisdom, thus becoming an effective leader for the Church. In practical terms, the Seminary under the life transforming power of the Holy Spirit exerts special efforts in character formation and life transformation. The Seminary in response to the call of Christ to the Church emphasizes the various disciplines of ministry, which include leadership, preaching, pastoral care, education, evangelism, mission, and worship. The Seminary, in her witnessing to the sovereignty of God in God’s creation of the world, integrates reason with faith in areas of culture, politics, economics, and science and enables ministers to lead the faithful in the pursuit of truth, love, justice, and peace.

On the path toward the achievement of these goals, the Seminary must be a spiritual community of learners. In this community, both teachers and students demonstrate their obedience to the calling of God by studying Scripture and theology studiously and through their growth in faith, understanding, and discernment. In this fellowship among teachers, students, and staff, the Seminary must become a community of the Trinitarian God and will seek to grow in wisdom, faith, love, humility, courage, justice, and hope by nurturing friendship and love for one another, through cultivating discipline in our lives as the followers of Christ, and by engaging in critical self-reflection. In so doing, we are to build up students who are not only high achievers in the classroom, but also servant leaders who possess moral and spiritual character readily serving God and ministering to people in churches, organizations, and in society. In other words, while we do not only pursue excellence in our teaching and research, we are intentional in our efforts to emphasize spiritual formation, pastoral skill-learning, and social engagement of the students. The Seminary must equip servant leaders who are committed to the mission of the Gospel, characterized by spiritual and moral strengths, and be able to exercise critical thinking and effective leadership.

Today what we envision is an achievable endeavor that we will bring to realization; it is not an impossible task for which we dream. Because we believe in the grace of Christ that God wills to open the future for us; because we believe in the power of the Gospel of Christ; because we believe in the guidance of Scripture we teachers and administrators stand firm on the testimony of Scripture, we stand on our Baptist forefathers’ belief in sola scriptura, and we cultivate in church leaders a sense of responsible scriptural reasoning. Because we believe in the guidance of the Holy Spirit, we will cultivate the soil of life with the mind of Christ; and we believe those who sow in tears will reap with songs of joy. Because we believe in prayer, we believe that when all of our teachers, students, and staff pray on our knees God will bless us for our strenuous efforts to please God, have mercy on our weakness, grant us forgiveness for our transgressions, and continue to lead us forward with hope. Because we believe that you are “co-walkers” with us, your prayers, encouragement, and financial support from the Church and fellow Christian brothers and sisters, we will experience the might and richness of God with you and we shall co-labor in the equipping of the faithful servant leaders of God.

I believe the morning sun is dawning on us so that the Seminary will move forward, because of the labor of our forefathers, because you walk with us, and because God has given us the mission and honor of shaping servant leaders of a new generation. May glory be to the only one true God. Amen.

Jan 2009