HKBTS and the President’s Council

First established in the 1980s, the President’s Council of the Hong Kong Baptist Theological Seminary (HKBTS) was less active then and the council members met less frequently. It was not until 2009 when I started to convene members of the Council for regular meetings each year that the situation began to improve. I am glad to see the team beginning to gel and functioning well over the past ten years. Now passionate discussions frequently occur in meetings and our council members are enthusiastic in contributing ideas generously as we all bond and grow closer together.

Mentors Who Enlighten Me

Essentially, I am a pastor and a scholar, and there are still many areas in which I am unenlightened. Council members have become my mentors in enlightening me with their expertise. I have been free to show my “ignorance” in front of them at each annual gathering, and discuss with them any experimental concepts I have come up with. The Council consists of elites from different industries, such as banking, finance, insurance, marketing, architecture, trading, education and other professional fields. With no fear of being mocked and losing face, I wish to use my ignorance to facilitate our council members in exchanging their professional views and experience, hoping to compensate for my inadequacy. It has been truly enjoyable to listen to their stories and perspectives and to learn from their experiences.

In fact, their life experiences have impacted me throughout the past ten years. The bits and pieces that I have gained from listening, however insignificant they may appear to be, have widened my horizons, enriched my life, and built up my experiences, which in turn can be transformed and utilized to pastor the church and advance the development of the seminary.

Friends in Fellowship

There are also times I met with individual members of the Council. Not only do we further our discussions from the meetings, exchanging views so as to better understand each other on certain issues, but we are also connect through fellowship as brothers and sistersin Christ. We share our joys in serving the Lord and delight in the bonds we have in Christ.

A Two-way Learning Experience

The growing bonds among us in the past few years have also reinforced our mutual trust as our council membersare more willing to boldly share their thoughts and burdens with each other. This, of course, puts me in the position where I can be more than a listener; I can also give suggestions on how to pastor the church and to lend them my full support.

Hence, I am not a mere learner among them, but I have also become increasingly an educator, offering them my knowledge in theological education. As exceptional as they are in their workplace and as leaders in the church, theological education is,however, not a field the council members would normally be masters within. My role, therefore, is to share with them my own vision in theological education, any relevant stories that are known to me, as well as my first-hand experience, so as to ensure our council members are well-informed and hence are able to offer more pertinent ideas. On the other hand, the experiences of the council members from both workplace and the church that I learn from them help me shape my “church theology”to be more relevant and applicable to the church. I am therefore eager to share with my fellow council members more of the theological perspective which I have been reflecting on. Hence, we learn from each other in various aspects. Of course, what we are to learn in our ministry in the Council is ultimately who the Lord we are serving is. This is our most important life-long learning.

The Campus Extension Project and the Council Members

The Extension Project of the Sai O Campus (Phase 3) has been incubated for 10 years, and its groundbreaking ceremony finally took place on May 23. Let me recount some of the episodes involved, in which the roles of the council members are not to be missed.

When I first took office as president, an enthusiastic council member offered to make a donation of $7.8 million to the seminary for the construction of a new building. The name “Faith, Hope, and Love Project” was already on my mind then. However, was it an appropriate time for campus extension while the seminary was in the darkest valley? Having consulted with the chairman and vice-chairman of the Board of Trustees, I found that the timing was apparently not fit to initiate an extension project. The seminary was at a significant turning point in its history. No one knew whether it would be reviving after having been ruined, or if things would go further downhill. No one knew except God. So I expressed my appreciation and concerns to this council member through a deacon at her church: “Regarding the donation, not for now. May the Lord lead us. We will expand our ‘hardware’ some day when our ministry starts blooming and when we know it is the will of God. And shall that day arrive, we will rejoice and be joyful and glad in the campus extension.”

The good intent of this council member and her family was an encouragement to the seminary anyhow, reassuring us that the seminary belongs to the church, and belongs to God. He, who sends us both sunshine and rain, provides sufficiently. What we, as workers with God, are to do is to respond faithfully. Thereafter, I focused my efforts on fosteringspirituality among us in the seminary and enhancing the strength of our teaching and researchcapacity.

During this time, suchterms as hospitality, theologia, synergy, discipleship, integral mission, solidarity, and koinonia became our common language. The “software” of our “Faith, Hope, and Love Project” and the blueprint of its content gradually took shape as time went on.

In the Thanksgiving Service, held on February 20, 2011, celebrating the diamond jubilee (60th anniversary) of our seminary, I spoke of our vision for the “Faith, Hope, and Love Project” and its implementation in specific ministries such as: expanding our faculty team, developing our graduate studies program, reforming and developing the lay believers program, and exploring the possibility of setting up a Baptist Theological Research Centre, a Family Education Research Centre, a Social Research Centre and an Ethics Research Centre. Over the years, our teaching staff, students, publication, graduate studies programs, lay believers equipping programs, and distance education program have all witnessed significant progress in terms of quality and quantity. Our graduate studies programs and publication have seen exceptional achievements in particular. These achievements have made it essential for our seminary to move forward, and to further its development for churches in both Hong Kong and China. In view of the shortage of space to cope with our development, we put the campus extension project back into our agenda once again.

Spiritual Signs of Validation and the Council Members

Initially proposed by the president, the Campus Extension Project is now zealously supported by the Board of Directors and the President’s Council. I did step back and had doubts at one point, as a huge sum of money would be involved. But the Board of Directors and the President’s Council unanimously support this project. They believe it is a golden opportunity, and God will finish what He Himself starts.Thus, we all committed to this Campus Extension Project.

There are numerous spiritual signs testifying it is the will of Godsince the extension project was launched. One was the unity among the members of the Board of Directors, where disputes and debates on this issue never appear in our meetings. We all said “amen” after careful considerations and thoughtful prayers.

The “730 meetings” also serve as a sign of validation. It started at the beginning of the new school term in 2018, a time when my schedule was tightly packed with conferences and camp meetings. Meanwhile, the work of the Campus Environmental Consultation and Development Committee and the Building Committee was kicking off. To my surprise, the members of the committees, some of which are also our council members, showed their ungrudging support to attend the meetings at 7:30 am. The meetings are always held in a pleasing atmosphere. One of the committee members once told me, “We are here for a morning worship and fellowship at the seminary!” Our meetings are full of energy and joy, and more like “morning tea time” with old friends. We still continue to gather at 7:30am up till now. These elites from the architectural and engineering fields and of the church, value others above themselves in humility, and humbly listen to each other. The way they prioritize the benefits of the church and of the seminary touches my heart. Some may say, “This is the ideal of Baptist faith in practice,” but I also see among us a fellowship with a deep and strong spiritual bond.

The maturation of the President’s Council may serve as well as a sign of validation. The President’s Council spent five hours discussing and exchanging ideas in a meeting held on April13. In fact, in an annual gathering several years ago,our council members advocated us to boldly take a step further in the Campus Extension Project. The preliminary proposal was to build a three-story academic building with a gross floor area of 10,000 square feet on the Sai O Campus so as to strengthen the seminary’s education and research capacity, but the Council prompted the seminary to go further and look into the space usage planning and the complete renovation of the existing campus.

With these spiritual signs, I am convinced that the Lord has been leading us through the whole Campus Extension Project. We offer our thanks and praise to the Lord for all His blessings.

Self-offering to the Lord

The seminary has been maturing in various aspects, though its word-of-mouth reputation has yet to be solidly established. Those dark days have made a deep and far-reaching impact, and outsiders might have wondered how we would ever get back on track. In recent years,the President’s Council has been striving to establish theword-of-mouthreputation and the witness of the seminary, in the hope that the seminarymay benefit the church more. They generously offered their advice and opinions on the different issues concerning the seminary such as our website, image, financial management, and campus extension. This year,we discussed how the seminary constructs a theology so as to help the church respond to society.And our council members are willing to offer helpand support, and even to take the role of initiator.

Ten year ago, I said that our faculty is the engine that pushes the seminary forward. Now, the seminary also have our auxiliary engines, one of which is the President’s Council. Every time a council meeting is held, my heart is filled with joy and excitement, and my mind is stimulated. The council members are not bound by the walls of the meeting room, as they continue to contribute their ideas and advice to me through phone messages and letters after the meetings.

How blessed is HKBTS to be endowed with such a dedicated team of council members in expanding the ministry of God!

Aug 2019