The Synergy of Our Faculty Team

Ever since assuming my presidency, I regularly give a “housekeeping” report in the morning chapel to share the current situation of the Seminary. Once I said I had five things to report that day. Unfortunately, I went back and forth, turning ideas over and over again in my mind, I still could not recall one particular item and had to leave it unreported. Later, in the classroom, some students asked me, “President, is there still one more item you have wanted to tell us?” I answered, “Uh, right, I recall what it is now. I wanted to say: Our teachers are not bad.” The students instantly corrected me by saying, “President, you are wrong and that is why the Holy Spirit stopped you. Our teachers are in fact very good!”

As a matter of fact, our teachers are very good! By being “good,” I mean our teachers are willing to work hard together and God cheers us on by enabling us to pull together and exhibit a team spirit. This incident took me back to June 2008 when we had our faculty retreat in Guang Zhou. The theme of that retreat was “Teamwork.” In the retreat, I asked each of our teachers to share thoughts about their teaching and the areas, merits and strengths of their research study. I immediately put together a profile of each of our teachers’ expertise and areas of research. To my amazement, a beautiful picture of a team emerged. It was God who had painted a picture blueprint and then put each of us — being in relatively the same age range, young and energetic, with different expertise — in different positions so that we could complement and balance out one another in a concerted effort to foster the growth of the Seminary. In the last thirty minutes I solemnly said, “Despite how well we have spoken, how well we have planned and thought, and how well we have put everything together, if there is no mutual trust, what has been said in these two days will all be empty talk and practically useless.”

One year later, in June 2009 we came together again for another Faculty Retreat. This time I shared the three-year plan for the Seminary with our teachers and concretely thought over again how the faculty team could complement one another. We came to this consensus: “Besides his/her major area of expertise, each of our teachers needs to have a minor interdisciplinary area of study.” It is our hope that each of us not only has a specific contribution to make in a special area of study but should also expand into areas beyond our individual expertise, enabling us to advance toward more creative, interdisciplinary study and dialogue.

In August 2009, God led us to take a major step to make our vision a reality. God also led Dr. Alexander Mak, Dr. Tony Sher and Dr. Sam Tsang to join our faculty team, bringing us the dynamism and vigor to construct a practical theology as well as to deepen our theological wisdom.

In December of the same year, I paid a visit to each of the teachers’ offices to chat with them and reaffirm their research commitments as well as their keen interests for the church and society. As they shared, I was greatly surprised as they all reaffirmed that synergy picture that we had painted together at the 2008 Faculty Retreat. I felt happy that God had already prepared us to complement one another making interdisciplinary studies possible. At the same time, we had also learnt to take seriously both the needs of the church and those of society. Such faculty teamwork is what I have always looked forward to forming. Not only does such teamwork help us avoid the fragmentation often found in modern theological education, but more importantly, this teamwork synergy can generate the power needed to drive HKBTS forward while meeting the ever changing needs of the church and society.

Then, what will the synergy of the HKBTS faculty team be like? From my conversation with each faculty member, I came up with the following jigsaw puzzle:

 

• Among our Biblical Studies teachers, there are three in New Testament and two in Old Testament. Our N.T. teachers are experts in N.T. Narrative Studies, Pauline Studies and N.T. Greek. Beyond their specialties, they also do research in the interdisciplinary studies of pastoral care, counseling, and the dialogue between the church and culture. This includes dealing with the relationship between politics and religion, for example, “How do Christians deal with the Judaistic heritage?” Our O.T. teachers mainly focus on the study of the Pentateuch, the Historical Books, Psalms and Writings, and Prophetic Literature. At the same time, they are also interested in interdisciplinary studies in areas of ethics, leadership, Bible translation, and Bible teaching as related to the pastoral ministry.

Wong Fook Kong (Old Testament)
Major:	Pentateuch, Rabbinic Hermeneutics, the study of metaphors in the Psalms
Minor:	Ethics, Leadership
How to face the needs of the church and society：A concern for how the Bible speaks to economics issues; biblical perspectives on leadership
Tony Sher (Old Testament)
Major:	The Historical Books
Minor:	Constructing an Old Testament Theology or Biblical Theology from a study of the Bible
How to face the needs of the church and society：A concern for Bible teaching in pastoral ministry, an ongoing effort in biblical translation seeking to contribute to better Chinese translation of the Bible
Sam Tsang (New Testament)
Major:	New Testament Narratology, New Perspective on Paul
Minor:	Homiletics
How to face the needs of the church and society：A concern for the interaction between society and church culture; an interaction with post-modernism
Clement Shum (New Testament)
Major:	Pauline Studies, the Four Gospels
Minor:	The Prophetic Books, the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Septuagint
How to face the needs of the church and society：A concern for how the church should respond to government policies; how Christians should participate in politics
Alexander Mak (New Testament)
Major:	Paul’s Pastoral Epistles, the pastoral perspective of the Gospel of John
Minor:	Spiritual Theology, the biblical perspective of pastoral counseling
How to face the needs of the church and society：Involvement in helping the poverty-stricken and minority communities; paying special attention to the spirituality of ministers; involvement in pastoral counseling in the church, for example, in regard to divorce, extramarital affairs, suicide and self-esteem

 

• As for teachers in Christian Thought, we have experts in systematic theology, theology and culture, theology and philosophy, and church history. Our teachers also do crossover studies in ethics, biblical studies, spiritual theology and leadership.
  
  

Joshua Cho (Systematic Theology)
Major:	Systematic Theology
Minor:	Ethics, Spiritual Theology, Leadership
How to face the needs of the church and society：A concern for the construction of a theology and spiritual ethos in Baptist Churches; conservation of our environment
Andres Tang (Theology and Culture)
Major:	Doctrinal Theology, Contemporary Theology (Moltmann, Bonhoeffer, Gunton), Cultural Hermeneutics (Western Philosophy; Eastern Philosophy; Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism; Mou Zongsan)
Minor:	Worship Study, Spiritual Theology
How to face the needs of the church and society：A concern for the secularization of the Christian church; the reactionary formation of the church against the capitalist society; a construction of the church culture
Lindsay Robertson (Theology and Philosophy)
Major:	Systematic Theology
Minor:	Biblical Theology
How to face the needs of the church and society：A concern for the homiletic ministry of the church
Nathan Ng (Church History)
Major:	Church History (Early Church History, History of the Middle Ages, Reformation), Hong Kong Church History
Minor:	Chinese Church History, Apologetics, Biblical Studies
How to face the needs of the church and society：A concern for the family, marriage and sex education; issues of social ethics, for example, economics and politics

 

• As for our teachers in practical theology, we have four experts who are dedicated to the study of Christian ethics, pastoral theology, missions and world religion and homiletics. Amongst them, the Christian ethics teacher is interested in doing an interdisciplinary study in Baptist History and Faith, and eco-theology; the teacher in pastoral theology is also engaged in religious education and family worship; the teacher in missions and world religions is also involved in theology study; the teacher in homiletics also sets foot into the study of leadership, spiritual theology and mentoring.
  
  

Vincent Lau (Christian Ethics)
Major:	Christian Ethics, especially Yoderian ethics
Minor:	Baptist History and Faith
How to face the needs of the church and society：A concern for discipleship training; church and state relations; eco-theology
Desmond Choi (Pastoral Theology)
Major:	Pastoral Theology, Pastoral Care and Counseling
Minor:	Leadership, Ethics, Religious Education
How to face the needs of the church and society：A concern for minority communities; paying attention to family education; research on the churches’ and Hong Kong’s elderly ministry
Eric Kwong (World Religion)
Major:	World Religion, Folk Religion, Evangelism
Minor:	Theology
How to face the needs of the church and society：A theological reflection on the missions ministry; cross-cultural missions; construction of evangelistic strategies to different communities
Brian Lam (Homiletics)
Major:	Homiletics
Minor:	Leadership, Spiritual Theology, Life Mentoring
How to face the needs of the church and society： A concern for the ethical practice in the marketplace, especially the role of small- and mid-sized businesses in the commercial society

 

• Lastly, as for religious education and church music, we have experts in children’s education, the design and methods of evaluation in education, and hymnody respectively. They do interdisciplinary study on social ministry, developmental psychology, theories of intelligence, the study of worship and spiritual theology.
  
  

Grace Lo (Religious Education)
Major:	Children Education
Minor:	Social Ministry
How to face the needs of the church and society：Involvement in church administration by being a church deacon
Celia Juergens (Religious Education)
Major:	Educational evaluation methods and the design of evaluation tools
Minor:	Developmental Psychology and its applications on intelligence (quotient, emotional quotient, spiritual quotient, adversity quotient)
How to face the needs of the church and society：Organizing educational services for the orphan and the poverty-stricken
Helen Wan (Church Music)
Major:	Church Music, Congregational Hymns, Hymnody, Acoustics
Minor:	The Study of Worship; Spiritual Theology
How to face the needs of the church and society：Involvement in church music training and missions

In these frank dialogues and interactions, I have profoundly experienced the crucial importance of the synergy of teamwork. The faculty team is the engine and the driving force of the seminary. The character, spirituality, vision and competence of our teachers are decisive for whether or not the seminary is excellent, whether it can serve the church heartily and forcefully and whether it can face up to meet the needs of the society as her conscience.

Unknowingly, I have been the Seminary’s president for one year. I still remember a year ago I drafted a strategic plan for the Seminary in which there was a major core concept: The synergy of all fellow workers. At that time, I envisioned the synergy of the faculty team; the synergy of our staff; the synergy of individual departments; the synergy of the administrative affairs office and the academic affairs office; the synergy of the administrative affairs office, the academic affairs office and the faculty; the synergy of staff, teachers, administrative leaders and the Board of Trustees. I am truly convinced this: Only if there is a good synergy among ourselves can the Seminary move forward! On the contrary, if there is no synergy among the various parts, the engine can provide neither the synergy function nor the forward driving force.

In the past, I had the privilege of bearing the responsibility both as a leader and a servant. Sitting at the front of the HKBTS train, I have witnessed in close range how God has led us to move on joyfully. Sitting on the front seat of the train, I keep thinking for the sake of the Seminary, reading and doing research study for her sake, praying for her sake, working for the sake of this family of God, taking the leading role for the sake of our fellow-workers, watching over this piece of land for its sake, and bearing the deputy responsibility for the sake of God’s appointment. Right now (from June 2008 to the present), God has begun to build up our faculty team so that we can display our synergy as the important engine to foster the growth and advancement of the Seminary. Sitting at the front of the train, I know that those behind me also keep thinking for the sake of HKBTS, reading and doing research study for her sake, praying for her sake, working for this family of God, taking the leading role together for the sake of our fellow workers, watching over this piece of land together for its sake, bearing the deputy responsibility each in our role as we work together for the sake of God’s appointment.

Such a seminary team will grow and mature. Such a seminary team will develop true piety and reflect God’s power of transformation. I pray that God will let this spiritual growth and maturity of the Seminary be the mark of the whole community. I pray too that each individual member in this community will grow and mature together, “attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ” (Ephesians 4:13).

Jan 2010