New missional opportunities in theological education

One of the more exciting recent developments in Christendom is the radically changing nature of ministry training. Education in general is being severely tested in our rapidly shifting culture, and seminary education is not immune to those pressures. Consequently, we’re seeing some interesting experiments on the landscape.

I was fortunate to be part of one of those experiments. Many of you know I just finished an MA in Global Leadership from Fuller Theological Seminary. Rather than train college graduates how to be professional ministers in Christendom churches, the MAGL was designed to equip ministers from all over the world to be missionaries in their own context, and to shift the locus of learning from the teachers to the students by grouping experienced and highly diverse students together in small learning communities called cohorts. It was an amazing experience that deeply affected my perspective on the Kingdom and on culture. I would highly recommend it to anyone looking for a ministry education that challenges the status quo.

Since the MAGL started about 10 years ago other schools and programs have followed suit, developing their own highly unique approach to missiological training programs for ministry in the 21st century.

One of the latest programs to enter the fray is the Doctor of Ministry in Missional Leadership from Northern Seminary in the Chicagoland area. My good friend, and fellow Fuller alum, JR Rozko has been working with some amazing missional thinkers and scholars like David Fitch, Alan Roxburgh, and Craign Van Gelder to put together an exciting new program of missional training that not only unique in content and format, but relatively affordable as well.

Things are changing fast. If you’re a minister looking to be further equipped at the graduate level for leadership in a post-Christian and post-Secular Western world, consider checking these programs out. You won’t be sorry.

Technorati Tags: David Fitch, Fuller Seminary, JR Rozko, Northern Seminary

3 Questions About Jesus: JR Rozko

JR Rozko approached our 3 Questions About Jesus as though it were an email from a  friend, asking: Who is Jesus the Christ? What has he done? And why does it matter? (Previous installments: Jason Coker | Jesse Schroeder | Cari Jenkins | Jason Clark | Ben Sternke)
________________________________________________________________

Dear Friend,

What matters most to you?  No matter how you answer that question, I’d venture to guess that it relates to what it means to live a life of significance.  I mean, regardless of whether we think that some higher being exists or not, the mere fact that we exist compels us to wonder what life is all about – it’s really the most fundamental of life’s questions right?

The basic Christian answer to this question regarding the purpose of life is that we have been created by a God who made the world and everything in it and desires to be in relationship with us.  As I’m sure you’d agree, our world is far from perfect.  I wonder what you might name as its fundamental problems and where you think they came from?  Christians would say that all the pain and suffering in the world stems from the fact that this relationship we were created to have with God has been broken by our prideful attempts to try and be God as opposed to be in relationship with God.

This is where Jesus comes into the picture.  Jesus is both our chief example of what it means to live in relationship with God as well as the one who has restored our ability to even have that relationship.  Jesus fed the hungry, restored sight to the blind, and made crippled people walk.  He did all this to exhibit God’s desire to make all things new.  The pinnacle of this mission came by way of his death and resurrection.  He was killed because he suggested that God was ultimately in charge of the course of history and not us.  A few days after the ruling powers hung him on a cross, God triumphantly raised him from the dead.

I realize this might be difficult to believe.  It is – and it should be.  I wonder if you can pinpoint any beliefs you hold that might be difficult for someone else to believe?  I bet you can.  That’s because believing is always a matter of experience and relationship.  One never really comes to believe in God, the resurrection, or the ongoing work of God in the world until they experience it in the context of a true relationship.

Looking forward to more conversations.
__________________________________________________________________________

JR and his wife Amy live in Elgin, outside of Chicago.  JR works for Northern Seminary and Amy works for International Teams.  They are part of Life on the Vine, a missional community in the NW suburbs of Chicago.  JR blogs at lifeasmission.com.

Technorati Tags: 3 Questions About Jesus, Jesus Christ, JR Rozko, searching

Pick My Spring Seminary Classes For Me

UPDATE #2: Sadly, while I was able to get into MC535, all the other classes were full. Some of you are thinking, “That’s what he gets for waiting until the last minute!” but believe it or not, I’ve always waited until the last minute and never had any trouble before. (Sigh.) So, my second class is now “CN568: Theological and Pastoral Perspectives on the Contemporary Family,” which I’m still excited about because the professors – John and Olive Drane – are stellar.

UPDATE #1: The people have spoken! According to your votes I will be taking “MC535: The Emerging Church in the Twenty-First Century” and “TH550: World Religions in Christian Perspective” (see vote totals below). Thank you for voting, classes start tomorrow!
______________________________________________________________

I need to take two Fuller Seminary courses this Spring and I’m having a hard time choosing. So, I thought, why not let my friends pick for me? You can skip to the poll below to choose two classes for me, or take a minute to read the course descriptions:

MC535: THE EMERGING CHURCH IN THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY
Identifies characteristics of churches in postmodern and post-Christian contexts. Examine and consider how these communities embody their faith and what value it has for the broader Church. Explore the dynamics of the sacred/secular split, forms of community, contextual forms of apologetics, hospitality, new forms of participation, creativity, leadership, and the spirituality of everyday life. Theologically, the class will explore how the reign of God might manifest in worship, in formation, and in witness in postmodern cultures.

• Upside: I already know a lot about this subject, it’s highly relevant to my mission, and it’s taught by a friend, JR Rozko.
• Downside: I already know a lot about the subject : )

TH550: WORLD RELIGIONS IN CHRISTIAN PERSPECTIVE
The purpose of this course is twofold. First it will provide an overview of the world’s major religions–Hinduism, Islam, Buddhism, and Sikhism–focusing on their emergence and history, core beliefs and practices, religious texts and interpretations, as well as contemporary influence and expressions. Second, this course introduces various approaches on how Christianity relates to other religions and religious pluralisms, technically known as the “theology of religions.” We will critically discuss Catholic and Protestant proposals and responses and attempt an outline of Evangelical approach. Case studies will be conducted regarding Islam-, Hindu-, Buddhist-, and Sikh-Christian encounters.

• Upside: New material for me, plus living in SoCal, this should be highly relevant : )
• Downside: I don’t know what to expect from a Veli-Matti Kärkkäinen class.

OT502: THE HEBREW PROPHETS
The course studies the contents of the Former Prophets (Joshua to Kings) and the Latter Prophets (Isaiah to Malachi), their possible historical backgrounds, different approaches to their interpretation, and their significance for us today.

• Upside: I’m really into the OT lately, and it’s taught by Fuller legend John Goldingay, whose Writings course I very much enjoyed.
• Downside: I’ve had plenty of OT and NT classes in my life. At this stage of my education it’s nice to take more specialized courses, like…

TC530: THEOLOGY AND FILM
This course will consider a theology of culture by focusing on one particular aspect: theology and film. The course will (1) view, discuss and analyze a multicultural and global selection of films, (2) provide the student methodological and critical perspectives for engaging culture, both from the humanities and the social sciences, and (3) explore theological and biblical perspectives foundational to theology and film criticism.

• Upside: This fits the “Theology and Culture” focus of my degree perfectly, and I very much enjoyed the Theology and Contemporary Literature course taught by the same professor, Rob Johnston.
• Downside: I’ve already taken a film course (Engaging Independent Film), and this would probably be somewhat redundant, as that course drew heavily on Johnston’s work.

So, those are your (my) choices. Please pick two in the poll below before Sunday afternoon:

[polldaddy poll=2966189]

Technorati Tags: Culture, Emerging Church, Film, Fuller Seminary, John Goldingay, JR Rozko, Old Testament, Rob Johnston, School, Theology, Veli-Matti Kärkkäinen

The Marriage of Jesus and Jane Vella

I’ve recently joined a dialog with some other San Diego folks on the topic of leadership training. The common concern seems to be the development of a grassroots, trans-denominational, and locally generative alternative to traditional seminary. Recently Jason Evans introduced the work of Jane Vella as a catalyst, so today I want to briefly engage with how her work might be relevant to this topic by comparing it to Jesus’ leadership training methods and ask for your input.

(For an excellent orientation to this topic I’ll simply refer you to JR Rozko’s series, “Toward a Missional Vision of Theological Education,” Parts One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, Eight, and Nine. If you’re interested in this subject, it’s a must read.)

Jane Vella is one of the leading figures in the field of adult education. In Learning to Listen, Learning to Teach she reviews twelve principles for adult learning and demonstrates their effectiveness through short case stories. Essentially, Vella asserts that adults learn best when immersed in a learning environment that models equality, demonstrates relevance, and provides opportunity for hands-on discovery. I think there are some important and obvious ways the twelve principles converge with Jesus’ practices:

• Needs Assessment: A posture of “sympathetic listening” whereby the teachers meet the learners “where they are.” Teachers must learn student’s needs before knowing what and how to teach. The incarnation of Christ is the greatest example of sympathetic listening in human history.
• Safety: Adults learn best in an environment of grace. Jesus formed an environment of safety by assembled his community of disciples, going so far as to redefine their familial loyalties to himself, God, and one-another.
• Sound Relationships: Teachers and learners are committed to acting on each others behalf. Jesus included his disciples in almost everything he did, ministry, friendship, eating, sleeping, traveling, etc. His process was essentially deeply relational.
• Sequence and Reinforcement: Deliberately building chains of mastery. The Sermon on the Mount is sequenced from the simplest, basest human issues to the most complex relationships and struggles. Each teaching point (i.e. “blessing those who curse you”) depends critically upon and reinforces previous lessons learned (i.e. “letting go of anger”).
• Praxis: A learning feedback loop of action and reflection. Adult learners require concrete application not merely intellectual abstraction. The disciples were involved in ministry tasks from the beginning, starting with the simple and moving to the more complex.
• Respect for Learners as Decision Makers: Adults are decision-makers who need to determine their own learning path. By teaching in parables Jesus was providing open-ended stories and questions for his hearers to engage with, even honoring their choice at times to stubbornly misunderstand.
• Ideas, feelings, and actions: Adult learning must include the affective realm as a means of natural reinforcement. With Christ, the process of discipleship was hands-on and often involved powerful emotions, provoking ideas, and real-life situations.
• Immediacy: Adults need immediate relevance in learning. Jesus’ disciples they knew they were getting into something that had immediate, even urgent importance. As N.T. Wright has shown, to be a follower of Christ meant you were engaged with the most pressing matters of political life in first-century Palestine.
• Clear roles and role development: It’s important for adult learners to understand everyone’s role, especially their own. Jesus utilized the clear roles of rabbi and disciple that were inherent in ancient Jewish culture, and then redefined their roles at the end of his ministry, saying they were now his “friends.”
• Teamwork and small groups: Adult learning works best in a plurality of people focused on a unified lesson or task. Jesus sent out his disciples in teams to do their work. There were no isolated learners in Jesus’ community.
• Engagement: Adults need learning to be immediately hands-on. Jesus’ classroom was his ministry mission. He didn’t train his followers first, and then begin his mission; they were learning while doing in the midst of a lab environment.
• Accountability: Adult learning is reinforced by the support and positive pressure of peer expectations and feedback. The intimate relationships among Jesus and his disciples provided a natural setting for mutual accountability.

I’m struck by how transferable the ideas of Vella and the practices of Jesus are to our current cultural climate. The twelve principles of dialogue education seem to mirror many of the value shifts occurring in the emerging post-Christian era:

• Rejection of hierarchy/embrace of equality: Hierarchy communicates dominance and supremacy to emerging generations; open dialogue emphasizes the equality of teacher/learner, and learner/learner relationships.
• Rejection of mechanistic/embrace of organic: In light of the conspicuous failure of some Modern systems, emerging people pessimistically reject strict cause-and-effect thinking. Dialogue education allows for an organic apprehension of learning.
• Rejection of monologue/embrace of dialogue: The dominance of one voice can communicate supremacy and simple-mindedness. Dialogue allows complexity.
• Rejection of certainty/embrace of uncertainty: Again, certainty communicates arrogance, a posture that post-moderns often mistrust. Uncertainty, however, communicates humility and the self-confidence to be authentic.
• Rejection of monism/embrace of pluralism: In an increasingly pluralistic world, dialogue embraces the truths that everyone brings to the table. This is a far reaching subject that not only impacts the way we interact with learners, but shapes how we interact as the church with the world becoming learners ourselves.

Some Questions for Consideration: How are these similar to current models of ministry leadership training? How are they different? How could these be used to create a discipleship and leadership training approach both effective and accessible to anyone? What are opportunities and pitfalls?

Technorati Tags: Education, Jane Vella, Jason Evans, Jesus, JR Rozko, Misisonal Leadership Training, Seminary

Weekly Link Round Up

My favorite posts from around the interwebs this week:

• Darryl Dash confesses to flunking Kingdom Economics. Nice job Darryl.
• My new Vineyard friend Ray Hollenbach asks, Is Obedience Possible?
• The digital Jason Evans practices walking as a spiritual discipline. Sounds like a Phil Dick novel to me.
• In the wake recent proclamations of the death of the Emerging Church, of Jamie Arpin-Ricci posts some very helpful thoughts as usual.
• On to the latest Missonal uproar. Bill Kinnon fired a beautifully snarky shot, Dan MacDonald claims Mercy = Missional and Vice Versa (and I largely agree), and Rick Meigs provides a nice running catalog of several good responses.
• JR Rozko stays out of it so far, be he did post an excellent piece on how existing traditional churches can become missional. A hugely important topic.
• On to a couple fantastic stories in a local rag, the San Diego City Beat: First, The $140 Million Foreskin and the (ahem) short follow up piece.
• Finally, a couple of excellent religion-related articles from Io9: First, the delicious little piece, Is Vat Grown Meat Kosher? and second, Digital Maps Reveal Hidden Geographies of Sex and Religion. Oh yes, you read that right.

Technorati Tags: Bill Kinnon, Dan MacDonald, Darryl Dash, I09, Jamie Arpin-Ricc, Jason Evans, JR Rozko, Links, Ray Hollenbach, Rick Meigs, San Diego City Beat

Top Five Posts From 2009 That Weren't Mine

I started this blog in June of 2009 mostly as a way to connect with people in our fledgling faith community. After that project began to take on its own life (and spawn its own website), Pastoralia emerged to become a space for writing about my thoughts and experiences as a leader exploring the intersections of faith and culture.

I have enjoyed writing here so much I’ve decided to devote more time to it from now on. Consequently, Pastoralia will undergo some significant changes in the coming weeks, but in the meantime, here are a few of my favorites posts of 2009 from around the Christian blog-world (don’t worry, this’ll be quick): Continue reading…

Technorati Tags: Bill Kinnon, David Fitch, Jamie Arpin-Ricci, JR Rozko, Michael Spencer