Reflections of a Fresh Seminary Graduate - Benjamin Lau

Psalm 37:4 "Delight yourself in the LORD, and he will give you the desires of your heart."

Pre-amble 

Stepping into Trinity Theological College (TTC) on 1 July 2013, has been a desire that God have placed in my heart for a very long time. My faith adventure with the Lord began more than 11 years ago, when God transformed me as a young 16 year old. I still remember vividly the scene as I surrendered my life and future to God, responding to an altar call at a youth camp on 9 December 2005. God eventually called me into full-time ‘vocational’ Christian ministry work few years later on 7 October 2008 at a Cru (formerly known as Singapore Campus Crusade for Christ) World-Wide day of prayer meeting. Few months later, after much discernment and wrestling with God, I finally responded to that call on 17 Jan 2009 at the “Fellowship of the Burning Hearts” retreat also under Cru Singapore. Couple years later in 2011, after serving my national service, the doors opened for me to serve full-time as a youth worker in Wesley where I continued to serve there for another 2 years before finally applying for further theological studies at TTC.


Each of us come with a certain pre-notion of theological thought, from our family upbringing, our churches, our denomination or a certain theological college we graduate from. As what Hans Georg Gadamer’s shared in his approached to hermeneutics, "All of us come to a text with our own 'horizon of understanding': Based on our own assumptions, bias and questions, our “horizon” influences the way we interpret the text—but it is in turn reshaped by the “horizon” of the text."[1] 

With that said, I will be sharing my personal reflection from someone who grew up in a Christian family, spend his whole life in a Methodist church, was serving in an inter-denomination para-church during his student days and now is a fresh graduate from TTC. I hope this post would encourage you in someway or another. You might be someone who is contemplating full-time vocational ministry work or formal theological studies, or perhaps you have been in ministry for a while, and this musing of mine reminds you of the calling that the Lord has ignited in your heart many years ago, or if you are a reader who just so happen to stumble upon this post because of a friend you know who have been tagged and it has evoke some questions to your mind, feel free to message me and I am more than happy to address your questions or comments. 

Introduction 

I entered seminary life with much enthusiasm and zeal, yet with some apprehension from horror stories that I have heard of people who had their faith challenged or their devotional life being affected. However, despite those mixed feelings, I felt grateful each day to have these 3 years to immerse myself in the academic rigour of full-time theological studies. And now having just graduated, I can say that those horror stories of theological studies were not as bad as it appeared to be. 

Most seminary students will probably wrestle with the many theological debates, for example, if we are to understand the book of Jonah as a fictional story or a historical account, wrestle with questions of predestination and free-will, if the earth was created in 6 literal days or are we to understand it figuratively. Even just hearing these questions may evoke people outside the college to think that we are some liberal college, but the fact is, wrestling with these debates actually challenged and grew my faith in God over the years. 

God taught me many precious lessons that were not even in my main core curriculum of my study. I will be honest that seminary life was not all a bed of roses, I have been broken, challenged, tested, disappointed, discouraged but besides the low periods, there were many highlights of good times and joys, fond memories with my classmates, family groups, hostel-mates, soccer mates, captain ball mates, which led me to form many life-long spiritual friendships with so many to-be pastors, missionaries and Christian workers, from different denomination, and churches in Singapore and other parts of the world. 

People will expect that now that we have graduated from theological studies, we can answer all those tough theological questions about life and theodicy (The answer to why God allows suffering). However, I am sad to disappoint them that I still struggle giving a satisfactory response. One may have heard this before that theological studies tend to leave one with more questions, and I can affirm with them, that that is very true for me as well as many of my classmates. Having said that, I am thankful for these questions as they have kept me humble and reminded me that I have to be constantly dependent on God for His wisdom. If there were one thing that theological studies have impacted me, I would say that it has compelled me to be on this pursuit of discovering this God of mystery, to continue to develop a philosophy for ministry which I hope will aid me better to serve God’s people. However, as there are many lessons learnt in my time here, I will just highlight 3 key learning points using the acronym of T.T.C as markers for this reflection. 

1) Theological Framework for Ministry 

2) Theory of the “Dialectics” 

3) Catholicity of the Church (“Ecumenism") 

Reflections:

1) Theological Framework for Ministry
Firstly, I believe a “Theological framework for ministry” is very important. In fact, even before coming into TTC, I decided to draw up a mind-map of my previous theological framework of ministry. I was prepared for this mind-map to continue evolve and change over the years, and today I have summed it up with a framework of "Orthodoxy, Orthopraxis and Orthopathos” extracted from my pastoral theology term paper. In this “tri-perspective” framework, each aspect is just as important as another, as it helps one have a philosophy for ministry, this can also be term the “Mind, Hands and Heart” framework. 

a) Maintaining a Theological Mind (Orthodoxy) 

As we begin ministry, we need to ensure that we have a sound theological mind, this can be referred to the “Orthodoxy”, which is the “true belief or doctrine where it concerns the Christocentric beliefs and early church belief and tradition.”[2] A pastor should not just graduate from a seminary and leave his entire theological education in college. He should have an attitude of life-long learning where one will continuously be proactive in engaging theological books, theological seminars, and keep up to date with the developments of theology in the scholarly circle even how busy he is as a pastor in a church. 

Dr Simon Chan provides an appropriate illustration for this, as he parallels, “Dogma to a Spiritual Director” with “a map to a traveler”[3]. He explains that dogma or doctrines is like an important guide for the pastor to know and the congregation member need not know exactly how it works, thus the pastor needs to know his theology in order to guide his members in understanding them.[4] 

Such knowledge of Scripture sets the foundations for orthodoxy integrating it with the right understanding of church history and traditions so that one can respond to the day-to-day issues that pastors face in ministry. Having a good theological framework and coherent picture of God allows one to have a well-balanced tension compared to swinging to either extremes from ‘knee-jerk’ reactions.[5] Willimon reminds us that, “we need a continuing critical assessment of our present needs” whichever denomination we are.[6] Each of us have our own presuppositions of how church should be run, but we also need to be constantly aware of the Spirit’s leadings, and this is where having such a theological mind allows us to discern and give a better assessment in dealing with issues like this. 

Tidball explains that Pastoral theology is the dialectic tension of grappling between Christian doctrine and theology with the actual pastoral ministry experiences on the other.[7] At the end of the day, going back to my Methodist roots, I will use the “Wesleyan Quadrilateral” as my theological framework for pastoral consideration where Scripture is first the overarching authority integrating alongside Traditions, Reasons and Experience.[8] Oden echoes this framework of pastoral theology by asserting that, “Pastoral theology is attentive to that knowledge of God witnessed to in Scripture, mediated through tradition, reflected upon by systematic reasoning, and embodied in personal and social experience.”[9] 

b) Love in Action (Orthopraxis) 

The ‘orthopraxis’ or “Love in Action”, inspired from a title of a book of a collation of essays of Christian/Pastoral ministry.[10] A responsible minister is a shepherd to his sheep, one who is intentional in loving his sheep by caring, serving and feeding them. Oden describes such pastoral care that is holistic which involves, “human caring- physical (temporal), moral (volitional), and spiritual (eternal caring)- are best seen creative tension with each other in pastoral care.”[11] 

This act of loving and serving is well summarize by Derwin Gray who categorize three essential practices of a Pastor, “Practice the Presence of People”, “Practice Being a Servant” and “Practice the Presence of Christ”.[12] He expounded that Pastors should treat every person whom they interact with in light of Jesus redemption for their lives who are made in God’s image.[13] Ajith Fernando further adds to this point, that at the end of the day pastors are “servants of the people” who should be there for those who are in need, praying and blessing them.[14]“ And of course the epitome of such a servant leader is Jesus, who is the perfect example who modeled leadership for us with “a basin and a towel.”[15] Pastors need to be aware that with recognition from leading from the top, we forget that Jesus humbled himself by leading from below and taught us how we should have such a practice of loving and serving others in our life and ministry. 

c) Calling and Spiritual formation (Orthopathos) 

Lastly, one of my biggest take away in TTC is having my calling affirmed and being challenged to grow in Spiritual formation. I will classify this as “Orthopathos” which is described as a committed deeply felt response of the heart to Gods truth.[16] Samuel Solivan explains that ‘orthopathos’ builds a bridge between ‘orthodoxy’ and ‘orthopraxis’, it maintains the aspect of Loving God and Loving People, holding the relationship of the heart, mind and will.[17] 

I agree with Willimon here that such a vocational call has an outward and inward affirmation by God and His people, which validates the call of a Pastor.[18] Prime would argue that the call to shepherd God’s people is a “special calling because of its strategic and unique importance for the spiritual well-being of Christ’s flock ” and one should avoid it if one is not called.[19] 

Willimon shares this deep insight, “The calling is worth doing because the Caller is so interesting. To have one’s life commandeered by a God name Trinity is great adventure for the called… It is God’s labour, not our own that sustain us.”[20] This reminds me of the deep calling in my life at that prayer meeting which I shared earlier, when God just implanted this clear vision unto my heart on 7 October 2008. That burden came with a mission, “to reach out to the World, by starting with equipping the people in the church to prepare them for outreach to the World.” 

Besides knowing the vocational call to be a pastor, I believe it is very important for a responsible pastor to grow in Spiritual formation. A pastor once shared with me that Spiritual formation is more of “an attitude of the heart” than what we do.[21] This lesson became especially real to me when I just took on, the Spiritual formation chairperson role in my first year in TTC. It was a tough lesson to go through, but it was an experience that has greatly shaped me today. As shared in my previous post, the Holy Spirit led me to this question, "What is the spiritual condition of my heart today?" [22] Knowing what “spiritual formation” intellectually in our mind is one thing, but having a fresh experience of such peace and joy of His love shredding upon your heart is another. That experience was not some very dramatic 'experiential' encounter of God, but it took a simple spiritual conversation with a friend that allowed me to have such a refreshing realization of God convicting me and shaping me to who I am today. 

Bishop Wee Boon Hup explains Spiritual formation as a process, it is responsive, is progressive, is transformative and it influences others to follow Christ.[23] This is so true, as the Apostles Paul has said, “Be Imitators of me, as I am of Christ”.[24] Keeping our Sabbath is also part of Spiritual formation, it is the intentional putting of a stop to one’s work and making that time to recalibrate and be spiritually recharged. One needs to be very careful not to serve on empty and this is where self-examination is very important for a pastor to be intentionally aware of God’s presence in his life. The early church father, Ignatius of Loyola shares this spiritual exercise of contemplation called the Prayer of Examen which brings one to look into the internal affections of ones heart, emotions and feelings and by examining the day in thought, word and deed.[25] At the end of the day for us to be effective and responsible to our congregation, there needs to be “personal intimacy and conversation with God”.[26]


Summary 

In summary, I hope that this Theological framework for Ministry would enable me to serve more effectively to God’s call for my life. Firstly, I hope to maintain a strong theological mind so that I can feed and protect the sheep that God has place in my path. Secondly, a servant-hood heart who practices serving his congregation, loving his family, being responsible for his own soul-care, and to disciple and equip his sheep. Thirdly, one who is assured of his calling and is intentional in growing in spiritual formation so he can be an effective and responsible minister. Affirming with what Edmund Chan shared once, “Ministry is the outflow of your life... take care of the depth of your life and let God take care of the breadth of your Ministry”.

2) Theory of the “Dialectics”

In our academic journey in theological studies one will also come to realize that there are so many theological arguments that appears to be paradoxical at times. In fact, it was such apparent paradoxes that compelled me on to be on this discovery of this God of mystery, and to wrestle them out at a theological college one day, and I can now say that I am thankful that I had these 3 wonderful years to experience that.


One of my lecturers, Dr Leow Theng Huat, wrote an article called “‘For Goodness’ Sake’: Some Observations on the Justification for Dialectics in Christian Theology”, where I have reference too for this segment. The term use of the “Dialectical Method” pretty much sums up much of my own personal resolve to this theological paradoxes. Dr Leow alluded to the writings from Roman Catholic theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar, he asserts: “Von Balthasar begins his exposition by pointing out that the term ‘dialectic’ contains two related meanings. There is, firstly, the meaning based on the preposition ‘dia’ in the sense of ‘against’: Dialectic is “a form of speaking that sets one work against another.” There is, secondly, the connotation of ‘dia’ as ‘through’. Dialectic can therefore also refer to the discovery of a way past the confrontation of two opposing sides. This kind of a “dynamic” dialect was utilised most famously by German philosopher G.W.F. Hegel.”[27]


I have come to learn that, we have to be open to various arguments, yet maintaining the theological integrity, and not to be susceptible to any teachings without a thorough and objective critical analysis of it. Having understood the polarized views, we are able to better grapple with such theological arguments, which usually ends up with a more nuance “Yes and No” answer. This however does not mean that God contradicts himself, rather dialectics is how God’s revelation is appeared to us, and not present in God himself.[28]


Von Balthasar ascertain this beautifully, “God’s Word meets a creature who has nothing to say about this event of revelation, not only because the creature has encountered God’s incomparability but because the creature’s active opposition to God has robbed it of all chance of responding to the divine Word with a word from its side that is even in the least appropriate.” [29] I affirm with Leow who argues that such dialectics helps one to facilitate our response of faith; in fact it is “the intellectual replica to the obedience of faith.”[30] At the end of the day, such dialectical methods should only be use as a last resort after wrestling with the polarized arguments and it in itself is a position such as how we view the Kingdom of God, which theologians have argued to be the “now-and-not-yet”.


3) Catholicity of the Church (“Ecumenism")

Lastly, “ecumenism” is a burden that God has laid upon my heart in the last few years. In fact, most of the people I know who have gone through formal education in TTC have been influence in someway or another by this ‘ecumenical spirit’. Ecumenical in this sense is one who advocates the catholicity of the church, where the word ‘catholic’ means "the universal church.” Such catholicity can be applied to the Protestants, the Roman Catholics and even the Orthodox churches, as long as we can agree on the foundational essential doctrines such as the view of the Trinity in the Nicene Creed (A.D. 325) and affirming that Jesus is fully God and fully man. We may differ on the peripherals of our practices but we can affirm each other on the essential doctrine of the faith. 

This burden in my heart actually started even before I entered TTC in 2012. I was attending a large conference, which invited international speakers from all over the world. Each speaker preached a sermon which came from a deep burden in their heart. After one of the session, I had this sudden thought and I began asking myself some questions, “What if, all of us has who worship the same God, has been used by Him differently through the burdens he place in our hearts? Some may be called to preach on “social justice”, others on “suffering”, while others to promote a certain cause? God may have revealed to us a different facet of who He is, yet points to the same Kingdom work that all of us are called to do, just that we have a different emphasis from our own upbringing and convictions? We may not totally agree with another denomination based from our own presuppositions, but what if there are certain elements of truth that we are blinded from because of the culture context we are brought up in?” As I began musing about those questions, the “ecumenical spirit” continued to grow in my time studying in TTC, especially after the study of Church History and weekly Field Education visits that we experienced in the first year. I recollected visiting more than 18 different churches in the span of 6 months, covering almost the entire spectrum of “types” of churches in Singapore. From the conservatives to the charismatic, from the mainline denominations to the independent churches. The spectrum of churches includes the Lutheran, Anglican, Presbyterian, Methodist, Brethren, Baptist, Pentecostal, Assemblies of God (AOG), Syrian Eastern Orthodox Church, Roman Catholic Churches, Mega Churches, Emergent churches and other Independent churches. After each visit and dialogue with the various church leaders, I begin to be more open, and understanding to why each church do what they do. I may not agree to everything they have shared, but I know I have become more hesitant to judge them. 

Andrew Walls the Christian theologian and missiologist, shared in his article, “Culture and Coherence in Christian History”, explaining how Christianity has been defined by culture changes over the course of church history especially in relations to the “indigenizing” and the “pilgrim” principle. Each stage portrays how different cultures over the years has influenced and shaped Christianity with distinct characteristics that eventually spread throughout the world.[31] With that premise, it has challenged me to rethink some of the presuppositions of my understanding of the Christian faith today. I believe I need to constantly reassess my theological framework, from my upbringing, such as my family roots to my nationality, to my denominational background to my involvement in a particular para-church groups, interactions, experiences in various Christian ministries and theological teachings which all have a part in defining the lens that I have of the Christian faith that will influence how I live the Christian life and do ministry. I believe and hope from that we can learn to bring forth the gospel to the nations, which is “infinitely translatable” that will diffuse in the diversity of Christianity. And we can also live out our faith as part of this larger community of believers in our own respective culture from the common signposts of Christianity over the course of church history.[32] 

Perhaps with this, we should shift our focus to co-labouring our strengths to further God's kingdom plans instead? Imagine everyone who graduates from TTC catches such an “ecumenical spirit”, where different denomination and churches can come together and further God’s kingdom together? Imagine the greater impact the universal church can make? As I conclude with this, instead of arguing of who is right or wrong, and judging one another. Let us focus on what Jesus said in John 13:34-35, "So now I am giving you a new commandment: Love each other. Just as I have loved you, you should love each other. Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples.”

As what one of my lecturers believes in, "In all things that is essential from the Word let there be Unity, for the peripheries let there be Liberty and for all things good let there be Charity" 

Endnotes: 

[1] Leow Theng Huat, Church History 2 (Singapore: TTC, 2014), Lecture 13. [2] Les L. Steele, On the way: a practical theology of Christian formation (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Book House, 1990), 37. [3] Simon Chan, Spiritual theology: a systematic study of the Christian life (Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 1998), 238. [4] Ibid. [5] Ibid. [6] Ibid., 71. [7] Derek Tidball, Skillful shepherds: an introduction to pastoral theology (Grand Rapids, MI.: Ministry Resources Library, 1986), 24. [8] Alan K. Waltz.A Dictionary for United Methodists, Alan K. Waltz, (Abingdon Press, 1991), http://archives.umc.org/interior.as... (accessed 14 October 2014). [9] Thomas C. Oden, Pastoral theology: essentials of ministry (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1983), x-xi. [10] Daniel K. S. Koh, Christian Ministry: Love in Action : Essays in Honour of Rev. Dr. George Wan Tian Soo (Singapore: Methodist Welfare Services, 2012), xvii. [11] Oden, Pastoral theology, 198. [12] Derwin Gray, http://www.derwinlgray.com/building... (accessed 15 October 2014). [13] Ibid. [14] Ajith Fernando, Jesus Driven Ministry (Wheaton, Ill: Crossway Books, 2002), 215-223. [15] Willimon, Pastor, 52. [16] Robert W. Pazmiño, Principles and Practices of Christian Education: An Evangelical Perspective (Grand Rapids, Mich: Baker Book House, 1992), 103. [17] Samuel Solivan, “Orthopathos: Interlocutor between Orthodoxy and Praxis,” Andover Newton Review 1 (Winter 1990), 19-25. [18] William H. Willimon, Calling & Character: Virtues of the Ordained Life (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2000), 15-29. [19] Derek Prime and Alistair Begg, On Being a Pastor, 19. [20] Willimon, Pastor, 335 [21] Discussed in a conversation with Dr Daniel Koh. [22] John Wesley's Accountability Discipleship Groups, http://www.goforthall.org/articles/... (Accessed 16 October 2014) [23] Wee Boon Hup, Christian Ministry: Love in Action : Essays in Honour of Rev. Dr. George Wan Tian Soo (Singapore: Methodist Welfare Services, 2012), 2-4. [24] 1 Corinthians 11:1, English Standard Version. [25] Jimmy Tan, Pastoral Theology (Singapore: TTC, 2014), Lecture 9. [26] Wee Boon Hup, Christian Ministry: Love in Action, 15-16. [27] Leow Theng Huat, “For Goodness’ Sake’: Some Observations on the Justification for Dialectics in Christian Theology” in What Young Asian Theologians Are Thinking, (Singapore: TTC, 2015), 117. [28] Von Balthasar, The Theology of Karl Barth, 78-79. [29] Ibid., 82. [30] Ibid., 75-76, 79-80. [31] Andrew Walls, “Culture and Coherence in Christian History,” in The Missionary Movement in Christian History: Studies in the Transmission of Faith (New York: Orbis, 1996), 16. [32] Ibid., 23-25.