Why I Left Bethel (and Enrolled at RTS)

Seminary education is no little decision. Deciding who and what and where your mind will be influenced has always played an irreplaceable role in the historical lives of educators, ministers, leaders, heroes, and heretics. After some hard thought about where money, time, and energy should be spent, I’ve come to have a thorough change of mind.

I chose to pursue an MA in Christian Thought at Bethel Seminary for several reasons:

1. The degree coursework: Balanced in its approach, including philosophy, biblical studies, theology, and apologetics. I love integration, which I firmly believe should come before specialization (Ph.D).
2. The degree structure and location: I would be able to work full time and still earn the degree by working from home. And although two 2-week intensives were required per year for the 3 year program, I would only have to drive 6 hours to the Twin Cities, and could stay with friends I know.
3. The degree quality: Although this quickly became one of the main reasons I left Bethel, I initially got on board with the assurance of ATS accreditation and a general sense of high-quality education in comparison with other seminaries. But, as we’ll see, this was quickly defrauded in my mind.
4. To hopefully impact my historical tradition (mainstream evangelical Baptist) with Reformed theology: I have no interest in regurgitating Calvinism and Kupyerianism and the sovereign grace of God to people who have been learning these things their whole lives. Mainstream evangelicals need Reformed theology, not CRC pastors’ kids. And with a more mainstream degree, I might have a better chance of teaching at a similar institution in the future, thereby giving me opportunities to feed the solid meat of Reformed theology to those in spiritual hunger.

I left Bethel Seminary after two quarters (16+ credits) and enrolled at Reformed Theological Seminary for the following reasons:

1. The Christian Thought program at Bethel was a happenin’ project back in the day, but not anymore. Dr. David Clark, who was the head of the program, is now the Provost over the entire university and seminary. Gregory Boyd, who also taught at Bethel, is now teaching elsewhere. Both their books (Letter’s to a Skeptic and Dialogical Apologetics), are still standard reading for the apologetics class. But as of now (2010), the program is not being spearheaded or led by any major, active Christian apologist. Meanwhile, the thoroughly published John Frame, Richard Pratt, Harold OJ Brown, and others guide the MA of Religion at RTS.
2. The degree structure and location. While it seemed handy at first, the four week per year seminary on-campus intensives (for three years) are both expensive and disruptive to one’s career/ministry life. While these intensives tack on at least an additional $1-2k to the normal tuition load per year, RTS requires only two intensives for the total degree and less than a week for each. Interestingly, the MAR at RTS is just as ATS accredited as Bethel. Moreover, Bethel’s structure is superbly rigid. The intensive schedules are definitive, as well as the course times, the due dates, the course load, etc. RTS is vastly different, requiring only a slight priority of order for the first few classes. Otherwise, students take whatever classes they want for the degree at any time and can take as many as they want. RTS also has a built-in integrative thesis project, ensuring that students have the necessary research experience if they want to pursue a Ph.D. The MACT at Bethel, however, without serious modification, does not even make room for a thesis track at all. So, as far as time, money, and convenience goes, RTS was a no-brainer.
3. The degree quality, teaching, and disposition.
   1. Philosophy of Scripture. During my first on-campus intensive at Bethel Seminary, the entire InMinistry (distance-ed) student body received a rather unpleasant and spontaneous lecture by one of the InMinistry organizers. I was sitting in the back when she began her plug for the gender-neutral TNIV Bible (now out of print). As best as I can paraphrase and remember, she said “the whole seminary uses the TNIV…we’re not in the ancient Bible days anymore, we don’t use that outdated language, we’re in the 21st century, people!” I later found out that students had been getting docked in exegetical/biblical studies papers for using non-gender-neutral Bibles. Of course, the whole time I was thinking, Are we not allowed to use the Greek New Testament for our exegetical papers? I don’t know why I was surprised, it wasn’t as if Bethel seminary students were required to take Greek and Hebrew. In fact, they aren’t even available to MACT students. One wonders how a student can truly engage in Christian Thought without at least having some knowledge of biblical languages and the linguistic tools through which Christian Thought itself emerged. RTS, of course, provides both Greek and Hebrew for all MA Virtual students. What had replaced these essential courses at Bethel?
   2. Philosophy of “Spiritual formation.” Through the politics of seminary education, accreditation, and sources of funding, the academic MA degree at Bethel has become saturated with irrelevant and unnecessary coursework under the increasingly popular category of “Spiritual formation.” Quite oblivious to the fact that theology changes a person’s heart and the way a person lives, much of the focus of the Spiritual formation branch (1/3 of the Bethel Seminary vision) involves nothing more than abstract and fuzzy concepts of “social systems,” racial discrimination, and faith traditions. Some of the reading was helpful (i.e. Spiritual Theology by Simon Chan), but the class essentially lacked a God-centered approach so much that I was actually chided by a professor for not being focused enough on myself in my assignments. I could understand trying to be more reflective and personal later in the degree after covering the basics, such as God’s existence, God’s holiness, God and creation, God’s truth, God’s revelation, etc. But having learned nothing about any of those, it seemed rather foolish to jump into the baffling maze of self-oriented activities that seemed far closer to jumping through hoops than actual education.
   3. Bad Theology. Besides touting a poor Bible translation and docking students for not using it, Gregory Boyd and his open theism left a serious mark on Bethel Seminary. It is quite common to come across professors and students who openly say God has nothing to do with evil events. Open theism teaches that God is “doing the best he can with the knowledge that he has,” and, as such, the God of open theism lacks both omnipotence and omniscience. God continually fails to bring about His desires. He is frustrated by the stubborn wills of men. He is not the God of Scripture who defines the beginning from the end, makes things happen just by speaking, and who saves unfailingly His people from the punishment of sin. Of course, even more disturbing as one of my professor’s doctrine of Scripture, which is summarized by his own words: “Truths are in the Bible because they are true; they are not true because they are in the Bible.” (This unbiblical view of Scripture has been thoroughly critiqued here.)
   4. Lack of Good Theology. As soon as I received my reading list for Systematic Theology I, I decided I could not justify spending 2.5 more years at Bethel. Normally, one would expect introductory books on systematic theology, like a theological prolegomena of some kind – any kind – to be in the required curriculum. Perhaps one-volume works like Wayne Grudem’s Bible Doctrine or Systematic Theology, Reymond’s A New Systematic Theology of the Christian Faith, Swindoll’s Understanding Christian Theology, Bavinck’s Our Reasonable Faith, or even something small and concise and more mainstream like Concise Theology by J.I. Packer. Or maybe the first volume of a series like Geisler’s multi-volume Systematic Theology, or works by Tillich, Hodge, Turretin, Schleiermacher, or at least someone with some historical authority and influence. Well, there was the first volume of Veli-Matti Karkkainen’s work (“A Global Introduction”), and it was nice to see Timothy Ward’s Words of Life. However, first on the list was Introducing Feminist Theology by Anne Clifford, followed by two other books that just simply would have been more appropriate for the last year of systematic theology and not the first. A Theology 101 course should involve God’s existence, God’s attributes and nature, His holiness, and the doctrine of creation, as well as a decent chunk on theological prolegomena. I was simply baffled to find virtually none of these major topics covered in the Systematics I curriculum, but instead global, cultural, pseudo-systematics books that were post-modern and usually unashamedly grounded in the changes of time and various cultures instead of the unchanging nature of the Creator. It left me wondering, if this is Systematics I, do I want to torture myself with Systematics II and III? Douglas Kelly’s own Systematics at RTS (if not Frame’s Theology of Lordship series) was clearly superior to the Bethel alternative when it came to theology.

RTS is cheaper in price, more convenient and flexible in structure, and has far higher standards of educational quality and theological soundness than Bethel Seminary.

A Word of Advice for Those Choosing Seminary Education

Lessons learned? Many. In short, don’t think too hard about seminary and over-analyze. Stick with the basics:

1. First and foremost, go where the true God and His Word are honored. There’s no amount of analysis or sufficient train of thought that can justify the intentional attendance of a seminary that doesn’t give a hoot about the Creator of the universe and His Word. It’s hard to prepare your mind and heart for ministry when the man standing in front of you and the books that are saturating your consciousness are bent on interpreting life, reality, purpose, meaning, and morality without acknowledging the Lord of creation. Challenge is good. But surrounding yourself with the right people and a genuinely Christian environment is key to education and spiritual progress.
2. Second of all, go where you know there’s good teaching. Period. RealApologetics.org doesn’t endorse any seminary, but it has been said that Greenville Presbyterian, RTS, and Westminster are kind of the “remnant” of today’s seminary education. Every institution has problems, and virtually every seminary is going to have border-line heretics. You can’t prevent that, but you can prevent going to an institution where the wackoids aren’t as heavily concentrated by choosing a better institution.
3. Go where the coursework is sufficient for your desires and your future career. Sometimes you need to bite the bullet and take courses you might not enjoy (i.e. languages). Other times, you don’t. Nothing is worse than sitting in a classroom and paying thousands of dollars for a class that you hate. Your heart must be in the class as much as your head. Of course, you can’t ensure that every class will be edifying. But, again, you can prevent having that bad experience over and over just by choosing the right place. Regarding career: if you want to teach biblical studies at a college level, you’ll need biblical studies in your MA curriculum (the same is generally true for other fields like theology, apologetics, philosophy, etc.). I can’t tell you how many friends I’ve come across who think it will be easy to pick up a job teaching Bible and hermeneutics at a college when their degree and coursework is in theology (not NT, OT,  exegetical or Biblical studies). It usually doesn’t work like that. There are distinctions within the disciplines, and if you don’t have the graduate credits (the study) in a particular field, you probably won’t end up teaching in that area unless you have other study or publications in it. In short, choose the right degree and not merely the right place to get it.

The money and location factor come in next, but that’s why I’m not doing a traditional program to begin with. Mark my words, if I didn’t have a problem with going up to my ears in debt like most of my friends, and didn’t have a (wonderful) commitment as a Pastor, I’d be studying at Westminster tomorrow. But my role as a Youth Pastor on the edge of serious economic times obviously leads me to think twice about a traditional program and leads me to distance education. Whatever the case, location, cash, and spouse-related issues are a factor, too. But only you can determine what’s wise in your situation. As for these three other principles, let them be known, and hopefully, they are helpful to you.